Chapter 23
Hannah had shared the news about Henry’s death with Lizzie and let herself feel the utter despair of loss.
Her dreams that night were filled with images of Henry, always just out of reach, then burning in an aircraft and lying dead.
The following morning, she rose with the sun and put herself back together as she had so many times before.
If she were to extract the intelligence London needed to protect Britain from Hitler’s lethal weapons, she couldn’t afford to wallow in her misery.
One wrong move, and it could be the end, not only of the mission, not only for her but also for Lizzie and Ingrid.
The price of an error was too steep, and as she boarded the train that morning and scanned the closed faces around her, she gave herself a strict order.
There would be time to grieve for all she had lost when the war was over.
She must use her pain to propel her through these dark days.
Her heart throbbed with the loss of her fiancé, and with the bittersweet melancholy of returning to her hometown that could never again be her home, no matter the outcome of the war. She had seen too much.
A soldier who recognised her at the entrance of the Air Ministry checked her handbag more carefully than usual whilst he wished her a good morning.
‘Is something special happening today?’ she asked, her tone light and casual, as if they were friends.
The soldier stood taller and towered over her as he shifted his rifle across his tunic. ‘Reichsmarschall Goring is honouring us with his presence today.’
Hannah flashed a bright smile at the soldier, her stomach sinking. ‘What wonderful news! That is an honour indeed.’
He moved aside for her to pass, and her eyes landed on the enormous portrait of Hitler dominating the entrance to the building. She went through the usual mechanical salutes as she passed the main reception and made her way deeper into the building and to the typing pool.
After lunch, the supervisor called them to the front of the room and told them Reichsmarschall Hermann Goring would arrive at any moment. ‘I don’t need to remind you he is your boss and that everything and everyone he comes into contact with must be beyond reproach.’
There was an excited flutter in the air as the young women tidied themselves and fussed over their clothing. Goring may have lost some respect because of the Luftwaffe’s failures to protect German cities from Allied bombing, but many still revered him like a god.
Hannah’s mind circled back to the thoughts she’d harboured about assassinating Hitler, and they now switched to Goring.
If she had a gun, she could take a shot at the infamous second-in-command and might even kill him today before she was arrested.
There was nothing wrong with her aim, and she was confident in her ability to take him out with one shot.
Hannah would have gladly given her life to eliminate him, but there were at least two reasons not to act on her desire.
First, she didn’t have access to a gun, which had been a calculated decision on her part, based on the SOE’s orders.
She didn’t obey their commands without question, but she knew when they made sense.
As a Resistance leader, she thought of them more like suggestions.
And second, she could do far more damage to the Reich in her current position by using espionage as her weapon.
Placed as she was in Luftwaffe HQ, she would personally see to it that the information the Allies needed to either destroy or at least seriously compromise Nazi weapon development would be delivered into the right hands.
If she needed a third reason not to kill the vile Nazi who would parade himself like a hero through the building at any moment, it was that she would not sacrifice Ingrid Becker or Lizzie Beaumont to satisfy her own thirst for revenge.
Like her profound grief, her vengeance would be deployed in a myriad of ways when the time was right.
Hannah had no doubt that the opportunity for unbridled revenge would come one of these days, but in the meantime, she had to put the mission before her personal vendetta.
The supervisor answered the telephone on her desk and crossed to the window. ‘The Reichsmarschall is here! Stand tall and straight, ready for his inspection, ladies.’
A taut expectancy hung in the air as they waited.
Hannah burned with anger when she caught sight of the infamous Nazi entering the room, escorted by bodyguards.
His immense bulk, clad in the blue-grey Luftwaffe uniform, medals pinned to his chest, was even more imposing in person as Goring lumbered into the room.
With each laboured step, he moved closer to Hannah, where she stood next to the supervisor, her heart clattering.
Secretaries and clerks froze, desperate to get a glimpse of the legendary Reich second-in-command with his peaked cap, gold-braided uniform and eagle insignia.
‘Heil Hitler,’ rang repeatedly on the air with enthusiastic salutes, as he moved past the rows of staff who barely breathed, such was the anticipation of this rare visit.
Hannah saw he carried his marshal’s baton, and her stomach clenched as he drew closer.
This was the ruthless architect of the Nuremberg Laws—the vicious anti-Jewish policies that were implemented when she lived with her family in Berlin.
Following Kristallnacht, when Jews were beaten, murdered, and arrested in a giant wave of organised violence, this monster ordered a one billion mark fine on Jews to ensure they were crushed both economically and physically.
It was he who ordered the Aryanisation of Jewish property and ensured they had no means to survive in Hitler's Germany.
The Reichsmarschall stopped next to the supervisor who chanted, ‘Heil Hitler, Herr Reichsmarschall!’
Hannah trembled inwardly with a fierce cocktail of emotions fighting to destroy her composure, but her inner steel took over as she noticed his florid complexion up close.
With any luck, he would drop dead from a heart attack right in front of her.
She made a show of respectfully lowering her eyes before he reached her and echoed the salutation in a calm voice.
