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‘Nothing?’ Ritter thought. ‘Can it be truly possible this clown realizes what he is saying or is he as touched by madness as his masters?’
The car ramp was wrecked, but there was still room to take the field car inside. As they stopped, an SS sentry moved out of the gloom. The sergeant waved him away and turned to Ritter. ‘If you will follow me, please. First, we must report to Major-General Mohnke.’
Ritter removed his leather military greatcoat and handed it to Hoffer. Underneath, the black Panzer uniform was immaculate, the decorations gleamed. He adjusted his gloves. The sergeant was considerably impressed and drew himself stiffly to attention as if aware that this was a game they shared and eager to play his part.
‘If the Sturmbannführer is ready?’
Ritter nodded, the sergeant moved off briskly and they followed him down through a dark passage with concrete walls that sweated moisture in the dim light. Soldiers crouched in every available inch of space, many of them sleeping, mainly SS from the looks of things. Some glanced up with weary, lacklustre eyes that showed no surprise, even at Ritter’s bandbox appearance.
When they talked, their voices were low and subdued and the main sound seemed to be the monotonous hum of the dynamos and the whirring of the electric fans in the ventilation system. Occasionally, there was the faintest of tremors as the earth shook high above them and the air was musty and unpleasant, tainted with sulphur.
Major-General Mohnke’s office was as uninviting as everything else Ritter had seen on his way down through the labyrinth of passageways. Small and spartan with the usual concrete walls, too small even for the desk and chair and the half a dozen officers it contained when they arrived. Mohnke was an SS Brigadeführer who was now commander of the Adolf Hitler Volunteer Corps, a force of 2,000 supposedly handpicked men who were to form the final ring of defence around the Chancellery.
He paused in full flight as the immaculate Ritter entered the room. Everyone turned, the sergeant saluted and placed Ritter’s orders on the desk. Mohnke looked at them briefly, his eyes lit up and he leaned across the table, hand outstretched.
‘My dear Ritter, what a pleasure to meet you.’ He reached for the telephone and said to the others, ‘Sturmbannführer Ritter, gentlemen, hero of that incredible exploit near Innsbruck that I was telling you about.’
Most of them made appropriate noises, one or two shook hands, others reached out to touch him as if for good luck. It was a slightly unnerving experience and he was glad when Mohnke replaced the receiver and said, ‘General Fegelein tells me the Führer wishes to see you without delay.’ His arm swung up dramatically in a full party salute. ‘Your comrades of the SS are proud of you, Sturmbannführer. Your victory is ours.’
‘Am I mad or they, Erich?’ Ritter whispered as they followed the sergeant ever deeper into the bunker.
‘For God’s sake, Major.’ Hoffer put a hand briefly on his arm. ‘If someone overhears that kind of remark …’
‘All right, I’ll be good,’ Ritter said soothingly. ‘Lead on, Erich. I can’t wait to see what happens in the next act.’
They descended now to the lower levels of the Führerbunker itself. A section which, although Ritter did not know it then, housed most of the Führer’s personal staff as well as Goebbels and his family, Bormann and Dr Ludwig Stumpfegger, the Führer’s personal physician. General Fegelein had a room adjacent to Bormann’s.
It was similar to Mohnke’s – small with damp, concrete walls and furnished with a desk, a couple of chairs and a filing cabinet. The desk was covered with military maps which he was studying closely when the sergeant opened the door and stood to one side.
Fegelein looked up, his face serious, but when he saw Ritter, laughed excitedly and rushed round the desk to greet him. ‘My dear Ritter, what an honour – for all of us. The Führer can’t wait, I assure you.’
Such enthusiasm was a little too much, considering that Ritter had never clapped eyes on the man before. Fegelein was a one-time commander of SS cavalry, he knew that, awarded the Knight’s Cross, so he was no coward – but the handshake lacked firmness and there was sweat on the brow, particularly along the thinning hairline. This was a badly frightened man, a breed with which Ritter had become only too familiar over the past few months.
‘An exaggeration, I’m sure, General.’
‘And you, too, Sturmscharführer.’ Fegelein did not take Hoffer’s hand but nodded briefly. ‘A magnificent performance.’
‘Indeed,’ Ritter said dryly. ‘He was, after all, the finger on the trigger.’
‘Of course, my dear Ritter, we all acknowledge that fact. On the other hand …’
Before he could take the conversation any further the door opened and a broad, rather squat man entered the room. He wore a nondescript uniform. His only decoration was the Order of Blood, a much-coveted Nazi medal specially struck for those who had served prison sentences for political crimes in the old Weimar Republic. He carried a sheaf of papers in one hand.
