A Prince and a Spy

by Rory Clements

  ‘You’ve lost me,’ Wilde said. ‘Who exactly is Heinrich Müller?’

  ‘Head of the Gestapo. It’s believed he has taken charge of the hunt for Rudolf Coburg. It’s big news that such a senior guy would leave Germany.’

  ‘Then we may be too late,’ Wilde said.

  Harriet shook her head. ‘No, they’ll never find him.’

  ‘How can you be so sure?’

  ‘Because he is too well hidden.’

  ‘Anyway,’ Phillips said, ‘we’re not going to hang around. William Donovan and Herschel Johnson are both absolutely as one on this – if Müller wants Coburg, then we want him more. And unlike Müller, we want him alive.’

  ‘I’m glad you all see it the way I do,’ Wilde said.

  ‘Hey, anything that harms our enemy’s reputation has to be good news.’

  No, Wilde thought, it was more than just that. A lot more. This wasn’t merely about the propaganda war; this was the essence of the real war. To hell with Hitler’s reputation. If he was murdering innocent people by the thousand, something had to be done to stop him.

  ‘So,’ Phillips continued. ‘Freshen up, have some breakfast, then you’ll both be driven to a US airfield from where you will be flown to Stockholm. I want you to bring Mr Coburg back to Britain, to this office, along with his stash of documents.’

  ‘Simple as that?’

  ‘Simple as that.’ He turned and smiled at Harriet. ‘Are you OK with this, Miss Hartwell? It could be a dangerous assignment and it will be one hundred per cent American apart from yourself. But you are the one who knows how to find our man.’

  ‘She could tell us,’ Wilde said. ‘Map it out.’

  ‘No, it’s not straightforward. I have to go.’

  ‘I rather thought you’d say that,’ Phillips said.

  ‘But I don’t need him.’ She nodded towards Wilde. ‘Just give me a plane and a pilot – I can do this myself.’

  Phillips laughed. ‘No chance, I’m afraid. Wilde goes too or it’s no deal. This is our operation now.’

  Chapter 28

  The pain was overwhelming. From his ankle, it swept through his whole body and left him almost paralysed. He had been bitten by an adder, and even in his fever he was certain that Eichmann was the culprit. Eichmann, the slender one with the blank eyes and the silent hiss.

  Coburg was drenched in sweat and was sure he was dying. His throat had swollen and he was struggling to breathe. The throbbing pain was relentless. It had happened soon after dawn, following a fitful grappa-fuelled sleep. He had woken groggy, in desperate need of a piss. Stepping barefoot from his pine bed, he had trodden on the snake and it had gone straight for his lower leg.

  He kicked the vile animal away, then sat down on the edge of the bunk and vomited. He had never known such pain. His mouth began to foam. He felt the poison spreading through his veins and knew there was nothing he could do about it.

  Now, three hours later, he lay prostrate awaiting the end. Without anti-venom serum, without medical assistance, there was no hope. In his delirium, even as he fought for breath, he was sure that he felt his heart rate slipping, felt that his body was swelling by the minute. His eyes were fixed to his bare ankle, which was blue-black and grossly swollen.

  Perhaps it was all he deserved. Perhaps it was like this in the gas room: the panic, the pain, the sheer horror. All those trains he had helped Eichmann organise, the emptying of the Polish ghettos, sending men, women and children to the camps. Of course, he had known they weren’t merely transit camps. There had been no onward journeys to organise. Nor were they labour camps, otherwise there would have been continuous transports carrying the supplies of food and other necessities such places would need, as well as return trains for the goods they produced. But all that ever returned to Germany were the valuables, the hair and the clothing that had been removed – stolen – from the Jews.

  He had always known they were death camps, but his mind could not comprehend such a thing, and so he had not admitted it to himself. Even so, what did it mean on paper or at the end of a telephone line? It was only when you saw the results close up that you could see what your actions meant. Only when you saw a baby’s brains being dashed out on concrete that the chalked numbers on the freight cars turned from statistics into horror.

  He had no excuse now. He could no longer evade the truth about himself. He was a murderer. God in heaven, what would his church-going mother think of him if she ever discovered what he had done? It was one thing to expel the Jews from her town, another to slaughter mothers and babies. No Christian could countenance that.

