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Jinnie woke up on Saturday morning and for a moment wondered where she was before remembering she was in Manfred’s Berlin apartment. Hanna and ‘Lina’ had left for Hanna’s home in the suburb of Charlottenburg late in the evening, leaving Manfred and Karl. Manfred had warned Jinnie that his housekeeper would be there at seven the following morning to make breakfast. Jinnie washed, dressed and made her way to the breakfast room where Manfred was eating a plate of bread, cold meat, cheese and hard‑boiled egg. Manfred introduced Frau Fischer, his housekeeper, saying, “She is one of us.”
Jinnie was asked if she would like coffee and was presented with an individual Kaffeepresse, which she allowed to brew before pushing the plunger. Frau Fischer asked her if she would like the same as Manfred for her breakfast, and she asked if she could have bread, butter, jam and chocolate spread, which arrived quickly. Manfred said, “I suggest a stroll this morning. We can walk past the tower. You can have a look in daylight, but it will have to be a walk‑by. If we stop, it is almost certain the CCTV will spot us. It is designed to zoom in on anyone who lingers.”
The walk had been further than Jinnie had expected. Manfred seemed to have taken a rather circuitous route, with the huge tower always in their sight. Eventually they strolled along Gontardestrasse that separated the site of the tower and Alexanderplatz station. As they walked, Manfred explained that if everything went to plan the tower would fall across this road and its observation dome would come dome‑plumb in the middle of Alexanderplatz Station, with the aerial above the dome reaching the Galeria Berlin Department store on the other side of the station.
***
Hanna and Penny picked up Jinnie outside the apartment block just before 10 pm in a cleaning‑company van. Manfred had assured her that ‘PfP’ had taken out all the public CCTV cameras for miles around the TV Tower, only private ones like in the parking basement and lift were working, hence Jinnie and Manfred discussing the club they were going to after supper as they went down to the street in the lift. The van picked Jinnie up bang on schedule, and Manfred strolled off in a different direction to walk to the tower.
Hanna parked the van next to another cleaning‑company van and the sisters, who had donned boiler suits over their street clothes, were handed over to colleagues who led them to their respective buildings, but not before they all wished each other good luck. Hanna was left in the van with a military‑style agile frequency‑hopping radio to control activities. The radio, of Polish manufacture and widely used by the German forces, had been selected to mislead the Germans if it should fall into their hands.
Jinnie emerged onto the roof of the office block and was delighted with the view over the open area around the base of the tower and Gontardestrasse from the corner she was shown to. Her spotter for the night greeted her and explained he was in radio contact with lookouts on other parts of the roof, on Penny’s building, on buildings around the city and, most importantly, with Hanna. Jinnie settled down to check her sniper rifle, ammunition and night scope, all of which were fine.
Through her scope Jinnie watched box after box of explosive being carried from Deutsche Telekom vans into the tower while her spotter kept up a description of what was happening elsewhere in the city. The first diversion was as a firebomb at the airport; it was in a large Lufthansa office building and the building was ablaze. As the stacking of the explosives continued, Jinnie’s spotter reported that the Schutzpolizei were reporting suspicious cars in about a dozen places, with the worry that they were car bombs, regularly.
Jinnie was getting bored, although several vans had left the site nothing much more was happening. The night trams regularly clanked down Gontardestrasse, trains ran into Alexanderplatz station, the occasional person walked by, many obviously drunk, a few taxis and cars went by but no one stopped. Then a series of small bombs went off, taking down several hundred yards of overhead power lines on the approach to Berlin Central Station where the tracks passed over Humboldthafen. The spotter reported an outbreak of window‑smashing in the posh shops of Kurfürstendamm with alarms going off and police so stretched they were struggling to attend. This was exactly what had been planned, regular police patrols halted because the crews were being sent to the growing number of incidents.
Just before two a.m. Hanna gave the order to withdraw. As the cover for Hanna’s people on the ground, the plan called for Jinnie and Penny to cover the withdrawal and not leave for 10 minutes. Jinnie checked her watch and watched as the area below emptied out with vans leaving in every direction, leaving just Hanna’s van. Jinnie thought this was probably the longest 10 minutes of her life, but eventually it was over, and she joined Hanna as her spotter wandered off, with the sniper rifle in a suitcase, in the direction of the station. He had told Jinnie that he was getting on the U‑Bahn. On Friday and Saturday night, trains on his line ran every ten minutes all night and someone getting on at Alexanderplatz station with a suitcase would not be at all suspicious.
