Return to

Home Page

NEW AUTHORS SHOWCASE

 

09-02-09

6M

p3

The Heidorf Legacy

by

Dennis Higgins

Synopsis

The Heidorf Legacy, a book in three parts, tells the story of a German research doctor who accidentally clones twin boys towards the end of World War 2.

Book 1.   details the life of the doctor and the events leading to the birth of the twins.

Book 2. covers the period when the unusual birth was discovered by the Russians, and the plans made by them for the boys.

Book 3. sees the infiltration of the boys into the higher echelons of power in the United States, leading to a dramatic and unforeseen climax.

 

 

THE HEIDORF TRILOGY

Prologue                                                                                                               

United States of America at the beginning of the 21^st Century

     Almost sixty-eight million viewers in the United States, and a similar number of viewers worldwide, recoiled from their television sets in horror at the sound of the shot.  They watched, disbelieving yet fascinated, as a man at the forefront of the small group of people, walking onto the stage for the start of the first convention in the campaign to secure the incumbent President’s re-election for a second term of office, catapulted back into the arms of the following entourage.  The sheer professionalism of its operator enabled the TV camera to catch a brief glimpse of the bright red stain which spread as magic over what moments previously had been an immaculate white shirt-front.  Then its field of vision was blocked off as a phalanx of security men, guns drawn, surged forward with the President hidden somewhere in their midst.      Their reactions were pure reflex, the result no doubt of many hours of rehearsing for such an eventuality, and their momentum enabled them to force a path through the hundreds of delegates milling around at the front of the auditorium before those at the back realised that anything was wrong.

     A second camera at the rear of the auditorium swivelled round to point at the fire exit on which the human spearhead was converging but, by the time it had focussed, the main body of men was through, leaving several of their number blocking the doorway, guns still drawn, to prevent anyone from following. The crescendo of sound within the auditorium was suddenly cut off in its prime as the sound of squealing tyres, followed by the howl of a rapidly receding siren, came from the still open doorway.

    The whispered words of a shocked delegate echoed through the eerie silence like thunder.  “Christ!” he exclaimed. “Someone’s shot the President!”

 

BOOK 1.

Chapter 1.

Germany – April 1945

     Until now Oberst Julius Klein had shown little interest in the fluctuating fortunes of war.  His rank of Oberst, although real enough to command the respect of those below him on the promotion ladder, was a matter of expediency rather than a reflection of his military skills.  Conscripted by the German army’s medical branch he was a scientist with unlimited resources at his command and answerable only to Heinrich Himmler himself.  Even Bernhard Rust, the Minister for Science and Education, had no jurisdiction over him.  Today, however, he had little option but to concern himself with the realities of a war which threatened to engulf him at any moment.

    The sounds of war were all around him and only this very morning he had received a top priority signal direct from the Reichstag informing him that he should make urgent preparations to destroy all evidence of the work for which, as head of the special unit at Castle Heidorf, he had been responsible.  The only exception to this order would be the project code-named ‘Wunderkind’, on which he and his team of specially trained nurses had been working for the past two years.  This project, he was informed, would continue in Berlin within the Reichstag itself, and he was to have all of the equipment and documentation that he would need to continue with the project ready for transportation in just two days time.  Transport arrangements were to be made in conjunction with the Commanding Officer of the border garrison at nearby Vierraden, and would be by way of two army trucks for his equipment and whatever records he needed to take with him to continue his work.  The twin boys who had been born at the castle three weeks earlier would travel with him and two nurses by ambulance.

    He flinched involuntarily as somewhere overhead yet another salvo of shells screamed by with a high-pitched whine.  He had no idea as to whether they had been fired by his own retreating army or by the Russians who, according to the propaganda machine, were suffering enormous losses as they forced back the German army by sheer weight of numbers and a fanatical determination to destroy everything and everyone in their path.  The tales that were coming back with the fleeing population were of appalling atrocities being committed by the rank and file of the Soviet army against men, women and children alike. If they were to be only half believed then the day after tomorrow couldn’t come fast enough.

    He leaned back wearily in his solid wooden chair, part of the inventory of the castle that had been commandeered by the military to provide the laboratories, offices and living quarters of the small scientific institute that it now housed, and gazed absently at the sepia-tinted photograph which stood framed on his desk.  It was of a small, apprehensive-looking boy clutching tightly onto his tute, a cone shaped container trimmed with silver paper, in which there were sweets and other small items that all German children were presented with for their first day at school.  The photo was of Julius, and his parents stood behind him as they posed at the school gates.

    He smiled fondly as he thought back to how proud they had been on that day, and how hard they had worked in order to send him to school instead of into the woods and fields to help scratch a living as most of the other peasant children of his age had been forced to do. That he had been a very bright child who would benefit from a formal education had become apparent to his parents very early on, but what had been less apparent was where the few phennigs would come from that were needed to pay for books, crayons and writing paper each term.

