The two OSS agents made it to the Austrian-German border after midnight. There to meet them and take them into Germany was a tall, husky army officer, with a flashlight in his hand and a long cigar in his mouth. Crowded around him was a seasoned detachment of twenty-five gun-toting young men, their uniforms worn from battle.
“Welcome to Germany. I’m Colonel Burns. 324th Infantry Regiment, 44th U.S. Infantry Division. You must be Hollinger and McCreedy.”
“We are,” Hollinger answered.
“You got ID?”
“Yes, sir,” Hollinger said, flashing his OSS identification the same time McCreedy did.
Burns shone the flashlight at the cards, and seemed convinced. “You can’t go anywhere dressed like that.” The colonel looked over his shoulder at a junior officer. “Parker?”
A lieutenant stepped forward. “Yes, sir.”
“Get these men some army gear and pistols. And find some kit bags for their civvies.”
“Yes, sir, colonel.”
“You men do know how to handle hardware, do you?”
“Yes, we do,” McCreedy answered.
Burns smiled at Hollinger. “By the way, where do you get your suit? I haven’t seen one like that since I left the States.”
“Custom-made in England.”
“Nice tie.”
“Thanks.”
“Kind of bright, though. OK, the situation. Over here.” Burns spread out a map on the fender of a jeep. “Help me out with another flashlight, Parker.” Under two lights, Burns explained: “We’re here. Mittenwald. Last we heard, the scientists were at Oberammergau. There. Twenty miles.”
“A set of army barracks, right?”
“That’s right, Mr. Hollinger. Guarded by SS troops.”
“Do we expect trouble?”
Burns shrugged. “It’s possible, even though it’s now confirmed that Hitler is deader than a hammer. Either they’ll give up or fight to the end for the Fuehrer. Who knows? But we’re prepared for anything.”
Hollinger glanced around. “It seems you are.”
“If we need any more men, we’ll get them,” Burns assured the OSS agents.
Himmler took the dispatch delivered to him by courier from the office of Admiral Doenitz. Himmler read it, then crumpled it in his hand. Dammit. He was dismissed forthwith from all his posts. He removed his glasses and rubbed his sore eyes. Lately, he was prone to stomach cramps, headaches, and terrible dreams. Today was no exception. He stood, slowly, his forty-five-year-old body aching him with every move.
He strode to the washroom aboard his train and lathered his moustache before the mirror. Through the window, he saw his adjutant and two male secretaries throwing files in the bonfire, the flames shooting eight feet high into the afternoon sky. After all these years, this is what it had come to. Destroy everything. Himmler knew that all German forces had more than likely pledged allegiance to Doenitz. The deposed SS and Gestapo chief didn’t stand a chance now. Without power, and without any verbal contact with the SS guards in Bavaria, his collateral was gone. Never mind the scientists, anyway. Himmler figured that the guards had probably deserted their posts as soon as they heard Hitler was dead. That meant no peace terms with Eisenhower or Montgomery looming on the horizon.
When Himmler emerged from the washroom, his face was clean-shaven, and he had two vials of instant-acting cyanide in the trouser pocket of his civilian clothing. He found the file incriminating Martin Bormann as Hitler’s messenger of mass murder, and took the sheets out. He walked outside, threw his diary into the fire, then stopped in front of Ludwig Hahn to shake his hand. He only glanced approvingly at the other men. Himmler walked to his limousine, door open, his driver waiting. His subordinates were left to fend for themselves.
“Switzerland,” Himmler said in a trance to his driver, as he stuffed the sheets incriminating Bormann inside his shirt.
Martin Bormann was not in the mood to celebrate his forty-fifth birthday. He was the last of the Nazi high command left in the Fuehrerbunker. Only two army generals and some officers remained below. An hour before in the pot-holed Chancellery garden, Goebbels had shot himself, and his wife, Magda, had swallowed poison, their six children already dead from the same batch of lethal cyanide. Like Hitler and Eva, their bodies too were doused with petrol and set aflame. No longer interested in living, the last thing Dr. Goebbels wanted for his family was to be brought up in a non-National Socialist Germany.
Bormann had other plans for his hide. He had a distinct advantage over the other Nazi brass. Hardly photographed throughout his rise to power on Hitler’s coattails, neither the Russians nor most Germans could identify him on sight, especially now in civilian clothing.
He and Else Krueger walked up the stairs hand-in-hand to the bunker entrance. On the surface, machine guns rattled and heavy artillery pounded in the night. He stamped out his cigarette on the top stair. The Fuehrer had hated smoking in the bunker. Bormann had already said his goodbyes to his other secretaries, the ones he had fondled at work or slept with over the years. Bormann stopped Else at the second step, and said with passion, “Goodbye, Else. Good luck. Women will not be safe out there.” He kissed her hand with intent. “I always, and I mean always, had the greatest amount of respect for you.”
They hugged.
She managed a weak smile. “Goodbye, Martin. Happy birthday.”
It was the first time they had used each other’s first names.
“Thank you. Too bad there’s no time to celebrate. Be brave.” He gave her a loaded Luger, and in a soft voice said, “Don’t worry, I have another. Use it, if you have to.”
Bormann left first.
As soon as he stepped through the unguarded entrance, he was fired at by a sniper. The bullets pinged off the concrete. He could not tell where the shots were coming from. Bormann ducked off to the right, and dove for a pile of rubble a few feet away. He saw Else leaving, her shadowy figure keeping down, running in the opposite direction, even more bullets pinging at her. Obviously, the Russians were monitoring the bunker. Bormann backed up, squatted down, and ran through the water-puddled Chancellery garden, past the bodies of Dr. Goebbels, Magda, Eva, and Hitler, to the street beyond the crumbled walls, the flames of the still-burning Goebbels family lighting the way. He stopped behind a pile of bricks in front of the subway station, and bent over to catch his breath. There was no electricity in Berlin, but several large fires brightened the sky. He knew this was going to be tough. It would require a lot of luck and a good lot of running to escape the city through the Russian lines. He should have kept in better shape. Maybe some of Hitler’s chocolates would fire him up. Bormann chuckled to himself at that thought. What a time to think of chocolates.
He slowly entered the subway station. This was his only escape on such short notice. He would crawl through the many tunnels, then, once outside, he would walk along the tracks until he reached the Friedrichstrasse Station, a few hundred yards away, where the only German fighting men left were still holding off the Russian onslaught. They were the three-thousand strong Battle Group Mohnke, a rag-tag outfit of sailors, paratroopers, Hitler Youths, and SS men. A few hundred yards from the station stood the Weidendammer Bridge over the Spree River, and a possible escape through Berlin’s north-western suburbs.
Bormann withdrew his Luger from his leather overcoat. Holding it waist high, he stepped forward into uncertainty.
Some birthday.