by Ted Dekker
He couldn’t explain what happened next, except to think that a week of madness had finally broken him down to a pulp. Stephen dropped to his knees, covered his face, and yielded to sobs. They started with soft shakes and grew to rob his breath completely. He bobbed on his knees, wanting to shake the emotion that ravaged his body, but it only tightened its grip on his throat and chest.
The photographs from Martha’s sunroom flashed across his mind. Girls and boys, wives and mothers and daughters, husbands and fathers and sons. They had died, and he had lived—because of one named Ruth. He owed his every breath to another Jew. And for twenty years, he’d betrayed the memory of their deaths by ignoring their pain.
Chaim tried to comfort him, tried to suggest they must leave, but Stephen sank to the ground, letter clenched in his fist. For a few unbearable moments, he imagined that the picture of the little bald girl from the medical clinic was him. He was there, in Poland. Every day, the Germans carried him down to a room that smelled like alcohol, and they injected different parts of his body with cancer cells. That’s how he lost his hair and his teeth.
But he wasn’t dead from cancer. He was alive because someone else had died to give him life. Ruth. Esther.
Chaim was shaking Stephen violently. “Someone’s coming!”
Stephen scrambled for orientation. “The letter!”
A door slammed somewhere.
Stephen struggled to his feet. They had to get out! He quickly shoved the letter into the ash tray below the boiler.
“You’re leaving it?”
“What if they find it on me? We’ll come back for it. Hurry!” He ran out, scooped up the tin box with the journal and the scarf, and turned for the door.
“No. Not this time.”
Braun stood at the entrance to the stairwell, pistol in his fist. He walked straight for Stephen. The German’s gun hand flashed out, and Stephen felt sharp pain shoot through his skull. Something crashed to the concrete. A tin box.
He hit the floor hard and lost consciousness.
38
STEPHEN HAD NO IDEA HOW LONG HE’D BEEN UNCONSCIOUS.
He lay in a heap on the basement floor, stripped to his undershirt and briefs. His head pounded, and he lay still for a few minutes, listening to several men talking in German. Slowly, the details of the letter again filled his mind. He had to find Esther.
Stephen straightened his leg. The talking ceased immediately. Thirty seconds later, Braun stood above him.
“Have a seat.”
Hands hauled him up from behind. They set him in a chair.
“Where’s the rabbi?” Stephen asked.
“The rabbi?” Braun chuckled. “He’s no rabbi. Which is a disappointment to me.” Braun wore an unbuttoned Nazi SS jacket, revealing a black silk shirt beneath. His slacks and shoes were the same he’d worn before. The red scarf was draped over his left shoulder. He strolled to Stephen’s right, drawing on a cigarette.
“I would have killed his worthless soul already, but for the moment he’s more useful to me alive. The old ones always go quickly, my father used to say.”
Stephen felt a chill snake down his spine. The large blond they called Lars stood by the stairwell, staring without emotion. Claude stood in front of the boiler room.
“Do you like my jacket?” Braun asked. “It was my father’s. I wear it sometimes, when I make deals with Jews.”
He held up the tin’s lid and stared at Ruth’s picture. “I want you to tell me where you put the Stones, Mr. Friedman. We found the floor safe. I must say, your juvenile bluffs successfully diverted our attention from the basement. We tore the upper floors to pieces, and all the while you had the safe covered by a drum in the basement. How did you get in?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, an hour ago you weren’t in, and now you are. How did you get in?”
They hadn’t discovered the covered tunnel yet. “Through the garage door.”
Roth slapped Stephen hard across the cheek. “I don’t have time for lies, Jew.”
Stephen caught his balance, put his hand to his tingling face. “We . . . we knew the fire would force your evacuation. In the confusion, we forced the garage door open and walked in. I was dressed like a fireman.”
“Where are the clothes?”
“We tossed them outside.”
Judging Roth Braun by his expression was impossible. He showed no emotion. “And the jackhammer?”
