by Lewis Orde
‘Katherine, of course,’ Roland responded instantly. Damn it! He had to try it Hoffbein’s way. It was the only way he could keep Katherine and Franz ignorant of the truth. If he could find a way to stop Kassler coming to a trial that would wreck all their lives, he’d do it – even if it meant murdering his daughter’s father-in-law. Some way he’d keep the lid on it. Katherine’s well-being was more important than any personal feelings.
‘You’re going to see him, aren’t you?’
‘Yes. I think there is one way, the only way.’
‘Do you want me to come with you?’
The offer came as no surprise to Roland. He knew that Goldstein would walk through fire for him.
‘Thanks, Alf, but the answer’s no,’ he said, appreciating his friend’s loyalty. ‘This is something I’ve got to do for myself.’
‘I wish you luck,’ Goldstein said as he swung the Bentley into the driveway of Katherine’s home. ‘Tell everyone that I apologize for messing up their Christmas by dragging you away.’
‘I will.’ Roland watched the Bentley glide away. He rang the doorbell, forcing a smile onto his face. Even though his own Christmas was a wreck he wasn’t about to ruin everyone else’s.
‘What was that all about?’ Katherine asked when she opened the door.
‘There was an attempted break-in at Eldridge’s last night.’ Roland was amazed at how easily the lie sprang to his lips, but lying was simple now, especially when he’d agreed to commit what was virtually murder. ‘The police couldn’t get hold of the manager but they had Alf listed as one of the keyholders. He thought I should know about it.’
‘Anything stolen?’
‘Only my time with you,’ Roland answered as he wrapped an arm around Katherine’s shoulder and walked with her into the house. ‘No, it was a storm in a teacup; they never even managed to get in before the burglar alarm went off. Now where’s the rest of my lunch? I’m famished.’ As he walked into the dining room, his eyes met Franz’s, held them for an instant and then broke away. Tomorrow he would try to talk the young man’s father into committing suicide; how could he look him in the eyes now? Searching for something to concentrate on – to mask his fear, the self-loathing he felt for allowing himself to be forced into such a situation – Roland skipped his gaze around the room until it rested on the outsized, gray top hat Katherine had given him for his trip to the Palace. His knighthood! How could he go to the Palace, be dubbed a knight by the Queen, when he’d helped a Nazi war criminal escape justice . . . and when he now planned to push the same man over the brink?
The knighthood was unthinkable now. He couldn’t accept it and live with himself.
Early the next morning Roland took a taxi to Heathrow Airport and booked the first flight to Stuttgart. The moment he cleared the landing formalities in Germany, he called Kassler’s private number at his office, the line that bypassed the switchboard.
‘Heinrich, it’s Roland.’
‘Fröhlich Weihnachten, Roland. How was your party at Katherine and Franz’s? I tried to telephone you twice yesterday but all the circuits were busy,’ Kassler said, believing Roland was calling from London.
‘Very enjoyable. Heinrich, I’m in Stuttgart, at the airport, and it’s imperative that I see you immediately.’
The urgency in Roland’s voice was so clear that Kassler didn’t question the reason for the summons. Without telling anyone where he was going he left the office, climbed into his Mercedes 300 SEL and drove toward the airport at Echterdingen.
Roland was waiting by the terminal, under cover from the heavy rain, when Kassler drew up in the steel gray Mercedes. After Roland was settled in the front seat Kassler asked the nature of the emergency.
‘Drive somewhere quiet where we can talk. I’ll tell you then.’ As he gave the instruction, Roland forced himself to look at Kassler, to stare at the heavy face and pale blue eyes, the thin gray blond hair, and to superimpose over those features the face of the man he’d interrogated at Bergen-Belsen. An angel of mercy, he’d called himself. Like hell – a thief! A conscienceless villain whose lies had backed Roland into this corner.
Suspecting nothing, Kassler left the airport and drove two miles toward Stuttgart before pulling off the road. ‘Now will you tell me?’
‘Sure I will. Do you remember that man we accosted on Fifth Avenue? The man who was in the coffee shop when we were there?’
