Sleeper agent, p.17
Sleeper Agent, page 17
He turned his back on her. “Ready to move out!” he shouted.
It was an impressive procession lined up on the grounds before the castle, facing the forest beginning nearby. At the head stood SS Major Helmuth, holding the eagerly straining Rolf on a tight leash. Behind them the column of “ PWs, shouldering spades, picks and shovels, led by Sergeant Winkler and guarded by the four MP’s. And bringing .up the rear the Engineer lieutenant and his detail of men, carrying ropes, axes and hoisting equipment.
The woman took it all in. The open derision on her heavy face had given way to uneasy apprehension. But the set of her jaw was still stubborn and firm.
Tom turned to her. “Well, Frau Peukert. Have you anything to say?”
She did not answer him. Stonyfaced she stared straight ahead.
He turned to the two soldiers flanking her. “Bring her along,” he ordered sharply.
Together he and Larry marched to the head of the column. Larry glanced at his partner. He looked faintly amused. “Curtain, act one,” he said. “On with the play!”
“With a cast of thousands.” Tom grinned. “I only hope they know how to deliver their lines!” They took up positions directly behind the Gestapo major and his dog.
“Major Helmuth,” Tom said. “Los!—Let’s go!”
At once the Gestapo officer dropped the long coiled leash from his hand, holding on only to the looped end of it, giving Rolf full rein. “Such!” he commanded urgently. “Such! Such!—Search! Search!”
With a small yelp of excitement, nose to the ground, Rolf took off. Zigzagging, he searched and sniffed the ground before them in ever widening loops. Suddenly he let out an eager bark, and tugging at the leash, he led his master toward the forest.
Falling in behind came Tom and Larry, the Peukert woman and her two guards, Winkler, the column of PW’s and their MP guards, and the Engineer Lieutenant with his detail of men, all half-trotting to keep up with the straining dog.
Through the forest wound the whole procession, following the convoluted zigzag track of the dog. Deeper and deeper in among the trees and brush. From time to time Rolf would yelp excitedly as he pulled on his leash in his efforts to leap ahead.
Tom gave the Peukert woman a quick glance. She seemed less sure of herself as they went on.
They were about four hundred yards into the woods when Rolf suddenly reared and barked sharply.
The major released him, and at once he streaked away on a tangent. But only a short distance. At the edge of a small clearing he stopped. Furiously he began to scratch and claw at the ground.
Helmuth ran to his dog. He clipped the leash back on his collar and held him off.
The Peukert woman had stopped dead in her tracks. She stood stock still, staring at the excited barking dog, her face deathly pale and drawn, her eyes wide in silent, incredulous terror.
Tom took her firmly by the arm. Like an automaton she walked with him. He led her to the spot on the ground that showed the scratch and claw marks of the Gestapo dog. She stared at the dog. Tom turned to the dazed woman. “Is there anything buried here?” he asked sharply.
She did not hear him.
He stepped in front of her. “Answer me!”
She shook her head. Whether in defiance or incredulity, he could not be sure. He grabbed a spade from one of the PWs. He shoved it at her. “Dig!”
She made no move. No sound. Her eyes, aghast, were riveted on Rolf.
The dog crouched before the woman, snarling and growling dangerously, deep in his throat. His ferocious eyes never left her. His bared fangs gleamed evilly above his dripping crimson tongue. Only the sturdy leash held by Helmuth kept him in check.
“Dig!” Tom repeated. “Or are you afraid of what you will find?”
The woman stood motionless, mesmerized, staring at the menacing dog as if she were looking at the devil himself.
Tom turned to Winkler. “Tell the prisoners to start digging,” he ordered. He looked gravely at the woman. “You have made your choice, Frau Peukert,” he said.
She shivered abruptly. She tore her gaze from the dog. She grabbed Tom’s arm. “Wait!” she cried. It was a sound of soul-tearing agony. “Wait!” Her voice was deeply shaken. Unreal. “Der Hund hat rechts!” she murmured. “The dog is right!”
