A Traitor's Loyalty: A Novel (19 page)

A grey-uniformed Wehrmacht rifleman stood guard by the embassy’s front entrance, a small blue, white, and red Tricolor sewn onto his upper sleeve indicating that he was a Frenchman. France, like most of Germany’s fascist satellites, no longer had a military of its own. By the Warsaw Pact in 1955, the Führer had dissolved the satellites’ independent armies and air forces and had absorbed them into the Wehrmacht. The new pan-European Wehrmacht drew its ranks and regimental officers from all the Warsaw Pact states, but the general officers were almost universally German.

Himmler, of course, had wanted to disband the Wehrmacht altogether and replace it with his Waffen-SS, which already had regiments recruited from every state of fascist Europe, thereby giving the Reich and its European empire a military that was as ideologically and racially focused as the National Socialist government. But he had been frustrated by Heydrich, who as Reich Commissar-General was commander of the massive Wehrmacht forces charged with keeping the East pacified and defending the Ural border against the Siberian raiding parties. Heydrich’s victory in the dispute with Himmler over the fate of the Wehrmacht had marked the final, irrevocable rift between the two former political allies.

Quinn checked his watch. A quarter past eight. Still fairly early. He sat down near the bottom of the stone steps leading up to the embassy entrance, watched, and waited.

He did not have to wait long. It was just after twenty past when he saw Maurice Beauchamp enter the square from the Grand Avenue, wrapped in a long charcoal trench coat and a grey fedora and carrying a briefcase. He rose to his feet when he saw him.

After a few steps Beauchamp spotted Quinn too. Maybe the Frenchman already knew that Garner was dead and Quinn had read the Columbia-Haus file, or maybe he simply saw something in Quinn’s eyes as their gazes locked briefly across the small square. Whichever it was, as soon as Beauchamp spotted him, he turned and ran as fast as he could back out towards the Grand Avenue.

Quinn took off after him, skirting past the statue of Laval as he darted across the square. He paused as he emerged into the Grand Avenue, scanning the vista before him for Beauchamp. Momentarily he could not find him, but then he saw him: on the other side of the street, heading in the direction of the Führer’s palace.

He followed, pushing his way past several sightseers who yelled after him in protest. He was much fitter than Maurice and gained on him quickly, but in such a crowded place the danger of losing him remained great.

Without warning the Frenchman cut inside the front gate of the Propaganda Ministry, his hat flying from his head with the sudden change of direction. A moment later Quinn followed. Maurice was charging across the Ministry’s entry courtyard towards a small exit in the far corner. Quinn pursued him, vaulting over the edge of the fountain at the courtyard’s center.

Beauchamp disappeared through the small archway in the brick wall, but Quinn was just a meter or two behind him now. The two men emerged onto the edge of the lawn separating the Propaganda Ministry from the Führer’s Palace. Beauchamp had turned and was dashing along the side of the Ministry building, but in turning he had slowed sufficiently to allow Quinn into touching distance. Quinn reached out, stretching forward, and grabbed him by the shoulder.

Both men stumbled at the contact. Beauchamp turned about, arms flailing wildly, and his briefcase struck Quinn on the temple, hard. Quinn staggered back, putting out his hand against the Ministry wall to steady himself and dropping to one knee. The briefcase swung open, disgorging a flock of loose papers that were immediately caught up on the breeze and flurried around the two men.

Maurice, still off his balance, stumbled at the impact with Quinn’s head and collapsed onto his back. He made to get up again, to continue running, but Quinn was faster. He caught the Frenchman by the leg and pulled him back down, then used the leverage provided by his grip to haul himself up on top of the older man
and straddle him. With his left hand he pulled Maurice round by the shoulder, then drew back his right fist and punched him in the jaw. The Frenchman went limp beneath him and Quinn collapsed forward and rolled off him, lying on his back on the pavement and gasping for breath.

After a few moments he rolled onto his side and raised himself onto one elbow. Across the lawn a Waffen-SS guardsman was watching them apprehensively from his position amongst the columns of the colonnade along the side of the Führer’s Palace. He had unslung his rifle and taken half a step forward, unsure of how he should react to the commotion twenty meters away.

Quinn dug into his inside coat pocket and worked his ID free from where it had lodged itself beneath the folded copy of the Columbia-Haus treaty. He flipped the ID open and held it up toward the guardsman, even though there was no possibility of the young man being able to make out anything of it from across the lawn.