Hanna drove carefully towards Manfred’s apartment, not wanting to attract attention, and popped the van into a lock‑up garage some distance from the apartment. Manfred was waiting at the garage and he and Jinnie walked arm in arm back to apartment while Hanna and Penny were picked up in a nondescript Volkswagen to be driven back to Hanna’s Charlottenburg house. As they neared the entrance, Manfred whispered to Jinnie, “Be careful what you say in the lift or in the apartment until Karl gets back and scans it. The place has been empty for some hours and I trust nobody.”
Manfred opened the front door and went to turn off the alarm system, but it was already off. Manfred held a finger to his lips for silence and took a Heckler & Koch USP automatic out of his pocket and handed it to Jinnie. He then tapped an 8‑character code into the alarm panel which swung open to reveal a cavity containing more pistols and ammunition. He selected another and half a dozen clips of 9mm ammunition. Half he put in his pockets and half he gave to Jinnie who put them in her jacket pocket. Together they edged down the hallway first to the dining room which was unoccupied. As they crept back out into the hallway, Jinnie saw a shadow move under the kitchen door. Together they walked silently to the door and dropped to their knees on either side of the door.
Manfred reached up to the door handle and pushed the door open a crack. He peeped through the crack and signalled two to Jinnie, with one high and one low. Using hand signal she understood she was to take the one low on the left while he took the one high on the right. His next signal was not to kill them unless forced to. He then gave a 3, 2, 1 countdown with the fingers on his left hand, before they burst in, taking the agents completely by surprise.
Manfred had just got the two intruders standing up on the floor when Karl arrived via the good/trade lift and, entering via the apartment’s service entrance and kitchen door, came up behind them; he searched them, removed two pistols and spare magazines from them before securing their hands with cable ties. Karl quickly confirmed that they had been in the process of installing bugs, the apartment was still secure. On questioning, the intruders reluctantly revealed they had entered the apartment by abseiling down the goods lift shaft from the roof.
A quickly whispered discussion took place between Karl and Manfred who suddenly moved quickly, and the two intruders were on the floor unconscious. Manfred said to Jinnie, “There are plastic cleaner’s gloves in the top drawer over there. Put a pair on, collect their tools and put them back in their backpack. We need to dispose of these two as if they never made it this far, so they are going to fall headfirst down the lift shaft and land on the top of the lift car. I expect they will be found tomorrow, but it might take a while. The longer the better really; if the bodies decompose a bit it won’t be so easy for a postmortem to sort out how they died.”
The bodies and backpack were transported to the roof where it was found that access to the lift house was unlocked and ropes dangled down the shaft. Before dropping them down the shaft, Karl made certain both were dead from broken necks. Their guns and spare magazines were returned to their holsters, and they were held one after the other over the lift shaft and dropped headfirst down the shaft. The backpack went down between the two bodies.
The three agents left the door to the lift house unlocked and headed back to the kitchen ensuring the emergency access to the roof was unlocked. Back in the kitchen it was quickly tidied up and left as if nothing had occurred. The three retired to the sitting room which Karl scanned while Jinnie fixed drinks on being given the all‑clear. Karl then scanned the rest of the apartment and again gave all clear, so Manfred returned the pistols to their hiding place behind the alarm panel. Back in the sitting room Manfred put the TV on and switched it to a news channel, it was reporting numerous incidents all over Berlin. A commentator was speculating that it was an intensification of the PfP campaign.
Jinnie asked, “Why would the Gestapo, or whoever they were, come down the lift shaft and not just use the trade lift.” “I suspect they knew there are cameras in it, and the likelihood was they would be seen and taken for common or garden burglars. The CCTV is operated by the Criminal Police, the original excuse for all the cameras was to protect the population from common or garden criminals like shoplifters, muggers, burglars, traffic offences and the like. Most ordinary people don’t realise the Gestapo and other security services also make use of it.”
As they talked, there was a huge boom, and the TV lost its signal, displaying a blank screen full of static. Manfred tried the remote control, and it was the same on all channels. Karl tried the internet, and that was also down. He then reached for a portable radio, and all the Berlin stations were down. He eventually found a Potsdam station that appeared to be having a phone‑in about yesterday’s football. The discussion was about SV Babelsberg 03, a local side who were mid‑table in a minor league. Manfred listened, but with no interest in the discussion, he wanted a report on the explosion and if it had brought the tower down.
