“This ought to be good.”
Harry took him up to his bedroom, opened the closet, took out a white dress shirt on a hanger and handed it to him. Cordell took off the leisure suit jacket, folded it over the back of a chair, unbuttoned the animals-rampant polyester, slid out of it. Harry handed him a pair of black pants, a light blue shirt with a button-down collar and a camel sweater. Try it on. I’ll see you in a few minutes.”
Cordell was checking himself out in the full-length mirror when Harry came back in the room.
“You look good.”
“I look like you with an Afro. Brothers see me like this they gonna kick me out the tribe.”
“The comb in your hair’s a nice touch.”
Cordell pulled it out and slid it in the right side pocket. “How’s that? I pass inspection?”
They landed at Gatwick airport outside London the next morning at 7:56. Had an hour wait and then a two-hour flight to Innsbruck, Austria, arriving at 11:03 a.m. Collected their luggage and went through customs. Harry rented a Mercedes-Benz sedan with tire chains.
The sun was up high and the road was snow-covered, the snow so bright it was blinding. They’d climb a steep mountain grade and fly down the other side, Harry trying to pass slow-moving trucks. Then the clouds rolled in and it started to snow, Harry watching the windshield fog up and the wipers thump back and forth, headlight beams coming the opposite way out of the grey gloom, holding the steering wheel with two hands.
They crossed the border into Germany, Harry nervous, thinking he was going to be arrested as a sleepy-eyed border guard glanced at their passports and took them into a little shack.
“What’s up with that?” Cordell looked worried now.
“I don’t know. Maybe he’s making a copy.”
“So they’re gonna know we’re here.”
“But they’ve got to find us.”
The guard came back and handed Harry the passports.
They drove on to Munich, arriving at 12:57 p.m. Harry was exhausted. He’d only slept a couple hours on the transatlantic flight, and not at all on the flight to Innsbruck.
They met Berman at the Bavaria statue at Theresienwiese, the Oktoberfest grounds deserted now in early November. Berman got out of his car, smoking a pipe, looking dapper in a Loden sport jacket and Tyrolean hat. Harry introduced him to Cordell and they shook hands. Berman opened his trunk and brought out a box that he handed to Harry. “The weapons you requested, with appropriate cartridges.” He went back to his trunk and took out the rifle wrapped in brown paper. “Who would like this?”
Harry nodded at Cordell and Berman handed him the rifle. “A silenced Mauser, eight millimeter, seven point nine to be exact, fitted with a scope.” Berman paused. “You have returned, Herr Levin, and you need a lot of guns. I hope everything is okay.”
“Now it is,” Harry said.
They drove to a secluded area north of the city, parked in an empty lot next to an abandoned building. Cordell unwrapped the rifle. There were four five-round stripper clips taped to the stock. He loaded the rifle, screwed the silencer on the end of the barrel, adjusted the scope and got out of the car. Cordell brought the stock to his shoulder, worked the bolt, fed a round into the chamber, aiming at a chemical barrel about a hundred yards away. He squeezed the trigger, heard apfft sound, felt the rifle buck and hit the center stripe he was aiming for.
Harry opened the box, looking at a Smith & Wesson .38 with a rubber grip, a matte black .45 Colt Commander, and a box of cartridges for each gun. Harry opened the cylinder and slid in five .38 cartridges, snapped it closed and put the hammer on the empty chamber.
Harry parked down the street from Martz’s house. They needed a place to spend the night. Staying in a hotel was way too risky. Their passports would have been registered with the police and Harry would be on his way to jail.
Harry had no idea if the house had been sold, rented or what. He got out and walked to the front door, looked in the front window. Martz’s furniture was still there. He rang the bell. No one came. Harry walked around the side of the house. Tried the door, expecting it to be locked, but it wasn’t.
He went through the kitchen into the dining room, checked the salon and Martz’s study. Everything looked the same as it did the night Martz and Lisa were murdered.
