Jack Higgins - The Eagle Has Flown

‘What a world we live in,’ he said softly as the car took the road up to the castle, snow falling gently. ‘I sometimes really do wonder who is running the lunatic asylum.’

He smiled as he sat back, looking suddenly quite charming although the duelling scar on one cheek hinted at a more ruthless side to his nature. It was a relic of student days at the University of Bonn. In spite of a gift for languages, he’d started in the Faculty of Medicine, had then switched to law. But in Germany in 1933 times were hard, even for well-qualified young men just out of university.

The SS were recruiting gifted young scholars for their upper echelons. Like many others, Schellenberg had seen it as employment, not as a political ideal, and his rise had been astonishing. Because of his language ability, Heydrich himself had pulled him into the Sicherheitsdienst, the SS security service, known as the SD. His main responsibility had always been intelligence work, abroad, often a conflict with the Abwehr, although his personal relationship with Canaris was excellent. A series of brilliant intelligence coups had pushed him up the ladder rapidly. By the age of thirty, he was an SS Brigadeführer and Major General of Police.

The really astonishing thing was that Walter Schellenberg didn’t consider himself a Nazi, looked on the Third Reich as a sorry charade, its main protagonists actors of a very low order indeed. There were Jews who owed their survival to him, intended victims of the concentration camps rerouted to Sweden and safety. A dangerous game, a sop to his conscience, he told himself, and he had his enemies. He had survived for one reason only. Himmler needed his brains and his considerable talents and that was enough.

There was only a powdering of snow in the moat, no water. As the Mercedes crossed the bridge to the gate, he leaned back and said softly, ‘Too late to get off the roundabout now, Walter, far too late.’

Himmler received him in his private sitting room in the south wing. Schellenberg was escorted there by an SS sergeant in dress uniform and found Himmler’s personal aide, a Sturmbannführer named Rossman, sitting at a table outside the door, also in dress uniform.

‘Major.’ Schellenberg nodded.

Rossman dismissed the sergeant. ‘A pleasure to see you, General. He’s waiting. The mood isn’t good, by the way.’

‘I’ll remember that.’

Rossman opened the door and Schellenberg entered a large room with a vaulted ceiling and flagged floor. There were tapestries on the walls and lots of dark oak furniture. A log fire burned on a great stone hearth. The Reichsführer sat at an oak table working his way through a mound of papers. He was not in uniform, unusual for him, wore a tweed suit, white shirt and black tie. The silver pince-nez gave him the air of a rather unpleasant schoolmaster.

Unlike Heydrich who had always addressed Schellenberg by his Christian name, Himmler was invariably formal. ‘General Schellenberg.’ He looked up. ‘You got here.’

There was an implied rebuke and Schellenberg said, ‘I left Berlin the moment I received your message, Reichsführer. In what way can I serve you?’

‘Operation Eagle, the Churchill affair. I didn’t employ you on that business because you had other duties. However, by now you will be familiar with most of the details.’

‘Of course, Reichsführer.’

Himmler abruptly changed the subject. ‘Schellenberg, I am increasingly concerned at the treasonable activities of many members of the High Command. As you know, some wretched young major was blown up in his car outside the entrance to the Führer’s headquarters at Rastenburg last week. Obviously another attempt on our Führer’s life.’

‘I’m afraid so, Reichsführer.’

Himmler stood up and put a hand on his shoulder. ‘You and I, General, are bound by a common brotherhood, the SS. We are sworn to protect the Führer and yet are constantly threatened by this conspiracy of generals.’

‘There is no direct proof, Reichsführer,’ Schellenberg said, which was not strictly true.

Himmler said, ‘General von Stulpnagel, von Falk-enhausen, Stief, Wagner and others, even your good friend Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, Schellenberg. Would that surprise you?’

Schellenberg tried to stay calm, envisaging the distinct possibility that he might be named next. ‘What can I say, Reichsführer?’

‘And Rommel, General, the Desert Fox himself. The people’s hero.’

‘My God!’ Schellenberg gasped, mainly because it seemed the right thing to do.

‘Proof.’ Himmler snorted. ‘I’ll have my proof before I’m done. They have a date with the hangman, all of them. But to other things.’ He returned to the table and sat. ‘Have you ever had any dealings with an agent named Vargas?’ He examined a paper in front of him. ‘José Vargas.’

‘I know of him. An Abwehr contact. A commercial attaché at the Spanish Embassy in London. As far as I know, he has only been used occasionally.’

‘He has a cousin who is also a commercial attaché at the Spanish Embassy here in Berlin. One Juan Rivera.’ Himmler glanced up. ‘Am I right?’

‘So I understand, Reichsführer. Vargas would use the Spanish diplomatic bag from London. Most messages would reach his cousin here in Berlin within thirty-six hours. Highly illegal, of course.’

‘And thank God for it,’ Himmler said. ‘This Operation Eagle affair. You say you are familiar with the details?’

‘I am, Reichsführer,’ Schellenberg said smoothly.

‘There is a problem here, General. Although the idea was suggested by the Führer, it was, how shall I put it, more a flight of fancy than anything else? One couldn’t rely on Canaris to do anything about it. I’m afraid that total victory for the Third Reich is low on his list of priorities. That is why I personally put the plan into operation, aided by Colonel Radl of the Abwehr, who’s had a heart attack, I understand, and is not expected to live.’

Schellenberg said cautiously, ‘So the Führer knows nothing of the affair?’

‘My dear Schellenberg, he carries the responsibility for the war, its every aspect, on his own shoulders. It is our duty to lighten that load as much as possible.’

‘Of course, Reichsführer.’

‘Operation Eagle, however brilliantly conceived, ended in failure, and who would wish to take failure into the Führer’s office and place it on his desk?’ Before Schellenberg could reply, he carried on. ‘Which brings me to this report which has reached me from Vargas in London via his cousin here in Berlin, the man Rivera.’

He handed across a signal flimsy and Schellenberg glanced at it. ‘Incredible!’ he said. ‘Kurt Steiner alive.’

‘And in the Tower of London.’ Himmler took the signal back.

‘They won’t keep him there for very long,’ Schellenberg said. ‘It may sound dramatic, but the Tower isn’t really suitable to house high-security prisoners long term. They’ll move him to some safe house just as they did with Hess.’

‘Have you any other opinion in the matter?’

‘Only that the British will keep quiet about the fact that he’s in their hands.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘Operation Eagle almost succeeded.’

‘But Churchill wasn’t Churchill,’ Himmler reminded him. ‘Our Intelligence people discovered that.’

‘Of course, Reichsführer, but German paratroopers did land on English soil and fought a bloody battle. If the story was publicized, the effect on the British people at this stage of the war would be appalling. The very fact that it’s SOE and their Brigadier Munro who are handling the matter, is further proof.’

‘You know the man?’

‘Know of him only, Reichsführer. A highly capable intelligence officer.’