Five minutes after U-509's radio operator transmitted his message to BdU in northern France, the duty officer at BdU flashed a brief message to Hamburg. The duty officer at Hamburg was an Abwehr veteran named Captain Schmidt. He recorded the message, placed a priority call to Abwehr headquarters in Berlin on the secure line, and informed Lieutenant Werner Ulbricht of the developments. Schmidt then left the mansion and walked down the street to a nearby hotel, where he booked a second call to Berlin. He did not want to make this call from the thoroughly bugged lines of the Abwehr post, for the number he gave the operator was for Brigadefuhrer Walter Schellenberg's office at Prinz Albrechtstrasse. Unfortunately for Schmidt, Schellenberg had discovered he was having a rather lurid affair with a sixteen-year-old boy in Hamburg. Schmidt readily agreed to go to work for Schellenberg to avoid exposure. When the call went through he spoke to one of Schellenberg's many assistants-the general was dining out that night-and informed him of the news.
Kurt Vogel had decided to spend a rare evening at his small flat a few blocks from Tirpitz Ufer. Ulbricht reached him there by telephone and informed him that Horst Neumann had contacted the submarine and was coming out. Five minutes later, Vogel was letting himself out the front door of his building and walking through the rain toward Tirpitz Ufer.
At that same moment Walter Schellenberg checked in with his office and was told of developments in Britain. He then telephoned Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler and briefed him. Himmler ordered Schellenberg to come to Prinz Albrechtstrasse; it was going to be a long night and he wanted some company. As it happened, Schellenberg and Vogel arrived at their respective offices at precisely the same moment and settled in for the wait.
The location of the Allied invasion of France.
The life of Admiral Canaris.
And it all depended on the word of a couple of spies on the run from MI5.
53
Martin Colville used the barrel of his shotgun to push back the door of the barn. Neumann, still standing next to the radio, heard the noise. He reached for his Mauser as Colville stepped inside. Colville spotted Neumann going for the gun. He turned, leveled the shotgun, and fired. Neumann leapt out of the way, hitting the floor of the barn and rolling. The roar of the shotgun blast in the confined space of the barn was deafening. The radio disintegrated.
Colville aimed the gun at Neumann a second time. Neumann rolled up onto his elbows, Mauser in his outstretched hands. Sean Dogherty stepped forward, screaming at Colville to stop. Colville turned the gun on Dogherty and squeezed the trigger. The blast struck Dogherty in the chest, lifting him off his feet and driving him backward like a rag doll. He fell on his back, blood pumping from the gaping wound in his chest, and died within a matter of seconds.
Neumann fired, hitting Colville in the shoulder and spinning him around. Catherine had by now drawn her own Mauser and, using both hands, leveled it at Colville's head. She fired twice rapidly, the silencer dampening the blasts to a dull thud. Colville's head exploded and he was dead before his body hit the floor of Dogherty's barn.
Mary Dogherty lay in an agitated half sleep upstairs in her bed when she heard the first shotgun blast. She sat bolt upright and swung her feet to the floor as the second blast shattered the night. She threw off her blanket and raced downstairs.
The cottage was in darkness, the sitting room and the kitchen deserted. She went outside. Rain beat against her face. She realized that she was wearing only her flannel nightgown. There was silence now, only the sound of the storm. She looked out across the garden and spotted an unfamiliar black van in the drive. She turned toward the barn and saw light burning there. She called out "Sean!" and started running toward the barn.
Mary's feet were bare, the ground cold and sodden. She called Sean's name several more times as she ran. A shaft of faint light spilled from the open door of the barn, illuminating a box of shotgun shells on the ground.
Stepping inside, she gasped. A scream caught in her throat and would not come out. The first thing she saw was the body of Martin Colville lying on the floor of the barn a few feet away from her. Part of the head was missing and blood and tissue were scattered everywhere. She felt her stomach retch.
Then she turned her attention to the second body. It was on its back, arms flung wide. Somehow, in death, the ankles had become crossed, as though he were napping. Blood obscured the face. For a brief second Mary permitted herself to hope that it wasn't actually Sean lying there dead. Then she looked at the old Wellington boots and oilskin coat and knew it was him.
The scream that had been trapped in her throat came out.
Mary cried, "Oh, Sean! Oh, my God, Sean! What have you done?"
She looked up and saw Horst Neumann standing over Sean's body, a gun in his hand. Standing a few feet from Neumann was a woman, holding a pistol in her hands aimed at Mary's head.
Mary looked back at Neumann and screamed, "Did you do this? Did you?"
"It was Colville," Neumann said. "He came in here, gun blazing. Sean got in the way. I'm sorry, Mary."
"No, Horst. Martin may have pulled the trigger, but you did this to him. Make no mistake about it. You and your friends in Berlin-you're the ones who did this to him."
Neumann said nothing. Catherine still stood with the Mauser leveled at Mary's head. Neumann stepped in, took hold of the weapon, and gently lowered it toward the ground.
Jenny Colville stayed in the darkened meadow and approached the barn from the side, hidden from view. She crouched against the outside wall, rain smacking against her oilskin, and listened to the conversation taking place inside.
She heard the voice of the man she knew as James Porter, though Mary had called him something else, something that sounded like Horse. It was Colville… Sean got in the way. I'm sorry, Mary.
Then she heard Mary's voice. It had risen in pitch and quivered with anger and grief. You did this to him… You and your friends in Berlin.
She waited to hear her father's voice; she waited to hear Sean's voice. Nothing. She knew then they both were dead.
You and your friends in Berlin…
Jenny thought, What are you saying, Mary?
And then it all came together in her mind, like pieces of a puzzle that suddenly fall in the right order: Sean on the beach that night, the sudden appearance of the man called James Porter, Mary's warning to her earlier that afternoon: He's not what he appears to be… He's not for you, Jenny…
Jenny did not understand what Mary was trying to say at the time, but now she thought she did. The man she knew as James Porter was a German spy. And that meant Sean was a spy for the Germans too. Jenny's father must have discovered the truth and confronted them. And now he was lying dead on the floor of Sean Dogherty's barn.
Jenny wanted to scream. She felt hot tears pouring from her eyes down her cheeks. She raised her hands to her mouth to smother the sound of her crying. She had fallen in love with him, but he had lied to her and used her and he was a German spy and he probably just killed her father.
There was movement inside the barn, movement and a few soft exchanges of instructions that Jenny could not hear. She heard the German spy's voice, and she heard a woman's voice that did not belong to Mary. Then she saw the spy emerge from the barn and walk down the drive, torch in hand. He was heading toward the bicycles. If he found them, he would realize she was here too.
And he would come looking for her.
Jenny forced herself to breathe slowly, evenly, to think clearly.
She was being battered by several emotions. She was frightened, she was sick with the thought of her father and Sean dead. But more than anything else she was angry. She had been lied to and betrayed. And now she was driven by one overwhelming desire: she wanted them caught and she wanted them punished.