Eva (24 page)

Woody handed the report to Major Hall. “Man,” he whispered. “What a mess. What a God-forsaken mess.”

On his way back to town the harrowing images conjured up by the report would not leave his mind. But there was something else. Something that nagged at the edges of his memory. Something he had read in that gruesome Russian autopsy report. Something he had been too shaken to recognize.

What?

He willed himself not to dwell on it. He knew that if he tried to force the memory to the surface it would resist and remain submerged. He had to let his conscious mind ignore it, and it might suddenly pop up.

He was nearing the railroad tracks. He wondered how long it would take to make repairs.

He stomped on the brakes.

The jeep skidded to a halt.

Repairs! That was it!

He knew what had been bothering him.

Quickly he turned the jeep around and barreled down the road—back to Corps CP.

He ran up the stairs to the CIC office, two steps at a time. He knew he had a case. A real case. A damned glamor case.

A five-pointer for sure!

The adrenalin that shot through his body and the familiar surge of exhilaration told him that.

He burst into Hall’s office. “Mort,” he cried, “let me see that autopsy report again.”

Major Hall looked at him in startled surprise. No can do, Woody,” he said. “Streeter has it already.”

“Never mind,” Woody snapped. He strode up to Hall’s desk, obviously agitated. “I remember it.” He stared at his CO. “Mort,” he said emphatically, “that damned report has a hole in it big enough to drive a 2½
-ton
truck through!”

“What the hell are you talking about?” Hall asked.

“Document No. 13,” Woody said. “The autopsy report on Eva Braun. Or rather Eva Braun Hitler. The Russians claim they identified her positively through a special dental bridge. Right?”

He looked searchingly at Hall.

Hall nodded. “So?”

“So, that damned bridge they’re talking about wasn’t in Eva’s mouth when she died and when she was burned! It was never fitted! It was lying in some dental lab somewhere else in Berlin. That dentist I caught. In Albersdorf. Remember? He was running off at the mouth about Eva Braun and he definitely said so. So how the hell could the Russians use that damned bridge as positive identification?”

“Go on.”

“Don’t you see, Mort? It wasn’t Eva Braun who was burned with Hitler. It couldn’t have been. It was someone else. A—a substitute. Anyone.”

“It could have been Eva—without her teeth.”

“Okay. Sure. But that is not
certain.
There
is
no positive identification of her body, as the Russians say. The only thing that’s positive is that the Russians are monkeying around with the identification of Eva.
That’s
certain, dammit! Based on the forensic evidence in their autopsy report there is absolutely no basis to claim they found Eva Braun’s body. Nothing. Except that damned bridge. And that’s turned out to be a crock.”

“So?”

“The Russians are lying, Mort. They want us to believe it
was
Eva Braun. Hitler’s wife. But that damned dental bridge they used to identify her wasn’t anywhere near the body when it burned. They must have planted it there
after
they found the body. If they found it at all! They’re pulling something, Mort. What? Why? Ask yourself why? What the hell gives? And if the Russians aren’t trying to pull a fast one the damned Nazis are! And I sure as hell would like to know
their
reason!”

Hall frowned. “It’s possible your dentist informant gave you a bum steer,” he suggested.

“Possible, but I do not buy it,” Woody countered firmly. “Not by a long shot. I am convinced—totally convinced—that dentist gave me the straight poop.”

He looked earnestly at Hall.

“I’m right, Mort,” he said with quiet conviction. “I feel it in my guts. Eva Braun did
not
die in the Bunker. It was not
her
body that was burned with Hitler’s.”

“So, what if it wasn’t Eva’s body?”

“Okay,” Woody said. “What if it wasn’t Hitler’s either?”

Hall stared at him.

“Look, Mort,” Woody said earnestly, “if the Russians lied about Eva, Hitler’s wife, being dead, they might also lie about Hitler himself. Suppose she
is
alive. Suppose
be
is too. Shouldn’t we know? And why the hell the masquerade, anyway?”

