Hell's Gate(55)

“As approved by our brilliant Führer, a pair of V-1e’s will hang below the wings of our bombers like mistletoe hangs from its host plant. The bomber will draw close to the target . . . then release her mistletoe. The pilot will steer the V-1e, lock on to the target, and then bail out. Since the V-1e will have been destroyed along with its target there will be no landing. You’ll be happy to learn that just last week the Führer himself told me—”

“Bail out at six hundred kilometers per hour?” Voorhees interrupted. “From directly in front of the engine intake? What happens to the canopy? What happens to the pilot?”

There were several more audible gasps and many of the faces in the crowd turned toward Reitsch, expectantly. But the test pilot said nothing, and her silence told them everything they needed to know about the potential for a successful bailout.

Voorhees turned to the man next to him and spoke loud enough for everyone to hear, “That thing is a death trap and a piece of shit.” What am I doing? he thought. And why now? Am I losing my mind?

The grumbling had grown louder now. Nobody had ever heard Voorhees speak like this. The officers present made a point of stepping away from the scientists. And the stepped-away-from scientists now regarded Voorhees as one might regard a stranger who had barged into a wedding.

No, I’m not losing my mind, Voorhees thought. It’s von Braun’s words, getting to me. It’s the Statue Man. It’s Lisl.

Hanna Reitsch shot Voorhees an icy stare that lasted only a second, then she was smiling again, as if his last comments had never been uttered. “Of course, I was the first to sign on, and as of a week ago I was pleased to report to our Führer himself that we have over one thousand volunteers.”

Looking around, Voorhees could see that the pride in her voice contrasted with the mood in the room. There were no more questions, and many of those present were trying to think of excuses for hasty but less than obvious exits; the late hour or paperwork that suddenly needed shuffling.

“A thousand heroes! Heil Hitler!” Reitsch shouted, but for several seconds, there was no response, until a pair of officers snapped to attention and returned Reitsch’s Nazi salute. However, their voices served only to emphasize the dread that had settled on the men. A few of the scientists appeared to be in shock and even the officers looked uncomfortable, shifting in place as if their boots had suddenly shrunk two sizes. No one said a word.

Voorhees shook his head, realizing at long last that the Dream was dead. And it had been ridiculous all along, now that he thought about it. For what was the Dream? Nordic mythology sewn together with romantic notions from the nineteenth-century? Jules Verne, H. G. Wells, and the Chariot of Odin arching toward Mars. It was ridiculous and now it is over. “A thousand suicides,” he muttered, and turned away.

“Heroes, not suicides!” Reitsch snarled at him, the soft features of her face suddenly pulled tight. “The Leonidas Squadron!”

Voorhees took a deep breath, then let it out. He felt exhausted but turned to face the test pilot. “With all due respect Flugkapit?n Reitsch, wasn’t it King Leonidas who led the three hundred Spartans to their deaths at Thermopylae in 480 B.C.?”

Reitsch seemed surprised for an instant, then she smiled at the engineer. Voorhees thought, This must be what a captured bird feels, just before the cat’s nervous system initiates a death-dealing bite.

“I took you for a coward,” Reitsch said calmly, “but I see now that you are more than that. You are a coward who knows his military history.”

Then the room trembled slightly and, as dust sifted down from the ceiling, they heard the wail of sirens.


Operation Hydra was, this night, at this point in history, the largest single bombing sortie ever carried out by the RAF. Currently, Voorhees and his colleagues were in the bull’s-eye of nearly six hundred Halifax, Sterling, and Lancaster bombers. They were trying to kill him and as many of the other rocket men as possible. But now the party for Hanna Reitsch had intervened, putting many of them only steps away from a bomb shelter.

Voorhees, however, wasn’t thinking about the bomb shelter. He emerged from the officers’ mess with only one thought. Lisl. I must find Lisl.

Someone grabbed him, forcefully, by the arm. “This way!”

“I must find Lisl!”

“No time for this,” the soldier said, and smacked him with a gun butt. “Come to your senses and get in.”

Voorhees went down the concrete steps, half-stumbling, half-pushed. He heard the blast door slam shut above him, and then the six hundred giants came stampeding, directly overhead.

After an hour, Voorhees heard only the faint crackle of burning wood from above—thousands of tons of burning wood. The last of the enemy bombers had moved on, and soon after, a siren sounded the “all clear.” Someone gave an order, “Everyone outside to help!”

Voorhees emerged into pitch black—even though the moon was full this night. The world was eerily quiet, considering all that had happened. The smoke made it hard to see, and even harder to breathe, but the red glow, burning through from every direction, gave the impression that every building had been destroyed.

The engineer looked around. Nobody was paying attention to him now.

Maurice Voorhees disappeared into the smoke.


It had ended for Voorhees and Lisl much as it began—in a crater. The second and final crater had once been Lisl’s dormitory but that building had disappeared—utterly disappeared. In the bowl of the crater, Voorhees had located tattered pieces of garments belonging to at least a dozen people, and broken crockery that turned out to be chips of bone. Hope forever died the moment he found a familiar shoe. It was spotlessly clean and still warm.