The Iron Storm by CW Browning (classic literature books TXT) 📕

in the end, the truth had come pouring out. It always did once Hans got his hands on someone.

On either side of him, cells just large enough for a single metal bed and a toilet were visible behind iron bars. Each cell was separated by a three-foot thick cement wall, and none of them had windows. The only light came from the row of bare bulbs hanging above his head as he strode past the bars, but it was enough to catch a glimpse of pale faces silently watching him pass by. Some were terrified, some resigned, and one had gone beyond both emotions to something close to madness. Seven men and one woman, all stripped to their underwear, and the only things they had in common were the daily interrogations they were subjected to. They had all been betrayed by someone close to them. The woman had been turned in by her husband. Some were suspected communists, and some, like the woman, were there because they had been caught with illegal materials in violation of the state. In her case, multiple copies of a London newspaper had been discovered in her possession. One of the men had a copy of a book written by a Jew, along with several recordings by Mendelssohn. Only one of the detainees had been brought in for being an active traitor, and he was behind the steel door Hans had just come through.

As he went towards the guard at the far end of the corridor, Hans tightened his jaw. The man’s name was Dieter, and he was a mechanic at the Daimler plant. Two nights before, blueprints for the new extension of the plant, and that of three other munitions factories in Stuttgart, had been stolen from the back of a staff car. Dieter had been the one to take them, but when they arrested him, the plans were nowhere to be found. After four hours of interrogation, the man had finally cracked, giving Voss what he wanted. The plans were on their way out of the country, bound for France and, ultimately, MI6.

Hans passed the last cell and joined the guard at the end of the hall.

“He’s dead,” he said shortly, jerking his head towards the steel door at the other end. “I’ll send someone down to clean up.”

“Yes, Obersturmbannführer,” the guard said smartly, saluting.

Hans nodded and pulled on his coat, straightening it in silence. Once he had it laying perfectly, he opened the door to the stairwell and started up the winding steps to the upper level of the townhouse. Before succumbing to his injuries, Dieter had informed him that there were also photographs of the Daimler plant, both from the air and from the ground, included with the stolen plans. Hans’ lips tightened. All of it was heading straight into the enemy’s hands. Not only that, but Dieter had no idea where or how the package was getting to France. Only the courier knew the routes, he’d gasped when pressed. No one else. He didn’t even know the name of the courier, or of the people the information went to. All he did was gather it and pass it on.

Reaching the top of the stairs, Hans opened another steel door and stepped into a hallway lined with wood paneling. He may not know the names of the agents carrying the information, but he knew where it was going. He could alert the men at the borders, but Hans knew it was useless now. The package had probably already left Germany. If he wanted to prevent it from falling into the hands of the English intelligence service, he would have to track it down immediately, and preferably before it made its way to France. Once it reached France, the likelihood of finding it before it went to England was slim. It was best to stop it before it crossed the French border.

Dieter had said the couriers traveled through Holland and Belgium. Voss had several agents in both countries. He would alert them to increase the surveillance on all known Allied agents. One of them would have to pass the package on, and when they did, Voss had a very real chance of getting it back. Even if it had already made it to Holland, it still had to go through Belgium.

That was where he would start.

Chapter Two

Evelyn set down the highly polished box and got up impatiently, crossing over to her bedroom window and throwing it open. She leaned out and took a deep, calming breath of fresh air. After working on the box solidly for over forty minutes, she was no closer to opening it than she had been last Christmas when she’d begun working on it in earnest. She had figured out some of the mechanisms, but couldn’t get past a certain point, despite trying all the tricks she’d learned over years from opening both Chinese and Japanese boxes.

What if this really is the one I can’t figure out? What then? 

She supposed they could always destroy the box in order to get to the contents inside, but she hated to do that. It was the last gift her father had given her before he died. She didn’t want to destroy it.

Exhaling, Evelyn watched as a crow glided across the side lawn, heading for the trees. Perhaps she was trying too hard. Sometimes her father would say that she had a tendency to become trapped by her own tunnel-vision when she was working on something. Perhaps that was the problem now. Because she knew it was so important to get the box open, perhaps she wasn’t seeing anything else. Her lips curved suddenly as she remembered Sifu telling her the same thing. He had defeated her repeatedly with a single move for weeks before she finally saw her way out of that particular tunnel. Once she had, however, it was as if a flood-gate had been opened, and she quickly became the top student in the Wing Chun school. But that