Authors: Daniel Silva

The Unlikely Spy (53 page)

BOOK: The Unlikely Spy

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BERCHTESGADEN

"I'd feel better if those bastards were in front of us instead of behind us," Wilhelm Canaris said morosely as the staff Mercedes sped along the white concrete autobahn toward the tiny sixteenth-century village of Berchtesgaden. Vogel turned and glanced through the rear window. Behind them, in a second staff car, were Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler and Brigadefuhrer Walter Schellenberg.

Vogel turned away and looked out his own window. Snow drifted gently over the picturesque village. In his foul mood he thought it made the place look like a cheap postcard:
Come to beautiful Berchtesgaden! Home of the Fuhrer!
He was annoyed at being dragged so far from Tirpitz Ufer at such a critical time. He thought, Why can't he stay in Berlin like the rest of us? He's either buried in his
Wolfschanze
in Rastenburg or atop his
Adlersnest
in Bavaria.

Vogel had decided to make something good out of the trip; he planned to have dinner and spend the night with Gertrude and the girls. They were staying with Trude's mother in a village a two-hour drive from Berchtesgaden. God, how long had it been? One day at Christmas; two days in October before that. She had promised him a dinner of pork roast, potatoes, and cabbage and, in that playful voice of hers, promised to do wonderful things to his body in front of the fire when the children and her parents had gone off to bed. Trude always liked to make love that way, somewhere insecure where they might be caught. Something about it always made it more exciting for her, the way it had been twenty years ago when he was a student at Leipzig. For Vogel the excitement had gone out of it long ago.
She
had done it--done it intentionally--as punishment for sending her to England.

Watch me and remember this the next time you're with your wife.

Vogel thought, My God, why am I thinking of that now? He had managed to hide his feelings from Gertrude, the way he had managed to hide everything else from her. He was not a born liar, but he had become a good one. Gertrude still believed he was a personal in-house counsel to Canaris. She had no idea he was the control officer of the Abwehr's most secret spy network in Britain. As usual, he had lied to her about what he was doing today. Trude believed he was in Bavaria on a routine errand for Canaris, not ascending Kehlstein Mountain to brief the Fuhrer on the enemy's plans to invade France. Vogel feared she would leave him if she knew the truth. He had lied to her too many times, deceived her for too long. She would never trust him again. He often thought it would be easier to tell her about Anna than confess he had been a spymaster for Hitler.

Canaris was feeding biscuits to the dogs. Vogel glanced at him, then looked away. Was it really possible? Was the man who had plucked him from the law and made him a top spy for the Abwehr a traitor? Canaris certainly made no attempt to conceal his disdain for the Nazis--his refusal to join the party, the constant stream of sarcastic remarks about Hitler. But had his disdain turned to treachery? If Canaris was a traitor, the consequences for the Abwehr networks in Britain were disastrous; Canaris was in a position to betray everything. Vogel thought, If Canaris is a traitor, why are most of the Abwehr networks in England still functioning? It didn't make sense. If Canaris had betrayed the networks, the British would have rolled them up overnight. The mere fact that the overwhelming majority of the German agents sent to England were still in place could be taken as proof that Canaris was not a traitor.

Vogel's own network was theoretically immune from treachery. Under their arrangement, Canaris knew only the vaguest details of the V-Chain. Vogel's agents did not cross paths with other agents. They had their own radio codes, rendezvous procedures, and separate lines of finance. And Vogel stayed clear of Hamburg, the control center for English networks. He remembered some of the idiots Canaris and the other control officers had sent to England, especially in the summer of 1940, when the invasion of Britain seemed at hand and Canaris threw all caution to the wind. His agents were poorly trained and poorly financed. Vogel knew some were given only two hundred pounds--a pittance--because the Abwehr and the General Staff believed Britain would fall as easily as had Poland and France. Most of the new agents were morons, like that idiot Karl Becker, a pervert, a glutton, in the espionage game only for the money and the adventure. Vogel wondered how a man like that managed to avoid capture. Vogel didn't like adventurers. He distrusted anyone who actually wanted to go behind enemy lines to work as a spy; only a fool would actually
want
to do that. And fools make bad agents. Vogel wanted only people who had the attributes and intelligence necessary to be a good spy. The rest of it--the motivation, the tradecraft, the willingness to use violence when necessary--he could provide.

