She got slowly to her knees, and felt water trickling against her neck; he must have splashed her face with it; there was a glass from the bathroom on the stool beside her.

  “I’m glad you have recovered your senses, Fräulein. I have no time to waste this evening. I had asked you, if you recall, whether you wished to say anything.”

  She felt so cold. So cold.

  He was waiting, the fingers of one pale hand drumming on the other. The silence in the room was broken only by the ticking of the little clock.

  “Yes.” She found it difficult to put her thoughts into the right words, in the right order. All she could see was the face of Franz, in the photographs. “Yes.” Still on her knees in front of Vogel, in the unconscious attitude of prayer, she asked him, “Is there anything, anything in the world, that I can do to save my brother?”

  The drumming of his fingers stopped, as he appeared to consider. It was a long time before he spoke.

  “Perhaps. We are trying to find this Cblonel friend of yours. If you chose to help us, I would order your brother’s immediate release.”

  29

  LOWESTOFT, ENGLAND, 25th MARCH 1940

  It was blowing a gale across the North Sea by nightfall and the East Coast lifeboat services had been called out three times in the last three hours, one boat taking the crew off a seagoing barge under sail before she went down.

  Four of the reception committee had reached the clifftop landing strip an hour ago, alerted by an emergency signal from Bletchley. One of them—the king’s equerry—knew that this must be Kramer coming across: they hadn’t expected to receive anyone else from The Hague before it shut down. Kramer was a key man, and the last

  “They’ll have diverted this one, surely.”

  They stood huddled against the wind, watching the east.

  “Bletchley said he was coming down here.”

  One of them tried to relight his pipe, but gave up. “Bletchley can’t know what it’s like.”

  “The pilot had to divert in any case. A pack of MEs had started hunting for him.”

  They listened to the windsock tugging at its cleat. “All I hope is that he doesn’t hit the hangar.”

  No one spoke further. Later, in between the wind gusts, they thought they heard the sound of an engine,

  and strained their eyes to to look for the Lysander, one or two of them believing they could see its shape above the cliffs. But the sound faded out, and soon afterward the door of the radio hut banged open and a man came trotting across to them, his head lowered against the wind.

  “No luck this time,” he told them. “He’s down in the sea.”

  The night editor of the Lowestoft Evening Herald looked at the piece of paper.

  “What’s this?” He’d thought everyone had gone home.

  “I just got it myself.” The cub reporter stood panting, his cheeks flushed from the night air. “Got a chum, down at the coastguard station.” He dared all. “Can I have a byline, chief?” It would be his first.

  The editor ignored that as he read the story. Reports have been confirmed that late this evening an unidentified aircraft went down in the sea not far from the coast. Boat 3 of the Lowestoft Lifeboat Service, called out by the Coastguards, was successful in taking the occupants off the plane before it sank.

  The editor picked up a telephone, asking for the special extension number. He read the story, nodded a couple of times and rang off.

  “We can’t print it,” he told the cub. “You’d get shot as a spy. Listen, there’s a story about old Mrs. Fawcett-Jones, the lady who hit an air raid warden over the head with an umbrella tonight, thinking he was a German parachutist. You want a byline on that?”

  30

  BERLIN, 25th MARCH 1940

  The night was clear overhead, but a light mist was creeping from the surface of the lake across the parkland, moving between the few trees and masking their outlines. Here and there, starlight still penetrated where the mist was less dense, and from the northwest edge of the lake the little island could be seen. It was approaching ten o’clock.

  The silence in the park was accentuated by the sound of the traffic along the Kurfürsten Allee, as the citizens of Berlin sought comfort and distraction among the restaurants and nightclubs that were still doing good business. Germany was officially at war, but nothing had happened since its declaration, except the invasion of Poland. Berliners, having prepared themselves for the onslaught of air bombardment, felt in a strange way cheated. Doomsday was to be delayed for a while, and the city passed its days and nights in a worsening state of nerves.

