Five Past Midnight (16 page)

Sergeant Hans Fischer lowered the notebook. "Power was out four times for a total of ninety-three minutes. The generators were up and running within two minutes each time."

It was a boast. The diesel generators were complicated to start, and it was a nervous business because the most important people in the Reich were a few feet away in thick blackness waiting for the return of light.

"There is still a small oil leak at the base of starter one. No better, no worse. I telephoned Erwin and he said he was on his way, but he must have been detained."

Erwin Gockel was a Wehrmacht mechanic, and he was scheduled to look for the reason for the oil leak. In any event, the room had a second starter engine, the spare. The room also contained yellow canaries in a wicker birdcage.

Fischer signed out on the roster, nodded good-bye to the canaries, and left the room, still stretching the aches out of his limbs. The job involved mostly sitting on a hard chair staring at dials.

The generators and starter engines and the fan boxes occupied much of the room, and an instrument panel took up much of the remainder. The panel — gauges and toggles and warning lights — monitored the generators and the ventilating system, some of which Kahr had designed. He had caught the Führer's attention once, when Kahr had insisted to his captain that an air-intake grate behind a jumper bush in the Chancellery garden should be raised as protection against an attack with heavier-than-air gas. Due to his experience in the Great War, Hitler feared gas. The gracious captain had mentioned Kahr in the report that had resulted in the grate being raised. Later a note of appreciation from Hitler himself had been taped to the ventilator control panel. On stationery decorated with the national eagle and a swastika, the note had read, "Sgt Kahr I appreciate your work with the grate Hitler". Kahr had often wondered if the Führer had taped it to the panel himself, perhaps having had to first search for pen and paper, then the tape, finally entering the generator room to put up the note, wondering where just the right place was so Sergeant Kahr would be sure to see it. This little scene pleased Kahr greatly, and he had replayed it endlessly in his mind.

Kahr looked at the oil- and water-pressure gauges, making notes in the machinery logbooks attached to the panel by cords. He lifted a rag from the wall hook behind his chair and checked six dipsticks, two for each of the diesel engines and one each for the starter motors. The room was dimly lit by a single overhead bulb, and Kahr had to bend close to his work, making sure the lines of oil were up to the marks on the sticks. Then he wiped away the few drops of oil that had leaked from the starter motor. Two jerry cans of gasoline were next to a box of gas masks. A diesel fuel tank was also squeezed into the room, and Kahr twisted off its cap and checked its level with a dipstick. The tank contained only two hundred liters of diesel, a small amount due to the possibility of fire. The two or three liters that were consumed by the engines each day during the blackouts were replaced daily, through a fuel pipe with its outlet in the garden above.

Also squeezed into the room were two metal cots with mattresses. When more than one mechanic was on duty, there was no rule against one taking a nap. And in an emergency, the generator-ventilator mechanics would quarter in this room.

Sergeant Kahr returned the rag to the hook, then lifted a pinch of birdseed from a cloth bag and dropped it into the wood cup at the side of the cage. The canaries sidled along the perch to look at the offering, then ignored it, returning to their preening. The birds were an alarm, as they would die from gas before humans, and thereby would allow people in the bunker time to find their gas masks. Frequently, Kahr and Fischer were on duty during the same shift, and after a week of hearing Fischer say in a falsetto voice "Heil Hitler, Heil Hitler, Heil Hitler" to the canaries, Kahr told him that it was parakeets that could talk, not canaries. Not appreciating having been revealed as a moron, Fischer had been cool toward him ever since.

