Chapter Six.
In the square in front of the Kaserne Headquarters building, three LSSAH motorcycle escort Scharführers were waiting. As Wolff and Karyn said goodbye to Collani and Schütt, the young SS-Sturmmann came with the scabbard and harness. He had fashioned a beautiful piece of workmanship in black chrome leather. The straps and scabbard were lined with the softest kid to lie against the Fräulein Doktor's skin. Wolff thanked him and slipped the scabbard into the Attaché case.
The escort kicked over and started their big BMW R12 motorcycles with the white panniers on either side of the rear wheel, and settled into the saddles. They wore snow-white leather belts with a white shoulder cross-strap, but without the cartridge boxes; and they wore white leather gauntlets. They wore the leather chinstraps of their black Schirmmützen under their chins, and motorcycle goggles. Wolff settled Karyn in the Mercedes and placed the Attaché case in the dickey seat compartment. He climbed in and started the big engine. The escort riders took station… two in front, one behind; and the group moved off towards the entrance of the Kaserne. The SS-Oberschütze at the gate snapped to attention, presenting arms as the Mercedes swept out through the Kaserne main gates, turning right onto Finkensteinallee. Karyn settled into the deep, beige leather seat, smelling the late blossoms of the old lilac trees that lined the cobbled street. It was such a pleasant smell after the institutional aroma of boiled cabbage and polish that pervaded the Lichterfelde Kaserne.
At the junction of Drakestrasse and Karwendelstrasse, a Verkehrspolizei Oberwachtmeister wearing his distinctive short white uniform coat that led to all motorcycle traffic police being nicknamed "white mice," was waiting, sitting astride his powder-blue BMW R5 motorcycle with the engine ticking over. Seeing the Mercedes approaching, he snicked the big twin into gear and rode out into the intersection, stopping the traffic with his "Zeichenstab"… his red and white "HALT" wand, as the Mercedes cruised across Drakestrasse, heading east.
As the trailing LSSAH motorcycle escort Scharführer cleared the junction, the Verkehrspolizei Oberwachtmeister released the clutch lever of his BMW and accelerated after them. He roared past the Mercedes and took up position some ten metres in front of the lead escort. He switched on his Martin-Horn and headlamp, and accelerated away. The LSSAH Motorcycle escort and the Mercedes sped up to match his speed as he thundered up Karwendelstrasse; the penetrating, trumpet-like, low-high-low tones of the Martin-Horn echoing back from the old plane trees that lined the road.
At something like sixty km/h, he swept out onto Hindenburgdamm, holding out his "Zeichenstab" wand at arm's length, as the sparse traffic screeched to a halt. The SS escort and Wolff's Mercedes followed, as the Verkehrspolizei Oberwachtmeister tucked away his Zeichenstab; twisted the throttle grip of his motorcycle wide open, and accelerated away past Pauluskirche Island, with the traffic darting out of his path in obedience to the braying Martin-Horn and blazing headlamp of the bellowing, powder-blue Polizei BMW twin.
So it continued; the furious escort through the Friedenau and Schönberg suburbs, whose peace was shattered by the raucous bark of the fishtail exhausts of the four big BMW twins, mingling with the deep exhaust boom and shrieking supercharger of the Mercedes. With her hair streaming in the wind; all that Karyn observed of that wild ride were the white, startled faces of drivers and pedestrians; houses flashing past, and the needle of the big, white-dialled Mercedes speedometer to the right of the instrument panel in front of her, sitting permanently on the one hundred and twenty Km/h mark; with the Mercedes Benz three-pointed star radiator mascot always framing the leading Polizei motorcycle escort like a gun-sight.
Fortunately, there wasn't much traffic about, and the escort reached the junction of Hauptstrasse and Kolonnenstrasse, at the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Platz in a little over a quarter of an hour. Wolff kicked down on the accelerator and the supercharger disengaged, its banshee howl fading away as the motorcyclists leaned over their machines to negotiate the right-hand turn into the short Kolonnenstrasse.
As they passed the right-hand junction with Papestrasse, Wolff glanced down the long, straight road. He knew that down at the far end; lay the dreadful SA-Feldpolizei Papestrasse barracks, which, from March to December 1933, had been the prison for about two thousand people arrested by the SA-Feldpolizei thugs. Many of these prisoners were tortured in the cellars, and at least fifteen… but probably many more, had been murdered in the ugly, sprawling red-brick building. He dragged his eyes back as the convoy sped past the junction into Immelmannstrasse.
They accelerated away again, down towards the junction of Berlinerstrasse and Belle-Alliance-Strasse. The two front LSSAH outriders and the Verkehrspolizei Oberwachtmeister stopped the traffic as the Mercedes swept out into Berlinerstrasse, turning right, and then left, through the un-named, and half-built concourse of the new Zentralflughafen Berlin-Tempelhof.
In 1935, as part of Welthauptstadt (World Capital) Germania, building work had commenced on the old Tempelhof Airport to the design of the architect Ernst Sagebiel, This design was very stark and linear, being described as "Luftwaffenmoderne"... the Terminal building was started in 1936, and the whole place still resembled a gigantic building site, with acres of jutting steel girders and concrete mixing equipment. It would eventually become the largest structure in Europe.
The two LSSAH motorcycle escorts and the Verkehrspolizei Oberwachtmeister caught the speeding Mercedes, and its single escort, and continued east down Columbiastrasse, past the towering, gruesome hulk of Gestapo remand prison Columbia-Haus on the right-hand side of the road at the junction of Columbiastrasse and Golssener Strasse. Popularly known as "Kazet" or "KZ" Columbia-Haus; it had once been a notorious Military Prison belonging to the Kaiserin Auguste Viktoria Guards Regiment Kaserne which was situated on the other side of the road. A dark, Trojan-grey-brick, four-storey monstrosity shaped like a squared- off letter "U," with sharply pitched roofs adorning the right-angled structures to each end of the main block that ran parallel to Columbiastrasse; it was built in the same style as the barracks across the road.
The area had consisted of a prison building with one hundred and fifty-six cramped, bare concrete-floored cells; a court building, residential buildings, and other outbuildings; and was surrounded by a Trojan-grey-brick, three-metre wall matching the buildings within. It had been used as the Gestapo prison centre in Berlin since 1933, and had only been closed in early November of last year. Its surviving prisoners had been transferred to the new Sachsenhausen concentration camp at Oranienburg.
