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Overview
Tom Jaeger’s war with the Nazis began the day World War II ended . . .
During those last days in the bunker, Hitler and Bormann created a plan that would perpetuate the cause of Nazism long after they were dead. A small band of highly trained agents were to be planted all over the world, someday to come together and bring final glory to the Fatherland.
Rudolph Kessler was one of those sleeper agents. He was letter-perfect in English, incredibly smart, and highly resourceful. All he had to do was get through the enemy lines once the war was over, make his way to the United States, and then prepare incognito for the precise moment when the worldwide Fascist movement would once again rear its ugly head. And only one man stood in his way: Tom Jaeger. Only Tom understood the lethal, far-ranging depths of this daring plan. And he couldn’t get anyone to listen—except for one woman . . .
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781497642737 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Open Road Media |
| Publication date: | 07/01/2014 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 278 |
| File size: | 971 KB |
About the Author
Ib Melchior was born and raised in Denmark, receiving the post-graduate degree of Cand. Phil from the University of Copenhagen. Arriving in the United States in 1938, he worked as a stage manager at the Radio City Music Hall in New York City and began his writing career, penning short pieces for national magazines. When the attack on Pearl Harbor plunged the country into war, he volunteered his service to the US Armed Forces, and served four years, two of them in the ETO working as a counterintelligence agent. His work earned him decorations from three countries, including the US, and he was subsequently knighted and awarded the Knight Commander Cross by the Militant Order of Sct Brigitte of Sweden. After the war, he moved to Hollywood in 1957 to write and direct motion pictures. In addition to twelve screenplays, including The Time Travelers, which is one of the films he also directed, he has written seventeen books, most of them bestsellers. Best known for his WWII novels that explored his own exploits as a CIC agent, such as Sleeper Agent and Order of Battle, his books are published in translations in twenty-five countries. For his work, he has been honored with the Golden Scroll for his body of work by the Science Fiction Academy and the Hamlet Award for best legitimate play by the Shakespeare Society of America.
Read an Excerpt
Sleeper Agent
By Ib Melchior
OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA
Copyright © 1975 Ib MelchiorAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4976-4273-7
CHAPTER 1
Her eyes hated him.
She was a pretty girl. Perhaps twenty-six. Her blond hair, drawn back tightly, was gathered by a thin blue ribbon at the nape of her neck and allowed to hang loosely down her back. Her tanned face was fresh and soft, but her troubled eyes were dark with hate. More than hate. Suspicion. Uncertainty. And fear.
Thomas Jaeger knew the look. Knew it well. He had seen it cloud the bleak faces of countless suspects, male and female, young and old, military and civilian, from the shores of Omaha Beach through Normandy and Luxembourg, across the Rhine and through the heartland of Germany to this little Bavarian town of Grafenwöhr nestled in the forest clad mountains twenty-five miles southeast of Bayreuth. Here his Counter Intelligence team, one of the six teams of CIC Detachment 212, had set up shop only the day before, even as the place was being secured by elements of the 1lth Armored Division.
Grafenwöhr was a town like so many others in Bavaria. Picturesque, colorful, distinguished only by the presence of a huge German Chemical Warfare Service dump concealed in the woods surrounding it. Stacks and stacks of incendiary bombs and poison gas projectiles. The Ordnance boys had estimated over three million of them. Enough to wipe out all of Europe.
The girl had wandered into town—she, her girl friend and her little boy, who was four years old, healthy, cute—and obviously pure Aryan.
Their clothes, though of good quality, were dirty and bedraggled. They said they came from the Czech town of Pilsen, some seventy-five miles to the east, and had been on the road for days, carrying their scant belongings with them, in an effort to reach their home town of Bayreuth before being cut off and trapped by the rapidly advancing Russian troops.
He believed them.
But it was CIC routine to screen everyone who crossed the line from enemy-held territory, military or civilian. And there were literally thousands of them.
The front was beginning to break up. Hitler's thousand-year Third Reich lay gutted, cut in half like a chicken carcass on a butcher's block.
The situation was unpredictable from hour to hour, from village to village. Fierce resistance and heavy fire-fighting, especially where Waffen SS troops were in command, were still the order of the day. And yet in some sectors the hordes of surrendering German troops were so great it became impossible to handle them. As in Grafenwöhr.