“Amt III,” he called reassuringly and waved the guardsman back. The young man took a cautious step backward but did not sling his rifle back over his shoulder.

Quinn looked around and spotted an alcove in the Ministry building’s wall a few feet away. He got to one knee and grabbed Maurice by his coat lapels. The Frenchman was curled into a fetal ball and coughing as he tried to get his wind back. His spectacles lay a few meters away in the grass. Quinn hauled him up and half-dragged him across the pavement.

The alcove contained a small stone bench in a recess that would be hidden from the prying eyes of the Waffen-SS guardsman or anyone else out on the lawn. Quinn hauled Beauchamp onto the bench and bent over him, hands firmly on the other man’s shoulders to prevent him from making any sudden moves. Both men were breathing heavily and sweating in the chill morning air, which burned inside Quinn’s chest every time he inhaled.

After a few moments Beauchamp looked up at him, blinking, trying unsuccessfully to focus on his face. Quinn straightened and walked over to the grass, clutching one arm across his abdomen as he bent over to retrieve Maurice’s spectacles. One lens had completely shattered. Quinn stepped back into the alcove, took Maurice’s hand and placed the spectacles in his palm.

The Frenchman closed his fingers around the bent wire frames, fumbled with them and managed to put them on. He frowned when he realized one of the lenses had broken. He looked around at his surroundings, blinking, one eye comically larger than the other. He looked at Quinn and blinked several times, trying to focus, then tried closing the eye behind the shattered lens. Evidently this was not sufficiently comfortable, for he shook his head and took off the spectacles, massaging the bridge of his nose with thumb and forefinger. After a moment he looked up but was unable to find Quinn and simply stared sightlessly off into space.

Quinn, satisfied that Beauchamp was not going to try to make a break for it, was sitting with his back against the opposite wall and his knees tucked up under his chin, watching the other man.

“What happened?” Maurice asked at last, in French. “What did you find out?”

“I think you know,” Quinn said.

“Columbia-Haus,” he said glumly. “You f-found out about Columbia-Haus.”

Quinn nodded, then realized Maurice could not see the motion. “Yes.”

“You’ve read it?”

“I have.”

“Where did you find it? Garner?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve found him then. Where is he?”

“He was in Munich. He’s dead.”

Beauchamp was silent for several moments. “You killed him?” he asked at last.

“No,” said Quinn. “The British government did. They’ve been following me. But then, you already knew that.”

“I had a fair idea they would be, yes.”

Quinn shook his head. “You knew. You’ve been feeding them information on my whereabouts.”

Maurice pursed his lips as if he wanted to say something but evidently thought better of it. Instead he said, “So why are you here? Wh-what do you want to know now?”

“Everything else you haven’t told me.” Quinn leaned forward. “How can I stop this, Maurice?”

Maurice laughed hollowly. “You can’t, Johann—or whatever your name might b-be right now.” Quinn was glad the Frenchman could not see him flinch at that. “It’s done. Just waiting for the signatures. Just because the Führer is dead doesn’t mean there won’t be s-someone else to sign it in his place.”

“There has to be something I can do,” Quinn countered. “There has to be something in the balance. If there wasn’t, there’d be no need for all this. They would never have brought me back if this whole thing wasn’t absolutely desperate.”

At first Beauchamp said nothing. Then, sounding slightly more earnest now, “Give it up, will you? You’re beaten. You’ve r-read the damn thing. R-remember those names on the back page? Both countries are in too far to b-back out now.”

The names on the last page. The Führer, Himmler, the Prime Minister, and Lord Home.

Quinn frowned. Prime Minister and Führer; Foreign Secretary and—Reichsführer-SS. Why not the Foreign Minister?

“Himmler,” he said, and he saw Beauchamp start. “This isn’t a Foreign Ministry treaty. This isn’t a government treaty. It’s an
SS
treaty. It’s Himmler’s.” Beauchamp was becoming more agitated. Quinn frowned. “Maurice,” he said warningly, “there’s something you’re still not telling me.”

The Frenchman seemed about to object, then visibly wilted in resignation. “Yes,” he agreed. “It’s Himmler’s. But the Führer had already approved it before he died. It’s just as good as a Foreign Ministry treaty.”