When operational, Columbia-Haus had been run by SS auxiliaries of the Gestapo, and had become notorious for the brutal treatment of prisoners. From May 1935, a prisoner transport shuttle ran three times a day between Columbia-Haus and Prinz Albrecht Strasse 8, at 7.30 am; 1pm, and 5pm in the dreaded, Polizei "Green Minna"... the "Black Maria" closed vans.
The Berlin SD maintained its own interrogation command... the Vernehmungskommando... at Columbia-Haus, and deviated in its special actions far beyond the ideal images that its leaders projected; and to which, more idealistic Party members aspired. Columbia-Haus was under the jurisdiction of the Polizeiabteilung z.b.V. Wecke. This was the elite outfit of Göring's secret state police. They were assisted by the SS auxiliaries whose foremost function was to provide guards and "assist" in interrogations. The SS men were specially selected. Both by inclination and by training; they regarded all Jews, Communists, Socialists, and pacifists as so much offal. The mere idea of feeding their victims, instead of exterminating them like the plague they were, was, for them, an insufferable form of kindness.
Much as they would have liked to murder half of the German people for the sake of the "Volksgemeinschaft,"... "The People's community"... (One of Hitler's platitudinous slogans regarding National solidarity)... Germany's relations with other countries prevented them from achieving this ideal. But they made the best of these circumstances. They were highly qualified specialists who murdered without leaving proofs of their crimes. In many cases, they left the last act to the prisoner himself. He committed suicide. On the basis of a carefully developed technique; they tortured him to the point where there was no other way out for him.
KZ Columbia-Haus, Columbiastrasse 71, was justly notorious for its ten basement interrogation rooms in which Communists, Social Democrats; Jews, Homosexuals, and other enemies of the Nazi regime were held "under investigation" by the Gestapo; which meant that they were continuously interrogated, beaten, and abused before being sent to concentration camps. Countless prisoners were tortured to death in the gruesome bowels of Columbia-Haus. The guards even had a system of identification for the severity of injuries inflicted. A red paper cross would be pinned to the prisoner's cell door with a chalk inscription.
The words: "Der Tripper!"... (The Clap!) meant the occupant was actually a case where the lower abdomen and genitals had been severely injured during the floggings in the cellar. "Achtung!"... (Attention!) meant that the prisoner had been beaten to the point where he was in real danger of dying and required urgent medical treatment.
Daily; pedestrians who happened to be strolling past the ugly building along Columbiastrasse towards Die Volkspark Hasenheide could hear singing coming from the courtyard. Polizeiabteilung z.b.V. Wecke fostered this "cultural work," which had at the same time, a practical purpose. The singing society was obliged to begin its activities at the very moment when the guards in the cellars went to work on the bare buttocks of their victims with their wetted stock whips. The massed voices of the chorus drowned out the shrieks and screams of the tortured prisoners. If the singing society was mobilized at eight in the evening; it was, as a rule, in the interests of pure art for the SS. But if they sang in the daytime it was another story. Masked by the innocent tunes of old German folk songs, stubborn prisoners were "prepared" for the investigating judges. After the basement was made soundproof by double doors, and all windows had been walled up with bricks, there was no need for the chorus except when the SS were feeling sentimental after a hard day's "work."
This dreadful pile was now empty, and due for demolition; as the extended Zentralflughafen-Berlin would cover its site with the eastern end of the massive, twelve-hundred metre quadrant of the new terminal and hangars building.
As they swept past the gaunt building, Wolff shivered. Another dark shadow to blight a pleasant, sunny afternoon. How many souls had screamed their lives away in there? He detested the perverts who disgraced the uniform; who had been given free rein in that dreadful building. Many of those animals who would later become extermination camp Commandants had perfected their sadistic trade in Columbia-Haus. But there was one interrogator in particular… Kriminaldirektor Jannike Kügelgen of Department IV2a, Das Hauptquartier der Gestapo, Prinz-Albrecht-Strasse 8.
Kügelgen was twenty-seven; an attractive, blonde, blue-eyed Saxon; one-point seven-two metres tall; with a voluptuous figure. At first glance, most men would think... "A top-class girl"... but her eyes were cold... too cold; and her lips were thin... too thin. She was infamous for her methods of successful "interrogation" of dissident Germans. Jannike Kügelgen had been an ex-BDM Leader, and one of the first females to join the National Socialist party. The BDM also acted as an instrument of indoctrination for many of the women. As a lowly junior clerk… a "Sachbearbeiter" in the Berlin Polizeipräsidium, Alexanderplatz, she soon used her connections… and her bed, to gain promotion. By the time the Gestapo was formed in 1933, she was a "Beamtin"… a senior administrator in the Schutzpolizei. Göring soon politicised the service and all Nazi Party members were promoted… including Jannike Kügelgen.
She had originally volunteered to be trained as a member of the SS-Helferinnen... the SS Signals personnel. The plan was that she would serve as a telephonist, a teleprinter operator, or a radio operator. However, during her training at Die Reichsschule für SS-Helferinnen, Oberenheim-Alsace; it was discovered that Kügelgen possessed an inherent sadistic streak and had embraced the more vicious aspects of the indoctrination training with such gusto; which combined with her above-average intelligence and vehement racialism, swiftly brought her to the notice of the Authorities, and her rise through the ranks to "Dienstführerin"… Service Leader was swift.
There were, and would be few women who became Gestapo interrogators. Kügelgen was one of them. She only ever interrogated males. She was based at first, at the so-called "Untersuchungshaft und Aufnahmeanstalt Moabit"… the pre-trial and trial arrest "Investigation prison," Berlin-Alt-Moabit, 12-13. She used mental and physical torture and humiliation in all of her interrogations. It was rumoured that, in Moabit, she had personally flogged at least eight prisoners to death with her specially-made whip laced with wire thongs.
On June 4th, 1937, the Ministry of Justice and the Gestapo would legalise torture to such an extent that they would introduce a standard club of medium density, flexible rubber; forty-two centimetres long by twenty-four millimetres in diameter; known as a "Gummiknüppel", to be used in beatings so that the torture would be regularized; but prior to this, a blind eye was turned to "Verschärftes Verhör"... "Intensified Interrogation." For Kügelgen, this would never be enough. Already, she had devised a particularly efficient use of electricity as a torture medium; indeed, she was the only interrogator in the Berlin office who used such a method.
Kügelgen had read of the exploits of a certain corrupt Parisien ex-police inspector... Pierre Bonny, in some lurid rag. He had developed an interest in electric torture techniques, which he had apparently used to great effect on his suspects. He was well-known throughout France for his contentious investigations into several scandals during the twenties and early thirties. He was said to have used a cranked magneto from an old "Aboilard" wall telephone to generate electric shocks to his suspects.