He thrust his face close to hers. Razor-eyed, he glared at her, holding her. He shot his questions at her like staccato bursts from a machine gun. “There is something buried here?”
“Yes.”
“There are other burial places?”
“Yes.”
“You will show us where?”
“Yes.”
“How many?”
“One.”
He frowned. “Only one?”
“Yes. Most of the papers were burned. Only the most vital documents were buried.”
“Here?”
“No.”
“Where?”
She pointed.
“In the woods. That way.”
“What is buried here?”
She averted her eyes. “Only . . . personal belongings. The commandant’s personal belongings.”
He turned from her. “Sergeant Winkler,” he called. “Have the men fall in. We are moving on to another burial spot. Frau Peukert will lead us.” He turned to the woman. “On your way,” he ordered.
She seemed to sag a little. Her ruddy complexion had gone sickly gray, her defiant eyes lackluster. She was thoroughly cowed. She started off into the forest.
Tom walked at her side. He felt good. His scenario was working out beautifully. It was just as well that the Peukert woman had refused to dig at the hiding place where the commandant’s loot was buried, he thought. Only a foot down she would have unearthed the foot-long, arm-thick Bavarian sausage he’d placed there! The spicy strong-smelling sausage he’d liberated from Buter’s larder and spent half the night dragging all over God’s half acre, laying a trail for Rolf to follow, leading to the only place where he knew from Fräulein Ingeborg that something had been buried! The only place Rolf could possibly have found. The Gestapo dog had played his role like a real trouper.
The second burial spot was half a mile farther into the forest. Frau Peukert pointed wordlessly to a spot between two tall pine trees, and the PW’s went to work with their picks and shovels.
Grimly the woman watched the men dig into the loosely packed ground. She was deeply disturbed.
The enemy was unearthing a cache of documents never meant for eyes hostile to the Third Reich. She did not know the full import of the buried records. But she did know that their discovery by the Amis had to be reported at any cost, and she knew to whom. They would know what steps to take.
She knew what she must do. As soon as circumstances would permit.
An hour later a pit had been exposed, a deep square concrete shaft lined with tarpaper. In it rested three steel boxes, each twice the size of a footlocker.
Using their heavy ropes the Engineers brought up the top box. It was securely locked, and totally without markings. But on the lids of the two boxes remaining in the pit Tom could make out the flying eagle insignia of the Luftwaffe and the letters OKL—Oberkommando der Luftwaffe—Air Force High Command. The records of the Cornelius Luftwaffe project! The Collection and Evaluation of Information for Future War.
It was what he had come for. It was a whale of a haul! The unmarked box would be the records of the Schloss Ehrenstein school. He had the Engineers put it aside. It could wait. He was eager to take a look at the Luftwaffe documents.
Larry came up to him. Tom grinned broadly. “We pulled it off!” he exulted. “It was beautiful!” He laughed. “I’ll never forget the look on that Frau’s puss. It was worth the entire price of admission!”
“Wait till she finds out about the damned sausage,” Larry said. “She’ll split her gut! That was some trail you laid. Even I could smell it!”
Tom laughed. “I wonder how many other cases have been solved by a dog,” he said. “And a sausage! A Gestapo dog—and a Counter Intelligence sausage! A hell of a tough act to follow.” He turned back to watch the Engineers wrestle the Luftwaffe boxes from the pit.
The bone-rattling explosion slammed into him with numbing force, shooting searing lances of pain through his ears. He whirled around while the deadly thunder still hung in the acrid air.
The Schloss Ehrenstein documents box had been opened! It was a mass of seething flame. Tom rushed toward it. The whole infernal scene instantly etched itself indelibly on his mind.
Sgt. Winkler lay writhing on the ground near the blazing box. His clothing spurted white-hot flames in several places. His face was a glistening mask of crimson ooze. His hands suddenly burned with a searing pain. With a mind-wrenching effort he forced his eyes open. He brought his pain-torn hands up. He held them to his face. And he screamed.
There—were—no—hands. Only two bloody stumps spurting his life away. It was the last sight he ever saw.
