The Spandau Phoenix

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He was a soldier, a man of forty-eight, a pilot.

And he was already in the air.

Two thousand feet above Amsterdam, the Messerschmitt Bf-110 Zerstdrer

plowed through a low ceiling of cumulus clouds and burst into clear sky

over the glittering North Sea.

The afternoon sun flashed across the fighter's silver wings, setting off

the black-painted crosses that struck terror into the stoutest hearts

across Europe.

Inside the cockpit, the pilot breathed a sigh of relief.  For the last

four hundred miles he had flown a tiring, highly restricted route,

changing altitude several times to remain within the Luftwaffe's

prescribed corridors of safety.  Hitler's personal pilot had given him

the coded map he carried, and, with it, a warning.  Not for amusement

were the safety zones changed daily, Hans Bahr had whispered; with

British Spitfires regularly penetrating Hermann Goering's "impenetrable"

wall of air defense, the danger was real, precautions necessary.

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