Mrs. Roosevelt's Confidante (8 page)

“Do—do you have any children?” von Bayer asked.

“I have a daughter, Elise Hess,” Clara replied. “And…” She stopped.

“And?”

“And another daughter, Margaret Hope. From a previous marriage.” She added, “To an Englishman.” She stood and went to the blackout curtain, pulling it aside to reveal oriel windows with small, diamond-shaped panes of leaded glass. Outside was darkness pierced by starlight. She left the curtain open. “A small act of defiance against our British ‘hosts,' ” she announced.

“Where are your daughters now?” von Bayer asked.

“They tell me Elise is in Ravensbrück.”

“I'm so sorry,” Kemp said. “But they do keep the German political prisoners separate from the Jews, you know. They have much better treatment.”

“I'm sure. And Margaret works for Churchill himself, if you can believe it. Such a disappointment, that girl. Both of them.” She sighed.

“We were just talking about what 1942 will bring for us,” Kemp told her. “Von Bayer here thinks that, now that the Americans have joined the war, it's the nail in our coffin. While I remain loyal and true to the Führer, as befits a Prussian. What's your stand, Frau Hess?”

“I think Germany will have a few surprises in store for the so-called Allies in 'forty-two.”

“So you've been saying.” Kemp narrowed his eyes. “I know that you were in with Goebbels and his crowd before you were captured—is there something specific you know?”

“Oh, I think you'll be quite surprised when you learn what the Führer has up his sleeve. You've heard whispers of his so-called mystery weapons? Wait until 'forty-two.” Clara sipped her drink. “Then the fun will really start.”

Kemp leered. “Can't you tell us anything else, Frau Hess? You keep hinting at something. And you
did
work with the Abwehr for years.”

“I'd love to tell you everything.” The blonde revealed small, pearly teeth. “But then I'd have to kill you.”

“Shit! What do you think she meant by that? ‘Mystery weapons'?” The microphones installed in Chatswell Hall's drawing room were excellent and could pick up everything, even the slightest whisper, which could then be heard distinctly up in the great house's attic.

When Chatswell Hall had been turned over to the British government, in 1940, and converted into a minimum-security prison, a staff of six was brought in to listen to the prisoners' conversations. Microphones had been concealed in lamp fittings, behind picture frames of gilt gesso, and in fireplaces, all over Chatswell Hall. MI-9's specially designed microphones reached everywhere. Nothing was out of range; even the trees were bugged. Conversations about the war were recorded, then transcribed, and then translated. The transcripts were stamped with
TOP SECRET
in red ink and sent on to Lord Cherwell and then, ultimately, to the Prime Minister.

Hidden away in the drafty, dusty attic of the Tudor mansion was the latest listening equipment. Under the sloped ceiling, the room looked like a telephone switchboard run riot. Making sense of the chaos were two young men—German refugees who'd escaped to Britain and were now specially trained as MI-9 monitoring officers. Both wore headphones, to listen in on the conversation in the drawing room below. Wavering yellow and blue needles measured the sound of the prisoners' voices.

“She's got nothing. Just trying to be dramatic—self-important bitch,” declared the first, a dark-haired young man with a German accent, as he adjusted his earphones. His eyebrows were black and shaggy, and his cheeks were pitted with acne scars.

“Did you record it?” asked the second, rubbing his hands together against the cold. He was built on thicker lines, with fair hair and a deep dimple in his chin.

“Of course I recorded it—although I don't think it means anything,” the first young man replied.

The second shook his head. “I think we should have it transcribed. Let's ask Captain Naumann.”

Lord Abernathy wasn't really named Abernathy. And he was no lord. He was Captain Walter Naumann, an upper-level officer of MI-9. He was at Chatswell Hall in the role of Lord Abernathy to gain the prisoners' trust. His persona had been deliberately created; his “character” Lord Abernathy was a part-German distant relation to the royal family, and a friend of the Duke of Windsor and his American wife, Wallis Simpson.

In reality, however, Naumann was from a working-class background, had a Jewish mother, and, at least before the war, had specialized in character roles in amateur West End productions.

