Mean Evergreen (Mercy Watts Mysteries Book Twelve)

by A W Hartoin

  I held my breath as I looked in each vault, but Nadelbaum wasn’t in with Jean Moulin or the Veils and I was starting to think I’d picked the wrong section. He might be in with Victor Hugo or the mathematicians or the banker. I hurried toward third door, the one that contained the Curies, the scientists shared a hall with the resistance fighters and a holocaust surviver, appropriate, I always thought.

  I hadn’t really walked in any of the vaults. They were narrow with just enough room for two people to pass comfortably. I didn’t think there was a good place to hide from view, but I was wrong. There on Pierre Curie’s vault was a smear of red on the pale stone. The vault looked clear. I slipped out my Mauser and put my back toward the open black gate-like door, sliding myself sideways inside.

  “You don’t make good choices,” I said.

  Nadelbaum looked down at me from where he’d wedged himself on top of Marie Curie’s tomb. “Shit.”

  “You disgust me. There are five women in this place and you had to squat your rank butt on one of them. I ought to shoot you just for that.”

  “She’s dead. She doesn’t care,” he said with a sneer.

  “Pay attention. I care,” I said. “Get off.”

  “You have no authority over me.”

  “This,” I shook the weapon, “says I do. Get down, now.”

  “You won’t shoot me.” He wasn’t looking all that confident when I clicked off the safety, but he didn’t budge.

  “I shot Richard Costilla in the face so you might want to move along.”

  Nadelbaum scampered to the end of the tomb. Then he climbed down as he cradled one arm, leaving more smears of blood, and knocking off the flowers. He had scrapes like rug burn down one side of his face and a lower lip that was swelling to epic proportions. He pressed himself against the back wall in the dimmest part, looking back like he thought he might be able to climb out the small, barred window.

  “What are you going to do?” he asked.

  I used my casted hand to pull out my panic button and pressed it.

  “What’s that?”

  “It alerts the cops if something’s happened to me,” I said. “You happened to me.”

  He flushed with anger and he was pretty good-looking. Better in person than in photos and I was starting to see what Madison fell for. That deep melodious voice, cultured, even when whining about his predicament. The good clothes and expensive watch. Such a good way to suck a girl in.

  “Why did you chase me?” he demanded.

  “So I would catch you.”

  That was apparently confusing and he dithered for a minute before tilting his head and saying, “What do you want?”

  “I’ve got it.”

  Nadelbaum fumbled in his pocket and I got ready to fire, but he didn’t pull out a weapon. He pulled out an opaque green bottle, yelled, “Ha!” and threw it with gusto at my feet where it landed with a thunk.

  We both stared at it for a second until I said, “What was supposed to happen?”

  “I thought…”

  “What? I’m dying of curiosity. Would it explode, so you could escape through a plume of green smoke like the Wicked Witch of the West or something?” I asked, barely containing my urge to laugh.

  He didn’t answer, staring down at his failure, a bottle that had a skull and crossbones and the words, “Vorsicht” and “Gift” on the label. Gift meant poison as if the skull and crossbones weren’t enough to give it away. Underneath that was piece of paper with a handwritten note that I couldn’t make out.

  “Why didn’t it break?” he asked finally.

  “You’re an asshole and fate hates you,” I said.

  He stared at me like I was serious, so I said, “It looks like Bakelite, you moron.”

  “Bakelite?”

  “Plastic.”

  “It’s not plastic,” he said with considerable umbrage. “My great-great-grandfather made that in the war.”

  “Wait a minute,” I said. “Is that the insecticide you gave Anton to knock me out?”

  His eyes got all shifty. “No.”

  “It says poison. You could’ve killed me. The Klinefeld Group wouldn’t give you money for my body, idiot.”

  “I’ll…give you the money,” he said. “As soon as you let me go, I’ll give it to you.”

  “Who do you think you’re dealing with? You tried to kill me,” I said and pointed at the bottle. “Twice.”

  “I have the money. You want it, don’t you? Let me go and I’ll give it to you.”

  I rolled my eyes. “We already have it, moron. Done and dusted. Back where it belongs.” I glanced back. “Where are the cops? I’m ready for some creme brûlée and a hot bath.”

  “You’re lying,” he hissed.

  “Nope. Lisa Purcell was transferring it back into her account about the time you were in Louis Vuitton,” I said.

  He balled up his fists and said, “What do you want?”

  “You don’t have anything I want.”

  Nadelbaum pointed a shaking finger at me. “I’ll tell the cops that it was all Madison’s idea. The kidnapping, everything. Let me go or I’ll say it.”

  “What about the money you stole from The Klinefeld Group? Was that Madison’s idea, too?” I asked.

  He pressed back hard against the stone and pulled out a wallet. “I’ve got some money here. You want it?”

  “Not even a little.”

  He fumbled the wallet and it fell at his feet. “You’ve got to let me go. They’ll kill me if I don’t pay them back.”

  “And that bothers me because?”

  “You don’t want me to get killed,” said Nadelbaum. “You don’t.”

  I tilted my head. “Well, I’m willing to see how it goes.”

  “I…I have information about them.”

