There was something wrong here. She spoke as if the deed was already done. Furthermore, the power cut had come and gone. Had the blackout already served its purpose? This woman showed no fear. But could it be that she did not mind dying?
“Why was your lover arrested?”
“They called him a pervert.”
“What kind?”
“He was homosexual.”
“But he was your lover?”
“Yes.”
Dieter frowned. Then he looked harder at the woman. She was tall and broad-shouldered, and underneath the makeup she had a masculine nose and chin…
“Are you a man?” he said in astonishment.
She just smiled.
A dreadful suspicion dawned on Dieter. “Why are you telling me this?” he said. “Are you trying to keep me occupied while your friends get away? Are you sacrificing your life to ensure the success of the mission-”
His train of thought was broken by a faint noise. It sounded like a strangled scream. Now that he noticed it, he realized he had heard it two or three times before and ignored it. The sound seemed to come from the next room.
Dieter sprang up and went into the torture chamber.
He expected to see the other woman agent on the table and was shocked to find someone else there. It was a man, he saw immediately, but at first he did not know who, because the face was distorted-the jaw dislocated, the teeth broken, the cheeks stained with blood and vomit. Then he recognized the squat figure of Sergeant Becker. The wires from the electric shock machine led to Becker’s mouth. Dieter realized that the terminal from the machine was in Becker’s mouth, secured there by electrician’s tape. Becker was still alive, twitching and emitting a dreadful squealing sound. Dieter was horrified.
He swiftly turned off the machine. Becker stopped twitching. Dieter grasped the electric wire and jerked hard. The terminal came out of Becker’s mouth. He threw it to the floor.
He bent over the table. “Becker!” he said. “Can you hear me? What happened here?”
There was no reply.
Upstairs, all was normal. Flick and Ruby walked quickly through the ranks of telephone operators, all busy at their switchboards, murmuring into their headsets in low voices as they plugged jacks into sockets, connecting decision-makers in Berlin, Paris, and Normandy. Flick checked her watch. In exactly two minutes all those connections would be destroyed, and the military machine would fall apart, leaving a scatter of isolated components, unable to work together. Now, Flick thought, if only we can get out…
They passed out of the building without incident. In seconds they would be in the town square. They had allmost made it. But, in the courtyard, they met Jelly- coming back.
“Where’s Greta?” she said.
“She left with you!” Flick replied.
“I stopped to set a charge on the diesel fuel line in the generator room, like you said. Greta went on ahead of me. But she never reached Antoinette’s place. I’ve just met Paul, he hasn’t seen her. I came back to look for her.” Jelly had a paper packet in her hand. “I told the guard at the gate that I just went out to fetch my supper.”
Flick was dismayed. “Greta must be inside-hell!”
“I’m going back for her,” Jelly said determinedly. “She saved me from the Gestapo, back in Chartres, so I owe her.”
Flick looked at her watch. “We have less than two minutes. Let’s go!”
They ran back inside. The switchboard girls stared at them as they raced through the rooms. Flick was already having second thoughts. In attempting to save one of her team, was she about to sacrifice two more-and herself?
When they reached the stairwell, Flick paused. The two soldiers who had let them out of the basement with a joke would not let them in again so easily. “As before,” she said quietly to the others. ‘Approach the guards innocently and shoot at the last moment.”
A voice from above said, “What’s going on here?”
Flick froze.
She looked back over her shoulder. On the staircase coming down from the top floor stood four men. One, in major’s uniform, was pointing a pistol at her. She recognized Major Weber.