“We need to ask Captain Naumann what?” The prisoners' dinner was being served, and since Lord Abernathy was no longer needed, Naumann had made his way up to the attic. He was a tall man in his sixties, painfully thin, with silvery hair.

“Hess said something about what Hitler ‘has up his sleeve' and ‘mystery weapons.' What do you think?”

Naumann chuckled, wrapping a knit scarf around his throat. “She's a diva, that one. I wouldn't want to bother Lord Cherwell prematurely—” He gave a final tug at his scarf. “But go ahead—send it along, just in case.”

“Yes, sir.”

Naumann looked down his long, aquiline nose. “Do let me know if she says anything else on the matter.”

When the older man left, the two with the headphones relaxed. The dark-haired young man, Arthur Chester, turned to his companion. “So what does your family think you do?”

The heavier, fair-haired Owen Rose chuckled. “They think I'm on patrol—security. What about yours?”

Arthur bit his lip. He had been born Teddy Schächter, a German Jew, and had escaped Germany before the war began. He'd Anglicized his name and joined the Pioneer Corps, serving in British army uniform. He was passionate about giving something back to Britain for saving his life. And also as retribution for what the Nazis had done to him and his family. “I left them in Berlin. I don't know where they are now. I imagine, if they're lucky, in a camp.” There was a moment of silence. Then he added, “Sometimes one of the English says, ‘Oh, how awful to fight your own people!' But they aren't my people anymore. They're the enemy.”

Despite his background, Arthur did his best to distance himself from the prisoners' anti-Semitism. He always tried to stay professional in his speech and bearing, so that even when he heard about atrocities on the Eastern Front, he was able to remain detached. As Naumann always said, “What you're doing in the M Room is more important to the war effort than if you drove a tank or fired a machine gun—don't forget that.”

Owen understood what Arthur was getting at. He had once been known as Heinz Rosenberg himself before changing his name and doing his best to lose his accent. “I'll get this conversation, including the Diva's mention of the so-called mystery weapons, transcribed and translated,” he said. “And then we can send it to London for Lord Cherwell to decide.” He chewed on his lower lip. “Wonder what they made of the last one we sent.”

“Gimme,” the Prime Minister ordered, seeing David pick up a folder that had been sent from London via the British Embassy in Washington.

David, used to the P.M.'s curtness, handed the page over. “Yes, sir.”

It was two in the morning. And while everyone else at the White House was asleep, or at least in bed, Winston Churchill was working in his map room cum office.

Churchill's blue eyes, threaded red with exhaustion from the dangerous trip, the President's Martinis, and now the late hour, scanned the lines from Duncan Sandys and Lord Cherwell, also known as Prof. “Another memo from Sandys, hmm? And another one from Prof.”

“Yes, sir. The reports we've been receiving about the prisoners held at Chatswell Hall in the last few days are vague. And the photographs of the possible rocket-making sites that are being developed at Danesfield House in Medmenham are inconclusive. In a nutshell, Duncan Sandys thinks attack by long-range rockets is a viable threat, and Lord Cherwell doesn't. Cherwell's been most outspoken on the matter.”

“Heh,”
Churchill snorted. “If you read between the lines, Prof is saying it's bunk.”

David permitted himself a small smile. “Yes, sir.”

The two men had worked together for years. David had believed in Churchill even during the so-called Wilderness Years, when Churchill had spoken out about Hitler's rearmament of Germany in the House of Commons and been laughed at and called names. They'd been together as he became First Lord of the Admiralty, then Prime Minister. They'd been through the Battle of Britain. They'd been through assassination attempts and kidnappings. They had developed shorthand for what was most important. And their gruff, professional interactions were underscored by genuine affection.

Churchill looked at David. “You've seen these reports?”

“I have, sir.”

“And what do
you
think about these alleged super-rockets, Mr. Greene?”

“I think the evidence Sandys cites looks credible. However, if we do as he suggests and bomb the hell out of the base at Peenemünde, we're taking away vital men and aircraft from defense.”

