The documents of a more esoteric nature were shipped to a special institute called the Ahnenerbe, founded in 1935 by Heinrich Himmler to look for traces of Aryan influence around the world. The institute had considerable means and employed up to three hundred specialists — the elite of the Nazi scientific community, including archeologists, physicians, historians, and chemists.
Ahnenerbe’s research was under the control of a secret society called the Thule, which had infiltrated the centers of Nazi power, including the upper echelons of the SS.
We have few documents on this dangerous sect, but we know that two members of the Thule were in charge of the Freemason archives. One of them, a certain Wolfram Sievers, general secretary of the Ahnenerbe and a dignitary in the Thule, was sentenced at Nuremberg. During his trial, one of our Freemason brothers, a captain in charge of interrogations, learned that Ahnenerbe researchers were on the verge of making a breakthrough that would be key to the future of the Aryan race, one that would be more important than the V-2 rockets. Our brother took down Sievers’s statement but observed that he seemed to have lost his mind.
Marcas stopped reading and looked at Mareuil. “So what if Sievers seemed nuts? The Nazis were a bunch of crazies, as Zewinski would say.”
“We know that economic, social, political, and cultural factors all contributed to the rise of Nazism. Hitler was probably not a puppet of the Thule, and he was entirely responsible for the regime’s atrocities, but it is clear that there was a time in his life when the Thule influenced him. Read on. The key to Sophie’s murder is perhaps connected to those archives.”
Marcas shrugged and focused again on the dog-eared pages.
When the Germans sensed that the tide was turning after the defeat of Stalingrad in 1943, they took precautions. The Masonic archives were split up and sent to several destinations — mostly castles and salt mines — where they could not be easily seized.
In April 1944, with Germany losing the war, SS high command intensified its operation to hide the stolen archives. Whole trains were commissioned to move tons of documents from place to place.
When the Soviets invaded Germany in 1945, Russian intelligence units tracked down everything that the Nazis had stolen. At the end of the war, more than forty train cars full of recovered documents were sent to Moscow. Ultimately, all the Masonic documents stolen from France ended up in the hands of Russian intelligence.
Our grand master has requested the return of those documents. The Soviet Union, however, claims that none of them are in their possession.
The text stopped there. Marcas looked up and gave the papers back to Mareuil. “Someone clearly thought the documents were important. What happened after that?”
“Nothing for forty years, until the fall of communism, when the issue surfaced again. The Russians admitted that they had our archives, and negotiations for the return of the documents got under way. We received the first batch in 1995, with the rest coming in installments through 2002. In theory, they have now gotten everything back to us.”
“In theory?”
“That’s where Sophie Dawes comes in.”
Mareuil sipped his wine before continuing. “The documents were inventoried twice: once by the Germans and once by the Russians. It became clear that the Germans had listed more documents than the Russians. Some were missing.”
“Are you saying that Moscow deliberately kept part of the collection?”
“That’s what we thought at first, but then Sophie found this.”
Mareuil pulled out an envelope. “It’s a copy of an interrogation led by the French Army in April 1945 in a small German village. A man named Le Guermand was arrested when he tried to return to France. He was an SS officer in the Charlemagne Division, a unit composed of French soldiers. They were defending Berlin at the end.”
“You’re giving me a history lesson here. What’s the connection to the lost archives?”
“I’m getting there. A little before the Reich fell, Le Guermand and other SS officers were pulled off the front for a final assignment: to lead a convoy west, no matter what it took. Russian troops took down Le Guermand’s truck a few miles from Berlin, but he managed to escape. A French patrol caught him a week later. He was delirious, going on about priceless documents on letterhead with a square and a compass.”
“Why did he say all that?”
“He was facing a firing squad for treason. In exchange for his life, he offered to lead the investigators to the last truck, which was somewhere in the forest.”
“So what did they find?”
“Nothing. Three French soldiers went off with Le Guermand. The next day, a patrol found four bodies in an abandoned barn.”
“No more Le Guermand, no more papers. Is that what you’re saying?”
“Not exactly. The Russians actually did find the truck. Sophie had been working on that part of the archives, but key documents were incomplete. She had them with her.”
“And you’re suggesting someone wants them enough to kill for them?”
“Not someone. The Thule.”
Marcas listened as he sliced into his cod with honey sauce.
Mareuil continued, slipping a leather-bound notebook across the table. “They hated us as much as they coveted our knowledge, brother. Here’s a diary kept by one of us — Henri Jouhanneau — in 1940 and 1941. He was a neurologist before he was deported. Read it sometime. It’s edifying.”
“Seriously, I’m having a hard time seeing the relationship between these stories and the murder. As remarkable as the archives are, they’re just history, and the Nazis vanished sixty years ago, except for a small minority who are nostalgic for those days. So unless some old SS geezers have decided to leave the nursing home and take up arms again, I don’t think this is much of a lead.”
Mareuil sighed. “In 1993, the German police discovered an extensive network of extreme-right activists. They were exchanging plans for building bombs. They had the blueprints for Masonic lodges and Jewish synagogues. And some of them were bold enough to share their personal addresses. What were these people calling themselves? The Thule. And if you think they were just a bunch of retired Third Reich lovers and low-life skinheads, you’re wrong. They were computer engineers right out of the university, along with highly successful stockbrokers and financial analysts.
“A few extremists. And we’re not in Germany. It’s a big step from that to a huge conspiracy against the Freemasons.”
Mareuil set down his knife and fork and pulled another paper from his briefcase. He read the passage slowly. “What a shame the Führer did not have sufficient time to eradicate your brotherhood from the surface of the earth. Your members deserve to be burned at the stake as a public hygiene measure. Freemasons, the hour of your expiation is near, and this time, we will let none of you escape. Heil Hitler.”
Mareuil paused. “That dates from last year. It’s from an online message found on a number of anti-Freemason sites. I’m telling you, the three blows are a message.”
“In that case, the murder in Jerusalem is connected. But how? What was Sophie going to do there?”
“I don’t know,” Mareuil said.
They sat in silence.
After a few seconds, Mareuil continued. “Did you know that Freemason scholars met at Le Procope before the French Revolution to discuss philosophy? The place is nothing more than a tourist trap these days, but here we are, you and I, just across the street, talking about similar issues two centuries later. That’s what counts. People are dying. Be vigilant — and mindful of the chain that unites us over time and space.”