He was given his chance. Air Vice Marshall Leigh-Mallory was now a convert to the Bader strategy, and other squadrons in 12 Group were being urged to mirror his tactics of breaking up enemy formations by diving through their centers. He had even nicknamed the 242 the Disintegration Squadron in honor of this technique. So on September 10 he was given two more squadrons, the 302 and the 611, and there came into existence a new outfit: the 12 Group Wing. All of the original 242 pilots felt the pride of it.
On the 15th, 12 Group Wing was scrambled twice to meet Luftwaffe attacks. The second time they were scrambled late, and forced to attack from below. They hated it, but had to make do. Still, when the engagements were reviewed and tallied that evening, 12 Group Wing claimed 52 confirmed victories and 8 more possibles. What a day!
Bader was to receive the Distinguished Service Order in recognition of his accomplishments. But they weren’t done yet; the Germans were still coming, day by day, still determined to bomb Britain into surrender.
On the 18th they scrambled in the afternoon, and were cruising just below a thin layer of clouds at 21,000 feet when they spied two groups of German planes about 5,000 feet below. There were some forty planes—and they were all bombers! No fighter escort.
“Fish in a barrel,” Lane murmured, hardly believing it. Apparently the Nazis were so determined to bomb that they had stopped making fighters. That was their folly.
When the action was done, they had claimed 30 bombers destroyed, plus 6 probables and two more damaged. There had been no casualties on the British side.
By the end of September the German attacks were becoming less frequent and destructive. The Battle over Britain continued, but the days of the heavy bomber raids were coming to a close. The R.A.F. was establishing its supremacy over the skies of Britain. This aspect of the war was being won.
But Lane knew that this was only the first phase. The war would not be over until the Nazis were defeated on their home soil. That would be no fish-in-a-barrel shoot.
Indeed it was not. Lane went on a routine mission, and got ambushed by a German fighter plane, and had to pancake. He brought his plane down safely, but his face had been scratched by shrapnel from an enemy round and the blood impaired his vision.
A medic came to attend to him as he climbed out of the cockpit. “I’m okay,” Lane protested. “It’s just a scratch. Just let me get cleaned up.”
“That’s no bleeding scratch,” the medic said. “You’ve got a round in your head!”
Lane laughed. Then he passed out.
• • •
Things were hazy after that. They kept him sedated, and there was surgery. When he recovered full consciousness, his head was thoroughly bandaged and his vision blurry.
He was given leave as he recovered. Unable to stand and watch others flying when he could not, he went to London—and was surprised by the changes there. As war loomed closer to Britain, nearly everyone in London carried a gas mask. A large percentage of the people were in uniform, including the women. Newspapers carried features such as “These Are Your Weapons, and How to Use Them.” Balloons attached to cables were hung at an altitude of about five thousand feet, to prevent German bombers from flying low enough to aim accurately. Lane, like other pilots, didn’t much care for the balloon barrage system, because balloon officers called what they did “flying.” Also, when visibility was poor, British planes sometimes got snagged on the cables. Just which side were those balloons on?
When his recovery was complete, he reported for duty, but was met by a curious diffidence. The other pilots seemed glad to see him, but were vague about plans.
Bader gave him the bad news. “Your body is fine, your brain is fine. But that wound did things we don’t understand to your vision. Maybe you will recover completely, in time. But we can’t risk you in a plane now.”
“But I still have missions to fly!” Lane protested. “There’s a war to see through!”
“You need perfect vision to fly. Otherwise you will be a risk to yourself and others in the squadron. Would you want to be dependent for your life on another man who couldn’t see straight?”
Lane saw the way of it. “But I’m otherwise fit. There must be something I can do. I can’t let a little injury wash me out.”
“I understand.” Bader glanced down at his own legs. He understood better than any man alive. “Your fiancée—she’s in Spain?”
“Yes. Only I haven’t heard from her since June. The Quakers had to leave Spain, but she wasn’t with them. I’ve been worried sick.”
