No Dawn for Men (14 page)

“Transportation?”

“Yes. I have a colleague who has a garage on Hermann Goering Strasse. He’ll lend us a truck with no history.”

“We have to leave now, tonight.”

“I need an hour.”

“You’ll lose your job.”

“It’s time I joined the underground anyway.”

“Can you reach 007 to confirm?”

“Yes.”

“You can tell me about that scar on the ride to Deggendorf. Is there a special story, or was it just boring old shrapnel?”

“A story involving an American and a woman.”

“Good, it will help us pass the time.”

27.

The Schorfeide Forest

October 7, 1938, 11:30 p.m.

“What happened back there?” Professor Tolkien asked.

“Sleeping gas,” Korumak replied.

“Sleeping gas? That smoke?”

“Yes. It doesn’t last long. Five minutes at the most.”

“Who . . . ?”

“The dwarf servants.”

“What is sleeping gas?”

Korumak did not answer. He stared at Tolkien. “Your face is bleeding,” he said. “I’ll get you some water in a moment.”

“Why?” Tolkien asked. He put his fingers to his throbbing head, where he had bumped it against something very hard, and then along his cheek, which stung and was indeed bleeding.

“Goering was going to question us,” the dwarf replied, “then lock us up and notify Himmler. They overheard him.”

“Where are we?”

“In a mine,” replied Trygg Korumak. “Not far from Carinhall.”

“Why did you blindfold us?”

Once clear of Carinhall, the small group had gathered in the forest at the foot of a wooded hill to get their bearings. There, Korumak, in a husky whisper, had simply said, “Follow me. Do not speak.” Twenty minutes later, after clawing their way through a ten-foot-high high wall of dense brush, they had emerged in a small, moonlit valley on the opposite side of the same hill. Up and over and around what seemed like a dozen boulders, they went, until finally Trygg halted and handed Tolkien and Shroeder large cotton kerchiefs, saying sharply,
put these over your eyes.

“The entrance is secret,” the dwarf replied.

“I couldn’t find it again in a million years.”

“Perhaps. Then again, perhaps you could. We are all capable of much more than we realize.”

“How long will we stay?”

“An hour, no more.”

“Where are we going?”

“To meet with friends, water people.”

“Water people?”

“Yes, they will guide us to the Oder and then take us downriver to a place where we can cross back into Germany.”

“We’re walking?”

“Part of the way, yes, tonight and all day tomorrow.”

“And then where?”

“To Metten, to find the Devil’s Canyon.”

“The Devil’s Canyon?”

“Men call it that.”

“What men?”

Tolkien and Korumak were sitting cross-legged in front of a small fire in a circular cavern they had reached by a long series of steeply descending rough-hewn stone steps. At the beginning of the descent, Tolkien had struck his head on the ceiling of the tunnel. After that, he had crouched very low, gripping the back of Professor Shroeder’s coat with a strength he did not know he had. Along the cave’s perimeter were five stone platforms carved with precision out of the cave’s wall. On each was a thick straw mat covered by a wool blanket. Against the wall near the stairway stood a half dozen axes, their curved, mace-like blades shimmering in the firelight. From an arched opening to their right, the voices of Professor Shroeder and the two dwarfs who had lead them out of Goering’s hunting lodge and into the forest could be heard approaching. Tolkien heard the words
levasst-u-rukhas
, or rather sounds to that effect.
Ancient Norse?
he said to himself, and then,
no not at all like it. Then what?
Before he could ponder more, Korumak replied, “The men who discovered it.”

“You mean Professor’s Shroeder’s canyon, the ritual . . .”

“Yes.”

Tolkien remained silent. He had studied the dwarfs of Scandinavian legend extensively. They were, above all else, secretive. They had a language of their own, which they never spoke in the presence of men or other races, not even the gods, and which they rarely committed to paper or writing of any kind. Their dwarf names did not even appear on their gravestones. Great miners and metal workers, they were also fierce warriors, with the strength and endurance of three or four strong men. They were cunning and loved gold, and because he had portrayed them this way in
The Hobbit
, the managing partner at the publishing house he had visited yesterday had told him, smiling broadly, that he was seen to be simpatico with the Reich regarding the Jewish problem.
The Jewish Problem
.
Bloody Nazis
. Thank God he had refused to sign that vile “I am not a Jew” oath. He would write a proper letter of rebuke when he returned home. If he returned home.

“Are the two servants your countrymen?”

“Yes.”

“I am in their debt.”

“We all are.”

Before he could speak again, Shroeder and the Carinhall dwarfs entered the round cave laden with woven baskets and stone jugs filled with water. Tolkien looked upon them, particularly Shroeder, with something akin to shock. The German professor was dressed in brown woolen leggings and fur-covered boots that laced to just below his knees. On top he wore a tunic of the same dark color and material, and over this a hooded, dark green woolen cape that reached nearly to his feet. Leaning on his cane, the old German professor looked tired and pale, and sad somehow, as if he had just come to terms with an unhappy fate. His face bore the signs of scratches and bruises that had been cleansed but were still raw. Yet there was a presence to him, a light in his eyes that Tolkien had not seen before and indeed never expected to see in the mild-mannered old professor. Was he talking to the Carinhall dwarfs in their language?

The dwarfs had changed clothes as well, their servants’ livery exchanged for sleeveless leather tunics with silver buckles over woolen blouses and leggings. The metal hobs on their leather boots scraped on the stone floor. The woman handed baskets filled with similar clothing to Tolkien and Korumak.

