Mission Berlin (The Only Good German) Page 2

  ‘But don’t they want lots of papers and orders and so on?’

  ‘No, they’re not like us. They’re just glad to have the help. Really. There was no checking. I’m in uniform, I’m English because I speak English, and I’ve got an AB64 part two so I’m a soldier. Let’s have a good meal, I’ll open the wine now.’

  As he pulled the cork he called to her. ‘They’ve given me a small truck so I sold the bike.’

  She came out of the scullery. ‘How did you sell it?’

  ‘On the black market. Got a Leica and a Rollei and a gramophone – not bad.’

  On the Friday he’d told her he was bringing home one of the MilGov lieutenants the next evening for a meal. She’d made a good potato soup and they had had tinned meat and potatoes.

  Lieutenant Mathews was responsible for all stores and services for the many MilGov detachments as far south as the Kiel Canal. Before the war he had been in an insurance office. He’d had three years as an orderly-room sergeant at an artillery site near Glasgow, and then he’d been commissioned and sent out to Flensburg. Max said that he was a man of influence but he was very lonely. He could be a useful man, Max hinted, and Max hoped to set up some deals with him.

  Ushi had been introduced as the daughter of the owners of the farm. She hadn’t been all that impressed herself. He was about thirty and already rather bald, and she thought that his Army issue, steel-framed glasses made him look like the wolf in ‘Little Red Riding Hood’. However, as the evening wore on, it became clear that the lieutenant himself was very impressed with Ushi. She had wondered if Max would mind, but he didn’t seem to notice.

  The following Monday Max had come home late and he sat up talking to her till long after midnight. It seemed that the lieutenant was very attracted by her. So much so, that in return for sleeping with her once in a while, arrangements could be made with Max for permits for scarce materials that would make all three of them rich. Not in Deutschmarks nor Occupation Marks, but sterling and dollars. The kind of figures bandied about represented nearly a hundred thousand dollars, for Max and the girl, in six or seven months.

  Ushi shed a few tears. Not because the lieutenant wanted to sleep with her, nor because of the sheer commerciality of it all, but because her Max didn’t seem to mind. It turned out that sleeping with her ‘once in a while’ really meant about three times a week. But as Max had pointed out, two of those occasions would be afternoons, so it wouldn’t really interfere with them.

  Chapter 3

  The man who stood there was well over six feet, broadshouldered, and the blond hair that blew across his face in the fresh spring wind did nothing to hide the arrogance of the pale blue eyes. The good tweed jacket, the hand-knitted, polonecked sweater and the grey flannel trousers all spoke of his Englishness. But he wasn’t English. The barbed wire stretched across the road, and the big man was looking across at the Military Police corporal.

  It was May 1945, Bad Oeynhausen, headquarters town of 21 Army Group. It was virtually intact and rumour had it that it was one of those choice and lucky towns in Germany, like Frankfurt, which had been singled out by the Americans, or the British, to be preserved, to make their occupation more comfortable. The Town Council which had put it on the map fifty years before had not been looking for the kind of guests that it had now. These were takers, not spenders, and the only Germans allowed through the barbed wire were prisoners or servants.

  Corporal Anderson of the Corps of Military Police was a new boy. He had not pushed through the Normandy plains nor up the steep hills of the Ardennes. He’d only been a member of the British Army of the Rhine for two weeks. Nevertheless, he knew his job. He was there to keep importunate Germans out. Whether they wanted extra rations, jobs, their property back, or merely to denounce the neighbours, Corporal Anderson’s small German vocabulary was usually enough. But this man wasn’t having any. The air of authority was unmistakeable. Corporal Anderson had suffered under its British equivalent, from the depot at Woking, to his embarkation at Harwich. Another thing that put him on edge, was that this man spoke with an Oxford accent, and finally he succumbed to the natural pressure of the stranger on the other side of the barbed wire. The man wanted to see an Intelligence Officer. So what the hell. Let him see one.

