The Secret of Spandau

by Peter Lovesey

  ‘Leave it, Jane. We don’t have to justify ourselves to someone who doesn’t even tell us his name.’ He steered her towards his car.

  As they turned away, the security officer said to their backs, ‘You’ll be wasting your time if you go on with this.’

  ‘What did he mean by that?’ Jane asked Dick when they were fastening safety-belts.

  ‘It sounded ominously like the threat of a D Notice.’

  She took a long breath. ‘They can’t kill this story. It’s got to be told.’

  He started the Renault, and backed it slowly, watched by the security officer.

  ‘What a wimp!’ said Jane.

  ‘Just a functionary, doing his job.’

  ‘A bloody obnoxious job. If he goes back inside and scares that old man …’

  ‘He won’t,’ said Dick. ‘He’s assigned to us. Watch him get into his car and follow. I reckon we alerted them by going to see Salter-Smith. The pressure is really on now.’

  Jane watched in the wing-mirror, and saw Dick’s prediction confirmed. Grey-eyes got into a blue Volvo and cruised into position behind them.

  ‘Where are we going now?’

  ‘To my place to check some facts,’ answered Dick.

  ‘We’re going to need all the evidence we can get to win this one with Cedric.’

  Jane saw the sense of that. Dick was right about the pressure. It was coming from every direction: the secret service, Cedric, and Red in Berlin. And now there was this incredible lead on Churchill: a vast new avenue of enquiry to explore. Would it lead to Hess, or off into new territory? She kept thinking of Red, primed for action. On the phone to Cedric he had joked about some German girl making demands, but that was typical of Red. The message that had come over to Jane was a strong appeal for quick results. She sensed that he saw trouble looming, and in Berlin trouble came in ugly forms.

  ‘I’m going to call Cedric as soon as we get there,’ Dick announced. ‘We’ve got to go out to Henley and see him tonight.’

  Mindful of phone-tapping, Dick kept the call as uninformative as possible. Fortunately, Cedric caught on to the urgency of the request and agreed to see them at whatever time they could arrive. It was already 4.00 p.m.

  Dick put two meat-pies in the microwave and brought out some Perrier water. At his suggestion, they spread a large sheet of paper on the floor and made a simple timetable: a vertical line down the centre: on the left, the dates Frank Perry had given for the German visits; on the right, the principal developments in the corresponding period of the war.

  GERMAN MISSIONS WAR EVENTS

  * * *

  1940

  * * *

  10 May Churchill becomes PM. Hitler forces break through France

  24 May German advance on Dunkirk halted on Hitler’s orders

  2 June Dunkirk evacuation complete

  22 June Franco-German Armistice

  16 July Hitler orders preparation for invasion of Britain

  19 July Hitler offers Britain peace in Reichstag speech

  (?)July – First mission

  10 Aug Battle of Britain begins

  17 Sept Hitler postpones invasion of Britain indefinitely

  18 Sept – Second mission

  (?)Oct – Third mission

  14 Nov Blitz begins

  (?) Dec Hess’s first attempt to fly to Britain

  * * *

  1941

  * * *

  (?) Jan Hess’s second attempt

  (?) March—Fourth mission

  6 Apr Germany invades

  Greece and Yugoslavia

  10 Apr German advance in Libya

  21 Apr Allies withdraw from Greece

  (?) Apr – Fifth mission

  2 May – Sixth mission

  10 May Hess arrives in Scotland

  16 May Blitz ends

  22 June Germany invades Russia

  Before it was all on paper, Jane could see a pattern emerging, a pattern dominated by Hitler’s curious love-hate attitude towards Britain. He had not planned to go to war with Britain. He had counted on a bloodless agreement on terms that would recognize Germany’s power over mainland Europe.

  When Churchill had succeeded Chamberlain as Prime Minister, there were fighting words from the new leader about blood, toil, tears and sweat, but Hitler, of all people, understood rhetoric. His tanks had rolled through France and the Low Countries, providing their own eloquent testimony to German invincibility. They could have annihilated the British Expeditionary Force, but Hitler astounded his Panzer commanders by arriving in person at battle headquarters and ordering them to halt. The miracle of Dunkirk, the evacuation of over 300,000 British troops, was by grace of the Führer. Why? Was it a magnanimous gesture to the new Prime Minister? When the last troops had been lifted off the beaches, Churchill thundered his response: ‘We shall never surrender.’

