Ulterior Objectives: A Lillian Saxton Thriller

by Scott Dennis Parker

  Henry looked back inside the room. He could hear her feet. He wondered if the microphones could.

  From out in the hallway, he heard the sound of a person grumbling. Someone was approaching the room. He needed to act fast.

  He frantically gestured to Lillian to get to the roof. She nodded and redoubled her efforts. Henry ducked inside the room. He had only seconds.

  As soon as the person in the hallway opened the door to check on Lillian’s yelp, he would bang into the door. Moments after that, all hell would break loose. Henry needed a distraction.

  In preparation for the night, Lillian had tied the sheets and blankets together. With the rope, the sheets weren’t needed. But they were available. An idea came to his mind when he heard the sound of the key jingling on the keychain.

  He lunged for the chair and dragged it to the window. He hurriedly tied one end of the sheet-rope to one of the legs.

  The key chunked into the lock.

  Henry picked up the chair, the sheet-rope dangling at his feet. He grabbed the empty end.

  The lock turned.

  Henry hurled the chair out the window. It flew in a nice, graceful arc until the slack of the sheet-rope jerked the chair back to the hotel facade. Henry gripped the other end of the sheet-rope and hoped the chair would have its desired effect.

  The door opened.

  And immediately banged into the writing table.

  ***

  Colonel Gunter Graf rather enjoyed this mission. So far, it had proven to be quite simple. With the Wehrmacht on the move and arriving any day now, all he had to do was while away the days and hours in this sumptuous hotel.

  The food was excellent. Not as good as Wilma’s, of course, but good enough that he didn’t have to subsist on rations or dried meat. The soldiers under his command seemed smitten with the good food and excellent accommodations as well. Each of them allowed—or tolerated; Graf couldn’t tell which—his giving mini-lectures on the types of food and their origins.

  The wine available to consume was also in Graf’s wheelhouse. He opted to pay for the few bottles he wanted before the Wermarcht arrived. He didn’t want to raise too many suspicions on what was happening on one wing of the eighth floor. He had enjoyed enough wine that night to put him in a comfortable snooze.

  The tremendous sound of something heavy smashing into a window jolted him out of his slumber.

  “Gott in Himmel!” The half-empty wine glass smashed to the floor as Graf flailed about. “What the hell was that?”

  The next thing he heard was one of his men yelling and banging something. Always ready at a moment’s notice, Graf grabbed his pistol. He hurried to the door and flung it open.

  Downstairs, people were screaming and yelling. He didn’t smell any smoke so the sound was probably not a stray bomb. Besides, if it was, he wouldn’t be here to ponder the question.

  He looked over at room 809. One of his men, Kurt by the looks of him, was shoving with all his might against the door. It was barely moving. The prisoners must have put something in the way. But why?

  Escape. They were trying to escape.

  Ursula, Adolf, and Dieter rushed out of their adjacent rooms. “One of you check downstairs. The rest, help Kurt open that blasted door.”

  Dieter rushed down the hallway and to the staircase. Ursula and Adolf stood next to Graf and Kurt.

  “Just a little more and I can get in.” Kurt grunted with the effort.

  Adolf hurried next to Kurt. He put his shoulder to the door and the two of them pushed as one. The door opened and Kurt stuck his head and shoulders around the door.

  Two bullets slammed into his head. It jerked back, sending blood splattering on the wall. Kurt Schmidt was dead before his body even touched the floor.

  Graf saw what had happened and his pistol to bear. He crouched, putting the wall between him and the shooter. How did Clark or Saxton have a gun?

  They didn’t. There was only one explanation.

  Graf grabbed Adolf’s shirt. “Keep this door secure. Shoot whoever’s inside if you can. Ursula, with me.” Graf stood and made his way to the Geigers’ room. He fumbled for the keys. They got caught on his pants and fell to the ground.

  Another door opened. Wilhelm stuck his head out into the hallway. “Who’s shooting?”

  “The prisoners!” Graf yelled. “Get your gun and help Adolf.”