Kügelgen decided to try the same method of torture. She used a kurbelinduktor... the crank inductor from a VBT Feldernsprecher 33 field telephone. This caused a high-voltage shock… anything up to a thousand volts. There was no amperage behind it, just voltage; but it was excruciatingly painful. A few swift turns of the inductor crank handle, with wires suitably attached to her victim, strapped naked and helpless on the table in front of her, soon softened up even the hardest of them. She became notorious for her relish of late-night visits to the cells at Columbia-Haus, accompanied by two large and menacing, uniformed Schutzstaffel thugs; where she would indulge her "Schadenfreude" appetite for inflicting pain and degradation.
One of her favourite opening gambits was to enter the interrogation room smoking a cigarette. She would begin the session by taking the cigarette from her lips and applying the glowing tip to the naked man's nostrils. His screams of agony and the unpleasant smell of singed flesh were an exhilarating introduction to the session's entertainment. She would withdraw the cigarette; inspect the damage, and smile sweetly; murmuring,
'Done to a turn!… We'll grill the other side for you in a moment.'
She would then puff on the cigarette and repeat the torment. In a while she would move on to the other agonisingly sensitive parts of his body; after which, she would take a Gummiknüppel... the flexible rubber cudgel, and would beat the man on his genitals, working herself up into an ecstasy while the prisoner fainted from the pain. Then, would come repeated near-drownings in a bath filled with ice-cold water, electric shocks from the kurbelinduktor, with wires attached to lips, nipples, ears and genitalia; or slowly crushing her victim's testicles in a special vice manufactured by the Brockenstahl Werkzeugmaschinen Fabrik Company specifically for this purpose.
Other "Entertainments" included kicking a prisoner in the belly until he vomited up blood, then forcing him to lick up the vomit; securing a prisoner's wrists behind his back with piano wire, and having her goons hang him up by the arms while she beat him… causing shoulder dislocation; whippings with her Moabit whip; beatings with the buckle end of a military leather belt… you could rip open faces and take eyes out with that… and the use of her "Stahlrute"... a telescoping whip baton made of heavy steel springs housed within an aluminium tube. It extended in a flash with a flick of the wrist, locked using friction, and was closed with a twist or by slapping the heel of the hand against the tip ferrule.
She particularly relished her "SiPo" Stahlrute, because the heavy steel, solid ball ferrule on the business end of the extended springs… when swung forcibly; imparted a wicked whiplash effect, and struck the victim with the force of a bullet. It was very effective for softening her victims up… especially around the lower back and kidneys area. They'd be pissing blood for a month after ten minutes or so, of that treatment. It didn't take too much effort to turn her victim's genitals into a raw, ruined lump of bloody meat with the "SiPo" Stahlrute, either.
"SiPo"… the abbreviated form of "Sicherheitspolizei"; was the name allocated to the combined forces of the Gestapo and the Kripo… the Criminal police, between 1936 and the start of the War in Sept 1939.
The SiPo extending spring cosh with its telescoping set of coil springs and metal ball ferrule head was one of most effective in-fighting weapons ever developed… maximum inflicted pain with minimum effort … and, of course, there was always the usual burning of flesh and body hair with a soldering iron and a kerosene blowlamp; and the application, generally by her goons, of "Gleichschaltung"... "Bringing into line"... severe beatings with Gummiknüppeln on the bare back and buttocks of her victim; the infliction of which was universally nicknamed by the Gestapo thugs as "The Hindenburg's Alms." Another little party trick of theirs was to break two of their victim's fingers... one on each hand; choosing the middle-finger because that was the one that gave the most excruciating pain, and because it could successfully be broken in three places. Then the victim was forced to perform press-ups. Each time he failed, they encouraged him with vicious beatings around his kidneys with their Gummiknüppeln.
At length; after such a session of "rigorous interrogation," the victims would be thrown back into their cramped cells, exhausted; with their bodies swollen and broken; unable to open their mouths, and unable to even tremble anymore.
Wolff had the misfortune of meeting her at Columbia-Haus shortly before it was closed. He had been sent down there on the orders of Himmler to establish why they had forfeited so much possible information by beating over forty prisoners to death in the previous month. As he was leaving he met Kügelgen coming up from the basement, having just finished one of her "Intensified interrogations." He noted with disgust, the brightness of her eyes, the hint of sweat on her brow… her obvious arousal, with her nipples straining through her white service shirt… splashed with her victim's blood. The bitch actually took her perverted sexual pleasure from inflicting her tortures on her helpless victims. It was all he could do to return her arrogant salute. He had no choice but to do so; her Gestapo rank was the equivalent of SS-Sturmbannführer. But, if anyone ever deserved a high-power, 9mm, soft-nosed bullet in the back of the head, it was Kriminaldirektor Jannike Kügelgen.
As they came down Columbiastrasse, the motorcycle escort began to slow as they approached the heavily-wooded Hasenheide stretching away to their left. The escort turned right into the short Lilienthalstrasse, and the Verkehrspolizei Oberwachtmeister switched off his Martin-Horn. As the road widened out into the parking area, before them lay the old Terminal building that had been elegantly designed by the Engler Brothers; built little more than ten years ago… and now due for closure. Wolff brought the Mercedes to a halt in front of the entrance as the LSSAH escort switched off their engines. The Verkehrspolizei Oberwachtmeister swung his motorcycle around, and giving the normal Polizei salute to Wolff and Karyn, accelerated away up Lilienthalstrasse, heading north towards where the towering Gothic revival spire of the Kirche am Südstern loomed in the distance above the trees.
As the echoing boom of the Verkehrspolizei BMW exhaust faded amongst the trees of the Hasenheide Park; Wolff collected the RF-SS Attaché case from the dickey-seat of the Mercedes, and escorted Karyn into the Terminal Hall. Waving away the "Zollbeamter"… the Customs Official at the desk, they walked straight out to the old Heinkel building topped by the control tower which, also housing the radio station, was originally used as the Terminal by the original passengers. The tall radio signal towers which had held the powerful beacons for night flying and had once stood to either side of the Terminal building had been removed; and the huge, white-painted, concrete letters spelling out BERLIN between the two central taxi-ways that stretched out onto the grass landing ground like an inverted arrow-head were now becoming faded, with encroaching grass beginning to blur the sharp edges.
The concrete-laying gangs were still working around the airport perimeter, laying a wide perimeter track in a complete encompassing oval around the old landing ground. At specific intervals, they were constructing three great semi-circles of concrete thrusting out into the grass of the main flying area. These, when completed, would be the starting points of the take-off runs, depending on the wind direction.
