Shock Warning

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Dawn over the Caspian was a beautiful sight, but Emanuel Skorzeny was not contemplating that kind of beauty. Instead, he lay dreaming — not of resurrection but of death.

Later, when he awoke from his uneasy slumbers, he would realize that these dreams were coming more often now. Skorzeny didn’t believe in signs from the heavens; he knew they were messages his own brain was sending to him, not communications from some imaginary higher power. Nevertheless, they disturbed him, and he was not a man who enjoyed being disturbed.

He was back in Dresden, in 1945. Winter. Mid-February. Very cold. Working with Vater Otto in rooting out the hidden enemies of the Reich. And who better than him, since his parents had once been among those hidden enemies?

They were in a restaurant. Everyone was singing — Schubert’s “Erlkönig.” That’s when they heard the sirens.

You rarely heard sirens in Dresden. The beautiful city on the Elbe was far inland, far removed from the western front. True, the Americans and the British were flying relentless sorties over the other major German cities, pounding the Reich into rubble while Goering’s useless Luftwaffe sat on the ground, unable to attack and unable to defend. Teenaged boys, he had heard, boys his age, were manning the antiaircraft guns in Berlin.

But in Dresden they didn’t worry much about bombing raids. True, there had been a couple of attacks on the rail yards, but the Florence of the Elbe had no military targets to speak of, and its status as one of the architectural wonders of Europe, the visible manifestation of all that was great about German Kultur, would certainly spare it from destruction. The real worry was the Russians to the east. They were coming and, since the epic defeat at Stalingrad, there was no one to stop them. That had been two years ago, almost to this day, and the rest was commentary. Indeed, Father Otto was already making arrangements for their escape.

He knew, because at night, asleep upstairs in their small house, he could hear voices, talking treason. The war was lost, they all said, and now the only question was what to do about it, and where to flee. After all, Father Otto was among the most-wanted men in the Reich, but he had got out of tougher spots than this in the past. He would think of something. And he would not leave his Sippenhaft son behind.

They were celebrating Shrove Tuesday, the day before the beginning of Lent, not that either he or Father Otto cared about such things. Religion was something that had abandoned him with the death of his parents, a death they forced him to watch as part of his reeducation as a loyal and dedicated citizen of the Reich.

It was just before ten o’clock in the evening; at midnight, it would be Ascher Mittwoch, the beginning of the penitential season that would culminate with Christ’s resurrection on Easter Sunday forty days later.

At the sirens, Father Otto knew right away what was coming, that much was clear. He rose immediately and, without a hint of concern, took Emanuel by the arm and led him into the cellar. And then he did a remarkable thing. He picked up one of the chairs and smashed right through the foundation of the building, opening a hole into the next building.

That was impossible. German cellars were famous for their thick stone walls. But in many of the Dresden buildings, the cellar walls had been replaced by mere partitions, so that people would not get trapped in them if the house above collapsed after a bombing. Father Otto knew that. Father Otto knew everything.

But in the dream, Skorzeny did not know that. In the dream he watched in wonder as the wall vanished and they dashed through where the stones once had been.

The bombs were already falling as they emerged into the street. Not ordinary bombs. Firebombs. Much of the city center was already in flames.

“Run, Kurt, run!” commanded Father Otto. Kurt was his new name, the one they gave him when they placed him with Father Otto. He could barely remember his old name.

They ran.

Over dead bodies, past people aflame. The heat was already incredibly high, so high that those closest to the center of the raid had simply burst into flames. Others toppled over from lack of oxygen, which was being sucked into the vortex.

The bastards above knew this was going to happen. They knew, and yet they did it anyway. They had done it to Hamburg, Bomber Harris and the others, and now they were doing it to Dresden.

They were doing it to him, personally. And he would hate them forever for it.

The car was nearby. Emanuel jumped into the front seat as Father Otto landed behind the wheel. People were rushing toward them, imploring them to help them escape, but they had no time for people. They barely had time for themselves.

The attack had come from the east, so it was to the east they fled as the flames roared up behind them.

Father Otto sang as they drove:

Something hit the roof, hard. It sounded like one of the balls from the Kegelbahn. “Why are they throwing things at us, Father?” he cried.

Another bowling ball hit the roof, only this time it wobbled and then rolled down the windscreen and onto the hood. It wasn’t a bowling ball, it was a human head.

Then another, and then another.

Not only heads but limbs were flying through the air, some of them on fire. Arms and legs and hands and feet. A legless, headless, and armless torso hit the street right in front of them, but Father Otto just drove right over it.

