Naked flesh. It was always there at the forefront of his mind these days. Naked female flesh, pale and soft and pliable. Reclining in white sheets on pillows of down. And then, the others. Was it only a month since that night and the dinner? Here in this little cabin on a rocky outcrop, a thousand miles away, it seemed to Rudolf Coburg that the night and the flesh had been there, in his memory, all his life and beyond. So much desire and gratification, such foodstuffs in a time of hunger and war, such dazzling surroundings in a vast and beguiling hunting lodge, deep in conquered Poland, such wondrous wine from the cellars of Paris. And the girls, the flesh! Pure, Aryan, clean, willing and warm of heart. Chosen personally for each man by Heinrich Müller. The counterpoints of passion. Pleasure more exquisite than ever in a world consumed by pain.
The girls had been there, in their rooms, when they arrived by Junkers Ju 52 from Tempelhof. Each room had an overflowing bowl of fruit, two bottles of vintage champagne, a signed photograph of the Führer, and a naked girl in a large double bed with crisp linen sheets and a duvet filled with down. Coburg’s girl was called Dagmar, and she was exceedingly sweet-natured and pretty with skin like gossamer. After their love-making she was gone with a kiss to his cheek and a beautiful smile and a promise to return whenever he desired.
Twenty men in twenty rooms. All senior members of the party and of the various branches of government, entertained lavishly by Müller, the new head of the Gestapo. In the evening, they had dined together in a salon of darkened oak and guttering candlelight with antlers on all the walls, and they had drunk toast after toast from fine crystal glassware. First, of course, to the Führer, but then also to Himmler and then, in more sombre mood, to Reinhard Heydrich, lately the victim of an assassin’s bomb in Prague. And then, as one, they had thrown their priceless crystal glasses into the stone hearth.
Never had he drunk so much, never had he felt so mellow and, to be honest with himself, so intensely alive. It was as if he had drunk of nectar and feasted on ambrosia. If he had had a sword in his grasp, he would have happily taken on an army single-handed and would have expected to slay them all. But that had always been the point, hadn’t it? It was clear now; they were all supposed to be intoxicated by the fine flesh and the liquor, their minds dulled, yet their spirits elevated to a plane none of them had ever experienced. To ease them into the night ahead, and to prepare them for it.
At the head of the long table, Müller had risen to his full height of five and a half feet and made a little speech. He said the Führer himself had suggested he bring them all here into the conquered territory to this ancient hunting lodge. He wanted them all to know that though they were office-bound in Berlin, they were every bit as important to the Third Reich’s struggle as the young men on the front line. In many ways, even more important, for they were the men who organised the labour, the armaments, the munitions and provisions that kept the engine of great Germany running. They were the men who organised the trains and made the removal of populations a reality. He wanted them to know that administrators could be warriors, too.
It had been a warm summer’s evening. After the last course – there had been ten in all, including the pièce de résistance, roast suckling boar – they had trooped out into the torchlit gardens, laughing and rejoicing at the impending end to the war and the birth of a new Teutonic empire that would stand for eternity.
Twenty servants in white livery appeared with silver salvers, one for each of the guests. On each platter, a fully loaded pearl-handled pistol was laid. ‘Take your guns, gentlemen,’ Müller intoned. ‘The fun is about to begin.’
Floodlights burst into life, illuminating a series of targets thirty metres away across the lawns. Each target consisted of a crude drawing of a Jew, in the manner of a Der Stürmer caricature. Large noses, stubbly chins, sneering lips – drawings that said ‘this man is about to cheat you and rob you blind and steal your children for infernal rites’.
‘Now then,’ Müller had said. ‘We take it in turns. Whoever shoots the most Jews wins a prize – a golden dagger commissioned by the Führer himself. You, Herr Coburg, are you a good shot?’
‘Not bad,’ he had said. Shooting parties had been part of his childhood education; he had not been the best, but he wouldn’t feel out of place on a partridge shoot at a country estate.
‘Then you go first.’