“We were digging a hole from a sewer that connects the buildings, but the motor burned up. The fire was a last resort.” Stephen took a deep breath. “There are no Stones,” he said. “Only the scarf.”
“And the journal.” Braun raised it in one hand and took a drag on the cigarette with the other. “Do you know who this scarf belongs to?”
“Rachel Spritzer.”
“You mean Martha. She was my father’s personal servant at Toruń. She stole this scarf from my father. I know it well. It was very special to him.” He lifted the picture of Ruth, caught Stephen’s eye, and sniffed the photograph as if testing her perfume.
Stephen felt sick.
“This is Ruth,” Braun said. “Amazing how Esther resembles her.”
Stephen’s hands were free; he could rush the man and take the picture. But it would only prove that he knew about Esther. He couldn’t tip his hand. Braun didn’t know about the letter yet.
“You do know Esther?” the German asked, gaze studied.
Stephen didn’t respond.
“Ruth’s daughter.” Braun’s lips twitched. “My father sent her into the Alps after the war, to a small village named Greifsman.” His eyes twinkled. “She’s very beautiful.”
She was alive! “He . . . I don’t understand . . .”
“Why is she alive? Let’s just say that Esther is our bargaining chip, in the event we ever found Martha. But her value has now expired, hasn’t it?”
Braun grinned. “And you’re Martha’s son, David. My father made the mistake of allowing you to live as well. He wanted Martha’s missing son to haunt her till her death. A good instinct, but fundamentally flawed. After all, you were chosen by the scarf.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Stephen said. He had to distract Braun from this line of thinking. “I knew Rachel Spritzer from an antique shop I used to frequent,” he lied. “She purchased some things there. She talked about her Stones of David, but I always thought she meant her children, until I saw that she had donated one to the museum. I looked around and stumbled onto the floor safe. You know the rest.”
“Another one of your inventive stories? My father took the Stones of David as spoils from a collection in Hungary, and I’m sure he would like to have them back. But this”—he held up the journal—“interests us the most. If you’ve seen the contents I’m sure you know why.”
It occurred to Stephen that Braun was incriminating himself—something he would never risk if he intended to let Stephen live. A moan seeped from under the door to the coal room.
Chaim.
“I think the Stones were in this box with the journal,” Braun said. “I’m willing to wager the old man’s life on it. We can begin now, one finger at a time, or you can tell me what you did with them and make this painless.”
“There are no Stones! Do whatever you want, but there was only the scarf.”
The letter would prove there were no Stones here, but did he dare tell him about the letter?
“Fine.” Braun turned to Claude, who stood by the door to the coal room. “Start with a thumb.”
Stephen bolted to his feet. “Stop!” He had to stall. “Okay, listen. The scarf must mean something. She left it for a reason. It leads to the Stones. Ask yourself how.”
Braun hesitated. “Nothing comes to mind.”
“Think about it. She wanted me to find the scarf. Why?” Stephen felt toothless, standing up to this monster while wearing nothing but Fruit of the Loom briefs and a torn T-shirt, but he would bite at any hope. “Because you�
��re right. I am David. The scarf saved my life. She drew me in to find the scarf.”
“Cut off his thumb,” Braun said to Claude, who turned to enter the room where Chaim moaned.
“Wait, there’s a letter! It’s in the boiler.”
Braun held up his hand to Claude. He glanced through the door into the boiler room.
“Well?”
Claude ran in and emerged a moment later bearing the smudged letter.
Braun took the letter, eyed Stephen, and then read it quickly. His left eye twitched once as he neared the end. Stephen sagged into the chair. Braun would now assume the Stones were hidden somewhere else. The Stones’ hiding place will go to the grave with Ruth and me.
ROTH WAS having a hard time controlling his exuberance. He was playing the boy like a fiddle. He’d convinced the Jew that he was after the Stones of David as well as the journal. And that Esther was still alive in Germany.
He turned his back to Stephen and reread the letter. The old man called Stephen’s name softly once, and Claude thumped the door. “Shut up!” An eerie silence filled the basement.
