Stephen Hunter - The Master Sniper

“Or truly beautiful. The modern architects—not thought highly of by certain powerful people, I admit—” Vollmerhausen was taking a real risk but he felt his new kinship with Repp would allow such a radical statement—“say beauty is form following function. There’s nothing very pretty about Vampir, which makes it beautiful indeed. Not a wasted line, not an artificial embellishment.”

“Form follows function, you say. Tell me, a Jew said that, didn’t he?” He was fiddling again with that curious black thing, that little metal cube.

Vollmerhausen wasn’t really sure. “Probably,” he admitted.

“Yes, they are very clever. A clever race. That was their problem.”

It was not long after this unsettling conversation that another curious thing began to happen. Or rather: not to happen. Vollmerhausen began to realize with a distinct sensation of reluctance that he was done. Not merely done with this last modification, but done completely. Done with Vampir.

There was simply nothing to do until the team came for the gun.

In this involuntary holiday, Vollmerhausen took to strolling the compound or the nearby woods, while his staff fiddled away their time improving their quarters—technical people love to tinker, and they’d worked out a more efficient hot water system, bettered the ventilation in the canteen, turned their barrack into a two-star facility (a joke was making the rounds: after the war they’d open a spa here called Bad Anlage). Now that the pressure was off, their morale rose remarkably; the prospect of leaving filled them with joy, and Vollmerhausen himself planned to check with Repp as soon as possible about the evacuation. Once, in his strollings, he even passed his old antagonist Schaeffer, resplendent in the new camouflage tunic all the soldiers had brought back from a tank-warfare course they’d gone to for two days, but the SS captain hardly noticed him.

Meanwhile, rumors fluttered nervously through the air, some clearly ridiculous, some just logical enough to be true: the Führer was dead, Berlin Red except for three blocks in the city center; the Americans and English would sign a separate peace with the Reich and together they would fight the Russians; Vienna had fallen, Munich was about to; fresh troops were collecting in the Alps for a final stand; the Reich would invade Switzerland and make a last stand there; a vast underground had been set up to wage war after surrender; all the Jews had been freed from the KZ’s, or all had been killed. Vollmerhausen had heard them all before, but now new ones reached him: of Repp. Repp would kill the Pope, for not granting the Führer sanctuary in the Vatican. Absurd! Repp was after a special group that Himmler had singled out as having betrayed the SS. Repp would kill the English king in special retribution; or the Russian man of steel. Even more insane! Where could Repp get from here? Nowhere, except south, to the border. No, Vollmerhausen had no ideas. He’d given up wondering. He’d always known that curiosity is dangerous around the SS, and doubly dangerous around Repp. Repp was going to a mountain, that’s all he knew.

It occurred then to Vollmerhausen, with a sudden jolt of discomfort:

Berchtesgaden was on a mountain. And not far. Yet the Führer was supposedly in Berlin. The reports all said he was in Berlin.

The engineer suddenly felt chilly. He vowed not to think on the topic again.

Vollmerhausen was out of the compound—a beautiful spring day, unseasonably warm, the forest swarming green, buzzing with life, the sky clear as diamond and just as rare, spruce and linden in the air—when the weapon team arrived. He did not see them, but upon his return noticed immediately the battered civilian Opel, pre-war, parked in front of Repp’s. Later he saw the men himself, from far off, civilians, but of a type: the overcoats, the frumpy hats, the calm, unimpressed faces concealing, but just barely, the tendency toward violence. He’d seen Gestapo before, or perhaps they were Ausland SD or any of a dozen other kinds of secret policemen; whatever, they had an ugly sort of weariness that frightened him.

In the morning they were gone, and that meant the rifle too, Vollmerhausen felt. Twice before breakfast staff members had approached.

“Herr Ingenieur-Doktor? Does it mean we’ll be able to go?”

“I don’t know,” he’d answered. “I just don’t know.” Not needing to add, Only Repp knows.

And shortly then, a man came for him, from Repp.

“Ah, Hans,” said Repp warmly, when he arrived.

“Herr Obersturmbannführer,” Vollmerhausen replied.

“You saw of course our visitors last night?”

“I caught a glimpse across the yard at them.”

“Toughies, no? But sound men, just right for the job.”

“They’ve taken Vampir?”

“Yes. No reason not to tell you. It’s gone. All packed up. Carted away.”

“I see,” said Vollmerhausen.

“And they brought information, some last-second target confirmations, some technical data. And news.”

Vollmerhausen brightened. “News?”

“Yes. The war is nearly finished. But you knew that.”

“Yes.”

“Yes. And my part of the journey begins tonight.”

“So soon. A long journey?”

“Not far, but complicated. On foot, most of it. Rather drab actually. I won’t bore you with details. Not like climbing aboard a Hamburg tram.”

“No, of course not.”

“But I wanted to talk to you about your evacuation.”

“Evac—”

“Yes, yes. Here’s the good news.” He smiled. “I know how eager your people are to get back to the human race. This can’t have been pleasant for them.”

“It was their duty,” said Vollmerhausen.

“Perhaps. Anyway, you’ll be moving out tomorrow. After I’ve gone. Sorry it’s so rushed. But now it’s felt the longer this place stays, the bigger the chance of discovery. You may have seen my men planting charges.”

“Yes.”

“There’ll be nothing left of this place. Nothing for our friends. No clues, no traces. Your people will return as if from holiday. Captain Schaeffer’s men will return to the Hungarian front. And I will cease to exist: officially, at any rate. Repp is dead. I’ll be a new man. An old mission but a new man.”

“Sounds very romantic.”

“Silly business, changing identities, pretending to be what one’s not. But still necessary.”

“My people will be very excited!”

“Of course. One more night, and it’s all over. Your part, Totenkopfdivision’s part. Only my part remains. One last campaign.”

“Yes, Herr Obersturmbannführer.”

“The details: have them packed up tonight. Tomorrow at ten hundred hours a bus will arrive. It’s several hours to Dachau. From there your people will be given travel permits, and back pay, and be permitted to make their way to destinations of choice. Though I can’t imagine many of them will head east. By the way, the Allies aren’t reported within a hundred kilometers of this place. So the travel should be easy.”

“Good. Ah, thanks. My thanks, Herr Obersturmbannführer.” He reached over and on impulse seized Repp’s hand.

“Go on. Tell them,” Repp commanded.

“Yes, sir, Herr Obersturmbannführer,” Hans shouted, and lurched out.

Tomorrow! So soon. Back into the world, the real world. Vollmerhausen felt a surge of joy as if he’d just glimpsed the sea after a trek across the Sahara.

It was in the general confusion of preparing for the evacuation that night that a thought came to him. He tried to quell it, found this not difficult at first, with the technicians rushing merrily about him, dismantling their elaborate comfort systems in the barrack, storing personal belongings in trunks, even singing—a bottle, no, several bottles appeared and while Vollmerhausen, teetotaler, couldn’t approve, neither could he prevent them—as if the war were officially and finally over and Germany had somehow won. But later, in the night, in the dark, it returned to him. He tried to flatten it, drive it out, found a hundred ways to dispel it. But he could not. Vollmerhausen had thought of a last detail.