The Rules in Rome (30 page)

When the bodies had been
collected and his latest catch brought to the Via Tasso, Zimmerman went with the new interrogator to visit the injured Gappisti. The man was obviously in pain from Möller’s bullet and the nails, and Zimmerman could almost smell the fear.

“I want your real name, and I want the name you go by with your partisan friends. Then I want to know who supplied you with the nails and who supplied your friend with that map. And I want to know all your other contacts.”

The skinny Gappisti didn’t answer, and Zimmerman would have been surprised if he had right away. Ostheim’s replacement, Untersturmführer Koch, hadn’t started working on him yet.

“I’ll be back later, and you can tell me then.”

Three days later, the Gappisti still hadn’t given anything away, but the Allied Armies were getting closer. Zimmerman had no choice but to go through his files and either pack or burn them. He didn’t want anything useful to fall into Allied hands if he had to leave. And he would have to leave—soon. It was May thirtieth. Zimmerman wasn’t sure he’d be in Rome when June arrived.

While going through his paperwork, he came across his report on the prison escape the night Ostheim was killed. He flipped through it, and a question that had nagged him then returned, stronger than before.
What was Dietrich doing in the prison that night?
Ostheim would have found out. Ostheim had wanted to look at Dietrich’s files after the curfew party. It had seemed petty at the time, but if army headquarters was anything like Gestapo headquarters, no one would miss one little file amid the packing and burning.

An hour later, Zimmerman returned to his desk, Dietrich’s folder in hand. Remembering Dietrich’s Iron Cross, Zimmerman searched the file. Dietrich had done something impressive before, and Zimmerman wanted to know what it was. He skimmed through Dietrich’s military career until he found the citation. The Soviets had overrun the German lines, including a group of engineers. Dietrich had climbed on a T-34 tank, dropped a grenade through its turret, and single-handedly killed its entire crew. Then he’d machine-gunned down two squads of Soviet infantry.

Zimmerman put the file down, searching his memory. At the curfew party, Dietrich had said he owed his Iron Cross to his men, but according to the write-up, he’d acted alone.

Zimmerman found more papers—and the answer to a question Ostheim had asked months ago. The SD investigator who’d come to Rome in February had been following up on Dietrich’s erratic behavior during his recovery in Berlin. While serving on the Eastern Front, Dietrich and his men had been involved in the severe mistreatment of Soviet civilians. Cruelty to Russian peasants wasn’t worthy of an SD investigation, but bragging about
his exploits in the presence of Swiss diplomats had been sufficient reason for someone to make sure Dietrich was being more discreet in Rome.

The next page was a letter dated in early March from an Untersturmführer Fritz Meyer complaining that Dietrich had interrupted his men at a train station in Lombardy, intervening on behalf of an Italian woman handing out potatoes to a train loaded with Italian prisoners.

Atrocities for Soviet civilians and mercy for Italian ones?
It was possible but seemed strange. Zimmerman dug through his desk drawer, past postcards
he’d been meaning to send his son, past the picture of his family. He finally found a blank piece of paper and began a list.

Iron Cross citation

Meyer’s letter and the SD report

Zimmerman thought a while longer, then added two additional lines.

Unexplained presence in prison during jail break

Knew of planned raid on San Lorenzo church

Something was off about Dietrich. Zimmerman wondered why he hadn’t connected the dots before. He folded the paper and stuck it in his pocket, then went to find more information. Scholz and an aide were in his office, digging through paperwork.

“Sir?”

Scholz looked up. “Yes, what is it?”

“Could I look at some of your reports? The ones on all the engineering projects?”

“Take whatever you like. Destroy them when you’re finished.” Scholz motioned for his aide to find the relevant files, and Zimmerman walked back to his desk with a six-inch stack of reports. He spent the next hour shifting through them. By the time he was finished, he had another line on his list.

Highest percentage of damaged projects of all engineers

Zimmerman wasn’t sure that counted as a reason for suspicion. Surely Allied airplanes didn’t know whose projects they were bombing, and other engineers had percentages nearly as high—Heinie Vogel, for example.

“Sir?” Koch stood before his desk. Zimmerman had been so absorbed in his thoughts that he hadn’t heard the new interrogator approach.