Kahr lowered himself to the chair. Exhaust from the engines was piped directly outside, but the room still reeked of fuel. The Daimler company had known where these two diesel power plants were destined, and so had covered them with ornamental twists of chrome and brass, and they more closely resembled tea samovars than engines. Air flowed into the room from a grate above the rag hook, but the place was always too warm. On the wall above the panel was a diagram of the ventilation system, showing routes of the piping and the locations of the fans, filters, belowground grates and aboveground outlets and inlets, even the locations of the four cages of canaries. Switches on the panel activated dampers and gates, allowing Kahr to direct the flow of air. In the event of a gas attack he had been trained to shut off the fresh-air intakes and allow only captured air to circulate. Many of the ventilation pipes passed through this cramped room, along the ceiling and the long wall opposite the control panels. These were ribbed pipes, eighteen of them that entered the room from the walls and connected to the fan boxes. Half the pipes were painted red and half were green because they made up two separate, redundant systems. If for some reason smoke or noxious gas were to breach the red set of pipes, that set could be closed off, and the fresh air and exhaust run through the green pipes. The fans were powered by outside electricity or the generators in the room next to them. Each air pipe in Kahr's room had a hatch that could be opened so the pipe could be pumped out in the event of flooding, which had never as yet occurred, or to insert poison to kill rats, which occurred frequently. The ventilation pipes were purposely too narrow to allow even the smallest of men to crawl through them. Near the fan boxes were two air purification systems, each in metal crates the size of a desk, and each with pipes running up the wall to join the other ventilation pipes. The air purification machinery was serviced daily by an outside technician, and Kahr knew little about them, other than how to switch them on should air in the bunker be fouled with smoke or gas.

A large red button on the panel activated the
Notbremse,
the emergency brake, which was to be punched only in case of fire, explosion, or assassination attempt. This button sealed all the doors and activated the sprinkler system. An identical button was located at the guard captain's station. Also in Kahr's room were emergency controls for the fire-fighting system, large valves to shut off water pipes.

With the dipsticks checked and the canaries fed, Kahr had completed his work for the shift, until the lights went out and he had to bring the generators to life. And with nothing to do, his thoughts invariably returned to his lost sons and his one hope, the return of his boy Max. Kahr had avoided religion all his life, until the death of his second son, and now had turned to it with fervor. Perhaps if he loaded God with prayers, much like loading artillery shells onto the bed of a transport truck, God would allow a small mercy. Kahr did not know theology, but suspected the sheer number of his prayers would not be overlooked. God would not overlook Ulrich Kahr's thousandth plea, or his ten-thousandth. Kahr closed his eyes and whispered a new prayer, softly, hardly audible under the sough coming from the air grate and the ventilator fans' whine. Even soft prayers were all right, Kahr figured, because God was
not deaf.

The signal came from the buzzer above his desk. Two rings, then one, then another. Kahr was puzzled. Few people visited the generator room, because of the noise. He threw the bolt and opened the heavy door.

"Sergeant Kahr," the visitor said.

The voice, the golden voice. Kahr stepped away from the door so quickly that his chair spilled backward against the gas-mask crate, and the startled canaries chirruped and frantically flitted around their cage.

Kahr straightened his backbone, slapped his arms against his sides, thrust his chin up and sucked his belly in.

"Sergeant Kahr, we are a family here belowground," Adolf Hitler said, entering the room slowly, more a shuffle than a walk.

"Yes, my leader." Kahr fought for breath. Most Germans, even high-ranking officers, suffered an inability to breathe while being addressed by their leader, so powerful was his effect.

"I
have tried to take some of the burdens off my family, especially now that we must live down in this terrible place."

"Yes, my leader."

Even though Kahr worked within two dozen meters of the Führer almost every day, he seldom more than glimpsed the man, usually through a door or between several generals, sometimes partly hidden behind his dog as Hitler kneeled to pet it. So Kahr's image of Hitler had remained fixed, the glowing giant on the posters. Now Kahr was startled at Hitler's rapid decline. The Führer's pale blue eyes — his one distinctive feature — were bloodshot, the pupils filmy. Hitler's face was bloated and the skin was chalky and yellow. The bags under his eyes, which Hitler blamed on mustard gas in the trenches, were purple and puffy. Deep lines ran from his newly pulpy nose to the corners of his mouth. His hair had turned gray within just the past two months, not a dignified silver but a drab mouse gray. Hitler's left arm was palsied and useless, and he gripped it with his right hand to prevent it from shaking. The contrast between Hitler and his SS guards, chosen for their health and beauty, had become appalling.

But, still and ever, the voice. "I cannot let my intimates suffer alone."

On his nose were the nickel-rimmed spectacles that most Germans knew nothing about. He brought up a sheet of paper to his eyes, and then Ulrich Kahr knew the reason for the visit.

