The Swiss Courier: A Novel (15 page)

“Your mother is on the line. If you will follow me.” The proprietor motioned to the front room.

Becker stood, his eyes meeting Pastor Leo’s gaze. Yet he didn’t blink, didn’t show any hint of alarm.

As he strode out, others in the room offered him best wishes.

The pastor suppressed a smile. Benjamin Becker, he knew, was in a unique position, and his true identity needed to be protected at all costs. He and others had told Benjamin that . . . more than once:
“Never let Kassler ever doubt your allegiance
to him. Never. Many lives are at stake if you do.”

Pastor Leo knew what the phone call was all about. No doubt Sturmbannführer Bruno Kassler had called Becker’s home, stating the matter was urgent.

How Becker had come up with the uniforms, Pastor Leo didn’t want to know.

Dieter Baumann cradled the twined shopping basket and briskly walked to the rear of the grocery store where yogurt and other dairy products were stacked with smart precision in a refrigeration case. He peered at several of the plain yogurts, packaged in brown glass containers, then placed one in his basket.

“Shopping light, I see.”

Dieter turned toward the voice he’d been expecting to hear, then looked over the man’s shoulders to see if anyone else in the store had noticed their presence. The Migros Market was quiet this early in the morning.

“Just picking up something for breakfast.
Guten Morgen
, Ludwig,” Dieter said, using the code name for his contact. Dieter, of course, knew his German counterpart’s real name was Karl Rundstedt, but he would never let on that he’d uncovered such privileged information.

“What did you hear about Patton?”

Dieter knew all sorts of rumors regarding the Allied breakout of Normandy floated around the streets and offices of the city—no doubt fueled by BBC Radio. Dieter cleared his throat. “If I understood my American source right, the radio reports are true: the Americans have broken out of hedgerow country. Patton’s Third Army will not race for Paris, though. They will circle around and attack the German Seventh Army from the rear, attempting to surprise your military forces pinning Montgomery’s troops at Caen. It’s called Operation Cobra.” He could see from Ludwig’s gaze that he was digesting the information, which he had given without taking sides, as befitting the “neutral” Swiss.

“And, of course,” Dieter added, “the French resistance is also doing their part to harass the occupiers.”

“Good work. The knowledge is useful.” Ludwig picked up a small jar of milk and tossed it back and forth between his hands. “Now can you find out what’s happened in the last twenty-four hours?”

Dieter knew he’d pressed Dulles as hard as he could. But perhaps the American colonel with the legation in Bern would share some battlefield gossip. They’d become friendly when Dieter helped two American pilots who’d escaped from Davos meet up with French contacts in Geneva.

“Well, information is hard to obtain . . . unless I could propose a swap.” Dieter let his voice fall, as if he were uncertain his idea would work. He’d discovered over time that the more unsure he acted, the greater the reward he was given for his work. “Unless . . . I could tell the Americans that one of my contacts in the Swiss Army wants information on Patton’s movements in exchange for—” Dieter shrugged his shoulders. “You got anything worthwhile?”

“Well, there is something.” Ludwig looked around the grocery store to see if anyone was within earshot. Then Ludwig pursed his lips. “I saw an urgent flash pass throughout the network this morning. Came out of the Gestapo regional office in Heidelberg. A prisoner has escaped. The Gestapo telegraph gave a physical description of the missing man. They mentioned a bonus of 1,000 Reichsmarks for help in finding him, so he must be someone the Americans would love to get their hands on.”

“Why would the Yanks be interested in him?”

“Sorry.” The German held his palms up. “The traffic didn’t say. But since Heidelberg is around 250 kilometers from the Swiss border, they must be worried that he could escape into Switzerland, where he could contact the Allies.”

Dieter adjusted his shopping basket from the crook of his left arm to that of his right. “Maybe the American colonel will play ball with me, as they like to say in the States. I’ll see what I can do.”

“Fair enough.”

