Death on the Rhine

by Charles Whiting

  Eight

  The General lay on the big bed, legs wide apart, and completely naked save for his socks, his teeth in a glass on the bedside table, gasping urgently. ‘What a cunning little minx you are!’ he panted, his skinny white body glazed in sweat, as she worked upon him busily. ‘Begad, why can’t damned wives be like this. Oh!’ his whole body trembled as her fingers gave him another delicious thrill. ‘I swear,’ he panted… ‘I swear, I could die happy this very night!’

  She looked at the General in disgust. His eyes were screwed up like those of a child, deep in some beautiful sleep, and not wanting to wake up to the awful realities of the nursery. She grinned. What a prophetic statement he had just made! She gave him a last tug, slapped his testicles lightly, and wiped the vaseline, with which his penis was smeared, off her hand onto the towel on the other side of the bed. ‘General,’ she breathed, thrusting her wet tongue into his ancient ear until he squirmed with pleasure, ‘I shall have to go and make a pi-pi now. You have made me so excited, that I can’t hold myself… you understand – much longer.’

  He opened his eyes and stared at her naked body. ‘Must you, now?’ he asked miserably.

  ‘Yes, my general,’ she said, thrusting her hands between her legs in the manner of a little girl.

  He stared down at his loins. The effect was already beginning to wear off.

  She saw his look. ‘Don’t worry. We shall do that delightful thing all over again until it stands. This time, however, much naughtier.’ She opened her mouth and ran her pink tongue around her lips suggestively.

  ‘Oh, I say,’ he gasped. ‘Do you really mean—’

  ‘Now close your eyes and rest for a moment. You’ll need all your strength for what I am going to give you this night.’

  ‘Oh, will I?’ The General screwed up his eyes, as if his very life depended upon it.

  She didn’t waste any time. She picked up her shoes and clothes from the chair beside the bed. On tiptoe she went out to the large ornate bathroom, with its gold taps and lavatory set on a marble pedestal, as if it were a throne. On the bed the panting General continued to keep his eyes closed, no doubt allowing his mind to dwell on the delightful things she would do to him with her cunning mouth when she returned.

  Hurriedly she dressed, going through her instructions as she did so. Time was now of the essence. He would already be in the upper storey. Now he needed the signal. She remembered von Horn’s instructions. ‘Once he has done the job, Gracious Miss, you will deal with him. His dead body must be found next to that of the Tommy. Your part in his death will naturally be hushed up by the English. They are a prudish race. It wouldn’t look good for the dead general to be found with a mistress, German and a third of his age to boot. Once the English police have been dealt with, you fade out of the scene and go straight to Switzerland, as planned. But the main thing is we have our symbol, which will help to create a new Germany.’ At the memory of those words, her eyes glistened fanatically. ‘A new Germany!’ she whispered fervently to herself, ‘in which all this Jewish decadence and perversion will vanish.’ She pulled the lavatory chain once, waited till the cistern flooded again, and pulled it once more.

  It was the signal…

  * * *

  The ‘Beast’ heard the signal as he crouched on the balcony outside the General’s bedroom. He had seen what had gone on before and had wondered how a well-born German woman, even if it was done for the cause of the Fatherland, could indulge in such perversion. It had made his blood boil. More than once, he had muttered, ‘Schweinerei –such piggery—’ and had forced himself not to break through the window and carry out his mission there and then.

  Now she had given the signal from the lavatory. It meant the coast was clear. He could finally do what he had come so far to do. Tomorrow the whole of Germany would ring to the news. The English Army Commander had been assassinated by a patriotic German. It would be the call to arms!

  Gently, almost noiselessly, he inserted the blade of his knife into the gap between the windows underneath the catch. On the bed the naked old man lay motionless, eyes still tightly screwed together. He was still waiting. The ‘Beast’ gave that terrible, mutilated smile of his. The old man would be surprised. What he would receive in a moment would not be love, perverted as it was, but death!

  Carefully, he started to raise the catch with the blade of his penknife…

  * * *

  Dickie had just checked the kitchen door and was standing outside under the canopy, watching the raindrops coming down in bitter relentlessness, when his nose wrinkled at the smell. It wasn’t from the kitchen, but from above him. He frowned in bewilderment, only half realising why he was bewildered.

