The Windsor Protocol Read online

  THE WINDSOR PROTOCOL

  Peter MacAlan

  © Peter MacAlan 1993.

  Peter MacAlan has asserted his rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1993 by Severn House Publishers Ltd.

  This edition published in 2018 by Endeavour Media Ltd.

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER I

  Thursday, August 1, 1940

  CHAPTER II

  Monday, August 5, 1940

  CHAPTER III

  Thursday, August 15, 1940

  CHAPTER IV

  Friday, August 16, 1940

  CHAPTER V

  Friday, August 16, 1940

  CHAPTER VI

  Saturday, August 17, 1940

  CHAPTER VII

  Monday, August 19, 1940

  CHAPTER VIII

  Monday, August 19 — Tuesday, August 20, 1940

  CHAPTER IX

  Tuesday, August 20, 1940

  CHAPTER X

  Wednesday, August 21, 1940

  CHAPTER XI

  Wednesday, August 21, 1940

  CHAPTER XII

  Thursday, August 22, 1940

  CHAPTER XIII

  Friday, August 23, 1940

  CHAPTER XIV

  Saturday, August 24, 1940

  CHAPTER XV

  Sunday, August 25, 1940

  CHAPTER XVI

  Sunday, August 25, 1940

  CHAPTER XVII

  Sunday — Monday, August 25/26, 1940

  CHAPTER XVIII

  Monday, August 26, 1940

  CHAPTER XIX

  Monday, August 26, 1940

  CHAPTER XX

  Tuesday, August 27, 1940

  CHAPTER XXI

  Wednesday, August 28, 1940

  CHAPTER XXII

  Wednesday, August 28, 1940

  CHAPTER XXIII

  Thursday, August 29, 1940

  CHAPTER XXIV

  Thursday, August 29, 1940

  CHAPTER XXV

  Friday, August 30, 1940

  CHAPTER XXVI

  Friday, August 30, 1940

  CHAPTER XXVII

  Friday, August 30, 1940

  CHAPTER XXVIII

  Friday, August 30, 1940

  CHAPTER XXIX

  Saturday, August 31, Tuesday, September 3, 1940

  CHAPTER XXX

  Tuesday, September 17, 1940

  HISTORICAL NOTE

  For good friends and neighbours —

  Alan and Heather Reid —

  “Lang may your lum reek!”

  “…after the final victory, we must effect a reconciliation. Only the King (George VI) must go — in his place, the Duke of Windsor. With him we will make a permanent treaty of friendship instead of a peace treaty.”

  - Adolf Hitler

  “Germany wants peace with the English people; the Churchill clique stand in the way of that peace, and it would be a good thing if the Duke were to hold himself in readiness for further developments. Germany is to force England to peace by every means of power and, upon this happening, would be prepared to pave the way for the granting of any wish expressed by the Duke, especially with a view to the assumption of the English throne by the Duke and Duchess.”

  - Joachim von Ribbentrop German Foreign Minister, July 11, 1940

  “With an ‘if you might put Paris in a bottle.”

  - Walter Schellenberg Oberfuhrer, SS, August 1, 1940

  CHAPTER I

  Thursday, August 1, 1940

  The erect figure, in the immaculately tailored light grey suit, stood clearly framed in the centre of the rifle’s telescopic sight. To the man holding the rifle, the target was a very familiar image; a lean man in his mid-forties with a shy, disarming smile on his rugged features. He was bending forward now, shaking hands with some officials who stood awkwardly on the sun-baked quayside near the canvas-covered entrance to the ship’s gangway.

  The gunman licked his dry lips and felt the sweat drip from his forehead. He blinked, lifting his head from the telescopic sight to wipe the stinging salt from his eye. Then, once more, he sighted the rifle through the half-open window of the warehouse which overlooked the dusty, humid quayside.

