Читать книгу Our Only Shield - Michael J. Goodspeed - Страница 14

8

Northampton, 10 May 1940

STILL SWEATING from his morning exercise, Rory Ferrall walked around the flower beds of Ramsford House. The old estate no longer had its small army of gardeners, maids, and footmen. Everyone under forty had left for military service, and those too old or unfit for the army had been drafted into better-paying jobs in the munitions factories. Rory noticed that the weeds were already winning in their fight against the perennials. He enjoyed it out here in the countryside. He took a deep breath of the cold, damp air. He could smell last night’s rain soaking into the moist, rich earth. The months he had spent in London had left him fatigued and unfit, but in these last four weeks he had been exercising intensively every day and there was a huge difference in his energy level.

It was still frustrating. There was no word yet as to when he was to go to the Netherlands. He chafed at being kept perpetually in the dark. The only information he had received was that the plan developed for him had not been approved, as no one wanted to be seen to be undermining the Expeditionary Force’s efforts with the French. He would be advised as soon as a decision was made. In the meantime, he should continue to prepare himself.

Rory had driven himself hard this morning. After a good sweat he thought more clearly. He stood back on the lawn, looking over the house and its grounds. Since moving here a month ago, he had spent fifteen hours a day preparing himself for his task in the Netherlands. Still, he wondered how much he had accomplished. He had organized all of his training by himself. Harris’s section was still running on vapours; as far as he could tell, the much promised infusion of new staff was a long way from ever happening, and there was no one else in the Ministry of Economic Warfare who knew anything about Holland. There were fewer still who knew anything about clandestine warfare; but there was no point in being pessimistic.

At least now he had a passable cover story. Harris, Crossley, and he had agreed that he would travel in Holland as Martin Becker, a German- and French-speaking Alsatian businessman from Strasbourg. Even though it was deadly serious, it had been fun for the three of them making up Becker’s persona. They created Becker together one night over a bottle of brandy in front of the fireplace in the estate’s study. Wherever possible, Becker was given a similar background to the one Rory had used as cover in Germany in the Great War. And so it transpired that Becker had been seriously wounded while fighting the French on the Marne. He had served with the 9th Landwehr Division and was invalided home. This meant reluctantly becoming a French citizen after the Versailles Treaty. But Becker was a man with an easygoing disposition; his late wife, who he greatly missed, was half-French.

If questioned, Rory would only admit to speaking German and French. Becker would be travelling in the Low Countries, intending to expand his seed and fertilizer business on behalf of an old but sickly friend back in Strasbourg with whom he had been employed for eleven years. To flesh out his cover, someone in London prepared Becker a dog-eared French passport and a wallet-sized card with a picture of his deceased wife on one side and a memorial prayer printed on the other. He had yellowing discharge papers, a prescription for migraine headache medication from a French doctor in Strasbourg, a library card, and in his briefcase he would carry a series of letters and files from several Dutch farmers and agricultural distributors to an address in Strasbourg. Rory had even travelled down to a wholesale seed distribution firm in Kent, spending two days learning some of the fundamentals of the seed and fertilizer business.

Now he spent each day reviewing and strengthening his cover story, doing his physical exercises, practising Morse telegraphy, shooting at the pistol range, studying Dutch, and reading anything he could get his hands on that was remotely connected with the country or the agricultural supply business. His days were full, but it was exasperating. Nobody in the Ministry of Economic Warfare was prepared to risk compromising his security, and because the Dutch were still obsessively neutral and hoped to escape the war, he had been forbidden to make contact with anyone in the Dutch embassy. As a result, Rory found himself in the ludicrous position of preparing to risk his life on a clandestine mission without benefit of actual prior contact with a Dutchman. He shrugged his shoulders and rolled his head to stretch his neck muscles. There was no point, he thought, in getting worked up about it. If you were going to be successful in war, or anything else, you had to be accommodating about things that were beyond your control and ruthless in pursuing the things you could influence.

