The Leader And The Damned (62 page)

'What do the Met geniuses predict this time?'

'A complete clearing of the weather in twenty-four hours from now. A cloudless day tomorrow. Positively no snow. No "ifs" or "buts" and their report is in writing,' Schmidt replied.

'You twisted their arms, you must have done! Are. Stoerner's paratroopers standing by?'

'Men and machines are ready for the air-drop when you give the word...'

'What would I do without you, my dear Schmidt?' 'Have a nervous breakdown...'

Jaeger threw back his head and roared with laughter. This rapport between senior officer and subordinate had been built up slowly, in the great campaign of '40 in France; during the terrible ordeals on the Eastern front. The Colonel's expression became grave again...'

'It's going to be a race against time, you realize that?'

'I don't quite follow you, sir...'

'That fine weather, if it materializes. Perfect for our parachute drop, but-perfect also for the British to land a plane on that plateau to take out Lindsay. And God knows we have had enough rumours of an imminent airlift. From inside Fitzroy Maclean's headquarters, from other sources. Oh, I've decided to go in with the paratroopers myself. Long time ago since I dangled from a 'chute...'

'For God's sake, sir. After Kursk you were going to be invalided out of the Army. You remember what that doctor told you in Munich.'

'That I should only do what I felt like doing. I feel like dropping in on Wing Commander Lindsay. Inform Stoerner one more parachute will be required.'

`Two more. I took the same course with you at Langheim.'

'Now listen to me, Schmidt.' Jaeger's tone was grave. 'I've a premonition about this operation. You have a wife and two children...'

'Like yourself. I've carried out every order you've ever given me. Don't make me guilty of insubordination now...'

'Oh, hell - have it your own way,' Jaeger growled.

As Schmidt left the room to 'phone Stoerner, he sat down at a desk and took a sheet of notepaper from a drawer. It took him some time to compose the letter to his wife. He had always hated correspondence.

Dear Magda, We've had a marvellous life together. And all thanks to you, for your infinite kindness and consideration. I am writing on the eve of a somewhat difficult business we have to undertake. I wouldn't like you to suffer a shock if they send one of those bald official communications...

'Signal just came in,' Reader told Lindsay. 'It's the green light. Plane lands tomorrow at 1100 hours, subject always to the ruddy weather changing...'

'Christ, it's snowing. Are they mad?'

'Clear day forecast for tomorrow. And our weather's coming in from the west - over the Adriatic from Italy, so they should know.' Reader sounded buoyant. 'My God, inside twenty-four hours we could be out of the bloody Balkans forever. Promise myself one thing. I'm never coming back to this hell-hole.'

He looked up as Paco strolled over to join them. She wore a camouflage jacket, a heavy woollen skirt and knee-length boots. Her blonde hair was neatly brushed and she carried Reader's sten gun in her right hand. He had shown her how to use it.

'Care to come for a walk, lady?' Reader suggested chirpily. 'Get the old circulation moving.'

'All right. How are you feeling this morning, Lindsay?'

'I'm OK.'

He watched her walk away across the plateau with Reader, so close together they were almost touching. His expression was bleak, bitter. He had been standing, holding his stick. He was mobile now, his temperature was back to normal. Under the ministrations of Dr Macek the glandular fever had been brought under control.

Their relationship with the Partisans had radically altered over the months they had fought with the group, constantly fleeing from the Germans, evading Jaeger's attempts to trap them. Often by the skin of their teeth.

Reader, still playing the role of Cockney sergeant, still wisely concealing his real rank and Intelligence background, was largely responsible for the change. He no longer hid his transmitter, which he lugged from place to place. He had engaged the aggressive Heljec in a number of verbal battles and had won.

'If you want the guns and the ammo,' he had persisted time and again, 'you must co-operate with my people. Lindsay, myself, Paco - if she wants to leave - have to be flown out. Hartmann, too. The plane that takes us out brings in the guns.'

Reader had lost track of the weeks, months, the argument had raged in the quiet times. Haggle, haggle. It was the way of life in the Balkans. He had thrown in Hartmann as a bargaining counter, intending to sacrifice the German at the right moment. That had precipitated a violent struggle with both Lindsay and Paco.

'Hartmann has been very kind to me,' Paco told Reader. 'He must have a place on the plane.'

'He's a Jerry,' Reader told her. 'Heljec won't wear it — and what's all the fuss about, anyway...'

'Gustav Hartmann is coming with us,' Lindsay intervened. 'And that's an order. Don't forget I outrank you, Major...'

'And who's organizing this how's-your-father?' Reader had exploded. 'Spendin' 'arf me bloody life arguing the toss with this bandit. You know what his latest demand is? Mortars and bombs, for Christ's sake. He'll be lucky...'

'Hartmann is Abwehr,' Lindsay said quietly. 'Your people are going to be very interested in grilling him...'

'It's not on! It's not part of my instructions...'

'It's part of mine.' Lindsay's tone was clipped. 'I don't have to give you a reason. It just so happens that he's anti-Nazi. I've been talking to him...'

'Anti-Nazi!' Reader snorted. 'All the bleeders will be when the chips are down.'

'That's enough. I'm giving you a direct order. Hai !Alarm is part of the deal. It's up to you to fix it. That's why you were sent here. Make Heljec give way or I'll take over the negotiations myself.'