  An attractive woman, some years older than the man, clad in an appealing blue and white summer dress and large hat, was holding his arm now. She, too, was smiling, though even from this distance through the distortion of the lens, the gunman could see the smile was somewhat artificial. It was merely a forced positioning of the facial muscles, without emotion.

  The handshakes were being concluded now. Someone, an official in a spotless white uniform, was saluting. A couple of civilians gave curious, half-bows. The dapper man gestured, a gesture indicating impatience coupled with a dismissive salute. Then he was turning and moving with his female companion into the covered gangway which led onto the ship.

  The back of his head was framed for a moment in the gunsight. The gunman’s finger stroked the trigger for a second and he grunted softly: “Bang! Bang!” Then he raised his head and grinned crookedly at a second man who sat on an upturned crate, a pair of field glasses at his eyes. He was also intently examining the scene.

  “Well, that’s that,” the gunman said, lowering the rifle to the floor where he had been kneeling behind the open window.

  The man with field glasses grimaced impatiently.

  “Not until the damned ship sails and is out of Portuguese territorial waters.”

  The gunman sighed softly and glanced at his watch.

  “How long is that likely to be?”

  “Not until after six o’clock this evening.”

  “Surely there is no chance that they’ll get him to leave the ship now?”

  “I don’t know. I just take orders and pass them on.”

  The second man lowered his glasses a moment and reached for an opened bottle of beer at his side. He took a swig, grimaced at its tepid temperature, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. Replacing the bottle, he raised his glasses again.

  “They’ve gone into their cabin now,” he muttered, as if to himself.

  “Cigarette?” asked the gunman, hauling a pack of Gitanes from his top pocket.

  The watcher nodded. The gunman lit both cigarettes and handed one to his companion.

  “Not the sort of job I ever expected to do,” he ventured. His companion did not reply. The gunman inhaled deeply and let out the smoke with a low whistling sound. “I think London are out of their minds.”

  “Our’s not to reason why,” misquoted the watcher sharply. “If he delayed his departure again, the instructions were clear. Top priority code.”

  The gunman drew again on his cigarette and looked out across the quayside to the ship. Sailors were hauling on lines, the gangway was being winched away and there were general signs that the vessel was about to get underway. He could hear the rumble of its vibrating engines as they were prepared. “Do you think his brother approved the order?” he asked again. “I mean, someone at that level would have to, wouldn’t they?”

  The watcher put down his field glasses and examined his companion with a penetrating gaze.

  “If you are going to start analysing orders, then perhaps you should be considering a move to another branch of the service.”

  The gunman raised a hand in a curiously defensive gesture.

  “Don’t get so bloody touchy! Even you must admit that this is a pretty rum sort of a job. Anyway,” he turned and looked to where the ship was preparing to leave its moorings. “Thank God, it seems all right now. I wonder if he will ever know just how close he came to…?” He hesitated, shrugged and glanced at his wristwatch. He let his cigarette but
t fall to the wooden floor and ground it under his heel.

  *

  From the tower room of the German Embassy there was an uninterrupted view across the old quarter of the city, the picturesque Alfama, to the broad strip of blue water, the Tagus, making its sedate way past the waterfront of Lisbon harbour and pushing out to meet the tempestuous Atlantic beyond Cape da Roca. Oswald, Baron von Hoynigen-Huene, the Third Reich’s ambassador to Portugal, stood by the window of the room, gazing out across the vista of the city, which was drenched in the late afternoon sunlight, to where a multitude of boats and larger ships speckled the waters of the river.

  The baron was meticulously dressed as always, the carefully ironed creases of his white tropical suit were razor-sharp. He was a pleasant featured man in his midfifties, well-built but with an upright military bearing. The son of an English mother and a Baltic German father, he had been born in Switzerland, and, with his international outlook and gift for languages, he had made a career in the German diplomatic service. In 1934, the year after the National Socialists had come to power, he had been sent as ambassador to the Portuguese republic. It was well known that the baron was not very sympathetic to the National Socialists and perhaps there was some irony in the fact that he had been selected to be the Third Reich’s representative to the newly established dictator of Portugal, Salazar, and his right-wing corporate state which was so much admired by the Fuhrer. The baron had made the best of the appointment and became renowned in Lisbon diplomatic circles for his punctilious manners, wit and charm. Yet there was little charm on his anxious features now.