Hall contemplated the young agent. It was some can of worms he’d just opened. “I think you’d better have another talk with that dentist of yours,” he said grimly. “I’ll arrange it. Right now. AIC is still in Erlangen. “I’ll give them a call. Tell them you’ll be there in . . .”He looked up at Woody. “What is it? Seventy-five miles?” Woody nodded. “I’ll tell them you’ll be there within two hours.”

He quickly consulted a directory. He made the call and was connected.

“This is Major Hall, Commanding Officer of CIC Detachment 212,” he said on the phone. “We sent AIC a PW, one . . .” He looked at Woody.

“
SS Sturmbannführer
Franz Gotthelf,” Woody prompted.

“
SS Sturmbannführer
Franz Gotthelf. That’s correct, a major.

We need to know to which detention camp he was shipped. That’s correct, we want a follow-up interrogation. Okay, I’ll hold.”

He looked at Woody. “They’re looking up their records.” He listened. “Just a minute.”

He turned to Woody. “When did we forward him?”

Woody frowned. “Shit!” he said. He thought. “Late April,” he said. “Just about a month ago.”

“Somewhere around April 30,” Hall said. “I’ll hold.” He waited. Again he listened. He frowned. He looked up at Woody. “Who?” he asked. He looked startled. “Thank you.” He hung up.

“They don’t have him,” he said slowly. “He was turned over to the Russians shortly after we sent him down. Proper requisition orders and all that crap.” He looked soberly at Woody. “And here’s the kicker. The transfer was requested by Krasnov!”

Woody gaped at him. “Major Krasnov? Vasily Krasnov? Our resident Ivan? The Russian Liaison Officer to Corps? What the hell for?”

“Beats me.”

“Where’s his office? I want to see him. Right now.”

“Building II, third floor.”

Woody was halfway out of the door.

Major Vasily Stepanovich Krasnov, 2nd Ukranian Front, Special Occupation Liaison Officer to US Army, XII Corps, smiled at Woody, a speculative smile without warmth that didn’t reach his water-blue eyes above his high, rosy cheekbones.

“Yes,” he said. “Your CIC Major Hall just called to tell me you would be over, Comrade Ward. What do you wish with me?”

“I need some information, Major,” Woody said. “I need to know the disposition and the whereabouts of a certain subject, a German, one
SS Sturmbannführer
Franz Gotthelf, whom you requested be turned over to your people by AIC about a month ago. A dentist.”

Krasnov frowned in puzzlement. He gazed at Woody, his eyes guileless.

“What—dentist?” he asked.

I
T WAS THREE DAYS LATER
when Woody left his jeep at the Dismount Point near Building No. 1 at XII Corps CP. He was still seething, and visiting Corps CP again brought up his rancor, bitter in his craw. That red bastard Krasnov had brazenly lied in his teeth, and had obviously enjoyed doing so. He had categorically denied ever having heard of a German dentist named Gotthelf—or anything else for that matter—or ever having requested his transfer to Russian authorities. In fact, he doubted the man even existed. And this despite the records at Army Interrogation Center and CIC Detachment 212’s own reports which clearly showed the Russian liaison officer to be a damned liar! So much for “liaison” with the Soviets. Woody had been unable to get anywhere in his quest.

It had convinced him that something—whatever the hell it was— something was being covered up, and his own familiar feeling of taut alertness in turn convinced him that he was on to something big. He had refused to quit. Despite—or more likely because of—Krasnov’s duplicity, Woody was determined to pursue the matter of Eva Braun. It was on her he had concrete evidence. It was on her he might be able to build a case. And it was on the outcome of that case the question of Hitler, himself, would hinge.

He had sent out queries to all the CIC units covering the area west of Berlin—especially to units of the Ninth Army directly to the north. If Eva was still alive she would have fled Berlin, he reasoned. Of course, there was no guarantee that she had gone west, but it was odds on she had. No Kraut voluntarily fled into Russian-occupied territory.

