“There are a few barricades, Herr Obersturmführer. You may have to go some of the way on foot. Perhaps it would be better to leave the truck here,” the soldier offered.
“And risk losing my transport to some fucking deserter? You must be out of your mind, man.”
The Untersturmführer craned his head above the level of the window. “Who is he, Herr Obersturmführer?” He asked, pointing at Kruze, the only civilian in their midst.
“Mind your own damned business,” Herries barked. “Put it this way, if I don’t get him to Gestapo headquarters in the next fifteen minutes, you’re going to pay for it. This man is here on the orders of the Reichsführer himself.”
Hearing the name of Himmler, Reichsführer-SS, invoked, Kruze thought that Herries had played his highest card too soon. Gestapo HQ was one quick telephone call away, or the time it took a despatch rider to get to Thiersch Platz and back. It would take but a few moments to expose the emptiness of Herries’ bluff.
The Untersturmführer seemed to shrug. Threats were of no deep significance any longer, he just wanted to get this arrogant bastard on his way, before the Americans reached them. “You’d better move fast, Herr Obersturmführer,” he said. “They’re burning papers in there at the moment, I heard, in preparation for the withdrawal.”
Herries hit the dashboard, muttering oaths about treason and defeatism. The Gefreiter eased the truck forward across the bridge, while behind them, the SS officer waved to his comrade at the other end to let them through. Kruze removed his thumb nail from the palm of his other hand and noticed the pain for the first time. He thought they were never going to get across.
The truck bumped along the cobbled streets, Herries directing the Gefreiter skilfully down side roads until they emerged in the square itself. An imposing red flag, bearing the jagged emblem of the swastika, hung listlessly from a large building with a colonnaded facade on the other side. Sure enough, black smoke was pouring from almost every window as the clerks threw file after file into hastily constructed incinerators. Soldiers of every rank swarmed in and out of the front like ants.
Kruze looked sidelong at Herries, his eyes narrowed to slits. Make your move, you bastard, he thought.
“You can go,” Herries said simply to the astounded Gefreiter.
“Herr Obersturmführer?”
“I said you can go, you stupid shits,” Herries shouted. “You’ve done your duty, you’ve provided escort for us to our destination, so, unless you want to wait here long enough for me to change my mind, you had better get going.” He hopped down from the cab and Kruze followed him.
The Gefreiter did not need another second for the reprieve to sink in. The truck tore round the square and headed off back in the direction of the bridge.
Kruze followed Herries down an alleyway leading off the square. They marched briskly, but did not run; it would only have drawn attention.
“How did you know Gestapo Headquarters was here?” the Rhodesian whispered.
“You ask too many questions, flyboy,” Herries gasped. “Save your breath till we get to the watchmaker’s. It’s only a short way from here.”
“This close to the Gestapo?”
Herries smiled. “Why not? They’re always too busy to look under their own noses.”
In a few more minutes they were standing before 17 Piloty Strasse. Unlike other districts of the city, parts of the old quarter were comparatively undamaged. Except for one flattened block at the end of the narrow street, the other town houses stood firm, with only a few broken panes of glass in their small Bavarian window frames to show for the Allied bombing. There appeared to be no one else around.
It was a moment of strange and unnerving tranquillity, as if in the eye of the storm.
“I’m going in,” Kruze said. “You’ll only scare them looking like that. I doubt whether London told the watchmaker and his father they were sending a bloody Obersturmführer of the SS as my escort.”
While Herries watched from a discreet distance, Kruze walked over to the door and knocked. There was an interminable pause, then a slight rustle from within. Locks and chains rattled, the door opened a crack and Kruze’s heart leapt when he saw not one man, but two; the first bent and old, with wisps of grey hair and glasses, the other young, standing a little way behind, with a mop of full dark hair and piercing brown eyes.
“Guardian Angel,” he said, addressing the old one.
“Come in, quickly,” the old man replied in German. He pulled Kruze into the hallway, shutting the door behind him. Kruze followed him toward the back of the house.
A young man with a mop of full, dark hair and piercing brown eyes stepped forward from the shadows. “You’ve got the wrong person,” he said in perfect, but heavily accented English. “I am Schell, the watchmaker, the one you are looking for. He is my father.” He pointed to the old man.
They stood looking at each other for a moment, then Kruze crossed the threshold and shook his hand warmly. “Thank God,” he said, suddenly feeling the strength in his legs crumbling to nothing.
“Where is the other one?” Schell asked urgently.
“Across the street,” the Rhodesian replied, forgetting to warn him about Herries’ appearance.
The young man looked out nervously and pulled his head back inside in almost the same instant. “There’s an SS officer watching us,” he said, his eyes wide with fear.
“It’s all right,” Kruze said. “That’s Christian Herries, my bloody guardian angel. I’d better call him in.”
CHAPTER THREE
They parked the GAZ on the outskirts of Branodz and battled their way on foot through the thousands of mobilized troops who jostled and collided with them in the confusion of the early morning mist. Malenkoy led the way into the town, while Shlemov hissed for him to make more speed. Malenkoy’s legs propelled him as best they could, but it was hard to walk at all when his limbs seemed to have the consistency of watery broth.
On the forty kilometre journey from Chrudim the NKVD man had given nothing away, despite Malenkoy’s questions as they wound their way up the mountain track, leaving the major of tanks to suppose the worst. Whatever Shlemov was after, his own role in off-loading the crates was unlikely to be forgotten by the NKVD. He could only hope to reduce his crime in the eyes of the man from Moscow by lending him as much assistance as possible. He had started by furnishing all the details he could remember of the place where the crates were located.
“The mist will help us,” Shlemov growled, “if we can get there before it lifts.”
“How are you going to take a look? Krilov is bound to have posted guards; there is much pilfering here, even for something as worthless as delousing fluid.”
“Then you are just going to have to distract them long enough for me to get into the corral,” Shlemov said. “How much further is it? This damned mountain mist makes the place unrecognizable.”
“We’re almost there. Any moment now we should be able to make out the buildings. They will be visible just beyond the next checkpoint.”
The red and white barrier suddenly cut through the fog like a beacon. Shlemov elbowed his way in front of Malenkoy, flashed his ID papers at the sentry, and slipped through into the square, the main marshalling point for all vehicles and supplies passing through the town.
“Now where?”
“Over there,” Malenkoy said, pointing at a group of low buildings just visible at the far corner of the square. “It was used as a cattle enclosure until the 1st Ukrainian arrived. The milking sheds border three sides. Access is only possible through that gate straight ahead.”