Himmler nodded solemnly. 'And what we can do here,' he then repeated in his softly insistent manner, 'we can also do in the land you have claimed for us in the Antarctic. Yes, Lieutenant,' he said, nodding again, 'you have found the place for us.'

Ernst swelled up with the pride he had almost lost through Ingrid.

'The German genius,' Himmler continued, 'has rendered the impossible commonplace and there, though invisible to the naked eye, my first colonies are taking shape underground.' He nodded, as if bowing to that sacred earth, then glanced sideways at Ernst. 'It is my belief, Lieutenant, that these underground colonies, if created in the Antarctic, can, with the aid of the American's flying saucer, ensure the success of our forthcoming conquest of the whole Western world. By the time that's been completed as surely it must we will have moved the first of our men to the Antarctic to begin the Hrbiger Projekt: the creation of a society under the ice and the first steps toward the supremacy of Nordic man, who will, given time and our ever advancing technology, evolve into the Superman.'

Aware that he had been selected and shaken by the honour, Ernst wanted Himmler to take hold of his shoulders and gently shake him like a beloved son; but he understood that his Reichsfhrer, a true soldier, even a genius, could not stoop to the display of such emotions in front of his men. Understanding this, he tried to control his own emotions and instead siinply nodded agreement.

'Now that we have laid claim to Neuschwabenland in the Antarctic,' Himmler said, his pince-nez magnifying his mild eyes, 'it is my intention to ship specially trained SS troops, scientists, slave workers, and equipment there, to first construct, then live in, an underground research establishment and its attendant accommodations. This will in time become a self-contained, living colony under the ice. And from there, with the aid of the products of Projekt Saucer, we will spread the rule of the Third Reich across the whole world. We will do this, Lieutenant!'

Ernst was taken aback by the sudden intensity of Himmler's words, then swept away on a wave of exultation by his Reichsfhrer's unprecedented display of emotion. He had to look away from him, to find the freedom of sky and light, but was drawn back when Himmler actually touched him, tugging the sleeve of his uniform.

Ernst looked down and saw the eyes behind the pince-nez as prisms reflecting light.

'You have done a wonderful thing,' Himmler said. 'You have planted our swastikas in the ice. I am now placing you in charge of this great operation: to create Hrbiger's world of ice and fire under the Antarctic ice and, at the same time, keep a check on the vital progress of Projekt Saucer. This, Lieutenant Stoll, is your great mission on behalf of the Fatherland. Do not disappoint me.'

'No, Reichsfhrer,' Ernst replied, realizing in a flood of exhilarating emotion that he would be going back to k.u.mmersdorf West and the world he belonged to. 'I will not disappoint you.'

Then he looked over the forested hills and valleys with the pride he had almost lost.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN 'I didn't get very far,' Bradley said, describing what he had seen in the immense barn in that desolate field near Mount Pleasant, Iowa. 'In fact, I'd barely walked past the door when the rim of that G.o.dd.a.m.ned thing was in front of me.'

Recalling that eerie experience with vivid clarity, he wasn't comforted by the fact that the man to whom he was talking, retired US Army Air Force Wing Commander Dwight Nicholson, had insisted that they hold this conversation in a darkened room and was breathing like a man at death's door.

'It was shaped like a great steel saucer with a Perspex dome on top, taking up half the floor s.p.a.ce of the barn and starting to rust. At first, I couldn't grasp what I was seeing, but it gradually dawned on me. It was the superstructure for some kind of flying machine: one shaped like a saucer.'

'A piloted machine,' Nicholson said, his voice sounding ghostlike. 'Yes. The Perspex dome turned out to be a circular c.o.c.kpit, located at the centre of the disc. The c.o.c.kpit was fixed and the disc, in two parts, like one saucer placed upside-down on another, would have revolved around it.'

'And of course it was only a sh.e.l.l. There was no engine inside.'

'Right,' Bradley said. 'Even the G.o.dd.a.m.ned control panel had been smashed to h.e.l.l. He left nothing to chance.'

'Wrong. He left the prototype. He could have blown it up. Why didn't he?'

'He didn't want to draw the attention of the neighbouring farmers.'

'Or he wanted something to be found... to leave his mark.'

Nicholson smiled, inhaled on his cigarette, and blew a couple of smoke rings toward the window overlooking the garden of his home in McLean, Virginia. The sun, shining brightly outside, was filtering through the drawn blinds and forming webs of light in the darkness around him, illuminating his dreadful face.

'Just what we found,' he said, his twisted smile displaying admiration. 'The superstructure for a saucer-shaped aircraft, but with nothing inside. Either that b.a.s.t.a.r.d had gutted his own machine, taking everything of value, or there'd been nothing inside it in the first place.'

'Which means?'

'We all believed then, and I believe now, that the craft that exploded over Tunguska, Siberia, wasn't piloted it was some kind of missile and that the superstructure we found later was a prototype for the first of his piloted craft. That's what we found and what you found. Some smart cookie, that Wilson.' Nicholson shook his head from side to side, as if he couldn't believe his own words. 'We didn't know he'd left another one, that's for sure. In a barn in... Iowa?'

'Right. Up near the border of Illinois. Not far from Mount Pleasant, where Cohn and Goldman had their research establishment. Apparently Wilson had been working in secret on the flying saucer in that barn while ostensibly producing airships for Cohn and Goldman.'

'In other words, he took them to the cleaners. They were financing his saucer project without knowing it.'

'Right,' Bradley said. 'It was Goldman's belief that Wilson had secretly been trying to solve the problem of the boundary layer and also working on a crude atomic propulsion system. This suggests that the propulsion system managed at a later date to fly some kind of object as you say, some kind of missile as far as Russia, before it malfunctioned, blew up, devastated the forests of Tunguska, and led to the US government closing down Wilson's research establishment in Illinois and either cla.s.sifying or destroying what they could find of his work.'

'Which is why you came to me?'

'Yes. After finding the remains of that saucer, I checked out what Abe had told me and learned that it was essentially correct: that after Cohn and Goldman had gone bust, the US Army Air Force opened a file on a similar company located just across the state line, in Illinois. Unfortunately, in those records, the names of those involved were erased. But then I saw, in other records in Washington, that you'd been in charge of that operation just before you retired. And since you're an old friend and all...'

Nicholson smiled. 'Yeah, Mike, I understand. Can I take it that this is all off the record?'

'You are retired, Dwight.'

'I still want it to be off the record. I don't want my name mentioned.'

'You have my word on it.'

Nicholson nodded and grinned laconically. You could actually see the twisted grin in the semi-darkness, but it didn't look real.

'Okay,' he said. 'This is all based purely on recollection; I don't have any backup.'

'I'll take what I can get, Dwight.'

'Are you sure you don't want a drink?'