It was Dietrich who noticed the short muscular figure in naval uniform shrinking at the back of the line. He looked frightened at six hundred yards. He was walking slowly towards the gate at the eastern end of the terrace, almost hidden by the new Luftwaffe officers shouting their greetings to friends behind the wire. But my God, he had a nerve. Kapitan Mohr was at the blackboard with his English class when Dietrich threw open the schoolroom door:
‘He’s back, Herr Kap’tan.’
Mohr looked at Dietrich for a moment, then calmly put down the chalk and walked over to the bay window. The class followed his example. The prisoners were parting like a river washing round a rock but for a few seconds he was lost behind their shoulders. Then Mohr saw him at the end of the line, white, unshaven, unkempt, clutching his sack to his chest like a tramp with a schnapps bottle. Shabby Lange, frightened Lange, one of the guardians of the German Navy’s reputation. What would dapper Dr Goebbels have thought of his reporter? The British had held him for two additional days. Why? The camp was sure it knew; it was whispered a hundred times over lunch, on the touchline as the football pitch, and in the rooms after lights-out: ‘Lange broken’, ‘Lange an informer’, ‘Lange’, ‘Lange’, ‘Lange’. Fresh evidence, statements, a trial. And yet here he was again shuffling into Stapley camp.
The new prisoners who knew nothing of Lange were speaking, laughing, shaking hands with comrades. But the rest were silent and some were turning away, presenting their backs to Lange in disgust. He was quite close to the window now and Mohr was surprised and struck by the stillness of his face, stiff, white, yes, but he seemed to have found a new strength from somewhere, an inner calm. But it was only a glimpse; the stocky frame of the 112 ’s navigator, Bruns, had stepped in front of him, those intimidating shoulders blocking the view.
‘Shall I ask Bruns to bring him here, Herr Kap’tan?’ Dietrich was poisonous, a man who loved raw violence.
‘No. I’ll see him later,’ said Mohr coldly.
Someone was pushing his way through the crowd towards the two of them — Fischer, the commander of the 500 — and he placed a warning hand on Bruns’s shoulder. Strong words, an order and Bruns stepped smartly away. They spoke for a few seconds, then Fischer took Lange by the arm and began leading him across the terrace. As they passed the window he caught Mohr’s eye but looked quickly away as if ashamed of his small kindness. They disappeared into the house but Mohr stayed at the schoolroom window for a moment longer. The same number of guards in the same places, the wire, the gate, the watchtowers, no, there was nothing that struck him as out of the ordinary.
‘I want to see Kapitanleutnant Fischer and Major Brand in my room as soon as possible. And organise the Council for tonight.’
The expression on Lieutenant Duncan’s face was eloquent testimony to the unpleasantness of the scene he had just witnessed.
‘Of course he protested and asked to speak to you and then he wanted the camp commander. He was cold-shouldered by the prisoners. He was surprisingly brave and dignified. Poor sod.’
‘Yes. It’s tough.’ Lindsay instantly felt ashamed of himself for uttering such a hopeless platitude. He was standing at the intelligence officer’s desk, anxiously rolling a glass paperweight from hand to hand.
‘How you got approval for this desperate enterprise I’ll never know,’ said Duncan hotly. ‘Goodness, I hope you know what you’re doing.’
He lifted a pot of tea on to a small filing cabinet beside his desk and began stirring it with a knife. ‘And what if you get it wrong, time it badly? Lange could end up in the graveyard next to Heine.’
He stopped stirring the tea to fix Lindsay with a pulpit frown that a minister of the Free Kirk would have been proud of: ‘Or don’t you care?’
It was not worthy of a reply. There were listening devices in the old drawing room which the prisoners used as their mess, the kitchen and in the washroom, and a listening station in the west wing of the house. They had also worked on night-time positions for a large detachment of military policemen. Lindsay had considered placing one of the park’s German refugees among the new prisoners as a stool pigeon but that would have been even riskier. Yes, he was taking a risk, a terrible risk, but he had promised the camp commander he would pull the operation the moment Lange was in danger. There was just the doubt, the fear eating at him as he played restlessly with the paperweight: would he know when to take action?
‘Mohr will deal with this at once so it will happen tonight,’ he said with a certainty he did not feel. ‘We need to keep the prisoners busy before supper and roll call. Guards in and out of the house.’
