"This way, please, Captain."
The room into which Faulmann ushered his guest scarcely seemed sinister enough to be part of a Gestapo establishment. In fact, it reminded Carter of his bank manager's office, back home. The wood-paneled walls with their scattering of random pictures, the highly polished desk and elaborately molded chairs, the gracefully arranged potted ferns in brass planters, all seemed far too innocuous, given what went on in other, less accessible parts of the building.
"Is this your office?" he asked.
"No. This office is reserved for the use of high-ranking visitors such as Colonel Eisner." Faulmann glanced over his shoulder, as two of his men, none too gently, brought Cecilie in. "Leave the woman here," he ordered. Then as soon as the guards had left the room, he addressed her with elaborate courtesy: "Please, dear lady, sit down."
She didn't move. Faulmann waited for a few seconds, then gripped her upper arm with a force that drew a gasp from her, and forced her onto the nearest chair. Anything else he might have been considering, however, was forgotten, as Carter, acting by pure reflex, got between them, effectively forcing Faulmann to back off.
"There's no need for that," said Carter under his breath. "We're her friends now, right? You don't want her getting second thoughts, do you?"
"No," replied Faulmann, after a pause. "No, you are right. My apologies, madame." He bowed, but the rigidity of his expression and the cold look in his eyes showed just how much it was worth.
He beckoned Carter to one side, and spoke more quietly. "Captain, I trust that your previous intimacy with the woman is not going to soften your attitude. She is a traitor, after all. Perhaps it would be better to take her to the cells for now."
"No, leave her here," said Carter quickly. "She'll be easier to handle if we show her we can be nice, now that she's agreed to talk."
Faulmann considered this viewpoint. "Very well. She can't escape, in any case. The whole building is secure." He glanced at Cecilie, with a slight sneer. "In that case, I must leave her in your care for the time being. I have other duties to attend to, if you will excuse me." He clicked his heels together, saluted and left.
Carter let his breath go, and leaned heavily on the desk, both hands spread out to support his weight. "What the heck is wrong with you? Don't you know what these guys are like?"
Cecilie lowered her eyes. "He is an animal," she whispered.
"He sure is. But you get him all riled up, and he could hurt you, real bad, a whole lot worse than he already did." Carter broke off. After a few seconds he went on, more quietly, "Just play along, till Colonel Hogan gets here."
"How long will that be?" she asked, her voice cracking.
"I don't know." Carter straightened up, unconsciously wrapping his arms across his chest. His head wound was throbbing again, and the bruising down his side felt as if he'd just been kicked in the ribs. "See, that guy Eisner's on his way, they gotta take care of him first. But they won't let us down." His own voice sounded uncertain in his ears, and he cleared his throat. "Colonel Hogan won't let us down. He'll be here."
She looked down at her hands, the wrists still circled by handcuffs. "Why shouldn't we try to get out ourselves?" she said. Then, as Carter turned to stare at her, she went on, desperately. "The Gestapo man seems to trust you, he left us here with no guard."
Carter flushed. "That doesn't mean we can just walk out of here. Didn't you see how many goons they've got, all over the place? We wouldn't even make it to the stairs."
"We might be lucky," she persisted.
"We might get shot."
He knew what she was thinking: better dead than alive, in the Gestapo's hands. "The window?" she asked, after a few seconds of thought.
A quick look put paid to that idea. "No good," he said. "It looks out onto the street, and the guards at the main entrance would spot us right away. Anyway, we're six floors up, and nothing to hold on to."
He hesitated for a few more seconds, then went to the door, and cautiously opened it, no more than a few millimeters. But that was enough to attract the attention of the two guards standing outside, one on each side of the door. Both of them immediately came to attention. Carter stood momentarily petrified under their eyes, before he pulled himself together, and opened the door fully.
"Just checking," he said curtly. "Keep up the good work. The Führer would be proud of you."
The guards exchanged slightly puzzled glances. "Danke, Herr Hauptmann," one of them replied.
Carter retreated, closing the door. "Not a chance," he mumbled. "There's two guys right outside the door."
"Why?" Cecilie asked. She had gone pale. "Have they realized you're not Karl?"
"I don't know. Maybe." He went back to the window again. "Maybe not. They might just be extra security. He seems kind of worried in case I can't handle you, on account of you and Weber...anyway, they're there. So we better just forget it, and wait for the colonel to turn up. He'll get here, all right."
