"I could be completely wrong, sir," Charlotte said, mustering the most authoritative voice she could, "but I think I just overheard a German spy signaling a U-boat off the coast."
Kapitanleutnant Max Hoffman would never get used to the stench of a U-boat that has been submerged too long: sweat, urine, diesel oil, potatoes, semen. The assault on his nostrils was so intense he would gladly stand watch on the conning tower in a gale rather than stay inside.
Standing in the control room of U-509, he could feel the throb of its electric motors beneath his feet as they wheeled in a monotonous circle twenty miles from the British coastline. A fine mist hung inside the submarine, creating a halo around every light. Every surface was cool and wet to the touch. Hoffman liked to imagine it was dew on a spring morning, but one look at the cramped claustrophobic world he inhabited robbed him of that fantasy very quickly.
It was a tedious assignment, sitting off the coast of Britain for weeks on end, waiting for one of Canaris's spies. Of Hoffman's crew only his first officer knew the true purpose of their mission. The rest of the men probably suspected as much, since they weren't on patrol. Still, things could be worse. Given the extraordinary loss rate among the Ubootwaffe--nearly 90 percent--Hoffman and his crew were damned lucky to have survived this long.
The first officer came onto the bridge, face grave, a sheet of paper in his hand. Hoffman looked at the man, depressed by the notion that he probably looked just as bad: sunken eyes, hollow cheeks, the gray pallor of a submariner, the unkempt beard because there was too little fresh water to waste on shaving.
The first officer said, "Our man in Britain has finally surfaced. He'd like a lift home tonight."
Hoffman smiled, thinking, Finally. We pick him up and head back to France for some good food and clean sheets. He said, "What's the latest weather?"
"Not good, Herr Kaleu," the first officer said, using the customary diminutive form of kapitanleutnant. "Heavy rains, winds thirty miles per hour from the northwest, seas ten to twelve."
"Jesus Christ! And he'll probably be coming in a rowboat--if we're lucky. Organize a reception party and prepare to surface. Have the radio operator inform BdU of our plans. Set a course for the rendezvous point. I'll go up top with the lookouts. I don't care how bad the weather is." Hoffman made a face. "I can't stand the fucking smell in here any longer."
"Yes, Herr Kaleu."
The first officer shouted a series of commands, echoed among the crew. Two minutes later, U-509 punched through the stormy surface of the North Sea.
The system was known as High Frequency Direction Finding, but almost everyone involved with the project knew it as Huff Duff. It worked on the principle of triangulation. The radio fingerprint created by the oscillograph at Scarborough could be used to identify the type of transmitter and its power supply. If the Y Service stations at Flowerdown and Iceland also ran oscillographs, the three recordings could be used to establish bearing lines--known as cuts--which could then be used to locate the position of the transmitter. Sometimes Huff Duff could pinpoint a radio to within ten miles of its geographical location. Usually, the system was much less accurate, thirty to fifty miles.
Commander Lowe did not believe Charlotte Endicott was completely wrong. In fact, he believed she had stumbled onto something critical. Earlier that evening, a Major Vicary from MI5 had sent out an alert to the Y Service to look for this very sort of thing.
Lowe spent the next few minutes speaking with his counterparts in Flowerdown and Iceland, attempting to plot a fix on the transmitter. Unfortunately, the communication was short, the fix not terribly precise. In fact, Lowe could narrow it only to a rather large portion of eastern England--all of Norfolk and much of Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, and Lincolnshire. Probably not much of a help, but at least it was something.
Lowe dug through the papers on his desk until he found Vicary's number in London and then reached for his secure telephone.
Atmospheric conditions over northern Europe made shortwave communication between the British Isles and Berlin virtually impossible. As a result, the Abwehr's radio center was housed in the basement of a large mansion in the Hamburg suburb of Wohldorf, 150 miles northwest of the German capital.