Columns of Nazi troops, crowded onto their own vehicles, fully armed and under the command of their own officers, rumbled through on their way to the rear and captivity—with a single GI as both guide and guard. German staff cars, trucks and Volkswagens rubbed fenders with American half-tracks, 2½-ton trucks and jeeps on the narrow roads Ramrod German officers with white armbands reading LIAISON OFFICER WITH U.S. ARMY shared the streets with American MP's, and field orders were issued in both English and German by American and German commanding officers. Tom had seen one entire battalion of Nazi troops marching smartly through town, unguarded, carrying a white sign before them as if it were a conquered enemy standard: THESE ARE PW'S. DIRECT TO NEAREST CAGE. So many individual soldiers were trying to give themselves up that nobody could find time to bother with them—even when they anxiously accosted the GI's, holding out their paybooks and literally begging to be taken prisoner. The Americans would just point to the rear and order them to march.
Mixed in with the hectic military traffic came German civilians fleeing Czechoslovakia before the Russian onslaught; petty Nazi officials, who only weeks before had been the haughty masters of Sudetenland; dependents of the occupation forces; and others who thought it best to seek safety from the "savage Slavs."
On foot, crammed into all kinds of vehicles, pushing carts or bicycles, they streamed into the little Bavarian town. They were ordered to stay off the main roads so as not to impede military traffic, but this rule was constantly violated. It was the duty of the CIC to screen this flood of people before allowing them to proceed farther into Germany—behind the American lines.
The girl sitting so tensely before Tom and his partner, CIC agent Larry Scott, was one of these fugitives.
They had interrogated her companion first. Her name was Liselotte Greiner. She had answered their routine questions satisfactorily. Her papers were as valid as any, and her story had been plausible. She was obviously intelligent, but her handsome face had seemed hard. Perhaps it was only a resentful animosity she could not conceal. But she had been in complete control of herself, even a little haughty.
They had not liked her. But it was not their job to like or dislike their subjects. Only to screen them. They had been all set to send the two girls on their way after the usual cursory examination which under the circumstances constituted a screening.
But Tom had felt uneasy when they started questioning the second girl. Her name was Maria Bauer. Where her companion had been composed, she was nervous. Where they had seen only hostility and venom in the eyes of her friend, here there was also fear. Where the other's face had been only hard and resentful, hers was also vulnerable and fearful.
Tom recognized his nagging feeling of uneasiness. He knew what it meant. A hunch. A hunch that all was not as it seemed. A hunch that his subject was concealing something. A hunch that could not be explained logically but which was a familiar sensation to every seasoned interrogator. Seldom wrong, it had to be followed up.
He glanced at Larry. His partner met his glance and nodded imperceptibly. He, too, felt it, Tom realized.
Many subjects were nervous and ill at ease under interrogation. It was normal. But this girl had something to hide. Something she was in deadly fear they would discover.
Tom once more studied the little gray Kennkarte in his hand. It was the standard German identification card. It seemed in order, crisp and clean. He looked at the date of
issue: 17 September 1943. He frowned. "When was your Kennkarte issued to you?" he asked. His German was perfect.
The tip of the girl's tongue flitted between her dry lips in a darting motion. "On September seventeenth, 1943."
Perhaps that was it, he thought. Perhaps that was what had alerted him, nudged his subconscious into kindling his hunch. The girl had fished out her identification card from a large purse she nervously clutched to her. It was in too good a condition to have been treated like that for more than a year and a half.
"You've had this card since then?"
"Yes."
Slowly he turned the card over in his hand. Thoughtfully he examined it. "It's in pretty good shape for being that old, isn't it?"
Again the tip of her tongue darted swiftly between her bloodless lips. "I ... I didn't carry it with me for a long time after I got it," she whispered. "I ... I left it at the house."
Tom looked questioningly at her. "In Pilsen? In a strange town? You do come from Bayreuth, don't you?"
"Yes."
"And you didn't think it necessary to carry your German identification card with you—in Czechoslovakia?" His tone of voice eloquently conveyed his incredulity.
"No." It was barely a whisper.
"What would you have done if you'd been picked up?" Larry asked suddenly. "Or had an accident?"
The girl looked quickly toward the source of this new thrust. "I ... I don't know," she whispered. "I ... never thought ..."
