Read Come into my Parlour Online
Authors: Dennis Wheatley
Come into my Parlour
Dennis Wheatley
Edited by Miranda Vaughan Jones
IXÂ Â Â The Gestapo Get to Work
XIIIÂ Â Â The Truth, and Nothing but the Truth
XIVÂ Â Â Out of the Frying-Pan into the Fire
The Spider's Lair
At five minutes to ten on the morning of the 23rd of June 1941, the ugly streets of Berlin were already hot, and a blazing sun in a cloudless sky gave promise of a stifling day. The pavements were far more crowded than in peacetime, owing to the great influx of people brought to the capital of the now swollen Reich by innumerable varieties of war activity; but on this Monday morning the crowds seemed denser than ever and it was clear that they were animated by an unusual excitement.
Its cause was that only the day before the German armies had invaded Russia, and everyone was eager for news of this great new campaign.
Behind closed doors a few older people shook their heads. It was true that for over a year now Britain and her Empire had alone remained in arms to defy the might of Hitler, but those arrogant and accursed islanders still remained unsubdued; holding the oceans with their Fleets, doggedly barring the path through North Africa to the East and, with their ever-growing Air Force, proving a constant menace from the West. Hitler had promised that never again should the German people be called upon to wage a war on two fronts simultaneously. Was it really wise, some of the older people asked each other in guarded whispers, to take on the Russian Colossus, however flabby he might appear, before the arch-enemy, Churchill, and all he represented, had been finally overcome?
But such questioning found no place in the minds of the vast majority. Had not their glorious
Führer
added the Saar, Austria and Czechoslovakia to the Reich without firing a shot; eliminated Poland in one short month of war; forced Denmark and Norway into submission by a single subtle stroke; conquered Holland, Belgium, Luxemburg and France by the most brilliant campaign in history lasting barely six weeks; overrun Yugoslavia and Greece in another blitzkrieg of twenty-one days; and in the meantime made Italy, Hungary and Rumania into vassal States? Fourteen nations now acknowledged Germany as their Overlord, and eight of them had been subdued by
German arms between two Aprilsâsince from the invasion of Norway to the surrender of Greece less than thirteen months had elapsed.
Glutted with the loot of Warsaw, Paris, Brussels, Athens and The Hague, the German masses hailed the new campaign against Russia with excited joy and boundless confidence. For them, to expect victory had now become a habit of mind, and defeat unthinkable. In the cafés they were already speculating as to whether Moscow would be captured in one month or two, regretting that they would not get from it the fat dairy produce of Denmark and Holland or the silks and wines of France, but gloating over the thought that the great corn-lands of the Ukraine and the oil of the Caucasus could not but still further raise the now high standard of living for themselvesâthe
Herrenvolk
, and exclaiming joyfully that within another year the German Empire would extend from the North Sea to the Pacific Ocean.
Their confidence was shared by the quiet little middle-aged man who sat at his desk in a spacious second-floor room that looked out on a sunny courtyard at the back of the great S.S. Headquarters on the Alexander Platz.
Both the room and the man were scrupulously tidy. He was a pale nondescript person with fair hair cut short above a sloping forehead. His chin receded sharply and his weak eyes peered through strong-lensed pince-nez at the documents before him. But he worked with sureness and despatch; his delicate hands sorting through the papers with the same swiftness with which they had for years weighed out quarter kilos of currants and sultanas, when he had been a struggling grocer with a poor little shop in a suburb of Munich. In more recent years he had many times, by a single scrawl of his pen, sent to their deaths more people than there are currants in a quarter kilo; and in Germany's new Empire of two hundred and sixty-five million souls there were few who did not regard his name with fear or hatred. It was Heinrich Himmler.
A miniature silver chiming clock on his desk pinged the hour. He signed the paper he had been reading, placed the rest of the pile neatly back in his IN basket and stood up. Tightening the belt of his black and silver
Obergruppenführer's
uniform over his plump little paunch, he gave a quick glance in a wall mirror and, apparently satisfied with his appearance, strode with ringing steps across the parquet floor. Throwing open the door of an adjoining room he paused for a moment, dramatically, upon its threshold.
The room was even larger than his office, and was his private conference room. In it nearly a dozen men were already assembled round a gleaming mahogany table. On his appearance they sprang to
their feet as though animated by a single lever and, thrusting out their right arms, exclaimed in chorus: “Heil Hitler!”
