Traitor's Gate (13 page)

As the bus lurched to a stop on the corner of Friedrichstrasse and Unter den Linden, and Conrad stepped on to the pavement, he came to a decision. It would be wrong to try to trick Theo into giving him secrets, that would be betraying their friendship. But if he asked him straight out, then it would be up to Theo whether to help him or not. He had no idea what Theo’s reaction would be. Theo might have joined the German army, but he had always had a strong sense of justice and an equally strong dose of common sense. He must realize that Hitler was wrong – worse than wrong, evil. There was a chance, a good chance that he would be sympathetic to Conrad’s suggestion.

And, either way, Conrad would find out who Theo really was.

The woman getting off the bus after Conrad had no idea of the turmoil simmering in the Englishman’s brain. She was just doing her job. She was in her early thirties, smallish, wearing a brown hat and shapeless raincoat and carrying a shopping bag, one of thousands of such women in Berlin. Her job was made easier by Conrad’s preoccupation. And it was a job well done: Conrad’s visit to the British Passport Control Office would be sure to interest her superiors.

Conrad had been waiting on the Bendlerstrasse outside the War Ministry for an hour and a half. He lit another cigarette and checked his watch – it was half past six. Conrad was pretty sure he hadn’t missed him, but he didn’t know how late Theo might work. And of course he didn’t really know whether Theo worked in the War Ministry at all; that was what he was here to confirm. If he didn’t see Theo that evening, he would try Gestapo headquarters on the Prinz-Albrecht-Strasse the following day.

He turned away from the entrance to the ministry and looked down the street to see the tall figure of Theo striding towards him from the direction of the Tirpitzufer, the road that ran along the Landwehr Canal. Theo was almost upon him before he recognized his friend. ‘Conrad! What are you doing here?’

‘I wanted to talk to you and so I thought I would wait for you to leave your office.’

Theo glanced up at the imposing grey block of the ministry building. ‘Well, this is a damn silly place to wait. We’ll be seen.’

‘Does that matter?’ said Conrad. ‘We are friends after all. What’s strange in us meeting?’

‘Do you realize we are being watched?’

Conrad looked up and down the street. There were three people waiting at a bus stop about a hundred yards away. A woman, a round old man and a tall man with an umbrella and hat. At that distance it was difficult to see any of the three closely.

‘The tall man by the bus stop?’

‘No, the woman,’ Theo said.

‘Is she watching me or you?’

‘Well, she’s watching both of us now, isn’t she?’

‘Let’s walk to your flat then,’ said Conrad. ‘I have something I want to say to you.’

Theo paused to light a cigarette. ‘If you want to say some­thing important, it’s better we don’t go to my flat.’

‘Oh, the microphones.’

‘It’s always safest to assume they are there. Let’s go down to the canal.’

‘What about our tail?’

‘She won’t get close enough to hear.’

They crossed the Tirpitzufer and walked along the path next to the Landwehr Canal, under the chestnuts. Above them was the new Shell building, an elegant nine-storey edifice whose smooth white curves looked effete compared to the strong square slabs of Nazi construction sprouting up all over Berlin.

Conrad hesitated as he prepared to tackle Theo on Foley’s request, but it was Theo who brought the subject up before Conrad had a chance. ‘So you’ve been to the British Passport Control Office?’

‘Yes. I wanted to speak to the people there about a visa for Anneliese’s father. You know he’s in prison?’

‘By “the people” you mean Captain Foley?’

‘Yes, I do,’ admitted Conrad. ‘But how did you know I’ve been there?’

‘And do you know that Captain Foley is head of the British Secret Service in Berlin?’

‘I guessed as much,’ said Conrad. ‘Is it you who has been having me followed? Don’t you trust me?’

For the first time since they had met that evening, Theo smiled. ‘Yes, actually, I do trust you. About the big things, anyway.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I mean, I trust your instincts, your beliefs. You’re a good man, Conrad, an honest man, someone who believes in right and wrong and who will stand up against injustice when you see it.’ Theo’s voice was warm, but it was warmth tinged with a touch of sadness. ‘That’s why I think you should go back to England.’

‘But why?’ said Conrad. ‘You said yourself the people of this country are sleepwalking. So are the people of my country. Do you want me to join them?’

‘They weren’t all sleepwalking,’ said Theo. ‘When the Nazis came to power and Hitler usurped the constitution, there were many people who looked the other way, myself included, I’m ashamed to say. But there were some, hundreds – no, thousands – who stood up and shouted that what was happening was wrong. Students, workers, trade unionists, writers, civil serv­ants, lawyers, artists, schoolteachers, academics, pastors. People like you.’

‘Well, it seems there aren’t enough of us,’ said Conrad.

‘The cemeteries are full of you,’ said Theo. ‘And the con­centra­­tion camps. You asked whether I trusted you; well, I don’t trust you to keep yourself out of a graveyard.’

‘They won’t touch me,’ said Conrad. ‘I’m a foreigner, and a well-connected foreigner at that.’

‘Oh, believe me, Conrad, if they really want to, they’ll touch you. They won’t be stupid enough to arrest you and put you on trial. A bullet in the back of the head is all it needs. Perhaps your body will never be found. Go home, Conrad. Please.’

They came to a little bridge over the canal and crossed it, heading back towards Bendlerstrasse. A barge nosed quietly through the dark water. Conrad spotted the woman following them, now facing them on the other side of the canal. She turned and dropped her shopping bag, spilling a couple of items on to the pavement, and stooped immediately to pick them up.

Given what Theo had told him, Conrad wondered whether he should continue with his plan. But now he needed to know more than ever whose side Theo was on.

‘You said you are not a Nazi,’ he began. ‘And that you think the Nazis are mad.’

‘What if I did?’ said Theo.

‘I don’t know what exactly you do at the War Ministry, but if you come across any pieces of information that are interesting, you might pass them on to me? Something about Joachim’s plot to overthrow Hitler, perhaps?’

Instantly Theo stopped, as if he had been struck. He glanced quickly at Conrad with an expression of shock and sur­prise; then he took a deep breath and walked on, staring straight ahead, his jaw set, the duelling scar stretched taut.

‘Theo?’ Conrad said, searching for a response and getting none. ‘You could choose what to give me. Just things that might damage Hitler.’ They walked on in a silence that was rapidly becoming unpleasant. ‘Theo?’

‘You’re asking me to spy on my country,’ Theo muttered.

‘I’m asking you to help stop Hitler starting a war.’

‘No,’ Theo said. ‘If a war starts between our two countries, which is highly likely, you’re asking me to help Germany lose it.’

‘If a war starts it will be Hitler who starts it,’ Conrad said.

‘I can’t believe this!’ Theo said. ‘What right have you got to ask me to betray my country?’

‘I’m not asking you to betray your country,’ Conrad said. ‘Just to stop the Nazis.’

Theo’s eyes were alive with anger. ‘Look, Conrad. I thought you were on the side of peace and against war. I thought you were for the international brotherhood of man. I thought you swore that you wouldn’t let anyone order you to kill other people.’

‘Yes,’ said Conrad, swallowing. ‘I believe in all that.’

‘You can either be in favour of peace, or you can be on the side of your country against mine,’ Theo said. ‘What you cannot do is try to persuade me that spying for your country against my own is somehow backing the cause of international peace and harmony.’

‘I decided to ask you straight out,’ protested Conrad. ‘I’m not trying to trick you or anything.’

‘Captain Foley asked you to do this, didn’t he?’

‘Yes,’ admitted Conrad.

‘Why me? Why is he interested in me?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Conrad. ‘But I suspect
you
do.’

Theo snorted and shook his head. ‘I was wrong when I said I trusted you. You, of all people, to become a spy.’

‘All right,’ said Conrad. ‘If you don’t want to tell me anything I understand.’

‘You’re damn right I don’t want to tell you anything!’ Theo stopped and faced Conrad. ‘Look, I suggest you go back to your flat, pack your suitcase and get a train back to England. And until you do so, I suggest we don’t meet again.’

He hailed a passing taxi, which pulled over. He climbed in and wound down the window. ‘Go home, Conrad. If you want to stay alive, go home.’

Conrad trudged back to his hotel. The sky was grey and it began to rain. Conrad ignored it, moving slowly, not bothering to check whether the woman or some as yet unidentified colleague of hers was following him.

If Conrad had ever had any doubts that Theo was not simply drafting legal documents in a little office in the War Ministry, he had lost them now. Theo had put a tail on Conrad. He knew all about Captain Foley and the British Passport Control Office. And his contacts were good enough to tell him that Joachim was a Soviet spy.

Theo’s accusations had struck home. Conrad didn’t like his friend, or former friend, claiming that he had sold out his principles. That was the whole point of tackling Theo directly; if Theo really was as anti-Nazi as he claimed then he should have been all too eager to help Conrad.

But he hadn’t been. And the obvious conclusion was staring Conrad in the face. Theo had become a dyed-in-the-wool Nazi who would ruthlessly betray first Joachim and then him.

