Fox On The Rhine (37 page)

He could see the honest sympathy on the man’s face. “Certainly, Field Marshal. Sir--I’m pretty handy around a tool box, and I think I can whip up a few things that might make your life a little easier, if you’d like, sir.”

“Well, Feldwebel Clausen, I certainly would like. I’m in your capable hands,” replied Rommel, content with yet another command decision. This one, he thought, might turn out to be one of his best yet.

That night Carl-Heinz gathered his kit in the replacement barracks. Personal driver to the Desert Fox--my, wouldn’t Yetta and the kids be proud! Events had started, of course, when he had bumped into the photographer on the street late in the morning of this same day. Von Esebeck had recognized him immediately and had asked him about events in his life since that now-famous photograph. Apparently the baron had been to see Rommel later in the afternoon.

Carl-Heinz had been idle for the last few weeks, as useless as a piston without an engine block. Of course, here in Trier he had been able to visit Ulrich Pfeiffer in the hospital, and he had written Yetta every day--and, even more miraculous, received her replies in a timely fashion. Waiting for his new assignment, he had watched new tanks arrive, including the massive Tigers--which seemed like clumsy behemoths to Clausen--and more Panthers than he had imagined Germany’s factories could produce.

They were good tanks. He could remember his Panther rolling through the field full of burning Shermans, each marked with a white star in a crimson field he had later learned denoted them as one of Patton’s spearhead units. Fritzi and Pelz in the turret, loading and firing round after round, watching the surviving American tanks flee in disorder... destroying them one after another as they raced for the shelter of the woods overlooking Abbeville.

The shell that had struck their Panther had come from nowhere, seemingly--though that wasn’t possible, wasn’t even conceivable for a force that had struck them with such profound and irrevocable power. Concussion had knocked the big panzer across the ground, and somehow, in the thickness of smoke and fire, Carl-Heinz had thrown open the driver’s hatch and scrambled out. He remembered his shock as he looked back, realizing that the turret was completely gone. And with it had gone Fritzi and Pelz, two men who had lived and fought with Carl-Heinz for the last four years. Good men. Their loss saddened him

And then he had noticed the faint movement, the vibration of the radioman’s hatch. Pfeiffer, his chest torn by a shard of shrapnel, had pushed once, and then his strength had failed. Clausen had scrambled back onto the burning hull and torn the hatch back so hard that he had twisted a hinge. Ulrich was lying there, unconscious and covered in blood, and Carl-Heinz had somehow pulled him out and dragged him away before the Panther had been totally consumed by oily flame.

That evening he went to see Pfeiffer in the hospital, knowing that his new duties might put an end to these previously daily visits.

“Never mind about me,” Ulrich had said, his voice firming up despite the bandages that still encircled his chest. “I guess

I’m going to make it, one way or another. You know, I never thought I’d live through this war. I owe you my life, my friend.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Carl-Heinz replied, “You’d have probably gotten yourself out anyway. If it bothers you, buy me a beer when you get out of this place--before you go back home, you lucky bastard.”

The wounded man shook his head firmly. “Yeah, lucky, that’s me. But you... be careful, Carl-Heinz. There’s a lot of this war yet to be fought, and you’ve gotten yourself right back into the middle of it.”

“Don’t worry--I’ll be driving the Desert Fox around. And we all know he leads a charmed life!”

“I hope you’re right,” Ulrich said, his eyes shining with melancholy. “You’re too good a man to be killed.”

“You’re right about that,” Carl-Heinz laughed. “Or is it the other way around? Only the good die young, so you and I, we’re both safe as houses. Besides, I promised Yetta I’d come home; and if I don’t, she’ll kill me, you know.”

“Seriously,” Ulrich said. “Be careful.”

“I’m always careful,” replied Carl-Heinz with a toothy grin.

Broadcast House, Berlin, Germany, 22 September 1944, 2100 hours GMT

“This is Broadcast House, Berlin, interrupting our regularly scheduled program for a message from our führer.”

The announcer in the booth pointed a finger at Heinrich Himmler, who sat on a stool, his speech displayed before him on a music stand.

