Vengeance 10

Memling nodded, and von Braun walked carefully across the room. He paused before he opened the door. ‘Do you wish to check first? There may be a gun.’

‘I have already.’

‘Yes.’ Von Braun rubbed his lower lip. ‘You would have.’ He poured two glasses of cognac and brought them across to the coffee table. He was stumbling with the fatigue of three days spent in the command centre, working until it was clear they could do no more.

‘What happened?’

He took a swallow, and then another, letting the liquid dissolve the cold in the pit of his stomach before he answered. Memling waited.

‘We don’t know.’

‘What are you talking about!’

‘We lost contact after second-stage ignition, as the engines were being fired to shift the rocket out of Earth orbit. We know the engines ignited, but after that…’ He shrugged.

‘It’s been three days …’

Von Braun shrugged again. ‘We just have no idea what happened. Radio contact was lost. This morning we tried to find him with radar as Earth rotated so that our antennas had a clear view, but we could not achieve a signal. If he had continued on the course prescribed, Franz would have….’ Von Braun’s voice broke, and he had to take a deep breath, then ‘.… would have landed two hours ago.’

Memling took the glass and drank most of the cognac in a single gulp. He leaned back on the couch and closed his eyes. ‘So it’s over,’ he said after a moment, and von Braun was struck by the sadness, the sense of loss, in the Englishman’s voice.

‘Yes.’

‘What happens next?’

Von Braun walked to the window and stood looking out into the darkness. He was conscious of the beginning of a strange alliance that would have been unthinkable six months ago but which now seemed perfectly logical, the culmination of the random insanity that had held the world in thrall for seven years.

‘SS General Doktor Hans Kammler has given orders to evacuate immediately,’ he said. ‘The Soviets are less than fifty kilometres away. He is convinced that Russian commandos were responsible for the damage caused the night of the launching. There was a submarine sighted off the coast that night.’ Von Braun turned back into the room to study the gaunt Englishman, so different from the boy he had known before the war. ‘Franz told me you agreed to help. Were you responsible for the damage?’

Memling ignored the question. ‘Will you go?’

‘I have no choice.’ Von Braun shrugged. ‘We are ordered to make our way to Nordhausen, in the Harz Mountains, where the SS can protect us… or kill us if necessary.’ Von Braun paused. ‘I understand that you may have brought us an alternative.’

‘I did.’ Memling described SHAEF’s offer of employment following the war, providing the Peenemunde scientists surrendered to the Western powers. ‘On no account will the offer hold,’ he warned, ‘if your surrender is made to the Russians.’

‘I assume there are both political and practical implications to that statement,’ von Braun observed dryly, and Memling nodded.

‘Then you need have little fear on that score. No one wishes to disappear into Russia. Most of us are fighting the war to prevent the spread of communism to…’

Memling held up a hand. ‘Your motives do not concern me. ‘I’m just the messenger. Arrangements were made to take some of you out immediately, but I doubt if they hold any longer. You will have to find another way to make contact.’ Memling nursed his drink for a long moment while staring into the shadows. ‘What will you tell them about the V-Ten?’

Von Braun sighed as he replenished his glass. ‘Nothing. The dangers of such a weapon, the temptation to use — ‘

‘No one has,’ Memling interrupted, ‘and I doubt anyone ever will, resist the temptation to use any weapon, no matter how deadly, if it will ensure his survival. It may sound naive after what we’ve been through, but perhaps we should make damned certain the next time that the correct side has the V-Ten. And there will be a next time.’

Memling’s eyes were hollowed by fear and privation, and von Braun shuddered. This man is war, he thought, a war which I had no idea existed. ‘Perhaps,’ he said then. ‘In any event, the SS collected all project films for destruction, so there is nothing to discuss. In addition, the Führer is said to have given orders to resist to the last man, woman, and child. This is clearly nonsense, yet how many will and thus prolong the fighting? What will be the attitude towards Germany then? As it was the last time? Or will forbearance be shown? What inroads will the communists make?’ He sat down abruptly. ‘I am tired to death. For now, let us agree to say nothing until we see the shape of the future. We do not know what happened to…. Franz. Perhaps he died when the rocket motors exploded. Perhaps he did land on the moon. God in heaven only knows.’

* * *