World War II Thriller Collection (124 page)

Harald suffered a moment of panic. If the police found the film in his pocket, he would be finished.

“And Duchwitz is with you—I might have known,” Heis added, seeing Tik behind Harald. “But what on earth are you doing?”

Harald had to persuade Heis not to call the police—but he could not explain in front of Borr. He said, “Sir, if I could speak to you alone?”

Heis hesitated.

Harald decided that if Heis refused, and called the police, he would not surrender gracefully. He would make a run for it. But how far would he get? “Please, sir,” he said. “Give me a chance to explain.”

“Very well,” Heis said reluctantly. “Borr, go back to bed. And you, Duchwitz. Mr. Moller, perhaps you'd better see them to their rooms.” They all departed.

Heis walked into the chemistry lab, sat on a stool, and took out his pipe. “All right, Olufsen,” he said. “What is it this time?”

Harald wondered what to say. He could not think of a plausible lie, but he feared the truth would be more incredible than anything he might invent. In the end he simply took the little cylinder out of his pocket and gave it to Heis.

Heis took out the roll of film and held it up to the light. “This looks like some kind of newfangled radio installation,” he said. “Is it military?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do you know what it does?”

“It tracks aircraft by radio beams, I think.”

“So that's how they're doing it. The Luftwaffe claim they've been shooting down RAF bombers like flies. This explains it.”

“I believe they track the bomber and the fighter that has been sent to intercept it, so that the controller can direct the fighter precisely.”

Heis looked over his glasses. “My God. Do you realize how important this is?”

“I think so.”

“There's only one way the British can help the Russians, and that's by forcing Hitler to bring aircraft back from the Russian front to defend Germany from air raids.”

Heis was ex-army, and military thinking came naturally to him. Harald said, “I'm not sure I see what you're getting at.”

“Well, the strategy won't work while the Germans can shoot bombers down easily. But if the British find out how it's done, they can devise countermeasures.” Heis looked around. “There must be an almanac here somewhere.”

Harald did not see why he needed an almanac, but he knew where it was. “In the physics office.”

“Go and get it.” Heis put the film down on the laboratory bench and lit his pipe while Harald stepped into the next room, found the almanac on the bookshelf, and brought it back. Heis flipped through the pages. “The next full moon is on the eighth of July. I'd bet there will be a big bombing raid that night. It's twelve days away. Can you get this film to England by then?”

“It's someone else's job.”

“Good luck to him. Olufsen, do you know how much danger you're in?”

“Yes.”

“The penalty for spying is death.”

“I know.”

“You always had guts, I'll give you that.” He handed back the film. “Is there anything you need? Food, money, petrol?”

“No, thanks.”

Heis stood up. “I'll see you off the premises.”

They went out by the main door. The night air cooled the perspiration on Harald's forehead. They walked side by side along the road to the gate. “I don't know what I'm going to tell Moller,” said Heis.

“If I might make a suggestion?”

“By all means.”

“You could say we were developing dirty pictures.”

“Good idea. They'll all believe that.”

They reached the gate, and Heis shook Harald's hand. “For God's sake, be careful, boy,” said the head.

“I will.”

“Good luck.”

“Goodbye.”

Harald walked away in the direction of the village.

When he reached the bend in the road, he looked back. Heis was still at the gate, watching him. Harald waved, and Heis waved back. Then Harald walked on.

He crawled under a bush and slept until sunrise, then retrieved his motorcycle and drove into Copenhagen.

He felt good as he steered through the outskirts of the city in the morning sunshine. He had suffered some close shaves, but in the end he had done what he promised. He was going to enjoy handing over the film. Arne would be impressed. Then Harald's job would be done, and it would be up to Arne to get the pictures to Britain.

After seeing Arne, he would drive back to Kirstenslot. He would have to beg Farmer Nielsen for his job back. He had only worked one day before disappearing for the rest of the week. Nielsen would be annoyed—but he might need Harald's services badly enough to hire him again.