In the same instant Tom saw Larry run to the fiery box. He saw him thrust his bare hands into the flames. He heard him bellow with raw pain. He saw him tear his hands away, clutching a sheef of burning papers. He saw him hurling them to the ground, stamping out the flames.
Tom was at Winkler’s side. He saw at once he could do nothing. For an instant he looked at the dead soldier. Winkler . . . Sergeant . . . a boy . . . of German descent.
He felt a sudden sharp stab of all-engulfing identification. Of German descent. Dead.
The boy had let curiosity get the better of him. He had been impatient. With a pickax he had forced the lock on the Schloss Ehrenstein box. But the documents it contained were never meant to fall into enemy hands. The Germans had guarded well against it. As the lock was broken and the lid pried open, a violent incendiary charge exploded, spewing jagged steel splinters and instantly setting ablaze the papers inside.
Tom ran to Larry. His partner was sitting on the ground, dazed, his hands held tightly in the pits of his arms, his face a drawn mask of agony.
Tom gently pulled Larry’s hands from their inadequate sanctuary. He gasped. The hands were horribly burned. Bits of the white phosphorous from the incendiary charge—hot enough to burn through steel—had been imbedded in the skin and seared away the flesh to the blackened bone. The fingers on both hands were distended, encased in charred crusts.
Tom gagged. “You—goddamned—fool,” he sobbed. His voice broke. He looked up. “Medic!” he shouted. “Medic, dammit! Medic!” He looked at Larry. His eyes smarted. It was not the smoke.
Larry numbly examined his mangled, disfigured hands. “I . . . didn’t count on that damned phosphorus,” he mumbled. “I guess . . . I guess I brought myself a Stateside ticket.” He looked up at Tom. “Winkler?” he asked.
“He bought it. All the way.”
Larry shivered. His face was growing ghostly pale. He was rapidly going into shock.
Two Engineers came running up.
“Get him back!” Tom snapped savagely. “Get him to an aid station, dammit! Get—” He stopped. He stood up and turned away. His throat was too tight for him to go on.
The Engineers hurried Larry away.
Tom watched the lieutenant and some of his men valiantly trying to get at the still blazing documents box. They managed to overturn it, spilling the contents out on the ground. They stamped on the papers furiously.
But it was too late. The incendiary bomb had done its job too well. There was nothing left but still smoldering ashes and black flakes of scorched and burned paper. Nothing Except—
His eyes sought the papers Larry had pulled from the fire. They were lying on the ground where he had thrown them. Perhaps three or four sheets, the edges seared and browned. Numbly he picked them up. They had been bought at a terrible price.
Standing rooted to the spot he stared at the top sheet:
GEHEIM GEHEIM GEHEIM
[Secret] [Secret] [Secret]
UNTERNEHMEN SCHWEIGEAGENT
[Operation] [Sleeper Agent]
PERSONALBOGEN
[Personal Dossier]
KESSLER, RUDOLF
RUDI A-27
Beneath the code name someone had written in a careful, meticulous hand,
KOKON
PART 3
30 APRIL-5 MAY 1945
7
Obersturmführer Rudolf Kessler glanced impatiently at his watch. He was surprised to see that the day had come to an end. It was just past midnight. Living underground gave little sense of passing time.
He was restless. He had been waiting tensely almost an hour outside Bormann’s private bunker office. He knew that when the door finally opened and he was called in, he would be facing the Reichsleiter himself—and the climax of the last few frantic days of briefing.
Time was running out. Too fast. The place was rife with rumors. They said that the Russians were only a mile away. They said they would reach the Führerbunker on May 1st or 2nd. They said that General Wenck’s rescue army was still expected any hour.
Everything seemed to have been speeded up. Crazily. Even time itself. Months flew like days.
He had not liked his stay in the bunker. He felt both physically and mentally entombed. Life around him had a nightmarish quality. It made him feel constantly uneasy. Yet, never before in his life had he felt so exhilarated, so keyed up, as he did at this very moment.
His briefing on KOKON was completed. He had been instructed in everything: his own specific orders, Reichsleiter Bormann’s personal plans, the innermost secrets of KOKON! He—knew.
He shifted uncomfortably on the bench. He watched the steady stream of grim people passing before him. The domed yellow ceiling lights gave an eerie, unnatural cast to the scene. It seemed to him as if all the Bonzen—all the big shots—in Germany were hurrying through the bunker corridors deep under the Reichschancellery. Generals, admirals, diplomats and ministers. Nazi officers of the highest ranks.
He felt a fierce pride surge through him. At this moment, he, Rudi Kessler, was more important than any one of them! Again he looked at his watch. It had been an eventful day. Before it was over it would surely be the most eventful day in his life.
Early in the morning the Führer had married Fräulein Eva Braun. The ceremony had taken place in the map-room of the Führer’s private quarters. Reichsleiter Bormann had been there, of course. Rudi had not been present at the modest champagne reception afterward, but later he had congratulated the Führer with the others. He was pleased. He liked the friendly, unpretentious Fräulein Eva.
The Reichsleiter had been occupied with urgent affairs all morning, and at noon three important officer couriers, .one of them Standartenführer Wilhelm Zander, Bormann’s personal aide, had left the bunker on a vital mission. It was rumored that they carried copies of the Führer’s personal and political testaments. He had been awed. Papers, he thought. Papers covered with the marks of the future.
Later in the afternoon he had played for a while with the Führer’s Alsatian dog, Blondi, and her new litter of puppies. One of them had been his special favorite. It had reminded him of Mausi. He frowned. That was ridiculous. Anyway, it was completely immaterial. The dog had been ordered put to sleep.
Dr. Haase had given her poison while she was quietly nursing her four pups. She died almost instantaneously. So fast that her puppies were still trying to suckle her in death. Standartenführer Günsche, the Führer’s personal bodyguard, carried her body in a box to the garden above be buried. There he shot the pups, one by one, still clinging to their mother’s teats.
It was too bad, he thought unemotionally. But since the order had been given to do it, it was obviously necessary.
In the evening, while the Führer had been in conference with his military leaders, some appalling news had reached the bunker. Reichsleiter-SS Heinrich Himmler had turned traitor! He had made an offer to the Anglo-American High Command to surrender Germany! Himmler! That back-stabbing Schweinehund!
And if that was not enough, only a few hours ago the Führer had finally received the delayed report that Mussolini and his mistress, Clara Petacci, had been caught by partisan terrorists the day before. They had been executed, their bodies desecrated and barbarously strung up by their heels. The news had depressed everyone. An ignoble end for such a valiant leader. A friend of the Führer himself.
He took a deep breath. He glanced toward the closed door.
An eventful day. A time of critical decisions. Momentous tasks. He, Rudi Kessler, was living history that would never die. But it all paled in his mind when he contemplated his own mission, yet to be carried out! KOKON.
The door to Bormann’s office suddenly opened.
Rudi had expected to see Bormann’s secretary, Fräulein Else Krüger, “Krügerchen—Little Krüger"—as she was affectionately called by the Reichsleiter’s staff.
The man standing in the doorway was familiar to him. It was the’ civilian who had examined him at Schloss Ehrenstein, Brigadeführer Arnold. This time he wore his SS general’s uniform. He motioned Rudi to enter.
Reichsleiter Martin Bormann sat in stocky stolidity behind his massive desk, brought down into the bunker from his offices in the Reichschancellery above. His arms were folded across his chest, the swastika armband prominent on his simple uniform. He was not an impressive man.
Rudi always felt a twinge of disillusion when he saw the Reichsleiter in person. But it was just that. A fleeting thought. He knew that Bormann’s mind was the sharpest, the most cunning in Germany. He knew him to be the true heir of the Führer himself.
Arnold took his place at the side of the Reichsleiter. He placed his uniform cap on the desk: Rudi glanced at it Once before—how long ago?—he had stood before a desk staring at the death’s-head emblem on a black peaked SS uniform cap.
The meaning of the skull and crossbones flashed through his mind. “Obedience and loyalty to the Führer and to one another unto the grave and beyond!” It had been the credo of the ancient Teuton knights. He believed in it.