To the north-west, a huge, wide apron of concrete was being laid in front of the skeletal beginnings of the new Terminal building, which would contain hangars and workshops forming a massive quadrant, twelve hundred metres long, around one corner of the airport, with hangars and gates all along the aerodrome side.
Wolff and Karyn walked down the long covered walkway towards the airport apron where one of the Deutsche Lufthansa, Heinkel He70 "Blitz" fast mail planes, which had been taken off the Lufthansa "Blitz-Dienst"… Lightning Service routes operating between the main cities of Berlin, Frankfurt-am-Main; Hamburg, and Köln, specifically for this flight, was waiting. It sat on the wide apron, its BMW 12-cylinder, V-inline engine idling, with the big two-bladed propeller rotating slowly, and glittering in the afternoon sunlight.
Shining silver and black; with the broad red Hakenkreuzfahne stripe across its fin and rudder below the blue encircled, and stylised "Crane in flight" Deutsche Lufthansa badge on the tip of the fin; it was a very smart livery. A silver lightning flash was painted along the aeroplane's flanks, zigzagging down the engine cowling; to finish above the silver lettered "LUFTHANSA" painted on the aeroplane's black nose. A set of low steps had been placed at the trailing root of the starboard wing, and the young Deutsche Lufthansa navigator waited on the wing-root walkway to help his passenger up onto the wing, and in through the door of the passenger cabin.
Karyn stood at the steps and turned to say farewell to Wolff. He smiled, and handed her the SS Attaché case containing the Walther and ammunition, the gold coins; her documents, and the fighting knife. Her packed suitcase had been conveyed as promised, from the Kaiserhof Hotel, and was already on board in the luggage compartment behind the cabin. Two of the LSSAH outriders had left their machines in the concourse with the third outrider, and now stood behind him. Wolff smiled, and said,
'Gute Reise!... have a good trip, Fräulein Doktor. Keep in touch through the Moscow Embassy. If there is any real danger to you, we shall come to bring you out. The code word to be sent in such a situation will be "Marlene"... Sepp's party piece.'
He saw that Karyn was a little apprehensive, and said quietly,
'You'll be fine; remember, Sepp likes you… and if, God forbid, the code-word is ever sent, he has said he will send in his old SS-Stabswache "Zwölfenders"... his professionals, to bring you out. Now, off you go; the pilot's getting restless.'
The young Deutsche Lufthansa navigator stretched down his hand, and helped Karyn up onto the wing root walkway, and into the passenger cabin. Karyn gave a last backwards glance out of the doorway, and as she did so, Wolff and the two SS outriders snapped to attention with a crash of heel-irons, and delivered a perfectly synchronised Hitlergruss. Karyn returned the salute, and ducked back into the cabin. The young navigator settled her on the rearmost of the four deep leather-upholstered seats that were fixed in facing pairs, fore and aft, and strapped her in. She smiled,
'Danke sehr...'er.... '
The navigator gave her a shy smile, and replied,
'Stetten... Rudi Stetten, Fräulein Doktor.'
And, with an ill-concealed blush, stepped out onto the wing and closed the door. She heard him clamber in through the door below the cockpit, where his navigation-radio station was situated below, and behind the pilot. The door slammed and the vibrations settled as the big BMW engine picked up revs as the pilot went through his magneto-drop checks. Karyn smiled at the thought of the young navigator... poor lamb. She imagined him in front of her, behind the cabin bulkhead; flustered, and rummaging through his charts. He was sweet... about nineteen.
Three years later; at three o'clock, on the afternoon of Friday, 16th August 1940; ex-Deutsche Lufthansa... now Luftwaffe Navigator-bomb-aimer, Oberfeldwebel Rudi Stetten of 7/KG55 "Greif" squadron, based at Villacoublay, France; would embrace a terrible, screaming death above the soft, green meadows and apple orchards of Kent, in the plunging, raging fireball that had been his Heinkel 111P-1 bomber, G1+FD.
He never even saw the Supermarine Spitfire of 602 Squadron, Royal Air Force; that poured a devastating, sustained three-second burst containing the new De Wilde incendiary ammunition into the Heinkel, penetrating its insubstantial armour and causing the inner wing-root fuel tanks and bomb load to detonate, less than one and a half metres behind his navigation station. Just one more casualty on a sunny, late-summer afternoon; barely twenty-two years of age, and he'd never known the touch of a real woman.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
The engine revved up, and they started to move. With squeal of brakes, the Heinkel turned on the concrete apron in front of the old Terminal building. Karyn settled herself on the forward facing bench seat as the Heinkel began to move forwards. The Pilot taxied across the broad apron towards the right-hand taxiway that arced around the aerodrome almost to the centre of the acres of grass enclosed by the new perimeter track. The brakes squealed again as he turned to the left and moved towards the grass of the take-off and landing area. There was a slight jolt as the main undercarriage wheels rolled off the concrete onto the grass, and then again, the squeal of brakes as the pilot lined the nose of the aeroplane up to the east for his take-off, and stopped, with the big BMW engine idling lumpily as he waited for clearance from the radio control tower in the old Terminal building.
Karyn gazed out of the rear port window of the cabin and saw a red signal lamp glowing from the window of the control tower. Why the wait? She looked out of the starboard window and saw another Deutsche Lufthansa He 70 touching down out on the field. As the sleek aeroplane settled, with the afternoon sunlight shimmering on its beautiful silver shape, Karyn thought how it looked… for all the world, like a dragonfly settling on the surface of the pond in the meadow behind her parents' home in Grünheide. Perhaps she would not have had this thought, had she known what it carried.
This Heinkel was the fast mail plane from Munich. On board, in a sealed despatch pouch, it carried a communication addressed to the Führer from Dr. Wilhelm Stuckart, co-writer of the 1935 "Nürnberger Gesetze"…The notorious anti-Jewish "Nuremberg Laws." These Laws were the basis for the exclusion of Jews... as well as Gypsies and coloured people from all public business life, and for the reclassification of the political rights of Jewish citizens. The Jews were returned to the legal position they had occupied in Germany before their emancipation in the 19th century. Jews could no longer exist as German citizens or marry non-Jews.
Now; in the communication carried by the Heinkel that was just landing; Stuckart advocated the enhancement of the persecution of the Jews. The communication, entitled ''Redemptive anti-Semitism,'' included the following suggested measures:
1. "Race Defilers" to be sent to concentration camps after their prison terms were served.
