"This house was built in the late 1800s by a wealthy Spaniard. His family sold it to my father when they came upon hard times. Father had acquired a great deal of wealth during the war and had wisely traded Nazi currency for gold."
"Smart," Sean said, admiring some of the paintings that lined the stairwell. The man had good taste in art as well as good financial sense, despite being a Nazi.
"Yes. Father knew that Hitler's days were numbered, though he would have willed the Führer to live a thousand years. When the war turned, he saw the writing on the wall. He knew it was only a matter of time before the Führer's empire collapsed. He had no intention of being bankrupt when it did."
She turned left and led him down a long, wood-paneled hallway adorned with several more paintings. These were of people from the past: a gallant nineteenth century German military officer, a red-haired woman in a pink dress, portraits of children from the early 1900s, and a few pictures filled with a family.
"This was my father's family before the war. His mother and father, brother and sister, and they all lived in Bayern, one of the most beautiful areas in the world."
Sean had to agree, and now that she mentioned it, he recognized some of the mountain ranges in the backdrops of the portraits. "Bayern is certainly full of spectacular scenery."
She turned her head toward him as she floated along. "You've been there?"
"Yes, ma'am. I've been all over the world. I have to say that some parts of Germany can stand up to some of the planet's most scenic places."
She smiled at his comment, clearly pleased to hear it. "I agree, though I have only been to my family's homeland a few times. Being the daughter of a former SS officer can make travel somewhat… tricky."
He had to admit he'd never thought about it like that before.
"Fortunately," she went on, "I was able to take in the German countryside a few times before resigning to my life here."
"There could be worse places to retire," Sean said, walking past a window that gave a spectacular view of the crashing white tops of the ocean waves.
"You are most certainly right about that," she agreed.
"Your English is very good." He changed the subject to something he'd noticed before.
"Thank you. I was taught by an American schoolteacher. He had retired to San Sebastián to open a bookstore. When I was four years old, my father took me to his shop and introduced me. I spent the next several years going to that bookshop every day to learn. It's why I use conjunctions unlike many other people with European roots."
"I noticed." He passed her a sideways grin.
The two walked through a doorway at the end of the corridor and into an octagonal room. The wood paneling continued until it reached a bookshelf that wrapped around a massive desk in the center. An antechamber stretched out to the side, giving another extraordinary view of the coastline and the crescent-shaped bay down below. He returned his gaze to the interior and looked upon the area behind the desk. The bookcases ended with the three panels that cradled the desk chair. On the paneled walls hung three paintings, each placed next to each other. They were of three islands, though not tropical. They appeared more barren than anything else, difficult places to live. The rocky, jagged shores were clearly not for sunbathing, and the gray skies in the background depicted something that looked more like an alien world. He noticed that in the center painting, the sun had managed to crack through the cloud cover and a single beam of light streaked down to a place amid the soaking wet rocks and craggy coastline.
Irena flitted around behind the desk and opened a file drawer on the bottom right, then bent down and removed a black leather notebook. "This was my father's. If he left anything of record related to your quest, it would be in here." She noticed Sean staring at the paintings. "A small outcropping of islands between here and the Falkland's," she said. "Never understood what my father liked so much about those paintings."
"You kept them here in his memory?"
"Yes. I may be a snippy old woman, but I do have moments of sentimental feelings."
"You're not that old," Sean said with utmost sincerity.
"I am sixty-eight, and you let me know how old you feel when you hit that age. I know by years I'm still young, but I certainly don't feel it."
He smiled. It wasn't the first time he'd heard that line before, and he doubted it would be the last. He stepped around behind the desk and stood next to her. His nostrils filled with the flowery scent of her perfume. He picked up the notebook and began reading through it. Everything was in German, but much more legible than what he'd read in Poland.
"Do you need me to translate?" she asked in a kind tone, leaning over his shoulder.
"No, ma'am. I speak and read German," he answered in perfect German with a central mountain region accent.
Her eyebrows flicked up for a second. "Impressive. You apparently speak several languages."
His eyes continued to scan the pages quickly. Several minutes went by and turned into dozens as he poured through the pages. Irena eventually tired of standing and made her way to a leather club chair in the corner underneath volumes of old books. When Sean finished reading, her glass was empty, and his eyes tired.
"Did you find what you were looking for?"
He shook his head. "This is just a bunch of notes about his time in the army. There's no mention of the experiments in Poland, U-boats, the journey here. There's nothing." His voice trailed off, and he tried not to sound too downtrodden, but it was difficult to mask. He'd taken a huge gamble coming to Argentina. If the notebook in his hands was all there was to be found, he'd made his bets and lost. Dr. Ott's life was hanging in the balance, and time was running out.
"Are you sure there's nothing else?" he asked, beginning to hit the point of desperation.
She shifted the empty glass to the other hand and scratched the skin next to her left eye. "Like I said, my father disposed of anything related to his time with the Nazis, either before I was born or when I was so young I don't remember. Either way, I haven't seen anything in this home that might help you. If it's not in that book, I'm afraid there's nothing I can do."
Sean's face curled as he pressed his mind to think. There had to be a connection. A worrisome thought popped into his head. What if Stoepel wasn't the one with the connection? What if it was Wolfz? Right now, the police would be scouring the area after finding the killer dead on the street. They'd likely be going door-to-door, gathering information. Then he had an idea.
"Irena," he forced out the first name awkwardly, "do you know any other Germans living in the area with similar backgrounds to yours?"
One of her eyebrows rose a quarter inch. "By similar backgrounds I'm assuming you mean with parents who were in the Third Reich?"
He nodded.
"There were only a few in this area a decade after the war ended. Some were arrested and charged for war crimes, mostly the higher-ranking officers. After the extradition, the small number that remained was left to live out their lives with the guilt of what they'd done."
Sean listened closely before he asked his next question. "You don't, by any chance, know a man named Alfred Wolfz, do you?"
Irena glanced down at her wine glass. Her finger unconsciously ran around the rim in a circle, making a quiet squeaking sound. "Alfred Wolfz was the son of an SS officer, from what I understand. His father was taken away when he was twenty, the result of an ongoing inquisition. Alfred was left with a small estate and enough money to survive. Last I heard, he lives somewhere in town en route to the mountain resorts. I haven't seen him in years, despite San Sebastián being a relatively small city. Part of that is by design."
Sean's eyes narrowed, and his brow wrinkled together.