Roth planted his feet wide and rolled his neck.
“The Stones aren’t here,” Roth said softly.
He took several deep breaths. He was so taken by his own game that he almost missed the significance of the last line. He’d missed it when he’d first read the letter several days earlier. Now it jumped out at him.
“What could she have possibly . . .” He read the last line out loud. “As for the treasure, its hiding place will go to the grave with Ruth and me.”
The implication was what? That Ruth, not only Martha, had known something about the Stones’ hiding place.
He turned around and would have grinned wickedly if not for his practiced control.
“Strip him!”
The others hesitated, not expecting the sudden order.
Roth walked to the Jew. “I said strip him!” He grabbed the neck of Stephen’s T-shirt and jerked it down. The cotton fabric ripped, leaving half of Stephen’s chest exposed.
Lars and Ulrich grabbed Stephen and pulled him to his feet.
Roth stared at Stephen’s chest. He extended his hand and touched the scar. Traced it.
“David,” Roth said. “Isn’t it ironic that after all these years, your very survival continues to play into our hands? You’ve led us to this letter, which says more than Martha meant—I can promise you that. I have to pay our beloved Esther a visit now, so I’m afraid we won’t be seeing each other again, but I want you to remember my face. I assure you, I look like my father. Your mother went to her grave with his face stamped in her mind. Why should you go any differently?”
He dropped the letter and walked to the door. “Lars, Ulrich, come with me.” He opened the door and turned back to Claude. “Kill the old man and dispose of his body. Keep this other stinking Jew alive until I call. If he tries to escape the basement, kill him. I trust you can manage that.”
The instructions were for Stephen’s benefit, naturally. The game wasn’t over—not yet.
Claude dipped his head, indicating that he’d understood. If he didn’t, he would pay with his own life.
THEY WERE going to kill Chaim?
“Cover the stairs,” Claude said to Carl. Stephen jerked his head around—Claude was screwing a silencer onto his pistol.
Stephen responded instinctively rather than with any kind of coherent plan. He leaped to his feet, hurled the chair at Claude with a furious grunt, and rushed the man before the chair struck.
Claude absorbed most of the flying chair with his left forearm, but one of the legs struck him square in the forehead. Stephen slammed into the chair, shoving Claude hard against the wall. The German batted at him with a thick hand, struck him on the shoulder, and pushed him into the coal room door.
Stephen grabbed the handle, jerked the door open, and spun inside. He slammed the door, once on Claude’s hand, and again after the man sensibly withdrew it. Stephen crammed his palm into the dead bolt he’d seen earlier. It banged home.
Stephen took a step back, trembling from head to foot. He couldn’t see—the room was pitch black. Fists pounded on the door. Bitter curses.
“Hello?”
Chaim’s voice. From his left. The pounding stopped, and it occurred to Stephen that a bullet could pop through the door as if it were paper.
He dived to his left.
Phwet! Stephen hit the rabbi and both crashed to the floor. Phwet! Phwet! Bullets punched round holes of light in the door.
“Uhhh!”
“Down!” Stephen snapped. “Stay down!”
He jerked his eyes back to the door. They seemed to be shooting randomly, hoping for a hit, but it wouldn’t take much to blow off the latch. In ten seconds they would be through.
“The tunnel!” Stephen coughed. The quick-drying cement they’d used set up in thirty minutes, but how long before it solidified?
Stephen rolled to his feet and tore for the center of the room. Somehow the spitting bullets missed him as he kicked at the coal they’d scattered over the tunnel. A circle darkened by coal quickly took shape.
“Chaim—”
“Hurry!” The rabbi was beside him, already stomping.
The shooting stopped momentarily, then started again, just below the dead bolt.
“Jump!” Stephen shouted. “Hard!”
He slammed both feet down and was rewarded with a teeth-rattling jolt. It had hardened.
“Together. One, two, three!” He jumped again, but the rabbi’s leap came after his. Two more holes popped in the door, up toward the latch.
“Together. Together! One, two, three.”
