“You do know the history of the BKA, right?”
“That it was started by Nazis?”
“Yes.”
“Yeah. I saw they finally admitted that a couple of years ago. They said it was because no one else in Germany had the investigative skills.”
Wilson chuckled. “Yeah, that’s it. They had to use elements of the SS and the Gestapo. That’s the only choice they had.”
“Right.”
“I’m just saying that an outfit that started that way may have some roots, some sympathies. Be careful who you trust in the BKA.”
“I hadn’t really thought that through.”
“Talk to your guys in Germany and see what they think. I would just have some real hesitation. But yeah, they could do it. They’re competent. There are also probably several commercial labs in Germany that could do it.” Wilson sat forward suddenly. “You hear about that testing of what they thought was Hitler’s skull?”
“No. I thought he was burned outside the bunker after he shot himself.”
“He was. But the Russians were there the next day. Or in a couple of days. I don’t remember. They said they destroyed the ashes, but secretly they took the skull back to Russia.”
“What happened?”
“Discovery Channel, or somebody, got ahold of the couch Hitler shot himself on, and pulled DNA off the blood on the couch. So that was in 1945, and they got good samples. Then they went to Russia—got them to let them take samples from the skull, amazingly—and compared it against the couch blood.
“The skull had a bullet hole in it and everything. Great show. Of course, the Russians only gave them thirty minutes access when they got there. Why would they do that? Anyway, you should check it out. It was on TV last month.”
“So what happened?”
“They used some forensic scientists from Connecticut. I watched it over and over. I checked all their procedures—what they told us about anyway—and it looked correct. They knew what they were doing. So they compared the blood, and it wasn’t a match.”
“How did I never hear about this?”
“Probably because it wasn’t a match. If it had been Hitler’s, it would have been front-page headlines.”
“So whose was it?”
“Well, the scientists said the skull was more likely to be a woman, and I think they’re right. So what woman had a bullet hole in her head that was close to Hitler?”
“Eva Braun.”
“Well supposedly she just took the poison. But who knows.”
“How do they know they got Hitler’s blood off the couch?”
“Never authenticated it. All they did was try to match it against the skull.”
“Why didn’t they get more blood from the couch?”
“Not sure. But for your problem, I can recommend some labs in Germany where you can get it tested. But what are you going to do once you get it tested?”
“We have to get it done quickly. In a couple of weeks. Our guy has to meet with this new Nazi who is trying to put together the leaders of all the Nazi movements around the world. One uniform, one leader, one structure, worldwide Nazism.”
He frowned. “That’s gotta be stopped.”
“That’s what I’m trying to do.”
* * *
I went to my office and called Florian.
“Ah,” he said. “Good to hear from you. Have you found your missing friend?”
I wasn’t sure Florian would still work with me after Buenos Aires. “Yeah. He’s back on board. He says he was never not on board. I’m still skeptical. And the leader of the Southern Volk—the former leader—has now gone missing. I think there’s an even chance that our friend did away with him.”
“Well, he has the flag. If we want to do anything with it, we need him.”
“Exactly. But I’m going to need your help.”
“Sure, anything.”
“How do we prove to Eidhalt that this is the actual Blood Flag? We have to authenticate it.”
“We could do some kind of carbon dating. Although, I don’t know if that works for something this young.”
“No, anybody could get ninety-year-old cloth. All that would do is date the flag. That doesn’t get us there. We have to prove it’s the flag. I think we have to get the blood sample off the flag and test the DNA of the men who were shot. How can we find them?”
“The ones who fell on the flag?”
“Right. Where are they buried?”
There was a period of silence. “I think Patrick may know. I know that there was something that happened with them. I don’t recall what it was. How much time do we have now?”
“Ten days. Then we have to be ready to go to the meeting.”
“Has your friend told them what he has?”
“Not yet. He’s supposed to meet Eidhalt in Germany. Then we’ll have to find someplace—a commercial lab—that can do this kind of testing that we can sell to Eidhalt.”
“I’m sure we can find such a lab. How do we go about this?”
I looked at the clock. “Assume we can get a blood sample from the flag. We’ve got to find either the remains of one of the men who bled on it, or one of their descendants. I think we’ve got to find where these guys were buried.”
Florian hesitated. “You can do DNA testing from someone who’s been dead for ninety years?”
“Depends. I know you can do testing on skeletons that have been around for hundreds of years. I’m trying to figure it all out. But for now, see if you can find the guys who were killed. Concentrate on the ones that would be the most likely. One guy apparently fell directly on the flag and bled to death there. Most of the blood’s probably his.”
“Let me talk to a guy who has suddenly become interested in what we’re doing.”
My antenna went up. “What guy?”
“The Verfassungsschutz. You know who they are?”
“Yeah, sort of closer to the CIA,” I responded, not liking what I was hearing.
“We got a visit yesterday from one of them. About this.”
“About what?”
“He heard we were asking around. Involving neo-Nazis.”
“Why was he interested?”
