'You're very frank about it,' Engles said.
'And why not? You are a Colonel in the British Intelligence.'
'Was,' Engles corrected him. 'I'm a civilian now.'
Keramikos shrugged his shoulders. 'What does it matter what you call yourself? I call myself a shipping agent. But you remain of the Intelligence, and you must know that your people are aware that we exist. But what can they do? For example, what can they do about me? I am a Greek national. Greece is a free country. They cannot arrest me. And I shall do nothing foolish here in Italy. I shall get the gold. But I shall be careful. I shall not kill any one — if it can be avoided. Mayne and Valdini are different. They are both gangsters, and dangerous. Mayne is a deserter, as I told Blair.'
'Yes, I know all about Mayne,' Engles said. 'What I am interested in is how you found out about this gold. You couldn't have learned about it in Greece.'
'I could not, eh?' He seemed amused. 'Yet this is the first time I have been out of Greece since I went to Alexandria. And that was a long time ago — just before the Greek mutiny. No, I heard about it in Greece. It was luck. The one man who escaped out of the wretched guard that brought the gold up from Venice sought the help of my people in Salonika. They asked him to account for himself. And he broke down under questioning. But you know the story of how Stelben got that gold, eh?'
'Only by deduction,' Engles replied. 'Not from evidence. Stelben kept his mouth shut. And I certainly didn't know any of the guard escaped. He even murdered his personal servant who had been with him for nearly six years. I'd like to know what your man had to tell. And Blair here knows nothing of the story as yet.'
'Ah! Then you shall read the statement of the Korporal who escaped. And we will have a drink to fortify ourselves, eh?' He ordered the drinks and I leaned closer, for Mayne had gone into something loud and sonorous, which, with the noise of the wind outside, made it difficult to hear.
When Aldo had put the drinks in front of us, Keramikos said, 'This does not reflect well on the Gestapo. But all organisations, you understand, have their bad servants. You must remember it was near the end. And Stelben had killed many people before he shot down those nine soldiers. The gold was at a bank in Venice. It was the property of one of the Rome banking houses and had been transported to Venice for greater safety after your troops landed at Anzio. When we fell back to the line of the Po River, Heinrich Stelben was instructed to convey the gold to the Reichsbank at Munich. He was to take it by road, for you were bombarding the railways from the air, and the route chosen was through Cortina and Bolzano to Innsbruck. You must picture to yourselves that little convoy. There was the truck containing the gold. It was closed and sealed. And two Volkswagens. And there were seven honest German soldaten and Stelben — and gold to the value of over eight million dollars.'
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE STORY OF THE GOLD
Keramikes paused and glanced quickly round. Mayne was playing Danse Macabre now. The Contessa and Valdini were still talking together. And the snow streamed past the windows and piled up in great drifts on the belvedere. Then he took an old leather wallet from his pocket and brought out a folded sheet of foolscap. He smoothed it out on the bar and handed it to Engles. That is the statement made by Korporal Holtz of the Panzer Grenadiers,' he said. 'You may read it.'
Engles placed it on the bar so that I could read it over his shoulder. It was typewritten and in German. It was dated 9th October, 1945. I reproduce it here because I happen to have it with me as I write and because it is a good statement. Holtz tells the story with a directness and simplicity of wording often to be found in statements from soldiers. And this, combined with the noise of the wind and Mayne playing, made the scene he described very vivid to me as I read it, there in that bar-room, right over the spot where it had happened. It was, as Keramikos said, not a pretty story and it invested the gold with a peculiarly live quality that must, I think, be possessed by all things which have inspired greed and caused the death of many people.
Statement concerning the events which took place on the night of 15- I6th March, 1945, at the Passo Tre Croci made by Korporal Holtz, H. V. of the 9th Panzer Grenadiers.
(Translation of the German original taken from the body of Keramikos, the Greek.) On 15th March, 1945 I was ordered to report with a guard of three men to Kapitan Heinrich Stelben at the Albergo Daniele, Venice. Kapitan Stelben ordered me to proceed to the Banca Commerciale del Popolo and take charge of forty wooden cases containing gold. As soon as it was dark, we loaded the cases on to a launch and proceeded to the Piazzale Roma. Here we transferred the boxes to a closed truck, which was then sealed by Kapitan Stelben and an official of the bank in my presence. The Kapitan then gave me the route, which was by Mestre-Conegliano-Cortina-Bolzano-Innsbruck to Munich. Besides the sealed truck there were two Volkswagens. One of these, with a driver, was assigned to me and I was instructed to lead. Next came the truck containing the gold with a driver and one of my men as guard. In the rear was Kapitan Stelben in the other Volkswagen with a driver and my other two men. The drivers were all German. I do not know their names. The names of my men were Soldaten Flick, Wrenner and Reinbaum.
At Ponte nelle Alpi we stopped to put on chains. The roads had a thick coating of snow as we climbed into the mountains. It was freezing and the surface was slippery. Shortly after Cortina, Kapitan Stelben ordered us to halt by blowing on his horn. It was just after two o'clock in the morning. We were at the top of a pass. I examined my map and identified it as the Tre Croci Pass and the big square block of buildings we had just passed as the Tre Croci Hotel.
The Kapitan drove up alongside my car and informed me that he had been given sealed instructions to be opened at this spot. He produced an envelope and opened it. He then informed me that he was ordered to place the gold under guard in a concrete building at the top of a cable sleigh nearby. He then took the lead and we branched off the main road on to a track. Within a few hundred metres we reached a concrete building and were challenged by a sentry.
The Kapitan explained his instructions and the sentry called the Korporal of the guard. When the Korporal came out, Kapitan Stelben handed him the instructions. The Korporal appeared puzzled and stated that he must speak with his officer, who was billeted at the hotel. The Kapitan informed him that such a delay was impossible and referred him to the instructions, which apparently stated that the gold must-be transferred with the least possible delay and its storage completed before first light. He said that as soon as the gold had been stored he himself would accompany the Korporal of the guard to interview his officer.
To this the Korporal agreed. We then broke the seals of the truck and proceeded to off-load the cases of gold and transfer them to the sleigh, the whole of the guard, which consisted of only two men and the Korporal, assisting. Whilst this was in progress, the Korporal approached me and expressed concern that he had not been permitted to report to his officer. He was a Bavarian and belonged to an anti-aircraft unit which had taken over from the ski troops who had been training there. They were building heavy flak positions at the top of the slittovia. He pointed out to me that it was strange that he had not been warned to expect the arrival of such an important convoy and, after some discussion, I became uneasy in my mind, especially as my men were openly grumbling because they had been led to believe that they were proceeding to Germany.