The Wind and the Rain

by Martin O'Brien

  “The palace is on our left, we can safely assume he won’t be visiting Prince Rainier for a morning cup of coffee,” Janko says as we head straight over another roundabout. We are soon surrounded by more utilitarian square residential blocks and Janko speeds up to maintain vision with the black car.

  Soon, the big concrete blocks give way to low rise houses on the left and a hefty stone wall on the right. The BMW remains in sight, but only just.

  “Should we speed up Janko?” I ask.

  “No, no. We’re OK, he’s driving along the Riviera road. He’s not speeding so I don’t think they’re aware,”

  The road is barely wide enough for two lanes, trees are hanging over the road too. The sturdy stone walls don’t look too yielding if we spin off the road. I hope Gunari is OK, he’s probably wondering where we are.

  “Keep your eyes on the car, Ana,” Janko says.

  “I am, I am,” I respond, I’ve not let it out of my sight since the tunnel in Monaco. We are now in a slightly more built-up area with more holiday apartments. To my left, the Mediterranean Sea occasionally pops into view. I have to fight the urge to take my eyes away from the black car and drink in the scenery.

  “I hope he doesn’t go up towards the hills,” Janko says. Over to our right, the hills rise high above and are heavily dotted with apartments. At the moment the black car remains in the distance steadily travelling along the road.

  The road tightens with the outcrop wall barely a metre from the right of our car. All of a sudden the sea comes in to view on our left, the large expanse makes us both look at it. Within a few moments, we are flashing in and out of tunnels again.

  “Is there enough petrol in the tank?” I ask.

  “I hope so,” Janko replies, not filling me with great confidence. What an anti-climax that would be, running out of fuel in the middle of nowhere as Tremmick disappears forever.

  The rocks to our right rise straight up for twenty metres. With the sea immediately below us to the left it is almost like we are balancing on a ledge. The sea and sky are almost the same colour making me disoriented. I focus on the black car which keeps leaving my view as the road winds around the edge of the land.

  The road curves inland and widens, the black car is a good hundred and fifty metres away. Janko speeds up slightly and within a minute we are in another tunnel. I can’t see the end of the tunnel and the car is not in view.

  “I can’t see it, Janko,” I say, desperation in my voice.

  “He didn’t pull off, we would have seen him,” Janko replies and increases the speed again.

  We surge out of the tunnel and Janko actually slows down which I find bizarre. The Med is visible again and a railway line runs adjacent to the road as huge hills once again hug us on the right hand side.

  Parked traffic begins to dot the sides of the road and a village appears in our eye-line ahead. Janko drops his speed drastically, I can’t see the black car. I am checking every single vehicle that we drive past. Trees and climbing plants seem to have sprouted out of the rocks.

  On the right is a little cafe and I spot the black BMW parked up outside.

  “Janko!” I cry out, “That’s it there,”

  Luckily I refrain from pointing out of the window like a gormless tourist. Janko maintains his speed and I see him glance out of the corner of his eye. On our left is a train station signed as ‘Gare d'Èze-sur-Mer’ and Janko turns the Argenta around in the car park nearby.

  Janko pulls the car up and we are about fifty metres away. Parked vehicles and abundant foliage help to disguise us. From what I can see, the cafe owner has just opened as he lets in a queue of about four people, probably regulars buying their morning refreshments.

  “What shall we do?” I say impatiently.

  “We wait,” Janko says with no emotion.

  So we wait. I wonder why Janko doesn’t walk over and shoot them all. As we went past I had a good look and I am adamant there was another guy in the back of the car. If the driver is the man we saw outside Tremmick’s apartment who is the man in the back?

  As I keep my eyes on the black car, the passenger door opens and an old man exits the vehicle. The old man looks around, Janko and I are both slumped in our car. I can still maintain eyes on him through a narrow gap in the bush on the driver’s side of the car.

  “He’s looking both ways,” I say. Occasional traffic is passing, mainly vans and small trucks. The old man walks around to the back of the car. It looks like he is opening the boot but I can’t see for sure.

