To Catch a King
Authors: Jack Higgins
TO CATCH A KING
Jack Higgins
Open Road Integrated Media
New York
For my daughter, Sarah, from one unashamed romantic to another . . .
CONTENTS
PROLOGUE
I
n July 1940, Walter Schellenberg, SS BrigadeFührer and Major General of Police, was ordered by Hitler to proceed to Lisbon to kidnap the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, then staying in a villa at Estoril after fleeing the German occupation of France. This story is an attempt to recreate events surrounding that astonishing episode. Most of it is documented historical fact although certain sections must obviously be a matter of conjecture. The person who emerges from the whole bizarre affair with the most credit is the Duke of Windsor himself. This book is a tribute to a gallant and honorable gentleman.
J
ust after midnight, it started to rain and the Portuguese policeman brought a cape from his sentry box and placed it around her shoulders without a word.
It was quite cold now and she walked a few paces along the road to keep warm, pausing to look back across the mouth of the Tagus to where the lights of Lisbon gleamed in the distance.
A long way; not as far as Berlin or Paris or Madrid, but she was here now, finally, outside the pink stucco villa at Estoril. The final end of things, more tired than she had ever been in her life before, and suddenly, she wanted it to be over.
She walked back to the policeman at the gate. “Please,” she said in English. “How much longer? I've been here almost an hour.”
Which was foolish because he didn't understand her. There was the sound of a car coming up the hill, headlights flashed across the mimosa bushes, and a black Mercedes braked to a halt a few yards away.
The man who got out of the rear was large and powerfully built. He was bareheaded and wore glasses, and his hands were pushed into the pockets of a dark mackintosh.
He said something briefly in Portuguese to the policeman, then turned to the girl. His English was quite excellent.
“Miss Winter, isn't it? Miss Hannah Winter?”
“Yes, that's right.”
“Could I see your passport?”
She got it out quickly, her hands fumbling in the cold so that the cape slipped from her shoulders. He replaced it for her politely, then took the passport.
“So—an American citizen.”
“Please,” she said, a hand on his sleeve. “I must see the Duke. It's a matter of the gravest urgency.”
He looked down at her calmly for a moment, then nodded to the policeman, who started to open the gate. The car rolled forward. He held the door for her. She climbed inside. He followed.
With a sudden burst of power, the Mercedes jumped forward, the driver swinging on the wheel, taking them around in a circle and back down the hill toward Lisbon.
She had been thrown into the corner and now he pulled her upright roughly and switched on the light. He was still clutching her passport.
“Hannah Winter—American citizen? I think not.” He tore it apart and flung it into the corner. “Now this, I think, would be a much more accurate description.”
The passport he pushed into her hands was German. She opened it in fascinated horror. The picture that stared out at her was her own.
“Fräulein Hannah Winter,” he said. “Born in Berlin on November the ninth, nineteen-eighteen. Do you deny this?”
She closed the passport and pushed it back at him, fighting to control her panic. “My name is Hannah Winter but I am an American citizen. The American Embassy will confirm this.”
“The Reich does not acknowledge the right of its citizens to change nationalities to suit their inclinations. You were born a German. I confidently predict you will die one.”
The streets were deserted and they drove very fast, so that already they were into the city and moving down toward the river.
He said, “An interesting city, Lisbon. To get into any foreign embassy it's necessary to pass through a Portuguese police checkpoint. So, if you'd tried to get into either the British or American Embassies, we would still have got you.”
She said, “I don't understand. When I asked to be admitted the man on the gate said he'd have to check with headquarters.”
“It's simple. The Portuguese police have accepted an extradition warrant to be served on Hannah Winter on a charge of murder—murder three times over. In fact, they've agreed to expedite the matter.”
“But you—you're not the police.”
“Oh, but we are. Not the Portuguese variety, but something rather more interesting.” He was speaking in German now. “Sturmbannführer Kleiber of the Berlin office of the Gestapo. My colleague, Sturmscharführer Gunter Sindermann.”
It was like something out of a nightmare, and yet the tiredness she felt was overwhelming so that nothing seemed to matter any more.
“What happens now?” she asked, dully.
Kleiber switched off the light so that they were in darkness again. “Oh, we'll take you home,” he said. “Back to Berlin. Don't worry. We'll look after you.”
His hand was on her knee, sliding up over the silk stocking to her thigh.
It was his biggest single mistake, for the disgust his actions engendered galvanized her into life again. She fumbled for the handle of the door, holding her breath as his hand moved higher. The Mercedes slowed to allow a water cart to pass. She shoved Kleiber away with all her strength, pushed open the door, and scrambled into the darkness, losing her balance, rolling over twice.
The shock effect was considerable, and when she got to her feet she had to lean against the wall for a moment. The Mercedes had pulled up farther along the street and started to reverse. She had lost one of her shoes, but there was nothing to be done about that. She kicked off the other, plunged into the nearest alley, and started to run.
A few moments later, she emerged on to the waterfront. It was still raining heavily and a considerable fog rolled in from the Tagus and street lamps were few and far between. There seemed to be no shops, no houses, simply tall gaunt warehouses rising into the night.
