Seconds later, the Ghost was inside.
26
Milli Brandt couldn’t sleep. Tossing in her bed in her home in Josefstadt, a fashionable district of Vienna, she was unable to think of anything but the damning verdict delivered by Mohamed ElBaradei at the emergency meeting six hours earlier. “Ninety-six percent concentration…one hundred kilos…enough for four or five bombs.” The words haunted her like the memory of a bad accident. But the look on ElBaradei’s face was worse. Anguish and anger and frustration, all covering what she read as surrender. The future was a foregone conclusion. The world was going to war again.
Suddenly, she sat up. Her breath came fast, and she had to pause as she gulped down the glass of water next to her bed. Quietly, she rose, and with a glance at her husband, padded down the hallway to her study. Inside, she locked the door behind her, then moved to her desk. A sense of resolve stirred within her. She was no longer thinking, but doing. This is duty, she told herself.
It was with a steady hand that she lifted the receiver. Amazingly, she recalled the number she’d been told to memorize all those years ago for use in emergencies only. The phone rang once, twice. Waiting, she realized that her life had changed drastically from what it had been only a minute ago. She was no longer the deputy director for Technical Cooperation at the International Atomic Energy Agency. As of this moment, she was a patriot, and a little bit of a spy. She had never felt so sure of herself in her life.
“Yes,” a voice answered, brusque, demanding.
“This is Millicent Brandt. I need to speak with Hans about the Royal Lipizzaners.”
“Stay on the line.” She could practically hear the man on the other end of the line consulting his files or logs, or whatever it was that intelligence professionals look at when an agent calls in.
“Agent,” of course, was not the right word. Then again, Millicent Brandt was not her real name. Born Ludmilla Nilskova in Kiev, she was the third daughter of an outspoken Jewish chemist, a refusenik, who had immigrated to Jerusalem, and then to Austria, some thirty-odd years earlier. Though brought up speaking German, attending Austrian schools, and holding an Austrian passport, she had never forgotten the country that had secured her family’s release from the Soviet Union. Not long after beginning at the IAEA, she received a phone call from a man claiming to be an old family acquaintance. She recognized the accent, if not the name.
They met at a discreet restaurant near the Belvedere, across the city from her workplace. It was a friendly dinner, the conversation never lingering on any one subject. A little politics, a little culture. Interestingly, the acquaintance (whom she had never, in fact, met) knew all about her passion for riding, her love of Mozart, and even her attendance of a monthly Bible study group.
As the dinner concluded, he asked if she might consider doing him a favor. Immediately, her alarm bells went off. He touched her arm lightly to soothe her worries. She had the wrong idea. He wanted nothing immediate. Nothing improper. Certainly, nothing that would risk her losing her job. On the contrary, it was vital that she keep her position. All he asked was that she look out for their best interests. A promise to let him know if she learned of anything that might put into question the security of her adopted homeland.
He gave her a phone number and a sentence she was to repeat if ever she felt the necessity to call him. He asked that she memorize both, and insisted on quizzing her until she could repeat the ten-digit phone number and the sentence flawlessly. Finished with this piece of business, he regained his light manner. He hugged her and offered his sincerest thanks.
As she climbed into a taxi for the ride home, Millicent Brandt, née Ludmilla Nilskova, felt an unfamiliar stirring in her breast. Part fear, part apprehension, part thrill. She had joined the ranks of countless others-executives, officials, bureaucrats, and professionals from every walk of life-who had sworn an oath to the state of Israel, and had promised to help the country in any way it saw fit.
On the telephone, the sharp voice returned. “Hans will meet you at the Gloriette at Schönbrunn Palace at ten a.m. Bring a copy of the Wiener Tagblatt and make sure the masthead is visible.”
“Yes,” she said. “Of course.” But the phone was already dead.
Milli Brandt hung up. She had done it. She had kept her promise. She was officially a sayyan.
A friend.
27
Gottfried Blitz shooed the three dachshunds inside the house. Closing the door behind him, he stood stock-still, listening for a cry of alarm. The dogs’ trained noses were more effective than any electronic security system. The house remained quiet. He walked into the living room. The hounds lay camped out on the marble floor, panting after their morning’s exertion.
Stepping to the window, he peeled back the curtain and glanced down the road. The street was empty. There was no sign of the hiker he’d spoken with earlier. Blitz made it a habit to memorize faces, and he knew that the pale, slim man was not a neighbor. His Italian was fluent, but not that of a native. Who then? A tourist eager to explore the surrounding hills? But in this weather? And why hadn’t he been headed toward the paths that began just past the end of the road?
Blitz peered at the darkening sky. It was not yet nine o’clock and the day was already done. Rain began to fall. He listened as the drops grew heavier and began to strike the windowpane. Shivering, he dropped the lace curtain into place.
Lammers’s death had him spooked. The papers indicated that the killer had been waiting for him at his home. There were suggestions that it had been a professional job, and that Lammers may have been involved with organized crime. Blitz knew better. He also knew that if Lammers had been compromised, it wouldn’t be long until he was, too. At any other time, he would break camp and call it a day. Gottfried Blitz was in grave danger.
But this was not any other time.
The end game had begun. The Pilot was in the country. The final test of the drone had been a resounding success. Operational status had been elevated to red. It was a go. For all intents and purposes, the attack had already been launched.
And now, the mess in Landquart. One man dead, the other injured.
Blitz chewed on his lip. He’d questioned sending the bags by train, but in the end, there had been no other way. It was not just a question of manpower (Division had only seven operatives in the country) but risk. At this stage, it was too dangerous to hand off the bags personally. Using the Swiss mail system hadn’t troubled him, though he could see now that putting his name to the receipts had been a mistake. It was Finance that had insisted. They didn’t want the money left unclaimed should something go wrong. Operations had signed off on it, too. The money was key, they’d said. It’s the first thing they’ll look for. Crumbs for the trail, went their logic. You had to lead the police by the nose if you wanted them to find anything. And all trails led to him. To Gottfried Blitz.
Still, he couldn’t get Theo Lammers out of his mind. A professional job. Someone waiting for him at his home. He shuddered. It could mean only one thing. The network had been penetrated.
In the living room, he turned on the stereo. Wagner, as always. Just loud enough to let his neighbors know that he was at home, and that today was a day like any other.
Friends and neighbors knew Gottfried Blitz as a wealthy German businessman, one of thousands who had fled to southern Switzerland to enjoy the milder clime and the Mediterranean atmosphere. He drove the newest Mercedes sedan. He made annual pilgrimages to Bayreuth for the Ring cycle. Sunday mornings, the good Herr Blitz attended Lutheran services like any other good Christian. As a cover, it was complete.