Colin Forbes - The Leader And The Damned

'I can fly myself there,' Lindsay responded with typical audacity. 'Supply me with a flight plan.' He stood up and returned the salute. ' Heil Hitler! '

'One of the Fuhrer's personal pilots, Bauer, has just arrived at the airstrip. He will pilot you there. It is an honour..'

'It is, indeed.' Lindsay, who had just finished a meal, gazed at a girl dressed as a nurse who entered the room and waited for instructions. She was dark-haired and attractive. 'Do I get her as well as the pilot, Muller?'

The Commandant laughed coarsely. Lindsay had struck exactly the right note to appeal to the Commandant, who shook his head. 'She will attend to your face wound. Please sit down so she may attend to you. Meantime…' He produced a flask from his hip pocket and unscrewed the cap. 'A drink of schnapps? Very difficult to obtain these days in Germany..'

'Thank you..'

Lindsay sat down in a leather arm chair and took a generous swig from the flask – so generous he caught a flicker of alarm cross Muller's face. The Englishman was greatly amused, holding firmly on to the flask as the girl knelt by the arm of his chair, gently removed the sticking-plaster which had been roughly applied to his jaw earlier. Using a piece of gauze soaked in some disinfectant liquid she skilfully removed the ugly scab which had formed over the wound. There must be no traces of ill-treatment when he met the Fuhrer. From now on he was to be coddled as a very important person – until the confrontation at the Wolfsschanze took place.

Lindsay recognized the Junkers. 52 transport plane when the Mercedes in which he had been driven arrived at the airstrip. It was a reliable workhorse and should reach East Prussia in a few hours – even though it had to fly the full breadth of the Third Reich before they reached their destination.

As he opened the door and put a foot on the ice- encrusted running-board he felt the bulk of the sealed envelope Muller had permitted him to take from the wall-safe. True, a bomb-disposal expert had tested the package – Muller certainly knew his job – but the actual contents remained secret.

'Bauer? I'm Ian Lindsay. From the look of you I shouldn't have any worries on this flight..'

Lindsay held out his hand to the man in a pilot's helmet who had come forward from his machine. His step was firm and his face was creased into a pleasant grin as they shook hands. The Englishman knew exactly what had been in the pilot's mind. 'Another bloody God Almighty..' He would have been told his passenger was a Wing Commander who considerably out-ranked him. He would further have been impressed on hearing Lindsay knew the Fuhrer. But above all else – discounting difference in rank – there is a camaraderie among fliers, regardless of which nation they represent.

Bauer was surprised and pleased at Lindsay's friendly informality. He also noted that Lindsay paused to thank his driver for getting him to the airstrip safely. Commandant Muller had apologized for not accompanying the Englishman.

'I have to do every ruddy thing myself,' he had explained back at the Berghof. 'I must stay here in case that creep, Bormann. He stopped and winked at Lindsay. 'You went deaf suddenly, didn't you?'

'As a matter of fact, yes. You were saying?'

'Happy landings..'

Lindsay was about to climb into the passenger seat of the Junkers 52 when he asked Bauer the question, hoping to catch him in a relaxed mood. He gestured towards fresh plane ruts in the snow, tracks made by a heavy machine.

'Somebody else took off earlier today?'

'Very hush-hush.' Bauer looked resentful. 'The SS hustled me away into a but – but not before I saw the Condor land. It was a bit weird.'

'Weird?'

'It looked just. like the Fuhrer's plane. Same markings, a twin of the Condor he always uses. Then there was the convoy of cars from the Berghof which arrived at the same moment.'

'Something funny about them, too?'

By his complete lack of side Lindsay had already established an excellent rapport with the amiable Bauer.

'Couldn't see who was inside any of them,' the pilot chattered on, taking final drags on his cigarette. 'Curtains all drawn. The odd thing is the Fuhrer is at this moment at the Wolf's Lair.'

'I hope so,' Lindsay replied, carefully not probing any further. 'I'm supposed to be on my way to meet him.'

'Then we'd better get cracking..'

Bauer ground out the cigarette under the heel of his boot and within minutes the machine was airborne. It gained height swiftly on a north-easterly course. When Lindsay glanced back through his goggles the Obersalzberg had disappeared.

'Commandant Muller! You are to delay Wing Commander Lindsay's departure from the Berghof until further notice.' Bormann barked the order over the telephone from the signals office at the Wolf's Lair. Muller's reply came back to him with horrible clarity.

'Reichsleiter, I am afraid he took off half an hour ago as per your previous order…'

'Recall him,. for God's sake! Radio the pilot..'

'I cannot do that,' Muller informed him. 'Control at the airstrip have lost radio contact with the pilot. There is a storm north of Salzburg – and the mountains don't help..'

'Are you telling me you cannot reach the plane before it lands at the Wolf's Lair?' Bormann demanded.

'Quite possibly, yes!' Muller snapped with some satisfaction.

'In that case,' Bormann said more calmly, 'put me through to SS Colonel Jaeger. On the private line..

He waited, his mind in a turmoil. He had not slept for twenty-four hours, the Fuhrer was dead, killed on his way back from Smolensk. The local SS team had cleared up all traces of the catastrophe, the second team from Berlin, the execution squad under the command of Rainer Schulz had arrived and liquidated the local team when it had completed its grisly task.

Bormann had been so absorbed in attending to the details, the extraordinary arrival of Wing Commander Lindsay had slipped his memory until this moment. And the second 'Fuhrer', Heinz Kuby, was due to land at the Wolf's Lair shortly. He would decide how to deal with the unwanted Englishman later. The fresh priority was solving the problem of Muller, the only man at the Berghof aware of Kuby's existence. A confident voice came on the line.

'Colonel Jaeger speaking. You wanted something?'

No respectful reference to Bormann's title of Reichsleiter. At the Wolf's Lair Bormann pursed his lips: he disliked Jaeger and his independence intensely. He would have to handle this bastard.

'You are sure this line is safe?' Bormann demanded.

'Unless the Gestapo is tapping the line.' Jaeger sounded very much as though he didn't care one way or the other.

'Colonel Jaeger! You are the commander of the special Waffen SS unit charged with security at the Berghof..'

'I'm not a communications expert…' Jaeger now sounded thoroughly bored. 'As for being in control of security here that's a laugh. There's a whole area of the Berghof sealed off from my inspection…

`Don't let's go into that,' Bormann said hastily. He became more conciliatory. 'I'm phoning to warn you of the imminent arrival by plane from Berlin of SS Lieutenant Rainer Schulz. I have arranged for Schulz to come straight to your barracks. On no account let the Commandant know he is coming.'

'If you say so..'

Jaeger replaced the receiver and swore. A tall, well- built man of forty, bluff in manner with thick, dark eyebrows, a neat moustache and a firm jaw, he hated his present assignment. A veteran of all the major -campaigns so far, Hitler had taken a liking to him and had personally selected him to command his private bodyguard.

The Waffen SS later became smeared by being lumped together with other – less savoury – SS organizations. In fact it was an honourable body of elite soldiers comparable with, any Guards regiment in the British Army. Its allegiance was strictly confined to the Fuhrer and the Reich – not to Himmler. Its structure was unusually democratic, there being little difference between the officers and other ranks. Jaeger, champing at the bit for more active service, was a typical Waffen SS officer.