“Yes, what is it?”

“The Gappisti you arrested last Friday. He’s finally talking.”

Zimmerman motioned for Koch to sit down.

“Born Antonio Russo. Goes by Angelo among the other Gappisti. And he told me all about his friends.”

Koch handed over his notes, and Zimmerman glanced through the list, his eyes stopping on the second name: Concetta. He read the description:
Italian, five feet eight inches high, long black hair, birthmark on her right cheek. Operates a radio.
It even described where she lived.

“He’s supposed to meet the female contact just before curfew tonight,” Koch said.

“Keep him talking. See what else he knows.” Zimmerman checked his watch. “And leave word at the front entrance for Möller to see me as soon as he arrives.”

Koch left, and Zimmerman searched until he found a copy of Richter’s report on the wireless operator he’d tried so hard to capture. Sure enough, the transmissions tapered off the day Dietrich was shot in the Via Tasso prison. They began again when he went back to work. Zimmerman remembered Neroli’s description of the two women who’d thwarted his San Lorenzo roundup.
One looked like she was expecting a baby; the other one had dirt or something on her cheek.
It hadn’t been dirt; it was a birthmark.

Zimmerman’s list was growing, but it still wasn’t watertight. Had Concetta been using Dietrich, or was he part of the plot? Recalling how distracted Scholz had been with preparations to withdraw from Rome, Zimmerman thought he had better know for certain before he accused Dietrich of anything. At the very least, he should arrest Concetta and the rest of Angelo’s
contacts. But he didn’t have much time—he needed to know at once, before he was forced from Rome.

Zimmerman stared at his list, formulating a plan that would prove where Dietrich’s loyalties lay. He walked beyond Scholz’s office and found who he was looking for. “Obersturmführer Vogel, may I have a minute?”

Whenever someone knocked on his
door, Bastien found himself wishing it was Gracie and hoping it wasn’t the Gestapo. This evening, Heinie stood outside his room.

“Adalard, are you busy?”

Bastien wasn’t, not until late that night when he was supposed to help Gracie with her transmission. He had a long report for her, full of information on retreat routes and reinforcements. “No, come in.”

Heinie came inside but didn’t take the offered seat. “I was at the Via Tasso today. Zimmerman’s been looking for a wireless operator, been obsessed with it the last few weeks.”

“I’d heard,” Bastien said, thinking of Gracie’s narrow escape.

“He caught someone. A Gappisti who’s been passing reports to the wireless operator. And the Gappisti told Zimmerman who he’s been
working with.” Heinie looked at the carpet as if he didn’t want to continue.

“And?”

“It’s Concetta.”

“What?”

Heinie looked up, his face pained. “I’m sorry to be the one to tell you, Adalard.”

Bastien grabbed his holster belt and strapped on his pistol and knife. “Have they arrested her yet?” If he could warn Gracie before Zimmerman found her, they could both leave at once. The front line wasn’t too far way. He’d take his report directly there.

Heinie put a hand on Bastien’s shoulder. “She’s gone, Adalard. You can’t do anything for her now. And it gets worse. Zimmerman studied that old report I wrote for Scholz—the one about air raid damage on engineering projects. Everything you’ve touched has been bombed. She used you, Adalard. She got information from you and gave it to the enemy. I thought I should warn you . . . because I don’t know what the SS is going to think. You might want to come up with a good explanation for telling your mistress all about your job.”

Bastien stood there, unable to move. “You know what they do to prisoners in the Via Tasso?”

Heinie sighed. “Yes. Maybe she escaped. I shouldn’t say it, shouldn’t even think it, but I hope she did.”

“When did Zimmerman leave?”

“Adalard, you have to let her go.”

“But I . . .” Bastien let his thought trail off. He had to play his role a while longer.

“You really loved her, didn’t you?”

Bastien had never admitted it to himself, but he nodded at Heinie’s question. He did love Gracie, more than he’d ever loved anyone.

Heinie walked over to the wet bar. “I’ve only gotten drunk once before in my entire life, but I think tonight might be a good time to try it again.” He poured a drink and set it on the table by Bastien. “I know you don’t normally drink, but you should make an exception tonight. Maybe she got away. Or maybe she’ll cooperate, and there won’t be any reason to torture her.”