‘It’s organised.’
‘And you’ve checked the microphones?’
‘Yes.’
Lindsay spent the rest of the afternoon skulking in Duncan’s office. It was important that none of the prisoners saw him but the time ticked too idly by and it was as much as he could do to control the old panic welling inside him. He was depending on Duncan and the Military Police for the arrangements. Major Benson visited him once to rumble anxiously about his ‘mad scheme’; it should be a job for the Police not the Navy, his camp was being turned into ‘a circus’. Then at eight o’clock Duncan returned to report on the evening roll call. Lange had stood a little apart, a lonely figure but in good health and calm, and surprisingly he had made no request to speak to the camp commander.
‘I hear he’s being ostracised by the camp. The Altestenrat has let it be known that no one is to speak to him until he’s cleared his name,’ said Duncan, settling into his chair. ‘But there is no news of an investigation or a Council of Honour.’
The men listening to the hidden microphones had heard only the cursing of the cooks in the kitchen, the songs and banter of the washroom.
‘I don’t expect anything to happen before lock-up,’ said Lindsay, glancing at his watch.
Half an hour and then the game of cat and mouse would begin. The Military Police would move into position close to the west wing of the house ready to force their way in if called upon to do so. One group at the entrance to the old crew yard, the other close to the covered passage that offered direct access to kitchen and washroom. They would have to be discreet because Mohr would post his lookouts too. Could ordinary soldiers be discreet? Lindsay wondered. There were so many ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’, so many. A frisson of fear coursed through him from neck to toes. The more he thought about it, the more certain he was that it was going to be a disaster. Since the Culloden everything had been a disaster. Duncan was right, what if they were too late? Call it off now. He should call it off. But he knew he wouldn’t.
Then, at half past nine, there was a sharp knock on the office door and without waiting for permission a corporal stepped smartly inside. His face was bright with excitement: compliments of Lieutenant Green, orders are being given in the prisoners’ common room that suggest preparations are being made for the court. Lindsay was on his feet at once and without waiting for Duncan, he pushed past the corporal into the corridor, his heart pounding furiously. So, it was beginning.
Elsewhere in the house, Leutnant zur See Helmut Lange was placing one foot in front of the other very deliberately on the stairs. He felt strangely detached, as if he was floating above his body, marking everything from the escort at his back to the tiniest of stains on the rough strip of burgundy carpet. They turned right at the bottom and on through the hall, the armorial glass in the tall windows twinkling in the last of the light.
The lookout at the common-room door — a Luftwaffe officer he did not recognise — made a point of scowling at him before he stepped aside to let him pass. As Lange was reaching for the handle, it turned on the inside and the door swung open on a room full of faces. A little dazed, he stood there trying to focus on just one face until a hand pressed him firmly in the middle of the back and through the door. There were at least forty men, silent, watchful, hostile, leaning against the dark oak-panelled walls or draped over the common room’s battered armchairs. It was gloomy, some bulbs had been removed from the chandelier and the corners were lost in shadow. On the side of the room opposite the door, two lookouts were standing at the bay window with an eye to chinks in the heavy blackout drapes.
The Council of Honour was sitting in front of the inglenook fireplace at a low trestle table, a yellow file and papers scattered across its green baize cover. Major Brand of the Altestenrat was in the chair; to his right was Mohr, bent over pencil and paper; the third member was a fresh-faced captain of the Luftwaffe.
‘Here, Herr Leutnant,’ said Brand, pointing to a small wooden chair a short distance from the table. ‘Sit down.’
Lange’s right knee was trembling like a leaf in a gale and it was a comfort of sorts to sit down, to put the eyes of all but a few in the room behind him.
‘This is Hauptmann Peters,’ Brand turned his head a little to the Luftwaffe captain. ‘He will be taking the place of your former commander on this council. Kapitanleutnant Fischer is indisposed.’
That was for the benefit of the room. It sounded like an excuse. Perhaps his old commander was refusing to play any part in the proceedings. And just the thought was enough for Lange to feel a surge of gratitude and warmth for Fischer, bawdy, drunken, decent Fischer. Try, try, try, he must try to draw strength from the thought.
‘You know why you’re here before this council?’