The idea hit Conrad hard. It undermined not just his trust in Theo and his friendship, but his very understanding of the world. But, despite all the evidence, Conrad couldn’t quite accept it yet. He had hoped the confrontation with Theo would bring certainty. Instead it had piled on further doubts.

At Oxford, Theo had enjoyed a reputation as a bit of an enigma. But Conrad had understood him – or thought he had. There were three opposing forces in Theo’s character. There was the arrogant, upright Prussian, with his belief in order and duty. Then there was the romantic intellectual who liked to discuss poetry and ideology late into the night. And finally there was the charming, good-looking man-about-town who could drink his male friends under the table, and charm his female friends under the bedcovers. These aspects of his character seemed to be in constant conflict; at any time one or other was dominant, but the others were always there under the surface.

So who was Theo now? The Prussian patriot? The ideological Nazi? Although Conrad had seen him with flirting with the blonde girl, Anneliese’s friend, at the dinner party, he seemed much more serious than Conrad had ever known him. None of this quite made sense.

Theo had been serious when he had warned Conrad about the dangers of staying in Germany, deadly serious. Conrad accepted that Theo had a point: he must be more careful how he behaved in Berlin, and he could not assume that just because he was a former British government minister’s son he was safe. But Conrad wasn’t going to run away. Joachim had followed his principles and died for them. Conrad had been prepared to die for his in Spain, and had seen too many of his brave colleagues give up their lives for an ideal. What was happening to people like Joachim, like the schoolteacher in the street, like Anneliese’s father, like countless other Germans, was wrong and Conrad couldn’t – wouldn’t – run away from it.

General Ludwig Beck, Chief of the General Staff, surveyed the remains of the dinner that he and twenty of his fellow staff officers had just consumed. Candlelight glimmered off silver candlesticks and cutlery, sparkled through crystal glasses and decanters, and gleamed in shimmering pools on the deeply polished wood of the dining table in the private room of the Esplanade Hotel in Berlin. The grey of the officers’ uniforms and the black of the iron crosses adorning their necks flickered in shadows. Although they were relaxing after a good meal and plenty of drink, their sabre-scarred faces betrayed the intelligence, discipline and imagination that had made the German general staff the envy of the world for at least a century.

Beck hadn’t eaten or drunk much of the food and wine. An austere, thin figure, he possessed an iron self-discipline, into which he had retreated after the death of his wife from tuberculosis in 1917 when they had been married only one year. Although a highly talented violinist, he hadn’t played a note since that day. Unlike many of the men around the table, Beck was not from a Prussian military family: he was an intellectual from the Rhineland, widely read in philosophy, economics and French literature. He was the brains behind the army, the author of the highly praised
German Army Manual of Tactics
and the proud successor to von Moltke, who had planned the victory in the Franco-Prussian War, and to von Schlieffen, whose strategy had nearly led to a swift German triumph in 1914. A small man with an intense, intelligent face, his student duelling scar took the form of a swirl on his temple just behind his left eye.

They had spent the day in the best tradition of the Prussian general staff, playing a war game. This had tested ‘Case Green’, a German invasion of Czechoslovakia, with the French coming to the Czechs’ aid. The results had been even worse than Beck had expected. The Czechs had thirty-four well-trained and well-armed divisions and a string of robust fortifications along their border with Germany. The German army had indeed prevailed against the Czechs, but it had taken them three months, during which time the French army had smashed the six German divisions facing them in the west, and swept across the Rhineland deep into Germany. The Germans lost; the French won. That was the inescapable conclusion.

Beck wasn’t surprised. As a professional military strategist he was deeply suspicious of Hitler’s plans. The previous November Hitler had called in his service chiefs for a conference at the Reich Chancellery and delivered a five-hour harangue on his scheme to win
Lebensraum
in Central and Eastern Europe. First Austria, then Czechoslovakia, then Danzig and Poland would be attacked to secure ‘living space’ for the German people, and all this would happen between 1938 at the earliest and 1943 at the latest. Beck hadn’t been at that meeting, but General von Fritsch, the then commander-in-chief of the army, had been so incensed that despite being sworn to secrecy he had immediately rushed out to confer with his loyal deputy. Von Fritsch was convinced that the British, French and Russians would not sit idly by and watch Germany swallow up the eastern half of Europe. A world war would be the inevitable result, a war that Germany would lose. Beck agreed, and had spent the last several months firing off furious memoranda about the economic and military weaknesses of the idea: the memorandum was General Beck’s weapon of choice. Since the humiliation of von Fritsch and his replacement by the much more malleable General von Brauchitsch, Beck had kept the memoranda flying.