  Hitler was unconvinced. He had completed the defeat of France. He had signed an armistice allowing the Pétain government jurisdiction over two-fifths of the country: another display of magnanimity.

  He still had no desire to invade Britain. He was counting on a compromise peace. But in July he made preparations, and massed his forces on the Channel coasts.

  This was the pattern: a show of strength followed by an offer of peace. As Operation Sealion ostentatiously got ready, Hitler stood up in the Reichstag and issued a ‘final appeal’ to Britain’s ‘reason and common sense’.

  And at about this time, in July 1940, according to Frank Perry, a party of Germans had been secretly flown into Britain for a meeting with Churchill. Numerous peace feelers had been put out through neutral countries, but this was in another class. If it were true, it was sensational: Churchill actually talking to Germany.

  ‘What do you think?’ Dick asked, when he had finished.

  Jane didn’t conceal her excitement. ‘You can almost see Hitler’s mind at work. He makes a concession, and then sends his people over to get a reaction from Churchill. The Reichstag speech, then the cancellation of the invasion, then two deputations to Churchill in three weeks. It looks as if he really believed he could pull off a peace deal.’

  ‘Let’s not forget that the Luftwaffe were given a drubbing in the Battle of Britain.’

  ‘Exactly!’ said Jane. ‘What better incentive for Hitler to stop the conflict?’

  Dick nodded. ‘Hitler’s motives are clear from the start, but that’s not the story, is it? The story is Churchill. What was he up to, talking to the Nazis while he was hurling defiance at them in Parliament?’

  Jane had asked herself the question a dozen times and found no answer. Everything she knew about Churchill rebutted it. For all his faults, he had never made any secret of his implacable opposition to Hitler and the Nazis. ‘You ask: “What is our aim?” I can answer in one word: “Victory!”Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be: for without victory there is no survival.’

  She made an effort to be analytical. ‘Either he was seriously considering Hitler’s overtures, or he was boxing clever, trying to win time.’ As she said it, she found the latter idea so engaging that it showed in her voice.

  ‘… and that’s the more appealing explanation?’ Dick suggested in a voice that showed he disagreed.

  ‘History supports it,’ Jane answered stoutly. ‘There wasn’t a deal and the Allies defeated Hitler.’

  ‘Six sets of talks was boxing very clever indeed,’ said Dick with heavy irony. ‘The Germans must have felt they were getting close to a deal.’ He casually threw in another shaft. ‘And where does Hess fit in?’

  ‘Hess?’ Jane had almost forgotten him. ‘He acted independently. He has always said he came without Hitler’s knowledge.’

  Dick raised one sceptical eyebrow. ‘Yet he was regarded as totally loyal to his Führer, the most reliable of all the Nazi leaders. So far as I know, he has never to this day repudiated Hitler.’

  ‘Hitler repudiated him. He was in a screaming fury wh
en he heard what had happened.’ She hesitated, staring at Dick. ‘What are you suggesting – that Hitler was play-acting?’

  ‘No. He was angry, all right – in despair that Hess had failed.’ Dick leaned towards her in a more conciliatory way. ‘Like you, Jane, I’ve read everything I can find on Hess. I simply can’t accept that he flew to Britain without Hitler’s prior knowledge. He was with Hitler from the beginning, in prison with him, helping him to write Mein Kampf. I think he was sent by Hitler to clinch a deal with Britain. It was to be the culmination of all the secret missions, the ultimate proof of Hitler’s good faith.’

  ‘Are you saying that Hitler thought Churchill was ready to come to terms?’

  ‘Listen, we heard this afternoon that they’d been talking secretly on and off for ten months. Churchill must have given the Germans enough encouragement to keep coming, but there were no tangible results for Hitler. Time was running out, and he was getting impatient with Churchill, but he had the ace of trumps to play.’