Outside the temperature was dropping by degrees as they climbed higher along the winding Kehlsteinstrasse. The car's motor labored, tires skidding on the icy surface of the roadway. After a few moments the driver stopped in front of two huge bronze doors at the base of Kehlstein Mountain. A team of SS men carried out a rapid inspection, then opened the doors with the press of a single button. The car left the swirling snow of the Kehlsteinstrasse and entered a long tunnel. The marble walls shone in the light of the ornate bronze lanterns.

Hitler's famous elevator awaited them. It was more like a small hotel room, with plush carpet, deep leather chairs, and a bank of telephones. Vogel and Canaris stepped in first. Canaris sat down and immediately lit a cigarette, so that the elevator was filled with smoke when Himmler and Schellenberg arrived. The four men sat silently, each looking straight ahead, as the elevator whisked them toward the Obersalzberg, six thousand feet above Berchtesgaden. Himmler, annoyed by the smoke, raised his gloved hand to his mouth and coughed gently.

Vogel's ears popped with the rapid altitude change. He looked at the three men riding upward with him, the three most powerful intelligence officers in the Third Reich--a chicken farmer, a pervert, and a fussy little admiral who might very well be a traitor. In the hands of these men rested the future of Germany.

Vogel thought, God help us all.

The Nordic giant who served as the chief of Hitler's personal SS bodyguard showed them inside the salon. Vogel, normally indifferent to natural scenery, was stunned by the beauty of the panoramic view. Below, he could see the steeples and hills of Salzburg, the birthplace of Mozart. Near Salzburg was the Untersberg, the mountain where Emperor Frederick Barbarossa awaited his legendary call to rise and restore the glory of Germany. The room itself was fifty feet by sixty feet, and by the time Vogel reached the seating area next to the fire he was light-headed from the altitude. He settled down in the corner of a rustic couch while his eyes scanned the walls. Huge oil paintings and tapestries covered them. Vogel admired the Fuhrer's collection--a nude believed to have been painted by Titian, a landscape by Spitzweg, Roman ruins by Pannini. There was a bust of Wagner and a vast clock crowned by a bronze eagle. A steward silently poured coffee for the guests and tea for Hitler. The doors flew open a moment later and Adolf Hitler pounded into the room. Canaris, as usual, was the last one on his feet. The fuhrer gestured for them to return to their seats, then remained standing so he could pace.

"Captain Vogel," Hitler said, without preamble, "I understand your agent in London has scored another coup."

"We believe so, my Fuhrer."

"Please, let's not keep it a secret any longer."

Vogel, under the watchful gaze of an SS man, opened his briefcase. "Our agent has stolen another remarkable document. This document provides us further clues about the nature of Operation Mulberry." Vogel hesitated. "We can now predict with much greater certainty just what role Mulberry will play in the invasion."

Hitler nodded. "Please continue, Captain Vogel."

"Based on the new documents, we believe Operation Mulberry is an antiaircraft complex. It will be deployed along the French coastline in an effort to provide protection from the Luftwaffe during the critical first hours of the enemy invasion." Vogel reached into his briefcase again. "Our analysts have used the designs in the enemy document to render a sketch of the complex." Vogel laid it on the table. Schellenberg and Himmler both looked at it with interest.

Hitler had walked away and stared out the windows toward his mountains. He believed he did his best thinking at the Berghof, where he was above it all. "And in your opinion, where will the enemy place this antiaircraft complex, Captain Vogel?"

"The plans stolen by our agent do not specify where Mulberry will be deployed," Vogel said. "But based on the rest of the intelligence collected by the Abwehr, it would be logical to conclude that Mulberry is destined for Calais."