Kassler nodded. ‘The one we saw again at the airport. Of course I remember him.’
‘He was following us, Heinrich. More specifically, he was following you. His name is Peter Hoffbein and he works for the public prosecutor’s office, right here in Stuttgart.’
Kassler’s pale face turned a shade whiter as the first traces of a terrifying realization touched his consciousness.
‘Do you know why he was following you, Heinrich? Because you’ve been the subject of an intensive investigation for the past nine months. One of your former Kameraden threw you to the wolves, told the truth that you’d managed to hide all these years.’ Like a snake striking, Roland reached out and grabbed hold of the lapels of Kassler’s coat, dragging the German close. ‘You despicable bastard! You had me believing all that garbage about how you saved people! How you were working within the system to destroy it. And because I believed you, I helped you get off when you should have been rotting in jail all these years or squirming at the end of a rope!
‘How much did you steal, Heinrich?’ Roland’s shouted question stunned the German in the confines of the car. ‘How much of your success is due to those poor bastards you robbed on their way to the ovens?’
‘I stole nothing!’ At last Kassler found his voice, found strength to fight against Roland’s savage grip. ‘I tell you the truth—’
‘Shut up!’ Roland gripped Kassler’s lapels even tighter, dug his thumbs into the German’s throat so viciously that he threatened to cut off the air supply. ‘Hoffbein’s got proof of what you did. People have spoken out against you. And because of you, I’m tainted. Because I believed you, helped to make you into a hero. Because I befriended you. Because I used your money. And because’ – the thumbs dug even more painfully into Kassler’s throat and Roland’s voice became a harsh growl – ‘I let my daughter marry your son!’
‘My son had nothing to do with any of it!’ Kassler’s screamed denial tailed away under the pressure of Roland’s hands.
‘How the hell do I know that? How do I know that’s not a lie, like every other damned thing you ever told me?’
‘You know my son better than I do, Roland. You know what he’s like. Do you believe he would even consider such things as you accuse me of?’
Roland released his grip on Kassler’s lapels and the German sank back against the door of the Mercedes, gasping for breath. Roland, too, slumped back, physically drained by his own fury. But his mind was racing. He knew Kassler was telling the truth about Franz. The son wasn’t tainted by the father; in this particular case the apple had fallen far from the tree. But Franz was the weapon that Roland had to use against Kassler – the only weapon he had that would ensure Kassler’s destruction.
Roland was certain that Franz – in his father’s wartime situation – would have done exactly what his father had claimed to do: try to destroy the system from within. But that had never been Kassler’s intention when he had joined that system; he had only been interested in what benefits he could reap. Even turning against his own father to ensure his future!
‘What about your father, Heinrich? The Nazis put him in Buchenwald, didn’t they? What did you do to stop that happening? Or did you even try?’
‘I could do nothing to stop it,’ Kassler answered slowly. ‘Nothing that would have made any difference, except to send me and the rest of our family with him. Roland . . .’ Kassler leaned forward, the terror on his face yielding to earnest cunning. ‘You understand these things. You are like me. You know that if you are to succeed you must swim with the current. If you swim against it, you will drown.
’
‘Not if you swim hard enough against the current, you won’t.’ Roland glanced down and saw that his knee was touching Kassler’s. He pulled back sharply; even such slight contact was offensive now. What he wanted to do more than anything else was get out of this car, get away from Kassler, wash the bastard from his mind. But Katherine . . .? What would happen to Katherine then? To Franz? To the entire family? What would be left of the family Roland loved so dearly when Kassler was tried and convicted, led away to jail?
That thought alone hardened Roland’s resolve, reminded him why he had made this hurried trip to Stuttgart. He hadn’t come just to listen to Kassler’s confession, hear his excuses.
