Another man, dark-skinned and rough-looking, led them into an old building whose sign read, “Fischerei D73U.” Inside, Goddard could not help but notice fish bins. This clearly was not just a spy hangout but a real fishery. They were led to a dimly lighted room containing two cots and a washbasin.
“Sleep here. You will need it,” the man said, and then took Goddard s hand with his own leathery mitt. “I am so proud you help us. We will end the war and be rid of the Reich.” After the last word he spat on the worn hardwood floor. Goddard nodded but didn’t have time to respond before the other had left him and von Braun alone and closed the door.
“What next?” Goddard asked, sagging onto the nearest cot. At least its sheets seemed clean, he noticed. “You have a rocket factory on the Greek Isles?”
“You know I cannot tell you,” von Braun said in a somewhat guilty tone. “Please do not ask any more, for your own safety. Trust me that we will be safely escorted to our destination. In less than three days, we should be there.”
At that moment, it crossed Goddard’s mind that this could be merely an elaborate scheme involving US servicemen to lure him away from missile-production in America. Wemher, a betrayer? Anything is possible in war; Wemher had already supposedly betrayed his country. The thought became a foreboding.
“I won’t go into Germany,” he stated, coldly eyeing an old friend who looked suddenly menacing.
“We are not going to Deutschland,” von Braun assured him. Von Braun’s face showed momentary pain. “This must be hard on you. I am sorry to bring you into our plan. It’s just that I…” He paused and stared at the ceiling.
“Back when we met, in 1934, when I was young and impressionable, you inspired me to start a movement that kept man’s future in mind. It quickly caught on in that troubled Germany. If it weren’t for you, that fiend Hitler would rule the Europareich. You, Professor Goddard, have changed the world.
“You were the one responsible for the whole project. You are the man I respect above all others. I told the Bolsheviks that the American we needed had to be you. Perhaps I was selfish.” He sighed.
“You may return home if you wish. I will find another American, perhaps one of your designers.”
Goddard pondered these words. So, it was Wemher’s men who poisoned Hitler. Anyone part of that scheme would be reliable to the cause of humanity… unless they tried to kill the Führer only to save Germany, or merely advance themselves. How could he still be alive? So many connections, such a twisted spiral of plots. He drew a relaxing breath.
“ ‘Bolsheviks.’ So it’s Russia, then,” Goddard observed. Von Braun’s reaction verified the guess. Mysterious Russia, home to the Czars and vast unmapped territories. Images flashed into his mind of millions of “screaming Bolsheviks,” as one propaganda poster had labeled them. Hitler had been wise to sign a nonaggression pact with Russia and keep one border cool.
“Russia,” Goddard mused. “Hmmm. Premier Zhukov’s Kremlin has always been fair in its dealings with America. And if the Russians are allying with the Reich, the Allies are lost anyway. I would at least be in favor with the new world rulers, eh? Besides, my team doesn’t really need me anymore. There are a lot of brains at work devising new American bomb-delivery systems.” He wrinkled his forehead.
“Dammit, man!” he exploded. “We’re supposed to be enemies! I hope you are as foolish as I, else I am on my way to becoming a prisoner of war.” Only a tenuous belief in essential humanity, only von Braun’s declared alliance to the whole race before nationality, tore off the lid of claustrophobic fear that had begun to isolate Goddard from the dream-vision which had led him here. But he was, at heart, also first allied to humanity. Even before himself and his safety. What is one face among the billions? Will I let fear delay destiny, at least a hope for destiny?
“OK. I’ll continue on for another few days.”
“Misters Luftkanal and Schwartz,” a deep voice spoke quietly but loudly enough to stir Goddard from uneasy sleep, “we leave now.”
The room was lit by a single gas lantern held by the Greek fisherman from the day before. Goddard rose from his cot to see von Braun already buttoning a dark overcoat.
“Take these,” the Greek said, walking into the room and handing each of the rocket scientists an aged German Luger. “I pray you do not need them.”
Goddard hefted the weapon, turning it from side-to-side. He released the clip and saw that it was fully loaded. The fisherman hung the lantern from a hook near the door and left the room. Goddard stood in undershirt and shorts. He released the safety on the Luger and pointed it at von Braun, who had slid his pistol into the back of his pants.
“Wemher, I am armed now,” Goddard said. The barrel wavered slightly. “Is there anything you need to tell me? You have an excuse now; you can say I forced you to reveal your plan to kidnap me. The Reichcoun-cil—even with Goebbels and his kind in esteemed positions—is lenient compared to how the Reich was under Hitler; they will go easy on you. It wasn’t your fault. So do you need to tell me anything? You say you are my friend; now prove it.”
Von Braun finished buttoning his overcoat and smiled broadly.
“Mein lieber Freund! Good to see you in such high spirits!” He sat down to lace up a pair of salt-caked boots. “Yes, I do have something to say. Tonight we travel to Izmir, in Turkey. Not toward Deutschland, eh?” He laughed and stepped toward Goddard.
“Ah, mein Professor!” he continued. “Do not believe anything men tell you, until they prove it. And then doubt again. Such is the nature of war. This is what I have learned during the bloody Reich, this is the wise way. Even friends, even fools and dreamers can become corrupt. I may be a fool myself. This is why we carry our weapons from now on.” He put his arms out broadly, again grinning, and slowly placed them around Goddard in a gradually tightening hug.
Goddard felt his gun hand weaken and his face tremble somewhere between utter joy and unconcealable anger. A wall had fallen within him, a wall of feeling to which he had been adding bricks of war effort and mortar of patriotism since the war began, and his dreams of space had eroded with each elongating year.
In washed a flood of emotion and the wave of determination it revived. Once more, he felt like the man he had been in Roswell, New Mexico. No—now he felt more alive. Since then, he had witnessed the evil with which humanity infected itself. Then he had been purified in fire. Now, he would be part of humanity’s greatest united effort.
So he hoped. He would let that hope live, he would nurture it, without doubt. There were reasons to hope: The US messenger boy and marine, the US citizens at the airport, the considerably time-consuming blueprints. But if hope were shattered now, after allowing himself to come so alive, well… I’ll not live to see the sunrise that follows my betrayal.
Bub-bub-bub-bub-bub, the creaking, reeking old fishing boat’s muffled engine muttered as it carried them across a choppy sea. The stars were made unseeable when a searchlight swam along the undersurfaces of clouds, turning them into bursts of white. A crescent Moon had already set. Goddard, von Braun, the fisherman and an older woman stood on the decks, watching the searchlight and other fishing-boats’ lights weave tapestries of the night.