Harry turned the light on and walked down the stairs into the cellar, thinking about the night he’d found Martz and Lisa naked and dead on the floor. Hess had shot both of them in the back of the head and positioned them next to each other. The chalk outlines of their bodies and bloodstains were still there.
“I think we’re okay,” Harry said, opening the front passenger door of the Mercedes. They brought in their suitcases and the guns. Harry was tired. He carried his things upstairs, stretched out on Martz’s bed and fell asleep.
When he woke up it was dark. Harry got up and went downstairs. Cordell was asleep on a couch in the salon. Harry shook him. Cordell opened his eyes and yawned. “What’s up?”
“Hungry? I’ll go pick something up. What do you feel like?”
“What do I feel like, Harry? I feel like gumbo with lots of okra. But what am I gonna get?”
“Roast chicken or bratwurst, or how about Chinese?”
“Yeah, okay, I could go for something Chinesey. You know ribs, sweet-and-sour chicken, egg rolls.”
“You got it. You can take a shower upstairs in Lisa’s room, but let’s keep the lights off. I don’t want any neighbors calling the police.”
Harry picked up the food and they ate by candlelight in the kitchen, neither talking while they polished off three entrees and four egg rolls. When Cordell finished he said, “Nervous about tomorrow?”
“Not yet.”
“Well I’m gonna be there watchin’ your back.”
“I appreciate it.”
“Remember coming to the hospital with the bolt cutter? You didn’t show up when you did I wouldn’t be here.” Cordell stacked the empty takeout containers and threw them in the trash.
“Better get some sleep,” Harry said.
“Don’t take credit for anything, do you? Just get the job done.”
“We’ll see.”
Harry opened his eyes looking at the clock. It was 5:05 a.m. He was thinking about Colette, picturing her coming in the hotel restaurant the day they met, every eye in the room on her as she sat at his table, Harry hoping she was single and available before he even met her. Today was the day. He’d meet someone at Frauenplatz. Harry would go with him and trade himself for Colette. But he had a surprise for them.
At first light he woke Cordell.
It was cold and clear, light traffic as they drove to Frauenplatz, seeing the orange roof and onion-dome towers of the Frauenkirche looming in the distance.
“You gonna tell me what we’re doin’?”
“Planning our moves.”
“What’s that mean?”
“I’ll show you.”
Harry parked on Löwengrube and got out of the car, looking at the long rectangular side of the Frauenkirche. They walked to the square at the rear of the church, deserted now, but it would be crowded when they returned at four that afternoon. There was a fountain but the water was turned off. There were restaurants and shops in the buildings on the opposite side of the square.
Cordell said, “You really think they’re gonna bring Colette?”
“They better or it’s over.” Harry paused. “They’re going to want me to go with them and I will, but where’re you going to be? How’re you going to follow me?”
“I don’t know.”
“They could come from any direction,” Harry said. “Take me out to any of the streets around here, car pulls up, we get in. They’ve scoped the place out. They’ve got a plan, and we have to figure out what it is.”
Harry and Cordell walked around Frauenkirche, Harry looking for something that made sense. “I think their car’s going to be here,” Harry said, pointing to a side street to the west of the church. “
It’s the closest, most direct way in and out.”
“What if you’re wrong?”
Huber was getting ready to go home when he received a wire from customs and immigration, saying that Harry Levin had crossed the Austrian border into Germany at a remote station somewhere north of Innsbruck. It seemed incomprehensible. Why would Levin, knowing the charges facing him, risk returning to Germany?
Huber had admired the man, a Holocaust survivor who stood up for himself. He had even believed Levin’s allegations against Ernst Hess, believed the arrogant former Nazi had murdered Jews during the war. So, of course he was sympathetic when Levin was arrested in the young Jewish couple’s apartment. Arrested not for murder, but for carrying a concealed weapon – still a serious charge.
Huber had stuck his neck out, put his reputation on the line when he stood up for Levin, had him released from prison and deported. A few weeks later Huber felt like a fool when a hunter discovered three badly decomposed bodies in the forest outside Munich, and ballistics confirmed they had all been shot with the same weapon, an unregistered revolver the police had taken off Harry Levin.
