End of Spies by Alex Gerlis (best free ereader txt) 📗

to Vienna, a trip he preferred to do by car, and had sensed the farm would fit perfectly with his plans. It was owned by a Frau Moser, whose husband was listed as missing in action on the Eastern Front, presumed dead. She was struggling to keep the farm going and was most open to the proposal of the gentleman from Berlin.

He arranged for two Czech slave labourers to work at the farm and gave her a regular sum of money. In return, she agreed he could store items in the cellar and could assume the identity of her husband, though she only agreed to this once she’d been assured he was not interested in any other aspect of matrimonial life.

Back in Berlin, it was a simple matter for someone in Wolfgang Steiner’s position to alter Andreas Moser’s records, though for the time being it was an identity he wouldn’t use. Every couple of months he’d hide notebooks and rolls of film in his Daimler and stop overnight at the farm, where he’d secrete them in the cellar before continuing his journey to Vienna.

After meeting Bormann, Wolfgang Steiner waited until the third week of March 1945 before leaving Berlin. At the beginning of the month, Friedrich had paid a final visit to the city and his father had taken him aside and insisted he listen carefully to what he was about to tell him. If he did exactly as he said, he’d have a chance of evading capture.

An argument followed in which Friedrich insisted Germany could still win the war, but Wolfgang could see that even his son realised it was a hopeless case.

‘If you do as I say, then after two or three years it should be safe enough for both of us to come out of hiding and assume new identities. In any case…’ he hesitated, unsure how to broach this with his son, ‘I have a plan. If it works out, then you and I ought to be safe. It will just require you to do exactly as I tell you and for you to curb your excesses.’ He then gave his son the new identity he’d created for him and told him where to go. At one stage he’d thought about bringing him to the farm near Eggenfelden, but had decided that might be too rash.

It was a Thursday morning when he slipped away from his house in Charlottenburg. He told his elderly housekeeper – he’d made sure not to repeat the mistake of employing a young one – that he’d been called to Munich on urgent business and would be away for a few days. He telephoned a colleague at work to say he was unwell but expected to be back at his desk first thing Monday morning.

He took a train to Nuremberg and from there to Passau. He was travelling light, just a briefcase and a small case. He couldn’t be sure what would happen when he arrived in Passau – he had no idea whether there’d still be rail services heading west – but he was in luck: the last train to Neumarkt-Sankt Veit was departing in half an hour. He bought a ticket to its final destination but got off at Eggenfelden, leaving the station through a side exit and making his way east out of the town towards the farm. It lay in a dip in the fields; above it was a small copse where he waited until darkness fell. Then, satisfied that there was no danger, he walked down to the farm.

The first three months at the farm were extremely difficult. On his first morning there, Wolfgang Steiner knew he had to undertake what was going to be a most unpleasant task. The two Czech labourers were too much of a security risk – it was hard to imagine that when the war ended, they wouldn’t tell someone about the man who’d come to live on the farm, and there was also the danger they’d run away.

He found the two of them resting at the rear of the cowshed after their early-morning chores, their backs to him as he approached. He shot the taller of the two first, hitting him in the shoulder. The other one turned round, which made his shot easier, catching him high in the chest. He finished them both off with another bullet each and stood over them to make sure they were dead.

Frau Moser was in a terrible state after that, convinced she’d be arrested, and then worrying about who’d do the farm work. For a few weeks she clearly regretted letting the gentleman from Berlin into her life, spending much of the day sobbing and exhausted from all the extra work she had to do.

It turned out she had no close neighbours or friends and no family other than a sister near Munich who she’d not seen for years. They agreed that if anyone asked, she’d say her husband had returned unexpectedly from the war but had become a recluse and refused to see people.

The Americans arrived in the middle of May. The man who came to collect the milk each day had told Frau Moser they were in Eggenfelden and would soon be visiting all the farms. They turned up a few days later, four men in a jeep who checked the place out and then looked at their papers. They seemed satisfied, and registered them and issued new documents.

After that matters, began to get easier. Wolfgang persuaded Frau Moser to employ someone to work on the farm for a few hours each day, during which time he’d stay in the house. She was less exhausted and slightly calmer.

He spent his days in the cellar, logging the rolls of undeveloped film and reading through the notebooks. The more he thought about his plan and the more he refined it, the more confident he was about it.

By the time they got to July, life seemed easier. No one ever bothered them