And so they had all taken their turn, shooting at the pictures, laughing like schoolboys, cheering when one of the cartoon likenesses was hit full square in the face. They imbibed more drink – schnapps and brandy – between shots. They admired each other’s shooting or mocked mercilessly those who, like Eichmann, couldn’t manage a single hit.
Coburg didn’t win, but he achieved four out of six.
The fleet of open-topped Mercedes cars came for them at one o’clock in the morning. No one asked where they were going, for that would have spoilt the magic. This whole evening, surely, was designed as a wonderful thank you for all the hard work they had put in behind the scenes in their ministries back in Berlin. A party for victory with a finale full of mystery. The night was cloudless and the moon was full. The breeze in their hair and the beauty of the night served to enhance the anticipation. What could possibly be in store for them? A brothel, perhaps? Beautiful women? More fun and games? This place, sixty miles north-east of Warsaw, was a land of forests and rivers and dreams.
The journey was only about twenty minutes, perhaps eight miles along rutted roads, finally running at the side of a railway track. He gazed drunkenly from the window; it was dark, but occasionally he was sure he saw a corpse at the side of the line. And the night air was changing. No longer was it fresh, but imbued with a miasma of decay. He avoided the eyes of his colleague beside him in the back seat of the open-topped car. He resisted the desire to hold a handkerchief to his nose.
At last they arrived at a charming little railway station, where a long train of twenty or more cattle wagons was already standing at the low, ramp-like platform as though waiting to be unloaded. At the rear of the train was the locomotive which had shunted the train to this place. His companions in the car had gone strangely silent. Coburg noted that the clock beside the waiting room was telling the wrong time. He looked again two minutes later and noted that the hands had still not moved. How could they? They were painted on, not real. Time stood still in this place. He noted, too, the name of the station, a place name that meant something to him.
A name he had seen in documents in the office of Referat IV B4 back in Berlin.
Now, here in this beautiful little cabin by the sea, almost a month later and a thousand miles to the north-west, the name meant everything, but back then there was still mystery and the shudder of impending darkness. It was the smell that came first.
As they climbed out of the cars, the whiff of decay hit them like a fist to the face. The all-encompassing stink of human waste and rotting flesh, made all the worse by the furnace heat of that summer’s day and the still warm night.
A parade of a hundred or so uniformed men, some with rifles, others with whips and Rottweilers and Alsatians on short leashes, stood in a semi-circle like a welcoming committee. Even in his inebriation, Coburg recognised them as Trawniki Hiwis – Ukraininan and Latvian volunteer guards – and a few SS troops. One of them, an SS-Obersturmführer and clearly their leader, strode towards the guests, clicked his heels and gave the most extravagant Hitler salute that Coburg had ever seen.
And that was just the beginning. The show had not even begun. At a snap of the officer’s fingers, searchlights broke the darkness, turning night into day.
What came next meant Coburg could no longer sleep, and doubted he would ever sleep again.
Chapter 19
Wilde couldn’t leave Mimi. He had no idea who the men below might be. Were they officers of the state or rogue elements like the man who murdered Harriet’s father? If a defenceless old man’s throat had been slit without a qualm, what chance would Mimi Lalique have? He had to fear the wors
t.
There were no dividing walls between the lofts of the terrace of houses. Wilde carried her through to the far loft and stood on the shattered joists above a gaping hole, torn open by a massive bomb. Above them, a shaft of sunlight pierced through a hole in the roof where the Luftwaffe’s unwanted gift had ripped through the tiles.
It was what lay below that concerned Wilde. All he could make out was a dark tangle of broken boards and brick. The bomb had coursed through the centre of the house, collapsing landings and damaging staircases. Had it exploded, there would have been nothing left of the building; as it was there was wreckage enough to make the place uninhabitable.
Had Harriet come this way, climbing down through the broken timbers and rubble to the ground floor? Alone, he was pretty sure he could find a way down, but carrying Mimi was another matter. He weighed up his choices, wondering for a brief moment whether he could leave her here and go to fetch help. He instantly discounted that as an option; she was suffering badly – a heart attack, perhaps? – and the sooner she reached proper medical assistance, the better her chance of survival. He had to get her to hospital.