“Said he was working on a similar project. Wanted to make sure we didn’t bang into each other.”
I wasn’t sure whether to say what I was thinking or not. “Did you know him before yesterday?”
“No. We had never heard of him.”
“Did you tell him about the Blutfahne?”
“Yes, we mentioned it.”
“How did he react?”
“I’m not sure how to describe it. I’m not sure of the best English word. Enthusiastic.”
“Eager?”
“Perfect. Yes. Eager and enthusiastic about our project.”
“Did you say much else?”
“No. He said he wanted to meet soon.”
“I wish you’d talked to me first. I don’t like it. I’m coming over there. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I picked up the phone and told Alex we were going to Germany that night.
* * *
On my way to the airport, I texted Florian and asked him to meet us in Munich. Alex and I checked in at the Sofitel, a beautiful old building that had been completely modernized. We dropped off our bags and went to the restaurant in the lobby for a late breakfast. Florian and Patrick arrived as we were finishing. I waved. Florian looked a little disheveled with his hair in something of a mess. He was wearing a high-collared zip sweater. Patrick was wearing a sport coat and a blue shirt open at the collar. They ordered coffee and we got refills.
I said to both of them, “I checked the notes you gave me. The guy who seems to be the one who bled right on the flag the most is Jens Friedl. Any idea how to track where he was buried?”<
br />
Patrick looked around. He pulled some papers out of his coat pocket and laid them in front of him. “The men who died were buried in graves here in Munich. All marked. After Hitler went to prison, most people thought the movement was dead. Well, after Hitler got out of prison—after writing Mein Kampf—he rebuilt Nazism with new energy. The same people who were in the putsch were right there with him. Luddendorff, Hess, Röhm, Göring, all of them. They picked up right where they left off. The conditions in Germany were terrible and getting worse. After Hitler maneuvered himself into the position of chancellor, he then made it so that he could never be removed. This was all well known. He dug up the bodies, how do you say it?”
“Exhumed.”
“Yes. He had the bodies of the men who died in the beer hall putsch exhumed, and re-buried them under a monument to honor them. In 1934. I have found a picture of it.” He handed me a Xeroxed copy of a photograph that showed an ornate marble monument in honor of the martyrs of National Socialism. I couldn’t read the inscription, but the message being conveyed was clear. I handed the picture back to him.
“Then what?”
“Then the Blood Flag became the centerpiece of Nazism. The one magical thing. It, of course, was nothing of the sort, but Hitler made it into that. And the men who died—and bled on it—were the first martyrs of Nazism. So the monument was almost worshipped.”
“What happened to them?”
Patrick nodded. “At the end of the war the Russians were going to tear down the monument and destroy the remains of the ‘martyrs.’ They were going to dig them up and burn their bones.”
Patrick continued. “But the families heard about it. They begged for the remains so they could re-bury them. The Russians agreed, but only if they were buried in unmarked graves and never identified.”
Alex frowned. “We have to find unmarked graves?”
Patrick nodded. “Yes.”
“That will be impossible.”
Patrick shook his head, “No it won’t. We Germans keep track of everything. The families will know, or someone else will know. We’ll find out.”
I nodded as I drank my last bit of cool coffee. “If we find Friedl’s, which is the one we have to look for first, you do understand we’re going to have to dig it up?”
“Of course!” Patrick said enthusiastically, like it would be the most fun he’d had in years.
“And we have to do this in a way that our buddy, Jedediah Thom, can persuade Eidhalt. I need to get him on the phone, but let’s locate that grave first.”
Patrick and Florian prepared to leave. Then I added, “And then I want to hear about your contact with the Verfassungsschutz. But don’t talk to them directly. Not yet.”
Florian nodded.
I paid the bill then said to Florian and Patrick. “You guys find that grave this afternoon. Think you can do that?”
“We can try.”
“After you do, let’s get together tonight and go look at it. Then you can tell me about this visit that you had. I had an idea on how we might use that to our benefit.”
* * *
As the sun set, Alex and I walked out of the hotel and down the street to see the center of Munich. We had spent the entire afternoon researching the flag. I needed fresh air. I sent an email, high priority, to Jedediah’s account, telling him we needed to talk.
“Where are we going?” Alex asked as we walked briskly in the cold evening air.
“I want to retrace the route.”
“What route?”
“From the beer hall to the City Hall. The putsch.”
“Is the beer hall still there?”
“No. It was called the Bürgerbräukeller, but that building was torn down in the seventies. The Hilton sits on that property now. Tonight we’ll go eat in another huge beer hall, Hofbräuhaus, but before we do that we’re going to walk the same route Hitler led his Nazis on when the Blood Flag was created.”
We walked along the pristine sidewalk and looked at the old buildings. I looked at the map where I had outlined the course and turned to go down toward where the old Bürgerbräukeller was. “To think of Hitler walking in there—do you know how he did it?”
“Did what?”
“Started this whole march. This putsch.”
“No, no idea.”