In one respect, Rory conceded that he was fortunate. In the last two weeks he had been able to practise his German and French with four newly arrived trainees. They were mostly expatriate Polish officers, and he knew them by their cover names only. They were an optimistic bunch, anxious to fight the Germans. Amongst this group were two who could speak fluent German and French. On the other hand, having the chance to talk to them was not always a great comfort, as Rory found his French and German were rusty and he often struggled for simple words. It was an asinine way to prepare for a deadly serious mission. And notwithstanding his attempts to stay optimistic, whenever he saw Harris, he told him what he thought about the training regime.

He walked slowly up the stairs leading to the front door. Despite his misgivings about the mission, he liked it here. The great stone house was a magnificent example of Elizabethan construction, and over the centuries the landscaping had been steadily updated by some of the world’s finest designers. The house and grounds were a glorious illustration of what could be done when good taste and money converged over several generations. Someone once told him at dinner that the southern wing of the building had been designed by Christopher Wren. The glass in the front door could possibly be three hundred years old.

For the last two weeks Rory had been packed and prepared to leave Ramsford House on short notice. But even these final preparations hadn’t been easy, and getting a radio proved to be a serious trial. In the end, he had badgered Ewen Crossley and was given one of the first new, experimental, long-range Morse sets that the section had been allocated. The radio and its specially designed electrical hand crank weighed almost forty pounds and took almost all the space in a large leather suitcase. He only had one other smaller case for his revolver, two hand grenades, his clothes, false papers, false letters, money, and emergency rations. Both pieces of luggage were packed and sitting by his bed.

As he climbed the stairs to his room, one of the clerks from the newly formed administrative section came tearing breathlessly after him. “Mr. Ferrall, sir! There’s a call for you downstairs in the orderly room. It’s Colonel Harris and he says it’s important.”

He took the call in one of the converted drawing rooms.

“Ferrall speaking.”

“Rory, thank you for taking this call before breakfast. I do hope I haven’t disturbed your exercises.”

“Not at all, Geoffrey. What’s happening?”

“I don’t know if it will come as any surprise to you, but the Germans launched their invasion of France and the Low Countries this morning. The news will be on the radio within the hour. The Phoney War’s over. I’ve just finished speaking to my superiors, and I think you have a very good chance of travelling as we’ve planned. I can’t be any more specific as this is a civilian telephone exchange, but can you be ready to leave Ramsford House by noon?”

“I can be ready in five minutes if you like.” Rory’s heart quickened and he did his best to sound controlled.

“No need of that. Take your time. I’ll have a car pick you up at noon.”

* * *

IT WAS A BEAUTIFUL DAY, and like so many other shocked residents of Amsterdam, Annika and Saul had been drawn to the city centre in the days after the Dutch government surrendered to the Germans. There was nothing festive or jolly about their desire to come together. It was like a family being close after the sudden and tragic death of a loved one.

It was such a shock. The Netherlands had done nothing to deserve this. It seemed so unreal, a steady stream of uniformly bad news. It was as if they had lived through a nightmare and couldn’t wake from it. Even now, it was hard to remember what had happened in the proper sequence. German paratroops had landed on the first day; those were followed up by a ground invasion with tanks and motorized infantry. Pitched battles had been fought for three days, in which the Dutch were steadily hammered by the larger, stronger, and more professional German Army. And finally, on the fourth day, Rotterdam had been pulverized from the air. More than a thousand civilians were dead and tens of thousands of homes destroyed. The Germans threatened to repeat the bombing, and so the Dutch government signed an armistice.

It seemed like it was over before it started. The royal family had fled the country and was headed for Canada. And now there were German troops in Amsterdam in large numbers. There were even rumours of thousands of Dutch prisoners of war already being marched en masse into Germany to work in war factories.

