Colin Forbes - The Leader And The Damned

'Just how many people do know about this mission?' demanded the Wing Commander. 'Two in London and one here who flew out with me to arrange liaison was supposed to be the limit..'

'And now you get me babbling on about it?'

Alexander pulled at his trim moustache, his expression amused. He heard that Ian Lindsay ranked high in the field of insubordination and clearly he was not intimidated by a mere Deputy Commander-in-Chief of Allied Forces. Alexander rather liked that as he studied the man on the other side of the simple trestle table.

Twenty-six years old, Lindsay had thick blond hair, a nose like that seen on coins of Roman emperors, a good jaw and firm mouth. Five feet nine inches tall, he exuded an, aura of strength of character.

His expression was mobile – like an actor's. He had, in fact, toured with a repertory company before the war.

'Babbling is what worries me,' Lindsay replied. 'Sir,' he added as an afterthought.

'I have worries, too,' Alexander drawled, leaning back in his chair. 'Keeping the peace between Eisenhower and Monty. Planning the final attack on the Germans in northern Tunisia. Little things like that. And Telford, your liaison officer told me your own plans in confidence. I compelled him to – no info, no cooperation..'

'Surely you had a signal?' Lindsay rapped back. Was this general with his casual air any damned good?

'Read it for yourself, Lindsay…' Alexander pushed a slip of paper across the table. 'And I like to know everything that is going on in my command.'

Lindsay revised his opinion. There had been a snap in the general's eye as well as in his voice as he sat and waited while his visitor digested the decoded signal.

Please extend all facilities to Wing Commander Lindsay who is engaged on special rear area duties. Brooke.

'Suitably camouflaged – the wording – I trust you will agree,' Alexander suggested in an ironic tone. 'And apart from myself no one else in Africa even knows you're here. Good luck on your suicide mission. A sort of Hess in reverse, wouldn't you say?'

Manoeuvring the Mosquito in ascending circles high above the Obersalzberg, Lindsay recalled the Alexander conversation while he tried to watch for a host of perils through his goggles. A German fighter plane sent up on a visual spotting? Another of those bloody peaks appearing out of nowhere in the isolated mist patches? Above all, the dreaded down draught which could suck a machine into the abyss before the pilot was aware of it happening.

He decided he had used up his portion of luck in the air and that it was time to leave the comforting confines of his cockpit. He took a deep breath and ejected. Exposed to the bitter elements of icy space, he had a brief glimpse of a snowbound world far below.

He seemed to descend with extraordinary slowness, to float in space – which they had warned him was a danger sign. He could lose consciousness in seconds. He took a firm grip on the parachute ring and gave it a hard tug. Nothing happened. He continued to drift in nothingness. They had warned him about this, too, but the sensation was no less terrifying.

He looked up and a cloud had appeared from nowhere. God! A storm was blowing up… The straps jerked at his shoulders. The 'cloud' was the huge umbrella of his opened 'chute. And he was conscious of the return of a sense of purpose – of control. He looked down and saw the Berghof in the distance.

Lindsay became aware of a breeze carrying him straight towards the vertical rock face of a mountain wall. He tugged at the left-hand strap, held on and now he was descending diagonally on a course which should carry him close to the Berghof. Then he saw something he had forgotten about – the shaft of his abandoned Mosquito.

No more than a rapidly-falling spear, it was heading for another mountain. Subconsciously he felt it hit – his last link with a world he might never see again. A flaring flash as the fuel tank detonated, a distant thump which he could have imagined, then a shower of fragments fluttering into the valley.

He was engulfed by an eery silence, a lack of sound characteristic of the desolation of the winter-bound mountains. He had never felt more alone.

Lindsay concentrated on guiding the parachute away from those vicious precipices which reared to north and south. Was the Fuhrer at the Berghof, he wondered? He hoped to God he was and that if so he would remember their pre-war meeting at the Chancellery in Berlin. Hitler had taken a distinct liking to the young Englishman who spoke fluent German and who was sympathetic to Nazi aims. For over four hours they had talked together alone.

The hard, snow-crusted ground of the valley was very close now – and he was going to land near the curving road which led up to the Berghof. What was it General Alexander had said? A Hess in reverse.

On Saturday 10 May 1941, Rudolf Hess, the Fuhrer's Deputy, had flown on his own to Scotland to meet the Duke of Hamilton on a 'peace mission' to Britain. On 12 March 1943, Ian Lindsay, nephew of the Duke of Dunkeith and a pre-war member of the Anglo-German Fellowship flew to Bavaria on a 'peace mission' to Bavaria.

A Hess in reverse?

'Take me to the Berghof! Immediately! Heil Hitler! ' Lindsay rasped.

His right arm shot out in the Nazi salute as he stared arrogantly at the SS officer who had alighted from the military thick which had come racing and skidding down the road from the Berghof. Four other SS men armed with machine-pistols had emerged from the rear of the vehicle and they gazed curiously. at the German parachute billowing in the breeze on the slope below.

Lindsay noticed with satisfaction that he out-ranked the officer who automatically returned his salute and showed signs of hesitation. It was the first thirty seconds when you appeared on stage which counted – the Englishman had learned that from his pre-war experience in repertory, and he had learned a great deal more. He followed up his verbal offensive.

'What the hell are you standing about for? I'm frozen. Get me to the Berghof, I said..'

'Why did you not land at the airstrip?' the SS officer enquired. He was a slim, thin-faced man with full lips more appropriate for a girl.

'For Christ's sake!' Lindsay stormed. 'Do you think I enjoyed parachuting in weather like this? My engine stalled, of course, you bloody fool..

The question told him one thing for which he was much relieved. They had not observed the Mosquito until after it had exploded into pieces against the mountain wall. In due course a team would go to that remote area and identify the machine but by then he hoped to be grappling with other problems – breaking through security to see the Fuhrer, for example. He just hoped to God he was at the Berghof. He waited for the final question and it came.

'My name is Kranz,' the officer continued. 'There has been no notification to expect you. So, may I ask who you are and what is the purpose of your visit?'

'You may find yourself posted to the Russian front if you keep me hanging around here in this beastly cold,' Lindsay threatened. 'A signal was sent informing the Commandant of my arrival..

'From the Wolfsschanze?' Kranz asked tentatively.

'Of course! Has the damned system not worked, again? As to who I am, that is my business. As to the purpose of my visit that is top secret and I do not propose to discuss it in front of your men who, incidentally, are annoying me with their goggling…`

Kranz reacted at once ordering his men back inside the vehicle, and Lindsay knew he had won the first round. The idiot had not even demanded identification papers – which Lindsay could have produced if requested. But it was important to dominate the man from the first moment – like gripping an audience when you walk on to the stage – and showing him papers would have been a concession.