  ‘Shut the door,’ Smith, inside the kitchen, ordered. ‘It’s bloody cold, you know.’

  For a moment, Bird didn’t respond and Smith snapped, ‘What’s the matter, Dickie? Have you got wax in your ears?’

  Dickie shook his head like someone coming out of a heavy sleep. ‘No. There’s a funny pong.’

  ‘What do you mean – a funny pong?’

  ‘Up there.’ Suddenly Dickie Bird was one hundred per cent alert. ‘You know, it’s the way the Huns pong. That black tobacco they smoke and that funny hard ersatz soap of theirs, which doesn’t have any perfume in it—’

  ‘But the only Hun in this house at this moment is the General’s whore and presumably she’s deep down underneath the feathers by – Christ, do you think it’s the killer?’ Smith snorted urgently.

  ‘Could well be, and he’s up there somewhere. I—’

  He didn’t finish. Smith pushed him to one side and peered upwards through the falling rain, straining his eyes urgently. Suddenly he saw the dark shape crouched there on the balcony, outlined a stark menacing black by the light coming from the General’s bedroom. ‘Hey, you, what are you up to?’

  A flash of scarlet stabbed the rain-sodden darkness. Smith ducked as a bullet howled off the stonework a foot from his head. ‘It’s him, Dickie!’ he cried. ‘The killer!’

  ‘Oh, my sainted aunt!’ Dickie yelled and dashed inside, yelling at the top of his voice. ‘Stand to… it’s him!’

  ‘Lash up and stow,’ Ginger responded first. ‘The squarehead’s up there with his nibs and the tart. Come on, lads!’ He started to pelt up the stairs that led to the bedrooms, followed by the others, already brandishing their coshes and revolvers.

  Outside, Smith, narrowing his eyes against the rain, aimed and fired.

  The dark shape jerked convulsively. Smith had hit him. But the young officer had not reckoned with the enormous strength of the ‘Beast’. Despite the blood pumping in a scarlet arc from his wounded shoulder, he smashed through the window and landed on his toes inside.

  The GOC shot up from the big bed. ‘What the hell’s going—’ He stopped short when he saw the mutilated monster crouching there. At once he realised that the Colonial had been right all along. This man was about to kill him. Desperately he searched around for something to defend himself with. There was nothing! All he could do was to try to reason with the man, for already he could hear the many feet pounding up the stairs.

  ‘It’s no use,’ he stuttered. ‘You haven’t a chance. Give up while you…’ his words trailed away. He could see that he wasn’t making any impression on the monster.

  Slowly, the blood still pouring from his wounded shoulder, the ‘Beast’ staggered towards the bed. He felt his life fluid ebbing out of him. Still he was animated by that great burning rage which had made him kill so many times before. The old man had to die! Nothing else mattered. Slowly he started to bring those huge hams of his down, as the General sat there as if mesmerised, his skinny old limbs tensed for what had to come.

  The ‘Beast’ mouthed obscenities, a red haze threatening to envelop him. His blood fell to the floor and on to the white fur rug in great red gobs. He staggered and seemed about to fall, but he recovered and continued advancing while the General watched him, the full horror of what was going to ha
ppen slowly revealing itself on his raddled face. ‘No, no!’ he cried suddenly as the ‘Beast’ reached out his hands, the hairy fingers searching for the GOC’s skinny neck. ‘NO, PLEASE!’

  Ginger burst through the door. He took in the scene immediately. ‘None o’ that there ’ere!’ he yelled and flung himself at the ‘Beast’, his cosh raised. The ‘Beast’ brushed him aside with one swipe of his left arm, which sent Ginger flying helplessly against the wardrobe. The glass splintered and the boxes on top of it showered down on Ginger, who lay there racked with pain.

  Billy Bennett, panting, his face red and lathered with sweat, followed. He raised his revolver. Behind him CPO Ferguson yelled urgently, ‘Put yon gun down, ye bluidy fool… ye might hit the General. Grab hold o’ him!’