“These are Dagna and Gylfi,” Korumak said. “Professor Tolkien.”

The dwarfs bowed deeply, but said nothing.

“Thank you,” Tolkien said. “For saving us, and for these,” indicating the baskets of what looked like warm and comfortable clothes. He noticed now that Dagna and Gylfi were the same fair coloring as Korumak, with the same thick auburn hair, the same hooked noses and deep-set piercing green eyes. Gylfi had braided his beard in two places, like Korumak wore his. If she had worn a beard, the Englishman would have taken Dagna, the woman, for a man.

“We’ll change in there,” Korumak said, nodding toward the anteroom, “and tend to your bruises.”

Before turning to leave, Tolkien noticed that the basket that Gylfi was carrying held what surely looked like loaves of bread, dark and round, and steaming hot.
How in the world?
he said to himself. But that, and other questions, many other questions, could wait. He was dirty, and bruised, and thirsty, and hungry, and drained of energy. Yet he had no doubt that all of that would very soon be remedied, that, though only three days ago he was lecturing at Oxford, this cave, and the path he was about to embark upon were where he should be, where God in his wisdom wanted him to be.

28.

Carinhall

October 8, 1938, 2:00 a.m.

“How was the flight, sergeant?” Hermann Goering said.

“Fine, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“Surprised to get such orders?”

“No, Generalfeldmarschall. We are always ready.”

“They have a two hour head start.”

“That will not be a problem, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“Do you know what you’re tracking?”

“I was told two men and three dwarfs—two male dwarfs and one female.”

“Correct. They may have gone in different directions.”

“I brought five hounds, Generalfeldmarschall, and five Schäferhunde.”

“Fighting animals?”

“Yes. The hounds are for tracking only.”

“You know I keep mountain lions here?” said Hermann Goering.

“Yes, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“Four altogether, all full grown. Two males and two females.”

“Yes, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“You say your hounds are top quality, pedigreed?”

“Yes, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“German hounds?”

“They are Flemish hounds, Herr Generalfeldmarschall.”

“Yes, the half-breed Flemish. They will be under our flag as well, soon enough. What are your hounds’ names?”

“Hildegarde, Trudy, Greta, Marlene and Marie.”

“All female?”

“Yes, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“You are an infantryman, I take it.”

“Yes, Generalfeldmarschall, regular Heer.”

“The Luftwaffe will win the war, not the Army, do you agree, sergeant?”

“Yes, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“Still, you have your uses.”

The sergeant, in a long, black, hooded leather coat, did not reply. He had not been asked a question. He and Goering were standing in Carinhall’s Belgium block courtyard. The light from the cast iron lanterns on either side of the lodge’s massive front door bathed their faces. On the grass that surrounded the lodge’s forty-foot-high flagpole in the center of the expansive courtyard, the five bloodhounds sat on their haunches, their eyes fixed on their trainer and lord and master, Army Sergeant Klaus Klein. Behind them, standing at ease near the truck they arrived in, were four more Army regulars, all in the same long, black, hooded leather coats as Klein. Each had a submachine gun slung over his shoulder. They were all well over six feet tall. The insignia on the arm patches was the stylized face of a German Shepherd baring its fangs. In the truck’s open bed the five German Shepherds were standing, looking over at Sergeant Klein.

“They seem quite ready,” Goering said, looking over at the shepherds.

“They know there is work to do,” Klein replied.

“Will they kill a man?”

“On my command, yes.”

“You know I want these escapees brought here alive?”

“Yes, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“I want no interference from any other service branches.”

“Yes, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“Am I quite clear?”

“Yes, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“Good. Now tell me, what do you need?” Goering asked.

“Articles of clothing would be best, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“Captain Drescher is in the kitchen, inside and down the hall to your right. We have plenty of clothing. They all left in a hurry.”

The sergeant remained silent.

“My mountain lions have eaten dogs, Sergeant,” said Goering. “They’ve developed a taste for them.”

Silence.

“You see what I’m driving at, don’t you? You are an intelligent man, a veteran non-commissioned officer of the German Wehrmacht.”

“Yes, Generalfeldmarschall.”

“Good. I know then that you will not fail.”

29.

Metten Abbey

October 8, 1938, 6:00 a.m.

“This part of the abbey was consecrated in 766,” Father Wilfrid, the abbot of Metten Abbey, said.

“I have been respectful, my good priest,” Kurt Bauer replied, “but my patience is not limitless. You insist on believing that I am interested in the history of your abbey. I am not.”

“There are no tunnels here,” said the priest, “as I have said. But it appears you do not believe me.”

Father Wilfrid, a man in his early sixties, sat at his desk in his very simple study-cum-office in Metten Abbey’s central tower. These words he had just spoken, and the ones last night, were, combined, far more than all those he had uttered in the last ten years. On the day he was chosen as abbot in 1928, he said mass in the abbey’s twelve-hundred-year-old chapel, gave communion to the community of monks and oblates who had selected him, then said a word of humble thanks to each of them. Since then his speech was limited to “good morning,” “good afternoon,” and “good evening,” to those few monks he encountered in his daily routine. Across from him in an upright wooden chair sat SS Lieutenant Kurt Bauer, his young, ruddy face clean-shaven, his blond hair combed and severely parted, his blue eyes pitiless. Though a dedicated monastic, Father Wilfrid was not unaware of the events transpiring in his country. This, he said to himself, is the face of the new Germany.