Black Cross

After convincing Stern of the utter futility of his journey to England, Duff Smith finally got around to his proposition. “What I said back there,” he drawled, “about killing Germans inside Germany. I wasn’t joking.”

“What do you have in mind?” Stern asked suspiciously.

Smith’s face grew very hard, very quickly. “I’m not going to lie to you, lad. I’m not trying to save the pathetic remnants of European Jewry. Frankly, it’s not my bailiwick.”

“What are you trying to do?”

Smith’s eyes flickered. “Not much, except alter the course of the war.”

Stern sat back against the plush seat. “Brigadier … who are you? Who do you work for?”

“Ah. Officially, we’re known as SOE—Special Operations Executive. We raise mischief in the occupied countries, France mostly. Sabotage and the like. But with the invasion round the corner, that’s rather tapered off. We’re mostly dropping supplies now.”

“How can you alter the course of the war?”

Smith gave him an enigmatic grin. “Know anything about chemical warfare?”

“Hold your breath and put on your gas mask. That’s all.”

“Well, your former countrymen know quite a bit. The Nazis, I mean.”

“I know they’re using poison gas to murder Jews.”

Brigadier Smith waved his pipe in scorn. “Zyklon B is a common insecticide. Oh, it’s deadly enough in a closed room, but it’s nothing compared to what I’m talking about.”

In two minutes, Smith gave Stern a thumbnail sketch of the Nazi nerve gas program, including Heinrich Himmler’s private patronage. He leaned heavily on two points: Allied helplessness in the face of Sarin, and the Nazis’ predilection for testing their war gases on Jewish prisoners.

“We’ve pinpointed parts of their testing program to three prison camps,” Smith concluded. “Natzweiler in Alsace, Sachsenhausen near Berlin, and Totenhausen near Rostock.”

“Rostock?” Stern exclaimed. “I was born in Rostock!”

Smith raised his eyebrows. “Were you now?”

“What is it you want to do? Disable one of these plants? A commando raid?”

“No, I’ve something a little more complex in mind. Something with a little flair. What I want to do is frighten the Nazis so badly that they won’t dare use their nerve gas, not even when the Reich is falling down around their ears.”

“How can you do that?”

“I neglected to tell you one fact about the Allied gas program, Stern. After intensive analysis of the stolen sample of Sarin, a team of British chemists has managed to produce a facsimile nerve agent.”

Stern breathed faster. “How much do you have?”

“One-point-six tons.”

“Is that a lot?”

Smith sighed. “Frankly, no.”

“How much do the Nazis have?”

“Our best estimate is five thousand tons.”

Stern went pale. “Five thousand—? My God. How much would it take to seriously damage a city?”

“Two hundred fifty tons of Sarin could wipe out the city of Paris.”

Stern turned away from Brigadier Smith and pressed his cheek to the cold car window. His head was starting to throb. “And you have one ton?”

“One-point-six.”

“How wonderful for you. What do you plan to do with it?”

Brigadier Smith’s voice cut the air like a rusty saber. “I plan to kill every man, woman, child, and dog inside one of those three camps. SS men, prisoners, the lot. And I’m going to let Heinrich Himmler know exactly who did it.”

Stern wasn’t sure he had heard correctly. He took a moment to try and digest the enormity of what he thought the briga-dier had suggested. “Why in God’s name are you going to do that?”

“It’s a bluff. A gamble. Perhaps the biggest gamble of the war. I’m going to use our thimbleful of gas to try to convince Heinrich Himmler that we not only have our own nerve gas, but the will to use it. When he finds one of his precious camps wiped out to the last man, yet with every piece of German equipment in pristine condition, he will have no choice but to reach the conclusion I want him to reach. That if the Nazis deploy nerve gas against our invasion force, their cities will be annihilated by the same weapon.”

“But how do you know Hitler won’t retaliate with his superior stockpiles?”

“I don’t. But if I’m right about Himmler running the nerve gas program on his own, Hitler will never even find out about our raid. Himmler will sweep the whole thing under the rug. Even if Hitler were to find out, he wouldn’t have any evidence to hold up to the world as an excuse for a retaliatory strike. Not the way I’ve planned this show.”

“You’re mad,” said Stern. “Hitler doesn’t need to justify his actions to anyone.”

“You’re wrong,” Smith said confidently. “Hitler doesn’t hesitate to massacre Jews, but he does try his best to cover up the fact that he’s doing it. He cares about public opinion. Always has.”

Stern felt a sudden apprehension. “Brigadier, this is a strategic mission. Why have you come to me?”

“Because my hands are tied by some regrettable political considerations.”

“Such as?”

“The Yanks are against it.” Smith grunted. “Bloody schoolboys. They’re content to fight with sticks and pebbles and hope no one gets angry enough to go home for his father’s shotgun. American opposition rules out my using British or American commandos for the operation.”

“What about your SOE operatives?”

“The Americans have elbowed their way in there as well. They’ve demanded that we set up two-man parachute teams—one Yank, one of ours—to go into France and prepare the Resistance for D-Day. It’s pathetic. I haven’t met one Yank who can speak enough French to order Boeuf Bourguignonne, much less fool a German.”

“So you’re scraping the bottom of the barrel. Refugees.”

Smith grinned. “Bloody terrorists, at that.”

“Do you have the authority to undertake this operation? Brigadier isn’t exactly Supreme Commander.”

Duff Smith reached into the pocket of his beribboned tunic and pulled out an envelope. From it he withdrew Churchill’s note, which he handed to Stern. Stern didn’t blink once while he read it.

“Satisfied?” Smith asked.