Being at Kirstenslot would mean seeing Karen. He looked forward eagerly to that. She was not interested in him romantically, and she never would be, but she seemed to like him. For his part, he was content to talk to her. The idea of kissing her was too remote even to wish for.

He made his way to Nyboder. Arne had given Harald the address of
Jens Toksvig. St. Paul's Gade was a narrow street of small terraced houses. There were no front gardens: the doors opened directly onto the pavement. Harald parked the bike outside fifty-three and knocked.

It was answered by a uniformed policeman.

For a moment, Harald was struck dumb. Where was Arne? He must have been arrested—

“What is it, lad?” the policeman said impatiently. He was a middle-aged man with a gray moustache and sergeant's stripes on his sleeve.

Harald was inspired. Displaying a panic that was all too real, he said, “Where's the doctor, he must come right away, she's having the baby now!”

The policeman smiled. The terrified father-to-be was a perennial figure of comedy. “There's no doctor here, lad.”

“But there must be!”

“Calm down, son. There were babies before there were doctors. Now, what address have you got?”

“Dr. Thorsen, fifty-three Fischer's Gade, he must be here!”

“Right number, wrong street. This is St. Paul's Gade. Fischer's Gade is one block south.”

“Oh, my God, the wrong street!” Harald turned away and jumped onto the bike. “Thank you!” he shouted. He opened the steam regulator and pulled away.

“All part of the job,” the policeman said.

Harald drove to the end of the street and turned the corner.

Very clever, he thought, but what the hell do I do now?

Hermia spent all Friday morning in the beautiful ruin of Hammershus castle, waiting for Arne to arrive with the vital film.

It was now even more important than it had been five days ago, when she had sent him on the mission. In the interim, the world had changed. The Nazis were set fair to conquer the Soviet Union. They had already taken the key fortress of Brest. Their total air superiority was devastating the Red Army.

Digby had told her, in a few grim sentences, of his conversation with Churchill. Bomber Command would commit every plane it could get off the ground to the biggest air raid of the war, in a desperate attempt to draw Luftwaffe strength away from the Russian front and give the Soviet soldiers a chance to fight back. That raid was now eleven days away.

Digby had also talked to his brother, Bartlett, who was fit again, back on active service, and certain to be piloting one of the bombers.

The raid would be a suicide mission, and Bomber Command would be fatally weakened, unless they could develop tactics for evading German radar in the next few days. And that depended on Arne.

Hermia had persuaded her Swedish fisherman to bring her across the water again—although he had warned her that this would be the last time, as he felt it dangerous to fall into a pattern. At dawn she had splashed through the shallows, carrying her bike, onto the beach below Hammershus. She had climbed the steep hill to the castle, where she stood on the ramparts, like a medieval queen, and watched the sun rise on a world that was increasingly ruled by the strutting, shouting, hate-filled Nazis she so loathed.

During the day she moved, every half hour or so, from one part of the ruins to another, or strolled through the woods, or descended to the beach, just so that it would not be obvious to tourists that she was waiting to meet someone. She suffered a combination of terrible tension and yawn-making boredom that she found strangely wearying.

She diverted herself by recalling their last meeting. The memory was sweet. She was shocked at herself for making love to Arne right there on the grass in broad daylight. But she did not regret it. She would remember that all her life.

She expected him on the overnight ferry. The distance from the harbor at Ronne to the castle of Hammershus was only about fifteen miles. Arne could bike it in an hour or walk it in three. However, he did not show up during the morning.

This made her anxious, but she told herself not to worry. The same thing had happened last time: he had missed the overnight boat and taken the morning sailing. She assumed he would arrive this evening.

Last time she had sat tight and waited for him, and he had not shown up until the following morning. Now she was too impatient for that. When she felt sure he could not have come on the overnight ferry, she decided to cycle to Ronne.

