V2 A Novel of World War II - Robert Harris Page 0,104

the corridor, and we’ll get you involved if we have enough time?’

‘Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.’ She stood and saluted. She had rather dreaded the prospect of meeting him again, but now it came to it, it had not been too bad. She felt nothing for him at all.

The four Germans were all in the same car, an Austin 12, the biggest the Air Ministry could provide. Von Braun was in the front seat next to the driver; the other three were squeezed in the back. A smaller car full of military police followed immediately behind.

The day was thundery, the car stuffy with the smell of warm leather and cigarette smoke. The south London suburbs seemed to drag on forever. Graf said, ‘Does anyone mind if I open the window?’ Nobody replied. They were all staring at the bomb-damaged street. He wound down the window. Where the houses in the middle of the terrace had been demolished, they had left ghostly images of their former selves imprinted on the neighbouring walls – patches of paintwork and fading wallpaper, sheared floors, the ragged saw teeth of vanished staircases.

Van Braun said in English to the driver, ‘What district of London is this, please?’

‘Wandsworth.’

‘Was it hit by V2s?’

‘Yes,’ the man said grimly. ‘Often.’ They halted at a traffic light beside a sudden vista of rubble and weeds. Graf noticed a pram with no wheels lying on its side. ‘That was done by a V2 last November, since you mention it. Nine houses gone. Thirty-four dead.’

November, thought Graf. I might have fired that.

Von Braun craned his head to look. ‘It’s all been cleared up.’ He sounded disappointed. ‘You can’t see how the damage was caused.’

They passed over a bridge and drove beside the Thames. The wide river was grey and choppy, like the North Sea. The Houses of Parliament came into view ahead, with a big Union Jack flying above it, vivid against the yellowish-grey sky. Graf said, ‘I thought Kammler told us that had been destroyed.’ He leaned forward and spoke to the driver. His English had improved after three months of American interrogations. ‘Is it true Piccadilly Circus has gone?’

‘It was still there this morning.’

‘Leicester Square? The Tower of London? Three bridges over the river? Weren’t they all hit?’

The driver looked at him in the mirror. ‘Someone’s been having you on.’

Steinhoff looked professionally affronted by how intact the government district appeared to be. ‘What is that he’s saying?’

‘He seems to be implying we mainly hit houses.’

‘I don’t believe it. We fired more than a thousand rockets at London, all aimed at the centre.’

‘Relax, Steinhoff,’ said von Braun. ‘The war’s over. It’s all for the best. Do you think they’d be so friendly if we’d hit Buckingham Palace and killed the king?’

They pulled up outside a massive building on the corner of a wide curved road. ‘Here you are, gents,’ announced the driver. ‘The Air Ministry.’ Under his breath he added, ‘And now go fuck yourselves.’

Kay was in the corridor when they came up the stairs, escorted by Mike’s aide – four men in slightly shabby civilian suits. Two of them carried their hats and were nervously twisting the brims, looking about them as if they couldn’t quite believe where they were. The Peenemünde scientists had been so much at the centre of her life for the past couple of years, had assumed such an almost mythic status in her mind, that it was odd to see them now, so ordinary. The flight lieutenant knocked, opened the door to the conference room and they filed in. The last man, just before he entered, turned and looked at her – a flash of human connection in the dreary light – and then he was gone. She prowled up and down the corridor a couple of times, listening to the drone of male voices. Occasionally there was laughter. They seemed to be getting on tremendously. She went back into the office and laid out on the desk the photographs, maps and plans, and the stereoscopic viewfinder she had brought up from Medmenham that morning, then sat down to wait.

Von Braun commanded the room. He stood at the blackboard, his left hand hooked over his jacket pocket, his right holding a piece of chalk. He spoke without notes. Occasionally he would turn and write up a chemical formula or sketch a diagram, and the British technical experts would dutifully take notes. The room grew hot. So many perspiring male bodies clad in thick khaki and blue-grey