Five minutes after U-509's radio operator transmitted his message to BdU in northern France, the duty officer at BdU flashed a brief message to Hamburg. The duty officer at Hamburg was an Abwehr veteran named Captain Schmidt. He recorded the message, placed a priority call to Abwehr headquarters in Berlin on the secure line, and informed Lieutenant Werner Ulbricht of the developments. Schmidt then left the mansion and walked down the street to a nearby hotel, where he booked a second call to Berlin. He did not want to make this call from the thoroughly bugged lines of the Abwehr post, for the number he gave the operator was for Brigadefuhrer Walter Schellenberg's office at Prinz Albrechtstrasse. Unfortunately for Schmidt, Schellenberg had discovered he was having a rather lurid affair with a sixteen-year-old boy in Hamburg. Schmidt readily agreed to go to work for Schellenberg to avoid exposure. When the call went through he spoke to one of Schellenberg's many assistants--the general was dining out that night--and informed him of the news.
Kurt Vogel had decided to spend a rare evening at his small flat a few blocks from Tirpitz Ufer. Ulbricht reached him there by telephone and informed him that Horst Neumann had contacted the submarine and was coming out. Five minutes later, Vogel was letting himself out the front door of his building and walking through the rain toward Tirpitz Ufer.
At that same moment Walter Schellenberg checked in with his office and was told of developments in Britain. He then telephoned Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler and briefed him. Himmler ordered Schellenberg to come to Prinz Albrechtstrasse; it was going to be a long night and he wanted some company. As it happened, Schellenberg and Vogel arrived at their respective offices at precisely the same moment and settled in for the wait.
The location of the Allied invasion of France.
The life of Admiral Canaris.
And it all depended on the word of a couple of spies on the run from MI5.
53
HAMPTON SANDS, NORFOLK
Martin Colville used the barrel of his shotgun to push back the door of the barn. Neumann, still standing next to the radio, heard the noise. He reached for his Mauser as Colville stepped inside. Colville spotted Neumann going for the gun. He turned, leveled the shotgun, and fired. Neumann leapt out of the way, hitting the floor of the barn and rolling. The roar of the shotgun blast in the confined space of the barn was deafening. The radio disintegrated.
Colville aimed the gun at Neumann a second time. Neumann rolled up onto his elbows, Mauser in his outstretched hands. Sean Dogherty stepped forward, screaming at Colville to stop. Colville turned the gun on Dogherty and squeezed the trigger. The blast struck Dogherty in the chest, lifting him off his feet and driving him backward like a rag doll. He fell on his back, blood pumping from the gaping wound in his chest, and died within a matter of seconds.
Neumann fired, hitting Colville in the shoulder and spinning him around. Catherine had by now drawn her own Mauser and, using both hands, leveled it at Colville's head. She fired twice rapidly, the silencer dampening the blasts to a dull thud. Colville's head exploded and he was dead before his body hit the floor of Dogherty's barn.
Mary Dogherty lay in an agitated half sleep upstairs in her bed when she heard the first shotgun blast. She sat bolt upright and swung her feet to the floor as the second blast shattered the night. She threw off her blanket and raced downstairs.
The cottage was in darkness, the sitting room and the kitchen deserted. She went outside. Rain beat against her face. She realized that she was wearing only her flannel nightgown. There was silence now, only the sound of the storm. She looked out across the garden and spotted an unfamiliar black van in the drive. She turned toward the barn and saw light burning there. She called out "Sean!" and started running toward the barn.
Mary's feet were bare, the ground cold and sodden. She cal
led Sean's name several more times as she ran. A shaft of faint light spilled from the open door of the barn, illuminating a box of shotgun shells on the ground.
Stepping inside, she gasped. A scream caught in her throat and would not come out. The first thing she saw was the body of Martin Colville lying on the floor of the barn a few feet away from her. Part of the head was missing and blood and tissue were scattered everywhere. She felt her stomach retch.
Then she turned her attention to the second body. It was on its back, arms flung wide. Somehow, in death, the ankles had become crossed, as though he were napping. Blood obscured the face. For a brief second Mary permitted herself to hope that it wasn't actually Sean lying there dead. Then she looked at the old Wellington boots and oilskin coat and knew it was him.
The scream that had been trapped in her throat came out.