As the fog closed in around her, it was as if she was the only person in the world, and then she heard the sound of her pursuers echoing between the walls of the alley behind her.
She started to run again, lightly in stockinged feet. She was cold—very cold—and then a light appeared dimly in the fog on the other side of the street backing onto the river. A red neon sign said
Joe Jackson's
and underneath
American Bar.
She hurried across, filled with desperate hope, but there was no light inside and the glass doors were locked. She rattled them furiously in helpless rage. There was a wharf at the side of the building, another door with a light above it marked
Stage.
She tried that too, hammering on it with her fists, and then Kleiber ran around the corner, a Luger in his left hand.
“I'll teach you,” he said softly. “Little Jewish bitch.”
As Sindermann arrived she turned and ran along the wharf into the fog.
Joe Jackson had dark, wavy hair, pale face, hazelgreen eyes, and a slight, ironic quirk that seemed to permanently lift the corner of his mouth. The weary, detached smile of a man who had found life more corrupt than he had hoped.
He always closed Mondays. For one thing, it gave everyone a night off and for another, there was little trade to be had at the beginning of the week. It gave him a chance at the books in peace and quiet, which was what he was doing when Hannah first rattled the front door.
A drunk, he thought, looking for another drink, and returned to his accounts. A moment later, he heard her at the side door. He was aware of a murmur of voices and then a sharp cry. He opened the right-hand drawer of the desk and took out a Browning automatic, got to his feet, and moved out of the office quickly.
He was wearing a navy blue sweater, dark slacks. A small man, no more than five feet five or six, with good shoulders.
He unlocked the stage door and stood, listening. There was a choked cry from farther along the wharf. He went forward, taking his time, silent on rope-soled sandals.
There was a lamp on a pole at the end of the wharf. In its light, he saw Hannah Winter on her back. Sindermann crouched over her body. Kleiber stood above them, still holding the Luger.
“And now, Miss Winter,” he said in English. “A lesson in manners.”
“I don't think so,” Jackson called softly.
He shot Kleiber in the left forearm, driving him back against the rail, the Luger jumping into the dark waters below.
Kleiber made no sound—simply stood there, gripping his arm, waiting for what was to come.
Hannah Winter, still pinned beneath Sindermann's weight, gazed up at Jackson blankly. He tapped the German on the back of the head with the barrel of the Browning.
Sindermann stood up and raised his hands. There was no fear on his face, simply a sullen rage. Jackson helped the girl to her feet. For the briefest of moments his attention was diverted as she sagged against him. Sindermann charged, head down.
Jackson swung the girl to one side and stuck out a foot. Sindermann tripped and continued headfirst over the rail. They could hear him floundering about in the water below.
Jackson had an arm about her again. “You all right?”
“I am now,” she said.
He gestured with the Browning at Kleiber, who stood waiting, blood oozing between his fingers. “What about this one?”
“Let him go.”
“No police?”
“It's not a police matter,” she said wearily.
Jackson nodded to Kleiber. “You heard the lady.”
The German turned and walked away rapidly. Jackson pushed the Browning in his belt at the small of his back and picked her up in both arms.
“Okay, angel, let's get you inside.”
She stood under the hot shower for twenty minutes before toweling herself dry and putting on the robe he'd given her. The apartment was on the third floor at the rear of the club and overlooked the river. It was neat and functional and sparingly furnished, with little evidence of any belongings of real personal worth. The present resting place of a man who had kept on the move for most of his life.
The sliding windows stood open and she found him standing on the broad wooden veranda, a drink in one hand, looking out over the river. A foghorn sounded somewhere in the distance as a ship moved out to sea.
She shivered. “The loneliest sound in the world.”
“Trains,” he said gravely. “According to Thomas Wolfe. But let me get you a cognac. You look as if you could do with it.”
His voice was good Boston American. “Where are you from?” she asked.
“Cape Cod. Fishing village called Wilton. A long, long time ago.” He handed her the cognac. “And you?”
“New York, although it's a matter of dispute in some quarters,” she said and sipped a little of the cognac.
He lit a cigarette. “Those friends of yours out there? You said it wasn't police business.”
“True,” she said. “You see, they are police. A variety peculiar to the Third Reich, known as the Gestapo.”
He was no longer smiling now. He closed the window and turned to face her.
“You're Joe Jackson, aren't you?”
“That's right, but we've never met.”
“No,” she said. “But I know all about you. My name is Hannah Winter. I'm a singer. Born in Berlin, but my parents took me to America when I was two years old. I returned to Berlin to sing at my uncle Max's club two months ago. You know a piano player called Connie Jones?”
Jackson smiled. “I certainly do. He's in Madrid at the Flamenco with his trio right now. Due to appear here next week.”
“A fortnight ago, he was backing me at my uncle's place in Berlin. The Garden Room. He was the one who told me about the great Joe Jackson who runs the best American bar in Lisbon. Who fought with the International Brigade in Spain and flew fighters against the Nazi Condor Legion.”