Recognizing the voice, Brad tossed back the covers. It was not yet dawn, but he’d been awake since midnight, too high-strung from the roller coaster of the last forty-eight hours to sleep. He opened his room door to find Hans dressed in an army-issued wool robe and a night cap. Brad was in pajamas that he’d packed along with a few other things from his room over Madame Gastain’s stables. “Is my ride here already?” he asked. He and Lodestar and Lapwing would be leaving sometime after morning curfew, going separate ways in different vehicles to their safe houses.

“Non, Herr Wagner. I have come about another matter.”

Brad invited him in, and Hans cast a look toward Major General March’s room at the end of the hallway before entering. “I regret to disturb your sleep,” the aide said, speaking low, “but before the household is awake, I’ve come with a grave proposition that I hope you will accept. It has to do with the general’s concern for the safety of his son.”

Surprised, Brad said, “Isn’t Wilhelm safe at his aunt’s in Zurich?”

“For the time being, yes, but the general and I fear the day will come when he will be arrested. If that happens and he refuses to cooperate under interrogation, Reichsführer Himmler’s policy now is to incarcerate members of the prisoner’s family as leverage to get them to talk. Wilhelm will not be safe even in Zurich. He will be kidnapped and brought back to share the same cell as his father. Also, Herr General believes that should something happen to him, without his protection, and if the money dries up, he cannot be sure the aunt will treat Wilhelm kindly.” Sweat stood on Hans’s brow despite the night’s frigid temperature.

“What can I do to help?” Brad asked.

“I have come to propose that you take Wilhelm with you to America.”

Stunned, Brad stammered, “Hans, I’d love to, but I—I can’t promise he’d be any safer with me. I have no idea of my escape route and its hazards. I may not even make it out of France.” By what method he and the others would be extracted, Brad couldn’t even guess—by car, train, plane, ship, or on foot? Would their exfiltration take hours, days, weeks? Where would they be headed—to Spain, Switzerland, Gibraltar? The answers to these questions would not be answered until they got to their safe houses and made contact with Major Renault.