“They’ve given up pursuit,” the gunner said. “We made it clear.”
Jordan shrugged. He doubted it. The SS had taken a bloody nose, which would slow them down for some time, but it wouldn’t stop them indefinitely. It was far more likely that they’d be calling for air support, demanding that a HE-477 plink his panzers from high overhead before they resumed the advance. It was what he would have done. Or maybe they’d be calling infantry and sending them on ahead to watch for a second ambush.
“Take us to the second firing position,” he ordered. He was surprised they’d have a chance to use it. Indeed, he doubted there was much prospect of them surviving the day, but they were still in place to deal out a second bloody nose. The SS would have been slowed down and that was all that mattered. “And keep a sharp eye out for enemy aircraft.”
“Jawohl,” the driver said.
Chapter Fifteen
Berlin, Germany Prime
13 September 1985
Herman shook his head in grim disbelief as he stood near what had once been the Ministry of Economics. It had been a towering building, once upon a time, but now it was nothing more than a pile of rubble. The police and firemen who’d approached the building and set up lines to keep the public back weren’t trying to do anything to recover bodies, he noted, even as the sun was starting to rise. They knew there was little hope of anyone surviving the holocaust.
“Quite a mess,” a voice said. “Do you think it was deliberate spite?”
Herman turned, then straightened in alarm and snapped out a salute as he recognised Hans Krueger. He’d never actually met the man, not even after the uprising, but every policeman in Germany knew the names and faces of the Reich Councillors. A single word from one of them – even now, he assumed – would be enough to send a policeman to a very unpleasant duty station in Siberia or Germany South. But Krueger didn’t look angry, merely contemplative.
“I do not know, Mein Herr,” Herman said. He wasn’t sure if Krueger knew who he was. It was unlike a Reich Councillor to confide in a mere policeman, even one with a very powerful relative. “It might have been a lucky shot.”
“Holliston always hated economics,” Krueger said. He sounded more as if he were speaking to himself, rather than to anyone else. “I would keep telling him we couldn’t afford his grand projects and he would keep arguing, as if we could just print some more money and solve all of our problems.”
Herman nodded. “How many people were in the building?”
“We evacuated most of the bureaucrats last week,” Krueger said. “There shouldn’t have been more than a skeleton staff.”
“That’s a relief,” he said. A large percentage of the Reich’s population would probably have cheered, if a few thousand bureaucrats were killed, but they were the ones who kept the Reich going. “Did he know that?”
“I have no idea,” Krueger said. “But he wouldn’t want to hit the Reichstag itself.”
Herman frowned, inwardly, as Krueger strode off, a handful of armed bodyguards appearing from nowhere to escort him. No, the SS wouldn’t want to target the Reichstag, but accidents happened. It was easy – all too easy – to imagine a missile going astray and coming down on top of the building, killing his only daughter. He hoped Gudrun would have had the sense to stay out of such an obvious target, but he hadn’t heard anything from her since her return from France. She hadn’t even found time to join the rest of the family for dinner.
He shook his head slowly as he turned his attention to the wreckage. Kurt was in danger too, somewhere along the border line, but Kurt was a young man. Kurt could handle himself. Herman had made sure of it, teaching Kurt how to take a punch and come up fighting. Gudrun, on the other hand, was a young woman, someone who needed protecting… and he felt helpless to protect her. He couldn’t help wondering if he’d failed as a father.
“Get the buildings around the debris evacuated,” he ordered, tiredly. He’d been on duty all night, but there was little hope of actually getting some sleep. “And then see if we can organise teams to drag the bodies out of the wreckage.”
His radio buzzed. “Wieland?”
“Here,” Herman said, lifting the radio to his mouth. “Go ahead.”
“Take a car and go to the transit barracks,” the dispatcher ordered. “There’s been a murder.”
Herman cursed under his breath as he passed command to one of the other policemen – the chain of command had been blown to hell by the uprising – and then summoned a driver to take him to the transit barracks. It was a relief – an immense relief – that the streets were almost deserted. Far too many young men and women had defied the curfew in the days following the uprising – and the police couldn’t give them a good kicking any longer – but the bombardment had brought home the realities of war to Berlin. There were no cars on the streets. Most people, he hoped, would have the sense to stay inside.
He fiddled with the radio as the police car raced through the lightening streets, but heard nothing apart from patriotic music. That might be a mistake, he told himself; the provisional government needed to make some kind of statement before the rumours started to get out of hand. He made a mental note to discuss it with his superiors, then braced himself as the car came to a halt outside the transit barracks. The gates were wide open, with five policemen standing guard. None of them looked very happy to be there. He climbed out of the car and strode towards him. They stood to attention slowly, too slowly. It wasn’t hard to deduce that they were retired policemen who’d been called back to the uniform.
“Report,” he snapped.
“Karl was killed,” one of them said. He sounded furious, yet scared. “Someone rammed a pencil into his eye.”
Herman sucked in his breath as they led him towards the guardpost. The ordinary inhabitants of the transit barracks were watched at all times, but they hadn’t had the manpower to keep an eye on the refugees, even if they hadn’t been good Germans. And yet, if they’d murdered a policeman… he glanced towards the closed and locked door, then cursed mentally. The murderer was probably long gone.
“I assume you locked the door,” he said. “Did you think to count the refugees?”
“There was never an accurate count,” the spokesman reminded him. “We don’t know who’s missing.”
Herman scowled. He’d been there when the refugees had been counted, but record-keeping hadn’t been a priority. There had been so much chaos that he wouldn’t have been surprised if a handful of the refugees hadn’t been registered at all. And even if the murderer had been registered, he might well have given a false name. In theory, every citizen of the Reich was supposed to have a dossier; in practice, the registry system had broken down during the uprising and never recovered.