  *

  The drive to the airfield in Norfolk took almost four hours. For the first half, they rode in silence, but then Harriet turned to Wilde.

  ‘Was Peter drunk when he was with you in the train?’

  ‘I wondered that. To be honest, I don’t know. He wasn’t drinking when he was with me, just eating those infernal sweets . . .’

  ‘Until the one that wasn’t a sweet. Was it painless?’

  ‘Pretty much, I think. Quick, anyway. I still don’t really understand why he was so eaten up with guilt. Could he really have ordered the plane crash?’

  ‘No. But he could have passed on information from Stockholm to someone who did have that power.’

  ‘But which bit of information?’ He lowered his voice; this wasn’t something for the driver’s ears. ‘The meeting at Drottningholm? Or Coburg’s story?’

  ‘What do you think? They wanted me dead. Perhaps they thought Rudi was aboard. The Duke and all the rest were innocent bystanders – incidental victims – just as you’re likely to be, Tom.’

  ‘And you can be sure of that?’

  She didn’t answer. Wilde knew she was holding something back. The only sound was the roar of the engine. Suddenly she clutched his hand. He looked down at their entwined hands. His was large, a boxer’s, hers small and delicate. ‘Do you realise how much danger we’re in, Tom? I don’t think you do. Stockholm won’t be easy. They know me, and they almost certainly know you. We have to avoid public places. That means no hotels – certainly not in Stockholm itself – and no embassies.’

  He wanted to remove his hand from hers, but he didn’t. ‘Yes, you’re right.’

  ‘You really don’t like me touching you, do you? You’re afraid of your own nature.’

  He didn’t know what to say; he had been thinking just that.

  *

  They arrived at the airfield just after four in the afternoon. The sentry waved them through and directed them to a Nissen hut with a windsock blowing above its corrugated roof. The hut was a canteen and it had a cosy, lived-in feel to it. A basic kitchen had been set up at the far end where a middle-aged woman in a pinafore was clattering cups and plates. There were cooking smells and steam was blowing from a whistling kettle.

  Their eyes instantly went to the only other occupant of the hut – a leather-jacketed pilot sitting with his feet on the table. He held up his hand and gestured them to come over.

  ‘Hi, folks,’ he said, sliding his feet down to the ground and standing up. He held out a hand. ‘You must be Tom and Harriet, right?’

  No formality here, Wilde noted. He nodded. ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’m Chas. Major Charles Oldman from nowheresville, Nebraska, to the men under my command, but plain Chas to you. I’m going to be your pilot today.’

  He was a small, weathered man of about forty, with an all-American crew cut and a smile as wide as the Great Plains. He had the look of a working man who knew his job and did it well.

  ‘Pleased to meet you, Chas.’

  ‘Likewise. Now take a seat and make yourselves at home. Coffee’s on its way, then we’ll talk about what we’re going to do with you folks.’

  Strong American coffee was produced and food was offered. ‘I recommend the frankfurters with mustard, beans and French fries,’ Oldman said. ‘I don’t know when you’re next going to eat and I doubt you do. But I tell you this, you’re going
to be damned cold at 25,000 feet, folks. And if you’re hungry, you’re going to feel even colder. I suggest you eat.’

  ‘OK,’ Wilde said without enthusiasm. Harriet shook her head.

  Oldman waved to the cooking woman. ‘Same again, Gertie. Times one.’ He had a half-eaten plate of food in front of him and returned to it with gusto. A very full plate arrived soon after and was placed in front of Wilde. As he ate, he began to realise he was hungry after all. Then Harriet started stealing his chips until, at last, she ordered a meal for herself.

  There were only a dozen planes in evidence around the airfield. Wilde asked Oldman about it. ‘Tough one,’ he said. ‘Just between ourselves, my B-17s are over France today and I’m scared out of my mind for the boys. A lot of Hermann’s Messerschmitts have gone east, but there are still enough left over there to make things damned brutal for us.’

  Wilde pushed his empty plate away.

  ‘Now, folks, this is not going to be easy,’ Oldman continued. ‘I have been ordered to help you and it is my pleasure so to do. I will be flying you in a borrowed British de Havilland Mosquito which we’re trialling. It is extremely fast, it flies high, is spectacularly manoeuvrable and it has the range to get us there. There is no better way to get to Stockholm in a hurry.’