  “What’s he doing?” Janko says.

  “I think he’s getting something out of the back,” I say.

  Tremmick, the old man, walks towards the driver’s door. He appears to be engaged in a feisty conversation with the driver through the window as he suddenly stands up and bangs his hand on the top of the car.

  The man in the back of the car also leaves the vehicle. I can’t believe it, it’s Paul Beckermann. I would recognise that fat lump anywhere. He must have left Munich when he found out about the clinic and his son. His huge frame slowly ambles around the car and he starts speaking to Tremmick. Neither look very happy.

  A smile creep on my lips as I can see the impact our work has had on these two vile people. I turn to Janko and his eyes are focused on the target.

  “That’s Beckermann from Munich,” I say.

  “So that’s what he looks like, it’s always nice to put a face to a human rights abuser,” Janko stares at the obese man waddling around the car with a look of pure disgust.

  Beckermann and Tremmick shake hands and Tremmick starts to walk off pulling a small rolling suitcase. Beckermann gives him a hearty slap on the back, laughs so loud I can hear it in our car and makes his way to the passenger door where he enters the car.

  Tremmick walks over the road towards Èze train station. He must be catching a train, maybe the opposite way than to Barcelona. I can’t see through the trees to see how busy it is there. If the nearby pavements are any indicator, it is probably deathly quiet.

  “Ana,” Janko says, in his most gentle voice, “This is my plan,”

  “Go on,” I say.

  “I’m going to follow Beckermann wherever he goes and take him out. I can’t stand that man, an arms-length maniac. No blood on his hands, I will show him what blood is. I need you to deal with Tremmick. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

  “I understand, Janko,” I say. I understand but I’m unbelievably scared. Janko is basically ordering me to murder Tremmick. I have to follow the orders from my senior officer. Unlike the Nazi troops who slaughtered the populations of entire villages, this is a righteous death. I think about Pali, Gunari’s sister, a terrified little girl mutilated to death by this man.

  The BMW containing Beckermann slowly pulls off and does a one-eighty turn in the road. I grab my rucksack and get out of the car, the door is still open when Janko speaks to me:

  “Ana, remember why you are doing this. For family, for friends, for all of us,”

  I don’t say anything, the car door remains frozen in my hand. I turn to my right and see the black car driving back off towards Monaco.

  “Be strong Ana, and let your heart take courage,” Janko says. Finally, my mind snaps back to normal.

  “That’s a good line, Janko,” I say, impressed by his words.

  “Yeah, I stole it from Gunari, he says it a lot.” Janko smiles and starts the engine. I close the door and Janko drives away. I watch him leave and drive off into the distance.

  I am alone and ready to kill Albert Tremmick.

  Nulla Poena Sine Lege

  Sunday, 11 May 1986

  I stand in the same spot where Janko was parked up for a few seconds. I am dressed in the red Chanel dress and my formerly-white Adidas Lendls. Gunari never did find me any matching shoes. My only possessions are in my rucksack: a change of clothes, Polaroid camera, false passport, a makeup bag full of random currencies and my bagh nakh.

  God forbid if any police pull me ove
r and ask me to account for my possessions. Or ask why I’m here at small resort on the French Riviera. Janko said that I should try and charm any cops who speak to me. He says hostility is the worst trait you can display upon initial contact with the police. You should play to their ego. It’s only when they take you to the station that you say and sign absolutely nothing.

  I can’t comprehend that I am obliged to murder an old man in cold blood here in a beautiful village on the Côte d'Azur. Of all the surreal moments in the last couple of weeks this could be the most out-of-this-world. I have a plan which I think will work. However with Janko driving off, I’m not sure on my escape. I’m not sure he needed to leave but I think having borne witness to the clinic in Berlin he holds Beckermann personally responsible. When Janko has the determined look in his eye, he can be a very stubborn man.

  The sun is now piercing through the morning cloud. This would be an amazing day to go swimming in the sea or lying on a beach reading a book. Instead I have other plans.