“Men and women of Germany,” he began. ‘Tonight I speak to you with a heavy heart, on a subject I had hoped to avoid. As you know, only a few short months ago, cowardly British spies assassinated our beloved führer, Adolf Hitler. Those responsible were arrested, given a fair trial, and subsequently executed.” He adjusted his glasses over his watery eyes, and continued.

“I speak to you today so you might hear my voice and know that I am unhurt and well, in spite of the fact that I have only just escaped harm at the hands of the remnants of that small gang of criminal elements.”

The elderly officer was alone, shuffling along the Wilhelmstrasse with the slight stoop of an old man, making his way on foot from the War Ministry to his apartment in the staff compound. He took no notice of the Mercedes that rumbled quietly along the street, then glided gently to the curb behind him.

“General!” Bücher stepped out of the car and spoke sharply, knowing that General Rowekamp would spin about indignantly.

When he did, Bücher shot him in the belly, and then again, in the throat. He stood over the man, watching him choke around his blood, straining for a last breath that would never come.

“You fancied yourself a leader, did you not?” he questioned the dying man. “Well, now it is your turn to lead many of your precious General Staff into death.”

Rowekamp was not yet dead when Bücher reentered the car and gestured to his SS driver to pull away from the curb and turn at the next comer. Behind the car, the dying general’s hand clutched at empty air, while in the backseat Bücher was already double-checking the next name on his list. He listened to the radio broadcast as the car drove on.

“It was clear at the time that the British assassins received aid from a small clique of ambitious, unscrupulous, criminal, and stupid officers, kin to those anonymous cowards who stabbed the German army in the back in 1918. Some of those officers were quickly identified and received the just and appropriate fate such treasonous activities so richly deserved.

“We knew there were others associated with that small clique, not directly involved in the assassination itself, but rather a few weak-minded, defeatist, envious second raters who were too incompetent to pose any threat to the German people and its leaders. Knowing full well that a thorough investigation would necessarily bring dishonor on the sterling reputation of our brave and gallant officers of the Wehrmacht, who have nothing in common with the black deeds of those small and stupid traitors, we elected to do nothing that might interfere with the war effort. We believed that these little ratlike cowards would scurry back into their holes and their incompetence would render them harmless.

“Tonight, unfortunately, we have discovered otherwise. Rats and cowards are not themselves dangerous, but when they become the tools and accomplices of enemy spies, they have the power to wreak untold harm. I have escaped, yes. But others have not been so fortunate.”

General Friedrich Fromm, head of the Replacement Army and von Stauffenberg’s commanding officer, was relieved that he had, so far, escaped any implication in the coup. As soon as he realized that the conspiracy was destined to fail, he had arrested all the plotters under his command and had them shot on his own initiative, then called on Himmler personally to pledge his loyalty. He knew that he could not escape all suspicion, since the assassin had been on his own senior staff, but he hoped by demonstrating his loyalty so aggressively, he could at least save his skin.

Tonight, he and several of his comrades, including Colonel General Erich Hoepner, were enjoying a rare evening out in a small biergarten located where one of the nastier Weimar cabarets once reigned. Still in a more-patriotic-than-thou move, he hoisted his stein and shouted, “To the führer!” for the fourth time that night. The crowd in the smoky bar cheered and drank with him.

Then the door suddenly burst open. Fromm looked up--British uniforms? That was his last thought before the commandos aimed their weapons, spraying his table with machine gun fire. He saw Hoepner go down before the bullets knocked him backward; his beer stein spilled over himself, and as his blood ran red on the sawdust floor the screams of the crowd echoed in his ears.

“An airdrop of British commandos landed in Berlin only two hours ago. They have all been killed by SS troops, but not before they managed to assassinate several German officers, including General Friedrich Fromm.”

The use of the British uniforms was a good touch, Bücher thought. Himmler had a good mind for this sort of thing. And with numerous witnesses, the story would spread all over Germany. The time discrepancy could be easily ignored with good media control.

“Even now, officers of the Gestapo are arresting the remaining collaborators. These criminals and traitors will be punished for their crimes in a manner to which we National Socialists are well accustomed.”

