cool. ‘Traitors each and every one. No firing squad. A noose each when the time comes. No one higher, though? It would seem our field marshals are loyal at least.’
‘I wish I could confirm that, my Führer, but there is one who is heavily suspect. I would be failing in my duty not to tell you.’
‘Then tell me.’
‘Rommel.’
Hitler smiled a ghastly smile that was almost one of triumph, turned and walked away and turned again, still smiling. ‘I think I expected it. Yes, I’m sure I did. So, the Desert Fox wishes to play games.’
‘I’m almost certain of it.’
‘The people’s hero,’ Hitler said. ‘We must handle him carefully, wouldn’t you say?’
‘Or outfox him, my Führer,’ Himmler said softly.
‘Outfox him. Outfox the Desert Fox.’ Hitler smiled delightedly. ‘Yes, I like that, Reichsführer. I like that very much indeed.’
Hugh Kelso slept until noon and when he awakened, he was sick. He turned over in the violently pitching life raft and pulled down the zip of the entrance flap. His heart sank. There was nothing but sea, the life raft twisting and turning on the angry waves. The sky was black, heavy with rain and the wind was gusting 5 or 6, he could tell that. Worst of all, there wasn’t a hint of land anywhere. He was well out in the English Channel, so much was obvious. If he drifted straight across, wasn’t picked up at all, he’d hit the coast of France, possibly the Cherbourg Peninsula. Below that, in the Gulf of St Malo, were the Channel Islands. Alderney, Guernsey and Jersey. He didn’t know much about them except that they were British and occupied by the enemy. He was not likely to be carried as far south as that, though.
He got the Very light out, and fired an orange distress flare. There was seldom any German naval traffic in the Channel during daylight. They tended to keep to the inshore run behind their minefields. He fired another flare and then water cascaded in through the flap and he hurriedly zipped it up. There were some field rations in the emergency kit. He tried to eat one of the dried fruit blocks and was violently sick and his leg was on fire again. Hurriedly, he got another morphine ampule and injected himself. After a while, he pillowed his head on his hands and slept again.
Outside, the sea lifted as the afternoon wore on. It started to get dark soon after five o’clock. By that time the wind was blowing sou’westerly, turning him away from the French coast and the Cherbourg Peninsula so that by six o’clock he was ten miles to the west of the Casquets Light off the island of Alderney. And then the wind veered again, pushing him down along the outer edge of the Gulf of St Malo toward Guernsey.
Kelso was aware of none of these things. He awakened around seven o’clock with a high temperature, washed his face with a little water to cool it, was sick again and dropped into something approaching a coma.
In London, Dougal Munro was working at his desk, the slight scratching of his pen the only sound in the quiet of the room. There was a knock at the door and Jack Carter limped in with a folder in one hand. He put it down in front of Munro.
‘Latest list from Slapton, sir.’
‘Anything on Kelso?’
‘Not a thing, sir, but they’ve got every available ship out there in the bay looking for the missing bodies.’
Dougal Munro got up and moved to the window. The wind moaned outside, hurling rain against the pane. He shook his head and said softly, ‘God help sailors at sea on a night like this.’
As commander of Army Group B, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel was responsible for the Atlantic Wall defenses, his sole task to defeat any Allied attempt to land in northern France. Since taking command in January of 1944 he had strengthened the coastal defenses to an incredible degree, tramping the beaches, visiting every strongpoint, impressing his own energetic presence on everyone from divisional commanders to the lowliest private.
His headquarters seemed permanently on the move so that no one could be sure where he was from one day to the next. He had an uncomfortable habit of turning up in his familiar black Mercedes accompanied only by his driver and his most trusted aide from Afrika Korps days, Major Konrad Hofer.
On the evening of that fateful day at about the time Hugh Kelso was somewhere in the general area of the Casquets Light, west of Alderney, the field marshal was sitting down to an early dinner with the officers of the 21st Parachute Regiment in a chateau at Campeaux some ten miles from St Lo in Normandy.
His primary reason for being there was sound enough. The High Command, and the Führer himself, believed that the invasion, when it came, would take place in the area of the Pas de Calais. Rommel disagreed and had made it clear that if he were Eisenhower, he would strike for Normandy. None of this had done anything for his popularity among the people who counted at OKW, High Command of the Armed Forces, in Berlin. Rommel didn’t give a damn about that anymore. The war was lost. The only thing that was uncertain was how long it would take.
Which brought him to the second reason for being in Normandy. He was involved in a dangerous game and it paid to keep on the move, for since taking command of Army Group B he had renewed old friendships with General von Stulpnagel, military governor of France, and General Alexander von Falkenhausen. Both were involved, with von Stauffenberg, in the conspiracy against Hitler. It had not taken them long to bring Rommel around to their point of view.
They had all been aware of the projected assassination attempt at Rastenburg that morning. Rommel had sent Konrad Hofer by air to Berlin the previous day to await events at General Olbricht’s headquarters, but there had been no news at all. Not a hint of anything untoward on the radio.
Now, in the mess, Colonel Halder, commanding the regiment, stood to offer the loyal toast. ‘Gentlemen – to our Führer and total victory.’
‘So many young men,’ Rommel thought to himself, ‘and what for?’ But he raised his glass and drank with them.
‘And now, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, the Desert Fox himself, who does our mess so much honor tonight.’
They drained their glasses, then applauded him, cheering wildly, and Rommel was immensely touched. Colonel Halder said, ‘The men have arranged a little entertainment in your honor, Field Marshal. We were hoping you might be willing to attend.’
‘But of course.’ Rommel held out his glass for more champagne. ‘Delighted.’
The door opened at the back of the mess and Konrad Hofer entered. He looked tired and badly needed a shave, his field gray greatcoat buttoned up to his neck.
‘Ah, Konrad, there you are,’ Rommel called. ‘Come and have a glass of champagne. You look as if you could do with it.’
‘I’ve just flown in from Berlin, Field Marshal. Landed at St Lo.’
‘Good flight?’
‘Terrible, actually.’ Hofer swallowed the champagne gratefully.
‘My dear boy, come and have a shower and we’ll see if they can manage you a sandwich.’ Rommel turned to Colonel Halder. ‘See if you can delay this little