2. Prohibition of Jews from operating businesses and trades, and from offering goods and services.
3. Aryanization... "Arisierung," the process of transferring Jewish-owned independent economic enterprises to "Arisch" German ownership throughout the Third Reich. The owners to be pressured, boycotted, and subjected to various forms of persuasion, force, and terror to convince them to sell their businesses at a fraction of their value to Germans.
(This had been gathering pace for some years, but now Stuckart advocated accelerating the process to culminate in the "voluntary" sales of Jewish-owned businesses to be made a compulsory stage of forced transfer under law, within a year.)
4. The publication of conspicuous street posters and newspaper advertisements denouncing any German who bought goods from Jews.
5. Local newspapers to be forbidden to publish advertisements of Jewish enterprises.
6. Segregation of Jews from the German "Arisch" population.
7. A series of measures to be invoked which completely prohibit Jewish brokers, doctors, teachers, and lawyers from working.
8. "Arisch" doctors to be permitted only to treat "Arisch" patients.
9. Jewish children to be banned from going to public schools.
Here, in this modest sealed pouch nestled the catalyst that would fortify Hitler's ideology of "Lebensraum" as he had detailed in his book "Mein Kampf," published in 1925… and would lead inexorably to the genocide of the Jewish population of Europe a few short years into the future.
As she watched from the starboard window, the Mail plane disappeared, as its pilot completed his landing run and turned towards the Terminal. She glanced out of the port window and saw a green light flash from the control tower. The pilot pushed the throttle fully forward and held the Heinkel on its brakes as the big BMW engine noise built up to a snarling, vibrating crescendo. He released the brakes and the Heinkel leapt forward. Karyn was pushed back into her seat as the grass began to rush past. She felt the tail lifting and her ears popped as the Heinkel rose swiftly into the skies. Tempelhof Feld dropped away, and then they were climbing out beyond the airport boundary. Then came a double thump that shivered through the aeroplane as the main wheels came up and locked into the wing wheel-wells. She watched the Teltow kanal basin drift into view as the Heinkel banked around to port, and the pilot set course to the north-east. The snarling bellow of the engine softened as the pilot throttled back to climbing speed.
Gazing out of the port cabin window, she watched the Spree and the Rummelsburger See slip away below. Out to the north-west she could make out the heart of Berlin… the Siegessäule, distant and slender, thrusting up from the green sea of the Tiergarten; and a little further to the East; the Dom, shining brightly in the afternoon sunshine. As they gained height, Berlin became smaller and smaller, the sprawl of streets and houses began to thin, and green started to replace the browns and blacks. The Heinkel flew out over Nuenhagen… Eggersdorf… Strausberg, with the green fields giving way to the darker woodlands, and there… out to the left, she saw the Strausberger See, shaped like a shining blue seagull in flight.
The Heinkel climbed higher. Soon it would reach its operational cruise height of five thousand metres. It was beautiful up here, with hardly a cloud in the sky. Down below Karyn saw another big lake. Suddenly, a voice crackled in the cabin. Startled, Karyn looked around. On the bulkhead in front of her, she saw a small loudspeaker. The navigator, Rudi Stetten, was saying that the lake below to port was the Kietzer See that lay to the north-west of Neuhardenberg, and that soon, they would be crossing the River Oder. They were cruising at five thousand two hundred metres, at three hundred and thirty km/h. They would follow the River Netze east to where the Bromberg Canal led into the River Vistula. Then, they would only be about thirty kilometres from the Polish border.
The Heinkel droned on into the east. The land was very flat as they began to cross into the Polish Corridor. There were more woods below, and a sprinkling of lakes. The rest of the land was farming land, stretching away, with a village here and there; more lakes, and a scattering of many small pine forests. The hum of the engine and the gentle vibration was quite soporific. Karyn found herself beginning to nod off. Suddenly, she was jerked awake by Rudi Stetten's voice crackling on the cabin loudspeaker.
'Excuse me for disturbing you, Fräulein Doktor, but the pilot has identified a storm front ahead, and is about to climb to our maximum altitude in order to attempt to fly over it. It will become much colder in the cabin. If you lift the cushion of the seat in front of you, there is a locker. In it, you will find a flying jacket and a flask of coffee for your comfort. If the storm front is too high, I shall inform you. Should I have to do so, then please put on your seat harness. It is likely to be a little bumpy… Danke schön.'
Karyn looked out of the cabin window. The sky was still a beautiful blue, with wisps of trailing cloud far above. She heard and felt the Heinkel's engine droning sound increase as the pilot began to gain height. As she watched, a plume of condensation from the engine's exhausts began to stream back past the cabin window. At first, it was soft and feathery in appearance, but as the Heinkel climbed, it became thicker. The navigator had been correct; it was becoming chillier in the cabin. She reached forward, and opened the locker of the seat facing her. Just as he had said, there was a Luftwaffe-style, blue-grey leather flying jacket badged with the Lufthansa crane emblem, and a "Thermos" vacuum flask. She slipped on the jacket. The Shearling lining wrapped itself about her. She snuggled her face into the thick brown collar. It was gloriously warm.
She opened the Thermos, and the aroma of real coffee filled the cabin. She poured herself a cup and settled back into her seat. She gazed around the cabin. There were two windows on the left, with a large map of Deutsche Lufthansa routes fixed neatly to the fuselage wall between them; below which, was a small fold-down table. Spaced along the cabin wall were three wall-lamps with green bakelite, semi-circular shades that shone downwards… one above each seat, and one over the map. On the other side were three windows; one being in the door, and one to either side; and two of the green-shaded lamps mounted on the cabin wall; one above each seat.
The fuselage sides and floor were a beige coloured sort of checker plate… much the same design as non-slip, metal stair treads. This finish extended halfway up the cabin sides to where a metal strip separated it from the upper cabin and roof decoration, which was a pale pink and smoky-grey, smooth marbled finish reminiscent of the end papers of an expensive book. Above her head in the centre of the cabin roof was a large circular flush-mounted cabin lamp with a shallow, curved opaque glass shade; behind which was mounted a circular cabin ventilator.
As she sipped the coffee, she noticed that the deep blue of the sky was fading to a misty grey. The condensation trails were becoming thick and white; and beads of moisture were weaving across the outside of the cabin windows, and being whipped away by the slipstream.
She had just finished the coffee and screwed the cup back onto the flask when the Heinkel hit the edge of the storm front. The sleek fuselage plunged into the cold front that had risen from off the Siberian wastes far beyond the Ural Mountains, and which rose to something above twelve thousand metres. The Heinkel began to buffet and rock. Quickly, Karyn strapped herself into her seat as the skies became darker. In the cockpit, the pilot stared out of his windscreen. There, no more than ten kilometres ahead, was the biggest, most ominous thunderhead he had ever seen. The Anvil-headed cloud formation stretched for what seemed like endless kilometres across their heading.
