Spandau Phoenix (94 page)

"Where is Stern?"

Natterman felt the gun barrel against the back of his throat, as cold and deadly as a snake's head. He desperately needed to gag, but he didn't dare. The woman leaning over him was like a creature from a mother with blue-rinse hair, yellowed pearls hanging round her wrinkled throat"Jonas Stern!" Swallow snapped. "Where is he?"

Natterman nodded his head carefully. Swallow removed the Ingrain from his mouth. For a moment-thinking of Stern and his mission-Natterman considered lying. He changed his mind when Swallow jammed the gun barrel down onto the bloody bandage that Aaron had wrapped around Natterman's wounded thigh.

"Alfred Horn!" he gasped. "Stern went to see a man named Alfred Horn!"

Swallow jabbed the Ingrain deeper into Natterman's wound. "Where to see Alfred Horn?"

Natterman felt his stomach heave. "Somewhere in the northern Transvaal!

That's all I know. It was a blind rendezfi vous. Stern didn't know where he was going himsel " While Swallow considered this, Natterman looked past her to the floor. He saw black skin and white eyes. The messenger. Now he understood the second thud. Swallow had shot the Bantu boy in the throat. "Stern was wrong," he said, thinking aloud.

"He thinks you're after him. But you've come to destroy the Spandau papers, haven't you?"

Swallow's nostrils flared. "I've come for Stern. If he has the papers, that's a bonus."

Natterman glanced back at Aaron. The Israeli had fallen with his back against the foyer wall. Except for the blood on his chest, he looked like he was sleeping. Natterman remembered how innocent the young commando had looked watching the soundless television. "How do you do it?" he asked.

"That boy was hardly more than a child."

Swallow followed Natterman's gaze to Aaron's motionless body. She shrugged. "He was a soldier. Today was his day."

Natterman shook his head. "Every bullet has its billet, eh?"

"King William,' Swallow murmured, recalling the quote from her wartime service. "You're a philosopher?"

"I'm a fool. And you're a murderer, and a hypocrite as well.

That boy was probably someone's brother, too."

Swallow smacked Natterman on the mouth with the Ingrain, drawing blood.

Her eyes, as cold and dark and empty as deep space, settled on his face.

Natterman had never in his life felt such fear, not even as a young German soldier patrolling alone in the shadow of Russian tanks outside Leningrad.

"You're going to kill me," he said sotto voce.

"Not quite yet." Swallow lifted the telephone receiver and dialed an international number. As she waited for an answer, she casually pulled off her blue-rinse hair. Natterman's eyes widened. Beneath the wig, Swallow's hair was iron gray and cropped to within an inch of her skull.

She did not look like a grandmother anymore.

"Swallow," she said harshly.

In London, Sir Neville Shaw's heart leaped. "Good Christ! Where are you?"

Swallow's knuckles whitened on the telephone. "Listen to me, little man. I'm giving you one last chance to tell me where Stern is.

He's gone to see a man named Alfred Horn.

I want to know where@' "I'll tell you exactly where to find him!"

Without wasting a second the mI-5 chief read out the overland directions to Horn House. Swallow repeated them as they came, her head bobbing with birdlike impatience, her eyes locked onto Natterman. When Shaw finished reading the directions, he said, "I'm modifying your assignment.

You can still do what you like with Stern, but I need more than the Spandau papers now. I need Alfred Horn dead. You shouldn't have any trouble recognizing him. He's an old man, rides in a wheelchair most of the time. If you kill Alfred Horn, you can name your price."

Swallow laughed, a dry rattle. Her finger slipped inside the Ingrain's trigger guard.'As Natterman stared in horror, she reached out casually and laid the machine pistol against his cheek. Sir Neville Shaw's voice warbled from the telephone. Swallow drew back her lips, exposing her teeth like an animal preparing for a kill. Then her head snapped around toward the foyer. She dropped the telephone and raised the Ingrain.

What is it? Natterman thought wildly. Is someone at the door?

He couldn't hear anything but his hammering heart.