“Then why all the—” Quinn’s eyes widened. “The will. There’s something going on with the will. The treaty is due to be signed on Monday, but the will’s going to be read tomorrow. So Himmler needs the treaty signed sooner. He doesn’t think he’s going to be named as the Führer’s successor.”

“He
knows
he’s not the Führer’s successor,” Maurice corrected.

Quinn looked at him sharply. “What do you mean?”

“The will names Heydrich as successor,” Beauchamp said. “Himmler knows this because B-Bormann told him; Bormann witnessed the will. Himmler has a draft copy of the treaty with the Führer’s signature on it; Bormann had the old bastard sign it while he was delirious last week, after he collapsed and it became obvious he didn’t have long left.”

The Frenchman paused, taking in a long, shuddering breath, then continued. “Himmler needs to get the English Prime Minister to sign the treaty before the funeral tomorrow so he can announce it during his eulogy before the will is read and create enough of a commotion to have the will overturned.”

“So Himmler can seize power? Have himself made Führer?” Beauchamp nodded. Quinn was leaning forward now. “How do you know this, Maurice?”

The Frenchman sighed. “Because I don’t work for the English. I work for Himmler.”

“What?”

“Well, Fegelein, actually.”

“You work for Heinrich Himmler’s personal deputy?”

Beauchamp nodded.

“But how?” Quinn asked.

Beauchamp laughed again. It was not a pleasant sound. “I don’t think you’ve ever appreciated, Johann, just what a thorn you were in the Gestapo’s side. Lancelot was the bane of Berlin counterintelligence’s existence. You were
good
. They would have done anything to stop you. Himmler placed Fegelein in personal charge of their efforts to discover your identity.”

“And they found you?”

Maurice nodded. “About three months before you left Berlin. They’d figured out that you had an operative at the French embassy, and they fed different stories to each of the various department secretaries. It led them
to me. They would have tortured me and killed me. I had no choice.”

He stopped speaking, and Quinn looked up at him. He saw that Maurice’s lips were trembling and his eyes were moist. He was about to ask what choice he was talking about, but then it dawned on him.

“It was you,” he breathed. He sat back against the wall in surprise. He was no longer looking at Maurice. “You betrayed Karl and me to the Germans.”

Maurice shook his head. “No,” he said vehemently. “I betrayed
you
to the Germans. Not Karl. I thought—th-they told me—they told me Karl would be safe. They s-said once they had Lancelot they would let us go, leave us alone. They promised me a little cottage for the two of us in Corsica or the Côte d’Azur and a state pension from Paris. I believed them. What else could I do?”

The tears were running down his cheeks now. He was no longer speaking to Quinn, but to himself. “That was when I found out what your call name was. Lancelot. I hadn’t even known before then that you were working for England; you could have been with the Americans, or Canada, or Australia. I knew nothing about you. But you knew everything about me. You’d known my secret, my one, fatal weakness, before the first time we even met. You bastard.”

He was quiet for a few moments. Then, suddenly, he spoke again. “Afterward, though—after it was all over, and Karl was gone—they did leave me alone. Said I had to stay in Berlin, but they left me alone.” The bitterness in his voice started to rise again. “Until I got a phone call at half past two in the morning three nights ago, and they told me I could expect you to get in touch with me sometime that day.”

Once again he lapsed into silence. Quinn hesitated, unsure of whether Maurice was going to say something else, but the Frenchman gave no sign of preparing to speak again. Quinn said, “You told the Germans I would be at Denlinger’s flat. And they told the British embassy.”

Maurice shrugged. “If that’s what they did. I had no idea what the Gestapo would do with the information. I just passed it on.”

“But the
Germans
, Maurice,” Quinn breathed.

Beauchamp chuckled again. The sound of it was beginning to make Quinn’s skin crawl. The Frenchman’s voice was very bitter now. “How could I work for Germany, you’re thinking? I should hate Germany, you say, for what they have done to my country these thirty years. And I do, Johann, I do.” He sneered. “But I hate
you
more. I hate you for what you did to me, and to Karl. I had to live with my secret every day, terrified someone would find me out. I decided I would have to bury it away, never ever act on it, never ever risk discovery. You don’t know what it’s like. You don’t know how it is to live every day in fear of discovery of your one secret, because if they find out who you really are, they’ll kill you.” Quinn pressed his lips together and said nothing in response to this.