  Billy, as big and as broad as the ‘Beast’, clubbed the revolver by the muzzle and rushed into the fight. The ‘Beast’ didn’t seem to even notice the blow that Billy slammed into his shoulder. He merely shook his head like a bull importuned in summer by a swarm of cheeky flies. ‘Christ,’ Billy cursed, ‘the man’s like a ruddy ox!’ He smashed his revolver down on the ‘Beast’s’ shaven skull.

  The ‘Beast’ roared with sudden rage. He forgot the General for a moment and lashed out with a fist like a small steam shovel. Billy went flying, blood spurting out in thick rich snorts from his shattered nose. CPO Ferguson reacted with surprising speed for such an old man. He yelled at the General. ‘Fall on the floor, sir. NOW – QUICK!’

  The General dropped instantly and in that same moment, CPO Ferguson fired. The impact of the slug at such short range flung the ‘Beast’ off his feet, as the bullet struck him directly in his face. The years of plastic surgery disintegrated in a flash. The nose flew off as did the artificial jaw. Abruptly a huge hole appeared in the centre of his face, filled with gore and broken bones which glistened like polished ivory against that scarlet background.

  Fighting his fate to the very last, the ‘Beast’ tried to struggle to his feet while the Englishmen watched in horrified fascination. He managed to raise himself on one knee, hectic sucking noises coming from the hole, which sank in and out every time he breathed. Then he gave a soft keening moan and pitched forwards, head first, dead before he touched the floor.

  For what seemed an age all of them froze, like bad actors at the end of an even worse melodrama, each man trapped by his own horror and sense of shock at this terrible sight. Then Smith spoke slowly in a voice that he hardly recognised as his own. He said, ‘Ferguson, help the General to his feet.’ Then to the General. ‘Perhaps you should cover yourself – or dress – before our authorities arrive to investigate.’

  ‘Thank you… thank you very much,’ the GOC replied in a very shaky voice. ‘I will do as you wish.’ With hands that trembled badly, he reached for his silk khaki shirt and, with some difficulty because he was shaking so much, pulled it over his head.

  While he did so, Smith went over to the inert body. With the toe of his shoe, for he didn’t trust himself to touch the dead killer, he turned him over so that that terrible face was hidden from view, feeling the hot, choking bile rise up in his throat as he did so.

  ‘Thank God you did that, Smithie,’ Dickie Bird said with feeling. ‘Couldn’t have stood that face much longer – or what’s left of it.’ He sighed. ‘Well, it’s all over now, I suppose.’ He looked at Smith and then at the General, busy climbing into his breeches. Smith nodded and Dickie said formally, ‘I think we ought to go now, sir.’

  The GOC paused, one skinny white leg halfway into the breeches. He thought of the girl still in the bathroom and said, ‘Yes, I think I’ll be all right now. Thank you again, gentlemen.’

  The two officers clicked to attention and a still groggy Ginger and Billy tried to do the same, after a threatening look had been shot in their direction by CPO Ferguson, who said, ‘Sir, I’ll ask the West Yorks to send up some of yon squaddies to clear up,’ he indicated the shattered body on the floor, and left the sentence unfinished.

  ‘Yes, I’d appreciate that, Petty Officer,’ the General said. ‘It is rather messy.’

  Nine

  She listened to the sound of their boots vanishing down into the hall, her handbag, with the pistol inside it, clutched in her hands tightly. What was she to do? She guessed that the killer had failed because she had just heard the General’s voice. He was still alive.

  She tried to calm herself and think clearly. The other English had seen her come in. But did they know she was still there? She was sure that the General wouldn’t have mentioned her presence. That would have been too embarrassing for him. But if she did what she now knew she had to do, how would she get away? There was a cordon of troops and police around the villa. She wouldn’t be able to sneak through them without being apprehended.

  Suddenly she remembered the Rolls Royce. They wouldn’t stop the General’s car. They’d assume that she had stayed after all and the chauffeur would be taking her home now, nice and discreetly.

  She bit her bottom lip as she tried to work out the problem. The chauffeur was dead, she was sure of that. The killer had been ordered to assassinate him, too, so that there would be no witness to her involvement in the assassination. Then her face lit up. Of course, that would be it.

