Jack Higgins: The Eagle Has Flown

‘You look frozen, Jack. Help yourself to a drink.’

Jack Carter leaned his walking stick against a chair and shrugged off his greatcoat. He was in the uniform of a captain in the Green Howards, the ribbon of the Military Cross on his battledress. His false leg was a legacy of Dunkirk and he limped noticeably as he went to the drinks cupboard and poured a whisky.

‘So, what’s the situation at Studley Constable?’ Munro asked.

‘Back to normal, sir. All the German paratroopers buried in a common grave in the churchyard.’

‘No marker of course?’

‘Not at the moment, but they’re a funny lot, those villagers. They actually seem to think quite highly of Steiner.’

‘Yes, well, one of his sergeants was killed saving the lives of two village children who fell into the mill race, remember. In fact, that single action was the one thing that blew their cover, caused the failure of the entire operation.’

‘And he did let the villagers go before the worst of the fighting started,’ Carter said.

‘Exactly. Have you got the file on him?’

Carter got his briefcase and extracted a couple of sheets stapled together. Munro examined it. ‘Oberstleutnant Kurt Steiner, age twenty-seven. Remarkable record. Crete, North Africa, Stalingrad. Knight’s Cross with Oak Leaves.’

‘I’m always intrigued by his mother, sir. Boston socialite. What they call “Boston Brahmin”.’

‘All very fine, Jack, but don’t forget his father was a German general and a damn good one. Now, what about Steiner? How is he?’

‘There seems no reason to doubt a complete recovery. There’s an RAF hospital for bomber crews with burns problems just outside Norwich. Rather small. Used to be a nursing home. We have Steiner there under secure guard. The cover story is that he’s a downed Luftwaffe pilot. Rather convenient that German paratroopers and Luftwaffe aircrews wear roughly the same uniform.’

‘And his wounds?’

‘He was damn lucky there, sir. One round hit him in the right shoulder, at the rear. The second was a heart shot, but it turned on the breastbone. The surgeon doesn’t think it will take long, especially as he’s in remarkable physical shape.’

Munro went and got another small whisky. ‘Let’s go over what we know, Jack. The whole business, the plot to kidnap Churchill, the planning. Everything was done without Admiral Canaris’s knowledge?’

‘Apparently so, sir, all Himmler’s doing. He pressured Max Radl at Abwehr headquarters to plan it all behind the Admiral’s back. At least that’s what our sources in Berlin tell us.’

‘He knows all about it now, though?’ Munro said. ‘The Admiral I mean?’

‘Apparently, sir, and not best pleased, not that there’s anything he can do about it. Can’t exactly go running to the Führer.’

‘And neither can Himmler,’ Munro said. ‘Not when the whole project was mounted without the Führer’s knowledge.’

‘Of course Himmler did give Max Radl a letter of authorization signed by Hitler himself,’ Carter said.

‘ Purporting to be signed by Hitler, Jack. I bet that was the first thing to go into the fire. No, Himmler won’t want to advertise this one.’

‘And we don’t exactly want it on the front of the Daily Express , sir. German paratroopers trying to grab the Prime Minister, battling it out with American Rangers in an English country village?’

‘Yes, it wouldn’t exactly help the war effort.’ Munro looked at the file again. ‘This IRA chap, Devlin. Quite a character. You say that your information is that he was wounded?’

‘That’s right, sir. He was in hospital in Holland and simply took off one night. We understand he’s in Lisbon.’

‘Probably hoping to make it to the States in some way. Are we keeping an eye on him? Who’s the SOE’s man in Lisbon?’

‘Major Arthur Frear, sir. Military attaché at the Embassy. He’s been notified,’ Carter told him.

‘Good.’ Munro nodded.

‘So what do we do about Steiner, sir?’

Munro frowned, thinking about it. ‘The moment he’s fit enough, bring him up to London. Do we still house German prisoners of war in the Tower?’

‘Only occasionally, sir, transients passing through the small hospital. Not like the early days of the war when most of the captured U-boat people were housed there.’

‘And Hess.’

‘A special case, sir?’

‘All right. We’ll have Steiner at the Tower. He can stay in the hospital till we decide on a safe house. Anything else?’

‘One development, sir. Steiner’s father was involved, as you know, in a series of army plots aimed at assassinating Hitler. The punishment is statutory. Hanging by piano wire and by the Führer’s orders the whole thing is recorded on film.’

‘How unpleasant,’ Munro said.

‘The thing is, sir, we’ve received a film of General Steiner’s death. One of our Berlin sources got it out via Sweden. I don’t know if you’ll want to see it. It’s not very nice.’

Munro was angry, got up and paced the room. He paused suddenly, a slight smile on his mouth. ‘Tell me, Jack, is that little toad Vargas still at the Spanish Embassy?’

‘José Vargas, sir, trade attaché. We haven’t used him in a while.’

‘But German Intelligence are convinced he’s on their side?’

‘The only side Vargas is on is the one with the biggest bank book, sir. Works through his cousin at the Spanish Embassy in Berlin.’

‘Excellent.’ Munro was smiling now. ‘Tell him to pass the word to Berlin that we have Kurt Steiner. Tell him to say in the Tower of London. Sounds very dramatic. Most important, he makes sure that both Canaris and Himmler get the information. That should get them stirred up.’

‘What on earth are you playing at, sir?’ Carter asked.

‘War, Jack, war. Now have another drink, then get yourself off home to bed. You’re going to have a full day tomorrow.’

Near Paderborn in Westphalia in the small town of Wewelsburg was the castle of that name which Heinrich Himmler had taken over from the local council in 1934. His original intention had been to convert it into a school for Reich SS leaders, but by the time the architects and builders had finished and many millions of marks had been spent, he had created a Gothic monstrosity worthy of stage six at MGM, a vast film set of the kind Hollywood was fond of when historical pictures were the vogue. The castle had three wings, towers, a moat and in the southern wing the Reichsführer had his own apartments and his especial pride, the enormous dining hall where selected members of the SS would meet in a kind of Court of Honour. The whole thing had been influenced by Himmler’s obsession with King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, with a liberal dose of occultism thrown in.

Ten miles away on that December evening, Walter Schellenberg lit a cigarette in the back of the Mercedes which was speeding him towards the castle. He’d received the order to meet the Reichsführer in Berlin that afternoon. The reason had not been specified. He certainly didn’t take it as any evidence of preferment.

He’d been to Wewelsburg on several occasions, had even inspected the castle’s plans at SD headquarters, so knew it well. He also knew that the only men to sit round that table with the Reichsführer were cranks like Himmler himself who believed all the dark-age twaddle about Saxon superiority, or time-servers who had their own chairs with names inscribed on a silver plate. The fact that King Arthur had been Romano-British and engaged in a struggle against Saxon invaders made the whole thing even more nonsensical, but Schellenberg had long since ceased to be amused by the excesses of the Third Reich.

In deference to the demands of Wewelsburg, he wore the black dress uniform of the SS, the Iron Cross First Class pinned to the left side of his tunic.