  ‘Perfect,’ Wilde said.

  ‘But it is going to be tricky because the Mosquito is really just a two-seater light bomber, made of plywood and balsa. In normal circumstances, that means just pilot and navigator. No armaments, no room for gunners, nothing to slow us down.’

  ‘But there are three of us even without a navigator,’ Wilde said. ‘Sorry, I’m stating the obvious.’

  ‘Three we can manage because we won’t be carrying bombs, so we can fit one passenger in the bomb bay. That means one of you is going to be hellishly uncomfortable and the other is going to have to do a bit of amateur navigating. What’s it to be, folks?’

  ‘Harriet?’

  ‘Do you know how to navigate, Tom?’

  ‘I can read a map.’

  ‘That’s not the same thing,’ she retorted. ‘Anyone can do that.’

  Oldman grinned. ‘To tell you the truth, I could do without a navigator most of the time anyway, except the navigators’ union might object.’ He paused and watched their faces. ‘That was in the way of a gag, folks. There is no navigators’ union.’

  Wilde managed a laugh. ‘I’m sorry, Chas, I think we’ve temporarily lost our senses of humour.’

  Harriet had already made up her mind. ‘You’re the excess baggage on this trip, Tom – so you can have the bomb bay.’

  He raised an eyebrow, then laughed out loud. ‘Looks like the lady has outvoted me, Chas.’

  ‘You’re very generous. It gets very cold up there at high altitudes. But don’t worry, we’ll wrap you up as warm as a polar bear and you’ll be fine. And we won’t be attacked because Hermann’s got nothing to touch us for speed. Of course, if I happen to see him down below I might just drop you on his head. If that’s OK by you, Tom.’

  ‘Should be a soft landing with all that whale blubber he keeps around his waist.’ There was something else that Oldman didn’t seem to have considered. ‘I take it you’ll be waiting for us in Sweden, Chas?’

  ‘Those are my orders. However, you will be back with me within thirty-six hours, or I will come home without you.’

  ‘Fair enough. The thing is, we intend to have another man with us. That’s the whole purpose of our trip.’

  ‘Yes, I was told that. And I don’t want to hear who he is or any more about it. What that means, however, is that one of you may have to stay behind in Sweden for a while until I come back to collect you. Is that a problem?’

  ‘We’ll have to deal with it,’ Harriet said.

  ‘OK, well let’s see how big your man is and take it from there.’

  *

  After eating and refreshing themselves in the bathrooms, Wilde was zipped into a vast quilted suit, then a lifejacket and parachute. Harriet borrowed a leather flying jacket and pulled on a pair of over-large trousers over her bunched-up skirt, with thick sheepskin mittens for her hands.

  Oldman nodded at a shelf full of well-thumbed novels. ‘Borrow a book and flashlight, Tom. Pulp fiction’s the thing to pass the hours. You’ll find a couple of Chandlers there.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  ‘OK, let’s go. If we leave now, it’ll be getting dark before we approach the Norwegian coast, which will suit us very well.’

  Wilde had to be helped into the plane. He was so heavily wrapped up against the cold, he could hardly move. Somehow he manoeuvred himself underneath the open bomb doors, and was helped up into the space. Chas Oldman connected the oxygen supply to his mask and showed Wilde how to alter the intake of the precious gas as they rose to heights where it was necessary for survival. He then checked the intercom.

  ‘I’ll let you know when you need the oxygen, Tom. That’s all you have to do. Apart from that, try to relax, read a bit, sleep if you can. You won’t see a thing, but you’ll hear the relentless buzzing of the engines and you can chat to us over the intercom if you’re really bored. Other than that, see you in Stockholm.’

  Harriet was standing just clear of the bomb doors. ‘Thank you, Tom. You’re a gentleman after all.’

  ‘Don’t say I don’t do anything for you.’

  Slowly, the doors were closed on him and he found himself in pitch dark, packed in tight. He switched on his torch to take in his surroundings. The space was black and functional with clips for four bombs. He turned off the light and closed his eyes. His own breathing sounded preternaturally loud in the enclosed space. Then the engines roared into life and that was all he could hear.