'If you say so.
Wing Commander!
'

Lindsay had deliberately concealed the fact that Hartmann also was an invaluable witness to the extraordinary conditions prevailing at the Wolf's Lair. On the morning before the plane was expected, as Paco wandered off with Reader, Hartmann appeared and joined Lindsay.

'Those two seem to be developing a relationship,' Hartmann observed as he perched on a rock next to Lindsay.

'I'm not blind...'

'Get her out of your system,' the German advised. 'A woman is an unpredictable creature. Falling in love with someone who will never love you is worse than Gestapo torture. It lasts longer..'

'She's got into my bloodstream...'

`Then I'm very sorry for you.'

Hartmann tamped tobacco from his pouch into his pipe and lit it with enormous satisfaction. He rationed himself to one pipe a day now. Paco had brought him a fresh supply taken by a Partisan off a dead German. At the time Hartmann had thought, what things we'll do to satisfy our cravings!

'The plane is due tomorrow,' Lindsay said suddenly.

'I rather thought so. I saw them clearing rocks from the airstrip over there. It doesn't seem possible. In this weather.'

He brushed flakes from the shoulder of his jacket. Snow fell gently, flecking the ground cleared for the airstrip. It was cold - but the raw, biting wind of recent days had dropped.

'A clear, sunny day is forecast for tomorrow,' Lindsay said.

'Which might coincide with a fresh attack by Jaeger. Our persistent Colonel has been too quiet recently.'

'Heljec has made all his dispositions. All approaches to the plateau up the ravines are guarded. Heljec may not be worried about us but he does want those sten guns.'

'I saw you writing again in your diary, huddled under a rock before Reader spoilt your day.'

Lindsay produced his black, leather-bound book from inside his jacket, keeping it closed to protect it from the drifting flakes. He balanced it in his hand and looked at Hartmann with a grim expression.

'I've been scribbling away for weeks, as you know. Everything's there. Our suspicions about the second Hitler at the Wolf's Lair. Your conclusions as to the identity of the Soviet spy. Then if anything happens to me this simply has to get to London and they will know...'

'Don't sound so doomed...'

'It really doesn't matter whether I get through or not. That's being realistic. The diary must get through. And it would help if you got through with it. There is a first-class seat booked on the plane for you..

'Thank you...'

Hartmann puffed at his pipe which no longer tasted so good. He was disturbed by Lindsay's attitude, the sense of fatalism in the RAF officer he detected. And all the time they had talked, Lindsay had been watching the two small silhouettes walking slowly round the plateau. Paco and Reader.

NDA OK QSR5 NDA OK QSR5..

Seconds later Meyer, listening at the Dresden Monitoring Centre with Walter Schellenberg opposite him, recorded a series of five letters and five figures. They provided the agreed code.

'Now,' said Meyer, 'we switch from the 43-metre band, which
The Ghost
uses only for the call sign, to the 39-metre band. That's the wavelength on which they transmit the main signal...'

Meyer had cracked Lucy's system.

It had taken months of patient experimentation but the peacetime watchmaker had persisted. Schellenberg's shrewd eyes gleamed with triumph as he leaned forward, a pair of headphones over his ears.

Ten minutes later the transmission Meyer was recording ended. It was the night before Jaeger was due to launch his airborne attack on the plateau in Bosnia. Schellenberg removed his headphones, stood up, reached an arm across the table and shook hands with Meyer.

'You are a genius. You will go down in history. You know this, I hope?'

'I have just done my job.'

'And the mobile monitoring station at Strasbourg..

The 'phone inside the glass cubicle rang. Meyer reached for the instrument and nodded to Schellenberg.

'This will be them, I suspect. They're very quick …'

He identified himself, nodded again to Schellenberg, listening with only the occasional comment.

'Again? As on previous occasions. You're quite sure?'

He thanked the caller profusely, a point Schellenberg did not miss. The chief of the SD - SS Intelligence - never did miss a point. Meyer, always so modest, had trouble concealing his satisfaction.

'Strasbourg has pinpointed the location of
The Ghost
for the fourth time. It is Switzerland. It is Lucerne.'

'I've got him! Masson of the Swiss Intelligence.' Schellenberg shook his head in reluctant awe at the audacity of his Swiss opposite number. 'He is permitting a secret transmitter to send signals to the Soviets. We know it's the Soviets...'

'Because they always use five letters and five figures for the code,' Meyer interjected.

'Exactly! After all these months!' Schellenberg couldn't keep still. It was this uninhibited and infectious enthusiasm he displayed which partly explained his popularity with subordinates. 'Now I can break Masson! Compel him to reveal the identity of the Soviet spy at the Wolf's Lair! We may be in time to change the outcome of the whole war.'

It was typical of Schellenberg that he talked openly to Meyer about the most closely guarded state secrets. Meyer was completely trustworthy. By sharing his confidence Schellenberg gained his subordinate's total loyalty, his incredible application to his task.

'I gambled on this fourth confirmation,' Schellenberg continued. 'I have already made an appointment to meet Masson within hours inside Switzerland...'

'They will let you across the border?'

Meyer was astounded. Technically it was a gross violation of Switzerland's precious neutrality which that country preserved in a way a girl protects her virginity.

'I travel incognito,' Schellenberg explained with a flamboyant flourish. 'There have been previous visits. Now, I must leave Dresden immediately. Brigadier Roger Masson, I am coming...' Snow was falling heavily as he hurried from the building.

It was ten o'clock at night in Zagreb when Jaeger heard from the guard-room downstairs in the old villa that Karl Gruber of the Gestapo was waiting to see him.