The Haigerloch Project

He screamed. The hellish sound knifed across stage as he slipped from the charred plank and plunged into the blazing pit below….

Dirk turned to the others.

For a brief moment they stood together. Silent. In infinite closeness…

Then Dirk took Gisela's arm. They ran along the pinrail to the break in the rear wall.

Outside, the sirens were sounding the All Clear.

PART IV The Hour of 0500–0600 16 Jul 1945

1

“Five-minute warning!” the PA speaker boomed. “Five-minute warning!”

Dirk could feel the tension mount all around him He glanced at Sig standing next to him, staring out over the Alamogordo desert into the far distance. He wondered what his friend was thinking. Was he seeing in his mind's eye the Fat Man atop his hundred-foot steel tower ten miles away, ready for the final test? Code name: Trinity…

Or was he back at Haigerloch — and what might have been?…

For a moment, as he gazed into the raw morning twilight, his own thoughts went back….

They had returned to Hechingen two days after the raid on Haigerloch. They had nowhere to stay in Stuttgart, and with Colonel Harbicht dead, it had seemed reasonably safe. But they did not go near the Storp house. They kept a watch on Anna's place for a long time before approaching it cautiously.

Anna had been overjoyed to see them. Even the ever busy sewing machine was momentarily forgotten. Somehow the absence of its clackity whirring made the seamstress shop seem a different place.

No one had bothered her. No one had even talked to her — except some man named Schindler, who said he was the yard-master at the railroad yard, complaining that Oskar had not shown up for work and did she know where he was?

She had gone to the house and had found no one there. She had assumed they were all together.

When they told her that Oskar had been caught and was dead, she sat down at her sewing machine. Quietly she had run her fingers over the motionless flywheel and the still needle arm. Then she had looked up, her old, world-weary eyes dry.

“He was a good man, Oskar,” she said. “A good brother…” And she had bent over her machine and sent the flywheel spinning.

For ten days they had stayed with her, out of sight. And then, on April 23, a US combat task force had barreled into town hell-bent for the reactor caves at Haigerloch. It had been an incredulous captain of Combat Engineers whom Dirk and Sig had bade a cordial welcome!

Dirk had made certain that Anna and Gisela were placed under the full protection of the Americans….

He suddenly felt a longing pressure in his chest. As soon as the world stopped its insane ride on the roller-coaster of war, he'd get off. Hechingen would be his first stop….

He glanced around him.

It was still quite dark at 0525 hours. It was cloudy and a drizzle dampened everything and everybody. Only a few stars were visible in the sky. It was a miserable morning, but no one seemed to notice.

Base Camp was located ten miles from the bomb tower, the nearest point at which anyone was permitted out in the open. Between the camp and the tower — five miles away — was the Control Dugout. Only people whose duties made it absolutely necessary were allowed there. Most other observers were at a point twenty miles from the epicenter of the explosion.

He fingered the little piece of smoked glass he had been given with a strict warning not to watch the blast without using it. Ten miles? Typical brass exaggeration, he thought. An implosion-type atomic-fission bomb, they'd called it. What the hell kind of an explosion — atomic or not — could create a light strong enough to hurt your eyes at a distance of ten miles?

Oh, well. He'd use it. Everyone had a piece. Even General Groves, who stood only a few feet away, and another general with him. Rosenfeld called him McKinley.

“One-minute warning!” the PA system blared. “One-minute warning. Assume blast positions!”

He started to lie down…. Lie face down on the ground, he had been instructed, feet toward the blast. Close your eyes and cover them with your hands as the countdown approaches zero. After the flash you may sit up or stand up. Use the smoked glass as you watch the explosion. Be prepared for the shock wave which will follow in approximately fifty seconds.

All around him the observers were lying down, faces to the ground. General Groves. General McKinley. Rosenfeld. He glanced at Sig lying next to him. He winked.

“Okay, Siggy baby,” he said. “To coin a phrase—this is it!”

“Thirty-second warning!” Even the tinny voice over the PA speaker sounded tense. “Thirty-second warning!”

The silence along the ridge grew more intense. Dirk was aware of his heartbeat speeding up. He gripped the piece of smoked glass tightly in his hand. Easy. He loosened his grip. No need to break the damned thing.

“Ten seconds!” The taut voice on the PA rang out over the campsite. “Nine — eight — seven—”

Dirk stopped breathing.

“—three — two — one — NOW!”