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘Barbarossa. The invasion of Russia. In their political thinking, Hitler and Churchill had many differences, but they shared one dominating principle: a pathological hatred of Bolshevism. They both believed that Russia wanted world domination. So why not sink their differences and smash the Soviet menace together?’

  ‘Hitler and Churchill on the same side?’ Jane shook her head at the suggestion.

  ‘You’ve got to see it in terms of Britain’s desperate position in 1941,’ Dick urged. ‘We were alone in Europe. Churchill hadn’t persuaded America to join in the fighting. Things had gone badly in the Middle East and the Balkans. Our cities were being blitzed. Parliament itself was a heap of rubble. The pressure to cut our losses must have been overwhelming.’

  Jane said, ‘Yes, but Britain wasn’t in the business of invading other nations. Our people wouldn’t have consented to that.’

  ‘Some of them would. Remember that Hess tried to get in touch with the diehards – the extreme right wing of the Conservative Party – and in those days some of them were very extreme indeed.’

  ‘That doesn’t square with what you were saying just now,’ Jane pointed out. ‘Why didn’t he go straight to Churchill?’

  ‘Because basically Hess was sent to raise a posse. As Hitler saw it, Churchill had dithered for too long, listening to the secret delegations, maybe even talking terms, but refusing to come to a deal. The German plan was to win support from the diehards, put pressure on Churchill, and give him an ultimatum: join us, or face a revolt from your own supporters.’

  Jane was intrigued, if not entirely convinced. ‘But the plan fell through because Churchill got to hear of it prematurely?’

  ‘No,’ said Dick, surprising her. ‘That wouldn’t account for what happened after. Remember that astonishing period of forty-eight hours after Hess arrived, when no one knew what was happening. Churchill was at odds with his Ministers. Statements were prepared and rejected. Beaverbrook told the press to provide a smokescreen of rumour and speculation. I have a hunch that Churchill decided to accept the offer Hess had brought.’

  There was a long moment of silence.

  ‘All right,’ said Jane eventually, ‘what went wrong?’

  Dick shook his head. He had no answer yet.

  Jane leant forward on her elbows, thinking. ‘It’s horribly plausible. It accounts for so much. The treatment of Hess at Mytchett Place – the psychiatrists, the injections, the amnesia. Something extremely damaging to Britain had to be suppressed from his memory before the Nuremberg Trials.’

  ‘You’re not kidding!’ said Dick. ‘Can you imagine the reaction of our Russian allies if he gave evidence that Churchill had seriously considered joining the German invasion?’

  Jane nodded. ‘It wouldn’t do much for present-day Anglo-Soviet relations. If there’s anything in this, I’m not surprised MIS are onto us.’

  Dick got up to look out of the window.

  ‘Is he down there?’

  ‘The car is. I can’t see him. He’s probably on the roof with the SAS.’

  Jane made an effort to laugh, but the presence of the Volvo was not amusing. They both felt the unease of being under surveillance.

  Jane brooded on what she had just been invited to believe. It was shocking and repugnant, yet a thread of credibility ran through it. She searched for a break in the thread. ‘I’m still not convinced that Hitler sent Hess over. Are you sure it wasn’t just a quixotic adventure dreamed up by Hess to make his own impact on the war? That’s the way everyone tells it.’

  ‘Everyone?’ Dick repeated sceptically. ‘You mean Churchill and his Ministers in their various memoirs.’

  ‘And the German press statements,’ added Jane.

  ‘Can’t you see it was in their interests to cover up the truth? Neither the British nor the Germans wanted the Russians to know what was almost hatched between Hitler and Churchill.’ He snatched a book from the shelf above him and started leafing through it. ‘But the people close to Hitler knew. Listen to this, written in 1951, by Göring’s biographer, Willi Frischauer: Every single surviving member of Göring’s entourage … is convinced that Hitler not only hoped to make peace with the West, but to persuade the British Government to join in Germany’s attack on Russia. Hitler’s bewilderment in Berchtesgaden was due to the fear that his plot had failed.’

