She found the street she was looking for and turned left. The neighbourhood became very suburban with hills of lawns and chain-link fences. Vogel’s house sat on a corner across from the backyards of two other houses whose fronts faced away. The third corner was an empty lot. High cedar hedges lined his driveway. Very private.
Lights were on inside though the curtains were drawn across the front window. The brick house was modest in width but deep, with a garage attached near the back. They climbed what seemed an inordinate number of concrete stairs leading up to the small porch. She knocked, Nesha standing behind her.
The door opened sooner than she expected and Vogel greeted her with an unsurprised smile. “Ah, Doctor, how nice to see you again. I hope you’ve come to look at my collection.”
“You’re too kind,” she said. “My friend’s visiting from out of town and he’s very interested in art. I hope you don’t mind my bringing him.”
Vogel gave Nesha a cursory glance. “Not at all. My pleasure.”
He ushered them in through a small entryway and up a short flight of stairs that led up to the living-room, all carpeted in robin’s egg blue.
When Vogel turned, she said, “This is Nesha Malkevich. Max Vogel.”
They shook hands. The navy cardigan Vogel wore deepened the blue in his eyes.
“Take off your jackets,” he said, “while I put the kettle on.” He vanished into the kitchen.
Neither of them went to remove their jackets, but stood staring at the royal blue oriental rug lying over the blue broadloom. A pale blue French Provincial sofa and chairs bearing curved white arms and legs stood on the carpet. Instead of soothing her like it was supposed to, the undulating blue pulled at her feet, made her feel like she was drowning. It had been a long day.
While noises came from the kitchen she noted the broadloomed steps that led downstairs off the dining-room. The house was a backsplit, a style known for its surprising nooks and crannies.
When he emerged from the kitchen, Vogel said, “I keep the collection in a special room on the lower level.”
He led them downstairs where the floor was a gleaming parquet that smelled of wax. The hallway led to two doors, both closed. He stopped in front of one of them and pulled out some keys. She glanced at Nesha while Vogel unlocked a deadbolt. Once the door opened, she could see it was steel-layered with a wood veneer.
They followed him into a room panelled in rich mahogany. It was like stepping into another century, lights sparkling off the glass fronts of wooden display cases that filled the room. The ceiling was full height; a chandelier hung in the centre, its crystal teardrops shimmering in circles. Some framed drawings hung on the walls, but no paintings. There were no windows in the room.
A black leather armchair stood in the centre of the room beside a heavy desk with carved legs and leather-embossed top. Brass bookends shaped like lions held up several large volumes on one end. One book lay open. Vogel leaned on the desk, hands in the pockets of his cardigan, waiting, it seemed, for the compliments that must follow.
She approached the cabinet closest to the door. Candlesticks, mostly silver, some brass, stood arrayed on glass shelves. She could hardly believe how many. She stopped mutely before them, remembering the silver candlesticks her grandmother had brought with her from Poland to Toronto in the 1920s. When Rebecca was growing up, her family went to her grandmother’s most Friday evenings to eat the Sabbath dinner. The old lady threw a shawl over her head, passed her hands over the candles twice, then covering her eyes, mumbled the prayer as if she were on familiar terms with God. The candlesticks were in her mother’s dining-room now, of more sentimental value than anything else; no one lit candles Friday night anymore.
Sentimental value. Vogel’s candlesticks were all someone’s sentimental value. Many someones. Whose candlesticks were these that she was staring at? Where had they been murdered? The women who faithfully lit the candles every Sabbath, where were their final resting places? There were no tombstones anywhere with names engraved, only memorials bearing lists of the dead. But she hadn’t come to mourn.
“I must admit,” she began carefully, “I was hoping you would have the painting out, a valuable painting I was told you had.”
Vogel blinked twice, his face blank. “I beg your pardon?”
“Leo told me about the Raphael. Don’t be modest. We won’t tell anyone about it. But you must let us look.”