Mary cried, "Oh, Sean! Oh, my God, Sean! What have you done?"
She looked up and saw Horst Neumann standing over Sean's body, a gun in his hand. Standing a few feet from Neumann was a woman, holding a pistol in her hands aimed at Mary's head.
Mary looked back at Neumann and screamed, "Did you do this? Did you?"
"It was Colville," Neumann said. "He came in here, gun blazing. Sean got in the way. I'm sorry, Mary."
"No, Horst. Martin may have pulled the trigger, but you did this to him. Make no mistake about it. You and your friends in Berlin--you're the ones who did this to him."
Neumann said nothing. Catherine still stood with the Mauser leveled at Mary's head. Neumann stepped in, took hold of the weapon, and gently lowered it toward the ground.
Jenny Colville stayed in the darkened meadow and approached the barn from the side, hidden from view. She crouched against the outside wall, rain smacking against her oilskin, and listened to the conversation taking place inside.
She heard the voice of the man she knew as James Porter, though Mary had called him something else, something that sounded like Horse. It was Colville. . . . Sean got in the way. I'm sorry, Mary.
Then she heard Mary's voice. It had risen in pitch and quivered with anger and grief. You did this to him. . . . You and your friends in Berlin.
She waited to hear her father's voice; she waited to hear Sean's voice. Nothing. She knew then they both were dead.
You and your friends in Berlin. . . .
Jenny thought, What are you saying, Mary?
And then it all came together in her mind, like pieces of a puzzle that suddenly fall in the right order: Sean on the beach that night, the sudden appearance of the man called James Porter, Mary's warning to her earlier that afternoon: He's not what he appears to be. . . . He's not for you, Jenny. . . .
Jenny did not understand what Mary was trying to say at the time, but now she thought she did. The man she knew as James Porter was a German spy. And that meant Sean was a spy for the Germans too. Jenny's father must have discovered the truth and confronted them. And now he was lying dead on the floor of Sean Dogherty's barn.
Jenny wanted to scream. She felt hot tears pouring from her eyes down her cheeks. She raised her hands to her mouth to smother the sound of her crying. She had fallen in love with him, but he had lied to her and used her and he was a German spy and he probably just killed her father.
There was movement inside the barn, movement and a few soft exchanges of instructions that Jenny could not hear. She heard the German spy's voice, and she heard a woman's voice that did not belong to Mary. Then she saw the spy emerge from the barn and walk down the drive, torch in hand. He was heading toward the bicycles. If he found them, he would realize she was here too.
And he would come looking for her.
Jenny forced herself to breathe slowly, evenly, to think clearly.
She was being battered by several emotions. She was frightened, she was sick with the thought of her father and Sean dead. But more than anything else she was angry. She had been lied to and betrayed. And now she was driven by one overwhelming desire: she wanted them caught and she wanted them punished.
Jenny knew she would be no use if the German found her.
But what to do? She could try to run to the village. There was a telephone at the hotel and the pub. She could contact the police, and the police could come and arrest them.
But the village was the first place the spies would look for her. There was just one way into the village from the Doghertys': across the bridge by St. John's Church. Jenny knew she could be caught very easily.
She thought of a second option. They had to be leaving soon. They had just killed two people, after all. Jenny could hide for a short time until they had left; then she could emerge and contact the police.
She thought, But what if they take Mary with them?
Mary would be better off if Jenny were free and trying to find help.
Jenny watched the spy as he moved closer to the road. She saw the beam of his torch play over the surrounding ground. She saw it settle on something for a moment, then flash in her direction.
Jenny gasped. He had found her bike. She rose and started to run.
Horst Neumann spotted the pair of bicycles lying side by side in the grass at the edge of the road. He turned his torch toward the meadow, but the weak beam illuminated only a few feet in front of him. He lifted the bicycles, took hold of them by the handlebars, and rolled them up the drive. He left them at the back of Dogherty's barn, hidden from view.
She was out there--somewhere. He tried to picture what had happened. Her father storms out of the house with a gun: Jenny follows him and arrives at the Doghertys' cottage in time to see the aftermath. Neumann guessed she was hiding, waiting for them to leave, and he thought he knew where.