Bader nodded; it was evident that he had known this. “Would you like to investigate our facilities in Gibraltar? I understand they may be expanded, to give us better leverage in the Mediterranean theater. It would be better if a battle-experienced flyer had a look.”
“Gibraltar! That’s near Spain!”
“Which remains an officially neutral country. Possibly a passport could be arranged.”
Lane saw what the man was doing. He was giving him a chance to try to check on Quality directly. Lane reached up to shake Bader’s hand.
CHAPTER 6
BERLIN
Of course Heydrich did not send Ernst straight to Admiral Canaris. Canaris, as the head of the Abwehr, the military intelligence unit, was far too canny to accept unknown personnel. Instead he was provided as a routine assignment of personnel to Colonel Oster, Canaris’s chief of staff. Oster was a close friend of the Admiral’s, and was also under suspicion. Ernst was given the identity of Lieutenant Osterecht, who was a real man but who seemed to have been lost in some distant action; Ernst was in effect taking over the man’s career, assuming verifiable credentials. If the real Osterecht ever turned up alive or dead, Heydrich would try to conceal the information until Ernst could be withdrawn. Thus he traded his black SS uniform for the gray Wehrmacht uniform.
The Abwehr offices were in a shabby apartment house beside Berlin’s Landwehr Canal. The building was officially designated 72-76 Tirpitz-Ufer, but it was nicknamed the “Fuchsbau”—the Fox’s Den—because of its labyrinthine passages, innumerable doors and gloomy offices. The Abwehr offices were on the third floor of Fox’s Den, and were shielded from unwanted visitors by a folding metal grille.
Admiral Canaris’s office was at the end of the passage and had a small outer office maintained by his serious secretary Wera Schwarte. Oster’s office was down the hall, with his assistant, the civilian Dohnanyi, adjacent. Ernst was given a quick tour upon his arrival, meeting the Admiral only to shake hands, before being shunted down to what seemed like the smallest and gloomiest of the available chambers where he would be working.
Ernst had of course done his homework, and knew Oster’s background. The man had been decorated for gallantry several times during The War, and was a hero. But he was also temperamental, volatile, arrogant and cynical. It was said that Canaris believed that Oster’s exterior concealed a serious-minded man who subscribed to a simple and straightforward code of soldierly and Christian conduct. But others considered him to be a superficial careerist, irresponsible, careless, brash and peremptory, who would not last a moment without the Admiral’s support. He seemed to be obsessed with women and horses, with an insatiable appetite for new varieties of each. His womanizing had led to the end of his army career in 1932; only Canaris’s intercession had enabled him to return to the service in 1937 as an Abwehr officer.
But it was not Ernst’s business to remark on any of this. It was his business to do honestly and well anything that he was assigned to do, and to make mental but no other note of whatever he learned about the ultimate loyalty of those with whom he worked. He was a little fish in an alcove of a pond which was not enormous. At a later date he would report what was relevant to Heydrich, his only concern being accuracy.
His actual assignment was in Abteilung II, the division of the Abwehr concerned with Sabotage, Subversions and Special Duties. Within this he was in Section II, under Lieutenant Colonel Erwin Lahousen, an Austrian who had joined the Abw
ehr after the Anschluss.
Lahousen was glad to see him. “We have a lot to do, and too few competent people.” He lifted a brow at Ernst. “You are competent?”
Ernst spread his hands. “I hope so. I have not before done precisely this type of work, but am a quick learner. I’m still not sure why—”
“We did put out a requisition. So your training is not sabotage? That does not necessarily reflect on your competence. It may be that someone saw such promise in you that he could not let you miss this opportunity. Do you have any special abilities?”
“Some. But I have to say that it may not be competence that brought me here. I had what I prefer to term a personality conflict with my commander.”
Lahousen shook his head. “We know about that sort of thing, here; if you follow orders you will be all right. What abilities?”