They both leaped; they both slammed into the fresh concrete together; they both fell when the concrete caved.
“Out!” Stephen pushed the rabbi, who quickly crawled out.
Streams of light blazed through the holes in the door. Stephen shoved his hands into the tunnel, grabbed chunks of concrete and wood, and threw them out.
A shot blew away the door latch. But the dead bolt above still held. Someone kicked at the door and swore again.
The tunnel couldn’t possibly be clear of all the material Sweeney had used to prop up the concrete, but Stephen had pulled out the large slabs and the plywood. They were out of time.
“Follow me.”
He went in headfirst, like a tentative child taking his first daring ride down a slide. His hands struck two-by-fours, and smaller chunks of crumbling cement littered the hole. He shoved them down, ahead of him, praying they wouldn’t jam.
Wiggling and squirming, he slid down, plowing the refuse until it splashed into the sewer ahead. He didn’t try to slow his exit, but he did tuck and roll the moment his head cleared the tunnel. The sudden cold of sewer water sent waves of relief through him. He wanted to cheer.
The rabbi was spared the bath; he fell on top of Stephen like a huge sack of potatoes. The impact knocked the breath from Stephen’s lungs, but the fact was lost to the whine of bullets. Claude was shooting down the hole.
“Hurry!” Chaim gasped.
They ran through the blackness. The shooting stopped, and Stephen knew the German was coming down after them. He hoped Sweeney hadn’t heaped bricks on the manhole cover.
Stephen managed to find the ladder, scrambled up first. He heaved on the grate, but it refused to budge. Behind them, Claude swore. He was feeling his way out of the tunnel they’d dug. Stephen pushed again. Not a chance.
“Move it! Move it,” the rabbi whispered.
“It’s stuck! Shh, quiet!” But even the shh carried down the sewer like air brakes.
A huge splash. Claude was in. Stephen swallowed. This was it, then. They were trapped. He gathered all of his strength and crammed his back against the lid above. Nothing.
Far away, a dog barked.
“Brandy?” Stephen’s whisper echoed down the tunnel. His question was answered by a sudden sloshing and another big splash, followed by another curse.
Now the dog was barking furiously.
The manhole cover suddenly slid off. Stephen stared up into the round eyes of Sweeney. Brandy attacked his face with a wet tongue.
“No, Brandy. Hurry, get me out!” he cried.
Sweeney and Melissa grabbed his arms and yanked him out of the hole. Brandy stood back, head cocked.
“The rabbi, hurry!”
Up came Chaim.
The sewer filled with splashing and yells. Stephen shoved the cover back over the hole. “How was it braced?”
Sweeney got behind a large timber that he’d found and pushed it back over the cover.
“Good night, what happened?” Sweeney asked.
The cover bounced up.
“More! He’s strong.”
“There is no more,” Sweeney said.
Stephen looked around quickly. The cover rose a full two inches off the hole—he could see the German’s gun hand. Without thinking, Stephen jumped up on the timber. The lid clanged back into place.
“Find something.” The lid rocked crazily. “Hurry!”
Instead, Sweeney jumped up with him. This time the cover slammed home with confidence. “That’ll give him something to think about,” Sweeney said. “You’re lucky we came back to check out the damage.”
“My car’s on the street,” Stephen said to Chaim. “Spare key’s in the gas well. Take Melissa and wait for us.”
Chaim needed no encouragement. They left with Brandy bouncing behind.
The timber below them shifted, and Sweeney crouched like a surfer. “That guy’s a bull!”
“There’s more than one,” Stephen said. “We have to get out of here. Four guys with guns could be crossing the street already.”
“What went wrong?”
“Long story.”
“Did you get it?”
Stephen hesitated. “Sort of.”
“You don’t have any pants on,” Sweeney said.
“I about had my tail shot off. No time for pants.”
Sweeney stared at him dumbly.
“Make sure you don’t kick the wood off the cover when we push off,” Stephen said. “Ready? You go first; I’m right behind. Go!”