  I take off my trainers and put them in my rucksack. I pull out the tiger claws and put them on my hand. The only thing you can notice is the tan-coloured strap around the top of my hand. When my fist is closed the blades aren’t visible. I clench and de-clench my fist a few times and make a minor adjustment to the strap.

  I place the rucksack underneath a rusty, parked van positioned directly to the right of where Janko parked us up. I am beginning to sweat and my stomach is rumbling from the nerves. I have to urge myself to not simply sit down here and avoid killing Tremmick.

  It takes a minute but finally I am able to walk to the station which is a small two storey cube. The station is yet to open and there is no-one around that I can see. The path to the platforms is between the station building and some big, out-of-control rose-bushes.

  I pluck a dark pink rose from a nearby bush and place it in my hair. I walk past the sickly-smelling bushes to the platform and the station is virtually deserted save for some high palm trees and a squat old man stood next to a black suitcase. The man is Tremmick and he appears to be reading a magazine.

  I am fighting the nerves in my stomach. It is almost as if little knife stabs are pricking my internal organs. I keep telling myself this is for the Berša Bibahtale, the unhappy years suffered by the Romani. This man performed terrible, cruel experiments on countless people. He and his ilk killed without compunction nor reason. People like him are responsible for the deaths of half a million Romani.

  This man who escaped justice and a trial.

  This man who lived in luxury across the world enabled by sympathisers and people who find it easier to look away rather than face up to hard truths.

  This man who brought Kali Traš, Black Fear, to us. Now, I shall bring him his due punishment. The wind and the rain will wash away his sins.

  Unfinished Symphony

  Sunday, 11 May 1986

  They failed to kill me in Buenos Aires or Berlin, they sure as hell won’t be finishing the task here on the French Riviera. Knowing that I have once again given them the slip here in Monaco is exhilarating. Every time the Israeli Banden have tried to eliminate me they have failed.

  The laborious lengths these people stretch to, actually delights me. The money they are wasting to murder an old man in cold blood. I am simply an unostentatious, harmless old man who was but a minor player in the crimes of the Nazis. If only they used this wealth to try to improve citizens’ lives at home they might see more joy. Surely there must be politicians in Israel who realise that spending taxpayers’ money on hospitals and schools is a more worthwhile cause? Is it simply their genetics that propels them towards spiteful vengeance?

  But I can feel the anger rising up. My life has been turned upside down once again. People who can’t let the past rest and believe hounding a sick old man is a dignified use of resources. War makes no man proud, I know that better than most. Ultimately, it is a war and terrible things happen in defence of your country.

  I didn’t gas any Jews or force them into ghettos. I wasn’t responsible for rounding up their families, making them all stand on the precipice of pits and machine gun them to death. I was a doctor, in many cases helping them. I cured countless Jews from illnesses in the camps. You don’t see that written in the newspapers in Israel. Some people could argue I was a voice of reason, some may even call me a protector of the Jews.

  The Mossad, or Shin Bet, or whoever it is will not be happy when they realise that I am once again one step ahead of them. They think they are trying to catch some bone-headed idealist. However I can be as devious and cunning as any of these Jews. One more time, one last time I hope, it is time to melt away and settle somewhere else.

  The fake train ticket idea was my creation. I could sense I was being watched when I was buying the train ticket. Whether it is intuition I do not know but it is good practice to prepare well. If someone was watching me purchase a ticket they would obviously concoct a ruse to find out where I intended to travel. I knew they would ask about where I was going and so it has proved. Joachim was sure he saw two agents boarding the train at Monaco. They will be combing the train searching for me, guns in hand. I wonder if they will disembark before Barcelona when it dawns on them that I have outwitted them.

  The time is approaching to catch the real train going eastwards to Genoa where I will change and travel on to Vienna. Once in Vienna, I will change again and head to a little flat I purchased in cash after I moved to South Africa. Totally untraceable back to me or any of my acquaintances. It is located in the upmarket suburb of Hietzing, my new place will overlook Schönbrunner Park. It’s no coincidence that it is reminiscent of my place in Buenos Aires. I can look forward to seeing out my remaining years in comfortable surroundings.