His instruments were going crazy. Due to the rapid drop in barometric pressure, the altimeter was rapidly winding up... thank God for the "tube and ball" turn and bank indicator... at least he could see that he was maintaining attitude. All the barometric pressure driven instruments were becoming as good as useless. This Heinkel was an early model. The newer ones had Askania electric instruments. This one was fitted with the traditional "suck and blow" barometric variety that worked off differential pressure measured by the Pitot tube under the port side of the fuselage.
Deutsche Lufthansa Flugkapitän Willi Hettinger had seen a great many thunderheads in his career, but this was one of the biggest. Already, he could see the gust front and feel it tugging through the controls. The altimeter was spinning down again. The atmospheric pressure was rising fast. The rain was spattering his windscreen, and the up-draughts and downdraughts were bouncing the Heinkel around the sky. He barely had time to feel the onset of the vicious wind shear that suddenly struck from out of nowhere.
The Heinkel dropped like a stone. It must have lost several hundred metres altitude before Willi managed to pull her nose up. He could feel the sweat trickling down between his shoulder blades as he hauled her back into level flight. Lightning was flickering and darting through the dark cloud walls.
Suddenly, a bright, bluish-violet glow... St. Elmo's fire began to appear on the wing leading edges and the prop-tips. This bluish-violet glowing continued to grow to a depth of about twelve centimetres at the leading edges, and the entire prop circle slowly transformed into a bluish-purple disc. Willi heard the St Elmo's fire "singing" on the Heinkel's radio… a frying or hissing sound running up and down the musical scale; this was going to be a rough one. Strange spider-web patterns of St Elmo's fire were running all over the windows, and were quite visible even with the cockpit lights full up. The whole of the engine top cowling was glowing purplish-blue. This was not a good sign… the soft glow of the positive charge in the aeroplane's metal skin was reaching skywards in response to a growing area of negative charge in the clouds or air above.
He lowered the seat as far as it would go, tightened the seat harness so that he could hardly breathe; and then turned up the cockpit lighting as bright as it would go, just in case lightning struck the plane… then he wouldn't be blinded by the flash quite so much. He knew that this display of St Elmo's fire was often the portent to a lightning strike, and he wanted to be ready.
The lightning outside the plane couldn't actually be seen, because the aircraft was in cloud and rain, which often dulled the flash, so as to give it no discernible direction from the aeroplane. Though he could see plenty of lightning flashes, he couldn't really estimate from which direction they were coming. He decided to hold his course. The icing wasn't too bad... perhaps, a centimetre or so on the wing leading edges, and half that on the windscreen. There was no great worry at this stage, except for the airspeed indicator needle, which was bouncing up and down due to the ice building up on the Heinkel's pitot head. He flicked on the switch of the pitot head heating element. That might help to shift the icing and give him at least, some idea of his airspeed. All the cockpit windows were covered in the ice, much like the patterns on the inside of bedroom windowpanes on a frosty morning... except that these patterns were a fragile, purplish-blue spider's web.
Then; without warning, the lightning struck the Heinkel's nose, dead centre on top of the engine cowling. It felt as if the Heinkel had hit an imaginary pothole... just a hollow thump. The actual bolt of lightning was a sort of twisted length of thick purple, barbed wire, and seemed to be about three metres below the nose, and slightly right of the centreline. The brightness of the flash completely blinded Willi for a few moments as the Heinkel yawed across the sky. He recovered her, and as his sight returned, he was startled by the bright green glow of each dial and knob on his instrument panel. All the instrument needles, graduations and labels in the cockpit were coated with radium, and the brightness of the lightning had charged the coating far beyond its normal radioluminescence. The St. Elmo's fire was gone, everything seemed to be working, and they seemed to be flying out of the trailing edge of the thunderstorm.
Karyn had watched in fascination as the spider webs of St Elmo's fire crept across the cabin windows. She had no idea what they were; but they were beautiful. She hadn't even noticed the lightning strike as she was held spellbound by the dancing flickering lights. Rudi Stetten, however, was not fascinated at all. The lightning strike had blown at least three valves in his Lorenz radio which was earthed independently from the aircraft's earth-bonding system. Scratching about in the spares locker in his cramped compartment was no joke when the Heinkel was bouncing and jolting about in the turbulence. To be caught without radio this close to the Polish border was asking... no, it was begging for trouble.
He glanced out of his compartment window, as if half expecting to see the PZL gull-wing fighter silhouettes of the "Lotnictwo Wojskowe" … the Polish Air Defence Force... most likely, the ones that all the Lufthansa crews had been warned about... the 113th Pursuit Brigade IV/2... the "Eagle-owls" Eskadra out from Okecie airbase just to the south-west of Warsaw; boring in from starboard. OK, so they were a civilian aeroplane flying a Mail route, but that cut no ice at all with these crazy Polaks.
He knew from Goebbels' rabid speeches that there were latent sources of tension between Poland and Germany. Foremost was the problem of Danzig and the corridor. The "Free City" had been under Nazi control since 1935, and the city made no secret of wanting to return to Germany. At any moment, a minor incident in the corridor could provoke crisis, and the presence of over one million, two hundred thousand Germans in Posnania and Upper Silesia only complicated the situation. Members of the German minority were organized in cultural associations directed from Berlin, having the potential to initiate a wave of disorder that the Polish authorities would feel compelled to put down.
With this in mind, Rudi Stetten swiftly pulled the cover off the radio set above, and in front of his seat, and tugged out the blown valves. Fumbling for the replacements, he managed to break two fingernails, but that was a small price to pay against the chance of being bounced by the Polish Air Force. He struggled to refit the valves in his radio. Damn! One still wasn't glowing. He reached for another in the spares locker and happened to glance out of his window.
The ground was just about visible, and then, the awful truth dawned on him. That was the Vistula below, out over the trailing edge of the wing, but… on the track he had plotted, it should be curving to the right; but down below, it was curving to the left. He checked his slave compass. They were still heading northeast. That could only mean that they had tracked south in the thunderstorm… and tracking south meant they were in Polish Sovereign Airspace! To port, there was a built-up area. He stared at his map. That must be Rypin. That meant they had drifted south about twenty kilometres off his course which should have tracked direct from Bomberg to the rail junction at Jablonowa, then on to the railway cross-junction at Deutsch Eylau. Then; it would have been a simple task to follow the railway; crossing it just north of Wartenburg, keeping the Daddai See to starboard; and then straight into Wilhelmsdorf aerodrome near Rastenburg to spend the night and get the Heinkel checked and re-fuelled. But now…he must warn Willi to keep his eyes open whilst he plotted a new course.