The blood had drained from his face. “I see how hard it is to keep a secret. Well, then. But Mr. Malkevich must come upstairs and help me retrieve it from its wooden crate. Why don’t you stay and enjoy my collection while we men get to work.”
While they marched upstairs, she pretended to examine a cabinet in the corner. Three glass shelves held a dozen or so silver pointers of varying lengths and styles. Tiny ornate index fingers pointed from silver fists into some mysterious distance as if an answer might be found if only one looked in the right direction. The cards adjoining each artifact bore typed designations of country of origin and time period. Very professional.
When they were out of sight, she skulked to the desk and opened the top drawer. Pens, pencils, paper, scissors, tape. She tried the larger drawer beneath; it was locked. Opening the top drawer again she rummaged through, poking her hand near the back. Nothing. She glanced around the desk, checking beneath the open book. No. Her eye fell on the lion bookends. She lifted one up and there it was: a key. Taking a breath, she turned it in the lock below. The drawer pulled open. Inside lay an oblong wooden box. Just another silver goblet or pointer, she thought. She listened for voices or footsteps. Safe for the moment. She swung the top of the box open and gasped. Nestled in red velvet was the silver reliquary, the hand from Chana’s nightmare that had crossed the boundaries of time and space to land at Rebecca’s feet. There were the tiny gold-framed windows over the knuckles through which the bones were visible. The sheet of silver seemed to have been melted on, curves and lines profiling the skin, the very fingernails rendered.
She shut the box in horror. Her heart was leaping in her chest. With quivering fingers she replaced it in the drawer. How could she have been so blind? Leo was the third rag doll. Vogel was the uniformed doll. The head guard who had become human for a few minutes listening to the young orthodox boy singing Kol Nidre. Oberscharführer Steiner. The monster who had rounded up villages of Jews. Who had killed Goldie. She heard footsteps approaching and jumped toward one of the cabinets.
Vogel entered the room alone, his wavy greying hair somewhat ruffled, falling in strands around his ears. Rebecca’s heart throbbed.
“Where’s Nesha?” she said in a voice strange to her ears.
His head motioned toward the door. “He was so enthralled with the painting I couldn’t get him away.”
What had he done with Nesha?
“Why didn’t you mention you were in a concentration camp?” she said.
The expression went out of his eyes. “What makes you think I was?”
“Mona told us.”
“Mona.” He grimaced.
“She also said that’s where you met Leo.”
He sniffed as if there were a bad smell. “Leo was no innocent. I don’t know what he told you. Did he say he was a kapo? Oh, yes. He was responsible for the deaths of his own people. You know who were chosen to be kapos? Sadists. Thugs. People who liked to see others suffer.”
“Why don’t you tell the truth?” she said, trembling. “Leo wasn’t the murderer.”
A pained smile creased his mouth. He drew himself to his full height, taller than she remembered, and pulled the Luger out from beneath his cardigan. “You know nothing!” he spat. “Have you ever starved? Did you ever go to school in rags and have to sit beside children who whispered about you behind their hands? It’s easy to be self-righteous when you have enough to eat.”
“Lots of people grew up poor and didn’t become murderers.” He stood between her and the door.
“Nothing is that simple. You put ordinary
people in the same circumstances — yes, we were ordinary.... I’ve seen it time and again: every man is a potential killer under the right conditions. Sometimes we must kill in order to survive.”
“You didn’t have to murder children to survive.”
“I was there to do a job. I was told what to do and I did it. It was nothing personal. At first it disgusted me. But then, after a while, I would squint my eyes at the lines of people — especially from the distance — and they wouldn’t be quite people anymore ... they looked like ... ants ... columns of ants.... It’s very easy to step on ants, you hardly notice, they’re so small....”
“You profited from murder....” She waved her arm at the room, the glittering glass cabinets. “All this.... It’s not a collection — it’s a graveyard.”
His mouth turned down, the gun steady in his hand. “What do you think would’ve happened to these things if I hadn’t taken them? You should’ve seen the warehouses full of goblets and candelabra. They never even missed what I took. At least I study and appreciate them.”