Huber knew Levin had not checked into a hotel or his department would have a record of his passport. So where would he stay? Levin’s friend, the journalist Colette Rizik, had an apartment on Wagnerstrasse, and that’s where Huber had gone, but no one was there.
Next he checked Martz, the murdered Jew’s house and found takeout containers in a trash bin in the kitchen, a duffel bag full of clothes on the floor in one of the bedrooms, and an open suitcase in the other. People were staying there, and Huber had no doubt it was Harry Levin. He had the house watched but so far Levin had not returned.
Back at his desk, Huber received an anonymous phone call about Ernst Hess.
“I know where he is,” the man said.
“Who is this?”
“Who I am is not important. But what I can give you is.” After the newspaper article had appeared, Hess was a hot topic again. “Come to police headquarters and we’ll talk.”
“It’s not safe. Hess has friends everywhere.”
“You choose the place.”
“English Gardens this afternoon at one.”
This is what Huber had been waiting for, hoping for, a connection to Hess, a way to find and arrest him. They had almost had him at the Bayerischer Hof. Conlin, the American detective, had given him accurate intelligence about Hess murdering and assuming the identity of an American citizen named Max Hoffman. Hoffman’s passport had been registered with the police. That’s how Huber knew he was staying at the hotel. They had found his clothes and passport in the room. Huber had leaked the story to a reporter at Suddeutsche Zeitung.
Arresting Hess would be a real coup. It would make his career. Whatever influence Hess had had with the police was eroding fast. From what Huber had heard, Hess had even lost standing with the Blackshirts.
Huber was in the English Gardens at the agreed time, at the agreed place. It was too cold to sit. He moved around, paced and rubbed his gloved hands together trying to stay warm. There were a couple tourists taking pictures of the Chinese Tower. Huber saw a thin, nervous-looking guy, maybe thirty-five, approach and knew he was his man.
“Detective Huber?”
“And you are?”
“That’s not important at the moment.”
“Where is Hess?”
“I don’t know. But I know where he’ll be this evening.”
“How many men does he have?”
“Six.”
“It’s hard to believe there are six Germans naive enough to still believe in him.”
“It’s difficult to say no.”
Huber could relate. With sheer force of will Hess made you do things you didn’t want to do. But now he was an outcast.
“Did you bring the money?”
“It doesn’t work that way. When we have Hess in custody we’ll talk about the reward. Tell me your name?”
“Franz Stigler.”
“Where will Hess be this evening?”
Colette had been in the room for two days. In addition to Hess and Stigler she had seen six others. There were the two who had accompanied Stigler when she had been kidnapped that first night. One of the men, Riemenschneider, was huge and powerfully built. He had picked her up and carried her to the van like she was a stuffed animal.
There were the two that brought her meals. Colette had had the most contact with them. She would hear them come up the stairs with the tray and return later to take it away. One of the men, Willi, was small, shorter than she was, polite and nervous around her.
‘Fraulein, how was your dinner? Are you finished? May I take your plate?’
Colette didn’t think he was going to make it as a hate-mongerer, he was too nice.
Stefan was just the opposite, confident and belligerent. He had muscular tattooed arms on display in black sleeveless or denim shirts, calling her a traitor, a Jew-lover for turning against Ernst Hess, a true German, a hero.
There were two more Blackshirts she had seen smoking cigarettes in front of the house, but she didn’t know their names. She had overheard them talking about meeting Harry at Frauenplatz. If she could escape she could be there before them.
Colette had tried to loosen the bolt in the floor, even bending one of the forks, but couldn’t budge it. Then she thought of another way out.
On the morning of the third day Stefan had surprised her, saying, “Do you enjoy candy?”
Colette thought he was trying to be nice and said, “I have a weakness for chocolate.”
He picked up the tray and walked out of the room.
Just after noon Colette heard footsteps on the stairs and a key slide in the lock. The door opened. Stefan walked in and placed the lunch tray on top of the dresser, and came toward her, tossing a chocolate bar on the bed.
