by Robert Brown
Dieter’s local history articles were more interesting, because they had been written by Dieter himself. Most of them set out to prove that this region was ethnically German and had been since the early Middle Ages. Heinrich didn’t know enough Polish or medieval history to tell how accurate the articles were, but he smelled bullshit. A historian with an axe to grind was nothing more than a politician of the past.
The articles were published in a local German-language magazine that had an obvious slant but didn’t go too far to the right, as well as various right-wing websites.
One article stood out from the rest. It was about the treasure train.
Dieter gave a general history of the gold train that differed from the usual stories. In it he made no mention of stolen art, only gold and jewels, and put the figure of its value in euros that, when translated into dollars, came out to about 50 million.
In other words, he didn’t stick to the mainstream story. Instead his story jived with the one Amethyst Briggs had told.
Why did they stray from the myth? Were they getting their source material from somewhere else?
He couldn’t tell because Dieter cited no sources in his history articles.
Dieter’s conclusion was the most interesting part:
“Imagine what this money could do for our community, for it belongs to all people of Wałbrzych and those German speakers living in what is currently Poland. Youth centers could be opened to give much-needed guidance and recreation facilities to our young people. Monuments could be raised in honor of the war dead. University scholarships could send German-speaking residents to the finest institutions of higher learning in the Fatherland. Pensioners could be given a decent standard of living in their golden years. Tourist facilities could be expanded to bring in foreign currency and attract jobs while teaching the world about the region’s proud German heritage. This money could lift the entire region and restore it to its proper stature as a proud, vibrant part of the German community.”
Interesting. So Dieter, like the old bag back in Westchester County, had a better or at least different source of information than most people hunting for the train. And Dieter wanted to use the money for the community while the Purity League wanted to use it for its own political purposes. The organization claimed it only wanted to coordinate the various far right groups, but if they held the strings to the biggest purse around, it didn’t take a genius to see who would end up in charge.
But would the Purity League kill him over that? If they got the key to finding the train and not Dieter, what did it matter what he thought?
Wait, was he beginning to believe there really was a train? Maybe. The important thing was that they all believed in it, and with 50 million on the line, these thugs were capable of anything.
That still left far too many questions and damn few answers. He hoped he could learn more at the memorial service tomorrow.
Heinrich was tempted to go down to the bar for a nightcap to turn off the wheels grinding in his head, but he might bump into those boring tourists again so he decided to stick it out in his hotel room.
He fell asleep and dreamt of buried trains filled with gold and old men being clubbed to death on the streets of New York City.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The next day dawned bright and clear, with a bit of warmth that hinted at spring.
Heinrich woke up early, his biological clock still not set to Central European time. He took a stroll around the city, not sure what he was looking for. In a bookshop he found a book written by some local about the treasure train. He bought it and flipped through it as he waited for Jan. It didn’t tell him much that he didn’t already know, and the rest was hearsay or speculation.
The book had a short chapter on the history of the hunt for the train. The first serious searches began right after the war, although being under Soviet occupation it was difficult for people to just go off into the woods, shovel in hand. There were unsubstantiated reports that the Soviet army also searched for the train, and at times sections of the woods were cordoned off with barbed wire, but it looked like they found nothing.
The hunt began in earnest after the fall of Communism when once again people could wander around the woods without having their motives questioned. Several major expeditions turned up a few small bunkers, metal detectorists found heaps of war materiel, but otherwise all the searches met with no success.
Heinrich was amazed with the tenacity of these people. The author, a dumb-looking galoot whose back cover bio said he was a local farmer, boasted that he had been searching for the train for thirty years. Hardly something to boast about.
The discovery of a genuine document by the general who hid the train would be like dynamite to these suckers, Heinrich realized.
Jan showed up in better spirits than the day before, probably because he had no new bruises.
“We box now?” was the first thing out of the skinhead’s mouth.
Heinrich couldn’t see any way to say no so he said yes. They went and practiced some moves in the park. Luckily, this time no cop came around. The last thing he needed was to become known by the local police.
After that, Heinrich asked what else there was to see in this town. Jan shrugged.
“It boring. I tell you.”
“It’s boring. I told you,” Heinrich replied.
“Huh?”
“I’m correcting you. You’re good at languages, so you should speak them correctly.”
“Oh, OK. It’s boring. No, it’s fucking boring. I told you.”
“Much better, I guess. Hey, isn’t this a school day?”
Jan shrugged.
“Won’t you get in trouble for not going?” Heinrich asked.
Another shrug. “Nobody care.”
Heinrich figured that was true. Yesterday had been a school day as well. That cop who had questioned him hadn’t said a word about it.
They walked aimlessly around town for a while, and Heinrich saw how dull this place would be for a kid. He asked Jan about what there was to do, and besides a football pitch and a couple of movie theaters and a pool that only opened in summer, there was nothing.