  “The Klinefeld Group? Sure, you do.”

  “They’re Nazis and they’re into all kinds of, you know, Nazi stuff.”

  I yawned. “Shocking.” I pulled out my phone and pressed the emergency button, so much for the stupid panic button.

  “Don’t do that,” he pleaded.

  “Too late.”

  “I know about Berlin.”

  “I know about Berlin, too,” I said. “Love the Thai ladies in the park. The broth is so good.”

  He stared at me like I was an idiot, but I was just having fun. The broth is magical though.

  “The murder. They did it. You were investigating it. I know about what happened.”

  You’ve got my attention.

  “The powers that be told you they killed someone in Berlin?” I asked. “Get real.”

  “You do want to know. Let me go and I’ll tell you.”

  “Tell me and I’ll let you go,” I said. Liar, liar, pants on fire.

  “Okay,” he said coming forward. “So the Mossad knew about him and he knew that they knew. Nobody gets away from the Mossad.”

  “Who are we talking about?”

  “Jens Waldemar Hoff, the real one. He was going to cooperate and tell them information.”

  “So…”

  “They killed him and then they killed the cop.”

  “I know all that,” I said. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

  “They’re money laundering through the charity. That’s how they’re funded.”

  “Now that is interesting,” I asked. “Who are they working for?”

  “I only saw them once. I think they are with the—”Nadelbaum flew back against the wall blood spraying against the stone. I shrieked and a man grabbed me, tossing me in the crypt. He pointed a 9mm with a silencer at me. It’s a misnomer to say that thing was silent. I flipping heard it. I just didn’t hear him.

  “Thank you, Miss Watts,” he said. “You’ve saved me time and effort.”

  I pointed my Mauser at him and asked, “Who the hell are you?”

  “Can’t you guess?” He smiled but with no warmth whatsoever and I gave him the once over. Generic guy, on the small side with a tight, mean expression i
n his eyes. That stood out, the intensity of the meanness, but no bells were rung, and I said the only name that came to mind.

  “Jens Waldemar Hoff?”

  “Very good.”

  “Not really,” I said. “You’re all called that. Not very inventive, if you don’t mind me saying.”

  Hoff jerked his head toward Nadelbaum who had a hole dead center in his forehead. “He wasn’t.”

  “He wasn’t one of you,” I said.

  “No, he wasn’t.”

  “So your own people killed the first Hoff,” I said. “Wasn’t he one of you?”

  He frowned and then said, “He was and then he wasn’t. One must do what is necessary for success.” He advanced on me and I slipped in Nadelbaum’s blood and nearly went down. “Where is it?”

  “What?”

  He smiled again and a chill went down my spine. “Let’s not play games. The package. Where is it?”

  “Beats the hell out of me,” I said.

  “I will shoot you,” he said.

  “Right back at you.” I glanced at my phone. I pressed emergency but the screen was blank. Of course, it was. We were underground in a vault. Idiot.

  “They are not coming,” he said. “I have done my civic duty.”

  “Oh, really?”

  “I helpfully pointed out where the man you were chasing went. I’m sure they will have a fine time searching the Luxembourg gardens.”

  “Swell, but you forgot some things,” I said.

  “I don’t think so. I’m not known for failure.”

  “For starters, you let that dingus over there steal from you and find out about that Mossad thing. I call that a failure.”

  “Not my doing although I was quite efficient at cleaning up that mess. All I had to do was follow you,” he said with another chilling smile. “Very little effort on my part.”

  “Did you really kill Werner Richter, too?” I asked.

  “Me, personally?”

  “I meant your people, but I’ll take that as a yes.”

  “Take it any way you want,” he said. “Where is the package?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Ask again The answer will be the same.”

  Hoff showed his teeth. They were very white and kinda pointy. “You are going to tell me.”

  I might pee.

  “I might if I knew, but I don’t, so I can’t.”

  It could’ve been the tone of my voice or my expression. Something made him think again.

  “You found something in that dead woman’s purse,” he said.

  “Her name was Agatha and your people murdered her.”

  “It was about something in your parent’s house.”

  I could lie, but why bother. “The liquor cabinet. Stella shipped it back in 1938.”

  “Liquor cabinet?” He frowned again and his mind started working. So did mine.

  “Tell me where it is.” He extended his arm, pointing the 9mm at the center of my chest, but I had no fear. It just drained right out of me. It took some of my sense with it.

  “Tell me what it is,” I said.

  His mouth worked a little and I laughed.

  “You don’t know, do you?”

  “Do you?” The question was surprisingly innocent.

  “No, I don’t. The liquor cabinet had a secret compartment, but it was empty,” I said.

  “It couldn’t be,” he said.

  “Okay. You’re right. I’ll tell you what was in it,” I said. “A page ripped out of a Shel Silverstein book. Poetry. That’s it.”

  “Poetry.” His voice was flat.

  “I guess Josiah Bled liked it and we’re all screwed. By the way, they’re closing.”

  “What?”

  “That’s another thing you forgot,” I said, keeping the Mauser on him. “The guards will be checking for lingering tourists and here we are.”

  Voices echoed down into the vault. Young voices.

