40
I’M DEAD, BAUER TOLD himself. There’s no way out of this.
But there was always a chance. And only one way it could work: to stay in character, no matter what.
“I’m fixing your radiator,” Bauer said, reminding himself to be as nonchalant as possible. “Almost done.”
“My radiator?” Hitler looked back toward the door, as if about to flee or summon a guard. “Nobody mentioned this to me.”
“It was someone at the front gate, didn’t get a name. Feel free to call them.” Bauer knew it was the riskiest of bluffs, but he hoped he was projecting enough confidence, enough casualness, to assuage him. “You guys have had a heating problem. They said to start on the top floor.”
“Oh, very well, if you’re finishing up.” Hitler waved him off. “I could use the company. Someone who doesn’t expect anything from me.”
Bauer used the screwdriver, left-handed, to drive the screws back into place, firming the radiator cover against the wall.
Hitler settled in behind his desk as Bauer threw the tools into the bag, over the envelopes he’d taken from the safe, which Hitler was now sitting directly in front of.
One glance inside, one phone call to the guards downstairs, and Bauer would be finished.
“I see you’re favoring your right side,” Hitler commented.
“Oh, yeah. War injury. How do you like that—a one-armed radiator repairman?”
“Ah, you served your country, comrade. Where?”
The last thing he wanted was a conversation. But he had no choice.
“Eleventh Infantry,” he said.
“The western front. Yes, yes. You were at the Somme?”
Why did I give him my real information? he thought. But there was no turning back now. Besides, in his experience in interrogations, it was best to keep your lies as close to the truth as possible so you had less to remember and reduced your chances of getting tripped up.
“That’s where I screwed up my shoulder,” he said.
“Oh? How did that happen?”
“We were a few kilometers east of Le Sars. One of the men had his foot blown off by a British bomb. I tried to carry him over my shoulder and avoid the tail gunners. We took a tumble down a valley. Probably saved our lives but beat the hell out of my shoulder.”
That story was true, minus the permanent injury to his shoulder.
Hitler was at his desk, dressed in a gray double-breasted suit with a red-striped shirt and one of those fancy tab collars that Bauer’s father-in-law favored.
There was a puffiness beneath his eyes. Gone was the charismatic electricity he generated in his public speeches.
One-on-one, in person, Hitler seemed… ordinary.
Hitler appraised Bauer, nodding with approval. “You were rewarded, I trust? The Iron Cross?”
“First and Second,” said Bauer. “I should probably get back home.”
“I served, myself.”
Bauer, standing with his bag, itching to leave, felt like he had no choice but to follow up. “Where were you deployed?”
“I was an Austrian citizen,” said Hitler.
You still are, Bauer thought.
“I petitioned to volunteer. I was granted leave to enlist in a reserve infantry regiment—Sixteen.”
Bauer knew it. The first company of the List Regiment. “You were at Somme, too?”
“I was.” Hitler leaned back in his leather chair and crossed a leg. “I took shrapnel in my leg. Not a permanent injury like yours.”
Bauer couldn’t believe he was finding common ground with this. How could two men, serving in the same battle on the same side, have such starkly divergent concepts of what it means to be a nation?
But all he really cared about was leaving as soon as possible. At any moment, a guard could pop in, a phone could ring.
“My wife is waiting up for me,” said Bauer. “I should leave.”
“Then off you go.”
Bauer started toward the door, then stopped and turned. “By the way, who are you?”
Hitler thought for a moment, eyes lifting. “I am the man,” he said, “who will restore Germany to greatness.”
Bauer said nothing more, and closed the door behind him.
There were no guards in the upper hallway.
He walked as quickly as he could on the balls of his feet to minimize the sound of his footfalls.
He reached the back staircase and listened.
He heard no voices, no noise, in the rear stairwell.
He took the stairs down one floor, seeing and hearing no one.
He took the first half of the final staircase and stopped on the landing before the final turn to the bottom floor.
He could hear guards down near the front entrance. What he wouldn’t give for another distraction from Gerlich, but it would have been impossible to time.
Bauer heard the guards down the hall react to something with approval. Whatever it was that occupied their attention—some food? a bottle of booze? a nudie magazine?—he would have to take the chance.
Head down, Bauer quickly and nimbly took the final staircase and turned toward the service entrance.
He heard nothing behind him, though his heart pounded so fiercely it was hard to be sure.
He pressed his ear against the service door, listening for any sounds outside, the latest sentry patrol.
Between the thumping of his pulse and the extraneous chatter of the guards down the hall, he realized that he couldn’t hear a thing outside.
He had no way of knowing if any guards were outside.
Sooner or later, he’d have to take a leap of faith.
Sooner, then.
His bag hiked over his shoulders, Bauer pushed through the service door, looked out once, and sprinted toward the fence.
He hit the fence in stride, ignoring the searing pain in his shoulder, certain that he would have only one chance.
He pulled himself over the fence and landed cleanly on the pavement on the other side.
He sprinted down Arcisstra?e three blocks and found Helldorff in his Stutz coupe. He handed him the bag through the car window. “Take this and go. We’ll meet in an hour at the rendezvous.”
“You’re not getting in?”
“They know my face. You take it. Go to the meet point. I’ll find my way there. Go!”
Without another word, Helldorff sped away. Bauer drew one deep breath of satisfaction before sprinting in the other direction.