“Are a lot of young people joining the cause?” Heinrich asked.
“Yeah,” Jan said with a grin. “All the cool people.”
“You mean the kids who don’t go to school.”
“Yeah.”
“The rich kids don’t join,” Heinrich ventured.
“Them? They pussies. Have it easy.”
“They’re pussies. They have it easy,” Heinrich corrected. “Yeah, we have rich pussies in New York too.”
On a side street that gave a fine view of the castle framed between the closely set buildings, a shop caught his eye. It was a little antique place stuffed with old furniture, knickknacks, and leather-bound books. Just the kind of place he liked.
“Let’s go in here.”
Jan turned up his nose. “What you want to buy old shit?”
“You’ll see.”
They passed through the front door, a little bell announcing their arrival. An older man with wire-rimmed spectacles and a salt-and-pepper beard emerged from between shelves of old porcelain figurines and a heap of wicker chairs that needed some serious mending.
The proprietor gave Jan a dubious stare and turned to Heinrich.
“May I help you?”
“I’m looking for old 78 rpm records in good condition, and some Edison cylinders if you have any.”
Heinrich had already boned up on the specialist vocabulary.
The shop owner brightened. “Ah yes, we have quite a few old records. Not much demand for those these days. Come.”
He led them to a back room flanked by a pair of nude Greek statues of nymphs that looked like they had been made as lawn ornaments back in the Hapsburg days. Jan snickered and fondled one of the statue’s boobs. Luckily the shop owner didn’t see.
“Here we are.”
The back room was dusty and unused. All four walls
were lined with bookshelves, every one of them crammed. Two had books in Polish, German, and Czech. Another had sheet music and old magazines. The fourth made Heinrich’s heart skip a beat.
It was all records. Most were 33 rpm, of course. Even in antique stores that was generally the case. But he spotted two big stacks of old 78s.
Heinrich rummaged through them like a teenager who had just found his dad’s stash of porno mags.
“Why you want this?” Jan asked, scowling. “It is boring old stuff.”
“The sound quality is better on vinyl than on CDs or MP3s. It captures a better range of sound, and the data isn’t compressed,” Heinrich told him, impressed by his own ability to talk music in Polish. Of course he had looked up all those words in his first week of study. He couldn’t let the guys down.
Jan looked toward the door and moped. “Come on. Let’s go.”
“Here,” Heinrich said, and handed him a stack of 78s. “Be careful with these. Look through them. I want any old jazz or local music.”
Jan rolled his eyes, sat down on the floor, and went through the stack.
Heinrich was finding gold. He found a couple of old Polish folk recordings and set them on his purchase pile. Neil loved that stuff. He found some jazz odds and ends, mostly local bands playing their imitations of American hits. While they weren’t worth anything, he bought some of them anyway as curios. None of the guys had any of these.
“Cool,” Jan said behind him.
“Isn’t it?” Heinrich replied, still rummaging through the pile.
“Look.”
Heinrich turned around.
And was faced with a ghost.
Jan held up a record of German Wehrmacht marching songs. Proud ranks of soldiers marched along a street flanked by a cheering crowd. Judging by the label it was prewar, but just barely. Propaganda for the fight to come.
Heinrich trembled. Grandpa Otto probably owned that record back when he lived in Germany, back before he left his old life behind.
“You want?” Jan asked.
Heinrich checked on the proprietor and felt immense relief when he saw the man had gone back to the front.
“I… already have that one.”
“Cool! You got lots of these? I like to listen.”
“They’re all in America.”
“I’d like to see America,” Jan said, staring at him the way he did when he said he’d like to have a hamburger.
“Maybe some day,” Heinrich mumbled, going back to his stack.
His mind was such a blur he almost missed a rare impression of an early album of “Jelly Roll” Morton, perfect for Jordan. His friend already had a complete collection of such an important musician, but Heinrich bet he didn’t have an album with the slipcase in Polish. He’d have to tell the guy how their photo had gotten him a hookup with a beautiful Polish human rights activist.
Well, maybe. He had to survive the memorial service first.
Jan handed him a couple of records that would be decent B sides to any collection, and Heinrich finished looking through the rest.
All in all, a pretty good score. Nothing fantastic, nothing that would earn him serious bragging rights, but some decent stuff for trades and a few curios and titles to round out areas of his collection.
Next he pulled each record out of its sleeve to check its condition. Whoever had owned these sides had done a good job keeping them safe. One had developed a hairline crack, common with the brittle old shellac, and a couple had obviously been played plenty of times, but except for the cracked one, all were in good to superb condition.
But he couldn’t buy a single one until he checked on something. Leaving Jan to look through the bookshelves for any 78s that might have been tucked away behind other things, he went to the front room.
“Do you speak German?” Heinrich asked the shop owner. Some conversations required fluency.