Emanuel turned back to look at the city, which was now a gigantic fireball. The planes were coming in ranks, their progress barely disturbed by the antiaircraft fire.

“I hope that fat pig Goering burns in hell,” said Father Otto.

They were leaving the city. There was no urban sprawl in the Germany of that time; the city simply ended and the countryside began. Soon they were in a deep forest, the big Benz bouncing over potholed and damaged roads but making good time, speeding, speeding always toward the east. He saw a sign for Görlitz.

Then, even in his dream, he fell asleep.

When he awoke they had stopped somewhere in a clearing. There were no signs of life anywhere near them. Father Otto was rooting around in the trunk of the car, searching for something.

“What is it, Father? What are you looking for.”

Instead of answering, Father Otto turned his gaze past his foster son, to the west, toward where the proud baroque jewel had once stood on the banks of the Elbe, and wept.

This was an extraordinary thing. The great Skorzeny, the rescuer of il Duce, the bravest man in the Reich, a dashing figure in his SS uniform, his face creased by a dueling scar, was weeping. Emanuel could scarcely credit his eyes.

“It’s over,” he said. “And now it’s time for Operation Greif.”

He handed Emanuel a rucksack. “Everything you’ll need is in there. Clothes, new identity papers, some dried beef. You know how to find food in the forest, I know you do. Keep away from the bears and the boars and you’ll be safe enough.”

“You’re not leaving me here, Father!” he cried.

“I have to. Where I go now you cannot follow. The war is lost and soon all Germany will be under the boots of the Russians and the Americans. We are too far from the western front for me to get you to the Americans, who would take care of you. So I must leave you here for the Russians to find.”

Now it was his turn to weep. “No, Father, no! Don’t leave me here alone in the forest.”

“I must. But don’t worry. Your new identity papers are your old identity papers — do not show them to any German, lest they shoot you on sight. Instead, when the Russians come, and they will, ask for the officer and show him your papers. You are the son of one of the July plotters against the life of the Führer. They will respect and honor you for that.”

Father Otto turned to him. For a moment, Emanuel thought he was going to embrace him, as a real father would, but of course he did not. He had already shown enough weakness for one day.

“You have greatness in you, boy,” he said as he got back into the car and fired up the engine.

“But much anger, Father.”

“Hold on to that anger. Nurture it. Let it nourish you through the long nights ahead. Love nothing except your own hatred, lest you become soft and weak. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Father.”

“Wer reitet so spät durch Nacht und Wind?” Who rides so late through night and wind?

Emanuel answered: “Es ist der Vater mit seinem Kind.” It is the father with his child.

Otto Skorzeny smiled. “May God be with you, Emanuel,” he said, and drove off.

Emanuel watched for a long time until the car was no longer visible. Then he turned back into the forest.

The Erlking, the evil creature who lived in the woods and preyed on children, was waiting for him there. He would find a welcome ally.

Skorzeny was still sleeping when he became aware of the ringing of the secure telephone. Mlle. Derrida lay beside him, indifferent as ever.

He found the phone and looked to see who was calling. It was her. He knew it would be. She had not let him down. He might have just hung up, the information duly conveyed and noted, but he enjoyed the sound of her voice. “Yes?” he said.

“The package has been delivered,” came her voice. The connection must be bad, for it was muffled. But it was unmistakably her.

“And you?”

“I’ll be back soon.”

“Excellent. I shall have Mlle. Derrida prepare us a splendid lunch.”

“What a wonderful idea. See you then.”

She rang off.

Skorzeny rose, pulled on his robe, slipped the phone in its pocket, and stepped out onto the balcony. How different this sunshine was from that horrid winter in Dresden, the winter that haunted his dreams — which were, of course, not dreams at all but memories, the ghosts of the dead summoned up from the eternal wellspring of hatred that yet burned in his soul….

The Russians had found him a few weeks later, cold and hungry. They had treated him about as well as he could have expected, which was to say not well at all — which was why he treated them not at all well in his business dealings with them. Scores were always meant to be settled, right up to the day of final reckoning.

And now that his package was in Tehran, that day was hastened.

His hand brushed his pocket and bumped into the phone. He remembered that he had not turned it off, so he extracted it and pushed the off button.

Half a world away, at the headquarters of the National Security Agency in Fort Meade, Maryland, the Black Widow made a note of the duration of the phone call, its origin, and its reception; transmitted the audio to one secure destination and initiated a complete transcription, which it encoded; and then signaled to a human operator that its task was complete.

The tech specialist on duty noted the alert and sent it straight to the top, to General Armond Seelye, the DIRNSA, who in turn relayed it to the one man who needed to know about it.

In California Devlin looked at the readout and punched back: