Andrew Williams - The Interrogator

The guards at the security desk in the entrance hall had logged Lieutenant Graham out but Brown was still in the house. No one in the mess had seen him but one of the duty Wrens in the office thought he might be with the RAF. Lindsay found him at the door of the old library, coat across his arm. He nodded coolly and was on the point of slipping past.

‘May I have a word, Brown?’

He frowned and glanced deliberately at his watch: ‘Can’t it wait until the morning?’

‘No. The 112 prisoner, Heine, I need something from him.’

Lieutenant Brown rolled his eyes upwards: ‘Not now.’

Lindsay grabbed his arm and squeezed it very firmly: ‘Yes, now.’

It was unfortunate that Brown and Graham were the designated interrogators. Lindsay did not care for either of them — the feeling was entirely mutual. Brown was a fussy little man with thin, wispy red hair and thick round glasses. Before the war, he had worked on The Times and someone in the Division had considered this a sufficient reference to recommend him to the Section. But Lindsay was amazed that a journalist could be so credulous — lazy too. He treated the Section like a bank with business conducted across a table in office hours only.

Brown shook his arm free: ‘What’s so important that it can’t wait until the morning?’

‘Heine has let something slip about Mohr. He spent time at U-boat Headquarters. I need to know what he knows.’

Brown snorted irritably and shook his head: ‘It could take days to break Heine down.’

‘If you’re not prepared to do it, I will.’

Brown blinked at Lindsay uncertainly: ‘The Colonel wants us to speak to Heine?’

‘Yes, at once,’ Lindsay lied.

The microphone amplifier room was hot and cramped with barely space for a chair between the equipment stacked high along its walls. At one end, a jack field connected the cells and interrogation rooms to the ‘mapping’ positions further down the corridor. Lindsay slipped into a chair behind the duty operator who handed him a set of headphones, then leant forward to push a plug home on his board. There was a rustle of paper and the sound of distant but heavy footsteps. Then Lindsay heard a door open and the prisoner was ushered into the room. Brown offered him a chair.

‘Don’t try to make friends,’ Lindsay muttered.

Heine was the sort of German who would respond best to commands.

Brown cleared his throat: ‘Just a few small things, Herr Leutnant. Some details to clear up…’

Yes, Heine had been a member of the Marine-Hitler-Jugend , the Wandervögel hiking club too. No, he would not describe the 112 ’s operational orders or give details of his commander’s service history. After forty minutes, he was comfortable, still calm. Brown was no breaker. The interrogation was going nowhere.

Lindsay slipped off his headphones and got stiffly to his feet. Sometimes an interrogator needed the patience of Job but not with a prisoner like Heine.

‘Truth in the shortest possible time.’

The duty operator turned to look at him inquiringly.

‘Forget it,’ said Lindsay as he stepped out into the corridor. Brown was going to hate him.

The interrogation rooms were on the same floor in the west wing of the house. A couple of bored-looking guards were posted at the door of Number Three. Lindsay stood between them for a few seconds, breathing deeply, then he reached for the handle and walked inside. A draught of cold air swept into the room with him, stirring the cigarette smoke above the table.

Brown glanced over his shoulder: ‘What is it?’

Lindsay said nothing but pulled the door to with a heavy clunk and leant against it, arms folded. Brown was half out of his seat, a dark frown on his face: ‘What on earth…’

‘We’re going to blow hot, blow cold,’ said Lindsay calmly.

‘What?’

‘Just sit down.’

He looked across at Heine and said in German: ‘Herr Leutnant, you are going to tell me everything you know about your commander — Kapitän zur See Jürgen Mohr.’

Heine shook his head slowly.

‘Oh yes you are,’ said Lindsay coldly. ‘I know he was on the staff at U-boat Headquarters.’

Heine gave another nervous shake of the head.

‘Don’t deny it. I know. And I’m sure Kapitän Mohr would like to know how I know.’

Silence. Heine knew he was being threatened, but with what? Then his shoulders dropped and he crumpled over the table, his face in his hands.

‘Not me.’ His voice was shaking.

Unfolding his arms, Lindsay walked to the edge of the table and leant across it until he was only a foot from him:

‘Look at me, Herr Leutnant. Look at me. It was you. You know it was.’

‘I… please…’ He was very frightened.

‘Tell me and he will never know. But you must tell me, tell me now.’

Heine was hugging himself, rocking to and fro on his chair, close to tears.

‘Herr Leutnant, tell me at once.’

It was an order.

‘I can’t…’

‘Was Kapitän Mohr on Admiral Dönitz’s staff?’

Heine said nothing but gave the slightest of nods.

Is that yes?’

‘Yes.’

The break. It had been easy. Heine would answer their questions. Lindsay took a deep breath then glanced reluctantly across at Brown. His face was very pale, his jaws clenched tight with fury. Without losing eye contact, he pushed a scrap of paper across the table. Two words were written on it in pencil: ‘You bastard.’

Brusque orders and the clump of heavy boots forced Jürgen Mohr from a satisfyingly deep sleep back to the close darkness of his room. Someone was rattling keys at the door, cursing loudly.

‘Get your trousers on.’

A guard shone a torch in his face.

‘The switch is in the corridor, to the right of the door,’ said Mohr tartly.

Blinking sleepily in the light, he swung his legs off the bed and reached for his shirt and trousers. It was a little after midnight. His interrogator was hoping that in the stillness before morning the threats would seem more real. Mohr wondered whether it would be the uncertain Jew or that effete academic, Graham? Perhaps, this time, the lieutenant he had met in Liverpool. He smiled at the thought.

They led him down the back stairs and halfway along a dimly lit corridor on the first floor. The bare white walls of the interrogation room were lit by a single shadeless bulb, there was a plain wooden table with a metallic green ashtray at its edge and just one chair.

‘The prisoner stands in front of the table,’ said the sergeant, addressing a spotty youth in a private’s uniform. ‘Make sure he doesn’t move.’

The door slammed shut and Mohr was alone with his guard. He walked slowly over to the barred window at the far end of the room.

‘Come away from there,’ said the soldier nervously, but Mohr ignored him.

Through a crack in the blackout shutters, he could see the moon, white and full and uncomfortably bright. He had been betrayed by just such a moon. The British escort ships had seen the silhouette of U-112 slip into the convoy. In four minutes, HMS White had been upon them, running over the top, pounding the boat, tossing men about like rag dolls, a blind pitiless barrage. The boat had surfaced for a moment then plunged hundreds of fathoms to join the enemy ships it had sent before it, a broken grey shell on the ocean floor.

‘Herr Kapitän Mohr.’ Lieutenant Lindsay was standing by the desk.

‘Sorry, Lieutenant, I was dreaming. I often dream at this hour.’

Lindsay said nothing but sat down and took a notepad from the briefcase on his knee, opened it and began to write. For a full minute, the silence was broken only by the scratching of his pencil.