“They met in that massive beer hall often, giving speeches, inciting people, getting his brown shirts to intimidate people. All the stuff we’ve heard about. It wasn’t a huge deal, but it was noted. So on November 8th, 1923, he decided to make his play. He had his brown shirts bar or chain the doors closed. Three thousand people in the Bürgerbräukeller. He had it ringed inside by six hundred of his storm troopers. He fired a pistol into the air and jumped onto a table to announce the time for the revolution had come. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen any of his speeches, but he was mesmerizing. Almost didn’t matter what he was saying. He got people worked up. He got worked up. He told them it was time to stop putting up with what had happened to them! They had been stabbed in the back! The German people had been betrayed by the immigrants, and Jews, Bolsheviks, and traitors! The conditions were because of them! And the weak government surrendered their honor in the war! He told them it was time to take action. To take things into their own hands. And within that group of three thousand people, each had something against somebody that they wrote into his speech in their own minds.
“They weren’t sure what to do. They had the energy, the anger, but nowhere to go. So Ludendorff, this old timer from WWI yells, ‘We march!’ And they headed for the Bavarian Defense Ministry. Two thousand men, some armed, some in Nazi uniforms, the about-to-be famous Blood Flag, and off they went.”
“Okay, here we are.” I stopped and pointed at the buildings around. “Bürgerbräukeller would have been behind us. They came down this street, two thousand strong, many armed, yelling, screaming for the overthrow of the corrupt government of Bavaria, and the beginning of a German-wide revolt.
“But one man wasn’t going to have it—a German state police officer, senior lieutenant Baron Michael von Godin. He blocked the Odeonsplatz—the city square—with a hundred soldiers. The Nazis kept coming, threatening. Finally someone opened fire.”
We stopped. “Right about here.”
We surveyed the beautiful Odeonsplatz, imagining the confusion and anger that filled it ninety years ago.
“Then?” she asked, imagining the whole story. I pulled up pictures of the people involved on my iPad.
“Four state police and sixteen Nazis were killed. And several Nazis fell on the flag. Right here,” I said pointing down. “The one who bled the most on the flag was Jens Friedl. Hitler and Göring were both injured. Göring was shot in the groin. Most fled after people started falling. Pandemonium.”
We walked on another eight hundred yards and stopped. “Check this out,” I said, studying a map I’d called up on my iPad. After Hitler came to power, he made the walk from the Bürgerbräukeller to the Odeonsplatz, a holy walk. To ‘honor’ the Nazi martyrs and the putsch. He even posted guards here, like honor guards, for years, to honor the walk where they were shot. Check this out.”
I pointed to the Feldherrenhalle, the ornate, Italian-style building at the end of the Odeonsplatz. “That building was the background for the fight. It was where Hitler put up the monument to the dead Nazi martyrs of the putsch. Right there at the base of the building. And posted SS guards in front of it, who had to be saluted by everyone who passed.
“But not all Germans were so deferential. Thousands walked around to the back of the building, through a small street, rather than pass in front and do the Nazi salute. Come over here. There’s supposed to be a bronzed brick path.”
We turned the corner and found Viscardigasse. We stopped and looked at the stones of the narrow street. “Here,” she pointed. There was an eighteen-inch path of bronzed stones i
n the middle of the street representing the path people took to avoid honoring the memorial.
“They called this Drückeberger Gaßl. Shirker’s Alley. Like they were shirking their duty to the Nazis.”
Alex looked around and studied it all. “This is amazing. It seems so long ago. Munich looks so normal, so beautiful.” She knelt down and felt the bronzed stones and contemplated. “But why not more? Why not most? If most had refused, resisted, walked around the Nazis, Hitler never would have succeeded.”
I nodded. “One of the great questions of history. I think we’re wrong though if we assume it couldn’t happen anywhere else.”
My phone buzzed. It was a text from Patrick.
“What is it?” she asked, standing.
“They found the grave.”
* * *
We agreed to meet Patrick and Florian at the graveyard at 10:00 p.m. The streets were quiet. It was a cool evening and the stars were hidden by a thin overcast. They were waiting for us when we got there. Both were wearing dark clothing; an intuitive decision by amateur grave robbers.
Florian spoke quietly, “This way.” He headed down a sidewalk then turned down an alley. The buildings came right up to the streets and some overhung the pavement. We walked in silence. I resisted the temptation to look behind us.
We went a quarter of a mile and Florian stopped when there was an area to our right with no buildings. There was no light. Florian said, “This is it. Very old graveyard.”
From the edge of the cemetery I could make out some large gravestones with crosses, casting ominous shadows from the minimal moonlight penetrating the wispy clouds. I turned on my small LED flashlight. I was ready to go look. “It’s unmarked?”
Florian indicated for me to come closer and put my flashlight on a piece of paper he unfolded. It was a map of the cemetery. “Patrick thinks he knows where it is.”
Patrick leaned in and touched the paper. “There are several unmarked graves in this graveyard. They are numbered though, of course!” he said smiling.
“And you have the list?”
The Blood Flag Page 22
