‘I am very busy,’ said Hagemann. He had an instinctive mistrust of Fegelein. The soft round chin, full cheeks and shallow brow gave him an innocent and almost child-like face. But this appearance was an illusion.
That Fegelein had managed to advance so far in his career, and yet was so universally disliked, was a testament to the ruthlessness of his ambition. To Fegelein, the price of loyalty could always be negotiated, and friendship had no value at all.
He was not alone in making that equation.
In 1941, Fegelein had been arrested for the looting of money and luxury goods from a train, an offence which could have carried the death penalty – although his real mistake had not been the theft so much as the fact that these items had already been stolen from the safety deposit boxes of Polish banks by men who outranked Fegelein, and were, at the time, on their way back to a warehouse where the loot was scheduled to be divided among the thieves. The charges against him were dropped, on the orders of his master, Heinrich Himmler, which only added to rumours already circulating, that Fegelein led a charmed life. What had been only rumour before was transformed into fact when Himmler appointed him as his personal liaison officer. This, and his marriage to Gretl Braun, sister of Hitler’s mistress, Eva, had assured him an almost untouchable position in the Fuhrer’s closest circle. The marriage had been conducted hurriedly after Gretl discovered that she was pregnant. The fact that there was some question as to who might be the father of the unborn child, and Hitler’s outrage at the circumstances, had prompted Fegelein to come forward and offer his hand. In Hitler’s mind, this act of chivalry saved not only Gretl’s reputation, but also his own, as the consort of Eva Braun. The marriage had done nothing to temper Fegelein’s appetites and while Gretl remained, for the most part, far to the south in her home province of Bavaria, Fegelein had taken up residence with his mistress, Elsa Batz, in an apartment on the ironically named Bleibtreustrasse. Of this arrangement, Hitler was unaware or else he had chosen to look the other way and Fegelein had enough instincts for self-preservation not to ask which one was the truth.
‘I have one final question,’ repeated Fegelein, as he pursued Hagemann down the narrow corridor. ‘It won’t take a second, Professor.’
‘I was just leaving,’ Hagemann muttered.
Fegelein refused to take the hint. ‘Then I’ll walk up the stairs with you. I could do with a smoke,’ he laughed, ‘and they don’t allow that in the bunker.’
Side by side, the two men plodded up towards the Chancellery.
It was all Hagemann could do not to push Fegelein back down the stairs. He not only mistrusted this slippery emissary of the SS, he despised the whole organisation. Ever since the conception of the V-2, Himmler had repeatedly tried to take over the project. In an obvious attempt at blackmail, the SS had even gone so far as to arrest one of the programme’s chief scientists, Werner von Braun, on charges so trumped up that even Hitler, who normally deferred to the man he called ‘My Loyal Heinrich’, refused to accept them.
In spite of Himmler’s insatiable desire to control the future of the programme, Hagemann had managed to keep the SS at arm’s length.
But all that changed in July of 1944, when a bomb planted by the one-armed, one-eyed Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg in a briefing room of the Wolf’s Lair command centre failed to kill its intended target, Adolf Hitler.
Even as Stauffenberg and numerous other conspirators were rounded up and either shot or hanged, the SS, citing concerns for national security, finally received Hitler’s blessing to take over the V-2 programme.
Since then, the production and research facilities had been scattered all over Germany, slave labour had been employed to assemble the rockets, and virtually nothing could be accomplished without Himmler’s approval.
If it weren’t for that fact, Hagemann might well have told Fegelein exactly what he thought of him.
The two men reached the main floor of the Chancellery building, where their side arms were returned to them.
‘What did you want to know, Fegelein?’ Hagemann asked as he undid his belt and slid the Mauser holster back where it belonged.
Fegelein delayed giving an answer until they had passed beyond the earshot of the guards.
Out on the shrapnel-spattered stone steps of the Chancellery, Fegelein removed a silver cigarette case from his chest pocket, opened it and offered its neatly arrayed contents to Hagemann.
Hagemann shook his head. For now, he was more interested in filling his lungs with fresh air than with tobacco fumes.
Fegelein lit his cigarette, inhaled deeply and then whistled out a long grey jet of smoke. ‘What I wanted to know, Herr Professor,’ he said, ‘is how many of these rockets you have left. After all, what use is your guidance system if you have nothing left to guide?’
Even coming from this man, Hagemann could not deny that it was a reasonable question. ‘We have, at present, approximately eighty complete rockets. Once the guidance systems have been modified, they will be ready for immediate use.’
‘And how long will the modifications take?’
‘Only a matter of hours for each rocket.’
‘And after the eighty rockets have been fired, what then?’ asked Fegelein.
‘Our production facility in Nordhausen is still fully functional. At top capacity, we can produce over eight hundred rockets a month,’ and then General Hagemann paused, ‘provided there is no interference, either from you or from the Allies.’
Fegelein smiled. ‘My dear Professor,’ he said, ‘I am not here to obstruct, but rather to help you in any way I can.’
‘Is that so?’ asked Hagemann, unable to mask his nervousness.
Fegelein laughed at the general’s obvious discomfort. Playfully, he batted Hagemann on the shoulder with the rolled-up blueprints.
‘Those are not toys!’ snapped Hagemann. Angrily he shoved the leather cylinder into Fegelein’s hands. ‘If you’re going to carry them about, you might as well put them in this.’
‘I know what you think of me,’ said Fegelein, as he opened the chart case and slid the blueprints inside, ‘and aside from the fact that I couldn’t care less, surely you can see why I would want to support the development of a weapon that could be our only hope out of this mess.’ He waved the smouldering cigarette at the ruins of the buildings all around them. ‘I make no secret of the fact that it would benefit me to do so, over and above whatever good it does our country.’
You self-serving bastard, thought Hagemann.
‘You may loathe me for my reasoning,’ continued Fegelein, ‘but it does prove that my offer of assistance is genuine. If I didn’t think it would work, I promise you we would not be having this conversation.’
A black Mercedes rolled up to the kerb.
Hagemann noticed the SS number plates.
‘Ah! Here is my transport.’ He turned to Hagemann. ‘I must leave you now, Professor, but you should be aware that, once Himmler has seen these plans for himself, he will want to speak with you immediately. Face to face, you understand.’
Hagemann felt his bowels cramp.
‘There is nothing to be nervous about,’ Fegelein assured him, ‘unless of course he asks you to meet with his friends.’
‘What would be wrong with that?’ stammered Hagemann.
‘The Reichsfuhrer has no friends,’ said Fegelein called back over his shoulder, as he made his way down towards the waiting car.
Hagemann was surprised to see a tall woman emerge from behind the wheel. She wore a short greenish-brown wool jacket with flapped pockets at the hip and braided leather buttons, like miniature soccer balls. Her blonde hair was cut to shoulder length, in a style which had grown popular that winter, as if to match the austerity that had worked its way into every facet of civilian life.