  Most of the vehicles streaming along the Kurfürsten Allee were taxis, but earlier, just before nine o’clock, a succession of dark official cars and black vans with small barred windows had begun closing in on the park surrounding the Halen See. Other vehicles had arrived along Trabenerstrasse, northwest of the lake, and from its neighboring streets: Halenseestrasse to the northeast and Erbacherstrasse to the southwest. By half past nine, some thirty such vehicles had taken up station in unobtrusive locations around the park, and one hundred and twelve armed Gestapo officers had infiltrated the park itself, using the mist and the trees for cover and deploying themselves among the shrubs at the periphery.

  The decoy had not yet appeared.

  Superintendent Vogel was standing on a grassy mound not far from the water’s edge, southwest of the neck of the Halen See, where the sparse trees gave cover but permitted observation. Until thirty minutes ago, the Superintendent had not known that a decoy would in fact be necessary. He kept his fieldglasses raised to his eyes most of the time, to study the terrain between the water of the lake and Trabenerstrasse, opposite the little island. Even with his night lenses he failed to see more than two or three of the one hundred and twelve men who were now in or around the park, so effectively were they using their cover and the advantageous creeping of the mist. He was very pleased with them. An officer of sound training and long experience, he knew that it was now impossible for anyone to enter the park and leave it again of their own free will.

  Once again he checked his luminous wristwatch, noting the time at five minutes before ten. He raised the fieldglasses again.

  Martin had come into the park from the southeast, driving through Bismarkplatz and leaving the car halfway along Schinklestrasse, then crossing the Kurfürsten Allee on foot and rounding the lake at the north end. He was now standing beneath a linden tree a hundred yards from the rendezvous point.

  He’d seen four Gestapo vehicles on his way here from Bismarckplatz on foot, but that wasn’t unusual at this hour, when the streets were crowded and people were leaving the restaurants for the cabarets and the nightclubs; it was a good time for impromptu raids.

  Hedda would almost certainly be followed, as before. If there were one man, he would deal with him after Hedda had gone. If there were two, he’d keep his distance and use caution. He must be absolutely sure that their meeting would leave Hedda in no danger from the Gestapo.

  She was coming now, walking quickly from the edge of the park alongside Trabenerstrasse, her dark hair flying out as she hurried toward the rendezvous point. A man in plain clothes came fifty yards behind, his figure emerging from the mist. When she stopped walking, and stood uncertainly by the water’s edge, he moved toward cover and waited.

  She was looking around her, but Martin waited two minutes to watch for a second man to appear. None came.

  It was three minutes past ten when he left his cover and went down to the lake’s edge, calling Hedda’s name softly as he neared, so as not to startle her. She swung around and stared at him, and he saw she was not Hedda, but someone like her.

  Beyond her he saw a man in uniform, and then another. Turning, he saw three more, then five. They came from the mist, from the trees, from everywhere, twenty of them, fifty of them, more, their revolvers drawn as they closed in on him.

  Soon after 10:30 the same evening, a nurse came into the waiting room at the Accident and Emergency Care Clinic in the Schmargendorf district, adjacent to the Grünewald.

  “She will be all right now, Frau Hartnagel.”

  “She will be all right?" The thick-bodied woman was out of the chair in an instant, despite her weight. “How do you know she will be all right?” She stared at the nurse, her heavy makeup smudged and tear-streaked.

  She had been here since nine o’clock, when the patient had been brought in by ambulance.

  “Because I know what I am saying,” the young nurse told her evenly. “We induced vomiting immediately, and she’s been on forced liquids until now. She is out of danger.”

  "She is out of danger?” The tears welled anew from the encrusted eyes. “I must see her, then!”

  “I’m sorry, Frau Hartnagel. You are not a relative, I believe. You may return in a few hours, if you wish. Meanwhile we shall need a corroborative statement from you in writing, for the police. It seems there’s no question that she attempted suicide.”

  “My poor lamb! My poor child! It was lucky I found her like that, so lucky! There was no answer, you see, to my knocking, yet I knew she was in. I knocked and knocked, and then I used my key—I am her landlady, you see, her patroness—”

  “It was lucky, Frau Hartnagel, yes. You should go home, as soon as the desk clerk has your statement, and rest yourself. It was a shock for you.”