She felt increasingly nervous as she passed from the lonely country roads into the more populous streets of the little town. She told herself this was safer—she was more conspicuous in the countryside and could lose herself in the town—but it felt the opposite. She saw suspicion in everyone's eyes, not just policemen and soldiers but shopkeepers in their doorways, carters leading horses, old men smoking on benches, and dockers drinking tea on the quay. She walked around the town for a while,
trying not to meet anyone's eye, then went into a hotel on the harbor and ate a sandwich. When the ferry docked, she stood with a small group of people waiting to meet passengers. As they disembarked she scrutinized every face, expecting Arne to be in some kind of disguise.

It took a few minutes for them all to come ashore. When the flow stopped, and passengers started boarding for the return journey, Hermia realized Arne was not on the boat.

She fretted over what to do next. There were a hundred possible explanations for his nonappearance, ranging from the trivial to the tragic. Had he lost his nerve and abandoned the mission? She felt ashamed of such a suspicion, but she had always doubted whether Arne was hero material. He might be dead, of course. But it was most likely he had been held up by something stupid like a delayed train. Unfortunately, he had no way of letting her know.

But, she realized, she might be able to contact him.

She had told him to hide out at Jens Toksvig's house in the Nyboder district of Copenhagen. Jens had a phone, and Hermia knew the number.

She hesitated. If the police were listening in on Jens's phone, for any reason, they could trace the call, and then they would know . . . what? That something might be going on on Bornholm. That would be bad, but not fatal. The alternative was for her to find overnight accommodation and wait to see whether Arne came in on the next ferry. She did not have the patience for that.

She returned to the hotel and placed the call.

As the operator was putting her through, she wished she had taken more time to plan what to say. Should she ask for Arne? If anyone happened to be listening in, that would give away his whereabouts. No, she would have to speak in riddles, as she had when calling from Stockholm. Jens would probably answer the phone. He would recognize her voice, she thought. If not, she would say,
It's your friend from Bredgade, remember me?
Bredgade was the street where the British Embassy had been located when she worked there. That should be enough of a hint for him—though it might also be enough to alert a detective.

Before she had time to think it through, the phone was picked up, and a man's voice said, “Hello?”

It certainly was not Arne. It might have been Jens, but she had not heard his voice for more than a year.

She said, “Hello.”

“Who is that speaking?” The voice was that of an older man. Jens was twenty-nine.

She said, “Let me speak to Jens Toksvig, please.”

“Who is calling?”

Who the hell was she speaking to? Jens lived alone. Maybe his father had come to stay. But she was not going to give her real name. “It's Hilde.”

“Hilde who?”

“He'll know.”

“May I have your second name, please?”

This was ominous. She decided to try to bully him. “Look, I don't know who the hell you are, but I didn't call to play stupid games, so just put Jens on the damn phone, will you?”

It did not work. “I must have your surname.”

This was not someone playing games, she decided. “Who are you?”

There was a long pause, then he replied. “I am Sergeant Egill of the Copenhagen police.”

“Is Jens in trouble?”

“What is your full name, please?”

Hermia hung up.

She was shocked and frightened. This was as bad as it could be. Arne had taken refuge in Jens's house, and now the house was under police guard. It could only mean that they had found out that Arne was hiding there. They must have arrested Jens and perhaps Arne, too. Hermia fought back tears. Would she ever see her lover again?

She walked out of the hotel and looked across the harbor toward Copenhagen, a hundred miles away in the direction of the setting sun. Arne was probably in jail there.

There was no way she was going to meet up with her fisherman and return to Sweden empty-handed. She would be letting down Digby Hoare and Winston Churchill and thousands of British airmen.

The ferry's horn sounded the all-aboard with a noise like a bereaved giant. Hermia jumped on her bicycle and cycled furiously to the dock. She
had a complete set of forged papers, including identity card and ration book, so she could pass any checkpoint. She bought a ticket and hurried on board. She had to go to Copenhagen. She had to find out what had happened to Arne. She had to get his film, if he had taken any pictures. When she had done that, she would worry about how to escape from Denmark and get the film to England.

The ferry hooted mournfully again and moved slowly away from the dock.