‘And who is this?’ he asked, as he stood in front of her, his presence intimidating everyone around him. Hannah forced her hands, which longed to wring his neck, to her sides.
The supervisor interrupted, simpering. ‘This is Frau Weber, a recent Volksdeutsche recruit who is proving invaluable, Herr Reichsmarschall.’
Hannah’s stomach lurched again as the overweight, sweaty Commander of the Luftwaffe paused to inspect her.
His rheumy blue eyes flickered over her and made her flesh crawl.
It was all she could do to repress her shudder and not visibly show her repulsion, but she kept her expression respectful and cast her eyes downwards again.
This was the head of the same Luftwaffe that had murdered her fiancé.
All that was left of him were a few personal possessions buried in an envelope in a filing cabinet down the hall.
‘Very good. Excellent,’ he said, his sour breath wafting up Hannah’s nose, and the sweat pooling on his face as he extracted a handkerchief to mop his brow.
Hannah realised with satisfaction that the rumours were true.
The once dashing and decorated fighter pilot from the previous war now struggled with deteriorating health.
He was said to depend on pills to get through the day.
She was thankful for small mercies and held herself together as he passed by, before releasing a sigh of relief.
A short time later, he left the room, and the supervisor said, ‘Back to work, everyone. The excitement is over for today.’
Hannah sat down at her table and resumed typing, her senses gradually calming.
The bastard was just as disgusting in person as by reputation, and she had to quell the hatred that threatened to consume her so she could concentrate on her work.
She inserted fresh paper into her typewriter, and when she completed the urgent letter; she followed the supervisor’s instructions and went to deliver it.
This might be the day she received her first piece of intelligence.
After delivering several letters to the source, Ingrid had whispered to her she would have something for her soon.
Soon seemed to take a long time, and both Hannah and Lizzie were growing more impatient, but this was an espionage mission, not one that involved the adrenaline of regular physical sabotage where they blew up rail tracks and created chaos for the German military.
Those were Hannah’s specialities since early in the war, but the SOE often required a more pragmatic approach, which was the game they were playing now.
Patience was a quality Hannah had honed over time, but it didn’t come naturally to her or Lizzie.
Ingrid Becker sat at her usual desk by the window, which overlooked the main street, in the room she shared with her small team.
Her eyes met Hannah’s as she dutifully placed the clipboard on Ingrid’s desk, and Hannah sensed she wished to convey something to her.
Ingrid scanned the letter, and in one fluid movement, she switched it with a piece of paper, placing it beneath another letter on the clipboard Hannah was instructed to deliver to a different department.
The ghost of a smile passed between them, and Hannah left the room.
On her way to the next department on the upper floor, she darted into a small bathroom she used when she wanted to write down information and hide it on her person so it couldn’t be detected in the handbag search when she left the building each evening.
There were said to be leaks from the upper echelons of German administrative institutions, and security was growing ever tighter.
Hannah leafed through the papers on her clipboard and hurriedly scanned the document from Ingrid.
On the surface, it read like a standard typed scientific report about defence weapons, but Hannah knew there must be more to it.
Lizzie had instructed Ingrid to bury formulas and coded information about the weapons within other text.
That way, even if the documents fell into the wrong hands, it would be hard to decipher that they weren’t a routine part of her work.
Hannah didn’t have time to study the document now, so she removed it carefully from the clipboard, folded it tightly into a small wad of paper and stuffed it into the hollow heel of her shoe.
Lev had carved the space into her shoe heel before she left him in Toulouse.
The SOE agents weren’t the only ones with access to clever spy tools.
Lev’s solemn dark eyes and earnest expression entered her mind as she checked that the ingenious secret shoe compartment was clicked shut, and then she slipped out of the cubicle as the toilet flushed.
The main door opened, and an older woman entered whilst Hannah washed her hands.
Her eyes moved to the clipboard that was propped against the counter and no longer contained the treasonous document.
She smiled briefly at the woman, grabbed the clipboard and walked briskly up the stairs to the other department where she delivered the letter.
Her clipboard was empty when she returned to the typing pool, and the supervisor called her over.
‘I’ve got another urgent one for you, Frau Weber.
Your impeccable work has not gone unnoticed. ’
Hannah thanked the supervisor and returned to the typewriter to bash out more letters for the Third Reich until the light faded outside the nearby window.
She was eager to show Lizzie the information from Ingrid and hoped she wouldn’t be asked to work late like the previous day, but at least she was in demand for her efficiency and not suspected of treason. Yet.
That evening, as the other secretaries left the typing pool, chattering about the unusually eventful day, Hannah’s heels tapped on the polished floor towards the exit and paused whilst a soldier searched her handbag.
Then she left the grand building and stepped out onto Wilhelmstrasse, her heels clicking on the stone paving slabs.
Darkness had fallen, and a chill wind whipped around her neck as she burrowed further into her warm coat.
Lizzie would be thrilled. Finally, she would surprise her with something tangible to smuggle out of Germany and into Switzerland via the new courier route.
The game was on.