Cast No Shadow by Peter Sharp (books recommended by bts .txt) 📗

later. Ostensibly he was there to visit Inga, but in reality, to warn Inga and me. He was not surprised to find Jürgen there and had expected as much. He confirmed the news Jürgen had brought, Hans and Gunnar were dead. If I went back to Grense, I would be signing my own death warrant. I had to get away.

“It was my turn to be frantic. I was grief stricken over Hans and Gunnar, worried sick for Inga and frightened for myself and I had no idea what I was going to do. It was good, reliable Otto who provided us with the solution.

“Jürgen was to hit him with his pistol, hard enough for it to be convincing, then take his keys and drive us to a safe house in Munkelva. From there we would be transferred to Bergen as and when resources were available. Otto scribbled some notes onto a sheet from his notebook and passed it to me, saying, ‘This will guarantee your safe passage and also the safety of Hauptman Meyer as far as Bergen.’

“‘Now do it!’ he said and removed his hat. Jürgen knocked poor Otto to the ground with his pistol and threw on some civilian clothes belonging to Olly, Inga’s husband. Then we jumped in the car and drove to Munkelva. We had a sticky moment in Kirkenes where we were stopped, but Jürgen was able to convince the patrol that he was an off-duty officer taking a group of Norwegian ‘Friends of the Reich’ to a dinner appointment.

“In all it took nearly three weeks for us to eventually arrive in Bergen. I can’t help saying that I felt sorry for Jürgen. He received a very frosty reception from the resistance. He was told that he would be sent to Sweden where he would either be imprisoned or handed back to the German authorities in Norway.

“The following day however everything had changed. Jürgen was told that a British agent in Sweden would offer him a deal to act as a double agent in France. I was similarly told that this person was also interested in me as we already had a perfect cover.

“By now the initial grief I had felt had subsided and been replaced with a burning anger and a desire to inflict hurt on those who had hurt me, so I agreed. Jürgen and I crossed into Sweden, met with the agent and were then transported to England to undergo training with SOE.”

Kelly laughed at this point. “When where you there?” he asked. Sybilla calculated and told him. “Seems we missed each other by a few months,” he said. He allowed Sybilla to continue with her story.

“The plan was that Jürgen would present himself to the local Gestapo in France with the story of his escape from Norway with his mistress—me—and how he wanted to clear the slate by acting as agents for the Gestapo to weed out the resistance cells. They of course embraced him with open arms. What should have happened then is that he would report back insignificant snippets of information to the Gestapo whilst actually providing me with German intelligence to pass through the resistance.

“The plan was clearly too complicated and doomed to failure. Once accepted by the Gestapo, Jürgen saw his chance of really redeeming himself and getting back to Germany after the war. I became alarmed, but he watched me all the time, even insisting on us sleeping in the same room, though not in the same bed, for appearances as part of our cover.

“On one occasion I managed to slip away and made contact with a British agent. After communicating with England, I was informed that the situation was retrievable. I was to play along with him and go over to his side. That way I could still get some useful information from him. I was advised that it was strongly recommended that I start sleeping with him again. He was then more likely to believe my conversion and more likely to talk.

“Jürgen was besotted by me. He wanted to believe I was with him totally, even if his subconscious warned him against it. He was overjoyed when I moved into his bed and true to predictions, I was able to extract a huge amount of useful information. It presented me with a dilemma as I had to feed him information regarding the resistance groups I was infiltrating, but the Maquis handled this brilliantly, warning the group just before the Gestapo struck. Always blaming me, of course, to protect my cover.

“When someone takes the trouble to analyse this operation, they will find that of the four groups I infiltrated, all four were dispersed, and hence had to regroup at some inconvenience, but not a single individual was killed or captured.

“The rest you know only too well. You struck only a few days before. Unknown to Jürgen of course, I was to be ‘extracted’ and returned to England. ‘The Vikings’ were becoming too well known and it was believed that the Gestapo, although delighted at the breakup of the resistance groups, were nevertheless becoming suspicious at the lack of kills and captures as a consequence.

“Once I was safe in my refuge in Dunkirk, the resistance movement there, who were in on the double bluff, kept me safe until after the invasion. Then when the coast of France was in the hands of the allies, I was repatriated to England.

“I was on standby with SOE until near the end of the war but was never called upon to act. Just before the end, I was allowed to go back to Norway to stay with Inga for a few months. On my return to England I had planned to search for you, but at that point I was offered initially a secondment to MI5 and later a transfer. I was asked to go undercover in Berlin to gain evidence against war criminals. I couldn’t refuse; I still carried a huge burden of grief, anger and resentment. I had