“I have studied both American English and Spanish, and believe I speak those languages well.”
“Trilingual. That must be it.” The colonel signaled a man in the hall. “Fetch Heinz.”
In a moment a somewhat stout man appeared, evidently long out of training. “Heinz, we have here a man who speaks American,” the colonel said.
Heinz turned to Ernst. “Good morning, comrade,” he said in accented English.
“Don’t call me ‘comrade’!” Ernst snapped in the same language. “That’s a Communist.”
Heinz smiled. “And you could pass for American,” he agreed. “You sound just like one, arrogance and all.” He turned to the colonel. “He is good, sir. Better than I am.”
“Fetch Eva.”
Soon a middle aged woman appeared. “Señora,” Ernst said, standing.
“You are from Spain!” she exclaimed in Spanish.
“No. I studied it, and I like to be competent in what I do,” Ernst explained.
She turned to Lahousen. “Like a native,” she said.
The colonel smiled. “We shall surely have good use for you. But right now we are in need of a planner for commando operations. You will be that.”
“In what theater? It makes a difference.”
“Polish.”
“But I don’t speak—”
“There will be those who do. You can get started without them.”
So it was that Ernst found himself studying maps of Poland, and researching the German/Polish border. They were planning to take Poland! He had suspected it, but had not expected such abrupt confirmation.
Ernst did his work, and knew it was good. He had organized outings as a Youth leader, and understood how things fitted together. But one thing was missing. “I’ll need to see some of the terrain personally,” he told the colonel. “There could be things the maps and reports don’t tell us. One road blocked by temporary construction, and—”
“I anticipated that need,” Lahousen said. “It is time to consult with the colonel.”
He brought Ernst to Colonel Oster’s office. There was a board bearing the proverb AN EAGLE EATS NO FLIES. Two men were there: Oster, whom Ernst had seen but to whom he had never spoken, and a civilian. Colonel Lahousen, realizing that there could be awkwardness, made a quick introduction. “Sir,” he said to Oster, “I have brought Lieutenant Osterecht to confer with you and Captain Dohnanyi about the next stage of our operation. He needs authorization to inspect the terrain in person.”
“Now that is an amusing coincidence,” Oster said. “My friend was just about to travel in that direction. The Lieutenant can accompany him, in case he needs his shoes polished. I will suggest this to the Admiral.”
The colonel smiled, acknowledging the humor, but Ernst could tell he didn’t appreciate it. It was the type of humor directed at underlings whose opinion didn’t matter. Since that was a fair description of Ernst at the moment, there was nothing to be done about it. Oster lacked the authority to make assignments, but did control access to Admiral Canaris; therein lay his power. Ernst had quickly discovered how important personality was; it seemed that almost every officer had to be polite to an obnoxious superior.
Ernst did travel with Dohnanyi, and found the man surprisingly compatible. He had a good car and a civilian attitude. “I’m not a captain,” he said as they drove. “I’m actually an anti-militarist crammed into the unaccustomed uniform of a wartime supernumerary and assigned the rank of captain purely as a matter of protocol. I feel quite out of place in an Abwehr headquarters geared towards military order and efficiency.”
“I am in the military,” Ernst said. “But I feel out of place in the Abwehr myself. It is quite different from what I have known.”
“To be sure! It must seem strange to you to hear officers cursing the military.”
“I have not heard any—”
“You are too kind. A number have been cashiered from the service, and restored only because of the Admiral. They hold grudges against the system. I understand you had trouble in your prior unit; perhaps that is why you were sent to this hotbed of dissension.”
“No one has said that to me,” Ernst said carefully. Was the man fishing for some disloyal statement from him? Testing him, the way they had tested him in his foreign languages?
“And you do not know that many of us staunchly oppose the Hitler regime?”
Ernst was shocked. “I can not believe that! The Führer—”
“May be a madman. He is bringing us to a war that can destroy us. Do you think this present mission is for peace?”