‘Heinrich, you’re going to spend the rest of your life in jail. Think about that. Your picture’s going to be in all the newspapers, flashed across every television screen. Those friends you’ve made, all those rich industrialists, aren’t going to want to know you in a month or so. Even your former colleagues – your fanatical Kameraden in the SS – will despise you. You weren’t a supporter of the Nazis because you believed in them; you were just a sly opportunist siding with whichever ideology you thought would pay the most. And worst of all, your son’s going to see you for what you really are – a greedy, soulless crook. Think how proud Franz is going to be of you.’
‘No . . .’ Kassler shook his head wildly and Roland experienced a fierce elation that he’d judged the German’s weak spot perfectly. ‘Not my son, not Franz.’
‘Your son, Heinrich. Franz. Remember when you asked me in Monte Carlo how you got close to your children? You wanted that desperately, didn’t you, to be close to Franz? Well, in the past three years you achieved that. You worked hard at it, and you realized what a joy a family could be. And all the time you were setting Franz up for the most bitter disappointment in his entire life.’
Kassler continued shaking his head, now bewildered, frightened. Tears began to form in his eyes. ‘He will not believe it—’
‘Oh, he’ll believe it, all right, Heinrich. A parade of unshakable prosecution witnesses will force him to believe it. His own life will be ruined, just because he’s your son.’
‘No . . . not Franz.’ Kassler’s voice broke into choking sobs as he visualized Franz learning the truth. Franz would hate him, would never visit him in jail.
In jail! Kassler’s mind sharpened as he realized the capitulation he had just made, admitting to himself that he would go to jail. The switch from a life of luxury to the penury of prison meant nothing when compared with what his son would think and feel. Franz would despise him. And even after he died . . . in jail . . . Franz would loathe his very memory. There would be no moments of regret on the anniversary of his death. Only Franz’s hatred of what his father had been, of what he’d hidden all these years.
‘Roland, I could leave. I could run away. I could . . .’ A crafty gleam shone in Kassler’s eyes as he considered methods of escape, ruses that would mean his son never having to know the truth about his father. ‘I could do what your friend did after he murdered that man. None of this would have to come out.’
‘Do you really think you could run away, Heinrich?’ Roland turned around in the seat, stared through the rain-spattered rear window. ‘Do you see that black car?’ He gestured toward a BMW that was parked two hundred yards behind the Mercedes. Roland had no idea who owned the BMW. At this distance he couldn’t even see if anyone was in it; all the same the car would serve his purpose. ‘Police, Heinrich. They’re not letting you out of their sight until they’re ready to charge you.’
As Kassler stared at the black car, his eyes dimmed and he trembled.
‘There’s nowhere to run, Heinrich. No place to go except to a courtroom that will be so full of reporters there’ll barely be room for you.’
Roland watched Kassler carefully for the moment of the final, irrevocable breakdown. Franz was the key, the fact that Kassler and his son had finally drawn together. Above all else – even above Kassler’s business, his drive to win – was the joy of this closeness which had come so late in life. To have that destroyed would be worse than death itself. ‘Imagine what Franz is going to think about you then, Heinrich. When you die he’ll visit your grave only to spit on it. Is that how you want Franz to remember you? Do you really want him to know the evil you performed?’
‘Enough!’ Kassler screamed. ‘Enough! I understand you!’
‘Do you? Do you really understand me, Heinrich?’
Kassler breathed in deeply, fought against the fear of what must be done. ‘You leave little room for misunderstanding,’ he said coldly. ‘Roland, is this your idea? Or does it come from those fools in government who wish to avoid the embarrassment of such a publicized trial?’
‘Does it matter?’
Kassler shook his head. ‘All that matters to me, as you know, is my son. You have used him against me well, Roland. But what guarantees do I have that he will never know?’
‘You have my word.’
‘And what is your word based on? The word of some bureaucrat in the German government . . . this Hoffbein fellow? Can you trust him?’
‘If he breaks his word to me, I’ll kill him,’ Roland answered simply.
Kassler turned the ignition key and drove through the rain toward the airport. The black BMW remained where it was but Kassler never noticed. Now that he’d decided his course of action – his only course of action if his son wasn’t to detest his very memory – he had no fear of the police, no fear of exposure. He felt quite calm, able to think rationally, to act in the civilized fashion he’d always enjoyed before Roland had torn the facade apart. ‘What time is your return flight to London?’