Sitting at a café beside the Emperor’s Canal, Annika and Saul spoke in hushed, worried tones. It all seemed so inconceivable. Across from them were Oscar and Nina Van Sittart. Oscar Van Sittart worked with Saul at his law office.

“Saul, I don’t think we can stay here. Your German friend Pauli had the right idea. We Jews should just down tools and get the hell out of here.”

“You mean just sell everything and leave?”

“No, I mean just leave. Lock the door and get out. Give the key to a gentile friend and get out while the going is good. Maybe they could sell things later.”

“Where would you go?” Saul asked despairingly. “They’re still fighting in France. Half that country is overrun.”

“Make our way to America, Canada, South Africa, Australia, Ireland. Hell, I don’t know; anywhere but here. This is no longer just a bad premonition of disaster. This is a disaster.”

“What do you think they’ll do – uproot us, ship us off to some place like the Polish ghetto? You think we should just give up everything we’ve worked at for so many years? So we’ll be an occupied territory. This isn’t the seventh century. The Germans aren’t the Mongols. Civilization has progressed, and even the Nazis can’t destroy a thousand years of progress. No, we should stay here and resist this on our own terms. The rest of the country will stand by us, and the Germans will eventually come around to the rule of law. It’s in their blood. There may be some dark times, but we can see this out. I don’t believe in running.”

Annika was frustrated. “Saul! You said that to Pauli and he’s gone. I agree with Oscar. It’s long past time to get out. Yes, we leave everything. We won’t starve to death. We start new somewhere else. We won’t be the first to do that.”

Saul nodded and took a deep breath. “I agree, things are bad, but the Dutch people will stick together. What are the Nazis going to do? Mass executions for disobedience? We still have our courts, our ways, our traditions. They won’t break these overnight.”

“Don’t be a fool, Saul,” said Oscar. “What do you think they just did to Rotterdam? They flattened half the city. Thousands dead. Why? Because the Dutch army showed resistance when their country was invaded. Why can’t this happen here? Are we any better than the Russians? Russia has been a bloodbath for twenty years. It’s been completely out of control for years. Why can’t some people just interpret what they see for what’s really going on. This isn’t the worst of our troubles – with German troops invading, it’s the beginning. What’s to stop Hitler now? The British have been driven out of continental Europe. The French army has come apart. Look at Rotterdam. Nobody knows how many are dead. Why do think our army capitulated? Why did the Germans bomb Rotterdam? Now they’re bombing Paris. What have any of us done to Germany?”

“Saul,” Annika said, her voice rising, “I’ve never seen you so blind and so obstinate. But let me say something: I don’t want to raise children in a country like this. The Netherlands is fine. Raising a Jewish family in the Third Reich is not. I won’t do it. Oscar and Nina are going to try and get out of here, make their way to Spain and on from there. I want to go with them.”

As Annika spoke, three trucks of motorized German infantry followed by a police sedan drove at an insane speed down the Spiegelstraat. The drivers of all the vehicles in the convoy were leaning on their horns. There was something menacing and inhuman-looking about these soldiers, with their coal-scuttle helmets and their rifles. They were gone in a minute. All conversation stopped, and the waiter cleaning crumbs at the next table stopped and stared. “Where do you suppose they’re going? And how many years will we live under an army of occupation? Who would have thought it would ever come to this?” Everyone at the café’s tables stared in silence across the canal.

Saul was the first to speak. “It’s bad, but we’ll survive. We’re not quitters. We can talk about this again tonight. I gave my word to Uncle Samuël that I’d go and see him this afternoon. It’s not as simple as it sounds. I spoke to him this morning. He’s not well. He’s been talking to his doctor and they think he’s seriously ill. That’s why he’s anxious to see the family get back together again. He’s probably only got a few months left. Until yesterday he hadn’t told anyone except his wife. I promised to go and see him this morning. We’ll mend fences. This is no time for us to be running out on him. Annika, why don’t you go home with Oscar and Nina? I’ll meet you back there in two or three hours. I should go see Uncle Samuël myself. We’ll talk later.”