  Paul wasn’t too impressed when I told him a few minutes ago that this was our final meeting. He took on an offended air and immediately tried to ignore what I said.

  “Don’t be silly Albert, call me when you arrive safely at your next destination,” Paul said.

  “Do you ever listen Paul?” I slammed my hand on the roof of the car, “This is it now, goodbye Paul. Thank you for giving what you have given, farewell and best of luck for the future,”

  Paul walked around the car and I firmly shook his hand. Paul and I shared a look, the last time I will see his face. The most infuriating, yet loyal, man I have ever met. I smiled and turned away pulling my case towards the station. Paul slapped me on the back in that maddening manner of his and I heard his booming laugh. Clearly, he doesn’t think this is the last he will hear of me. But I know that was the last time I would ever see Paul again.

  I now enter the station and I see roses are growing everywhere. An overwhelming sight of coruscating pinks and reds glowing like a print by the American artist Warhol I once saw in a magazine. Yet it’s too intense. The rose-bushes don’t look like they are flowering. Instead they remind me of a quickly spreading virus. A wave of nausea stuns me and the smell reminds me a bit of the camps, an intense, sickly smell.

  I didn’t expect such a sudden feeling of sickness and it takes me a few minutes to compose myself. The train is due in about ten minutes. I can relax here for a while and watch the sun rise. I should sit down but the adrenalin is still keeping me on my toes. I can sit down when the train arrives. I pull out a copy of Der Spiegel and it has a large nuclear warning sign on the garish black and yellow cover alongside a headline about the Chernobyl nuclear meltdown. Those damn Soviets will kill us all. Wouldn’t be ironic if I began my new life in Vienna and the city was obliterated by a nuclear warhead a day later?

  I glance to my right and I see a young girl walking onto the platform looking lost. She is ravishing. Long dark hair, a pretty red dress and a rose flirtatiously placed in her hair. She starts to walk over to me. As she moves, I notice she is not wearing any shoes and walking unsteadily.

  Typical French girls drunk on wine bought by boorish rich men. It’s such a common sight on the Riviera. This girl is tantalising me. Maybe there are
some things in the south of France I will miss. Beautiful young girls obsessed with men with money and power.

  The girl is even more stunning up close, she has dark eyes – possibly of gypsy heritage by the looks of her. And she starts to speak and she sounds Slavic. I’m entranced by her.

  “Excuse me sir….” she begins…

  Anatomy of a Kill

  Sunday, 11 May 1986

  The cloying warmth of the sun bares down on me. Tremmick is about twenty metres away and I saunter towards him, my bare feet making no sound on the concrete platform.

  I keep my eyes on him and I notice he is turning around. I finally see the face of a monster. Initially, he appears troubled by my presence but it doesn’t take long before he starts gratuitously eyeing my body up and down. It’s such a strange feeling to have this old man staring at my body. He is leering at me, barely disguising his lust. A man without morals. A man unaware of his impending final judgment.

  “Excuse me sir,” I say in French, surprising myself at how successfully I can conceal my own fear, I say it in the dozy manner of someone who has been drinking alcohol all night, “Do you know what time the next train to Nice is due?”

  “About an hour’s time, sweetie,” the vile creature responds, with a smirk. His eyes are drawn to my legs for an uncomfortably long period and then back to my eyes.

  “Thank you,” I say, fixing him with my stare. I move closer to him and he begins grinning, his body shape is welcoming. More so when I lean in towards his neck and he slides a soft hand around my waist. In his ear, I whisper in German:

  “Thank you Dr Albert Tremmick, the Exterminator of Dieselstrasse,”

  I pull back and see the old man’s face, it is a picture of incomprehension. I’ve never seen a face change so quickly from unchallenged arrogance to epic desolation.