“I’ll be following the Führer,” Jäger told Gunter. “He insists.” His words were politic but his expression conveyed his chagrin. No man was a hero to his valet and no Führer to his security chief. “I’m leaving the investigation under your control, Gunter.”
“Of course, Gruppenführer.”
“The Führer himself requested I put you in charge, Gunter. Such an honor.”
An honor, yes, but being on the Führer’s radar was a double-edged sword. Life changed in a moment—just yesterday evening he’d been in Munich, checking decoded messages that reported a possible British parachute drop in France, when his assistant, Keller, took a call for him.
“Your wife told me to tell you she’s frosting the Kuchen.”
Gunter could still make it home in time. How often did his daughter turn two years old?
He’d slipped that evening’s reports and his daughter’s present, a Steiff teddy bear, into his case. Before he could make it any farther, though, Keller had brought him Jäger’s telegram, which summoned him to the airfield immediately for a flight to Belgian HQ at Brûly-de-Pesche, to continue on to Paris early this morning.
Gunter could almost smell the Schokoladenkuchen. Ach, why on his daughter’s birthday?
He blinked again, still trying to dislodge the stubborn grit from his eye, bringing himself back to the dusty runway. “A privilege, Gruppenführer.”
“Make us proud, Gunter,” said Jäger. “You excel at the hunt. No one assembles the pieces better than you, putting order to the chaos.”
“Danke.” He hoped his boss would leave it at that and let him get to work.
Jäger nodded. “Your uncle trained you well.”
Gunter’s mother had abandoned him as a child on his policeman uncle’s doorstep. He’d never known his father. Gunter counted himself lucky to be raised by his uncle, who had made sure there was always a coat on his back and bread in his school lunch pail, even during the hungriest days of the Weimar Republic. His uncle, a stickler for order and detail, had provided young Gunter a sense of safety he’d never known with his mother. No wonder he’d followed in his uncle’s footsteps. He’d found a great sense of purpose in police work, a world where his efforts produced tangible results.
“An honor to be of service,” Gunter said, a repetition of what they’d learned to always reply at the police academy. “I’ll assemble a team and report back to you as soon as I have news, and liaise with the SD at the Paris Kommandantur.”
Jäger took Gunter’s arm. “You will issue reports only to me. Am I clear? No information to SD, or anyone else. No assembling a team.”
“Jawohl, Gruppenführer, but without contacts on the ground . . .”
“I’ll see you’re in communication with the right people.” Jäger tapped his thick fingers together. “Your cousin Eva’s biology professorship is up for tenure at Universität Bayern, isn’t it?”
What business was it of his? Gunter’s heart beat hard in his chest.
“My old friend Professor Häckl heads the science department,” said Jäger. “He could smooth the way to tenure for her. But if that business with the Jew came up, well, it might be a bumpy road.”
His silly little cousin Eva’s affair, long since over, was a vulnerability that never went away. It had almost cost his uncle his police position a few years ago. Gunter, who had his own family now, had to be careful.
But Jäger had never put personal pressure like this on him before. His boss’s job must be on the line. That meant Gunter’s was, too.
Jäger stuck a cigarette between his thick lips. Lit it and inhaled. Gunter always thought those lips were mismatched to his otherwise long features. “You will keep me exclusively informed of findings.”
Already Gunter didn’t like this. He wondered if he was being set up to be the fall man. But what choice did he have?
He nodded. “Jawohl, Gruppenführer.”
Part I
Eight Months Earlier
October 14, 1939
Scapa Flow, Royal Naval Base,
Hoy, Orkney Islands, Scotland
In the naval munitions factory, Kate Rees pushed her hair under her bandana and shouldered the Lee-Enfield rifle. The indoor firing range sweltered. The late-afternoon sun bathed Lyness’s converted brick works in an orange glow. It was her last round testing the rifle, then off her aching feet. She couldn’t wait to go home to her husband, Dafydd, a naval officer on weekend leave from his engineer’s unit.
The piercing whistle blew the all-ready.
Kate put her eye to the sight and lined up the bead at the tip. Calculated the air current rustling the factory rafters. Focused on the black target rings three hundred yards ahead.
“Fire,” boomed a voice.
She squeezed the trigger ten times. Reloading and firing at ten consecutive targets. A bull’s-eye each time.
Sherard, the line supervisor’s work coat stretched tight around his middle, ticked a checklist as Kate shelved the Lee-Enfield into the satisfactory bin. He pointed to a man with sparse brown hair combed across his crown. “Gentleman wants a word, Yank.”
Still called her Yank even though she’d been working here almost a year.
“Impressive,” the man said, his English accent like cut glass. He leaned on a cane. “Where did you learn to shoot like that?”
“I grew up on ranches in Oregon,” she said, couldn’t help the flicker of pride in her voice. “My father taught me to hunt when I was a little girl.”
“What are you doing here?” he asked, his tone making it clear he wondered why anyone would come to this godforsaken Orkney island unless they were under military orders. She got that all the time. Hoy’s naval base at Lyness and Rinnigill required security clearance and was considered a hardship posting, although both bases now employed a civilian workforce of locals and non-locals: secretaries for the various departments, staff to work in the laundries and canteens. Twelve thousand shore-based personnel were billeted here at camps and installations all over the island.
“I married a naval engineer.”
“We’ve got a job for you.”
“Already got a job.” The military often scouted around the rifle factory and test range. Women were recruited for all types of work these days. She didn’t think much of it.
“It’s government work, and a bump in pay. In Birmingham.”
A bump in pay sounded attractive. But not Birmingham. She’d gotten accustomed to this wild, desolate place.