Hogan's men gathered in his quarters expectantly. Since the departure of the Gestapo with their prisoner, he'd spent a lot of time on the radio to London and the underground, even meeting with an underground group with an agent who worked as a clerk inside Gestapo HQ. They knew he'd returned with some papers, but still he'd told them nothing, only disappearing into his room with them. After a few days of preoccupation and further calls to London, Hogan finally called a meeting.
"What's the word, Colonel?" asked Lebeau excitedly. "Are we going to help the Captain?"
"Yeah, Colonel," Newkirk chimed in. "God knows what the ruddy Krauts are doing to him!"
You have no idea, thought Hogan. "Captain Harkness is on his own." He gave them a minute to complain, before shouting, "Quiet!" He waited for silence, and said, "He's not our concern, fellas. That's an order."
He saw reluctant acceptance appear in their faces, and continued. "His presence here got me thinking, and I've been doing some digging. It seems there is a trade in POWs , captured Allied soldiers being diverted from proper processing into camps, and ending up ... well, there are worse places than here."
Silence and shocked faces greeted him. "How many?" asked Kinch finally.
Hogan shrugged. "No way to tell. London believes someone in the SS is running the scheme. They're in a good position to make people disappear, and have very few limits to their authority. There's a group stationed in Vienna who seem likely suspects. An underground group in that area observed two SS men handing over half a dozen British prisoners to some men who are involved in running the main rail maintenance. Two of the prisoners were observed later working in a forced labour gang, laying tracks. The group had thought what they saw was a one-off. Our contact in the Hammelburg Gestapo has supplied suspicious expense reports submitted by Hochstetter and two others, a Lieutenant Weiss and Sergeant Bergen. Trips to Vienna, on very flimsy pretexts, followed almost immediately by trips to Dusseldorf and other nearby areas. They're obviously involved, so London wants us to investigate the Hammelburg connection."
His men looked dubious. "London got any suggestions on how we're supposed to investigate the Gestapo?" demanded Newkirk.
Hogan smirked. "It seems Sergeant Bergen is very fond of gambling."
"Of course heis," sighed Newkirk. "I take it we're about to get acquainted?"
"You're going to take him for everything he's got," grinned Hogan. "Which shouldn't take too long as he's had an impressive losing streak lately. And then we're going to blackmail him into telling us exactly what Hochstetter is up to."