This had to be a test! If Ernst failed to protest, he would be turned in for disloyalty to the Fatherland. Yet the man sounded sincere. “I think this mission is for war, yes. Because a great nation must be prepared for anything. If Poland attacks us—”
Dohnanyi laughed. “Scant chance of that! I am sure you are not that naive.”
“I do not question the decisions of my superiors. If it is decided that Poland represents a threat to—”
“Nor that naive, either. You know we are preparing to put down Poland, which has been a nuisance for a long time. And that we are even now preparing a nonaggression pact with Russia, and will let them have the far side of Poland.”
Ernst was amazed. “Poland, yes, I had gathered that there would be action there. But the Führer would never make a pact with the Communists!”
“But it is true. Hitler is doing it, and I fear disaster for our nation. But it is the regime I serve, and so like you I obey directives. Now we shall inspect the border, and I shall get us across so that you can ascertain what you need of the other side.”
“Across?” Ernst asked blankly. “Just like that?”
“Why did you think Colonel Oster had the Admiral send me with you? I have connections in Poland. I am a lawyer, and a good one; I do business there. I have a pass.”
So it turned out to be. The border guards allowed the car to pass, and they checked the necessary sites. Ernst had assumed that they would have to sneak across by night between roads, but they drove openly. He was amazed at the sloppiness of the border security.
Meanwhile he pondered the man’s words and attitude. Was it possible that there was such a hotbed of treason that its participants were open about it? If so, they were fools. But as he talked with Dohnanyi about other things, he became aware that the man was highly intelligent and possessed of a lawyer’s powers of reasoning. This was no fool.
That brought up the question whether this was a trap. Did they suspect that Ernst was really Heydrich’s agent? If so, they might expect him to report Dohnanyi, and thus reveal himself. That would cause the lawyer trouble, but would protect the others, because Ernst would never get any evidence on them after his report. But if he played along, pretending to harbor subversive notions, Dohnanyi might report him, and they would be rid of him. Either way, no important conspirator would be endangered.
The more he pondered, the more certain he became: Neither Admiral Canaris nor Colonel Oster was a fool, and both well understood the mechanisms of secrecy and spying. They had to be testing him, and his response would determine their accep
tance of them. This applied regardless whether they were loyal to the regime or traitorous. So he had to find a way to reassure them without getting himself in trouble. And gradually he worked out a way to do that.
When they returned to the Abwehr, Ernst reported to his immediate superior, Colonel Lahousen. First on the terrain: he had learned what he needed to, and could now complete the planning of commando missions to the region.
“And what of your companion?”
“Captain Dohnanyi was a pleasant companion, but careless in his speech,” Ernst said. “I could not take anything he said seriously, for if I did, I would not have been able to travel with him.”
The colonel nodded. “Civilians tend to be half crazy, sometimes,” he remarked. “It is best to ignore them.”
That was all. Ernst did not get in trouble. That was in itself significant, because his proper duty should have been to report Dohnanyi for speaking treason. Colonel Oster had to know the nature of Dohnanyi’s remarks—indeed, had probably instructed the man to make them—and Ernst had elected not to report them. Not quite. He had claimed not to take them seriously, but actually he was covering up for the man. That suggested that he had some sympathy. That would have been grounds to remove him from the Abwehr—had they wished to do so. He had become their tacit accomplice in silence.
• • •
Except for his secret existence. There was a telephone in Berlin which was safe, and a time when special calls were to be made, and he used that phone at the proper time for his first report directly to Heydrich.
“The civilian Johannes Dohnanyi is anti-military and says that he staunchly opposes the Hitler regime,” he said when Heydrich came on. “He speaks treason—but he may be testing me. I have not reported him, and so I may be compromised. As yet I lack evidence on Oster or Canaris.”
“I know about Dohnanyi,” Heydrich said. “Leave him alone. Oster will trust you if Dohnanyi does—but Dohnanyi may indeed be testing you. Stay with it.”