* * *

Amsterdam, 19 May 1940

AS THE BLACK OPEL OLYMPIA squealed on the cobblestones at the corner of Amsterdam’s Weesperstraat, Reinhold Neumann struggled to sit upright in the back seat. His driver, Dieter Schmidt, was grinning with his hand firmly on the horn. Driving at high speed in a military convoy through the streets of Amsterdam was the most exciting thing he’d done in days. He shouted over the blare of the car horn, “Sir, who would ever have thought the army would be able to drive their trucks this fast?”

“Keep enough distance between us and them so you can stop if you have to. I don’t want to die stuck to the back end of a Wehrmacht lorry.”

They were under strict orders not to stop, and it was unlikely that this column had any intention of slowing for anyone. Neumann knew the insane driving was in part melodramatic and they did it for the effect it would have on the local population. Aside from getting to their objective quickly, they wanted to convey the impression of merciless speed and efficiency. Resistance in the face of this display of strength and purpose would be utterly useless. As far as Neumann could see, these tactics were having their intended effect.

This was Neumann’s third high-priority objective of the day. His first two had gone smoothly, much more smoothly than he could have guessed two days ago when he was first warned of his secondary occupation tasks. And today, if he was successful, he would almost certainly be in line for another promotion. The Reich was growing at a great rate and it would need more senior police officers. He remembered reading somewhere that success was ambition’s strongest stimulant. Today he was feeling stimulated. The ease with which his team had carried out these police raids certainly kindled his daydreams of commendations, promotion, and glory, and he had to struggle to keep his mind on what he was doing now. So far it had been a good day.

Just before dawn, at his first objective, Neumann and his team had arrested the foreign minister. They ringed his house with troops and before anyone knew what was going on, they broke his door down with a sledgehammer. The poor old fool was dragged out of his house in his nightshirt, demanding to know under what grounds he was being arrested. That task went smoothly enough. Nobody in the house expected he would be arrested and the family was clearly terrified. There wasn’t so much as a second’s resistance.

After a quick breakfast of coffee, black bread, and cheese at the main Amsterdam police headquarters, Neumann’s team moved on to the day’s second objective, the Dutch Mint. He watched the streets of Amsterdam flash by and the shocked look on people’s faces as his column raced through their streets. He smiled at the thought. There was a certain professional satisfaction in knowing how easily the much more sensitive second operation went. That was one that had the potential to go wrong, but his team of police and infantry handled it superbly. Nobody expected them, and once they had clubbed the guards’ shift supervisor, clapped handcuffs on him, and thrown him into the back of one of the trucks, the remaining guards turned over all their keys and willingly demonstrated how to synchronize the unlocking procedure so they didn’t trip any alarms. He left two sections of infantry to guard the building, and he still had the better part of a company to handle the rest of the day’s work.

Things were going so swiftly. At this rate, he’d probably be finished by noon. There were only two more tasks on his assignment sheet. Both of these were in the same area. He had to secure two addresses in the diamond-cutting and trading section of town. When he briefed the infantry and his policemen that Amsterdam’s diamond industry was run by Jews, there were loud guffaws and cheers. Personally, he didn’t like that sort of display. Not that he particularly liked Jews, but if you are going to be professional in your police work, you shouldn’t allow the rank and file to behave like they were drunken louts at a village soccer game. Soldiers, police – it didn’t matter – they had to concentrate on what they were doing, and that required discipline and focus.

Whoever had mapped out these police objectives had done his homework well. Someone, well before the war, had exhibited real professionalism in this kind of detailed planning, and now things were going flawlessly. A platoon of infantry had been assigned to each Gestapo squad and so far there had been no resistance. Neumann liked that.

