Oskar stood naked. Roughly the women attendants pushed him down in the large chair. Quickly — with the expertness born of practice — they fastened a leather strap from the back of the chair around his chest. They clamped both his wrists to the long arm-rests with two more straps, his hands lying flat on the ends of the boards And they trussed his feet to the sturdy legs of the chair. He sat naked. Utterly helpless. Utterly vulnerable…
Harbicht contemplated him….
A railroad worker. It would be he who had engineered the ambulance feint — although he surely had not thought of it. It would be he who had rigged the crates filled with bricks that he brought to Haigerloch. It was he who had been the brawn at the communications-center takeover. Had he also planned it? Harbicht dismissed the idea. It had to be the work of the two verfluchte enemy agents….
He felt uneasy. The nagging feeling just below the level of consciousness still disturbed him. Something was not right about the sabotage mission. What was it?
Even though the saboteurs had not been able to reach the pile itself — had they really done the best they could? Granted the limitations of the explosives they could bring in: had they? Thank God someone had had the presence of mind to slam the security hatch. He smiled a cold inward smile. He had already talked to half a dozen men who claimed to have done it!..
His mind was working rapidly, trying to analyze the situation before he began to question the traitor-saboteur. He had to produce results at once. The sabotage attempt had been, at best, inefficient. Not in keeping with the brilliantly conceived and executed penetration operation. Still — what could they have done once inside? Once they discovered the locked steel door? If they had used all their explosives at the door, they might have blown it open. But then they would have had no explosives left to destroy the pile itself. From Reichardt he had learned the importance of the heavy water. If the enemy agents had blown up the storage tank, a far greater delay would have resulted. If, indeed, it would have been possible to replace the heavy water at Haigerloch at all — within the time frame available and at the present stage of the war. Could the saboteurs have known about the alternate installation at the Alpenfestung? Not possible.
Then why did they not destroy the heavy-water supply? Why? They might not have known the storage cave was accessible to them, of course. Possible — but not likely. They obviously knew where the reactor cave was located. But, then again, they had not known about the steel security hatch. Or were they not aware of the importance of the heavy water? Did they not know it was kept separate from the pile? He doubted it. That, too, would be out of keeping with their obvious familiarity with the Project….
He frowned. He was indulging in seesaw reasoning. It would produce no concrete results. The answers would have to come from the man strapped in the chair before him.
He felt irritated. Something was escaping him. Somehow he still did not see the complete picture. Angrily he cleared his mind and fixed his cold eyes on Oskar.
“Now, Herr Weber,” he said evenly. “I have a great many questions to ask you. Questions that do require answers.” He looked steadily at him. “I should like to know, for instance, who else belongs to your group — your Widerstandsgruppe in Hechingen. Where are they? And who on the inside at Haigerloch helped you?” He smiled unpleasantly. “And — why are you wearing only one sock? Many more…” He paused. He sighed. “However, in the interest of expediency I shall limit myself to two questions, Herr Weber. Two questions to which I admit I must have immediate answers.”
Again he paused. “One: Where are the two enemy saboteurs with whom you worked? Two: What was the real purpose of the sabotage raid?”
A blinding realization gripped Oskar. He did not betray it by a flicker of an eyelash. But he felt himself go cold. The officer suspected! But he would not know—unless he, Oskar, talked. Oh, God! Would he have the strength to keep silent?… Dimly he was aware that Harbicht was talking.
“You are, of course, quite correct in your surmise that you will be — ah — tortured, Herr Weber. But perhaps you have no clear comprehension of what that actually means. Let me assure you, ultimately you will talk. My purpose, admittedly, is to convince you of the futility of keeping silent. To persuade you to talk now. I am confident I will succeed.”
He snapped his fingers at one of the attendants. The woman went to a glass case and took out a tray of surgical instruments. She brought it to Harbicht.
“Normally I am not this — eh — frank with my subjects, Herr Weber, but in this case time is important, and I have hopes you are a man who can see reason. To help you, I shall perform a small demonstration.”
He picked up a scalpel. It was razor sharp, with a wicked curved point.
“Pain, Herr Weber,” Harbicht continued, “is alive! It leaps. It twists. It soars. No place is inaccessible to it. It has no limits….”
He touched the scalpel gently to Oskar's chest. The cold steel seemed to sear his skin.
“The human body has many points that are especially sensitive to pain,” Harbicht went on, like a lecturer in a classroom. He placed the tip of the scalpel on the base of the nail on the middle finger of Oskar's right hand as it lay in the leather vise. “Here, for example. A particularly sensitive spot.”
He pressed the scalpel down through the nail. Oskar stiffened convulsively. Liquid fire shot from the tip of his finger through his arm. He groaned through tightly clenched teeth, and he strained his arm against his manacle, trying to free it, unmindful of the leather strap that was tearing the skin on his wrist.
Harbicht removed the scalpel. He dropped it into a metal bowl with a sharp clatter.
“You see, Herr Weber,” he said pleasantly. “Pain can be quite excruciating, can it not?”
He looked closely at Oskar.
“Yes. Of course,” he commented matter-of-factly. “And still — there are other factors, Herr Weber. More terrifying…”
He nodded curtly to the other white-clad attendant. She at once went to a small table and opened a drawer.
“You see, Herr Weber,” Harbicht explained. “Knowing where the pain will strike, as you did just now, how it will be inflicted, gives a strong man an edge. An advantage, if you will. He can anticipate it. He can steel himself to endure it. As you did. Yes…”
He smiled. A terrible smile which never reached his eyes. He motioned to the attendant at the table The woman came over.
“However, Herr Weber, we can take that edge away! I think you will be amazed at the difference it makes. When you no longer know where the pain will strike. Or how Or—when.”
He reached. The attendant handed him a small black object. He held it up for Oskar to see.
“A blindfold, Herr Weber,” he said. “Simply — a blindfold.” He shrugged. It was a strangely chilling gesture. “We could, of course, blind you. But that seems so — permanent. It might remove a certain, shall we say, incentive to talk. No. A blindfold is quite as effective.”