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

Ferret felt he wasn’t in a position to refuse. He did think about telephoning his father in Berlin and asking him to speak with Reichskommissar Seyss-Inquart in The Hague, but he didn’t want to try his father’s patience, which even he recognised was wearing thin.

He decided to sort things out himself before this could happen. He went back to Euterpestraat at midnight and ordered the guards to bring the woman to the man’s cell. There he held a pistol to her head and forced her to kneel in front of de Vries, who was ordered to reveal everything. She started sobbing and shook her head. When the Ferret pulled the trigger, she moved so the first shot only grazed her skull. He was so angry it took him another three shots to finish her off.

Only then did he realise that the British agent was slumped in the chair he’d been strapped into. When he pulled his head back, it was evident something was wrong: the man had turned grey and wasn’t breathing. The medic confirmed he was dead.

When Obergruppenführer Winkler returned to Amsterdam, he found it hard to conceal his anger.

‘I see you managed to kill two birds with one stone?’

The Ferret muttered something about the woman trying to escape, and the Obergruppenführer told him to shut up. ‘I’ve spoken with your father: you’re being moved again. Fortunately you’ll be many hundreds of miles from here.’

The Ferret stared at the ground. He felt tears well in his eyes and his throat tighten. They’d send him to the east. He’d only been trying to do his best. He bit his lip so hard it started to bleed.

Chapter 3

Germany, March 1945

The young SS officer was waiting in the doorway of Wolfgang Steiner’s outer office, unsure exactly where he should stand. It was lunchtime, which had traditionally been a quiet period of the day, but that had been when life was normal, which it was now anything but. Indeed, the very notion that people would take a lunch break was a fanciful one: for a start, Wilhelmstrasse had been so badly bombed there was nowhere to go, and then there was the added complication of there being precious little to eat.

Steiner beckoned the officer in. He was an Obersturmführer and seemed nervous, which was also something new: SS officers, even younger and more junior ones, had always manifested a confidence bordering on arrogance, even when dealing with an official as senior as Wolfgang Steiner. But this Obersturmführer forgot to greet him with the Heil Hitler salute as he entered, and apologised profusely. As he moved in front of Steiner, the light fell on the man’s face, one side of which was badly scarred. Steiner wasn’t surprised; there were very few fit SS officers of that age and rank in Berlin. The city was being run by old men and invalids.

‘What is it?’

The young officer saluted again. ‘I have come straight from the Führerbunker, sir.’

Steiner nodded and waited for the man to continue. When he turned his head to reveal the part that wasn’t burnt, he looked younger than Steiner’s own son.

‘Yes, and?’

‘I have a message for you, sir, from the Reichsleiter.’

Wolfgang Steiner felt a sensation in his stomach. Although he got on well enough with Martin Bormann, he was always nervous about any dealings with Hitler’s deputy. For a couple of years they’d worked very closely in the Nazi Party headquarters – Bormann’s office had been just across the corridor from his – but for the past few months Bormann had spent most of his time in Hitler’s bunker, and Steiner hadn’t heard from him in a while. The rumours were that Bormann was more or less running the country.

‘Perhaps you’d like to give me this message?’ He held out his hand.

‘There is no letter, sir: a car will collect you from the front of this building at nine o’clock tonight and take you to a meeting with the Reichsleiter. He asks that no mention is made of this to anyone.’

Even allowing for his propensity to worry, Wolfgang Steiner realised this sounded ominous. Rather typically, too, he was bothered about a minor detail. ‘How will I know which car?’

‘I will find you, sir. Heil Hitler!’

Wolfgang Steiner’s secretary had brought him a plate of herring and a few slices of proper black bread, but he had no appetite that afternoon. He picked at the bread and sipped some water and wondered about having a schnapps or two but decided against it because these days once he started he’d never stop, and Bormann wouldn’t appreciate him turning up in any kind of drunken state.

He did think about whether he should leave the city – it was over seven hours, after all, before the car would be coming for him – but quickly decided against it. His plan had been carefully constructed and he wasn’t ready yet. It would all be a rush and something was bound to go wrong. And he knew how shrewd Bormann was: he had informants and confidants throughout the Parteikanzlei. He wasn’t even sure about his own secretary; she fussed over him unnecessarily, always wanted to know what he was up to and where he was going.

By the middle of the afternoon, he’d decided that if he was in trouble, then Bormann would hardly have left him alone in the Party headquarters; he’d have been pulled in straight away. But on the other hand – there was always an ‘on the other hand’ with Wolfgang Steiner – it was a rather formal summons. He and Bormann were on first-name terms after all, and Bormann was in the habit of sending hand-written notes. Using an SS officer as a messenger seemed to be making a point.

He’d been so careful and so meticulous he’d be amazed if Bormann had any evidence against him. As nine o’clock approached, a strange calm fell over him. Whatever was going to happen would happen, he told himself. Berlin would fall soon anyway, so it wasn’t