“Why are you here?”
“Aloysius sent me here to help get you out of this place.”
“That makes no sense. He arranged for me to be here, and he knows I’m perfectly content.”
“You don’t understand. He didn’t send me here to help you — he sent me here because heneeds yourhelp.”
“My help?” Constance said.
Esterhazy nodded. “You see, he has made a terrible discovery. It seems his wife — my sister — didn’t die accidentally.”
Constance frowned.
Esterhazy knew that his best hope lay in keeping as close to the truth as possible. “Helen’s gun was loaded with blanks on the day of that lion hunt. And now Pendergast has embarked on a mission to find whoever was responsible. Only events have spiraled out of control. He can’t do this alone. He needs the help of those he trusts the most. That means me — and you.”
“What about Lieutenant D’Agosta?”
“The lieutenant was helping him. And got shot in the heart for his trouble. Not dead — but badly injured.”
Constance started visibly.
“That’s right. I told you events have spiraled out of control. Pendergast is in over his head, he’s in terrible danger. So I took the only steps I could to contact you. I pretended to have knowledge of you and… your case. Obviously it was all a ruse.”
Constance continued to stare at him. The hostility had largely disappeared, but uncertainty remained.
“I’m going to figure out a way to get you out of here. Meanwhile, please continue to deny knowing me. Or you could feign a growing recollection — whatever you feel more comfortable with. Just play along. All I ask is that you help me get you out of here. Because we’re almost out of time. Pendergast needs your quick mind, your instincts, your research skills. And every hour counts. You can’t imagine — and I haven’t the time at present to explain — the forces that are now arrayed against him.”
Constance continued staring, her face a mixture of suspicion, concern, and indecision. Better to leave her now, let her mull it all over. Esterhazy turned and rapped lightly on the door. “Dr. Ostrom? Dr. Felder? We can go now.”
CHAPTER 49
Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
THE EIGHTEENTH HOLE AT PALMETTO SPRAY GOLF LINKS was one of the most infamous on the East Coast: a par-5 five-hundred-and-sixty-yard drive with a wicked dogleg and half a dozen wide bunkers tightly bracketing the fairway.
Meier Weiss rolled his wheelchair up to the tee, plucked the blanket from his ruined legs, grabbed the crutches that hung from his golf bag, and hoisted himself up to a standing position, locking the joints on his leg braces. “Mind if I give some more advice?”
Aloysius Pendergast slid his borrowed golf bag to the ground. “If you’d be so kind.”
“It’s a long hole, but we’ve got the wind to our backs. I usually try for a controlled fade. With luck, it puts you on the right of the fairway and sets you up for the green in two.”
“I am, alas, a skeptic when it comes to the concept of ‘luck.’ ”
The old man rubbed his sunburned forehead and chuckled. “I always like to play a round before getting down to any kind of business. Tells me all I need to know about my partner. Now, I’ve noticed improvement on your last few holes. Just remember to follow through on your swing, like I showed you.”
Grabbing his driver, Weiss stumped over to the tee. Bracing himself on the crutches, he drew the club back, then swung it down in a perfect arc. The ball shot into the air with a crack, curving gracefully to the right and out of sight beyond the fringe of trees.
Pendergast watched, then turned to Weiss. “No ‘luck’ in that shot.”
Weiss slapped the crutches and braces. “I’ve had plenty of years with these things to perfect it.”
Pendergast stepped up to the tee, lined up his driver, and took the shot. The club impacted the ball with too open a face and what was meant as a fade turned into something more like a slice.
The older man shook his head, clucking in sympathy but hardly able to conceal his delight. “May have to go searching for that one.”
Pendergast thought for a moment and then asked, “I suppose you wouldn’t consider allowing me a mulligan?” He already knew the answer but was curious to hear Weiss’s reaction.
“Mr. Pendergast, you surprise me. I wouldn’t have pegged you for the mulligan type at all.”
The ghost of a smile lingered on Pendergast’s face as Weiss eased himself back into his wheelchair while unlocking the leg braces. His heavily muscled arms propelled him along, almost shooting him forward along the gravel path. It was a facet of the Nazi-hunter’s forceful personality that he spurned the luxury of a golf cart, preferring to wheel himself over the course. It had been a long eighteen holes, but he showed no sign of fatigue.
As they made their way down the fairway and around the dogleg, their balls came into view: Weiss’s lined up nicely for a shot to the green, Pendergast’s in a sand trap beside the fringe.
Weiss shook his head again. “Your honor.”
Pendergast took a calculating stroll around the bunker, then knelt beside the ball, estimating the trajectory to the pin. He waited for Weiss to issue his recommendation.
“If I were you, I’d choose the lob wedge,” Weiss said after a moment. “It’s more forgiving than the pitching wedge.”
Pendergast rummaged through the set of Pings, took out the wedge, lined himself up gingerly, took a few practice swings, and then — with a huge spray of sand — hit the ball. The ball moved about two feet up the side of the bunker.
Weiss tut-tutted. “Don’t think about it too much. Try to imagine the feel of the shot physically before you swing.”
Pendergast lined himself up again. This time, he hit a more controlled chip shot that seemed to go long but, with heavy backspin, landed with barely a roll on the back side of the green.
“ Mazel tov!” Weiss cried, beaming.
“Pure luck, I’m afraid,” said Pendergast.
“Ah, but you said you didn’t believe in luck. No — you followed my suggestion and now you see the excellent result.” Selecting a seven iron, Weiss chipped his ball to within ten feet of the pin. Pendergast, at twenty feet, missed his first two putts, then holed out for a bogey. Weiss one-putted for a final eagle.
Pendergast marked it and handed the scorecard to Weiss. “You shot a sixty-nine. My congratulations.”
“It’s my home course. And I’m sure if you follow some of those tips I mentioned, you’d improve quickly. You have a natural golfer’s physique. Now let us talk.”
The formality of the game completed, they repaired to his house, just off the tee box of the fifteenth hole. The two men sat on the patio while Heidi, Weiss’s wife, brought them a pitcher of mint juleps.
“And so to business,” Weiss said, in a rare mood, pouring out the drinks and raising his glass. “So you have come to me about Wolfgang Faust.”
Pendergast nodded.
“Then you have come to the right man, Mr. Pendergast. I made it my life’s work to track down the Dachau Doctor. I was only stopped by these.” And he gestured at the legs under the blanket. Putting down the drink, he reached for a thick folder that sat at one edge of the patio table. “A lifetime of work, Mr. Pendergast,” he said, patting the folder. “Distilled between these covers. And I know it by heart.” He took a deep sip of his julep. “Wolfgang Faust was born in Ravensbrück, Germany, in 1908 and attended the University of Munich, where he met and became the protégé of Josef Mengele, three years his senior. He worked as Mengele’s assistant at the Institute for Hereditary Biology and Racial Hygiene in Frankfurt. In 1940, he received his medical degree and joined the Waffen-SS. Later, at Mengele’s recommendation, he worked for Mengele in the clinic block at Auschwitz. You know the kind of ‘work’ Mengele was involved with?”