There were no longer any sounds of pursuit as he came up over the crest of a sand dune, yet he continued to move carefully. The moon had slipped farther towards zenith, and heavy cloud was moving in for good this time. Memling studied the sky; it would snow before morning, he decided. The watch he had taken from one of the dead SS troopers in Trassenheide showed 10.55. Less than an hour to go. If they kept to schedule.
As he hunched into the shelter of a bush Memling found himself wondering at Bethwig’s confident assertion that the launching would not be stopped because of technical problems: had the Germans come so far that he could be that certain, or was it all an act for his benefit? He recalled the weeks and months of repeated failure in the years before the war, when he and Phil Cleator and Arthur Clarke and all the rest had struggled time and again to get their flimsy balsa and tin creations off the ground.
And that raised the question of why Bethwig was involved in this mad scheme to begin with. He was one of Germany’s premier rocket engineers. How in the name of God had he become involved in a gun battle at Gestapo headquarters? Was the dream strong enough, he wondered, to drive a man into open conflict with his government, even to the point of treason? He shook his head. It was damned unlikely that he would ever know.
But Bethwig had told him he was going to ride that shining monster to the moon, and his breath caught in his throat at the memory of the rocket towering from the centre of the launch complex. Only someone like himself, like Franz, like those of the Peenemunde staff, could ever really understand the lure of the dream that had driven them all these years. And given the slightest opportunity, Memling knew he would have taken Bethwig’s place without a second thought.
A figure materialised on the edge of the deeper blackness that was the pine forest. A smear of cloud slid away from the moon, and he saw Prager plodding in his direction. He watched as the Gestapo agent reached the fence edging the narrow track, stooped, and began to crawl through. A spotlight snapped on, catching Prager full in its beam, and a machine-gun stitched a dead-straight line of dirt explosions towards him; Prager’s coat caught on the barbed wire, and the stream of bullets marched past and left him dangling on the fence. A moment later soldiers ran down the road, and the lorry mounting the searchlight and machine-gun followed.
It happened so fast that Memling could do nothing but watch. Someone had made a correct guess and sent a detachment to wait in ambush. Sickened at the senseless cruelty of it, Memling edged down the flank of the dune as they dragged Prager up the road. An officer met them half-way, unholstered a pistol, and fired a single round into his head.
‘You bloody bastards!’ Memling ground out as two of the SS squad pulled Prager’s body to the side of the road and kicked it into the ditch. Memling reached the hard sand beach and began to run.
The plan had come into his mind fully formed. The track ran along the beach, just back of the dunes, as he remembered the map. Less than half a kilometre on, it snaked down into a gully and up again, making a sharp turn inland as it emerged. Memling reached that gully as the lorry came into sight, travelling slowly and rocking from side to side on the badly rutted road. The glare of its headlights whipped over him, and he flattened himself against the ground. The lorry lurched down the slope, gears grinding angrily as the driver fought the transmission and the steering wheel at the same time, and the soldier at the machine-gun hung on with both hands. As the lorry started up the short slope and entered the turn Memling twisted the cap off a grenade, pulled the igniter, and waited two seconds before tossing it into the open back. He heard someone swear, and then the grenade went off.
The blast swung the lorry half around; the petrol tank erupted and the rear became a mass of flames. The driver’s door flew open and Memling shot the man as he slid out, then shifted quickly and killed the gunner as he scrambled over the side. A figure leapt from the back, uniform blazing like a torch, and Memling ignored him as he rolled about on the ground for a moment, then lay still. A bullet kicked up dirt as he got to his feet, and instinctively he swivelled, finger squeezing short bursts from the MP40. The officer who had shot Prager jerked and fell across the hood of the lorry.
Memling climbed down into the gully. A series of pops sounded beneath the blazing canvas as ammunition exploded. He kept his eyes on the officer who was groaning and trying to push himself upright. The man saw Memling standing across the hood and lifted a hand as if to shield himself. Memling reached forward and picked up the officer’s pistol from where it had fallen into the open hood vent. The SS officer tried to speak, but Memling shook his head and shot him dead.