  Jane was silent, weighing what she had heard. She didn’t mention it to Dick, but she had at the back of her mind a phrase from Albrecht Haushofer, after one of his meetings with Hess: From the whole conversation I had the strong impression that it was not conducted without the prior knowledge of the Führer. This assessment from the judicious, reflective man who had shared in the planning of the flight carried conviction. ‘All right,’ Jane declared. ‘I’m prepared to go along with you almost all the way. I’m even prepared to believe that Churchill was in two minds about accepting Hitler’s offer.’

  ‘Good! We’re going places.’

  ‘To Cedric’s, you mean?’

  ‘Not yet.’ He smiled sympathetically. ‘I’m sorry, but we haven’t buttoned it up. We still don’t know what made Churchill turn the offer down.’

  Jane gave a shrug. ‘The War Cabinet, I suppose. They weren’t all rabid anti-Bolsheviks.’

  ‘They weren’t all consulted,’ said Dick tersely.

  ‘They were eventually.’

  ‘Only to a limited extent,’ insisted Dick. ‘I’ve seen a note in Churchill’s own handwriting in the Public Record Office saying Hess also made other statements which it was not in the public interest to disclose.’

  ‘Barbarossa?’

  Dick didn’t answer. A useful idea had just occurred to him. ‘I wonder if the PRO has a copy of Churchill’s appointments diary. Then we can find out exactly who was in on the discussions.’

  Jane shook her head. ‘I have news for you. There was a diary, but it mysteriously disappeared, and hasn’t turned up since.’

  ‘Are you certain about that?’

  ‘Positive. Sir John Colville mentions it in his memoirs. He ought to know.’

  Dick hammered his fist on the table. ‘You see? It’s a cover-up, Jane.’ He reached for another sheet of paper. ‘We’ll make our own bloody diary. We’ve got enough books and notes. Let’s get it all down, everything we know about Churchill’s actions and decisions from the time Hess landed.’

  It took another hour and a half of double-checking, but the result was spectacular.

  ‘Now we’re ready for Cedric,’ Dick declared.

  They each had an armful of books when they went out to the Renault at 7.10 p.m. The Volvo was nowhere in the street. If they felt relieved, it was only temporary. Jane was watching as they drove away, and a green BMW started up and pulled out behind them. It stayed in obvious attendance all the way out of London and along the M4 to Henley. The driver was younger than grey-eyes. He sported a heavy dark moustache and was wearing a tan-coloured windcheater. Presumably MI5 was no different from
any other organization when it came to duties at unsocial hours. The junior officers copped the night-shift.

  They were at Cedric’s inside the hour, drawing up in front of the converted cottages while the BMW was obliged to cruise slowly past, seeking a less obvious parking spot.

  ‘If Cedric says anything, we’ve no idea who was in that car,’ Jane murmured before they got out.

  Cedric hailed them like old friends. Here in his weekend home, he was unrecognizable as the tyrant in the editor’s chair. He kissed Jane and took over the books she was carrying. There was coffee waiting inside.

  He sat benignly in his armchair, smoking cigars and listening to Dick relating the visits to Salter-Smith in Brighton and Frank Perry in Richmond. When the question of Churchill’s secret meetings with the Germans came up, Dick made some remark to the effect that it must sound like something out of a spy story. Cedric shook his head and amazed them both by saying, ‘I believe every word of it.’

  Jane’s eyes widened. She exchanged a baffled look with Dick.

  Cedric shifted in his chair, and it was almost possible to believe he was embarrassed over something. ‘I owe you both an apology, because a call came in last week from Washington, and I didn’t see its relevance at the time, so I didn’t pass it on. You remember our man found a report in the National Archives about ex-President Herbert Hoover, who was taking an interest in the Hess case?’

  Dick nodded. ‘You mentioned it the other day on the Embankment.’

  ‘Regrettably, I didn’t tell you everything. Hoover claimed to be getting his information from reliable inside sources in London. This is the part that will interest you. He heard that Hess was the seventh German emissary of peace sent to England since the outbreak of war, and that the others had all come through Dublin and been picked up from there by a British plane.’

  Jane clapped her hands in excitement. ‘Fantastic! Frank Perry had it right.’