  It was never a pleasant sensation to be utterly in the hands of others. Wilde imagined himself a cat, caught in a cupboard. There was nothing to be done but wait, so he tried to relax every muscle. Very soon, the Mosquito bumped into life, taxiing along the runway, then quickly he sensed it soaring upwards at an astonishing rate.

  ‘All right down there?’ The American pilot’s soothing voice crackled through the intercom.

  ‘Fine. Pure luxury.’

  ‘We’re almost at 10,000 feet. Time to start on the oxygen.’

  *

  Wilde read a little of The Big Sleep, then switched off the torch and gave himself up to a kind of half-sleep. He awoke fully to a bumpy landing. The bomb doors opened and he looked down on to a dark patch of Sweden. He realised that it was evening. Unhooking himself from the oxygen and intercom, he eased himself down to the ground. Crawling out from under the plane, he found himself on a brilliantly lit landing strip. Harriet was standing, hands in the pockets of her leather flying jacket, looking at him wryly.

  ‘Good flight, Tom?’

  ‘Not bad, actually. You?’

  ‘Wonderful. Chas is good company.’

  Major Oldman climbed down from the cockpit just as a black car approached across the tarmac. ‘Good luck with whatever you’re trying to do,’ Oldman said. ‘This is a Swedish Royal Air Force base. All completely unofficial. No passport control, nothing. I think the Swedes are beginning to realise Germany is not going to win this war, so we’re allowed in here so long as we’re unarmed. Anyway, I’ll be in the officers’ mess while you go about your business. And remember, thirty-six hours – not a minute more.’

  ‘Thank you, Chas,’ Wilde said.

  The car slowed to a halt and the driver emerged. He was a young man in a good suit, white shirt and striped tie. In his hand he held a hat. ‘Professor Wilde? Miss Hartwell? I’m Bateman, Ted Bateman, from the US legation. I’m to be your driver for the duration of your visit.’

  ‘Do you know why we’re here?’

  ‘No, sir. But I have arranged hotel rooms for you tonight in a small town twenty miles north of Stockholm. I’m told you’ll be avoiding the city.’

  ‘And Herschel Johnson suggested this?’

  ‘I believe the suggestion came from Mr Phillips in London, sir. I
was also told to tell you that you are under no obligation to accept my services as a driver, nor to use the rooms I booked.’

  Wilde looked at Harriet. She nodded. ‘OK, well that’s roughly the right direction, so take us there. We’ll decide our next move on the way.’

  ‘Can I get your luggage, sir?’

  ‘We don’t have any.’

  Suddenly Harriet was looking at her watch. ‘No, it’s only seven thirty – that’s not too late. We should go directly to Ekberg. You know it, Bateman? It’s a small fishing town on the coast north of Stockholm.’

  ‘Well, I can sure find it on my map, Miss Hartwell.’

  ‘Take us there.’

  Chapter 29

  They arrived, and Wilde was incredulous. ‘Are you serious about this?’ he demanded.

  ‘This is where I was told to come.’

  ‘You can’t be right. It doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘You may have forgotten, Tom – I have perfect recall.’

  ‘But this is just a family home.’ Wilde looked up at the modest house and could not believe that the place had anything to do with an international arms dealer and fixer. ‘It seems strange . . . unprofessional.’

  ‘Good camouflage then.’

  The building was well away from the little town of Ekberg, about three miles inland. It was deep in the countryside of farmland and forest, down tracks, nowhere near any main roads. Wilde had questioned her about the place on the way here, but she hadn’t answered, merely jutted her chin towards the back of the driver’s head, as if to indicate that she didn’t want him to hear their conversation.

  Before turning off the highway, they had passed a curious variety of Heath Robinson vehicles – ordinary cars converted to wood-gas because of the petrol shortage in Sweden. No such problems for the US embassy staff. In the darkness, they saw houses with lights shining behind unblacked-out windows, a welcome change from the eternal gloom of night-time England.

  By the time they arrived, the moon was high and bright silver. The wrought iron gates to the property had been left open and they drove straight through. ‘Park here and wait, please, Mr Bateman. We won’t be long.’