Churchill sank back in his chair and slurped scotch and soda from his crystal tumbler. “But if it's true and we do nothing—and then London and the ports come under heavy bombardment from these flying things, we'll have to abandon our ultimate plan to land in France next year.”

The P.M. blew smoke rings into the air and watched them melt away to nothing. “All right. I want Sandys to figure out if this rocket threat is indeed real. And—if so—what we must do to stop it. Let's make him Chairman of the—let's see—‘Defense Against Flying Bombs and Rockets.' Have him investigate this so-called super-weapon program.”

David reached over for a pad of paper and pen. “But isn't Sandys already Minister of Supply?”

Churchill grimaced. “He'll manage. We all do.”

“What do you want him to do specifically?” David's pen hovered over the pad.

“The first task is to gather all the evidence on this so-called super-rocket program he can, and then present it to the War Cabinet.”

“Yes, sir,” David said, writing as fast as he could.

“And, of course, Prof should be a part of it. We need him for balance.”

“Yes, sir.”

“When you write to Sandys, make it directly from me. And ask him how his legs are. Don't want to seem like a complete martinet.” Sandys had been wounded in action in Norway.

“Yes, sir,” David said, remembering that Sandys was also the P.M.'s son-in-law. “Mrs. Churchill would be most pleased, sir.”

“It's not enough I have to win this war. I need to keep my wife happy as well?” the P.M. growled.

“As we well know, it never hurts, sir.”

The P.M. took a swig of his whiskey and soda. “Quite right, young man. Quite right, indeed.”

A soldier walked the perimeter of the Peenemünde compound, high walls covered with barbed wire, his boots making crunching sounds on the frosty ground. An Alsatian barked in the distance. It was early morning, and the sun rose scarlet through the pines and oak trees. Beyond the forest lay marshes and sand dunes, and then the Baltic Sea itself. The air smelled of evergreen and sea salt. The soldier tensed, sensing movement in the brush, but it was only a squirrel. One of his fellows on patrol called to him, “They're here! They're here!” His breath made clouds in the icy air.

A sedan approached the last checkpoint, long, black, and sleek, red Nazi flags on the hood fluttering in the breeze, noxious yellow exhaust fumes trailing behind. It approached the main guardhouse, made of concrete, painted in camouflage, and swathed in barbed wire. The guards on duty were expecting this man.

“Welcome, Herr Todt,” the most senior officer said, clicking his heels together. He saluted. “Heil Hitler!” The senior officer knew exactly who Fritz Todt was and why he was there—Hitler's favorite architect and Minister of Armaments and War Production for the Third Reich. Todt was a handsome man, with a straight nose and a strong jaw that compensated for his thinning hair. He was there for inspection, and at stake was the future of the entire Nazi rocket program. If it were shut down, all the men, including the guards on duty, would be sent to the Eastern Front.

Todt handed over his papers. “Heil Hitler!”

“Heil Hitler!” the guard said, saluting once again.

The gates swung open as the dogs barked, their hot breath visible in the frigid dawn.

Werner von Braun was sitting at his desk when the call came through. “Herr Todt is here, sir,” his secretary announced. Her voice had an edge of panic to it. Everyone at the complex knew that all of the rockets had been crashing; they couldn't get off the launch pad without exploding, or they combusted in midair, or they veered, always to the right, to crash in the forest or the sea.

Von Braun's face was slick with perspiration. This was the day. He had everything to lose. “Thank you, Frau Meyer.”

On the credenza behind him were models of rockets, each painstakingly crafted, each larger than the next. Boy's toys for a boyish-looking man. Next to them were a framed portrait of Adolf Hitler and a small Bakelite clock, ticking loudly.

Von Braun had a smooth, wide face, thick chestnut hair on the long side and worn combed back, and a crackling energy. At the age of just nearly thirty, he was the world's top rocket scientist and the reason they all were here, on this remote island just off the coast of the Baltic Sea. There were no signs, of course, for security reasons, but his kingdom was the Peenemünde Research Center on the island of Usedom, Germany. The research had grown so much in the past years that a small town had been built to support all the workers and their families. In addition to the rocket and fuel-making areas, there was a village train, shops, even a social club.