  Lieutenant Wilson, Intelligence Corps, was nearly 22. He’d been taught how to read ordnance survey maps, ride a motorcycle and deal with all sorts of exciting situations. But Lieutenant Wilson spoke good German, and wasn’t designed for excitement, and was now second-in-command of the Document Unit. On the front of his peaked hat was a bronze badge with the superimposed roses of York and Lancaster supported by a wreath of laurels, and a scroll with the words ‘Intelligence Corps’. A badge described by the rest of the army as a pansy resting on its laurels. The badge had deceived Corporal Anderson, and it deceived the big German as well.

  ‘I’d like to introduce myself. I’m Colonel Munsel and I think I can be of help to you.’

  An imperious hand in a fine leather glove from the Officers’ Shop cut him short.

  ‘Were you a member of the SS?’

  ‘Certainly not.’

  ‘Were you a member of the Gestapo?’

  ‘Look here, I haven’t come . . .’

  ‘Just answer yes or no.’

  ‘No, I was not a member of the Gestapo.’

  Lieutenant Wilson was cold, and he reckoned that he knew who the security boys were interested in, and this man wasn’t one of them. He rapped his leather-covered stick on one of the trestles holding the barbed wire.

  ‘Now you just listen to me. This is a security area. You’ve no business being here, and if you don’t leave immediately I shall have you arrested by the police.’

  ‘The German police,’ he added, as if there might be some doubt about the status of his authority.

  The big German looked at the young officer and the muscles at the side of his face were rigid. Then they relaxed, and as he turned he said, ‘You stupid little bastard.’ And he pushed up the collar of his sportscoat as he walked away down the road under the plane trees.

  Captain David Mills, Intelligence Corps, looked, at first glance, a little younger than his twenty-five years. But that was just physical fitness and an active war. It was his eyes and mouth that provided the rebuttal. His eyes were between pale blue and grey, and they seemed to observe without obvious movement. And this stillness tended to be disconcerting. He was a good interrogator, and like most good observers he didn’t constantly seek to display it. His mouth was wide for a man, and the wellshaped lips could have hinted at femininity, had it not been for the ridged muscles that bracketed them into a permanently sceptical straight line. It was not a young man’s mouth. It had spent too much time disbelieving in silence, and not enough time kissing. But like the violet striped ribbon of the M.G. on his battle-dress blouse, it was a significant clue to the young man’s background.

  When he stopped the jeep on the hump-backed bridge his driver had waited patiently. Over on the right was a twenty-acre ploughed field. A mixture of loam and clay. At the bottom of the slope was the edge of a copse which ran alongside the road they were travelling, half a mile or so ahead of them. The tip-off had been from a reliable source and Mills kept his binoculars on the far corner of the field. There was a man with some sheep at the edge of the copse, and a German Shepherd loped up the ditch inside the field. As he watched, the dog suddenly turned, and with its head outstretched, barked furiously, as a big man broke from the corner of the trees, and started walking along the hedge at the bottom of the field.

  Mills had seen too many pictures of this man not to recognize him immediately, even at that distance. Despite the binoculars he couldn’t see his face clearly, but he knew that this was his man. Mills opened the gate to the meadow, and they drove alongside the hedge, across to the far corner. And that was where they waited for him.

  As the man came the last few yards up the slope he was looking at the ground, and when Mills spoke, his head had jerked up with surprise. But with no sign of fear.

  ‘Colonel Munsel?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Colonel Munsel of the Abwehr?’

  The man stood still, hands on hips, looking at the younger man. ‘You must be Mills – I beg your pardon – Captain Mills.’ He hesitated, and then went on. ‘It wouldn’t be strictly accurate if I said I was an officer of the Abwehr, but I’m the man you want.’

  ‘Well, you’d better get in the jeep and we’ll be on our way.’

  Munsel made no move towards the vehicle, but said quietly, ‘Am I not to be allowed to get my things?’

  ‘Yes, of course. You can get a blanket and a razor.’

  Munsel nodded, said ‘Thank you’, and looked down at the ground, idly moving a few pebbles across the path with one elegant hand-made shoe.

  ‘I did actually go to Bad Oeynhausen to give myself up to the Intelligence people there, but when they found I wasn’t in the SS or the Gestapo they weren’t interested.’