“Yes,” he replied in that language.
“I noticed among your records that you had one of marching songs from the Wehrmacht.”
The man looked shocked. “Oh, I didn’t know that. I bought those as a lot from someone whose grandfather had passed away. Sometimes the old people around here hold on to such things. Did you want to buy it?”
There was an edge to the man’s voice.
“No.”
“Good. Because I’m going to destroy it.”
Heinrich nodded and clapped the man on the shoulder. Usually he’d have a fit if someone said they would destroy an old recording, but he could make an exception in these circumstances.
He went back and retrieved his records and his annoying sidekick and made a deal with the shop owner for the records. The asking price was a bit high but Heinrich didn’t haggle. It was nice to meet someone in this damn place who wasn’t a Nazi.
Heinrich went back to his hotel with the stack of 78s. When he came back out, it was time to head to the memorial service.
“I wish I could go to the castle,” Jan said, staring at the old fort in the distance.
“I’ll tell you all about it.”
“See you tomorrow? Maybe we find some Communist to fight.”
“Maybe.”
“Same time?” Jan asked hopefully.
“I’ll call you.”
The memorial service started in fifteen minutes, so Heinrich decided to take a taxi. He went to the main square and hailed one.
“Castle, please.”
The cabbie had a round Slavic face and a cigarette sticking out of his mouth.
“Castle closed today.”
“I’m going to a memorial service there.”
The cabbie flipped him off and drove away.
“I agree, buddy,” Heinrich sighed as he watched him go, “I agree.”
The next cab he hailed was driven by someone with German features.
“Castle, please.”
“It’s closed today.”
“I’m going to the memorial service.”
The cabbie smiled. “I am going there myself. Get in. It’s free.”
The ride wasn’t free. Heinrich had to deal with a lot of chummy banter from the cabbie who proved quick and eager to reveal political leanings that would get you hit with a bar stool in most of Heinrich’s favorite places back home. Even worse, he learned absolutely nothing of use.
He was beginning to lose his patience. Here he was sharing the same town, perhaps the same meetings, with the murderer and he was barely any closer than he was when he boarded the flight.
His Polish was getting better though. He’d learned all the best swear words thanks to Jan. He felt like using all of them on this asshat.
At least he got them to the memorial service on time.
It took place on the green lawn in front of the castle gate. The castle was, indeed, closed, even though his tourist brochure said it was usually open at this time. He wondered if the curators had closed it out of respect for, or in fear of, Dieter Freytag’s memorial service.
The cabbie parked on the edge of the winding road leading to the top of the hill. When they got to service, they found a crowd of about two hundred people. The assembled neo-Nazis stood or sat in folding chairs facing a table draped with the National Revival and Nazi flags. At the table sat Mikolaj Symaski, the head of the local Purity League, plus three other men he didn’t recognize. One was an older man wearing an armband with the National Revival logo, another was a burly younger man, and the third was an ancient guy in a wheelchair who looked half asleep.
Behind them stood a couple of vertical boards covered in photos. One was a big portrait photo of Dieter with his birth and death dates. Heinrich could see a family resemblance to Jan. Other photos showed Dieter at the castle, or at various meetings posing with other members of the group.
One of them showed Dieter, the older man at the table, and a few others shaking hands with Mikolaj, the younger man at the table, and several others he didn’t recognize. The caption below said something about unity between groups. National Revival and
the Purity League?
It takes some chutzpah to put that photo up when the Purity League more than likely iced the guy.
Then a detail in the photo got his attention.
In the photo, the younger man currently sitting at the table wore green sneakers. He stood with his side to the camera, but the white stripe was just visible on the back of one of his shoes.
Heinrich found a seat, his heart beating fast.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
It had been a detail he had missed. The police report had mentioned that the sneakers were of an unknown make, and Heinrich hadn’t recognized them either.
That was because they were some Eastern European brand.
He studied the young guy at the table who talked quietly with Mikolaj while the older man seemed to be ignoring them. He looked the right height and build.
Heinrich let out a long, slow breath. So he had his murderer.
But Hans had been in New York too. Why? And where was he?
Heinrich looked around the crowd for a moment before spotting him. He sat near the front. Chances were he had not seen Heinrich arrive. Good.
Next he looked around for cops. A pair of them stood further up the hill in front of the castle gate. Obviously their duty was to secure the region’s most valuable historic site rather than interfere with the memorial service. He could expect no help from them unless things got violent, and maybe not even then.
He noticed someone taking photos on his phone. Radicals tended to be a camera shy crowd, but this was a big event. Heinrich decided to dare a couple of photos himself.
He zoomed in on the photo of the guy with the green sneakers and then on the people at the table. Once he got that, he put his phone away, letting out a breath of relief. No one had said anything, and Hans had not turned around.