The sergeant groaned lowly and swayed. Only by replanting a foot could he stay upright.

Hitler said in a tender voice, "Your son, Max, has been lost near Stettin, on the Oder."

"Lost?" Kahr said in a fogged voice. His face was suddenly flushed, and he was dizzy.

"His commanding officer writes that Max did not come back from patrol. He is presumed dead. The Bolsheviks are not taking prisoners. I thought it better that I inform you, rather than you hearing this news from someone else."

Kahr blindly reached for his desk. His legs were suddenly unable to support him. Hitler stepped into the small room to help the sergeant into the chair, not much help, with only one hand.

Then Hitler put his good hand on Kahr's shoulder. "I am very sorry," he said, bending forward so as to gaze into the sergeant's watering eyes. "But at least you know that his loss was for the Fatherland."

Kahr gulped air.

Hitler squeezed the sergeant's shoulder
"I
will be thinking of Max, too So you will not be alone in your loss." He stood upright and left the room.

Kahr turned back to his control panel. The dials and gauges were scrambled by his tears. His boy Max. This dreadful news. His last son. Kahr's thoughts were broken and dulled. He could not see beyond that minute, that hour, that day. His business with this world was done. Ulrich Kahr's last hope was gone forever.

4

THE BAVARIAN MOTOR WORKS plant near Munich had been reduced to wreckage, but their motorcycles still worked well enough. Jack Cray straddled the machine, his hands out in front of him on the handlebars. The 900-cc engine rumbled under him. Wind blew in his face. The dirt road was pocked with puddles from the rain. He drove slowly, never more than thirty miles an hour. He did not know where in Saxony he was, somewhere north of Leipzig about fifty miles south of Berlin, he figured. He was in a shallow valley with hills rising on both sides of him. He guessed that any road headed north would take him to the city.

The motorcycle belonged to the Wehrmacht, and was painted in camouflage brown and black. After washing himself in a stream — he still smelled faintly of sewage — Cray had liberated the motorcycle from a military checkpoint north of Leipzig. In saddlebags hung over the rear fender were six stick grenades and four satchel charges, all stolen from the armory by Cray.

German countryside passed by Small homes and barns, fenced pastures, wood glades. He crossed a stone bridge over a stream, then paralleled a rail line for several miles. Clouds hid the sun. He sped through a village, nothing more than a train station and a dozen other buildings built around a crossroads.

Just north of the town was a rail siding occupied by a steaming locomotive and six cars. The top of each car was painted in bold white with a red cross. Four wooden buildings had once stood by the siding, but three had been destroyed. Hundreds of German soldiers lingered near the remaining structure, and the neighboring field was filled with soldiers, some standing on crutches some lying on cots and blankets. Bandages were everywhere, and even passing by quickly, Cray could see blood on many of them. This was a staging area for wounded, probably from both eastern and western fronts. Smoke poured from the locomotive's stack. Injured soldiers were being loaded onto the rail cars. Fifteen ambulances—trucks with red crosses painted on top—were parked by the siding, and three more approached the field on the road behind Cray. He accelerated to outdistance them.

Next, Cray passed a train that had been attacked by dive-bombers some time ago: twenty cars and a locomotive, so heavily damaged the field resembled a junkyard. The railcars had been carrying armored scout cars. Apparently unimpeded by enemy fighters or AA fire, the bombers had leisurely made extra runs, and the scout cars had been torn apart and flung all around and burned to black, and were now hardly recognizable. The tons of twisted metal and charred rubber had been pushed aside to let other trains pass, and the line had been repaired.

Cray was wearing a gray greatcoat opened to the midriff button to allow him to ride the BMW. Under the coat was the field uniform of a Wehrmacht major. His eyes were covered with bottle-bottom goggles, and he wore a leather cap with flaps over his ears. He chewed on a raw potato. Three more potatoes were on the seat of the BMW's sidecar, as was a Schmeisser submachine gun. A pistol in a holster was on his belt, and a Wehrmacht service knife in his boot. He passed another farmhouse at the side of the road, then drove alongside another field. He twisted the throttlejust to hear the satisfying rumble of the engine. He might get a motorcycle after the war. Jack Cray hadn't felt this good in months.