For a moment he considered letting her go. But Jenny was an intelligent girl. She would find a way to contact the police. The police would throw up roadblocks all around Hampton Sands. Making it to Lincolnshire in time to meet the submarine was going to be difficult enough. Allowing Jenny to remain free and contact the police would only make it tougher.
Neumann went inside the barn. Catherine had covered the bodies with some old sacking. Mary was sitting in a chair, shaking violently. Neumann avoided her gaze.
"We have a problem," Neumann said. He gestured at the covered body of Martin Colville. "I found his daughter's bicycle. We have to assume she's here somewhere and knows what happened. We also have to assume she'll try to get help."
"Then go find her," Catherine said.
Neumann nodded. "Take Mary in the house. Tie her up. Gag her. I have an idea where Jenny might be going."
Neumann went outside and hurried through the rain to the van. He started the motor, reversed down the drive, and headed toward the beach.
Catherine finished tying Mary to a wooden chair in the kitchen. She tore a tea cloth in two and wadded one half into a ball. She stuffed it into Mary's mouth, then tied the other half around her face in a tight gag. If she had her way Catherine would kill her now; she did not like leaving a trail for the police to follow. But Neumann obviously felt some attachment to the woman. Besides, it would probably be many hours before anyone found her, perhaps longer. The cottage was isolated, nearly a mile from the village; it might be a day or two before anyone noticed that Sean, Mary, Colville, and the girl were missing. Still, every survival instinct told her it was best to kill her and be done with it. Neumann would never know. She would lie to him, tell him Mary was unharmed, and he would never find out.
Catherine checked the knots one last time. Then she removed her Mauser from her coat pocket. She took hold of it, wrapped her index finger around the trigger, and touched the barrel to Mary's temple. Mary kept very still and stared defiantly at Catherine.
"Remember, Jenny is coming with us," Catherine said. "If you tell the police, we'll know. And then we'll kill her. Do you understand what I'm saying to you, Mary?"
Mary nodded once. Catherine took hold of the Mauser by the barrel, raised it into the air, and brought it down on the top of Mary's head. She slumped forward, u
nconscious, blood trickling through her hair toward her eyes. Catherine stood in front of the dying embers of the fire, waiting for Neumann and the girl, waiting to go home.
54
LONDON
At that moment, a taxi braked to a halt in a driving rain outside a stubby, ivy-covered blockhouse beneath Admiralty Arch. The door opened and a small, rather ugly man emerged, leaning heavily on a walking stick. He did not bother with an umbrella. It was only a few feet to the doorway, where a Royal Marine guard stood watch. The guard saluted smartly, which the ugly man did not bother returning, for it would have meant switching his stick from his right hand to his left, a troublesome task. Besides, five years after being commissioned as an officer in the Royal Navy, Arthur Braithwaite still was uncomfortable with the customs and traditions of military life.
Officially, Braithwaite was not on duty for another hour. But, as was his daily habit, he arrived at the Citadel one hour early to give himself more time to prepare. Braithwaite, crippled in one leg since childhood, knew that to succeed he always had to be better prepared than those around him. It was a commitment that had paid dividends.
The Submarine Tracking Room--down a warren of narrow, winding staircases--was not easily reached by a man with a badly deformed leg. He crossed the Main Trade Plot and entered the Tracking Room through a guarded door.
The energy and excitement of the place took hold of him immediately, just as it did every night. The windowless walls were the color of clotted cream and covered with maps, charts, and photographs of U-boats and their crews. Several dozen officers and typists worked at tables around the edges of the room. In the center stood the main North Atlantic plotting table, where colored pins depicted the location of every warship, freighter, and submarine from the Baltic Sea to Cape Cod.
A large photograph of Admiral Karl Donitz, commander of the Kriegsmarine, glowered down from one wall. Braithwaite, as he did every morning, winked and said, "Good morning, Herr Admiral." Then he pushed back the door of his glass cubicle, removed his coat, and sat down at his desk.