Eventually, the presenter said he had a news flash and went over to the ‘newsroom’ where someone read out a statement about an explosion causing extensive damage to the Berlin TV Tower and that TV, radio and broadband were down in much of Berlin. Back to the presenter, he immediately took a call from someone in Mitte who was asked to describe what he could see from his window. He said, “I can see the lights of loads of police, firefighters and ambulances. What I can’t see is the TV Tower, it is no longer there.” When asked, “What do you mean,” the caller continued, “I can usually see the TV Tower’s observation deck above the rooftops from this window, but it’s gone, it’s simply not there. There was a huge explosion, that woke me, followed by a mighty crash and all I could see was a massive cloud of dust when I looked out. I put the TV on, but there was nothing, your station is the only one I can find. The dust has settled, and as I said, the tower has gone, but it looks like there is a huge fire at the Alexanderplatz Station.”
Manfred gave Jinnie and Karl high fives and settled back to listen to other callers. By the time Jinnie decided it was time for bed, she was sure the operation had been a success. The tower had fallen just as planned, there was no train service through Alexanderplatz Station, the fire at the station was a bonus, there were no trams or buses through Alexanderplatz, the U‑Bahn was running but not stopping. Jinnie said, “I’m absolutely shattered, please let me sleep if you’re up before me.”
***
It was the hammering on the front door that woke Jinnie. A moment later Manfred’s head came round her door, and he said, “It’s the Kripo, it seems something happened in the block last night and they are going door to door asking questions, and they want to look round the apartment. You better get dressed.” Jinnie checked her Omega De Ville Prestige watch, 10:18, and reluctantly got out of bed and dressed before heading to the kitchen from where the smell of coffee was drifting. Frau Fischer wished her good morning and presented her with a large mug of coffee and the same breakfast as yesterday.
Jinnie asked, “I hear there was an ‘incident’ in the building. Do you know what it was and what the police are looking for.” “Not really,” replied Frau Fischer, “when I went to use the lift this morning there were men in white paper suits working on it, and I had to go to the front door and use the main lift. The maid from number 2 said someone had used the lift earlier and there was blood dripping from the ceiling, and the police were called. The police asked me what I had seen, and I told them ‘nothing’. I went home at four yesterday and arrived back at quarter past eight. I was late because half the tram lines weren’t running, and the traffic was awful. There is no TV or radio this morning, and a man on the bus said the TV Tower fell down on the Alexanderplatz Station and blocked six tram lines, the main train lines and a load of regional lines.”
“Are the police saying the tower falling down is connected to the blood in the lift?” Jinnie asked as innocently as possible. “I don’t think so. When I showed my papers that I didn’t live here and said I had been at home with my family last night, they weren’t interested,” replied Frau Fischer. Jinnie was aware of a detective listening to the conversation, so she drank some coffee and applied butter and jam to a slice of bread. Eventually the detective asked, “Are you Frau Marie Meier?” “I am,” replied Jinnie. “And you are a Swiss friend of Heir Hoffman.” “That’s right,” said Jinnie, “I came for a visit, just a few days.” “Can I see your passport?” “Of course. I’ll get it, it’s in the bedroom.” Jinnie was aware of the detective following her into the bedroom and waiting while she got the passport out of her handbag. He reached out a hand and Jinnie passed over the Swiss passport. He examined it, compared the photo to her, and handed it back, saying, “There is no entry stamp.” Jinnie replied, “That is because there is no immigration between Germany and Switzerland, it is a common travel area.”
Looking at the unmade bed, the detective asked, “You slept here?” “Yes,” replied Jinnie, “I only just woke up. We were late last night, Manfred took me to a club, and I slept in.” The detective grunted and had a quick look around the suite before rejoining his colleague in the hall where he was talking with Manfred and Karl.
Jinnie spotted the glance from the detective already in the hall and the almost unnoticeable shake of the head from Jinnie’s detective. The detective thanked them for their time and left. As he closed the front door, Manfred watched them ring the bell of the other penthouse apartment on the seventh floor. Karl quickly scanned the apartment in case the detectives had left a bug but found nothing. Jinnie asked, “What did you make of that?” “The detective told me they were investigating the deaths of two lift workmen who were servicing the goods lift overnight and had fallen to their deaths. He asked me where we were last night. As we agreed I told him Karl and Frau Fischer had gone home about five, we went out to dinner and then a club, we got in about 2:15, I couldn’t be sure exactly, but we used the main lift so would be on CCTV.”
