by Alan Elsner
“Maybe there is a connection,” I said. “Maybe Delatrucha appropriated this guy's identity.”
“Anything's possible, but how do you prove it? There's nothing to go on. We both know how easy it was for Nazis to get new identities after the war. Look at Eichmann and Mengele.”
In the summer of 1945, U.S. forces found themselves in charge of three million German POWs. There was no way to feed such a vast number, so the U.S. Army released them all, except SS men and suspected war criminals. The trouble was, it was tough to identify who was in the SS and who wasn't. Some, but not all, had their blood types tattooed under their left arms. Mengele, the infamous doctor of Auschwitz, didn't have a tattoo. Did Delatrucha? The way things were going, we'd probably never know.
Another problem was that before September 1945, the U.S. Army never even collected the names of all the POWs it had under its control before releasing them. It was ridiculously easy for Nazis to change identities. Adolf Eichmann was in U.S. custody that summer. First he gave his name as Adolf Karl Barth. Later he said his name was Otto Eckmann. After they released him, he got fake papers and escaped to Argentina. He was finally kidnapped by Mossad agents and brought to Israel in 1961, where he was tried, convicted, and executed for crimes against humanity.
We were stymied. I had to agree with George. There was nothing there. I turned to Lynn, stifling the spark I felt every time our eyes met. “Okay, what do you have?” She'd been fidgeting throughout George's presentation, as though she could hardly wait her turn.
“I've got tons! Let me start with Trout Man's daughter,” she said, removing a photocopied newspaper article from her file. She was wearing those cute granny glasses again. The clip included a picture of a tallish, slim woman with short dark hair dressed in a fashionable black cocktail dress, being escorted by a dude with a ponytail wearing a tuxedo. The dude had a possessive arm around her waist. The woman glared straight at the camera. Even in the poor reproduction, she was strikingly attractive and radiated strength of will.
“That was taken at the National Book Awards ceremony in 1989,” Lynn said, brushing her hand against mine and sending a low-level surge through me. The beloved mill girl is mine. “She's a literary agent. Her specialty is what you might call scandalous memoirs—books by people accusing their famous parents of abusing them when they were kids—that kind of gross stuff.”
“Who's the guy with her?” George asked.
“That's probably her most notorious client, Jimmy Williamson. They were romantically linked for a while, but they parted ways several years ago.”
“That sleazy guy's an author?”
“He wrote a memoir about growing up in a tough neighborhood in Boston, joining a gang, going to jail. Word on the street is that Susan wrote most of it herself. It was nominated for the prize, but it didn't win. Then, it turned out that she—how do I say this nicely?—gussied up some of the details.”
“She made some of it up?” I asked.
“Apparently. It caused a minor scandal a few years ago. That's when her business started tanking. Some of her top clients deserted her. Now she's apparently persona non grata in the book trade.”
“What about the mother?”
“Mary Scott. She lives in Alexandria,Virginia,” Lynn said. “After she divorced Delatrucha, she used to give occasional piano recitals at local churches and schools, but she hasn't played in public for a few years now.”
I looked at the photocopy again. “Well, this is interesting, but I don't see the relevance.”
Lynn's face reddened adorably. She pulled out another document and handed us each a copy. This was clearly the climax she had been building to. It was in Spanish. We looked at it blankly, then back at her. “Okay, you have us hooked,” said George. “What's it say?”
“Gentlemen, what you're looking at is an interview Mr. Trout Man gave in 1958 to Diario ABC, a big-time Spanish newspaper. He was on his first foreign tour after coming to the States.”
“How did you find this?” asked George, impressed.
Lynn grinned. “Diario ABC reprinted part of the interview in 1988, just before Delatrucha went back to Spain for a series of concerts marking the thirtieth anniversary of the first tour. I found it in the Nexis database.”
“That's amazing,” I said.
“It was totally luck,” Lynn said. “Most news databases only started around ten years ago. There's no way I could have tracked down a 1958 news story if they hadn't reprinted it thirty years later.”