  He stepped back and looked. “You’re right. Someone is coming. A family. Do you want me to shoot them?”

  “Do you want me to shoot you?” I asked.

  “Legend has it you can’t,” he said.

  Astonished, I asked, “What?”

  “Not with that weapon anyway. It belongs to us. Nice to see it in person. I would like to have it for my own, but I suppose I will leave empty-handed.”

  “I suppose you will,” I said.

  He turned the 9mm and held it against his stomach pointing it under his other arm in the direction of the donut and gazed at my Mauser with longing. It was creepy, in case you’re wondering.

  “Aren’t you going to shoot me?” I asked genuinely curious.

  “You shouldn’t give men like me suggestions,” he said.

  “I’m incorrigible,” I said.

  “That’s why I won’t. You will find the package someday and I’ll be right behind you.”

  “Sounds like a plan.”

  The smile came back and I felt oddly light. There but not there under his nasty gaze.

  He turned his weapon back on me. “You have been a problem for some time now. Perhaps I will save myself the trouble of killing you later.”

  “How will you find the package?” I couldn’t tell if he was just toying with me or not.

  “There are always other avenues to pursue,” he said.

  “Then why haven’t you pursued them? It’s only been like eighty years.”

  Hoff’s mouth twitched and he extended the weapon to the perfect firing position. “On second thought, tell me about that poetry.”

  “Nothing to say,” I said.

  His trigger finger moved ever so slightly and someone yelled out, “Hey!”

  Hoff looked to the left, a gun went off, and his head snapped back, his gun arm swinging wildly, firing one shot into the ceiling. I screamed and slipped around in Nadelbaum’s blood as Hoff fell out of sight. Then I scrambled for the entrance to the vault to find him sprawled out with a shot through one eye.

  Moe walked up, holstering his weapon, and said, “Aren’t you glad you couldn’t Fike me?”

  I found myself sinking down into the floor, melting like warm jelly. People were running toward us. A family. I pointed, yelling something about staying back. Unfortunately, I pointed with my gun hand, Mauser still in it. The family scattered and Moe took the Mauser and shoved it in his coat pocket before hoisting me to a seated position.

  “You’re alright,” he said, stroking my hair and tucking my panic button inside my coat. “It’s over.”

  “I don’t know if he was really going to kill me,” I whispered.

  “Now he’ll never have the option.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  So they arrested us. I don’t blame them. Found in the Panthéon crypt with two dead guys and multiple weapons. It didn’t look good. But neither did my blood pressure. It was so low, I passed out. The police cuffed me and took me to the hospital under guard. Sometimes things just work out. I was in the same room as last time, so Jean-Yves Thyraud knew just where to find me.

  The French spymaster, if indeed that’s what he was, walked in looking identical to the last time I’d seen him with his rumpled cheap suit and round, smiling face. He had a coat this time that looked like he’d robbed a homeless person to get it and the smell of a full ashtray filled up my small room.

  “Miss Watts, lovely to see you again,” he said, pulling up a chair.

  “Is it?” I jangled my cuff that was attached to the bed rail.

  He produced a small key and released me. “Better?”

  “Much. What about Moe?”

  “He’s been released.”

  “What happens now?” I asked.

  “You’re both free to go,” he said, steepling his stubby fingers under his chin and I knew that wasn’t all there was to it.

  “Yeah, right.”

  “I’d like a full statement,” Thyraud said with a smile.

  “I made a full statement.”

  “No, you didn’t.” />
  I didn’t. Of course, I didn’t. I wasn’t going to tell the Paris cops about my connection to The Klinefeld Group and Stella Bled Lawrence. That was on a need-to-know basis and they didn’t need to know.

  “You were in that crypt a long time,” he said. “What did you discuss?”

  “My kidnapping and whatnot.”

  “I’m interested in the whatnot and I believe you owe me.”

  I sat up and folded my hand in my lap. “Thank you for getting the Polizei off our backs.”

  “Twice,” he said.

  “Oh, that was you,” I said.

  He put his palms out. “Who else? And let’s not forget the US Army.”

  “I thought that was too easy. How do you have pull with our military?”

  “I don’t. My government has an interest in letting you do what you do,” he said.

  “Because of The Klinefeld Group? You said you have an interest.”

  “I do. We do. What did Nadelbaum tell you?”

  Because I did owe Thyraud, and because I couldn’t think of a reason not to tell, I spilled it. “They’re Nazis.”

  He blew out a breath in irritation. “Of course, they are. What else?”

  “They murdered one of their own in the 60s because he was going to cooperate with the Mossad.”

  “Now we’re getting down to it,” said Thyraud and he took out a notepad. “Names?”

  “I thought that might interest you.” I told him everything that I had on the murder. For me, it was done, so why not? “Also, Nadelbaum says they’re laundering money through the charitable works.”

  “Ah, yes. It’s nice to have that confirmed. They’ve been able to cloak themselves in charity for far too long. Who is funding them?”

  “We didn’t get that far,” I said.

  He tapped his lower lip and said, “I suspect, you wouldn’t be here if you had. Mr. Licata got there remarkably fast, but…”