  Wilhelm ducked back inside and reemerged with his gun in hand.

  Graf stooped and snatched up the keys. He had put all the sets of key on a single ring. Each key had the room number carved into the brass so it only took seconds for Graf to find the right one. He slammed it into the lock and flung open the door.

  CHAPTER 45

  Halfway up the side of the building, her bare feet slipping on the smooth exterior, Lillian almost wished the architects hadn’t been so pristine with their craft. She found it difficult to get purchase.

  Henry had ducked back inside the room. The next thing Lillian knew, he threw the desk chair out of the window. Behind it, tied to a chair leg, was the sheet-rope they had fashioned. She had only a few seconds to wonder why before the chair swung back to the side of the hotel and smashed into a window on the seventh floor.

  “Well, there goes the need to be quiet.”

  Without the need for silence, Lillian used her knees and shimmied up to the roof. Only then did she realize why the rope had dropped when she got on it.

  Three men held onto the rope.

  Her heart skipped a beat. Wasn’t there anything on which to secure the line?

  “We’ve got problems,” she said. Immediately she sat and started putting on her shoes.

  “Where’s Clark?” a man asked.

  “Still inside. You Arnold?”

  “Aye. And you’re the American.”

  Lillian stood. “I am. Now, lower me back down.”

  “What the hell?”

  Already moving to the edge, Lillian looked down. “Which room are the Geigers in?”

  “Eight zero eight best we can tell.”

  “That’s where I’m going. Be prepared to pull all four of us up.”

  One of the men groaned. “Don’t swing on the rope. The force makes it too heavy.”

  “Noted.” Lillian put both hands on the rope. “Ready?”

  “Aye,” Arnold said. “And hurry.”

  Without gloves, Lillian knew she wouldn’t have the added padding to slow her descent were she to rappel down the side. She would just have to make her best guess on the angle and trajectory and hope her feet found the ledge.

  She dropped over the side and slid down the rope. Before she knew it, her feet landed on the ledge right next to the window of room 808. She shifted her grip and drew her gun.

  And smashed the window.

  Inside, a woman screamed. Lillian hoped it was Elsa.

  Knocking shards of glass out of the metal frame with the pistol, Lillian stepped inside and had to duck immediately as something came swinging for her head.

  “Damn it, James, it’s me.”

  “Lillian?”

  “No, Tarzan.”

  “I’m sorry about that. I…”

  “Be sorry later. Help me drag this desk in front of the door.” Lillian moved like lightning. She had already started dragging the table before James reacted. He lunged for the other end and picked it up.

  The key slammed into the lock.

  Her back to the door, Lillian turned and fired one shot at the opening. Her bullet ripped into the wood next to the door frame. The door stopped moving inward.

  At the last moment, as she had in her room, Lillian ducked under the desk. Needing no pretense of silence, she used her back and legs to lift her end of the desk and rammed it flush against the door.

  Two shots rang out from the hallway. They made new holes in the door where Lillian’s torso should have been.

  Not wanting to waste her limited ammo on return fire, Lillian crawled on her hands and knees back into the room.

  J
ames and Elsa stood frozen in place.

  “Didn’t you hear me?” Lillian hissed. “Out the window. To the roof.”

  “You can’t be serious,” Elsa replied.

  Two more gunshots cracked the wood.

  “Very.” Lillian pointed to James. “You first.”

  “Why me?”

  “Because we need what’s in your head.”

  James’s face took in an angry visage. “You get nothing if we both don’t make it.” He gestured to Elsa. “Go.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Go! Now!”

  He helped his wife up on the sill. The rope dangled just to the side. James helped Elsa grab the rope. He laced his hands together and provided her a step up. With a heave, he all but threw her halfway up to the roof. He glared at Lillian, then followed his wife up the rope.

  More gunshots erupted. This time, they came from the room Henry was in. In a flash, he leapt up on the ledge, staggering to catch his balance on the edge of the window.

  “C’mon,” Lillian cried. “I’ll cover you.”

