Len Deighton - SS-GB

‘A very nice place,’ said Huth sarcastically. ‘A very nice place to hide me away so I don’t interfere with the workings of the department. Even my phone goes through Kellerman’s switchboard, I notice.’

‘Is it the location you don’t like?’ said Douglas.

‘Just get rid of all this furniture and junk,’ said Huth. ‘It looks more like a Victorian brothel than an office. Does Kellerman think I’m going to sit here getting drunk until the TV begins?’

‘There is a cable TV connection,’ said Douglas. ‘It can be used to carry police information; photos of wanted persons and so on.’

‘I’ll get you a job in the bloody Propaganda Ministry,’ said Huth. ‘How would you like that?’

‘Perhaps I could have time to think about it,’ said Douglas, pretending to take it seriously.

‘Just get this furniture out of here. I want metal filing-cases, with good locks on them, and a metal desk with locks on the drawers, and a proper desk light, not that damned contraption. You’ll be sitting in the adjoining office, so you might as well get whatever you want in there too. Get phones: four direct lines and have your extensions changed to up here. In the corridor I want a table and chair so that my sentry won’t have to stand all the while – and where the hell is the sentry?’

‘Sentry, sir?’

‘Don’t stand there repeating everything I say,’ said Huth. ‘The Peter Thomas murder investigation is part of an operation we have code-named “Apocalypse”. No information of any sort – in fact nothing at all – goes outside this room without my written permission, or that of the Reichsführer-SS, Heinrich Himmler. Is that clear?’

‘Unforgettably so,’ said Douglas, desperately trying to fathom what could be behind it.

Huth smiled. ‘In case the unforgettable quality lessens, there will be an armed SS sentry outside in the corridor for twenty-four hours of every day.’ Huth looked at his wristwatch. ‘He should be on duty now, damn him. Get on the phone to the SS guard commander at Cannon Row. Tell him to send the sentry and half-a-dozen men to clear this furniture out.’

‘I doubt if there will be workmen available at this time of night,’ said Douglas.

Huth tipped his head back and looked from under his heavy-lidded eyes. Soon Douglas learned that this was a danger sign. ‘Are you making another of your jokes? Or is this some new kind of provocation?’

Douglas shrugged. ‘I’ll phone.’

‘I’ll be in the number three conference room with Major Steiger. Tell the SS officer I want all this furniture out of here before I get back. And I want the new furniture installed.’

‘Where do I get metal desks?’ said Douglas.

Huth turned away as if the question was hardly worth answering. ‘Use your initiative, Superintendent. Go along this corridor and, when you see the sort of thing you need, take it.’

‘But there will be a terrible row in the morning,’ said Douglas. ‘They’ll all be here moving it back again.’

‘And they will find an armed SS sentry preventing them taking anything out of this room on the orders of the Reichsführer-SS. And that includes metal furniture.’

‘Very good, sir.’

‘In my brief-case you’ll find a cardboard tube containing a small painting by Piero della Francesca. Get it framed and hang it on the wall to hide some of this ghastly wallpaper.’

‘A real painting by Piero della Francesca?’ said Douglas who’d heard amazing stories of the artifacts plundered during the fighting in Poland, France and the Low Countries.

‘In a policeman’s office, Superintendent Archer? That would hardly be appropriate would it?’ He went out without waiting for an answer.

Douglas phoned the SS guard commander, and passed on Huth’s message with the friendly rider that Standartenführer Huth was in a great hurry.

The guard commander’s response was one of consternation. Kellerman’s briefing about the arrival of the new man was obviously taken seriously by the security force.

Douglas stepped across to the window and looked down at the Embankment. The curfew ensured that few civilians were on the street – Members of Parliament, and shift workers in essential industries and services, were among the exceptions – and the street and bridge were empty except for parked lines of official vehicles and an armed patrol who visited the floodlit perimeters of all the government buildings.

A motorcycle and sidecar combination stopped at the checkpoint where Victoria Embankment met Westminster Bridge. There was a brief inspection of papers before it roared away into the dark night of the far side of the river. From across the road there came the loud chime of Big Ben. Douglas Archer yawned and wondered how people like Huth seemed to manage without sleep.

He opened Huth’s briefcase to get the Francesca reproduction for framing, but before he had time to unroll it he saw, inside the pocket of the case, a brown manila envelope sealed with red wax and bearing the unmistakable heraldic imprint of RSHA – the Central Security Department of the Reich, and holy of holies of Heinrich Himmler and all he commanded. The envelope had already been opened along the side and a folded paper was visible.

Douglas could not repress his curiosity. He pulled out a large sheet of paper and unfolded it to find a complex diagram, as big as the blotter on the desk. It was drawn in black indelible ink upon handmade paper that was as heavy as parchment. Even Douglas Archer’s fluent German did not equip him to comprehend fully the handwriting of the German script, but he recognized some of the symbols.

There was a reversed equilateral triangle, inscribed within a double circle. The triangle contained two words, written to form a cross – Elohim and Tzabaoth. Douglas Archer’s successful investigation of a series of Black Magic murders in 1939 enabled him to recognize this as a ‘pentacle’ representing ‘the god of armies, the equilibrium of natural forces, and the harmony of numbers’.

A second pentacle was a human head with three faces, crowned with a tiara and issuing from a vessel filled with water. There were other water signs too. Handwritten alongside it was ‘Joliot-Curie laboratory – Collège de France, Paris’. And close against another water sign was written ‘Norsk Hydro Company, Rjukan, Central Norway’.

Heaped earth, spades and a diamond pierced by a magic sword ‘Deo Duce, comite ferro’ was an emblem of the Great Arcanum representing, according to the chart, ‘the omnipotence of the adept’ and here the runic double lightning of the SS was lettered, and followed by ‘RSHA Berlin’.

The third symbol was the spiral marked ‘Transformatio’ which became a spinning toy top with ‘Clarendon Laboratory, Oxford, England’ written there, and the words ‘Formatio’ and ‘Reformatio’ arranged over ‘Transformatio’ to make a triangle. Below it ‘German army reactor in England’ was written against a spinning device. In another hand, ‘Peter Thomas’ appeared here in pencil, as if added hurriedly at the last moment.

Douglas straightened as he heard the sound of German boots on the mosaic stone of the corridor. He folded the diagram too quickly to be sure that it showed no sign of being tampered with. Then he tucked the envelope away into the red-lined pocket of the case and closed it.

There was a knock at the door. ‘Come in,’ said Douglas as he unrolled the Francesca reproduction.

‘One sentry and six men for duty,’ reported the SS officer.

‘Standartenführer Huth wants this furniture removed,’ explained Douglas. ‘Replace it with metal furniture from offices on this corridor.’

The SS officer showed no surprise at the order. Douglas had the feeling that this farmer’s son from Hesse – as Douglas accurately guessed him to be – would have obeyed an order to jump out of the window. The officer took off his jacket to work with his six brawny lads while their armed comrade stood on duty in the corridor.