  “Such a shock, I cannot tell you! I am like a mother to her! She—”

  “The desk clerk is along the corridor and down one flight of stairs. I’ll repeat that the patient is out of danger, officially. Good night, Frau Hartnagel.”

  31

  BERLIN, 25th MARCH 1940

  There were five men in Superintendent Vogel’s office at Gestapo Headquarters: Vogel, the SS Colonel, a stenographer and two armed guards with drawn revolvers. Two more armed guards were stationed in the corridor outside. The clock on the wall showed 10:17. The arrested officer had been brought straight here from the Halen See.

  “Do you wish to smoke?”

  “What?”

  Vogel repeated his invitation, in the same silky tones. The man hardly seemed to know what he was talking about. He looked like death, his face drawn and his eyes, unnaturally bright, in great hollows.

  “No.”

  They had taken away his revolver and ceremonial dagger. Four armed guards were sufficient, even for Der Jäger. And an SS-Standartenführer was, after all, an SS-Standartenführer, and for the moment would be treated as such. Luftig would have insisted on that.

  “You may sit down, if you wish.” Vogel moved behind his desk, taking off his cap and smoothing his thin dark hair. Luftig, yes. But he was not going to telephone his good friend Luftig with this news until the morning. Tonight the prisoner was his.

  “I'll stand.” The Colonel was restless, his bright eyes everywhere except on the armed guards—they didn’t appear to worry him. “What is your name?” he asked Vogel suddenly, in a tone of impatience.

  “I introduced myself, if you remember.” The tone was still silky, but hardening.

  “I have a great deal on my mind.”

  “Superintendent Vogel.” The flat of his hand came down on the desk. “Please be good enough to remember my name in future, Colonel Brinkmann.”

  The prisoner frowned abstractedly. “Vogel, yes. I’ll give you one hour.” He looked at his wristwatch, comparing it with the clock on the wall. “Your clock here is two minutes slow.”

  Vogel leaned back, watching the man. “You will give me one hour?”

  “It’s all I can spare.”

  Vogel glanced at the stenographer, wondering whether to have this statement noted. It probably wasn’t worth it. First he would shake this bastard out of his skin; then his statements would be more relevant.

  “Do you know how we found you?”

  “What? Yes. You used a decoy.”

  “Ah. And do you know why we had to use a decoy?” “No.” The Colonel was pacing again, watching the floor.

  “We had to use a decoy, Colonel Brinkmann, because Fräulein von Gerlach, your mistress, was unavailable at the time. She had just committed suicide.”

  The Colonel’s step faltered slightly as he turned at the wall to pace back past the desk, but he didn’t raise his head. “Poor woman. Did you witness this, Herr Vogel?” He was looking suddenly, at the Superintendent, his eyes oddly bright.

  “Do you think I’m trying to deceive you?”

  “You might be. I’m not unconversant with the workings of the Gestapo mind.”

  It was how they’d described him, Vogel thought. Tall,

  Aryan, and arrogant. A typical fucking SS autocrat. And he was trying to provoke him, that was obvious, even to the workings of the Gestapo mind. But he wouldn’t succeed. Der Jäger had lost, and he, Vogel, had won. This was the ferocious assassin the whole of the SS had begun to fear; and he was in Vogel’s hands. This was the mysterious lover who had flitted in and out of Fräulein von Gerlach’s tawdry little life, while she’d been the protégée of a Superintendent of the Gestapo; and he was in his hands. And it was going to be very difficult to provoke him. Vogel felt something approaching tolerance tonight, as he often did when speaking with a man who was shortly to die.

  “I’m not trying to deceive you,” he said evenly. “The report I received was that Fräulein von Gerlach had swallowed a bottle of aspirins. A bottle of a hundred, if I recall. That would be the standard size, I assume.”