  Now and then he raised a pair of binoculars to his eyes and focussed on the medium-sized ocean liner, a ship flying the company pennant of the American Export Line, which was moving slowly from her moorings. Even from this distance the baron could clearly identify the name on the ship — the SS Excalibur — as it pulled out into the centre of the blue Tagus, bows turning to point towards the estuary and the haze covered Atlantic beyond.

  The click of the door behind him made him swing round with an expression of annoyance, ready to rebuke whoever had the temerity to entered without knocking. But the words were not spoken.

  A young man, barely thirty years old, fresh faced, with close cropped hair and a firm jaw-line, came in and closed the door behind him. He was dressed in a light coloured well-cut suit and carried a pair of powerful Zeiss field glasses in his hand. Without a word to the ambassador he crossed the room to the window and focussed the glasses on the river beyond.

  There was a silence before the ambassador cleared his throat deferentially.

  “Well, Herr Oberfuhrer?”

  The young man lowered his glasses and shrugged.

  “The entire party went on board,” he answered. His tone dispassionate. “I’ve just come from the docks. Monckton and some other English embassy officials have made sure that they are all safely on their way.”

  The ambassador bit his lip and cast a worried glance at the young man. Unlike many SS officers he had encountered, he found Walter Schellenberg was an intelligent and, on the surface, likeable personality. A graduate of Bonn University; a student of both medicine and law, who had left his studies to join the Nazi Party and SS, and was now, even at so young an age. in charge of the Third Reich’s counter-espionage service.

  “So this is the end of your mission in Portugal?” ventured the ambassador.

  Schellenberg shrugged as if the matter were obvious.

  “I shall leave in the morning to drive to Madrid. From there I shall get an aircraft back to Berlin.”

  He glanced at his wristwatch and then back to the calm estuary waters which looked so serene and colourful in the early August evening sunlight.

  “Eighteen-forty hours,” he observed.

  In the distance came three long blasts of a ship’s siren.

  “And there is the Excalibur announcing that she is on her way. Destination Bermuda, Herr Baron. An entire world away from Europe. The Duke is a lucky fellow.”

  The ambassador nodded thoughtfully.

  “And he and the Duchess are definitely aboard?” he pressed yet again.

  Schellenberg smiled slightly at the anxiety in the ambassador’s voice.

  “The Windsors and their entourage are now en route to the Bahamas,” he confirmed with an air of finality. “And so, Herr Baron, that is that.”

  The ambassador’s frown deepened. Worry etched his aristocratic features.

  “Perhaps, Herr Oberfuhrer,” he replied quietly. “But perhaps not. The Fuhrer may not think so. He will doubtless be angry at this failure.”

  CHAPTER II

  Monday, August 5, 1940

  The young, blonde haired secretary with the round, fleshy face was deferential and nervous.

  “I am sure that the Reichsminister will not keep you long now, Herr Brigadefuhrer,” she said, her voice so low that Rudi Olbricht had to bend forward in his chair to catch what she was saying. He was seated on the far side of the spacious office, facing a life-sized, full-length portrait of the Fuhrer which glowered pugnaciously out at the oak-panelled room in which the secretary occupied a large desk of similar wood.

  Olbricht was suddenly aware that he had been glancing in unconscious irritation at his wristwatch, an automatic gesture of agitation which seemed to be causing the young woman some anxiety.

  “The Herr Reichsminister for Foreign Affairs asked me to come to his office at eleven-thirty hours,” Olbricht explained sharply. “It is now twelve noon precisely.”