Memling crossed the road. By the time the first soldiers arrived to investigate the blaze, he was deep in the forest, moving south.
‘Right foot here, sir, then left foot on the couch. That’s it, sir, now ease in and down.’
The technician’s big hand pushed down on the helmet, forcing Bethwig’s chin against the rim, so that he spluttered in protest before he popped through the hatch like a melon seed, caromed off the far wall of the cabin, and bounced into the seat. With an air of exasperation, the technician leaned across and reset the three switches he had knocked out of position.
Franz lay back in the contoured seat while the technicians worked to secure him to the acceleration couch and hook him into the control panels. He could hardly believe that he had pulled it off, yet the couch rocked gently on its gimbals and there was the main instrument panel above his head. He was so excited that he no longer noticed the sweaty, oily smell of the pressure suit; nor did he notice that it chafed. The suit was just about one size too small, but that could not be helped. And his neck was just that much longer than the original owner’s that the top of his head rubbed against the padding.
The technician rapped on his helmet, and Bethwig came to with a start. The man was motioning for him to switch on the radio. For an instant, panic gripped him; if he turned his radio on, his voice would be transmitted over the intercom to the .launch area and the command centre. If they discovered that he had substituted himself for the pilot before the hatch was sealed, the SS would certainly end the launch attempt. The man pointed again, but the chief technician elbowed him aside and plugged his headset directly into Bethwig’s helmet.
‘Sorry, Lieutenant. Got delayed. Small problem in the instrument bay, but it’s fixed now. Some idiot left a bolt just loose enough to keep the hatch from closing.’
Bethwig suppressed a sigh of relief. Over the tinny intercom the chief technician would be unable to tell who was inside the pressure suit. He rocked the seat back until he could see the chronometer in the main panel. The two dials showed local and elapsed time. There was less than thirty-five minutes to go now.
They finished the instrument check, tested the oxygen and other support systems, checked the engineering and fuel systems, and ran through the final inventory of food and water stores. At the end the chief technician handed in the special tool kit made of non-sparking aluminium and bronze. When the hatch was closed and sealed, the air inside the cabin would be replaced with pure oxygen. Bethwig was not happy about that, but the original design had envisioned a flight of not more than fifty minutes’ duration for which oxygen was the cheapest and most efficient system. Now, in the event of a fire, even normally non-flammable materials, such as the kapok stuffing in the couch, the leather of his suit, the composition board of the instrument panel, and even the aluminium panelling, would burn furiously in a one-hundred-per-cent-oxygen atmosphere.
‘That’s it, then, Lieutenant Gross.’ The technician clapped him on the shoulder and set the gimbal brake. The couch immediately swung into a reclining position. The chief technician hesitated, as if he wanted to say more but could not find the words. He contented himself with a mumbled ‘Good luck’ and unplugged the headset. A moment later the interior of the cabin went dark as he lifted the hatch panel into place and began to bolt it down. Franz turned his head as far as the cumbersome suit would allow, and caught a final glimpse of the chief technician peering in at him. The thought occurred to him that the technician’s face was probably the last he would ever see.
Bethwig was alone. The silence was total but for the faint whisper of oxygen inside his suit. He took a deep breath, feeling the excitement rise, and grinned. He had expected to be terror-stricken at this point. Instead, he was elated.
The chronometer hands stood at minus thirty minutes. The winking red light indicated that the command centre was trying to contact him. He reached up and inserted his helmet radio leads into the main panel. There was nothing that could stop him now.