“How did you get the Raphael?”
He tilted his head watching her. “How did you find out about it?”
“Does it matter?”
He shrugged. “It was just a stroke of luck, as most things were then. We had lost the war and I was driving as far away from the camp as I could in a jeep. I was the first to come upon a wrecked truck — the driver was killed. In the back was a crate of paintings, untouched. Some General was probably waiting for them somewhere. Raphael was the best by far, but the five others were nothing to sneeze at. My income has depended on them over the years. I saved the Raphael for last. It was always my favourite, the precious young man in the velvet robe, the eyes so sure ... with a wave of his hand he could have anything.... But now I find my finances need an injection of cash....”
“Where is it?
“Where no one will ever find it.”
“Why did you kill Goldie?”
The animation in his face dropped. “Your questions are getting tedious. This is the last one. She was a crazy woman. She came to the store while Mona was out. She had this picture.... And she made these wild accusations, screaming — completely unreasonable. She knew who I was. She said she was going to the police.... I couldn’t talk to her, she wouldn’t listen. She ran out and I followed her. To your office.”
So he had been there.
“Goldie was paranoid; she accused everybody. Couldn’t you tell she was ill?” Rebecca considered trying to make a run for the door. Maybe she could get him off his guard.
“She knew who I was. I had to ... take care of her....”
“You don’t understand. She wasn’t a threat to you. You made a terrible mistake. She couldn’t know who you were because she was in Argentina during the war. You killed her for nothing.”
He shook his head, unconvinced. “Leo warned me about her. She showed him the picture and he got nervous. He didn’t want any connection between us. He was afraid people would still remember he was a kapo. The old woman must’ve been with Leo’s wife in the camp. She knew me....”
Rebecca was trying to inch sideways, but he had noticed. He lunged forward and grabbed her arm with brute strength, twisting it round her back.
“What, no more questions?” he cried as he pushed her forward toward the other closed door.
“Where’s Nesha?”
“You win the prize, Doctor! Here he is. All you have to do is open the door.”
She turned the knob with her left hand. A gust of cold air blew into her face along with a sickly, fetid smell. It was a cold-storage room. Maybe he stored his garbage there. In the shadows, she spotted the rubber tip of a running shoe. Nesha lay on his side on the concrete, the back of his head bloody, hair tossed across his face. She screwed up her eyes — his chest was moving. He was alive. As her eyes adjusted, she saw another body behind him: Feldberg, his eyes bulging, his mouth open, surprised by death. He had to have been dead for at least a day, judging from the smell. He must have guessed about Vogel killing Goldie. It was probably too much for him to resist the temptation for blackmail.
Vogel breathed on the back of her neck, wresting her arm till it became numb. “I’m going to let go of you. And when I do, you’re going to drag Mr. Feldberg outside for me.”
He stepped back, freeing her arm. She massaged it through her jacket sleeve to get the blood flowing again.
“Let’s go, Doctor. We have work to do.”
She stepped over Nesha and bent to collect Feldberg under the arms. The smell was unbearable. Vogel closed the door of the cold room. Feldberg was not a big man, but he was a dead weight. While she struggled to pull the body to the side door, she could see the purple impression of a ligature around the neck. The back of his head had taken a blow, no doubt to stun him first.
Thank God the door was on the basement level; she couldn’t have dragged him up any stairs. She followed Vogel, who was walking backwards with the gun, out the side door of the house. A three-foot walkway was all that separated it from the side door of his garage. Nobody would see them. There was no point in screaming. She hauled the body inside the garage then dropped it with a thud. Then she looked up. There in the shadows loomed the van of her nightmare. Vogel lifted the back gate open. Finally she believed she was going to die. The blackness of the interior transfixed her.
“Go on!” he rasped. “Jump up.”
She had no chance as long as he had the gun. She jumped.
Still pointing the Luger, he raised the body into a sitting position with one hand. His cardigan sleeve pulled away, revealing a bandage encircling his forearm. Rebecca remembered the broken glass in Goldie’s door.
