Page 37 of V2

She hesitated. He put his hands on her thin shoulders and gently pushed her to one side. She watched him as he opened the drawer. Beside the knife, and a packet of Wehrmacht-issue condoms (‘Vulkan Sanex’), laid out neatly on a sheet of newspaper, were half a dozen small pieces of the V2 rocket motor, none bigger than his fist, all blackened by fire. He recognised part of the turbine exhaust pump, a cooling nozzle from the combustion chamber, a stop valve from the alcohol tank, various other bits and pieces.

‘What on earth did you think you were going to do with those?’

‘I was interested.’

‘Oh, come on! Tell me the truth!’

She shrugged. ‘I thought maybe someone would pay me for them.’

‘Who? The English? They can pick that stuff up off the streets of London any day of the week.’

‘Who said anything about the English?’

‘You’re in the resistance, right?’

She looked away without answering.

‘They get you to listen to the rocket officers when they’re drinking? Pillow talk? Pass on what you hear?’

The faint thumping of the bedhead through the wall increased in tempo. This time the woman shrieked. The thumping stopped abruptly. Dear God, he thought, what has become of us?

He started stuffing the rocket fragments into his pockets. ‘I’m taking these away. If you get caught with them, you’ll be shot, no question.’

‘Why should you care?’

He closed the drawer. His hands were blackened with soot, his pockets bulging. ‘What is it you want to know?’ he asked abruptly. ‘I can tell you something that’s actually useful, if you like. The missile is unreliable – at the moment we have a failure rate of about one in ten. But the real problem is the shortage of liquid oxygen. Our main production plant in France has been overrun. There are seven plants in Germany, producing two hundred tons a day, which is only enough for twenty-five operational launches. Tell your friends to warn the British that if they want to stop the rockets, not to bother trying to bomb the launch sites, but to concentrate on the liquid oxygen factories and the railways.’

She frowned at him. ‘Are you crazy, or what?’ He made a move towards the door, but she blocked him. ‘If you go down too soon, they’ll be suspicious.’

‘All right.’

He lay back on the bed. She sat in the armchair. For a couple of minutes neither spoke. To his surprise, it was she who broke the silence.

‘We all thought Germany had lost the war. The rockets left, and then they came back. What does it mean? Are you winning again?’

‘No, we’re losing.’

‘When?’

‘Soon. Next year, maybe. How long have you been in Wassenaar?’

‘Three months.’

‘Where were you before?’

‘In a camp – for stealing.’

‘Where’s home?’

‘Groningen.’

‘That’s in the north?’

She nodded.

‘Is there any way you could make a run for it? I could borrow a car. You could hide in the back.’ He knew it was ridiculous even as he said it.

She shook her head. ‘It’s too far.’ There was a sound of movement from the neighbouring room. A door opened, slammed shut. They listened to a man’s footsteps receding down the passage. ‘I should go to her and see if she’s all right. You can leave now.’