“Not just luck. There was also hard work and persistence,” I said. Lynn reddened even more. George shot me a glance, and then looked back at Lynn. He couldn't figure out exactly what was going on between us, but it was obvious he'd felt a vibe.
“Enough with the mutual admiration,” George said. “Just tell us what it says.” Lynn handed us an English translation with one paragraph highlighted in yellow.
“I vividly remember the very first time I performed Winterreise in public. It was in Berlin in early 1944. There were air raids almost every night at the time. I was so scared I could hardly sing. I didn't know if it was fear of the bombs or stage fright. My voice wobbled through the first song. The second went better. Then the sirens sounded and everyone hurried away to the shelters, leaving me and my accompanist on an empty stage staring at the darkened hall.”
“Eeenterestink,” I said in my best German accent. “Veddy eeenterestink.”
Sometimes I wonder, do I really have what it takes? Will the others follow me? So far all we've done is talk. There are hundreds of groups all around this nation full of big talk, but not one of them has ever done anything worth shit.
I keep thinking about the jogger, trying to understand what happened. It's been weighing on me. There're so many thoughts and feelings jumping around inside my brain. Sometimes I feel them pressing up behind my skull until it's fit to explode. I wake up in the middle of the night, shaking with rage at all the cowards and baby murderers running our nation into the ground. Why don't the American people rise up?
One thing's for sure: I would never have shot that jogger if it wasn't for tracking that kike. He can call himself what he likes, but he sure ain't no hunter. I was on his trail for a week, and he never even felt me, except maybe once. Looking through the scope, I had him in my sights the whole time he ran up the hill. One easy shot, and I could have had his head stuffed and mounted on the wall of my cabin. But the phone call said “Not yet.” When he ran past and out of sight, the fury was still boiling up inside me. Suddenly, I was dizzy and nauseous. Everything was fuzzy and distorted. I saw flashes of light, like Saul on the road to Damascus. I stuffed a pill in my mouth and swallowed it dry. I closed my eyes because I knew the pain was about to begin. My tongue was already numb; I'd lost feeling in one side of my face. It felt like someone hit me with a twoby-four, like a drill boring through my skull. I lay there for Lord knows how long, praying to Jesus, until the pressure eased. My heart slowed down, and I could open my eyes again. The first thing that came into focus was a man running up the hill, puffing and sweating. The sun was setting, and I was shivering with the cold. The light was shining on him in a weird and unnatural way, like his head was on fire, and it came to me that it was a sign. Someone had to pay for all the suffering. I wasn't even sure I could hold the rifle steady, but once I had him in the crosshairs, everything slowed down to its normal pace again. So I let him have it—one clean shot—and it brought me back to myself. But afterward I wondered if it was the right thing, especially when I saw his wife and young kids on TV bawling their eyes out at the funeral. Then they said he worked for the federal government, and I felt better about it.
I'm running low on pills. What will I do after I run out? How will I manage if the pain strikes during the mission?
9
And if the little flowers knew how deeply wounded my heart is
They would weep with me to heal my pain.
—“AND IF THE LITTLE FLOWERS KNEW” BY HEINRICH HEINE, MUSIC BY ROBERT SC
HUMANN
THERE WAS SILENCE while George and I reread the interview. “This is incredible,” I said at last. “This changes everything.”
“His one slip,” George commented. “In 1958, he was probably feeling pretty secure. Nobody was looking for Nazis then.”
“I'm going to Rosen with this,” I said. “George, you'd better come, too. I have a feeling you may be packing your bags for Germany. This is fantastic work, Lynn.”
For the first time, we had evidence from Delatrucha's own mouth that he had been in Germany during the war. More than that, we now knew where he was at a specific time and place. He had given a concert, or at least started to give one. If we could find someone else who had been there, we might be able to discover his actual name. I was sure it wasn't Schnellinger, any more than it was Delatrucha. Without his real identity, we had little chance of making progress. But now we had a foothold. I bounded upstairs to Eric's office and barged in without knocking.