  The British agent shoved his pistol into his belt. As she had done, Henry faced the side of the building and used his ties to move. More than half of each foot hung over nothing.

  A bullet pinged off the ledge a mere inch from Henry’s left foot. He jerked it away suddenly. The movement caused him to lose his balance. With no purchase to grab, the only place for him to go was down.

  In a move Lillian almost couldn’t believe, Henry jumped up off the ledge and plummeted to the ground. Except he grabbed the ledge with his hands. His body slammed into the side of the building. He audibly groaned but held fast.

  The shot came from below. Lillian saw the head and torso of someone sticking out the window a floor below. More gunshots blasted in the night. Her angle didn’t give her a good view of the shooter but the shooter had an easy aim at Henry.

  Time to change the angle. “Hold on up there!” she called. Without waiting for an acknowledgement and keeping her feet on the ledge to act as a pivot, Lillian leaned out over the ledge. She almost achieved a ninety-degree angle from the side of the building.

  The shooter reemerged to resume his barrage. Lillian put three slugs into him. He jerked, dropped his gun, and slumped across his windowsill.

  Lillian bent her knees, changed her angle, and crouched on the ledge. She scooted a few inches to where Henry clung to the ledge.

  “More weight,” she called up to the roof. This time, she gave the men a moment to adjust. She positioned herself on the ledge and merely held on to the rope for support.

  Henry grabbed the rope with one hand, then both, and hauled himself up to the ledge.

  “Thanks,” he said, breathing heavily.

  “Don’t mention it. Now let’s get the hell off this ledge.”

  Henry, still holding on to the rope, bent his knee. “Need a lift?”

  Lillian didn’t hesitate. She used his knee as a step and launched herself up. She shimmied over the top and looked back to Henry. “Come on!”

  Henry started up.

  A mighty crash sounded from room 809. The Nazis had broken through the door.

  “Hurry!” Lillian shouted.

  “It’s not like I’m taking my time,” Henry retorted.

  Lillian pulled her gun out of her belt and aimed at the windowsill. A head stuck out. She let a bullet fly. It missed the person, but forced the Nazi to withdraw long enough to get Henry up and over the side.

  The three British soldiers all collapsed in relief. “Mate, you need to lay off the food,” Arnold said.

  Henry, breathing heavily, sat on the roof. He quickly put on his shoes and stood. “How’d you get up here?”

  “Theater entrance,” Arnold said.

  “That the only access?”

  “It’s the easiest one.”

  “Let’s go.”

  All seven people sprinted across the roof. Surprisingly, the roof was pretty flat with hardly any protuberances to trip them.

  “Why’d it take you so long to come back for us?” Henry asked.

  “There’s an invasion going on, mate,” Arnold said. “You weren’t our first priority.”

  “What is?”

  “The embassy.”

  “That where we’re going?”

  “Aye.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at James. “He the one?”

  “Yes.”

  “Need them both?”

  Henry and Lillian exchanged glances. She wondered if James had heard the British agent ask the question.

  James stopped dead in his tracks. “I want to make something perfectly clear. The only way I say anything is if my wife and I both get to Britain.”

  Lillian wondered what her new British allies thought of the inflected German accent James now sported.

  “Is that understood?”

  “Yes.” Lillian grabbed his arm and pulled him along with her. “Now let me make something perfectly clear to you. You are the asset. Elsa is one, too. Do what we say and we might get out of this alive. Delay like you just did and it could cost us.”

  One of the unique features of the Hotel Le Plaza was that it housed its own movie theater. Situated in the rear of the building, the area could show movies or newsreels or feature live entertainment. The requirement for a large screen meant that the roof of the theater rose above the roof of the hotel itself. An access door led down into the hotel. The door was open. As they neared it, a figure suddenly appeared in the doorway. The figure started shooting.

  Without thinking, Lillian dived to the ground. She brought Elsa Geiger with her. Henry, who had been running alongside James, did the same for the mathematician. Both Lillian and Henry used their bodies as shields but both came up with pistols in their hands.