  The arrest of Munsel was one of 21 Army Group’s top priorities – he was the Wehrmacht’s expert on the Russian Army, had connections with the Abwehr, and had helped in planning Operation Barbarossa – the invasion of Russia. 21 AG wanted him a lot, and they wanted him quickly. The thought of him being turned away was too much. Mills did his best not to smile, but it didn’t work. It sounded just like 21 Army Group.

  ‘Why did you try to give yourself up?’

  ‘Because I wanted to ask a favour in return.’

  ‘What was the favour?’

  ‘I wanted to get married before I’m made a prisoner, and I can’t get married without registering the application, and then I’d be picked up.’ The blue eyes looked at the Englishman’s face. ‘Would that be possible even now?’

 
Mills shook his head. ‘We’ve just finished a war, and marriages have to wait.’

  But the German didn’t give up that easily. ‘She’s the Count’s daughter and it’s easy for me to wait, but it’s not so easy for her.’

  Mills looked at Munsel with all the non-conformist distaste of a typical New Statesman reader who had just cast the first vote in his life. A vote for Labour and Clement Attlee.

  ‘Well, Count’s daughters are going to have to learn to take their place in the queue.’

  Munsel nodded slightly. ‘I’m sorry that you’re prejudiced against the aristocracy, because I’d still like to ask you if you wouldn’t think again.’

  ‘Why the hell should I?’

  Munsel put his hands on his hips, and was obviously considering carefully what to say. Then he looked at Mills as he spoke.

  Tor two reasons, captain. Firstly because if you help me in this matter I will co-operate with you, or 30 Corps, or 21 Army Group – whoever interrogates me. And secondly, she may be a count’s daughter, but she’s just a girl. And she’s pregnant. Our child will be born in the next two or three weeks.’

  ‘What type of information are you willing to discuss with us?’

  ‘You know what my job was?’

  ‘More or less.’

  ‘Well, I’ll discuss anything that interests you or anybody else at 21 Army Group.’

  ‘How soon are you prepared to be married?’

  ‘As soon as it can be arranged, but it would take at least a week because I think the Count would insist that it was done by the Bishop, and they don’t like one another.’

  This was understandable. The Count came from the Silesian borderlands and was a cold, arrogant Prussian; and the Bishop was a sly, greedy, fat, little man who would have done much better in commerce than the Church.

  Mills looked across at Munsel – ‘If I fix for the Bishop to marry you, would that be what you want?’

  He nodded. ‘I don’t really mind for myself. I’d like to please the Count. He probably isn’t your cup of tea but he’s a man of principle and I’ve got a feeling that the times we’re going to live in for the next ten years, are going to be difficult for him anyway. I’d really be most grateful if you would allow this.’ Mills was doing ‘she loves me, she loves me not’ with the petals of a small field-daisy. It came to ‘she loves me not’, and he pulled the head off just for Auld Lang Syne. As he stood up he said to Munsel, ‘Come on, let’s see what we can do. We’ll go and see the Count.’

  The German had put his hand on Mills’ shoulder for a moment and somehow he hadn’t resented it.

  The Schloss was pretty, rather than beautiful, and as they walked across the courtyard, the Count was giving orders to a workman. When he saw Munsel he was going to walk over towards him, but when he saw the English officer and his uniform his mouth went into a hard line, and he stood waiting for them to join him. Mills explained the position to him but the Count’s face didn’t relax, and he turned to look at Munsel and said, ‘Is this what you want, Otto?’

  ‘I think it’s very good of Captain Mills to allow us this privilege. I’m sure Helga will be pleased, and I think we should both thank Captain Mills for his co-operation.’

  Mills was amused by the little speech, because Munsel was obviously aware that the Count and he already disliked one another. Not for any good reason, just instinctively, which is probably the best reason of all. But the Count had been around for a long time, he didn’t second the vote of thanks, just looked at Mills with the alert eagle’s eyes as he said, ‘Perhaps you’ll both come inside.’

  The living room was large but there was a big log fire, and before Mills sat down he turned to the Count, ‘Freiherr von Leder, I’d better speak to the Bishop if you will show me your telephone.’