“We've had a breakthrough on Delatrucha. Now's the time to send someone to Germany,” I said excitedly. “I suggest George. He's been on the case from the start, and he knows what to look for.”
“What the hell are you talking about, Cain?” Eric asked.
I explained what Lynn had found and showed him the interview. He slammed his hand down on the desk. “That's my boy! Now we're in business. When can you leave, George?”
“Within a day or two, I guess. How do you suggest I go about it?” George asked.
“Start with the Nazi press,” I said. “You'll probably be able to find newspapers on microfilm at the university library. If Delatrucha gave a concert, it was probably reviewed. Concerts leave traces and memories; they have their own half-life. Someone somewhere remembers, you can bet on it.”
“What if the concert was held in a small hall and didn't rate a review?” said George, seeing the glass half empty.
“With a voice like his, Delatrucha was probably already marked as an up-and-coming star. There may have been a lot of interest in his debut.”
“I'll try to get a plane over there tomorrow night. That would put me in Berlin Friday morning. But don't expect miracles. This may take some time. I'm not even sure what's open on the weekend.”
“We don't have a lot of time,” Eric cautioned. “Hire a couple of local students to help you if necessary. Work as fast as you can. You know the deadline. The president is slated to give Delatrucha the prize on February 20.”
After George left, I showed Eric the fax David Binder had sent over. “This might explain all the hate mail we've been getting.”
“Bastards!” Eric said, standing up and thrusting out his chest. “I'm not a dwarf! I'm just below average height.”
“And I'm not your lackey. You've been promising a meeting with the FBI for a couple of weeks now, and it hasn't happened. I want that meeting. No more delays.”
“I know, I know. They keep stonewalling me. They say they have bigger fish to fry. For some reason, they don't take these neo-Nazis seriously.”
“That's exactly what David Binder says. He thinks the government's being negligent, and they'll only wake up when something really bad happens. I don't want to be the one it happens to. You have pull in this building, Eric. Use it. Get me the meeting. I mean it. I'm sick of always looking over my shoulder. I want that meeting, and I want it now.”
Two days later, we had our first full staff meeting of the new year.
“This is the outcome of my visit to Vilnius,” Janet said, indicating a thick pile of documents. She passed around copies for everyone to examine. I flipped through the file, which held order after order, all neatly signed by Bruteitis, a dozen in all. One sent a list of people with recognizably Jewish names to prison, another authorized a transport to a labor camp, and a third handed people over to a killing squad.
“Not bad,” I told Janet. “All this from the archive in Vilnius?”
She icily stared me down, saying nothing. Eric looked across the table at John Howard, who had a thin smile across his thin face, as if he knew something that none of the rest of us knew.
“Counselor, I assume this meets your standards for opening proceedings against Mr. Bruteitis,” Eric said coldly.
“Of course,” Howard replied, smiling his humorless smile. “This is exactly what I've been hoping for. I'm very happy. Filing earlier would have been premature, just as I argued. It underlines the importance of insisting on the highest standards in all our cases and never, never cutting corners.”
Eric ignored the slight. “Very good. When Mr. Howard is happy, everybody's happy. Janet, I want you to prepare a press release. We'll make a formal announcement tomorrow. The timing couldn't be better.” Members of the new Congress were even now arriving in Washington, ready for the formal handover of power to the Republicans.
As the meeting broke up, Janet took Eric's arm. “Eric, we need to talk,” she said, pointing to a seat. “Mark, you, too.”
I sat down again. Janet stood in front of us, glaring, waiting until everyone else had left. “What the fuck is going on? I want an explanation, and it'd better be good.”
“What are you talking about?” Eric asked.
“You know bloody well. I'm talking about George Carter dashing off to Germany without my knowledge or approval.” I could see from Eric's face that the accusation had struck home. But he was an expert in taking a punch and staying on his feet. “Let's go back to my office,” he said, playing for time. He led the way down the corridor, shut the door behind us, sat behind his desk, and indicated the couch for Janet and me.
