Title: The Day Before Sunrise
Author: Thomas Wiseman
Publisher: Book Club Associates (BCA)
Publication Date: 1976
Type: Hard Cover
Condition: Very Good
Jacket condition: Good
Edition: Book Club (BCE/BOMC).
Notes: rubbing to exposed edges of dustjacket. April 1945 - the last act of the war. The Allied stranglehold on Berlin is tightening by the day, as the escape corridor to the Bavarian Alps and the Swiss border is narrowing. In the maze of ruins that Berlin has become, a man of appalling ingenuity, with a ruthless sense of self-preservation, contrives his escape. He is the secret policeman Ernst Scholler. In his shabby, shiny suit with its sagging pockets, he is not immediateiy recognizable as some-one of importance, but as the Reich Special Investigator he has long been checking up on the highest in the land, and there is nothing he doesn't know about. Using his position and knowledge, he begins to bargain for his life with the Allies. The man with whom the bargain must be made is Allen Welsh Dulles, chief of the O.S.S. in Switzerland and President Roosevelt's personal representative. With chilling pragmatism, he sees that the longer the German surrender is delayed the deeper the Communist penetration of Europe will be. To stay that, in particular to stop Tito's seizure of Trieste, he is ready tb talk to the devil himself. Scholier and Dulles, both professionals and practical men, arrive at an arrangement of expediency in Berne. It requires supervision from the inside, and the only person available to act as an agent is a young American code-clerk, Elliott, who has no previous training in the field. Elliott becomes the Special Investigator's henchman and accomplice and enters the underground offices of the secret police. Bound to each other by mutual self-interest, a strange relationship develops between the two; as his sense of horror becomes blunted by what he sees, the young American begins to learn the trade-craft of deception, and rules which govern survival in such a world. Size: 12mo - over 6¾" - 7¾" tall
