Vengeance 10

The noise of engines dwindled, and he turned back to the barracks where the sergeant was still looking towards the road while the sentry behind stood at rigid attention, trying to make himself as inconspicuous as possible. According to Sussmann, the garrison had been reduced, in anticipation of the final withdrawal, to one hundred men. He had killed six and one officer twenty minutes ago, forty had just left, and there were at least another thirty, according to Prager, guarding the launching area and the various command centres. There would be ten to fifteen more SS still searching for him in the vicinity of the tank farm and a few guarding the burned-out Gestapo headquarters several kilometres to the south in Trassenheide. So there should not be more than a few left in the barracks.

There would also be radio equipment that might enable him to make contact with the submarine. He decided it was worth a try.

The parade was twenty metres in diameter and fringed closely about with trees that reached to the building on either flank. The intent obviously had been to create the same park-like surroundings found throughout the rest of the Peenemunde facility. Memling found it incongruous. He worked his way through the trees to the south-east side of the building, checking each window. The construction was cement block, as was nearly every building on the island, and the ground-floor windows were at eye level. Most of the interior was dark and the few lighted rooms empty. The central dormitory for enlisted personnel extended the length of the building at the rear; it was empty. What weapon racks he could see were also empty. He had then to depend on his single remaining grenade, the machine pistol and three magazines.

Memling completed the circumnavigation of the barracks. The single sentry and the sergeant seemed to be the only ones left, but he couldn’t be certain of that. He studied the sentry from the trees. Now that his sergeant had gone, the man had relaxed and was sneaking a smoke. His rifle, however, was still slung muzzle downwards, ready for instant use.

He faded back into the shadows and worked his way to a darkened room with an unlocked window on the south-east side. Cautiously he worked it up by pressing the frame back against the casement and lifting. It rose in jerks, binding on either side, and Memling swore silently. When he had it up as far as it would go, he passed the machine pistol through and eased himself into the room.

Memling knelt at the partly opened door for several minutes until satisfied the corridor was empty. The building was a single-storey cube, and there was no way to find out how many people were left inside except by checking each room. He opened the door carefully and stepped into the hall. The first door on his right opened easily. The room was dark, and when he turned the light switch, he found himself in a mess hall. The room was huge and, combined with the dormitory, probably accounted for half the available floor space.

He checked three more rooms, each empty, before reaching the end of the corridor. Two had been quarters for officers, and he wondered which had belonged to the man who had executed Prager. The hall made a right-angle turn across the front of the building. He knelt and peered around the bottom edge of the wall. Two doors were open, and light flooded into the corridor. He could hear voices and radio static but could not tell from which room they came. Jan quickly retraced his steps to the end of the hall. There was another corridor, as he had expected, running across the rear of the building. Three doors led off to rooms on either side, and he realised the two on the left would lead to the canteen and dormitory. The single door to the right was locked. There wasn’t time to open it, and he hurried on to the end of the corridor, repeated the minute examination from a prone position, then checked two more unlocked and empty offices. Again he found one door locked and another leading to the dormitory.

Satisfied that the building was empty but for the room in front, he crouched at the junction of the corridors. Again he could hear the same voices and static. So that was it, he thought. It was like France or Norway all over again. He felt the sudden surge of exhilaration and, realising that it was little different from fear, almost laughed aloud at himself. Memling walked past the entrance — two sets of double glass doors beyond which he could see the sentry — and stopped beside the first doorway. A burst of static sounded and someone swore. Another voice demanded silence. Two at least, he thought, and how many more in the next room? The radio was in there, so he dared not use the hand-grenade.