  He nodded and turned, and Mills followed him to the hall. He asked the operator to get him the Bishop of Hildesheim. His Grace was pretty cautious when he came on the telephone, because it was generally him calling the captain for some favour. It had never been the other way round.

  They got through the preliminaries and Mills got straight to the point. ‘Bishop, I want you to perform a marriage for a German officer, Colonel Otto Munsel, and Freiherr von Leder’s daughter, Helga.’

  The Bishop was smooth, but a bit silly with it. ‘Am I right in thinking, Herr Hauptmann, that the parties wish to be married themselves?’

  ‘They tell me that’s the case, Bishop.’

  ‘Well, I shall be delighted to perform the ceremony and all they have to do is to come down here and sign the appropriate forms and they can be married in less than a month.’

  There was nothing Mills disliked more than a weak man trying to use the rules to pretend that he’s tough.

  ‘My dear Bishop, it’s not only they who want to be married. I want them married, tomorrow, no later than midday, so I leave it to you to make the necessary arrangements.’

  This led to a flow of protestations about how impossible this would be on legal grounds, theological grounds, and even propriety itself was dragged in. He didn’t often have a chance of arguing with Mills and he was making up for lost time. Mills listened to the flow for a few moments and then interrupted. ‘Bishop, I recognized, when you came to see me last week about supporting your application for the release of the man you wanted to reinstate your stained-glass windows, that you are a man of enterprise, and that if you wanted something done you’d get it done. I must just rely on you.’

  The Bishop took the ball like the expert catcher he was. ‘Leave it to me, Herr Hauptmann. Shall we say at eleven tomorrow morning.’

  ‘My dear Bishop, let’s say that.’

  Mills went back to the sitting room and the two men had been joined by a girl. She was attractive but not pretty, with the aquiline nose and the weak chin that indicated that she was out of some top-drawer. They were introduced, and she made a pleasant, but cool, little ‘thank you’ speech. And well she might, because she was very, very pregnant.

  The three of them strolled down to the jeep and Mills told his driver to bring the jeep to the Schloss the next day at 1300 hours.

  Munsel and his captor slept in the same room at the castle that night, and Captain Mills was best man at the wedding the following morning. The marriage ceremony took place in the Count’s private chapel. There was a choir, and an organist, and instead of the Wedding March they had Elgar’s ‘Nimrod’ theme from the Enigma Variations. Otto Munsel was in uniform, wearing a Knight’s Cross with swords and oak-leaves; and although the sun shone through the narrow windows, it was a melancholy occasion. After lunch even Munsel himself seemed relieved when they were sitting in the jeep. They drove across the courtyard and down the hill to the main road to Hildesheim. Nobody had waved them goodbye.

  Two days later Mills got a small package. When he opened it there was a pair of gold cuff-links, engraved with the Count’s coat-of-arms, and a small note which said in German ‘With thanks for your kindness and help, from Freiherr von Leder and his daughter, Helga Munsel.’

  Chapter 4

  Mills’ HQ in Hildesheim was a requisitioned block of flats facing the Town Hall and the jeep stopped at the concrete forecourt for Mills and his prisoner to get out.

  Munsel was given a large room as his quarters. It was nearly seven o’clock that evening before Mills saw him again. Without formalities he had filled in the basic details of Munsel’s career. It wouldn’t be fair to say that he interrogated him, because he was only two willing to talk. He was a pleasant change from the hooligans of the Gestapo and the SD.

  When the war had started Munsel had been a lieutenant in the Wehrmacht but because of his fluent English he was transferred after six months into the Abwehr, and had worked for some time as a personal assistant to Admiral Canaris, specializing on evaluating information concerning the Russian Army. Then he had been called back to work in the Wehrmacht Nachrichtendienst, attached to Army Group North under General Haider. He’d had a tenuous link back to Stauffenberg’s group whilst they were cooking up the 20th of July plot against Hitler.

  He had completed his academic education at Balliol, and had not been a member of any Nazi party organization. But he didn’t pretend that he hadn’t wanted the Germans to win the war. One of his main duties had been to keep Army Group North and the OKW up to date on all activities of the Russian Army down to brigade level.