‘Ah, Martin,’ Fegelein said. ‘Was it important? I have the Führer’s orders to escort this gentleman to him the instant he arrived. Sturmbannführer Ritter, hero of Wednesday’s incredible exploit on the Innsbruck road. Reichsleiter Bormann you of course know, Major.’
But Ritter did not, for Martin Bormann was only a name to him, as he was to most Germans – a face occasionally to be found in a group photo of party dignitaries, but nothing memorable about it. Not a Goebbels or a Himmler – once seen, never forgotten.
And yet here he was, the most powerful man in Germany, particularly now that Himmler had absconded. Reichsleiter Martin Bormann, head of the Nazi Party Chancellery and Secretary to the Führer.
‘A great pleasure, Major.’ His handshake was firm with a hint of even greater strength there if necessary.
He had a harsh, yet strangely soft voice, a broad, brutal face with Slavic cheekbones, a prominent nose. The impression was of a big man, although Ritter found he had to look down on him.
‘Reichsleiter.’
‘And this is your gunner, Hoffer.’ Bormann turned to the sergeant-major. ‘Quite a marksman, but then I sometimes think you Harz mountain men cut your teeth on a shotgun barrel.’
It was the first sign from anyone that Hoffer was more than a cypher, an acknowledgement of his existence as a human being, and it could not fail to impress Ritter, however reluctantly.
Bormann opened the door and turned to Fegelein. ‘My business can wait. I’ll see you downstairs anyway. I, too, have business with the Führer.’
He went out and Fegelein turned to the two men. Ritter magnificent in the black uniform, Hoffer somehow complementing the show with his one-piece camouflage suit, sleeves rolled up to the elbow. It couldn’t be better. Just the sort of fillip the Führer needed.
Bormann’s sleeping quarters were in the Party Chancellery Bunker, but his office, close to Fegelein’s, was strategically situated so that he was able to keep the closest of contacts with Hitler. One door opened into the telephone exchange and general communication centre, the other to Goebbels’s personal office. Nothing, therefore, could go in to the Führer or out again without the Reichsleiter’s knowledge, which was exactly as he had arranged the situation.
When he entered his office directly after leaving Fegelein, he found SS-Colonel Willi Rattenhuber, whose services he had utilized as an additional aide to Zander since 30 March, leaning over a map on the desk.
‘Any further word on Himmler?’ Bormann asked.
‘Not as yet, Reichsleiter.’
‘The bastard is up to something, you may depend on it, and so is Fegelein. Watch him, Willi – watch him closely.’
‘Yes, Reichsleiter.’
‘And there’s something else I want you to do, Willi. There’s a Sturmbannführer named Ritter of the 502nd SS Heavy Tank Battalion on his way down now to receive the Swords from the Führer. When you get a moment, I want his records – everything you can find on him.’
‘Reichsleiter.’
‘That’s what I like about you, Willi, you never ask questions.’ Bormann clapped him on the arm. ‘And now, we’ll go down to the garden bunker and I’ll show him to you. I think you’ll approve. In fact I have a happy feeling that he may serve my purpose very well indeed.’
In the garden bunker was the Führer’s study, a bedroom, two living rooms and a bathroom. Close by was the map room used for all high-level conferences. The hall outside served as an anteroom, and it was there that Ritter and Hoffer waited.
Bormann paused at the bottom of the steps and held Rattenhuber back in the shadows. ‘He looks well, Willi, don’t you agree? Quite magnificent in that pretty uniform with the medals gleaming, the pale face, the blond hair. Uncle Heini would have been proud of him: all that’s fairest in the Aryan race. Not like us at all, Willi. He will undoubtedly prove a shot in the arm for the Führer. And notice the slight, sardonic smile on his mouth. I tell you there’s hope for this boy, Willi. A young man of parts.’
Rattenhuber said hastily, ‘The Führer comes now, Reichsleiter.’
Ritter, standing there at the end of a line of half a dozen young boys in the uniform of the Hitler Youth, felt curiously detached. It was rather like one of those dreams in which everything has an appearance of reality, yet events are past belief. The children on his right hand, for instance. Twelve or thirteen, here to be decorated for bravery. The boy next to him had a bandage round his forehead, under the heavy man’s helmet. Blood seeped through steadily, and occasionally the child shifted his feet as if to prevent himself falling.
‘Shoulders back,’ Ritter said softly. ‘Not long now.’ And then the door opened. Hitler moved out flanked by Fegelein, Jodl, Keitel and Krebs, the new Chief of the Army General Staff.
