It was Wolfgang, his conditioned reflexes spurred by sight of the
swastika flag. The Americans stared at him; it was the first words they
had heard him speak--perhaps they were the only ones he knew. Herr
Schwinzog raised his eyebrows.
"What did you say?"
"_Heil Hitler!_" repeated Wolfgang mechanically.
"What does 'Hitler' mean?" asked one of the old men curiously.
"I don't know," said the other old man. "Perhaps he is feigning
insanity."
Kahl found his voice. "But this is monstrous nonsense!" he shrilled.
"Is this not the _tausendjahrige Reich_ that Hitler promised us--"
"Silence!" snapped Schwinzog, and the scientist quailed. "You are not
here to plead or talk gibberish, but to hear sentence. Your case has
been decided after thorough investigation." He fixed all the prisoners
with a frigid gaze. "You Americans are capable of more cunning than
most Germans give you credit for; I know that well, for I was a
colonial administrator in your country for ten years. Your attempt to
masquerade as 'time travelers' shows originality in the conception
and thoroughness in the execution. Needless to say, nothing directly
incriminating was found among your effects. The experts report that
even the metal identification tags found on the two who call themselves
Ray Manning and Edward Dugan are authentic reproductions of those used
by the American army at the time of the Conquest.
"However, you made the mistake of using too much imagination in
the effort to confuse. Your story is too preposterous to be taken
seriously, especially since our best scientists have declared time
travel impracticable. Accordingly, we could sentence you to death for
unauthorized presence inside the Reich and for evident complicity in
the attempted sabotage of a German experimental station.
"In view of the absence of direct evidence of subversive actions, we
have decided on leniency. The two prisoners, real names unknown, alias
Pankraz Kahl and Wolfgang Muller--your claim to German citizenship has
been checked with the central archive in Berlin and found to be false.
Therefore I sentence you for the crime of imposture to five years in a
concentration camp."
Kahl burst into a desperate, unheard babble of protest. At a wave of
Schwinzog's hand the guards closed in. The Herr Doktor was dragged away
bodily, shouting disjointedly about the blindness of the Philistines
and Hitler's thousand years.
"As for you two," Schwinzog eyed Manning and Dugan with an oddly
speculative air, "since you have admitted American nationality, your
punishment is limited to immediate deportation--back to America."
They were more staggered than they would have been if he had said they
would be executed for failure to wear monocles.
As the guards surrounded them, Schwinzog raised his hand, his face
adorned by a mocking grin. "One more thing. You will be interested to
know that the raid on the Black Forest experimental station missed its
objective; the building destroyed was an unimportant storehouse. The
actual refining plant is nowhere in the vicinity. The project of which
your organization seems to be so well informed goes on as before and
will be completed inside a week. You may carry the message to America:
_One week to live._"