“You remembered.” Colette smiled.
“Now, what’re you going to do for me?” Stefan took a small black semiautomatic out of a back jean pocket and placed it next to the tray. He came over, stood in front of her and unzipped his jeans. “Get on your knees.”
Colette lifted her hands and said, “It will be better if you take these off.”
He selected a small silver key from the ring hanging from his belt, unlocked the cuffs and dropped them on the floor. She looked up at him, unbuckled his belt, opened the top of the jeans and tried to pull them down but they were too tight.
He pushed the jeans over his hips and grabbed a fistful of Colette’s hair. Now the fabric was loose and she pulled them down, bunching at his ankles, keys jiggling, and got a whiff of him, the sour stench of unwashed man.
He had to sit on the bed to get out of the black combat boots. This is what Colette was hoping for, pictured it going this way, get the man thinking with his weenie. She made her move, got up, went to the dresser, grabbed the pistol. Stefan stood up, tried to take a step and fell, rolled on his back and pulled up his jeans. When Colette racked the pistol, he stopped moving, looked up at her. “Cuff yourself and get on the bed.”
Stefan grinned. “You’re never going to get out of here. Give me the gun before you get hurt.”
Colette bent her knees slightly, holding the gun with two hands, barrel pointed at Stefan’s head. He sat up, reached for the handcuffs and clamped them on his wrists.
“Give me the key.”
He unhooked the key from the ring and tossed it on the floor at her feet. Colette crouched and picked it up, never taking her eyes off him.
“How many are in the house?”
“You’ll find out.”
“Get over on the other side of the bed.”
He did without saying anything. Colette opened the door and went down the stairs. Figured she had a few seconds to get out of the house, moved past two Blackshirts sitting in the salon, reading the newspaper. Heard Stefan open the bedroom door, yelling from upstairs. “She’s getting away. Stop her.” Colette ran to the front door, opened it and took off. Heard the explos
ive discharge of a gunshot, glanced over her shoulder and saw two Blackshirts running after her. The tree line was thirty meters. Twenty-five. Twenty. She was almost there when the big sedan skidded to a stop in front of her. Two more jumped out and charged toward her. Colette aimed the pistol at them, but now the others had caught up and surrounded her. Franz Stigler said, “Are you going to shoot us all?”
At 3:30 they put her in the back seat of an Audi sedan sandwiched between Stefan and the big man, Riemenschneider, a hood over her head. Where were they taking her? She felt the bumps on the dirt road that went through the woods, and then a smooth ride followed by stop-and-go traffic, the sounds of a city around her. When they were parked the hood was lifted off her head, eyes squinting in the bright afternoon sun. They were in the shadow of the Frauenkirche. Colette saw Harry walking toward the car with Franz Stigler. Her eyes met his and then the car was moving. Stefan pulled the hood over her head. Everything was over in a few seconds.
“You see, Herr Levin, Fraulein Rizik is alive and well.”
Stigler steered Harry to another sedan parked just down the street and frisked him, moving his hands under Harry’s arms, behind his back and between and down his legs.
“Okay.”
Stigler opened the front passenger door and Harry got in next to the Blackshirt driver, who glanced at him but didn’t say anything. There was a second Blackshirt behind the driver, and Stigler got in behind Harry. They took off. Harry saw his rental car at the end of the street, but no sign of Cordell and now he was concerned.
“Lean forward, Herr Levin, and place your hands behind your back.”
Stigler cuffed him.
They drove through Altstadt, heading west, and a few minutes later were on the highway to Dachau. Harry glanced in the side mirror, didn’t see a car in sight. Where the hell was Cordell?
Two Blackshirts brought Harry into the house, removed the handcuffs, escorted him upstairs, unlocked the door and pushed him in the room. Colette was sitting on the bed. She got up and Harry put his arms around her. She looked at him and started to cry. He brushed the tears away and kissed her. “Harry, what are you doing here?”
Back from the Dead Page 18