Lange nodded quietly. His left knee was beginning to tremble too. Why was his body letting him down? It was frustrating. Yet he felt an inner stillness he did not expect or understand. Brand began to read from a badly written charge sheet:… that you gave aid to the enemy by providing him with intelligence on the disciplinary proceedings of a Court of Honour…’
His voice was theatrically severe, almost comic, but there was also a note of pride, even of relish, that was entirely the man.
‘… that you have acted as informer on this and other matters of first importance to the Reich, endangering the security of fellow officers…’
It was the same charge written a dozen different ways. Mohr was fidgeting impatiently with his pencil and Lange could hear coughs and the shuffling of feet behind him. At last Brand reached the end and, placing the sheet down, he leant across the table to glare at Lange: ‘Can you answer these charges?’
‘I would like to say…’ He could hear himself as if at the end of a long tunnel. Was that his voice? It was a guilty voice. No. No. ‘I would like to answer, yes. There was a crime, a terrible crime, a man murdered for a moment of weakness. Heine murdered. And my fault..’
‘That’s enough,’ snapped Brand. ‘You’re here to answer for yourself and…’
‘I am at fault yes, yes. At fault for letting it happen and yes, perhaps helping it to happen.’
There was a rumble of surprise at the quiet but naked defiance, the steel in Lange’s voice. No one expected it from the PK man.
‘And to my eternal shame…’
‘That’s enough,’ Brand shouted and he began rising from his chair, his face and neck an indignant pink. But a firm hand and a look from Mohr held him hovering over the table like a petulant schoolboy. And it was Mohr who now spoke to Lange:
‘You’ve made your view known. But there is only one question we are here to answer: did you give intelligence to the British about the proceedings of this council and the disciplining of Leutnant Heine?’
There was an insistent cold purpose in his question. The room was still. Lange could hear his own short breaths and feel the eyes of many boring into the back of his head. He had resolved to say what was right, to condemn what had passed without fear but now, in that silence, Mohr’s steady gaze upon him, he was afraid again, very, very afraid.
‘I believe, I…’ What could he say? What? ‘It was a crime and
…’
‘The British are preparing a case. Did you provide them with intelligence? Did you speak of your comrades? Yes or no?’
Yes or no. Yes or no. It crackled distantly down the wire and through the small Bakelite headphones. Lindsay’s stomach was churning with anxiety as he leant towards the volume control on the receiver. It was almost time, almost time. Silence, then something that sounded a little like a choking cough and then uproar. Shouting, the screech of chairs, hissing, and noises it was impossible to place.
And then the calm voice of Mohr cut through all: ‘So to these charges against you, you plead guilty?’
Lange must have nodded because there were more hisses, shouts, an angry chorus of hate. And then silence. A complete empty silence. And a few seconds later a light buzzing. The line was dead. Lindsay spun round in his chair to look at Duncan: ‘For God’s sake. Can we get it back?’
‘Well?’ Duncan looked sharply at the young sergeant from Signals sitting at the receiver beside them.
‘It may come back, sir,’ he said weakly.
‘Two minutes. Two minutes. We can’t risk any more.’ Lindsay got to his feet to stand shuffling anxiously behind the Signalman as he tinkered with the set.
‘Let’s go now,’ said Duncan. ‘Now.’
‘No. We must see if…’
‘It’s back, sir.’
Lindsay snatched up his headphones and sat back at the table. Yes, yes. He could hear Brand, that pompous fool. Brand droning on about secrecy, the war being fought in the camp, the lives of their comrades, and the enemy’s spies: but Lange, what of Lange? He glanced across at Duncan who was bent over the sergeant’s shoulder, his hands pressing his headphones to his ears, a puzzled expression on his face. Why was Brand babbling on unchecked? He was addressing the room, not Lange. What was Mohr doing? The camp’s intelligence officer caught his eye at last and scrunched up his face in concern. And he was right, yes. Lindsay could sense there was something very wrong. Was Lange even in the room?
‘All right. That’s enough.’
Duncan ripped off his headphones: ‘Thank God yes. Let’s go.’
A shrill blast on a whistle, then a distant heavy thumping like native drums, wood on wood, something atavistic. Lange heard it as they half marched, half dragged him along the corridor, dark, stumbling, like a primitive sacrifice. Every grunt, every movement, every colour and shape, a rough flashing pattern, familiar but opaque with a fear he could taste, sweet in his mouth. Twenty metres, prisoners’ office on the right and the schoolroom, small pantry on the left, and at the end the heavy mahogany door to the servants’ quarters. Closer, closer, every step closer and he could hear the short anxious breaths of the men about him, hands tight on his arms and the collar of his jacket, and Bruns’s square head bobbing in front. And still the distant drumming, boom, boom, boom.