“Why the nosing round the flat?” asked Jinnie. “That’s just standard practice,” said Karl, “they work on the principle that if you object, then you have something to hide.” “I’m glad we cleared up last night,” said Jinnie. “Yes, I had a look around the place in daylight before we got the visit. Everything looked quite normal,” said Manfred. “I think those detectives were doing exactly what they told us, investigating the deaths of two men who fell to their deaths. I bet they had no idea they had been in the apartment and, depending on what the postmortem says, the Gestapo might accept an accident before they got in the apartment. But what worries me was why they wanted to bug me. Do they suspect me, or is it because I often hold meetings here with Hanna and they were looking to get some commercial advantage on the contracts we are negotiating with the Ministry?”
“If you ask me, it was the latter,” replied Jinnie. “I don’t think those two were some of their best operatives. There was nothing to say they had been in the apartment. Their guns were in their holsters, the bugs were still in their backpack, it all looks like an accident before making entry. If the PM says the fall killed them we are in the clear. But I suspect if it was for a commercial advantage they might be back. I suggest you change the alarm code, they obviously knew it, and think about installing your own CCTV, some cameras that are overt and some that are covert. If someone breaks in again you can go to the Kripo and show them the video, point to the bugs, shout commercial espionage and remove the bugs without suspicion.”
“I like those ideas,” said Manfred. “Can you sort it out please, Karl. Now let’s see what the radio is saying about the tower.” Manfred switched on the radio that was still tuned to the Potsdam station they had listened to previously. Within a few minutes, it was clear that PfP were getting the official blame for downing the tower and that the security services were investigating. The tower was destroyed and would take years to fully replace, although there was speculation of some sort of temporary military radio transmitter being ready in a few weeks. The damage to the Alexanderplatz Station was serious, half the roof was down and, with the remains of the tower, all the tracks were blocked and the overhead power and signalling were down. The fire that was still smouldering had destroyed much of the infrastructure, and the authorities were saying it might be months before trains were even running through the station again, as the roof was unsafe and needed to be demolished. The rubble blocking the tram tracks on either side of the station would have to be removed before the state of the tram tracks could be assessed, but that was considered the least of the problems.
Hanna and Lina/Penny arrived an hour later, complaining about the traffic disruption and police checkpoints. They also wanted to know why a police officer had been in the reception area checking everyone coming into the building. Manfred told them the story of the men in the apartment and how they had fallen to their deaths. Penny asked, “Do you think they suspect you?” “We don’t think so,” replied Jinnie. “It is the Kripo investigating, not the Gestapo. The detective I was speaking to was talking about lift engineers falling down the shaft.”
Hanna said, “London wants you two out of here as soon as possible, but I don’t think we can use the ingress route as an exit. One of my people said there were checks just to get onto the Central Station forecourt, who knows what the trains are like. One of the men embedded in the police says they are rounding up anyone they know of who has any link to the PfP. He says they don’t think the ‘resistance’ is active inside Berlin. It is only thought to be active in Greater Germany, perhaps our not taking part in action since the big raid has protected us.”
“So how are we to get out?” asked Jinnie. “The details have not been worked out fully yet,” said Hanna, “but I think it is via Poland.” “Isn’t there fighting in Poland?” asked Penny. “A little,” said Manfred. “The Nazis have withdrawn all the best troops for use in Russia. Those remaining are mainly those not fit for the front line and their main job is to clear out anything useful to the Poles, like trucks and stores, but the Free Polish Army and the Polish Resistance say they are trying to burn everything before the Poles get there. The problem is the Poles getting there too quickly for them and overrunning them before they can truly succeed.”
Hanna said, “I am in contact with the Polish Resistance, and they are in contact with the Free Polish Forces. We think that if we can get you into their hands, then they can easily get you back to Britain. It’s getting you across Germany to Poland that is a bit trickier. The problem is civilians are not travelling into Poland, so we either must put you into German uniform or smuggle you over.” “Personally, I prefer being smuggled,” said Jinnie. “I don’t want to be shot by the Free Poles.” “I agree,” added Penny. “I think we have more chance not being a target for the Poles.”
In Chapter 32 – Poland
© WorthingGooner 2025
