‘Okay Swan. I’ll let you have the helm. You sound like you know what you seem to be doing. I’ll just go and get the… your team together’
Derby jumped out of his chair and placing the cigar back into his mouth, as he walked over to pull open the glass door of his office. As he stood with his shoulder covering some of the letters of his name on the door, he called over to one of his men, sitting at another desk. ‘Will? I’m gonna need to get a small task force together. Go downstairs, and break out the special hardware, looks as though we’re gonna need it.’
Twenty minutes later, Swan stood over a table, surrounded by nine police officers, all holding various firearms. He held a cigarette in his fingers, while he briefed them over a street map of Titusville. After confirming everything, and handing out to all of them, a photograph of the couple had copied from the original retrieved from Fleischergarten, they led him out to the car park, and into a police car.
Derby stared out of his window, watching them all drive out into the street. Then, after a few moments, he stubbed out what was left of his cigar and grabbed for his hat, deciding he really could not miss any piece of this action.
Chapter 45
In North West London, next to a bridge that carried Victorian engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel’s Great Western Railway across the Grand Union Canal, a man sat waiting on a bench. He looked at his watch, then stared out in front of him, mesmerised by the flow of the water.
Earlier that morning, while sitting in his office in the Russian Embassy in Kensington Gardens, Vasilli Leskov had received a very brief phone call. The caller had given him a message: G- U- C B- 200- D 18:30, then hung up. Translated this stood for: Grand Union Canal — Bridge 200D. 16:30pm. The two-hour time difference was deliberate.
The area where he sat was picturesque, but at this time of the day, also very quiet. In the distance, he could hear traffic being carried across Bulls Bridge, the next crossing along the once industrious waterway, and a structure also built by Brunel.
A few minutes had passed, when he looked to his right and saw a man in a dark suit walking towards him. The man waved a copy of yesterday’s Times newspaper, and sat down on the bench beside him.
The Russian then relaxed, recognising the indicative signal. They shook hands. ‘Comrade, I was just thinking, what a beautiful place this is,’ commented the London director of the KGB.
The man next to him gestured in agreement. He pointed at the light blue girder bridge. ‘Did you know that one of Britain’s famous Victorian engineers built this bridge? It carries one of the oldest railways in the world across it.’
Leskov looked at the bridge and its blue plaque, inscribed with the 200D number, and smiled in appreciation. ‘Is that a fact?’
The KGB man then looked at the brown envelope in the man’s hands. ‘You have something good for me — I trust?’
The man passed it to him. ‘Looks like you have a saboteur at your Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. A German engineer by the name of Dieter Muller. He has been working for you since being captured at the end of the war, and could even be responsible for a number of incidents to your space programme.’
As Leskov opened the envelope, a train passed over the bridge. He speed-read the documents and by time the train had passed, had finished. ‘I will alert Moscow of this, and have this man dealt with. Do you know if he is working alone at the site?’
Leskov had been briefed on the latest N1 rocket disaster, but chose not to disclose this to his informant.
The man nodded. ‘I believe so. He is working for a German businessman, a Gunther Fleischer. The BND and one of our men raided his house near Hamburg, and found some names of ex-Nazi rocket engineers working for different space programmes like NASA, The British Rocket Establishment and your NV114, or whatever you call yourselves nowadays. He loves his birds, as he has given each of these men a bird of prey codename. Apparently, he is following up some wartime Nazi directive known as Operation Falling Star. It was set up to prevent all their advanced science and engineering knowledge from ever being used by the Allies, including you chaps. In fact, our man is over at Cape Canaveral, right now. He fears that the Apollo 11 mission could be in danger. The Yanks must have listened to him, as they flew him over in one of their supersonic F-111 bombers.’
The man looked at his watch. ‘He should be there by now.’
‘And what about your Black Arrow programme?’
‘All but dead in the water anyway, I’m afraid. The last launch out at our site in Australia was a complete disaster. So, I fear our PM will pull the funding on it and shut the programme down all together. I even think the facilities on the Isle of Wight will also closedown. This will of course bring our bid for space exploration to an abrupt halt.’
Leskov smiled at the man holding up the envelope. ‘This is good work, Comrade. I thank you.’ He shook the man’s hand and stood up. ‘Keep in touch, my friend.’
The man nodded. ‘I will, Vasilli.’
Forty five minutes later, the man walked up the stairs to the first floor in Leconfield House and was acknowledged by his long suffering secretary.
The man turned and smiled at her. ‘Any calls Katherine, while I was out?’
Katherine Miller nodded. ‘No, sir.’
The Head of B Section, Hugo Davies was relieved to hear this. ‘Jolly good, You may as well go home now. Have a nice evening,’ He entered his office and shut the door behind him.
Outside Peter Weisemann’s bungalow in South Street, Swan sat with Derby in the unmarked police vehicle. He surveyed the front of the building, wondering if Fleischer was inside.
Derby puffed on his Panama. ‘I suppose you’re thinking’ the same thing as I am, Swan. Is that Kraut bastard inside, or isn’t he?’ He turned to the Englishman, noticing a bulge under the left side of his jacket. ‘I see you are carrying. So what do you have? Don’t tell me, a Walther PPK?’
Swan decided to ignore yet another tiresome reference to Fleming’s fictional British secret agent. ‘I think we will give it another ten minutes, then knock on the door. What do you think, Roland?’
Derby knew from being called by his proper first name, he had annoyed his associate. He hated being called Roland; only his wife addressed him by it, and that was only when she was annoyed with him.
Ten minutes later, the two men climbed out of the car and walked towards the house. Swan looked through the windows and could not see any movement inside. It seemed that no-one was at home. On this, they decided to enter. Swan took out his gift of lock picks from Bruno Weitz and inserted one into the lock of the glass fronted door. After a few seconds, he was amazed how quickly it had taken for him to hear that triumphant ‘click’.
With the rest of Derby’s posse out of sight per Swan’s instructions, the two men entered. Swan walked behind the big sheriff as he searched inside, his gun at arm’s length in front of him. After a few moments, he confirmed that the premises were indeed empty. Swan observed his big companion place the pistol back into his belt holster.
They moved through into the kitchen, and seeing something on the table, went over to it. Swan thumbed through the contents of the bound manual to the Grumman Lunar Module’s guidance system, and held it up to show Derby. ‘I think this confirms that The Onyx Cross mean business, don’t you sheriff?’