Himmler took the salute, advanced to the chair at the head of the table, motioned the others to be seated, and sitting down himself, picked up the agenda that had been placed ready for him.
He was about to hold the formal monthly meeting, attended by all the German Intelligence Chiefs, at which he made his comments on the separate appreciations that had been submitted to him, and issued general instructions about matters on which he required more detailed information.
The three Directors of Intelligence for the Army, Navy and Luftwaffe were present, and the civilian Intelligence Chiefs for the Foreign Office and Economic Warfare. At the far end of the table sat Himmler's Principal Assistant, the S.S. General Kaltenbrunner; the only man, so it was whispered, of whom Himmler himself was afraid. Behind Kaltenbrunner, at a small separate table against the far wall, two S.S. majors waited, unobtrusive but observant, to act as secretaries and take notes of all that passed at the meeting.
On Himmler's right sat a small wisened man in Admiral's uniform. His sparse grey hair only partially covered a fine domed skull that seemed too big for his body; he had a thin cynical mouth and mild blue eyes. He did not look like a German and his name, Canaris, denoted the foreign extraction of his family; but he had for long been one of the most important figures in the High Command, and was the Chief of the old, pre-Hitler, German Secret Service. Like the three Directors of Intelligence, his allegiance lay with the
Oberkommandantur der Wehrmacht
, and he was responsible only nominally to Himmler.
At Himmler's other side sat another S.S. officer. He was a plumpish man with immensely powerful shoulders, a heavy jowl and hair cut
en brosse
. His thin sharp nose protruded from between what had been a pair of small, light eyes set much too close together; but now the left eye, although an excellent match and detectable as false only through its immobility, was made of glass. He was
Gruppenführer
Grauber, the dreaded Chief of Department U.A.âI, and controlled the operations of all Gestapo agents in countries outside the Reich.
Items one to seven on the agenda consisted of the monthly appreciations of “Future Enemy Intentions”, rendered in turn by the three Service Directors of Intelligence; their two civilian colleagues, Canaris and Grauber.
These dealt only with the war against Britain and the salient points that emerged were as follows. It was anticipated that within a matter of weeks both the French quisling, General Dentz, who was endeavouring to hold Syria against the Australians, and the last
Italian resistance in Abyssinia, would collapse. Grave concern was expressed by the Airman over the ever-mounting losses of the Luftwaffe based on French coastal aerodromes, owing to the R.A.F. daylight sweeps, and it was forecast that still further increases in Britain's air strength would have to be faced in the future. However, the morale of the British public had fallen sharply, and Churchill had suffered a considerable loss of prestige owing to the recent final abandonment of Crete. There was good reason to suppose that morale in Britain would fall still further during the autumn, owing to the obvious hopelessness of ever securing anything but a patched-up peace at best; the night bombing of industrial centres, a steadily increasing shortage of consumer goods and what would eventually amount to a famine in the luxuries of the masses, such as beer and cigarettes. Although still shrouded in secrecy, it was known that United States “precautions” were now assuming a warlike status, and that the Americans had landed so-called “Security Troops” in both Greenland and Iceland.
Canaris even went so far as to say that, in his view, unless some special measures could be devised to conciliate public opinion in the States, he believed that they would actively enter the war against Germany before the end of the year. The man from the Wilhelmstrasse offset this by forecasting a great strengthening of relations between Germany and Japan as a result of Vichy giving way to German pressure and agreeing to accept Japanese garrisons in French Indo-China.
After discussion and a reassessment of certain points these seven appreciations were taken as the basis of the monthly report for submission to Hitler.
It was not until item eight was reached that any reference was made to Russia. All these key men of the German war-machine had been concerned for many months with the gigantic preparations for the assault on the Soviet Union. Since early spring they had carried the secret of the D-Day fixed for the operation, and they were also fully informed of the time-table set for the campaign. They all considered it as certain that the German armies would be through the Russian-held half of Poland and in Minsk within a week, and that the Nazi Swastikas would be flying over Smolensk by the end of July. Only then did they expect that the main Russian resistance would have to be met, but after a series of big battles in the autumn it was anticipated that Hitler would be able to make a triumphant personal entry into Moscow by Christmas.
Every scrap of information they could gather regarding Russian resources had already been passed to the O.K.W., and it was now for
the Operations Branch of the General Staff to make the best use they could of it.
Himmler glanced at the one word “Russia” and prepared to pass the item, remarking casually to Grauber:
“I take it you are fully satisfied about your channels?”