In the cockpit, Deutsche Lufthansa Flugkapitän Willi Hettinger really didn't need warning. As he looked up from checking his instruments, out to starboard, through the breaking cloud, he saw a flash of sun on metal. Willi strained his eyes out to the southeast. There! Three black dots coming on fast. As they turned in towards his flight path, he recognised the gull-shaped wing configuration… Polish PZL pursuit fighters.
They were coming straight at him in a "Vic" formation. He held his course. He knew of the stories that German aeroplanes and buses were reported to have been shot at by Polish police and militia while passing through, or flying over the Polish Republic's territory on their way to, or from German East Prussia. They wouldn't dare… not with a civilian flight; and there was no way he was going to divert. On they came, straight at him; closing at a frightening pace. Willi gasped,
'Ach du Scheisse!' ... 'Oh, Shit!'
And braced himself in readiness to ram the stick all the way forward.
When they were no more than two hundred metres away, the PZLs split... one to port, one to starboard; and the leader pulled up and thundered over the top of the Heinkel's cockpit. Willi ducked involuntarily, and shouted over the intercom for Theo to transmit their identification and then try to raise some assistance. He knew full well; although Heinkel and Deutsche Lufthansa were silent on the matter; that the reason the Heinkel was so fast… setting no fewer than eight world speed records by the beginning of 1933; was that the airframe was made out of so-called "Elektron metal"... a very light, yet strong alloy of magnesium which burned spontaneously in air when heated, and was only capable of being extinguished when covered with sand.
Due to the perceived hazards of magnesium in the event of fire, the application of magnesium in the commercial aeroplane industry was generally restricted to engine- related components. This was not the case with the Heinkel He70. A single hit from a light machine gun tracer bullet was just as likely to set the entire aeroplane ablaze. The three PZL 11c pursuit fighters that were now harrying him were each armed with four 7.92 mm machine guns. If they decided to open fire, and a tracer bullet hit… he'd be trying to fly a burning coffin.
He glanced at the brass Minimax fire extinguisher charged with a litre of carbon tetrachloride, by the side of his seat. It would be about as much use as a "Ficktüte"… a condom salesman in a Nunnery if anything happened. He also knew that if the extinguisher was used; the reaction of the liquid on a high temperature fire… as it would be with "Elektron metal"… would be the formation of the poisonous gas, phosgene... and as if that weren't enough, there would also be chlorine gas and carbon monoxide.
Willi prayed that the Poles would not chance firing on a civilian flight... for if they did… the choice would be incineration or asphyxiation. He decided to hold his course while Theo tried to contact the Polish controllers to confirm they were the regular, scheduled mail flight. Behind him, Rudi was frantically transmitting their identification on the Polish frequency.
'Okecie Kontrol, this is Deutsche Lufthansa Blitz... Dora-Ulrich-Martha-Ida-Dora' transiting Berlin-Tempelhof to Rastenburg-Wilhelmsdorf.'
Then he would repeat the phonetic call sign of the Heinkel in plain, International code: "Delta-Uniform-Mike-India-Delta." Willi saw the PZLs coming in again. This time they buzzed him so close that the Heinkel rocked in their slipstreams. Karyn, meanwhile; was watching in nervous anticipation of what these little gull-winged fighters would do next. She saw they were Polish… she recognised the red and white checkerboard National marking on their wings and rudders; but she didn't grasp the real danger they were in. After all, all the Poles she knew, when she was growing up in Grünheide, had been friendly.
Between each transmission to the Poles, Rudi had spun the dial on his radio transmitter to the Luftwaffe frequency somewhere between thirty-five and thirty-seven kilohertz, and transmitted in plain language, their approximate position, airspeed, and compass heading; and their need for assistance. He didn't hold out much hope; the nearest Luftwaffe aerodrome must be over two hundred kilometres away. What he couldn't know, was that his message had been picked up by the controller of the Luftwaffe aerodrome at Jesau, some twenty kilometres south of Königsberg, and about one-hundred-and-sixty kilometres to the north of their supposed position. Suddenly, a faint voice crackled in his earphones...
'Deutsche Lufthansa… Dora-Ulrich-Martha-Ida-Dora; this is Jesau Control. We are despatching assistance. Increase your airspeed to maximum and retain your present heading.'
The radio fell silent. Quickly, Rudi passed the message to Willi, who was now sweating profusely. He didn't hesitate. Grabbing the throttle lever, he rammed it forwards through the safety detent that guarded the emergency power end of the throttle quadrant, just as the Polish fighters turned in for another pass. The Heinkel surged forwards; the airspeed indicator was winding up… three-thirty-five… three-forty km/h. One of the PZLs lifted in a starboard climbing turn, and then came down to station itself out on Willi's port wing tip. These little bastards could keep pace, and outrun him if need-be. Willi saw the cartoon owl painted in the red-bordered, white triangle on the fuselage, and his worst fears were realised. This was indeed the badge of the "Eagle-owl's" Eskadra, 113th Pursuit Brigade IV/2, and, according to the talk in the Lufthansa crew room, back in Munich, their pilots were some belligerent, mean-spirited assholes.
The Polish pilot stuck his hand out of the cockpit and jerked his thumb downwards... the unmistakable sign for "Follow me down." Willi looked across at the Polish pilot, who gave the signal once again, and murmured to himself,
'Geh und Fick dich selbst, Arschloch!'… 'Go and fuck yourself. Asshole!'
And pushed forward on the control column. The Heinkel continued to accelerate…three-forty-five… three-fifty… three-fifty-five… the speed at which the 1933 record had been taken. The PZL had peeled off and now they were re-grouping. Rudi was still sending the identification message, but it seemed as if these Poles didn't give a shit. The first PZL broke away and orbited out to starboard, and then it turned back in. Willi saw the haze of black smoke burst from its exhaust stub as the pilot pushed the throttle wide open. Here he comes… the PZL levelled out and came boring in; then, came the twinkle on the wing leading edges and from deep within the radial engine cowling. Jesu! He was firing!