    Fortunately for Julius, but far less fortunate for his older sister Carla, the local landowner, by whose grace the Klein family occupied the humble two-roomed cottage in a small hamlet situated halfway between the coastal town of Wilhelmshaven and the Dutch border, had recently dispensed with the services of yet another young chambermaid, the third in just under two years. Whether or not Julius’s parents had heard the rumour being bandied about that this one was not pregnant like the previous two, but had refused to indulge some of Herr Grunenwald’s more unusual sexual tastes, was a subject not broached with them by other workers on the estate.  In any event the pretty little twelve-year-old daughter of Hans and Frieda Klein immediately became a resident employee of the Grunenwald family, with her meagre wage contributing to Julius’s education until she too became pregnant at the age of seventeen.

    Julius worked hard at school, blissfully unaware of the sacrifices that were being made on his behalf.  Most of Carla’s earnings had been used to further his education, and the so-called severance pay, given to her embarrassed father by a grateful Herr Grunenwald to help with the confinement, came just in time to enable Julius to take up a place at the boarding-school in Oldenburg to which he had recently gained entry by way of a Bursar’s free scholarship.

    Carla, who was conveniently married off to the unsuspecting son of another estate worker, saw none of the money but took with her as a dowry, a three-month-old calf and six chickens.  Her new husband, a simple giant of a man, never questioned the fact that their first baby was born less than seven months into the marriage.  He was just happy that his first-born was a boy and that his wife hadn’t died whilst giving birth as had happened with so many of the young women in the village and surrounding areas.  The village gossips, although sharing one or two quiet sniggers behind his back, were remarkably silent about the whole affair, with none of them wishing to expose themselves to the wrath of the husband who was undoubtedly the biggest and strongest man in the neighbourhood.  Additionally none of them wished to bring down on themselves the displeasure of the wealthy landowner on whom they were all dependant.

    The problem of Julius’s education beyond the sixth grade was solved when he won a science scholarship to the School of Medicine at the nearby university.  This scholarship, financed by the rapidly expanding pharmaceutical company of Chemie Wessell, took care not only of the tutoring fees and all of the additional expenses incurred in obtaining a degree in medicine, but also provided him with sufficient funds to work on a full stomach and sleep with a sound roof over his head.  He took part in very few of the social activities normally associated with a large university and, apart from the hours spent poring over medical textbooks in the university library, spent most of his free time studying and collating the notes that he had made earlier each day.  This he did in the small but comfortable bedroom that he shared at Frau Schmidt’s lodging house with a young Jewish student by the name of Isaac Stern.

    Frau Schmidt, a childless, attractive and slightly overweight widow in her mid-thirties, had been vaguely apologetic when she had answered the door to him after he had spotted the card in the front downstairs window advertising that she had vacancies.  “I’m sorry to have to ask, but are you Jewish?”

    Julius shook his head. “No!” he said. “Why? What has being Jewish got to do with it?”

    “Oh, nothing!” she hastened to assure him. “Nothing at all really!  It’s just that the only vacancy I have for a man is in a shared room, and the other occupant is Jewish.”

    “ Is he a student as well?” Julius asked, still not understanding what being or not being Jewish had to do with anything.  Several of the boys at his boarding school had been Jewish and, apart from the fact that they had always left the morning assembly before the headmaster offered up prayers, they appeared to be no different from anyone else.  In fact it wasn’t until he left the insular boundaries of the village school that he became aware of religions other than the Lutheran religion that his family and all of the other families appeared to embrace.  Certainly in his village there was just the one church in which everyone was christened, married, had the last rites read over them and, if and when the need arose, worshipped.

    “Oh yes! She replied in answer to his question. 

    She gave him one of her warmest smiles, the sort she normally reserved for the few travelling salesmen who chose to stay at her modest rooming house rather than at one of the small commercial hotels in the centre of the town.  She regretted mentioning that the other occupant of the room was Jewish, but still felt the need to justify the fact that she had taken in a Jew as a lodger. “He’s a third year medical student and his father is a very famous surgeon in Berlin.”

    Julius’s face broke into a smile.  That he could be sharing a room with another medical student was music to his ears.  “Is he in now?” he asked, completely unaware of the woman’s discomfort.  “Do you think that I could meet him?  I’d like to see the room anyway!”

    Frau Schmidt stood back without comment and indicated for him to enter the house. She let him enter the narrow hallway and, after closing the door and making sure that the latch was on, squeezed past him and proceeded to lead him upstairs to the second floor.

    The stairs were very steep and Julius stared in fascination as the woman’s short woollen skirt strained tightly and provocatively across her well rounded buttocks.  Despite the skirt’s restraining embrace they wobbled tantalisingly just an arm’s length in front of his face as she teetered in front of him on heels that were far too high for either safety or comfort. Because the skirt was so tight she was obliged to hitch it up a few more centimetres to allow herself sufficient leg movement to mount the stairs, and instinctively Julius felt himself bending slightly at the knees.  This enabled him to snatch quick glimpses of creamy white flesh above the black tops of her dark stockings.  He felt a warm glow spreading through his loins….