"And your old theory about an artificial harbor at Normandy?"

"It was"--Vogel hesitated, searching for the right word--"premature, my Fuhrer. I made a rush to judgment. I reached a verdict before all the evidence was in. I am a lawyer by training, my Fuhrer--so you will forgive the metaphor."

"No, Captain Vogel, I believe you were right the first time. I believe Mulberry
is
an artificial harbor. And I believe it is destined for Normandy." Hitler turned and faced his audience. "This is just like Churchill, that madman! A grandiose, foolish contraption that betrays his intentions because it tells us where he and his American friends will strike! The man thinks of himself as a great thinker, a great strategist! But he is a fool when it comes to military matters! Just ask the ghosts of the boys he led to the slaughterhouse in the Dardanelles. No, Captain Vogel, you had it right the first time. It is an artificial harbor, and it is bound for Normandy. I know this"--Hitler thumped his chest--"here."

Walter Schellenberg cleared his throat. "My Fuhrer, we do have other evidence to support Captain Vogel's intelligence."

"Let's hear it, Herr Brigadefuhrer."

"Two days ago in Lisbon, I debriefed one of
our
agents in England."

Vogel thought, Oh, Christ, here we go again.

Schellenberg dug a document out of his briefcase.

"This is a memorandum written by an MI-Five case officer named Alfred Vicary. It was approved by someone with the initials
BB
and forwarded to Churchill and Eisenhower. In it, Vicary warns that there is a new threat to security and that extra precautions should be taken until further notice. Vicary also warns that all Allied officers should be especially careful of approaches by women. Your agent in London--it's a woman, is it not, Captain Vogel?"

Vogel said, "May I see that?"

Schellenberg handed it to him.

Hitler said, "Alfred Vicary. Why does that name sound familiar to me?"

Canaris said, "Vicary is a personal friend of Churchill's. He was part of the group that had Churchill's ear during the 1930s. Churchill brought him to MI-Five when he became prime minister in May 1940."

"Yes, I remember now. Didn't he write a bunch of vile articles about National Socialism throughout the thirties?"

Canaris thought, All of which turned out to be true. He said, "Yes, he's the one."

"And who's
BB?
"

"Basil Boothby. He heads a division within MI-Five."

Hitler was pacing again, but slowly. The tranquillity of the silent Alps always had a soothing effect on him. "Vogel, Schellenberg, and Canaris all are convinced. Well, I'm not."

"An interesting turn of events, wouldn't you say, Herr Reichsfuhrer?" The storm had moved off. Hitler was watching the sun vanishing in the west, the mountain peaks purple and pink with the high Alpine dusk. Everyone had gone except Himmler. "First, Captain Vogel tells me Operation Mulberry is an artificial harbor; then it is an antiaircraft complex."

"Quite interesting, my Fuhrer. I have my theories."

Hitler turned away from the window. "Tell me."

"Number one, he is telling the truth. He has received new information that he trusts, and he truly believes what he has told you."

"Possible. Go on."

"Number two, the intelligence he has just presented to you is totally fabricated and Kurt Vogel, like his superior Wilhelm Canaris, is a traitor bent on the destruction of the Fuhrer and of Germany."

Hitler crossed his arms and tilted his head back. "Why would they deceive us about the invasion?"

"If the enemy succeeds in France and the German people see the war is lost, Canaris and the rest of the
Schwarze Kapelle
scum will turn on us and try to destroy us. If the conspirators succeed in grabbing power, they will sue for peace and Germany will end up the way she was after the First War--castrated, weak, the beggar of Europe, living off scraps from the tables of the British and the French and the Americans." Himmler paused. "And the Bolsheviks, my Fuhrer."

Hitler's eyes seemed to catch fire, the very thought of Germans living under Russian domination too painful to imagine. "We must never let that happen to Germany!" he said, then looked at Himmler carefully. "I see by that look on your face that you have another theory, Herr Reichsfuhrer."

"Yes, my Fuhrer."

"Let's hear it."

BOOK: The Unlikely Spy

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