  One of the assailant’s bullets spun one of the agents around. The Nazi tried to duck back inside but failed as a hail of bullets from four guns pounded into him. He fell where he stood.

  “Clear,” shouted one if the Brits.

  Henry stood and hauled James to his feet.

  Lillian looked down at Elsa. In the ambient light, she saw a mixture of fear and relief wash over the German’s face.

  “Danke,” Elsa said.

  “Bitteschön,” Lillian stood and helped Elsa to her feet.

  A quick assessment of the agent who was shot revealed it was only a graze. All four people with guns ducked and covered each other as they descended the stairwell, ending at a door at the rear of the theater and hotel.

  Arnold peeked out the door. “Clear.”

  The other two agents scurried to two cars parked in the alley. They each got behind the wheel and signaled.

  “Let’s go,” Arnold said. “One asset per car.”

  James tried to object but Henry was already moving him to the rear car. Lillian guided Elsa to the front car. Arnold accompanied Henry. Lillian shoved Elsa inside the car and jumped in beside her. “Go!” she shouted to the driver.

  He needed no other directive. He threw the machine into gear and floored the gas pedal. The car lurched forward. The trailing vehicle matched speed. Together the two cars raced across the empty streets and headed for the British Embassy.

  Colonel Gunter Graf stood in a hotel room on the seventh floor and gazed at the slumped body of Adolf Richter. The young man had two holes in his head. The blood that had leaked out formed a congealed stain on the hotel’s facade. Graf hadn’t known Richter very long, but he was a fallen comrade. More important, he was a member member of the team Graf now commanded and he had lost him.

  A knock at the door. Wilhelm Lang entered. He studiously avoided the sight of the man and woman dead in the bed where Richter had shot them. “Sir, we’ve also lost Dieter. He’s up on the roof. He had cornered them but took many shots and died.”

  Graf pursed his lips. Make that two casualties from his team. He inhaled deeply and sighed. He found, at that moment, that he much preferred teaching military history than participating in it. If a student failed an exam, h
e had a chance on the next one. Here, when death was the result of failure, it was too permanent.

  “The hotel staff. What are they doing?”

  “They’ve called the police, but with the invasion coming, they are preoccupied. They will come.”

  “I know.” Graf flexed his jaw muscles. “And we will still be here. We’ve paid the hotel well. They will play their part.” He waved his hand in the air as if to swat an invisible fly. “Besides, it won’t matter soon anyway. Once the Wehrmacht arrives, we can do what we please without resorting to pleasantries.” He indicated Richter’s body. “Did you know him well?”

  “Yes, Herr Colonel. We served in Poland together.”

  “And Wolf?”

  Schmidt cleared his throat. “Yes, Herr Colonel. He was like a brother to me.” His voice cracked with emotion. “Also in Poland. He saved my life. I owed him.”

  Graf looked at Wolf’s body, still slumped over the windowsill. The head, hanging outside the window, had bullet holes in it. Precise bullet holes. He wondered who had shot Wolf: Saxton or Clark? He thought about what he knew about Lillian Saxton.

  Back in university, Lillian Saxton was a smart girl but prone to learning everything by rote memory. She demonstrated little in the way of creative thinking. Graf had the impression, even when she was his student and he her professor, that she was using her university education as a means of escaping her upbringing. He remembered her running around with James Geiger, Frank Monroe, and others. She had dated Geiger for a long time.

  Graf had lost track of them after they finished their semester abroad. Geiger had decided to stay in Germany and offer his mental abilities to der Führer by helping with the codes. Geiger had displayed all the traits of a man committed to das Vaterland despite his country of origin. He had become well respected in Berlin. His marriage to Elsa Stein further solidified his stature in society.

  But something had happened to Geiger. It was the only explanation for his sudden turn against the Third Reich and der Führer. The event must have been significant for Geiger to put his pregnant wife at risk.

  “Herr Schmidt,” Graf said, looking at the dead eyes of Adolf Richter, “you will have the chance to make good on your debt.”