Her shoulders dropped slightly, but then she braced, and lifted her chin. "Very well. We will wait."
"Uh-huh." He knew that sounded cold, but he couldn't help it. Her relationship with Weber, whatever it had been, was a barrier he couldn't get past. "Colonel Hogan will get here," he repeated. But she didn't look as if she believed him.
He looked out again, hoping unreasonably that maybe he'd see the brown Opel car, with LeBeau and Kurt, but there was no sign. Of course, they had to stay out of sight. They knew where he was, they'd be somewhere nearby. But he'd have given anything to be sure.
Had he known it, they had ditched the Opel, in case Faulmann or his driver recognized it, and were now watching from the vantage point of an apartment in the building across the road.
LeBeau remained at the window, his eyes scanning the Gestapo building, while Kurt sat in one of the armchairs, cleaning his gun. He looked up, as a knock fell on the door, and pushed the clip back in.
Two raps, a pause, then two slower raps. Kurt gestured to LeBeau to keep quiet, then went to the door, and put his eye to the spy hole. "It's Colonel Hogan," he murmured.
As he opened the door, LeBeau turned away from the window. "They're here, mon colonel. They arrived about an hour ago. Carter looked okay."
Hogan frowned slightly. "It took that long to get here?"
"They stopped on the way," said Kurt. "They have a secret base, hidden off the road."
"Maybe that's where they've been holding our friends from Düsseldorf. Faulmann must have decided to bring them into town."
"They didn't bring them," LeBeau put in. "There was a woman, we saw her when they took her inside. Cecilie, I guess. But nobody else, only Faulmann and two other Gestapo men."
"No sign of the others?" said Hogan sharply.
"No, sir."
"It would have been difficult to bring three prisoners in a staff car," remarked Kurt. "Perhaps they left the other two behind, for now."
"Yeah, maybe. But I've got a bad feeling about it." Hogan's frown deepened. "It makes things a little more complicated. As if they needed to be."
"Is something wrong, mon colonel?" asked LeBeau.
Hogan gave a short laugh. "We found out Eisner was already on his way here."
LeBeau stared at him, horrified. "But if he gets here while you're in there..."
"He won't," replied Hogan. "We stopped him on the way, and talked him into lending us his staff car, and his clothes." A slight grimace crossed his face. "That means we've got an extra four men for you to deal with, Kurt - Eisner, his aide and two SS men. We've got 'em on ice, out on the Schmeckhausen Road."
"You want our people to take them, along with the two you are holding at Stalag 13?" Kurt thought it through. "It could be manageable. We have three men from Düsseldorf, plus Dieter. Add in the two men the Gestapo are holding, and that will make six. The plan is for them to dress as SS officers, nicht? And for the real SS men to be passed off as captured Underground members?"
"Along with Weber and Staller," Hogan confirmed. "But if we can't spring those two guys, that shifts the balance, and not in our favor."
"Staller's wounded," LeBeau reminded him.
"Yeah, and my guess is, Eisner's not going to be much good in a fight. But that still leaves three SS men, all of them in good shape, plus Weber who's something of a wild card."
"Our men can handle them," said Kurt grimly.
"Let's hope so." Hogan went to the window, and surveyed the building opposite. "Okay, we'll play it by ear. Kurt, get your men together, and meet us at the entrance to the old waterworks in an hour. LeBeau, you better go with him. I know," he went on, as LeBeau ventured a protest, "but we didn't bring an SS uniform for you, so I can't use you here. You already did your part. Now it's my turn."
LeBeau looked away, his impatience clearly written on his face. "Yes, sir," he muttered.
"Excuse me, colonel," said Kurt, "but would it not be better for someone else to go in as Eisner? You are too valuable to your own organization, and to ours, to take such risks. I am known to them, but I have other men available who could..."
"No," replied Hogan brusquely. "Carter's expecting to see me. Anyone he doesn't recognize turns up, and he's liable to get flustered and give the show away. Besides..." He broke off, his eyes on the façade opposite, with its precise rows of windows. He knew, by the sudden relaxation of LeBeau's shoulders, that the Frenchman knew what he was thinking.
I sent him in there. It's my job to bring him out.
"They've been in there long enough," he said at last. "Let's move."