He’d had a helluva time wording his query so it didn’t come out pure gobbledygook. He didn’t have the foggiest idea what Eva looked like—and no one else seemed to know—so he could give no description of her. Anyway, he hadn’t wanted to be that specific. Not yet. So he had requested information about a young woman, using any name, exact age unknown, who had fled Berlin on or immediately after April 30, whose papers were either flawless or nonexistent—depending upon the circumstances of her flight, he thought—and who was in need of major dental work. A bridge. He had debated with himself whether or not to include that last bit. He anticipated the hubba-hubba ribbing he’d get. It would be of value only with regard to subjects interrogated
after
the query had been received. Who the hell would have said, “Open wide, please,” during the course of a normal interrogation? In the end he had decided to leave it in. It was, after all, the only real clue he had. But he had also realized that there would be thousands of young women fitting his description.

Already he’d had several responses—some more or less tongue-in-cheek, most of them easily dismissed. He had spent most of his waking hours for three days poring over the others without finding anything that seemed worthwhile pursuing. He had actually questioned half a dozen young women—one of whom turned out to be an
SS Feldmatratze
(an SS Field Mattress), a whore who’d had her teeth knocked out by a drunken client. She’d offered her favors free to anyone who’d get them fixed.

He hadn’t expected to jump into the crapper and come up smelling like a daffodil, but he was beginning to think the inquiry had been a futile effort, the whole damned search a lost cause—even with the hundreds of investigators he must have reached, and the thousands of subjects examined by them.

And now this latest one. Not really what he’d expected. Not a direct lead. But he knew the agent who’d called him about it and he knew the guy was on the level. So, next stop—Corps CP.

Major Hall looked up when Woody entered his office. “What’s so all-fired important that you have to see me at once?” he asked. “You don’t usually ask anyone anything.”

Woody plunked himself down in a chair. He looked straight at his commanding officer. “I want a three-day R&R pass, Mort. Starting right now.”

Hall snorted. “I could use a few months in Miami myself,” he said drily. “Nothing doing.”

“At least listen to my reason.”

“Shoot.” Hall leaned back in his chair with exaggerated patience.

“It’s about the Eva Braun thing,” Woody began.

“I thought it might be,” Hall commented caustically. Woody ignored his sarcasm.

“I think I may have a pretty damned good lead,” he said. “This guy at VII Corps CIC, in Halle, up north, Ninth Army territory, he called me about an elderly couple picked up on a curfew violation. Turned out they had no place to stay. They said they were refugees from Potsdam. They said they left there on May 1.”

“Adolf and Eva, I presume,” Hall remarked, straight-faced.

“Oh, shit, Mort, I’m serious,” Woody snapped. He realized he was being too testy. The damned case was apparently becoming too much of an obsession with him. He’d have to watch it. He grinned disarmingly.

“Actually they said their names were Konrad and Helga Bock,” he said. “This guy I know at VII Corps CIC—we went through basic together—well, he kind of put them through the wringer. That old hunch, you know. It turned out they’d been involved in a scheme to exfiltrate big-shot Nazis before we could nab them.” He looked at Hall. “You’ve heard the rumors about those escape routes.”

Hall nodded.

“Well, the last couple of escapees who came to them were sent on their way just before the Russians overran the place. And, get this, Mort, those two escapees were a young man—an SS officer—and a young woman. The
only
woman they processed. A woman they’d had orders to give priority, triple A, super-duper treatment to!” He looked earnestly at his CO. “Mort, I’ve
got
to talk to that Potsdam couple. How about it?”

Hall shook his head. “How the hell can I justify an R&R pass for you?”

“How the hell can you not?” Woody countered. “You wouldn’t want to go down in history as ‘For-want-of-a-nail-Hall’—or rather ‘For-want-of-a-three-day-pass-Hall,’ would you? The man who bungled the biggest damned case CIC Detachment 212 ever had?”

Hall looked at him skeptically. “Why do I get the feeling I’m being conned?” he asked.