They Used Dark Forces by Dennis Wheatley

Author:Dennis Wheatley [Wheatley, Dennis]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Occult & Supernatural, War & Military
ISBN: 9781448212811
Google: cR0rAQAAQBAJ
Barnesnoble:
Publisher: Hutchinson
Published: 1964-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

18

The Great Conspiracy

Gregory had his hand stretched out towards one of the windows in the little room. But at the Count’s cry he remained transfixed.

Sabine’s voice came through the velvet curtains, ‘Hitler dead! No! How? Surely no-one could have got into his headquarters and shot him. A stroke?’

‘No. It was a bomb. At least I think so. No details are known yet. But he’s dead. He must be. The codeword Walküre has been sent out. That makes it certain. I received it in my office twenty minutes ago, and I left at once to let you know.’

‘You were in the plot, then?’

‘Yes. Several times recently arrangements have been made to assassinate the swine, but they couldn’t be carried through because of his habit of altering his day’s schedule at the last moment. There were difficulties about the bomb, too. Our German fuses hiss when they are started, so a package containing one would attract attention. But British fuses are worked by acid. They are started by breaking a glass capsule containing the acid and in a given time it eats through a wire. That’s how I was brought into it. In my laboratory I have captured explosives as well as our own with which to experiment. I supplied the fuses. But they meant to get him this time, anyhow. If the bomb didn’t go off it was intended to shoot him.’

‘Kurt, I think you might have told me about this.’ Sabine’s voice sounded a trifle peevish.

‘My dear, I couldn’t,’ he replied apologetically. ‘All of us took an oath of secrecy. And I was never in the inner ring; so I didn’t know that another attempt was to be made today or who the gallant fellow is that did this splendid deed. But what’s that matter? We’re free! Free from that gutter-bred monster at last!’

‘How about the others, though?’ Sabine asked. ‘Himmler? Goebbels? Goering? They won’t give in without making a fight for it.’

‘Don’t worry. They’ll be taken care of. That was the object of sending out the codeword Walküre. By now the Generals who are in this will have taken over at the War Office. The Guard Battalion will be in possession of key points like the Broadcasting Station, and troops from the Tank and Artillery Schools will be marching on Berlin.’

‘Who is responsible for the Putsch?’

‘Colonel-General Ludwig Beck; and he has the support of many others who refused to kowtow to Hitler: Field Marshal von Witzleben, who is to become Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces; Halder, who’ll probably be chosen as Chief of the General Staff; Hoeppner, Olbricht, Fellgiebel, Oster, Hase, Wagner and Admiral Canaris. A number of our ablest younger officers are in it too: Merz von Quirnheim, Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg, Fabian von Schlabrendorff and Henning von Tresckow. It was he who put the bomb in Hitler’s ’plane when he went to the Eastern front, though, of course, I couldn’t tell you so at the time. Both the Police Chiefs, Count Helldorf and Artur Nebe, are with us; and several of the Army Commanders at the fronts, Von Kluge and Rommel among them.

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