Dieter spotted an older woman strolling in their direction. He quickened his words. “You’ll have to give me a day or so,” he said as he guided the German toward the bread aisle. “I’ll be in contact.” Dieter reached for a hazel-brown loaf of
dunkel Brot
off the shelf.

“Not so fast.” Ludwig grabbed his arm. “There’s something else that’s come up. Something on the side that could mean a lot of francs for our pocketbooks.”

“Oh?” Dieter cocked an eyebrow and studied the man’s face. It was clear that Ludwig toyed with him, just as he toyed with Ludwig—both with their own interests in mind.

Ludwig looked both ways to be sure they weren’t being overheard. “A high-level contact I’ve been developing just across the border told me they just picked up a Jew family who’d been hidden away in Weil am Rhein for the better part of a year. They apparently had heard about the—how can I politely say this?—unreceptive attitude from the Swiss authorities about Jewish refugees.
The boat is full
and all that.”

“So they didn’t want to chance sneaking into Switzerland.”

Ludwig shrugged his shoulders. “You know how well-patrolled both sides of the border are. Listen. This contact of mine, who works for the local Polizei, said that he went back to search this villa where they picked up the Jews as well as the family hiding them. Behind an antique sideboard in the main bedroom, he found a safe—a heavy safe.”

Dieter knew where this was headed. “And now you want to borrow the little safecracker in my office. Her skill . . . well, I’ll only risk it if you believe the reward will be worth our while.”

“I know, I know. You want to protect the little beauty.” Ludwig held his hands up. “But listen to this. Apparently the patriarch of this Jewish family was a diamond dealer in Berlin. He’d been able to avoid authorities because he paid people to hide them for years—like this winegrower in Weil am Rhein. Now that this Jew jeweler has been caught, his diamonds cannot help him or his family. A pity.”

From the sarcastic tone Ludwig used, Dieter knew that he felt anything but sympathy for this
Juden
family destined for the work camps.

The Swiss operative checked once more over his shoulder. “I’m not sold on this. This would be a highly dangerous operation, Ludwig. We rarely operate in Germany because of the Gestapo’s pervasiveness—”

“Dieter, please.” Ludwig waved off his concern. “I’ll provide you with valid work permits to cross the border. It’s fairly routine, you know, since thousands of Swiss cross the border each day to work in our textile and war matériel plants. What’s two more Swiss? You can cross the border in the morning, do the job, and return with the rest of the Swiss toting their lunch pails.”

Usually Dieter would have jumped at the opportunity— after all, who knew how many diamonds a safe like that could hold? But he had to admit that while he valued Ludwig’s help, he didn’t completely trust him. No one, in fact, could be completely trusted, especially in their business. Furthermore, his concerns centered on Gabi. She was valuable—too valuable to risk.

The more time he spent with her, Dieter found his heart warming to her innocent trust . . . and her beauty didn’t hurt things either. It was nice to have her around and would be even nicer to get to know her better. Dieter shrugged. “I’m still not convinced. I’ll have to think about this one.”

“Life’s a risk,
ja
? But my contact and I agreed you would get half the diamonds because you’re supplying the expertise. We’ll split the other half.”

“Honor among thieves?” Dieter chuckled.

“You could say that, my friend.”

Dieter paid for his breakfast—plain yogurt, a packet of honey, and a bread roll—at the Migros checkout stand and turned to stroll up the Thunerstrasse. His office was less than five minutes away.

As he bumped shoulders with Swiss businessmen and secretaries crowding the sidewalk on their way to work, he thought about how he had been playing both sides for nearly a year. His American handlers understood his methods were unorthodox and his contacts ran the gamut, but then again, he produced time after time. If his methods tipped the scales in favor of Nazi operatives in Switzerland on occasion, then so be it. He alone would be the judge of what was going too far. At the same time, Dieter also understood that “sharing” American troop movements or a classified document with the enemy—even though it sometimes garnered him
more
information for the Yanks—was a distinction often lost following an arrest for espionage.