Memling was crouched in a stand of pine less than thirty metres from the SS headquarters in Zinnowitz. Two five-ton lorries were parked on the gravelled parade, and he counted forty SS men drawn up in two columns. An officer ran from the building shouting orders, and the men hurried to their trucks. The officer leaned from the cab to give last-minute instructions to a sergeant, and the lorries lurched and bumped across the parade and out through the gate. Memling watched, waiting to see which direction they would take - north-west to the launch area or due north to the coast where he had ambushed the patrol. There was little more he could do if the SS had decided to halt the launching, but the lorries reached the main road and sped north.
The noise of engines dwindled, and he turned back to the barracks where the sergeant was still looking towards the road while the sentry behind stood at rigid attention, trying to make himself as inconspicuous as possible. According to Sussmann, the garrison had been reduced, in anticipation of the final withdrawal, to one hundred men. He had killed six and one officer twenty minutes ago, forty had just left, and there were at least another thirty, according to Prager, guarding the launching area and the various command centres. There would be ten to fifteen more SS still searching for him in the vicinity of the tank farm and a few guarding the burned-out Gestapo headquarters several kilometres to the south in Trassenheide. So there should not be more than a few left in the barracks.
There would also be radio equipment that might enable him to make contact with the submarine. He decided it was worth a try.
The parade was twenty metres in diameter and fringed closely about with trees that reached to the building on either flank. The intent obviously had been to create the same park-like surroundings found throughout the rest of the Peenemunde facility. Memling found it incongruous. He worked his way through the trees to the south-east side of the building, checking each window. The construction was cement block, as was nearly every building on the island, and the ground-floor windows were at eye level. Most of the interior was dark and the few lighted rooms empty. The central dormitory for enlisted personnel extended the length of the building at the rear; it was empty. What weapon racks he could see were also empty. He had then to depend on his single remaining grenade, the machine pistol and three magazines.
Memling completed the circumnavigation of the barracks. The single sentry and the sergeant seemed to be the only ones left, but he couldn’t be certain of that. He studied the sentry from the trees. Now that his sergeant had gone, the man had relaxed and was sneaking a smoke. His rifle, however, was still slung muzzle downwards, ready for instant use.
He faded back into the shadows and worked his way to a darkened room with an unlocked window on the south-east side. Cautiously he worked it up by pressing the frame back against the casement and lifting. It rose in jerks, binding on either side, and Memling swore silently. When he had it up as far as it would go, he passed the machine pistol through and eased himself into the room.
Memling knelt at the partly opened door for several minutes until satisfied the corridor was empty. The building was a single-storey cube, and there was no way to find out how many people were left inside except by checking each room. He opened the door carefully and stepped into the hall. The first door on his right opened easily. The room was dark, and when he turned the light switch, he found himself in a mess hall. The room was huge and, combined with the dormitory, probably accounted for half the available floor space.
He checked three more rooms, each empty, before reaching the end of the corridor. Two had been quarters for officers, and he wondered which had belonged to the man who had executed Prager. The hall made a right-angle turn across the front of the building. He knelt and peered around the bottom edge of the wall. Two doors were open, and light flooded into the corridor. He could hear voices and radio static but could not tell from which room they came. Jan quickly retraced his steps to the end of the hall. There was another corridor, as he had expected, running across the rear of the building. Three doors led off to rooms on either side, and he realised the two on the left would lead to the canteen and dormitory. The single door to the right was locked. There wasn’t time to open it, and he hurried on to the end of the corridor, repeated the minute examination from a prone position, then checked two more unlocked and empty offices. Again he found one door locked and another leading to the dormitory.
Satisfied that the building was empty but for the room in front, he crouched at the junction of the corridors. Again he could hear the same voices and static. So that was it, he thought. It was like France or Norway all over again. He felt the sudden surge of exhilaration and, realising that it was little different from fear, almost laughed aloud at himself. Memling walked past the entrance - two sets of double glass doors beyond which he could see the sentry - and stopped beside the first doorway. A burst of static sounded and someone swore. Another voice demanded silence. Two at least, he thought, and how many more in the next room? The radio was in there, so he dared not use the hand-grenade.