Tom frowned at the Kennkarte. There was ... something. But, dammit, it would take the whole bag of tricks, no doubt, to get at the truth. Time. And time they did not have. There were hundreds of others still to be screened. Hell, he thought, what kind of Mata Hari could this frightened kid be, anyway? There might be another way to get to her. A quicker way.
He smiled at her. His voice was friendly and relaxed. "Very well, Frau Bauer. Your papers seem to be in order." He gave the Kennkarte back to her. He watched her closely.
The reaction he expected did not come. The tenseness in the girl's face did not change. The fear in her eyes did not diminish.
He was puzzled. He had been sure she would relax once her identification had been accepted. He watched her. Watched her slender hands unconsciously twisting and untwisting the heavy shoulder strap on the bag she clutched to her.
Something else?
"Frau Bauer!" His voice was suddenly sharp. "Give me your bag!"
There was a barely perceptible gasp from the girl. The blood drained from her face, leaving her tanned cheeks a sickly gray.
Something else ...
Without a word she handed him the bag.
He took it. He turned it upside down. Its contents spilled out upon the table. The girl watched, mesmerized. He moved the objects about. A large comb. A purse with a little money. A purple hair ribbon. A lipstick. Handkerchief. A small pocket knife. A piece of paper with several safety pins attached. A child's toy whistle. A fountain pen. And ... ah! There it was.
He picked it up. A solid gold medal, twice the size of a silver dollar and many times as heavy, with a bas-relief religious motif embossed on both sides.
He had found the "something else."
The medal must represent a fortune to her, he thought. Her only means of starting a new life for herself and her boy, once back in Bayreuth, the only concrete hope in her nightmare world.
It explained her extreme nervousness. She was simply afraid he'd liberate the only thing of value she possessed. He felt sorry for her. His guilt feelings began to stir again. Angrily he suppressed them. He knew damned well how irrational they were.
He handed the heavy gold piece back to the girl. "Here," he said, his voice reassuring. "You'd better hold on to this."
She took the coin. Her fingers touched his. They were cold.
So certain had he been that he'd found the reason for her uneasiness that he almost missed her reaction. Or rather, lack of reaction. The girl did not relax. She showed no relief as she held the gold medal tightly clenched in her fist.
Tom shot a glance at Larry, but his partner's attention was on the release report he'd already begun to fill out.
Tom felt his pulse quicken. He had misread the girl completely. He suddenly knew he had to follow through. He scooped up the rest of the girl's belongings and dumped them into her handbag. He gave it to her.
She seemed to relax. She clutched the bag to her. She even looked a little smug as Tom unhurriedly reached over and picked up the release form filled out by Larry. He appeared to study it, but his thoughts were racing.
It was not the medal, not the gold value of it that concerned the girl. He was sure of it. It was easy to verify.
He looked up at her. He smiled. "That's a very interesting medal you have there," he commented. "Let me see it again." He held out his hand.
At once the girl dug into her bag and came up with the gold medal. She handed it to Tom. "Bitte," she said.
She watched him as he looked the coin over. But there was no anxiety in her large eyes. Rather a certain ... expectation, a seeming eagerness to please her interrogator. Deliberately Tom put the coin in his pocket.
The girl sighed. It was more a sigh of relief than of concern. The gold medal meant nothing to her. He was certain of it now. It had to be something else.
The bag itself!
He suddenly reached over and grabbed the bag from the startled girl. He spilled its familiar contents out onto the table. Quickly he examined the empty bag. He tested the seams, felt the lining and ripped it open. Hidden beneath it was a folded piece of paper. He slipped it out.
The girl had uttered not a word. Ashen-faced, she sat in her chair, an unnatural rigidity stiffening her young body, her eyes dark with fear and shock.
Tom unfolded the paper. It was a letter-sized document. Official. It was headed, GEHEIME STAATSPOLIZEI GEHEIME KOMMANDOSACHE—GESTAPO. TOP SECRET!
It was a routine document. Tom read it quickly. It dealt with the transfer of a certain SS Standartenführer, Gestapo Colonel Wolfgang Steinmetz, from Prague to Pilsen on special assignment. It was dated two weeks before.
Tom was puzzled. It made no sense. Why would she be carrying a document like that? Hidden in the lining of her purse? He passed the document to Larry. He picked up the completed release form and slowly tore it in half. His eyes bored into hers. "Who is this Colonel Steinmetz?" he demanded. "Why are you carrying his transfer orders?"