‘I have an open ticket.’
‘Please have the decency to be on the first flight,’ Kassler said; there was even the hint of an order in the request as the German regained full control of himself.
‘I will be.’
The two men didn’t speak another word until Kassler pulled up in front of the terminal. Roland opened the door stepped out, then stooped down to look at Kassler a final time. ‘Remember Franz, Heinrich, and what this will do to him.’
‘Goodbye, Roland. At our first encounter I recall expressing the desire that we should meet again. I don’t believe that sentiment is appropriate any longer.’
‘Goodbye, Heinrich.’ Roland closed the passenger door softly and walked toward the terminal entrance; he never looked back.
Kassler sat with his hands on the steering wheel as he watched Roland disappear into the terminal building. If the Englishman had come to Stuttgart with a loaded pistol, placed it against Kassler’s temple and pressed the trigger, he couldn’t have accomplished more destruction than he had done with those carefully chosen words about Franz.
For ten minutes Kassler remained in the same position, running through his mind every moment he’d ever spent with Roland. That first meeting, Roland’s threat to kill him, and the group of camp survivors who had spoken out on his behalf. Of course they’d spoken out for him. He had done good in the camp . . . ever since the autumn of 1944, once he realized that Hitler would lose the war.
Kassler had always prided himself on his ability to read the future, to understand which way it would swing, to play the turns and make his plans work. And they had worked. For almost thirty years they worked, allowing him to build himself up into one of the most successful industrialists in postwar Germany, a pillar of respectability. Indeed, a good German. But no more . . . somewhere, an anonymous little man who had been caught in some fervent Nazi hunter’s web had dropped Kassler’s name in order to ease his own way through the courts. Because of that, Kassler’s dream empire had crumbled.
Slowly, he drove away from the airport. Before reaching the autobahn he pulled into a gas station and had the gas tank filled. Then, with an increasingly mechanical certainty about his actions, he continued on toward the autobahn.
Would Roland still be at the airport, waiting for his plane? Did he intend leaving German
y before learning whether his visit had achieved the desired result? Kassler understood perfectly the reason for the visit. Roland didn’t want personal vengeance or the opportunity to confront Kassler with the accusations. He had come to persuade Kassler that for his son’s sake – as well as Roland’s own daughter’s sake – there could be only one solution. One honorable way out, as they might have said during the war, Kassler thought grimly.
He reached the autobahn and headed toward Ulm, watching the speedometer needle creep up to one hundred and twenty kilometers an hour as he kept the car in the inside lane. He wasn’t ready yet. He still needed time to think, to remember; time to consider whether he could have changed anything.
The wipers swished monotonously across the Mercedes’ windshield, clearing a path through the water that streamed down from leaden skies as Kassler drove steadily onward. He passed Ulm, saw signs for Augsburg and Munich. His foot pressed down harder on the accelerator as he switched to the outside lane. The speed increased . . . one hundred and fifty kilometers an hour, with the powerful 6.3-liter engine not even straining. Cars swept by as Kassler maintained his position in the outside lane, almost motionless as they struggled on in the rain. In the mirror, far back, he saw a blue light flashing. Was it meant for him? It didn’t matter. There was small chance of the police car catching up with him, unless its driver placed as little value on his life as Kassler did on his own at that moment.
He wondered if the Mercedes was aquaplaning now, the tires no longer in contact with the road surface but riding only on the water that covered the autobahn like a giant oil slick . . . Kassler knew he would find out soon enough, when the road swung left; then he would see how much traction the tires gave him on the wet road.
The bend came in sight and he pressed down even harder, waiting for the speedometer needle to hover just over the two-hundred-and-ten mark, the top end of this powerful car, the fastest he’d ever driven since buying it four years earlier. Were those drivers he passed watching his progress with envy? Ashamed of their own fear for not driving as shamelessly? God . . . he hoped so! In death, he wanted the same respect and admiration he had enjoyed in life.
