Eye of the Needle(32)
He served briefly as an ensign-cadet in the neutral zone of Friedrichsfeld, near Wesel, in 1920; did token officer training at the War School at Metz in 1921, and was commissioned Second Lieutenant in 1922.
(“What was the phrase you used?” Godliman asked Bloggs. “The German equivalent of Eton and Sandhurst.”)
Over the next few years he did short tours of duty in half a dozen places, in the manner of one who is being groomed for the general staff. He continued to distinguish himself as an athlete, specializing in long-distance running. He made no close friendships, never married, and refused to join the National Socialist party. His promotion to lieutenant was somewhat delayed by a vague incident involving the pregnancy of the daughter of a lieutenant colonel in the Defense Ministry, but eventually came about in 1928. His habit of talking to superior officers as if they were equals came to be accepted as pardonable in one who was both a rising young officer and a Prussian aristocrat.
In the late ’20s Admiral Wilhelm Canaris became friendly with Heinrich’s Uncle Otto, his father’s elder brother, and spent several holidays at the family estate in Oln. In 1931 Adolf Hitler, not yet Chancellor of Germany, was a guest there.
In 1933 Heinrich was promoted to captain, and went to Berlin for unspecified duties. This is the date of the last photograph.
About then, according to published information, he seems to have ceased to exist….
“WE CAN CONJECTURE THE REST,” said Percival Godliman. “The Abwehr trains him in wireless transmission, codes, mapmaking, burglary, blackmail, sabotage and silent killing. He comes to London in about 1937 with plenty of time to set himself up with a solid cover—perhaps two. His loner instincts are honed sharp by the spying game. When war breaks out, he considers himself licensed to kill.” He looked at the photograph on his desk. “He’s a handsome fellow.”
It was a picture of the 5,000-meters running team of the 10th Hanoverian Jaeger Battalion. Faber was in the middle, holding a cup. He had a high forehead, with cropped hair, a long chin, and a small mouth decorated with a narrow moustache.
Godliman passed the picture to Billy Parkin. “Has he changed much?”
“He looked a lot older, but that might have been his…bearing.” He studied the photograph thoughtfully. “His hair was longer, and the moustache was gone.” He passed the picture back across the desk. “But it’s him, all right.”
“There are two more items in the file, both of them conjectural,” Godliman said. “First, they say he may have gone into Intelligence in 1933—that’s the routine assumption when an officer’s record just stops for no apparent reason. The second item is a rumor, unconfirmed by any reliable source, that he spent some years as a confidential advisor to Stalin, using the name Vasily Zankov.”
“That’s incredible,” Bloggs said. “I don’t believe that.”
Godliman shrugged. “Somebody persuaded Stalin to execute the cream of his officer corps during the years Hitler rose to power.”
Bloggs shook his head, and changed the subject. “Where do we go from here?”
Godliman considered. “Let’s have Sergeant Parkin transferred to us. He’s the only man we know who has actually seen Die Nadel. Besides, he knows too much for us to risk him in the front line; he could get captured and interrogated. Next, make a first-class print of this photo, and have the hair thickened and the moustache obliterated by a retouch artist. Then we can distribute copies.”
“Do we want to start a hue and cry?” Bloggs said doubtfully.
“No. For now, let’s tread softly. If we put the thing in the newspapers he’ll get to hear of it and vanish. Just send the photo to police forces for the time being.”
“Is that all?”
“I think so. Unless you’ve got other ideas.”
Parkin cleared his throat. “Sir?”
“Yes.”
“I really would prefer to go back to my unit. I’m not really the administrative type, if you see what I mean.”
“You’re not being offered a choice, Sergeant. At this stage, one Italian village more or less makes relatively little difference—but this man Faber could lose us the war. Truly.”
11
FABER HAD GONE FISHING.
He was stretched out on the deck of a thirty-foot boat, enjoying the spring sunshine, moving along the canal at about three knots. One lazy hand held the tiller, the other rested on a rod that trailed its line in the water behind the boat.
He hadn’t caught a thing all day.
As well as fishing, he was bird-watching—both out of interest (he was actually getting to know quite a lot about the damn birds) and as an excuse for carrying binoculars. Earlier today he had seen a kingfisher’s nest.
The people at the boatyard in Norwich had been delighted to rent him the vessel for a fortnight. Business was bad—they had only two boats nowadays, and one of them had not been used since Dunkirk. Faber had haggled over the price, just for the sake of form. In the end they had thrown in a locker full of tinned food.
He had bought bait in a shop nearby; the fishing tackle he had brought from London. They had observed that he had nice weather for it, and wished him good fishing. Nobody asked to see his identity card.
So far, so good.