The girl's lips trembled, but she remained silent.
Larry pushed the Mandatory Arrest and War Criminals Wanted List across the table to Tom. His finger stabbed a name: STEINMETZ, WOLFGANG (39) ss STANDARTENFÜHRER. The colonel was a wanted man. A very much wanted man!
Tom picked up the field telephone. He cranked the handle. "This is Agent Jaeger," he said into the mouthpiece. "CIC Detachment 212. Get me Captain Elliott, Sixteenth Field Hospital. They're in Kemnath."
He waited. The girl was staring at him. She did not understand his words, but she knew it was her fate being decided.
"Ell?" Tom spoke with sober quiet. "I need to borrow one of your nurses.... No, no. A body search. We've got a subject here, a girl. She has to be searched. Thoroughly." He listened for a moment. He frowned. "Oh, come on, Ell. You can shake one of them loose for a few hours. I'll send a jeep for her."
Again he listened, his face grim. "Okay, Ell. I got you. Thanks." He hung up and turned to Larry. "No go."
"Dammit!" Larry sounded thoroughly disgusted.
"The Twenty-sixth ran into a pocket of SS. Beat the hell out of their forward units. They can't even spare an aspirin." He looked at the girl sitting tensely before him. He stood up. "Let's get on with it," he said.
They went over every inch of every stitch of clothing the girl possessed. Systematically they searched the girl herself. Things can be concealed in many ways. There are seven orifices in the female body. Each can afford a place of concealment. They did not miss any of them.
The girl endured the humiliating ordeal in stoic silence. She let herself be manipulated like a manikin. She seemed totally, inexorably resigned.
It was a distasteful, degrading experience. For all three of them. But it was not in vain. Taped to the instep of the girl's right foot Tom found a second Kennkarte. It had the same picture, the same description, the same vital data. It was the ID of the same girl. Only the name was different. It was Maria Steinmetz. Frau Wolfgang Steinmetz!
Tom stared at the card. So that was her secret. The damning fact she had been so mortally afraid he'd uncover, so fearful that her very actions in trying to conceal it had given her away. How often that happened, he thought.
Mrs. Wolfgang Steinmetz. Wife of a wanted Gestapo Colonel.
He placed the card on the table. He looked at the young naked girl standing in the middle of the room, her arms hanging dead at her sides, her head bowed. He swallowed. He turned to Larry. "Let her get dressed," he said quietly. "I'll be back in a couple of minutes." He left the room.
The house taken over by the CIC team belonged to a local big shot. It was large, opulently furnished in typical Teutonic taste, situated on the outskirts of town.
The owner, his family and servants had been living in it when Tom and his teammates had commandeered it. The Germans had been given half an hour to clear out and allowed to take only the most necessary possessions. In fear and shock they had obeyed, and the CIC team had moved in. They'd stay there until they had to move on, at which time the family could return to their home.
It was routine procedure, a procedure that had been learned the hard way: Always take over a house that is occupied and kick the occupants out fast. Empty houses are booby-trapped!
Tom and Larry were using the family dining room on the main floor as their interrogation room. Now Tom stood in the large entrance foyer. For a moment he leaned against the closed door to the interrogation room. He seemed to see the foyer for the first time: the front door with the two etched glass panels, the grandfather clock stopped at 7:19, the ornate mahogany dresser with the beveledged mirror and the hanging clothes rack made of deer antlers, the rows of roebuck and elk antlers and the plaques with wild boar tusks adorning the walls.
His parents might well have lived in homes exactly like this, he thought, before they emigrated to the United States. Before he was born.
He wondered what his mother would have thought had she known that her insistence that he learn to speak the language of the old country fluently had made it possible for him to do his present job. To perform duties such as the one he'd just completed. She would not even have been able to comprehend it. Neither she nor his father....
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Sleeper Agent by Ib Melchior. Copyright © 1975 Ib Melchior. Excerpted by permission of OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Contents
PART 1 18 APRIL 1945,PART 2 21-29 APRIL 1945,
PART 3 30 APRIL-5 MAY 1945,
POSTSCRIPT,
ESCAPE ROUTES,
BIBLIOGRAPHY,