Hitler's peace

Approaching the silver-haired figure, I reviewed all of the prejudices I was likely to encounter with this sixty-year-old Hoover Republican, this millionaire lawyer, Irish Catholic decorated war hero. To my certain knowledge, the general had been away from Washington since July, first visiting his son-a lieutenant who was aide to Admiral Hall in Algiers-then in Sicily, then in Quebec, and, for the most part of October and November, in Cairo, trying to foment an anti-Nazi revolution in Hungary and the Balkans.

“Good afternoon, General.” Even as I shook Donovan’s strong hand and sat down, he was catching the waiter’s eye, stubbing out his cigarette, and checking the time on the gold pocket watch he’d pulled from his vest.

“I like a man who is punctual,” said Donovan. “God knows that isn’t easy in this country. How was the voyage? And how is the president?”

I told him about the Willie D. incident and mentioned my suspicions regarding the disappearance of Ted Schmidt and the death of his wife back in Washington. “It’s my opinion that there was a German spy aboard the Iowa, ” I said. “And that having killed Schmidt, he radioed someone in the States to do the same to Mrs. Schmidt. I think someone wanted to make sure that an investigation into Cole’s murder was closed down as quickly as possible, and the Welles scandal made this easy. But my guess is that Cole was on to a German spy. Possibly the same German spy who was aboard the Iowa. ”

“That makes some sense.”

“I asked Ridgeway Poole if he could radio the Campus and find out some more about Mrs. Schmidt’s accident.”

Donovan winced a little, and I remembered, too late, that he hated Washington’s nickname for the OSS HQ almost as much as he hated his own. The “Wild Bill” cognomen by which he was known referred to the Donovan who had won the Congressional Medal of Honor in 1918. These days, the general preferred to project a more sober, responsible image than that of the dauntless battlefield hero. Personally, I didn’t like heroes very much. Especially when they were officers. And whenever I looked at Donovan I wondered how many men in his platoon his heroism had got killed.

“I wouldn’t worry too much about German spies if I were you,” Donovan said as the waiter came over at last. He ordered a lemonade.

My jaw dropped. For a moment, I was too astonished at what the general had just said to order anything at all. I asked for a beer and, when the waiter had gone, an explanation.

“We’re at war with the Germans,” I said. “German intelligence is my special field. I’m supposed to be a liaison officer between you and the president. Why would I not worry about German spies? Especially if one were so close to the president and might already have murdered someone.”

“Because I happen to know that the last thing the Germans want right now is to kill President Roosevelt,” answered Donovan. “For the last few weeks, my man in Ankara has been conducting talks with Franz von Papen, the German ambassador. Von Papen is in touch with leading figures in the German government and army, with a view to negotiating a separate peace between the Germans and the Western allies.”

“Does the president know about this?”

“Of course he does. Goddamn it, do you think I’d do something like this on my own initiative? FDR has an election in 1944, and I’d say the last thing he wants is to send a million American boys into battle unless he absolutely has to.”

“But what about ‘unconditional surrender’?”

Donovan shrugged. “A bargaining ploy, designed to bring Hitler to his senses.”

“And the Russians, what about them?”

“Our intelligence indicates that they’ve been making their own peace feelers, in Stockholm.”

I shook my head in disbelief. “Then what’s the point of all this Big Three stuff?”

Donovan straightened his right leg, painfully. “Peace negotiations take time,” he said. “Especially when they’re being conducted in secret. Besides, they could easily fail. What’s more, we think Sextant One and Sextant Two will help to keep the Germans focused.”

Sextant One was the official code name of the Cairo Conference, and I presumed Sextant Two referred to the Big Three Conference itself.

“I guess that explains a lot,” I said, although, in truth, I wasn’t quite sure exactly what it did explain. It explained why the Joint Chiefs had not been more worried about coming to Cairo. But none of that explained why the Schmidts were dead. Unless, of course, Ted Schmidt really had thrown himself over the side of the boat, and Debbie Schmidt had met a genuine traffic accident.

At the same time, I was aware that even if a separate peace negotiation was being pursued with one German faction, there were probably others, the fanatics, still intent on winning the war, whatever the cost.