  She’d put on the dead chauffeur’s cap and greatcoat. In the dim light of this rainswept night she’d pass as a man. Her own coat would be draped in the back of the Rolls, as if she were slumped in sleep there. That would be her escape route. She frowned again. But could she commit the murder, even if it was for the holy cause of the New Fatherland – and the future prosperity of the von Duckwitz family?

  Suddenly she realised that her role in the assassination of the General had been changed completely. As von Horn had planned it, she had been merely a tool, an auxiliary to the murderer. She would have dealt with the assassin and then would have vanished quietly into the obscurity of Switzerland for months, perhaps even years, while the great events in Germany took their course. She would not even have been a footnote in the history of the revolution to come. Now she had the opportunity to be a central character, a worthy successor to three hundred years of von Duckwitzs who had served first Prussia, then Imperial Germany with fame and honours heaped upon them.

  She looked at her own image in the mirror above the bath. Underneath all that beauty she saw the strong jaw and determined set of the face possessed by generations of her ancestors. She was one of them – and proud to be so.

  Now there was no going back, she told herself. She was alone in the house with the General. He would be easy meat for her.

  There was a gentle knock on the door of the bathroom. ‘Darling,’ the General enquired, ‘are you all right?’

  Swiftly she opened her purse and took out the little pearl-handled revolver. ‘Yes,’ she answered in that little girl’s voice that he liked. ‘Has something happened?’

  ‘Yes, I’m afraid there has been a little unpleasantness. Deuced rotten really. Spoiled our Saturday evening, what. But perhaps we can make up for it during the week.’

  ‘Of course, darling. You shall have some really special treatment next time.’ Softly, very softly so that he wouldn’t hear, she slipped off the safety catch and gripped the pistol more tightly.

  ‘Oh, I say,’ he chortled, the shock of what had just happened vanished now. ‘That’s dashed sporting of you, m’dear.’ He swallowed hard. ‘Something really special?’ he echoed.

  ‘Yes,’ she said through gritted teeth, reaching for the knob with her free hand. ‘You won’t be springing out of bed after that so quickly.’

  ‘Gosh!’ he breathed. ‘I can hardly wait. Pity that I’ll have to get you out now. But the police will be coming soon to clear up the mess and undoubtedly there’ll be questions and all that stuff. It’s much better that you’re out of the house by then. We don’t want any scandal, do we? Hopkins will take you home nice and discreetly.’

  She didn’t answer. She was concentrating totally on her task. Her knuckles whitened
as she gripped the little pistol even tighter. As soon as the door was opened, she’d fire. Immediately. There had to be no time to think – and hesitate. She took her own hand off the knob, changing her plan a little so that she had both hands available.

  ‘Why don’t you come in, General. I’m nearly dressed. But if you’d like to give me a goodbye kiss…’

  ‘My word,’ the General exclaimed in delight. ‘I don’t suppose that you’ve got your dress off and that you’re clad in your – er – frillies?’

  ‘I’m still in my underwear, General, if you would like a little peep before I finally get dressed.’

  ‘I’m coming in then,’ he quavered, hardly able to suppress his excitement, everything else forgotten. ‘Now!’

  The door handle started to turn. She waited there, pistol raised, hand holding it as steady as a rock.

  * * *

  McIntyre took it all in in a flash. The half-open door; the General with the look of a lecherous old goat on his raddled face; the outline of the girl in the bathroom mirror – and the gun she had levelled at the door.

  ‘Duck, sir!’ he roared at the General, reacting instinctively. He dare not use his revolver in case he hit the General. Instead, he used the only weapon at hand – his cap. With a savage jerk, he threw it at the woman. The cap, with its stiffened brim, hissed across the room like a discus… The girl yelped with pain as the brim, with the sharp-edged badge, caught her hill in the face. She staggered back, banged into the edge of the bath, overbalanced and fell backwards into it.

  On his knees at the door, the General caught what would be his last glimpse of those deliciously spread legs, with the patch of sheer black silk in between, barely hiding that source of all delight. Then McIntyre was through the door in a mad rush. He picked up the girl by the front of her dress. It ripped open and her breasts spilled out. The gun tumbled from her hand. Next moment he drew back his fist and slammed it hard into her pretty mouth. She went out like a light.