Behind him, along the line of lofts, he heard the sound of hammering once more. The men were trying to break open the hatch.
He manipulated Mimi around to his back, one arm over his shoulder, her legs over his other shoulder. She felt even lighter now and he had a hand free. Unlike the retractable ladder at Mimi’s house, the loft here had the remains of a proper staircase. Steep and narrow, but with a banister down the left side. Slowly, he descended to the remains of the upper landing. Mimi was silent, showing few signs of life. But every few seconds he felt sure he could sense faint breathing.
Flight by flight, step by step he made his way down. On the second floor, half of the staircase had been torn away and he had to edge his way with his back against the wall. A misstep or a collapsing stair would carry them both away.
At last, they made it to the debris-strewn ground floor. No sign of the bomb; he assumed it had been defused and removed many months ago. London had not suffered much bombing this past year. Motes of dust hung in the air, catching the low evening light that crept in through the gaps where windows had once been. Wilde placed Mimi on the floor for a few moments while he caught his breath. He took her wrist and felt for a pulse, then put his ear to her chest. She was alive, but in grave peril. He could do with Harriet’s assistance, but she had vanished.
The front door was unlocked. He poked his head out tentatively, looking back along the street to Mimi’s property, expecting to see the men who had broken in. But there was no one. The men could emerge at any moment, however, either from above or below; he had to take his chances right now.
He picked up Mimi again and placed her across his shoulders, paused a moment in the doorway, then took a deep breath and strode purposefully out on to the street as though he did this every day. Walking to the right, he didn’t look back, taking the first turning. Now they were out of sight. He could breathe again.
His initial instinct was to knock on someone’s door – anyone’s door. Everyone around this exclusive part of Westminster would have a telephone. But a black cab was passing and he hailed it.
‘Hospital. Take us to the nearest hospital.’
‘Hop in, sir.’ The driver began manoeuvring a U-turn even as Wilde was laying Mimi out on the bench seat. ‘That’ll be St Thomas’ – or whatever’s left of it after the bloody Hun’s done their worst.’
*
They pulled up outside the emergency department within a few minutes. The old hospital was so badly damaged that Wilde was astonished that any part of it could still be functioning. Two nurses and a doctor immediately took control of the situation. Wilde gave them Mimi’s name but the nurses didn’t seem impressed; a patient was a patient, however famous.
‘Will you wait, sir?’ one of the nurses asked.
‘Do you really need me? I’m not related to Miss Lalique.’
‘I think it better we have someone on hand who is acquainted with her, just in case. Do you know whether she has any history of heart problems?’
‘I honestly don’t know.’
‘Asthma? Lung condition?’
‘All I can tell you is that she was going upstairs and began to have difficulty breathing. She was clutching her chest as though she had a great pain and she was clearly becoming very weak. She just about managed to talk to me, but then she seemed to lose consciousness. Her breathing and heart rate were very faint. I brought her here as fast as I could. I thought it quicker than waiting for an ambulance.’
‘You did the right thing, sir. It would really help if you could wait here a little while longer, Mr . . .’
‘Wilde,’ he said and then wished he hadn’t.
‘We’ll need whatever details you have. Address, next of kin. Your own telephone number.’
‘And then I can go? You’ll be able to get me at the American embassy.’
The nurse looked at her watch. ‘Well, of course you’re not being held prisoner, but if you could just stay half an hour?’
He didn’t want to wait – he needed to get to safety – but he felt he didn’t have much option. The nurse escorted him downstairs to the basement where the wards and operating theatre had been relocated, and offered him a seat. The hospital was much reduced, but was still performing a crucial role. The electric clock on the wall said seven o’clock. He didn’t want to sit down.
After twenty-five minutes another nurse came and offered him a cup of tea. He declined the offer and asked how Mimi was.
‘Difficult to say, sir.’
‘She’ll certainly be kept in overnight, though?’
‘Yes, sir. She has had a heart attack.’
