The three men left the room, Lange patting Lockhart on the shoulder as he did so. Lockhart waited until he heard their voices fade down the corridor, and then leaned over and picked up the piece of paper. It contained only one sentence:

I…………………………being a British subject consider it my duty to offer my services in the Common European struggle against Communism, and hereby apply to enlist in the British Free Corps.

Signature………………………………….

It looked so innocent, framed like that. But then that was its intention. Lockhart put the paper down and walked to the window. It was dark outside. Maybe he should treat Lange like an idiot and try to escape. He turned his head to the door and then looked back out at the shadowy figures of the pine trees. He could be through the window, over the fence and running through them in a minute, free from this hateful situation. At least if he was shot he wouldn’t die a traitor. They would probably shoot Anna as well. They’d be together then—perhaps that was the only way they could be reunited. Lockhart wondered whether Anna, from where she was, could see any trees. Doubtful, he thought.

But this was too good an opportunity. The Germans were handing him a chance, small though it was, to investigate the possibility of whether sarin existed; to establish whether Nicolas’s warnings should be heeded. He would now have to act the role of traitor in full, knowing that the Germans would make great propaganda out of having an English officer joining them. When the news got back, he would be as vilified as those buggers Haw-Haw and Amery. Perhaps Cairo and Baker Street already thought he was a traitor. What would they think of him at Tara?

Although, to actually join the Waffen-SS…There was plenty of information about their massacres of POWs and their treatment of Jews in Poland and elsewhere. The SS even ran the concentration camps, but nobody truly believed the stories starting to come out of them. A chill ran down his spine as he pictured a starving Anna in a camp. He had to save her, and so many others, but in doing so, did he have to join their tormentors? It looked like that. If he died a traitor, then too bad—at least he would have a clear conscience before his God.

Lockhart walked over to the desk and picked up the pen. His hand was shaking so uncontrollably he had to put it back down. He sat and took several deep breaths, which made him feel faint. He let it pass, and then stood up and once more took the pen. He poised the nib above the sheet, but found that he could go no further. Rationally, he knew he should sign, but his instincts, his background, his whole sense of self stopped him doing it. It would be like signing his own death sentence. No. He couldn’t sign—for what was he really going to achieve? The idea that he could discover anything about one of the most closely guarded of Nazi secrets was risible. He threw down the pen.