“Lift him up!” he growled.
She bent down and grappled with shoulders and head to get a grip beneath the arms. Tugging with all her energy she yanked him up, falling backwards further inside. Here the odour of the decomposing body competed with the putrid smell of last week’s fish.
“Okay, your friend next.”
He prodded her back inside at the end of the gun. She supposed she should have been grateful that he wasn’t going to kill them in the house. Where was he taking them?
She stooped and pressed her fingers to Nesha’s neck to feel a pulse.
“It’s academic, Doctor,” said Vogel. “It’ll all be over soon.”
This time, carefully, she lifted Nesha under his arms and pulled him along the parquet floor. She didn’t know where she found the strength. He moaned as she bumped him along, adding some of his blood to the dirt soiling her linen trousers. She wished he would come to; she could really use the help. Her mind was trying to work, but she was so tired. For a second she considered: what if she just ran? He would shoot her before she reached the street. At this range it would be a piece of cake. Even if she managed to escape somehow, Nesha would be a dead man.
She gently let Nesha drop to the garage floor behind the van. Her heart pounded in her mouth, whether from exertion or fear she didn’t know. She had to think of something before Vogel drove them to their final destination. She would have to find an opportunity to go for the gun while his attention was on the road.
Vogel waved the gun toward the back gate of the van. She would have to find a way. She was just raising her leg to climb back in when she felt him lunge behind her.
“Help!” she screamed into the night. “Someone help me!”
A searing pain exploded in her head. Then the asphalt floor came up to meet her.
Then came the Holy One, blessed be He,
and slew the Angel of Death,
That killed the Shoichet that slaughtered the ox
That drank the water that quenched the fire
That burned the stick that beat the dog
That bit the cat that ate the goat
That Father bought for two zuzim.
One little goat, one little goat.
chapter thirty-four
There were no shouts at the door this time, no fists on w
ood. He came quietly treacherous and while she slept, pulled her, deaf and mute, through the unfamiliar dark. Though her hands were not bound, she couldn’t move them. She was paralyzed. The dark became black.
She lay on a grooved metal floor that moved beneath her. No, not just her. Her uncooperative body bumped against another, also inert. Was it David? Had she somehow found David again? The stench of decomposing flesh, animal and human, inhabited the air. Fishencrusted, slimy. I must open my eyes, she thought, I must stand up. The nightmare wheels whined under her ear, a groove dug into her cheek yet she couldn’t move. Her head throbbed, throbbed, distracting her, confusing her. She was being taken somewhere but was it to be tortured in some derelict basement, or to be strangled in some wood? Were they heading out of Buenos Aires or some highway north of Toronto? Black sedans rose in Argentine scenarios that faded in and out. She opened her mouth, or thought she opened it, but nothing came out. “¡Abra la puerta!” she screamed to herself. Only where was the door?
An uneasy calm began to spread over her. A floating beneath consciousness. She couldn’t fight it. He had won. She was going to just slip away. The way Chana had, without a fight. She was too tired to fight. Is that how Chana had felt when he had slunk into her room? Had she expected him — is that why she began to pull away from everyone? Last year. Her mind had turned inward last year. July. Like the duck. The duck waddled along the sidewalk last June. How’d she remember that? What if Chana had seen it in the paper? Recognized her own husband? Found the store? Found Steiner? Vogel. A stone masquerading as a bird. The smell! The smell was unbearable.
The wheels bumped, bumped beneath her ear. A grid of streetcar tracks? If only she could wake up, if only she could fight back. With what? She struggled to remember where she had been and what she had on her. Almost from above she saw herself wearing the gabardine jacket. The jacket. She had put something in the pocket in what now seemed like another life, but she couldn’t remember what. It didn’t matter what was in her pocket. If she couldn’t make herself wake up, the police would find whatever it was on what remained of her body. And the other body. No, not David. David was dead. But this other body, it would die too if she didn’t do something.
Rebecca Temple Mysteries 3-Book Bundle Page 22