He was playing a dangerous game. He had known his share of operatives, from both sides of the war, who were never heard from again. Like the French spy who’d been executed by a Nazi machine gunner poised no farther than five meters away. It was said the .50-caliber firepower nearly sawed his torso in half. But he wasn’t the only one. Just a few weeks ago, a Russian double agent was discovered in a Zurich back alley with several amputated fingers stuffed into his mouth. The Soviet operative was also quite dead.

Dieter involuntarily shivered and willed his mind to fixate on happier thoughts—like glittering diamonds. Before him lay a new and different opportunity, a chance to cash in on a tip. A way to position himself well for post-war Europe.

As his thoughts progressed along the Basel sidewalk, Dieter knew his plan centered on Gabi Mueller. Thankfully, she trusted him completely.

He anticipated no problems selling his plan to this naive church girl.

Bruno Kassler leaned back in his office chair and shuttered his eyes momentarily. It was his way of dealing with stress, but he didn’t think there was a word that accurately encompassed the weight on his shoulders. Everything—his job, his position, his honor was on the line.

He regarded the telegraph that Becker had transmitted posthaste to Reichsführer Himmler an hour earlier.

Last night, 1 August, 1944, at 22:25 hours, Joseph Engel was kidnapped by four masked men. Suspect Jews or Zionist sympathizers. Will advise on future developments.

Kassler regarded the telephone, expecting it to ring at any moment with Becker announcing that the Reichsführer was on the line. He could save his career by finding the physicist and the perpetrators—maybe his neck too. Although that was questionable.

He had heard the story about Himmler’s nephew, SS 1st Lieutenant Hans Himmler, who’d revealed SS secrets while drunk. Hearing this, his uncle demoted and shipped him off to the Eastern Front as a parachutist. Within six months, Hans Himmler was again charged with making derogatory remarks about the Nazi regime. The second time his loose lips resulted in a one-way trip to the Dachau concentration camp near Munich, where he was finally “liquidated” as a homosexual. In the new Germany, blood
wasn’t
thicker than water.

Kassler shuddered as he pondered his fate for displeasing the Reichsführer. If he were a praying man, he’d pray for help to find those who’d kidnapped Engel.

For the moment, he’d ordered Becker and several other officers to review files of known subversives. Extra roadblocks had been set up within the city proper and all arteries leading outside of Heidelberg. Orders were to search every truck, open every car boot, scatter every load.

Within the hour, a half-dozen Gestapo teams would fan out to interview “suspicious” people in shops and restaurants. In addition, Kassler directed the Heidelberg Polizei to conduct a house-to-house search in districts home to academicians from the University of Heidelberg. Maybe one of their own had pulled off the heist of Engel, although he doubted the intellectuals could have pulled off something as audacious as what happened last night. Either way, it wouldn’t hurt to poke around the elite class who’d never entirely warmed to National Socialism. But if they couldn’t have done it, then who?

How did these impudent traitors pull it off? Where did they get the uniforms?

Kassler couldn’t comprehend how four men dressed up as the Gestapo could brazenly snatch someone of interest just minutes before his arrival. It’s like they
knew
.

The jittery roommate, Hannes Jäger, wasn’t part of the plot, he decided. White with fear, the physicist insisted it was the Gestapo who’d taken his friend, and Kassler sensed no hesitation in Jäger’s description of the abductors or what had transpired.

Jäger had even broken down crying as he described the gun that was placed on his forehead and then lifted into the air and fired into a painting hanging on the wall behind him. The physicist genuinely believed the intruders would kill him. Either that, or Kassler had just witnessed the greatest acting job since Marlene Dietrich in
Blue Angel
.

Kassler rubbed his temples with his left hand. Bleary-eyed, needing sleep, he willed his weary mind to act . . . to do something more than just wait for news from those conducting the interviews or searching apartments and homes close to the university. He reached for the phone.

“Becker, who do we have in custody at the moment?”

“Let me look at the last report I received, sir,” the youthful aide replied.

Kassler heard a rustling of papers over the phone line.

“Ah, there it is. This is surprising, sir. No one is being presently detained. The last prisoner was executed . . . yesterday.”