‘That sounds bad.’
‘The doctor has given her some morphine for the pain and to relax her. You did well to get her here so promptly. There’s very little else to be done. Just wait and see, I’m afraid.’
‘But nothing I can do?’
‘Not really, sir.’
‘Then I’m going to have to take my leave of you. If anything happens, if you need me, you have my phone number and I’ll be a fifteen-minute taxi ride away.’
‘Yes, of course, I understand.’
He had to get to the embassy in Grosvenor Square so that he could contact Bill Phillips and get advice on what to do next. He guessed he would be advised to call in the police and allow them to interview him on embassy premises in the presence of counsel, in which case he might have to answer ‘no comment’ when asked what he was trying to do in Clade. Or perhaps he could find some way to get the whole thing sorted out through diplomatic channels? He was also keen to discover the fate of Harriet Hartwell.
Outside, the evening was fresh and clear. The sky over Lambeth was darkening fast and there were no street lights. He needed a taxi again, but legend had it that cabbies didn’t like to operate on this side of the river. He might improve his chances by walking north across Westminster Bridge.
He didn’t see Philip Eaton until it was too late.
There were two other men with him, men who looked a great deal stronger than Eaton; they wore plain clothes but had the demeanour of junior secret service officers. To the layman, they probably looked pretty anonymous, but for someone accustomed to the intelligence world, there was no doubt what they were. Wilde’s first instinct was that these must have been the ones who had broken into Mimi’s house, which meant they were armed.
‘Goddamn it, Wilde, you’re a devil to find when you make yourself scarce,’ Eaton said.
‘Eaton.’ His body was tensed for flight, weighing up his chances. He was strong enough, too, and reasonably fleet of foot. But he had no weapon.
‘Look, be a good fellow and don’t make a fuss. I’m afraid you’re going to have to come with us. That’s our car.’ A black Rolls Royce stood at the kerb. Just like the one Eaton had used on his trip to Cambridge the day after Cazerove’s suicide. What was going on here? MI6 definitely di
d not have Rolls Royces in its fleet.
‘You can’t touch me, Eaton. Diplomatic immunity.’
‘Sorry, old boy, needs must.’ He nodded to his two men. They moved in on Wilde as one. He didn’t fight them; he knew it was pointless, so he allowed them to bundle him into the back of the car. One slid in alongside him while the other took the wheel, with Eaton at his side.
‘I won’t let you get away with this, Eaton. This is no way to treat your country’s friends.’
‘Friends don’t go around slitting the throats of ageing schoolteachers.’
‘You know damn well that wasn’t me.’
‘Then you’ll have nothing to fear from being interviewed, will you? You have plenty of questions to answer. Come on, we’ve got a fair drive ahead of us.’
‘Where are we going?’
‘All in good time. Firstly, though, I would very much like you to tell me where the girl is.’
‘Girl? What girl?’
Eaton sighed. ‘This is going to be a very long night.’
*
The car finally came to a halt just before eleven o’clock. Wilde knew exactly where he was: Cambridge. They were right outside the ancient building commonly known as Latimer Hall. It was one of the grandest residences in the town. Wilde recognised it immediately – and knew who owned the place and called it home.
‘Why have you brought me here?’
‘I take it you know where you are?’
‘Of course. Latimer Hall. Templeman lives here.’
‘Got it in one.’
‘Yes, he always was filthy rich, wasn’t he? And I suppose this is one of his cars. I wondered what a secret service bod was doing riding around in a Rolls Royce.’
‘Come on, get out. You’ll have plenty of time for talking in a short while.’
Wilde was thinking. Strange that he was here at the home of Lord Templeman, yet another denizen of the Dada Club.
*
Templeman was in his large book-lined study wearing striped pyjamas and a cotton dressing gown, an outfit that would not have looked out of place at a boys’ boarding school when the pupils were huddled around drinking their cocoa and Horlicks before lights out. His desk looked like a hobbyist’s workbench, the remains of the German wireless scattered among various other bits and pieces, including screwdrivers, pliers and a soldering iron.
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