Hail Mary full of Grace, the Lord is with Thee…
Bruns was at the door and for a moment the hands loosened their grip as he was propelled through it into the servants’ passage.
… pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death.
And passed the kitchen and on, on to the washroom, a man in the shadows, blue on black. More banging, closer now, just a few metres down the passage. The door to the yard. The British. Lindsay. And why were they hammering on it?
Oh Mary be my strength.
Wet floor. White porcelain. A slash of violet light in the mirrors. A tap running. And more shadows, more men. Frightened faces but angry. They will stop now, they must. Arms tugged roughly back. The rope cutting into his wrists.
‘No, stop, stop.’
‘Fuck off, traitor.’ Dietrich’s saliva on his cheek. ‘Quick. Quick.’
A chair. Another rope. Someone with large practised hands knotting the rope. Koch.
Shouting in the passage. English. German. ‘Stop. Stop.’ And he knew he should struggle. Time. He needed time. And the things he could have done. Words he should have spoken. To lose hope. Life. Love. And the greatest of these is love. Hail Mary full of grace…
The noose in Dietrich’s hand too small and too stiff.
‘Fuck. Koch, do something about this.’
Shaking hands on the rope. Faces lost in shadow then close and very white. And the banging. Banging at the washroom door now.
‘There isn’t time. We can’t do it.’ Dietrich frantically pushing at someone and screaming: ‘Do it. That’s a fucking order.’
The rope fraying at the knot. The noose in front of his face. Pulling his hair. Pulling his head back. And the rope rough on his neck. Burning his neck.
‘The chair?’
‘No. No. No. Pull him up.’
The knot hard. Our Father, our Father… The knot nudging the back of his head. Tight. Tight. Tighter. Tighter.
… and at the hour of our death.
Fuck, fuck, fuck, what a shambles. Banging on the bloody washroom door like buggers at a rowdy rugby club while a man’s life was in the balance.
‘For God’s sake, hurry up,’ Lindsay shouted.
The Military Police sergeant swung the sledgehammer again. Boom against the lock, bouncing up and down the dark passage, a dull hollow echo that resonated like the torpedo that sank the Culloden. Duncan was standing beside him touching an angry cut in his lip. They had fought their way to the washroom, trading punches with some of the prisoners. Yes, a shambles, close to a riot. Doors barred. Soldiers armed with rifles in corridors and crowded rooms. No one with authority. He had left the arrangements to the Military Police. A shambles.
‘Get that fuckin’ door open now, you lazy lummox,’ Duncan bellowed, bank manager no longer but shipyard keelie. ‘And put your back into it. Oh God, give it here,’ and he snatched the sledgehammer from the soldier. Swinging his broad shoulders, he brought it down with such force that the lock burst, oak splintering, the hammer bouncing from his hands. It was as if a great cathedral bell had sounded only feet away. Only Duncan had enough presence to act, throwing his shoulder against the door: ‘You after an invitation?’
It gave way and he stumbled headfirst into the washroom. Lindsay followed, the soldiers at his back.
‘Stop it or we’ll shoot.’
He could see Lange’s twisted face and the rope in the light from a high washroom window. His body was shaking, his mouth open, gasping, gasping for air. But he was heavy and they were trying to lift his legs to tighten the rope. There were five, perhaps six men. Was that Dietrich?
‘Stop it now or I’ll shoot. Now.’
Dietrich turned to shout something to the others and they stepped back, their hands in the air. And now Lange was swinging, the rope creaking, taut, twisting, swinging free, a strange gurgling noise in his throat and his chest heaving for air. And Lindsay grabbed him and held his knees: ‘For God’s sake help me.’
Then a sharp crack above his head and a drenching spout of water and Lange’s body slipped from the broken pipe. Hands helped to ease it to the wet stone floor. Strings of hair across his forehead, eyes half closed, and the water drumming against Lindsay’s back as he bent to shelter him from its force.
‘Please God… a doctor, a doctor now.’
The cold was seeping through his jacket and through his shirt and creeping through his body. What had he done? Lange was dead.