Ritter had seen the Führer on several occasions in his life. Speaking at Nuremberg rallies, Paris in 1940, on a visit to the Eastern Front in 1942. His recollection of Hitler had been of an inspired leader of men, a man of magical rhetoric whose spell could not fail to touch anyone within hearing distance.
But the man who shuffled into the anteroom now might have been a totally different person. This was a sick old man, shoulders hunched under the uniform jacket that seemed a size too large, pale, hollow-cheeked, no sparkle in the lack-lustre eyes, and when he turned to take from the box Jodl held the first Iron Cross Second Class, his hand trembled.
He worked his way along the line, muttering a word or two of some sort of encouragement here and there, patting an occasional cheek, and then reached Ritter and Hoffer.
Fegelein said, ‘Sturmbannführer Karl Ritter and Sturmscharführer Erich Hoffer of the 502nd SS Heavy Tank Battalion.’ He started to read the citation. ‘Shortly after dawn on the morning of Wednesday, April 25th …’ but the Führer cut him off with a chopping motion of one hand.
There was fire in the dark eyes now, a sudden energy as he snapped his fingers impatiently for Jodl to pass the decoration. Ritter stared impassively ahead, aware of the hands touching him lightly, and then, for the briefest of moments, they tightened on his arm.
He looked directly into the eyes, aware of the power, the burning intensity, there again if only for a moment, the hoarse voice saying, ‘Your Führer thanks you, on behalf of the German people.’
Hitler turned. ‘Are you aware of this officer’s achievement, gentlemen? Assisted by only two other tanks, he wiped out an entire British column of the 7th Armoured Division. Thirty armoured vehicles left blazing. Can you hear that and still tell me that we cannot win this war? If one man can do so much what could fifty like him accomplish?’
They all shifted uncomfortably. Krebs said, ‘But of course, my Führer. Under your inspired leadership anything is possible.’
‘Goebbels must have written that line for him,’ Bormann whispered to Rattenhuber. ‘You know, Willi, I’m enjoying this, and look at our proud young Sturmbannführer. He looks like Death himself with that pale face and black uniform, come to remind us all of what waits outside these walls. Have you ever read “Masque of the Red Death” by the American writer Poe?’
‘No, I can’t say that I have, Reichsleiter.’
‘You should, Willi. An interesting parallel on the impossibility of locking out reality for long.’
An orderly clattered down the steps, brushed past Bormann and Rattenhuber and hesitated on seeing what was taking place. Krebs, who obviously recognized the man, moved to one side and snapped his fingers. The orderly passed him a signal flimsy which Krebs quickly scanned.
Hitler moved forward eagerly. ‘Is it news of Wenck?’ he demanded.
He was still convinced that the 12th Army under General Wenck was going to break through to the relief of Berlin at any moment.
Krebs hesitated and the Führer said, ‘Read it, man! Read it!’
Krebs swallowed hard, then said, ‘No possibility of Wenck and the 9th Army joining. Await further instruction.’
The Führer exploded with rage. ‘The same story as Sunday. I gave the 11th Panzer Army to SS-General Steiner and all available personnel in his area with orders to attack. And what happened?’
The fact that the army in question had existed on paper only, a figment of someone’s imagination, was not the point, for no one would have had the courage to tell him.
‘So, even my SS let me down – betray me in my hour of need. Well, it won’t do, gentlemen.’ He was almost hysterical now. ‘I have a way of dealing with traitors. Remember the July plot? Remember the films of the executions I ordered you to watch?’
He turned, stumbled back into the map room followed by Jodl, Keitel and Krebs. The door closed. Fegelein, moving as a man in a dream, signalled to one of the SS orderlies, who took the children away.
There was silence, then Ritter said, ‘What now, General?’
Fegelein started. ‘What did you say?’
‘What do we do now?’
‘Oh, go to the canteen. Food will be provided. Have a drink. Relax.’ He forced a smile and clapped Ritter on the shoulder.
‘Take it easy for a while, Major, I’ll send for you soon. Fresh fields to conquer, I promise.’
He nodded to an orderly, who led the way. Ritter and Hoffer followed him, up the steps. Bormann and Rattenhuber were no longer there.
At the top, Ritter said softly, ‘What do you think of that, then, Erich? Little children and old men led by a raving madman. So, now we start paying the bill, I think – all of us.’
When he reached his office, Fegelein closed the door, went behind his desk and sat down. He opened a cupboard, took out a bottle of brandy, removed the cork and swallowed deeply. He had been a frightened man for some time, but this latest display had finished him off.
He was exactly the same as dozens of other men who had risen to power in the Nazi party. A man of no background and little education. A one-time groom and jockey who had risen through the ranks of the SS and after being appointed Himmler’s aide at Führer headquarters, had consolidated his position by marrying Eva Braun’s sister, Gretl.
But now even Himmler had cleared off, had refused every attempt aimed at returning him to the death-trap which Berlin had become. It occurred to Fegelein that perhaps the time had come for some definite action on his own part. He took another quick pull on the brandy bottle, got up, took down his cap from behind the door and went out.
It was seven o’clock that evening and Ritter and Hoffer were sitting together in the canteen, talking softly, a bottle of Moselle between them, when a sudden hubbub broke out. There were cries outside in the corridor, laughter and then the door burst open and two young officers ran in.
Ritter grabbed at one of them as he went by. ‘Hey, what’s all the excitement?’
‘Luftwaffe General Ritter von Greim has just arrived from Munich with the air-ace, Hannah Reitsch. They landed at Gatow and came on in a Fieseler Storch.’
‘The general flew himself,’ the other young officer said. ‘When he was hit, she took over the controls and landed the aircraft in the street near the Brandenburger Tor. What a woman.’
They moved away. Another voice said, ‘A day for heroes, it would seem.’
Ritter looked up and found Bormann standing there. ‘Reichsleiter.’ He started to rise.
Bormann pushed him down. ‘Yes, a remarkable business. What they omitted to tell you was that they were escorted by fifty fighter planes from Munich. Apparently over forty were shot down. On the other hand, it was essential General von Greim got here. You see, the Führer intends to promote him to Commander-in-Chief of the Luftwaffe with the rank of Feldmarschall, Göring having finally proved a broken reed. Naturally he wished to tell General Greim of this himself. Signal flimsies are so impersonal, don’t you think?’
He moved away. Hoffer said in a kind of awe, ‘Over forty planes – forty, and for what?’
‘To tell him in person what he could have told him over the telephone,’ Ritter said. ‘A remarkable man, our Führer, Erich.’
‘For God’s sake, Major.’ Hoffer put out a hand, for the first time real anger showing through. ‘Keep talking like that and they might take you out and hang you. Me, too. Is that what you want?’
When Bormann went into his office, Rattenhuber was waiting for him.
‘Did you find General Fegelein?’ the Reichsleiter inquired.
‘He left the bunker five hours ago.’ Rattenhuber checked his notes. ‘According to my information, he is at present at his home in Charlottenburg – wearing civilian clothes, I might add.’
Bormann nodded calmly. ‘How very interesting.’
‘Do we inform the Führer?’
‘I don’t think so, Willi. Give a man enough rope, you know the old saying. I’ll ask where Fegelein is in the Führer’s hearing later on tonight. Allow him to make this very unpleasant discovery for himself. Now, Willi, we have something far more important to discuss. The question of the prominent prisoners in our hands. You have the files I asked for?’
‘Certainly, Reichsleiter.’ Rattenhuber placed several manilla folders on the desk. ‘There is a problem here. The Führer has very pronounced ideas on what should happen to the prominenti. It seems that he was visited by Obergruppenführer Berger, Head of Prisoner of War Administration. Berger tried to discuss the fate of several important British, French and American prisoners as well as the Austrian Chancellor, Schuschnigg, and Halder and Schacht. It seems the Führer told him to shoot them all.’
‘Conspicuous consumption, I would have thought, Willi. In other words, a great waste.’ Bormann tapped the files. ‘But it’s these ladies and gentlemen who interest me. The prisoners of Arlberg.’
‘I’m afraid several have already been moved since my visit, on your instructions, two months ago. Orders of the Reichsführer,’ Rattenhuber told him.
‘Yes, for once Uncle Heini moved a little faster than I had expected,’ Bormann said dryly. ‘What are we left with?’
‘Just five. Three men, two women.’
‘Good,’ Bormann said. ‘A nice round number. We’ll start with the ladies first, shall we? Refresh my memory.’
‘Madame Claire de Beauville, Reichsleiter. Age thirty. Nationality, French. Her father made a great deal of money in canned foods. She married Étienne de Beauville. A fine old family. They were thought to be typical socialites flirting with their new masters. In fact her husband was working with French Resistance units in Paris. He was picked up in June last year on information received and taken to Sicherheitdienst headquarters at Avénue Foch in Paris. He was shot trying to escape.’
‘The French,’ Bormann said. ‘So romantic.’