“Oh, no, you don't,” Janet fumed. “I know what you're trying to do with your massive desk and your ridiculous furniture, so you can look down on me from on high. Not this time. Quit the bullshit, and tell me why George left last night for Germany on a private investigation that I know nothing about.” Her voice was taut with fury, her face drawn tight. Her chest was heaving below her blouse. Embarrassed, I looked down, noticing her hands trembling. She grabbed the edge of Eric's desk to steady herself. I had never seen her like this.
I had warned him this might happen. There was no way I was going to bail him out. He coughed a couple of times and reddened. “Well, Janet, my dear, you were away—in Lithuania, of course—when this little thing came up. I decided, since it concerned a public figure, we needed to keep it secret for the time being until we knew what we might be dealing with. Of course, I was just about to brief you today, but someone evidently beat me to it. How did you find out?”
Vintage Rosen, putting his opponent on the defensive.
“George tried to call me from the airport. He left a message on my answering machine,” Janet said, slightly mollified. “I called John Howard, but he didn't know what was going on either.”
Shit! Now Howard was involved. More ammunition in his campaign to depose Eric. No wonder he had looked so pleased.
“Well, of course we always intended to bring you in as soon as possible, Janet, my love. But speed was of the essence. We had to get George over there immediately. It's no slight to you, and no harm's been done. Mark, why don't you take Janet down to your office and bring her up to speed?” Eric said, waving us both out.
“No,” Janet growled. “You bring me up to speed. Here and now.”
“Mark knows more about this than anyone. He's running the file. We can talk about this later. If you'll excuse me, I have other pressing matters to attend to. Someone has to run this office.” Eric picked up his phone. We were dismissed. The audience was over.
Downstairs in my office, Janet asked,“What the hell is going on? Is he really losing his grip, the way John Howard says?”
“Nonsense,” I said. “He's the same old Eric. Howard has delusions of grandeur. He thinks that just because his Republican buddies are suddenly ruling the roost, Eric's days are numbered. He doesn't know who he's dealing with.”
“We'll see,” said Janet. “Howard is devious and ambitious. You don't want to underestimate him. If Eric carr
ies on like this, he won't have any friends left in the office except you. I am seriously pissed, and I don't want anything like this ever happening again.”
Eric issued his press release on Bruteitis. The story made page three of the Post, which wasn't bad. The stack of files on my desk seemed higher than ever and had never looked more uninviting. Untidiness threatened. By the following afternoon, I was thinking of taking a break when Lynn came bursting through the door.
“Aren't you going to Charlottesville?”
“Why?”
“Delatrucha's music tutorial. It's this afternoon at the University of Virginia. Remember?”
I slapped my forehead.
“Well, let's get going! It starts at four. We can make it if we leave right now and drive like hell.”
“You're coming, too?”
“If you want me.” She smiled as I glanced at my watch.
It was about 120 miles to Charlottesville, two and a half hours if the traffic wasn't too bad. For an afternoon alone with Lynn, I would have gone, music or no music. “Brilliant,” I said. “Let's go.”
I felt like a schoolboy playing hooky as we drove through the heavy Washington rain. With Lynn beside me, I was in absurdly high spirits, almost dizzy with euphoria as we crossed the Potomac into Virginia. Lynn had come equipped with a collection of cassettes in her pocketbook. She slipped one into the machine, and a distinctive soprano sang of love coming to the door, looking for a woman. It's you, you're the woman, I wanted to cry out. Instead I said, “Joni Mitchell. That song was popular when I was in college. You know it?”
“Are you kidding? It's a classic. Anyway, most of the stuff I like is from the sixties and seventies.”
I reached out and stroked her hand for a second. The car felt warm and safe. We continued into the Virginia countryside in the company of Bob Dylan, Carole King, and James Taylor.