  “A hundred?” The bright blue stare considered. “Yes, I suppose that’s the standard size. Poor woman. Was she found in time?” The tone was indifferent, as if he felt he was expected to take an interest.

  “Whether or not Fräulein von Gerlach is dead or alive,” Vogel told him equably, “hardly matters. If she ever recovers, I shall be committing her to Ravensbruck Concentration Camp in any case.”

  The Colonel glanced at his watch again. “We are wasting time. You can hardly expect me—”

  “Don't you realize she betrayed you?"

  The stenographer looked up. He was a thin man with a small moustache, his uniform slightly too big for him. His heart had begun beating faster. He had attended many interrogations with Superintendent Vogel, and lived in abject fear of his eyes and his voice and his very name. He had seen the Superintendent intending to keep his patience with someone, and then failing. The stenographer, whose name was Fassbender, didn’t know which tone of voice filled him with more terror: the silky one, or this one with the ring of menace.

  “I gave her a choice,” Vogel said. “Your life, or her brother’s. She chose her brother’s.”

  “Hardly surprising.” The Colonel’s tone was cool.

  The Superintendent put both his hands flat on the desk in front of him, a habit he had learned long ago when he realized he was losing control; Luftig had taught him to do it, unknowingly. Luftig had the same infuriating calm that this autocratic bastard was showing. More than calm; a strange kind of indifference. There was something wrong.

  “Colonel Brinkmann, how well do you know—did you know this woman?”

  “Woman? Oh, I met her on the S-bahn one night, a few months ago. We—”

  “How often have you seen her?”

  “A few times. Once at the Tiergarten Bahnhof. I went to her apartment for a few minutes, to take her a little gift—she’s rather a lonely soul.”

  The pale hands on the desk remained still. “You haven’t enjoyed carnal relations with Fräulein von Gerlach?”

  The Colonel swung around and his eyes flickered. “You’ll confine your questions to the matter in hand, Herr Vogel.” Then at once he relaxed, smiling vaguely. “No, there was nothing of that sort in our brief relationship. She’s got a young brother in the camps, you know. She wanted me to get him released, but I explained it was a matter for the Gestapo, not the SS.”

  “It is indeed. For your information, Standartenführer Brinkmann, I personally ordered that her brother should be placed in the Besonder category, so that he should come to no harm.” Watching the man, he thought he saw a flicker come into his eyes again, but wasn’t sure. It was difficult to know what the devil he was thinking.

  “She must have been very grateful to you.” He was turning again, this time pacing away from the desk, and Vogel could no longer see his expression. “No one expects that kind of consideration from the gentlemen of the Gestapo.”

  “Nor from the gentlemen of the SS-Tottenkopfverbände,” said Vogel sharply, nettled.

  “Touché, my friend.”

  The Superintendent said carefully, “Since your relationship with Fräulein von Gerlach was so . . . inconsequential, why did you feel it necessary to murder two of my officers?”

  The Colonel swung around, astonished. “Your officers? But that’s absurd!”

  “One in an alley in the Grünewald district three weeks ago on March the fifth, and one at Tiergarten Bahnhof eleven days ago on March the fourteenth.”

  “They were Gestapo men?”

  “They were.”

  “How was I to know? They looked such a couple of shady characters I thought they were after Fräulein von Gerlach. She was a damned pretty girl.” He resumed his pacing, and came to a halt face to face with one of the guards, who brought up his gun into the aiming position, while Fassbender watched in frozen consternation. The muzzle was two inches from the SS Colonel’s chest, and three inches from his heart, and the guard’s finger was crooked on the trigger.

  The room had become very quiet. The other guard had taken a step forward, also bringing up his gun. He glanced toward Superintendent Vogel for instructions. Vogel sat motionless, trying to work out what was happening. Was the Colonel deliberately provoking the guard? Was he thinking of attacking him, for some lunatic reason? He mustn’t be allowed to do that. He was Vogel’s prize pigeon, ready for presentation to Deputy Commissioner Luftig, an example of how effective the Gestapo could be—and Superintendent Vogel particularly—when it set out to capture a wanted man.