Vogel thought, My God, why am I thinking of that now? He had managed to hide his feelings from Gertrude, the way he had managed to hide everything else from her. He was not a born liar, but he had become a good one. Gertrude still believed he was a personal in-house counsel to Canaris. She had no idea he was the control officer of the Abwehr's most secret spy network in Britain. As usual, he had lied to her about what he was doing today. Trude believed he was in Bavaria on a routine errand for Canaris, not ascending Kehlstein Mountain to brief the Fuhrer on the enemy's plans to invade France. Vogel feared she would leave him if she knew the truth. He had lied to her too many times, deceived her for too long. She would never trust him again. He often thought it would be easier to tell her about Anna than confess he had been a spymaster for Hitler.
Canaris was feeding biscuits to the dogs. Vogel glanced at him, then looked away. Was it really possible? Was the man who had plucked him from the law and made him a top spy for the Abwehr a traitor? Canaris certainly made no attempt to conceal his disdain for the Nazis--his refusal to join the party, the constant stream of sarcastic remarks about Hitler. But had his disdain turned to treachery? If Canaris was a traitor, the consequences for the Abwehr networks in Britain were disastrous; Canaris was in a position to betray everything. Vogel thought, If Canaris is a traitor, why are most of the Abwehr networks in England still functioning? It didn't make sense. If Canaris had betrayed the networks, the British would have rolled them up overnight. The mere fact that the overwhelming majority of the German agents sent to England were still in place could be taken as proof that Canaris was not a traitor.
Vogel's own network was theoretically immune from treachery. Under their arrangement, Canaris knew only the vaguest details of the V-Chain. Vogel's agents did not cross paths with other agents. They had their own radio codes, rendezvous procedures, and separate lines of finance. And Vogel stayed clear of Hamburg, the control center for English networks. He remembered some of the idiots Canaris and the other control officers had sent to England, especially in the summer of 1940, when the invasion of Britain seemed at hand and Canaris threw all caution to the wind. His agents were poorly trained and poorly financed. Vogel knew some were given only two hundred pounds--a pittance--because the Abwehr and the General Staff believed Britain would fall as easily as had Poland and France. Most of the new agents were morons, like that idiot Karl Becker, a pervert, a glutton, in the espionage game only for the money and the adventure. Vogel wondered how a man like that managed to avoid capture. Vogel didn't like adventurers. He distrusted anyone who actually wanted to go behind enemy lines to work as a spy; only a fool would actually want to do that. And fools make bad agents. Vogel wanted only people who had the attributes and intelligence necessary to be a good spy. The rest of it--the motivation, the tradecraft, the willingness to use violence when necessary--he could provide.
Outside the temperature was dropping by degrees as they climbed higher along the winding Kehlsteinstrasse. The car's motor labored, tires skidding on the icy surface of the roadway. After a few moments the driver stopped in front of two huge bronze doors at the base of Kehlstein Mountain. A team of SS men carried out a rapid inspection, then opened the doors with the press of a single button. The car left the swirling snow of the Kehlsteinstrasse and entered a long tunnel. The marble walls shone in the light of the ornate bronze lanterns.
Hitler's famous elevator awaited them. It was more like a small hotel room, with plush carpet, deep leather chairs, and a bank of telephones. Vogel and Canaris stepped in first. Canaris sat down and immediately lit a cigarette, so that the elevator was filled with smoke when Himmler and Schellenberg arrived. The four men sat silently, each looking straight ahead, as the elevator whisked them toward the Obersalzberg, six thousand feet above Berchtesgaden. Himmler, annoyed by the smoke, raised his gloved hand to his mouth and coughed gently.
Vogel's ears popped with the rapid altitude change. He looked at the three men riding upward with him, the three most powerful intelligence officers in the Third Reich--a chicken farmer, a pervert, and a fussy little admiral who might very well be a traitor. In the hands of these men rested the future of Germany.
Vogel thought, God help us all.
The Nordic giant who served as the chief of Hitler's personal SS bodyguard showed them inside the salon. Vogel, normally indifferent to natural scenery, was stunned by the beauty of the panoramic view. Below, he could see the steeples and hills of Salzburg, the birthplace of Mozart. Near Salzburg was the Untersberg, the mountain where Emperor Frederick Barbarossa awaited his legendary call to rise and restore the glory of Germany. The room itself was fifty feet by sixty feet, and by the time Vogel reached the seating area next to the fire he was light-headed from the altitude. He settled down in the corner of a rustic couch while his eyes scanned the walls. Huge oil paintings and tapestries covered them. Vogel admired the Fuhrer's collection--a nude believed to have been painted by Titian, a landscape by Spitzweg, Roman ruins by Pannini. There was a bust of Wagner and a vast clock crowned by a bronze eagle. A steward silently poured coffee for the guests and tea for Hitler. The doors flew open a moment later and Adolf Hitler pounded into the room. Canaris, as usual, was the last one on his feet. The fuhrer gestured for them to return to their seats, then remained standing so he could pace.