A knock came at the door of the home of the Berlin police president. Sleepily, the maid opened the door and three Gestapo officers pushed inside. “Wolf Heinrich von Helldorf?” they demanded.

“Up-upstairs,” stammered the maid, pointing toward the staircase.

Up the stairs rushed the agents, pushed open the bedroom door, and ran inside.

“Wh-what is it?” mumbled the sleeping woman. Then she woke, and screamed.

Her husband opened his eyes. “Yes?” he asked, thinking it was his own police officers.

“You are under arrest for treason, Police President,” the chief Gestapo officer said.

Von Helldorf took a deep sigh. His moment was here at last. He had hoped to live to fight another day, but that day would not come. “Just let me get my glasses,” he said, and reached toward the nightstand. Instead of glasses he produced a Luger, and shot one officer through the heart. Three bullets slammed into him a moment later and his wife screamed as she watched his blood pour out onto the carpet.

For a moment, the Gestapo second in command contemplated shooting the wife as well, but decided not to. She would spread the story, and hopefully in the process flush out still more traitors.

“Shortly, I will report to you on the final fate of all those who fail our Fatherland in its moment of greatest need. In the meantime, let me assure you that the Reich remains strong, our soldiers valiant, our will unbreakable, and our destiny certain. With our enemy to the east having sued for peace, our enemy in the west will shortly be destroyed under the brilliant leadership of the German military, the finest the world has ever known. And our place in the sun will be forever secure.

“Thank you and good night.”

Army Group B Headquarters, Trier, Germany, 23 September 1944, 0500 hours GMT

Carl-Heinz Clausen ignored politics, for the most part. People, in his opinion, made things unnecessarily complex, and he had trouble understanding why people would behave so badly when it was obviously unnecessary. Machinery he understood, systems he understood, so he confined himself to his job while all about him people buzzed about the Himmler speech and its aftermath. He couldn’t avoid hearing all the rumors--Wehrmacht officers shot by the SS, another Nazi purge like the infamous “Night of the Long Knives.” This person had been arrested, that person had been killed, this person was in the conspiracy, that person was not a conspirator, the British were behind it, the Americans were behind it, high party officials were behind it--how could anyone keep it straight?

There were rumors that Field Marshal Rommel himself had been incriminated, but that made no sense whatsoever. Still, Carl-Heinz had learned that many things involving politics made no sense whatsoever, so he kept a special eye out for his new commander.

He’d quickly grown into his role of driver, batman, protector, and even--Rommel joked--mother hen. It was obvious that the Desert Fox still hurt from his injuries, and that he was determined to overcome his pain and his limitations. That part Carl-Heinz understood, and he quickly assumed the role of valet and personal trainer in addition to official driver. He was the only person present when Rommel woke in the morning from a fitful night of pained sleep, having once again refused the pain medication the doctors had prescribed. Rommel would then get down on the floor for a rigorous set of push-ups and sit-ups that sent his body into spasms of agony, the sweat pouring down his face and chest, forcing himself to grow strong again, pushing himself past any human limits. Carl-Heinz was the only person other than the doctors who saw the still-red scars, the terrible evidence of his injuries. His rough, thick fingered hands, stained with grease, clenched in sympathetic pain, but Carl-Heinz understood the process of mending machinery, and knelt beside the field marshal to provide support.

Carl-Heinz spent his off-time scrounging materials to help his commander become more comfortable. He built a special chair to take the pressure off sensitive points, allowing Rommel to work more hours with greater comfort, he built a harness for the field telephone to keep the pressure off the field marshal’s face, and constructed a sculpted and specially supported mattress to ease the pressures of sleeping. He did the same sorts of things for Pfeiffer in the hospital; he made no important distinction between the two men. He could help, therefore he did help.

The official duties of his job were few at the beginning. Rommel was primarily involved in affairs of headquarters, and needed little driving. But Carl-Heinz showed up early each morning before the Desert Fox awoke, got him ready for his day, then went to see Pfeiffer in the hospital, then spent the afternoon building his latest inspirations. A few hours off late in the day, then another visit to Pfeiffer and then to help the Desert Fox into bed for the few hours of sleep the man permitted himself.