The four streams of tracer bullets slashed across the path of the Heinkel, barely a hundred metres ahead. Willi knew there was no more speed to be had from the Heinkel. He'd have to go cloud dodging as they had done over the Western Front in the last big "do." At this speed, he'd need to be careful; he was close to the aircraft design limits. The second Pole was boring in from the port quarter. Again… the streams of winking tracer streamed across his nose… only closer… much closer. Then Willi Hettinger saw them. Out to port... the Jesau Cavalry was coming!
Six shiny dots were streaking in from the north; all trailing hazy ribbons of black smoke from their engine exhausts; a sure sign that they were coming in with throttles wide open. The Polish pilots saw them too... six black and silver, Heinkel He 51 Bi-planes closing, flat-out, in a "Schwarm plus two" formation made up of three "Rotten"… three pairs of fighters.
The Stabsschwarm from Jagdgeschwader 131 "Richthofen" at Jesau had been out on a training flight sixty kilometres to the south of their home aerodrome with their thirty-six-year-old Kommandeur: Hauptmann Bernhard Woldenga, when the call came in. Woldenga hadn't hesitated. He had gathered his flock and called on the radio…
'Antreten zwei-null-null… Express-fahren, Kirchturm Fünfzig'… 'Steer two hundred degrees, full speed, altitude five thousand metres.'
The six Stab He 51's had formated into a schwarm formation with the spare rotte tucked in behind, and the throttles had been slammed right up to the firewalls. With their BMW 12-cylinder in-line engines screaming, and the black exhaust fumes whipping past their open cockpits, the Stabsschwarm from Jagdgeschwader 131 turned into the south-west in a soaring climb. They had been flying at twenty-five-hundred-metres, a little to the west of Heilsberg when the controller at Jesau called them. Now they raced across the farmlands of East Prussia at full throttle; the airspeed indicator needles quivering hard on the stops over the three-hundred-and-thirty-Km/h mark.
There! About five kilometres ahead, they saw a shining, silvery sliver with three dark shapes buzzing around it like angry wasps. Woldenga saw the telltale flickering tracks of tracer, and ordered his Stab to flick off the firing button safety latches on their control column yokes. The schwarm banked over to port, forming up into a "Gefechtsverband"… Combat formation, and, with the old fighter pilots' cry of…
'Mauerblume… Pauke-Pauke!'... 'Contact with the enemy; Attack!'
Woldenga and his "Katschmarek"… his wingman, led the three rotten into a screaming, diving intercept. They had covered over one hundred kilometres in less than twenty minutes, and now they tore into the PZLs. There was no way the Polish fighters could out-manoeuvre the slower, but much nimbler bi-planes. Not a shot was actually fired, but soon, Willi was in open airspace and the He 51s were chasing the Poles back into the south.
Forty kilometres to the east, Willi was re-trimming the Heinkel as the icing on the control surfaces melted, and was whipped away in the slipstream. He had gently throttled back and was intently checking his instruments. Oil pressure and temperature... within safe limits. Manifold temperature... a little high, but dropping back. Manifold pressure... OK. Engine temperature... Hot.
His primary flight instruments were spinning up to normal readings as the last of the ice came away from the pitot head out on the port wing leading edge. It was the fuel contents gauge that worried him. Fuel pressure was normal, but the fuel contents gauge needle was flickering ominously close to the bottom end of the dial. There was no knowing how much of their range had been compromised by their mad dash. Willi gently rocked the wings to slosh what remaining fuel there was, about in the tanks. The fuel warning light remained stubbornly extinguished. He pressed the switch on his throat mike.
'Rudi, I need a heading fast.'
Rudi answered,
'Jawohl, Herr Kapitän, but I need a ground fix first.'
So, Rudi was having to rely on the oldest navigational aid... the mark-one eyeball. Willi had complete faith in his young navigator; he was one of the best that Deutsche Lufthansa had. But nevertheless, Willi hoped he'd hurry up. They were still in Polish airspace, and there was no fuel to spare for another dash if they were intercepted again. As it was; Willi reckoned that they would be almost running on fresh air when they finally joined the Wilhelmsdorf circuit. He could only sustain this airspeed for a few more minutes, and as far as he knew, they were still nowhere near the border. He switched his throat mike again.
'Come on Rudi, I really need that heading...'
Rudi was poring over the two-year-old Reichsluftfahrtministerium Luft-Navigationskarte scaled at a vague 1:2000000 metres that they had issued to him in Berlin; and peering out the windows of his navigation station in the hope of making out some recognisable landmark below. All he could see was the rolling Polish countryside, sprinkled with pinewoods. There was not even a river or road visible to pinpoint their position and get a fix. These bloody maps were OK for general distance navigation, but he wished he had his detailed Lufthansa route maps with him. His stopwatches were running as he tried to measure time to airspeed from his slave altimeter and airspeed indicator that, at least, were now working. He reckoned they must be something like forty to fifty kilometres east of Rypin. He looked out of his port window. That might be the little town of Chorzelle about two kilometres back there; and out to starboard, perhaps that was Ostrolenka in the distance.
Then he saw it, almost like a gift from the Angels, he saw it… out to starboard… the great curve of the wide, marshy Narew river valley looping around Lomza. Swiftly glancing out to port; far to the north, he could just make out the Spirding Lake. Quickly, he slammed his slide rule protractor onto the chart. He scribed a pencil line from the mid-point between the two towns, directly to Wilhelmsdorf, and read off the heading. Grabbing the switch on his throat mike, he shouted,
'Turn onto new heading Null-Eins-Null... Zero-One-Zero… now! We are about eighty kilometres out of Wilhelmsdorf. We should cross the border in about ten minutes.'
He felt Willi kick left rudder as he pushed the control column spectacles over into a gentle, but resolute, enhanced aileron turn. He watched his compass needle swing round and settle on bearing Zero-One-Zero as the Heinkel set her nose for the safety of East Prussian territory. He breathed a sigh of relief. Polish airspace, and especially this far south, was not a place to be with a bright red Hakenkreuzfahne blazoned across your fin and rudder, even if you were a civilian flight.
In the cabin, Karyn was not fully aware of what was happening, and how close they had come to disaster. She had seen the Polish fighters buzzing around; she had seen the German fighters. She had felt the mail plane speed up, but she still didn't realise that the Poles had been deadly serious. The only Polish folk that she had any experience of were Jurek, her parents' gardener; and Grazyna, the old housekeeper. They had been lovely people. Her home in Grünheide was far enough away from the Danzig corridor to have shielded her from knowing anything of the festering tensions and animosity between the Prussian borderland Germans and the Poles. By pure chance, she had not seen either of the Polish fighters' firing passes, as she had been looking out of the opposite cabin window to the direction of their approach on both occasions.