Following Swallow's line of sight, he finally realized what she was looking at with such alarm. Nothing! Where less than a minute ago the bullet-riddled body of Aaron Haber had lain against the foyer wall, only bloodstained wallpaper remained.

Shrieking like a demon, Swallow fired a sustained burst into the foyer, then adjusted her aim to the bathroom wz The muted barks of the silenced weapon modulated quickly into loud bangs. Her silencer was burning out.

Natterman threw off the sheets and rolled off the far edge of the bed.

He had been on the floor for less than five seconds when the firing stopped. What the devil was happening? He raised his head above the line of the bed.

Swallow was crouched at the end of the bed nearest the foyer, trying frantically to clear the jammed receiver of her Ingrain. Like a man rising from the grave, Aaron Haber lurched up from the narrow space between the bed and the bathroom wall. Natterman's heart leaped with joy and astonishment. Dark blood covered the young commando's neck and chest, but his eyes burned wildly. Swaying like a drunken madman, he steadied his .22 automatic and fired four shots in rapid succession.

Swallow was so desperate to reach the safety of the foyer that she actually leaped into Aaron's bullets. Two slugs slammed into her left shoulder, but the others went wild. She staggered into the foyer, spun around and collapsed. Hoping that the impact of the fall had cleared her weapon, she scrambled to her knees, @st her Ingrain around the corner and pulled the trigger.

Aaron fired the instant he saw the gun barrel appear. His bullet tore the gun from Swallow's hand. It spun through the air and landed against the wall, too far away for either of them to reach. All Aaron had to do was step around the corner to finish the woman off. He started forward, then wobbled to a standstill. Bright blood pumped through his shirt.

Why doesn't she just run? Natterman thought angrily. She has the information she wantedt And then he knew. Swallow meant to leave no witnesses behind.

A horrible coughing spasm racked Aaron Haber's body.

He lunged forward, gurgled something in Hebrew, then dropped his pistol and collapsed at the mouth of the foyer.

Natterman peered around the edge of the bed. The Israeli lay on his stomach with his head pointed toward the door. Swallow's Ingrain lay at his feet. Natterman's heart sank. The gun might as well have been ten kilometers away. But as he jerked his head back behind the bed, he saw something that stopped the breath in his lungs-Hans's crossbow, loaded and lying beneath the bed. Yuri Borodin's gorillas had missed it during their sweep. Natterman lay flat and stretched his arm to its limit ...

Swallow glided soundlessly out of the foyer and bobbed over the wounded Israeli. A knife flashed in the air. Swallow reached for Aaron's hair, meaning to jerk up his head and slash his throat, but at the last moment she leaned toward his feet and grabbed for the Ingrain.

The decision cost her her life. The instant she moved, Aaron flipped over onto his back and grabbed her by the waist. Unable to reach the Ingrain, Swallow twisted in his arms and brought the knife down into his chest. She raised it again for the deathblow, but Natterman struggled up over the bed, steadied the crossbow, and fired.

The razor-tipped bolt speared through Swallow's breastbone with a sickening crunch. Sucking for air she no longer needed, she pawed the air in maniacal fury. Her last cry carried all the atrophied rage and pain of her unfulfilled quest for vengeance: "Sterrm!"

Swallow collapsed on top of Aaron, preceding the young commando into death by only seconds. Natterman stumbled over to the gasping Israeli and with painful effort shoved Swallow's corpse off his blood-soaked chest. Aaron strained to raise his head, then fell back and reached up to Natterman for succor. Natterman knelt over him.

"Lie back," he said.

"You're safe now."

A froth of blood bubbled from Aaron's mouth. 'Did I stop her?"

he asked softly. "She wanted ... Stern."

Natterman looked over at Swallow. Lying dead with the arrow buried in her chest, she looked like a locust husk spiked to a display board.

Natterman smiled at the young Israeli. "You stopped her."

"Tell ... tell Gadi ... did my duty." Aaron coughed once more; then he closed his eyes.

Natterman swallowed hard. This young soldier had given his life for Jonas Stern. Filled with a gudden rage, Natterman lurched to his feet and scrambled back to the telephone.