The Gracie Bastien had brought to Rome in February might have crumpled in a Gestapo interrogation, but after three months in the field, he knew she wouldn’t say anything, not anytime soon. “I’ve got to see if there’s something I can do.”

“Don’t be stupid, Adalard. If you interfere, you might end up in the cell next to her.”

I might end up in the cell next to her anyway
. Bastien grabbed his boots and slid his feet inside.

Heinie was quiet for a while, for too long. When Bastien looked over at him, his left hand held Bastien’s broken radio crystal. Bastien had hidden it in a teacup in the cupboard when he’d given the rest of the radio to Gracie. Heinie’s right hand held his pistol, and it was pointed at Bastien.

“You haven’t been sleeping with her; you’ve been working with her,” Heinie said.

Bastien didn’t reply. He was tempted to grab his own pistol, but Heinie might fire if Bastien reached for his weapon, and he wasn’t sure he could shoot Heinie.

“And she wasn’t using you; you’ve been using me! Zimmerman said that other than you, my projects had the highest percent of bombing damage. I
suppose you were the one telling the Allies all about my work?”

Bastien still didn’t say anything.

“Why would you betray the fatherland?” Heinie whispered.

“Our fatherland was hijacked by the Nazi Party, Heinie. They’ve corrupted Germany, and they’re destroying Europe.”

“Are you confessing to
treason
?” When Bastien stayed silent, Heinie set his jaw and lifted his pistol higher. “Why?”

Bastien spoke, not because Heinie was aiming a pistol at him but because Heinie was his friend, and despite his uniform, he was a good man. Silence might be the wiser course, but he wanted Heinie to understand. “The Nazis murdered my father at Sachsenhausen in 1936. His only crime
was disagreeing with them and writing it down with a convincing pen.”

“Zimmerman had your file on his desk. It said your father died when you were ten.”

Bastien took a miniscule step toward the door.

“You aren’t Adalard, are you?” Heinie’s mouth opened in a gasp of surprise, and his right arm relaxed slightly. “Of course you’re not. And Concetta . . . Her real name is Gracie, isn’t it? What you called her when you were sick . . . Who are you working for?”

“My new country.”

Heinie’s arm tensed again. “I think I deserve a better explanation than that.”

Bastien swallowed and shifted closer to the door. Everyone despised a traitor, but Heinie might respect an enemy, even one who’d been playing a role. “After the Nazis killed my father, I took my family to America. I joined the US Army, and when I came across Adalard’s body and saw a chance to shorten the war, I took it.”

“Of all the despicable things—”

“Heinie, you know the Nazis are evil. They’re controlling your life, telling you who you can and can’t marry. You saw the bodies in the Ardeatina Caves. You know it was murder. What do you think will happen to you and your family if the Nazis stay in power? What do you think will happen to Maurleen?”

“You leave her out of this.”

“Why? The best thing that can happen to Maurleen is for this war to end, soon, in an Allied victory.”

“That’s not true!” Heinie shouted.

“Yes, it is. The longer this war goes on, the more likely it is she’ll be killed, and as long as the Nazis are in power, she’ll never get to marry you.” Bastien took another small step toward the door, hoping Heinie wouldn’t pull the
trigger. Bastien had two choices: escape or death. He wouldn’t allow himself to be captured alive, especially now that Heinie knew he wasn’t Dietrich.

“Don’t move, Adalard, or whatever your name is.”

“Are you going to turn me in, Heinie? For doing something you know is right?”

Heinie’s eyes were pinched, and his jaw trembled. “I have my duty. You know that. And you know what would happen to me if I let you go.”

“No one has to know you were here. Put the radio crystal back where you found it and go to your room.”

Heinie’s arm shook as he kept his pistol aimed at Bastien. He gripped it tightly, his finger on the trigger for what seemed like a long time. “If I ever see you again, I’ll have to shoot you.”

“I understand.”

Heinie lowered his arm. “I hope you find her before Zimmerman does.”

Bastien took the final two steps to the door. “Thank you, Heinie.” Before
his friend could change his mind, Bastien stepped into the hall and ran for the back exit.