Neumann also liked what he had seen of Holland. It was such a sensible little country. The people were good looking, the towns and cities clean. There was an obvious sense of order and purpose to the place. In its own way, it was as Germanic as Salzburg. The café on the other side of the canal looked like it could have come out of a Viennese postcard: people enjoying the early summer sunshine, drinking coffee, reading newspapers. It was a shame it had come to war between them. But when you thought about it, compared to the Great War, the casualties in this operation had been insignificant. That’s how it should have been.

Neumann lit a cigarette and exhaled as they careened around another corner in one of the narrow streets north of the Herengracht Canal. He had to admit that whoever had decided that the Netherlands should be incorporated into the Reich certainly knew what he was doing. Oh, for now, there were sullen and hostile stares from most people on the street, but Neumann was confident that would all change once they got over the initial shock of being invaded. Besides, he had heard there was a group of Dutchmen that had actually been on hand to welcome the German army. The Dutch Nazi Party had urged a sensible armistice and made a small ceremony of welcoming their brothers in arms. That was wise of them. There was no point in taking casualties for what was a foregone conclusion. Their numbers weren’t large, but National Socialism had definitely taken root here. It just hadn’t had time to blossom yet. There was hope for the Netherlands. With their Aryan blood and their Germanic sense of order, someday they would be a part of the Reich itself, and not just one of the countries in its Empire.

The column came to an abrupt halt. The lead lorry stopped and infantry were fanning out around the block, preventing anyone from entering or leaving the cordoned area. These diamond factories shouldn’t take too long to deal with. Just like at the mint, he would arrest the owner, place a guard on the property, and then move off to his final objective for the day.

Neumann got out of his car and flicked his cigarette into the street. He straightened his Tyrolean hat and adjusted his tie in the reflection from the Opel’s window. He noted the small bronze sign beside the front gate tactfully advertising Samuël Van Zuiden, Diamond Merchant. Appraisals, Cutting and Sales. He glanced at the sheet listing his daily case file. He was at the right place. The only difference between the sign and his file was that the case file noted “Juden” behind the name of the business. Neumann smirked and wondered by how much this place would increase the Reich’s coffers.

The infantry platoon leader doubled up to him and saluted smartly. “The cordon is in place, Herr Major.”

“Fine. Send in the entry team. I’ll be here at the car. Report to me personally when the grounds are secure and we’ll do an inspection. Keep a section in reserve in case there are any problems.”

Neumann loitered about the car for several minutes, and then as he grew impatient, he walked up and down the cordon. The infantry stood in full fighting order: rifles, helmets, water bottles, leather ammunition pouches, respirators, and polished jackboots. The soldiers were spaced ten metres apart, every other man facing in opposite directions, allowing them to keep watch over the windows and doorways on both sides of the street. None of the soldiers’ eyes met Neumann’s and nobody spoke. Neumann looked at his watch. The entry team should be out by now. He paced halfway around the block again. Seconds before he was about to go in to see what was taking so long, a procession made up of three soldiers and a civilian in handcuffs came out the front gate.

“The premises are ready for your inspection, Herr Major. We had some problems with Herr Van Zuiden, but I think he understands the situation. Things are in order now.”

Samuël Van Zuiden had his head down. A trickle of blood ran from a cut above his left eye and his shirt was torn at the collar.

Neumann jerked his head toward the waiting vehicles. As the soldiers pushed Samuël Van Zuiden toward the truck, a sweating man on a bicycle cycled furiously up to the cordon.

“What’s going on here? What do you think you’re doing? This is my uncle; he’s done nothing wrong.” Saul let the bicycle fall to the pavement with a clatter. As he did so, two soldiers stepped forward and one of them pushed the butt end of his rifle into Saul’s chest.

“Stop! He’s my uncle. He’s done nothing wrong. I’ll take care of him. Please, release him.” Saul took a deep breath and looked around. Recognizing that Neumann was in charge he stepped toward him. “Please, sir, please.”

Neumann snapped his fingers. “Take him with the rest of them. I’ll do my inspection now. We have another cordon to complete before noon.”