  The secretary’s face was unhappy. She was very young and was, in fact, only on temporary duty as a receptionist while the Reichsminister’s regular secretary was at a dental appointment. She was not used to dealing with arrogant looking, black uniformed generals of the Schutzstaffeln.

  “The Herr Reichsminister was called to the Reichskanzlei just before you arrived, Herr Brigadefuhrer,” she said, almost apologetically. “But he expressly said that he would be back to keep his appointment with you and that it was imperative that you should wait for him.”

  Olbricht sighed with resignation and stretched his legs. After all, though he held high rank in the SS, when the Reichsminister for Foreign Affairs requested his presence he had little option in the matter. He wished, however, he could smoke but knew that smoking was forbidden in the office of Joachim von Ribbentrop. Von Ribbentrop liked to copy the Fuhrer’s habits as far as he was able in order to curry favour. At least that was the opinion of Olbricht’s immediate superior, Gruppenfuhrer Heinz Jost, who always sneeringly dismissed the head of the Foreign Affairs Ministry as “that arrogant ex-champagne salesman!”

  Suppressing a sigh of irritation, Olbricht picked up an abandoned copy of the Party newspaper Volkischer Beobachter, from the chair next to him, and pretended to scan it.

  Olbricht disliked being kept waiting; disliked simply doing nothing. He was a man of little patience and even when confined to an office, as he infrequently was, he liked to pace the room and smoke. He began to unconsciously finger the buttons on his well-cut black SS uniform, At thirty-five years of age, Olbricht was a brigadier-general of the Sicherheitsdienst (SD), the security service of the SS. But he was no mere administrator, as many officers of similar rank were. Olbricht was a veteran field operative whose espionage activities in Czechoslovakia, Austria and Holland had won him not only his promotions but several decorations which now adorned the uniform he wore. He was attached to the Reich Security Main Office (RHSA), Department VI, the Foreign Department responsible for investigations abroad and which included the military intelligence service.

  A buzzer sounded on the secretary’s desk and she started nervously and then looked up at Olbricht with obvious relief.

  “The Herr Reichsminister is ready to see you now. Will you go in?”

  She gestured towards a pair of double oak doors at the far end of the room.

  Olbricht laid down his newspaper, stood up and straightened his uniform jacket before striding confidently into the off
ice of the Reichsminister.

  Von Ribbentrop was seated behind his desk. He made no effort to rise to greet Olbricht but simply gestured for him to be seated. His lean, sharp features were pinched and serious. For a long while he said nothing, simply turning over the papers resting on his desk before him. Olbricht waited with ill-concealed impatience.

  The Foreign Affairs Minister suddenly raised his face to Olbricht, eyes sharp and searching.

  “Well, Brigadefuhrer…” he coughed nervously, adopting a schoolmaster voice. “Tell me, where were you born?”

  Olbricht was momentarily disconcerted by the unexpectedness of the question.

  “Why, in Detroit, Herr Reichsminister. In the United States of America.”

  Von Ribbentrop nodded as if he already knew the answer.

  “You grew up and went to school in America?”

  “Yes.” Olbricht bit his lip. Surely it was all on file? What game was von Ribbentrop playing at? He ventured: “I also did a post graduate course in Cambridge University, in England.”

  Von Ribbentrop pursed his lips.

  “So? You are an Auslandeutsch!”

  “I am a German and a National Socialist,” replied Olbricht defensively. “There are many such patriotic foreign-born Germans serving the Reich. May I respectfully point out that your own Under-Secretary of State, Herr Gruppenfuhrer Bohle, was born in Bradford in England?”

  A wan smile spread over the thin lips of the Foreign Affairs Minister.

  “I do not mean to impugn your loyalty to the Reich. I merely wanted to confirm that you are able to pass yourself off as an American. Also, while a student in England, according to your dossier, you moved in some pro-German English aristocratic circles.”

  Olbricht frowned. “I did,” he admitted, wondering where this questioning was leading. Some new assignment in America or England? Was that it?

  “Did you ever meet the Prince of Wales?”