"Who is this?" he shouted. "Speak!"

"Who is this?" came the wary reply, the British accent clear.

Natterman felt his hands shaking. "Your assassin is dead!"

he yelled. "Your secret will be secret no more!"

He threw down the telephone. Moaning in pain, he stripped off his shirt, picked up Aaron's first-aid bag, and began rummaging through the drug bottles. He wanted lo anesthetic. He needed to dull the fire of his wounds, but he could not risk losing consciousness. He had to be able to board an airplane under his own power. He hated the idea of leaving Ilse and the others behind, but he suspected that if he did not get out of South Africa today, he might not get out at all.

7.01 A.Al-Mi-5 Headquailers: Ch8rigPs Street, London Sir Neville Shaw dropped the phone, his face ashen. Deputy Director Wilson faced him from the doorway.

"It's over," Shaw said quietly. "After all this time, it's over."

"What do you mean, sir?"

"Swallow's dead. There's no stopping the secret now.

We've fired our last shell. From Churchill down to me, and all for nothing."

"Churchill, Sir Neville? I don't understand."

"Don't you? Haven't you got it yet, man? Horn is Hess, Hess is Horn.

The great bloody secret. Ever since Churchill, it's been our sacred charge."

"Sacred charge?"

"This service, Wilson. My office, particularly. It was mI-5

who ran the original Hess double-cross in 1941. We intercepted the first letter from Hess to the Duke of Hamilton."

Shaw lifted two sheets of Paper from his desk. "Why don't you read this, old man?, It's a memo to the prime MiniSterTyped it myself while you were getting tea."

Wilson stepped forward uncertainly and took the proffered pages.

His eyes widened as they flew over phrases that made his blood run cold.

Dear Mrs. Prime Minister:

In May 1941, Rudolf Hess, Deputy Fuhrer of the German Reich, flew to this country to assist in a coup d'etat aimed at the government of Prime Minister Winston Churchill and King George VI.

mI-5 was aware of this plot almost from its inception, and used it to buy time to forestall the German invasion of this country [Operation Sea Lion].

Regrettably, the success of the coup hinged on the participation of numerous ranking members of the wartime Parliament and the nobility, as well as a second accession of the Duke of Windsor to the throne. On 11May 1941, Prime Minister Winston Churchill instructed this office [Secret Finding 5731 to conceal all evidence of this AngloNazi collusion, on the grounds that exposure of such highranking treason might bring down the government and possibly even prevent American entry into the war.

Events of the past five days have made the continued suppression of this information highly unlikely. I must inform you that Rudolf Hess is alive as of this writing, and is a citizen of the Republic of South Africa [living under the alias "Alfred Horn"]. Hess may soon reveal this fact himself, or certain papers unearthed at Spandau Prison may do so. My best efforts to silence Hess and to destroy the papers have failed. Hess's current activities fall into the realm of the criminal, and, if exposed, could put at risk a significant number of British nationals. The family of Lord Granville, particularly, may soon be made public in this connection, as it has owned and operated Phoenix AG [a multinational defense contractor] at the bidding of "Alfred Horn" since 1947. Other families of the peerage [one of whom boasts a member of your cabinet] have lent their names to similar enterprises in exchange for large cash payments, and possibly for ideological reasons as well.

I'm afraid issuing a D-notice at this time would be counterproductive, however, as it would tend to indicate prior knowledge by your office of these activities.

The suppression of the Hess information to date has only been possible thanks to the nerve and foresight of Prime Minister Churchill.

In October 1944, Churchill flew to Moscow for a meeting with Joseph Stalin. With him he carried copies of assassination orders that were, to all appearances, signed by Stalin himself. These orders were actually forgeries fabricated by Reinhard Heydrich's SD.

They were brought into this country by a German-trained White Russian agent named Zinoviev, and recovered by mI-5 on 11 May 1941.

In Moscow, Churchill warned Stalin that he would inform the world press that Stalin had ordered the murders of Churchill and King George VI, if Stalin did not cease making accusations about AngloNazi collusion in the Hess affair.