'Yes. And we kept another hundred and twenty thousand between 1945 and 1954 in Hitler's old concentration camps. Many were Nazis, but businessmen and professionals were also our targets. A third of those died. The others were eventually released and absorbed into the Democratic Republic.'
'Including Nazi sympathisers?'
'Of course.'
'Doesn't that concern you?'
Sorge shrugged. 'Not really. I was eight years old at the time.' It wasn't the answer that the DDI expected and Sorge regretted his words. He wasn't here to make jokes. 'The thirty thousand in the Soviet Union, as I said, became a community in their own right. Without our knowledge, over the years, with the use of their money and supportive people in the Swiss banks, they forged contacts with those left behind in East Germany. They all had one dream. To regain what they had lost. They had a codename amongst themselves. Something that linked them, was a reminder of how they had got there. It had to be a safe name, innocuous, nothing that would draw attention to the past. They remembered the Lucy network, their gateway out of Germany. They called themselves Die Lucie Geists.'
'The Lucy Ghosts.'
'Yes.'
'Did the organisation extend to America?' The Exec Director was alarmed.
'Goodenache. I guess he was one of them?' asked the DDI.
'We weren't sure, but in view of his sudden departure, I would say yes.'
'Which ties Trimmler in. And God knows who else. The name Grob Mitzer mean anything?'
'He was one of their leaders. It was the Lucy Ghosts who supplied him with the cash that helped him build his empire.'
'Why didn't you stop it? Dammit, you knew about it for long enough,' snapped the Exec Director.
'We didn't realise how important it was. We thought they were like any other war time group, nothing more than reminiscences and marching songs. Old men remembering their youth. The importance of it didn't surface until Germany was reunified. And it was only the Englishman overhearing the conversation between Goodenache and Trimmler that finally bridged the gap.'
'So why should the English guy take off with the girl?' The DDI changed the subject.
'He's not one of us. I suggest you ask your allies about that. Maybe he's just an adventurer. No more. You must have cleared him.'
'Of course.' The Exec Director didn't want his dirty washing wrung out in front of this Russian. 'Was there anything else?'
'Only that the GDR, East Germany, as it was, is different to the West. There are still many there who haven't forgotten the War. Their attitude is different to us. Some are still waiting for the War to end. They're a traditional people. Many ex-Nazis, even Gestapo, working and living normal every day lives.'
'Working for the Stasi.' The DDI reminded them all of the secret police who had run East Germany with an iron fist.
'Some, yes. Others returned to the jobs they had before the War. Within the new Germany, many of them have become frightened. Their secrets are no longer safe. Most of all they fear the Israelis.'
'Is Frick one of these guys?' asked the DDA, remembering the name had been picked up by Adam in New Orleans.
'No,' lied Sorge. His orders were quite specific. Don't ratify any names. They didn't want the Yanks stumbling in and screwing up in an attempt to force the issue.
'So what's all this got to do with the deaths of our agents?' continued the DDA.
'We're not sure. Except that a lot of the information we have both lost was about the Lucy Ghosts. Link that with Trimmler's death, Goodenache's sudden departure for Germany, and the mention of the Lucy Ghosts during their conversation, and I think you will agree that is the strongest lead we have to follow.'
Nobody spoke for a while, then the Exec Director re-opened the discussion: 'Has Moscow any suggestions as to how we should proceed?'
'No,' replied Sorge. Which was what he'd been told to say. 'We hoped you would come up with something.'
'I'm sure we will.'
'Can you tell us the names of some of these Lucy Ghosts?' cut in the DDI. 'The ones in Russia. How high up the ladder did they go?'
Sorge enjoyed his reply. 'In time, yes. But I can tell you you're wasting your efforts looking for Martin Bormann in South America. He died twenty years ago.'
He watched their stunned faces across the room. Well and truly shafted.
They said little after that and Sorge was soon being escorted, with Nowak, down to the underground garage. Five minutes later they were on their way back to Washington.
'Bormann. Fucking Bormann. They had him all the time,' said an astonished DDI. 'Would'ya believe it? They probably got Hitler stashed away too.'
'Well, it's been a real eye opener,' said the Exec Director. 'But let's not forget we've still got a crisis on. Find the Englishman. Find him and see what the son of a bitch is up to.'
Ch. 52
The son of a bitch was relaxed as he hurtled across the land that is America.
The train had pulled out of Atlanta Station at seven thirty nine p.m., four minutes behind schedule.
They had slept well, eaten well, slept again and eventually got bored with the passing countryside. Adam had insisted they stay in the room and she hadn't found a good enough reason to change his mind.
He was thumbing through USA TODAY for the umpteenth time, looking for something he might have missed, when he heard her giggling. She was in the swivel chair, reflected in the window with the dark night as a backdrop, her head angled towards him.
'What's so funny?' he asked pleasantly, putting the paper down.
'You sure know how to give a girl a good time.'
'Don't I?' he grinned back.
'According to all the books, a secret agent's life's meant to be glamorous. We've spent twenty four hours together and in that time I've been bitten by bugs in a hooker's bed, tied up a guy with no legs and stolen his wheelchair, stayed cooped up in a train for twelve hours with an attractive man and behaved like a virgin. Don't take that the wrong way. But James Bond would've handled it differently.'
'He was Scottish. I'm English. They’re the ram 'em and bang' em type. We're more sophisticated.'
'What happens next?'
'In which department?'
'In the where're we going department.'
'To Nordhausen. That's where Trimmler said he would meet Goodenache.'
'Trimmler's dead.'
'And Goodenache's running from the Russians. He can't go back there. From what I heard, Germany was still their home. And Nordhausen was where they shared something special. They wanted to go there. If Goodenache's frightened, and he wants to hide, that's as good a place as any.'
'Nordhausen. Where is that?'
'Central Germany. South of Berlin, near what was the old east-west border. It was where the Nazis built most of their rockets, the V1's and V2's, during the Second World War. From what I remember, they moved most of the rocket manufacture down there so that our bombers couldn't get to them. Built the factory right in the heart of the mountains. Used slave labour. I think a lot of people died in the making of those weapons, even before they got launched and blew up half of London.'
'Why go back there?'
‘That’s what we hope to find out.'
‘He won’t go there. Not when he finds out that Mitzer and Trimmler are dead.'
‘Maybe other people are also going there. Maybe he’ll go there because it’s where he feels safe.'
'Maybe. Now that he’ll know he’s a fugitive.'
She shrugged and looked thoughtful.
'Penny for them,' he said after a while.
'I was thinking of Peter.'
'Ah! The venerable ex.'