“Did he ever visit?”
“Not once. I think we both knew what a disaster that would be. But he always sent a letter, every quarter. It’s how I learned about you. About everything except, well, all of this.” She gestured to the report.
“Did you write back?”
“Of course. To his office address. He was very clear on that point. Have those letters turned up as well?”
“No. Not one.”
“Just as well. He loved his wife, you know. But I don’t think that he was ever the same person again.”
“Viv didn’t think so, either.”
The comment hung in the air while they sipped tea.
“This money he wired you,” Nat said. “Do you mind if I ask the amount? It’s important for me to know, believe it or not.”
She told him. It was a perfect match for the number Holland had mentioned weeks earlier, while smearing Gordon’s name. So, yes, Gordon Wolfe had indeed blackmailed Bauer, but only for payments that went straight to one of Bauer’s victims. Gordon must have taken great pleasure in being able to make the man squirm even as he showered generosity on Sabine. And he must have found some way to convince Bauer that killing him would only release the secrets to the world at large. That way, Bauer had no choice but to keep playing along. Until, of course, he found a way to fight back, by offering the secrets of his nuclear black book to whoever could locate Gordon’s buried treasure first, an action that had unleashed the resources of two powerful governments.
It meant that the storage locker in Baltimore had no longer been safe or adequate. That was why Gordon had gone to such lengths to secure the materials here in Switzerland, locked beneath layers of his own cryptic clues, with Nat holding all the keys.
He wondered briefly how the old man had managed to transport the files here. With a quick visit? By mail? Via some trusted courier? Who knew? Either way, he had fooled them all. Maybe the feds now had his secrets, but so did Nat. And he knew just what remained to be done with them.
They drank more tea, and talked a while longer about the past, and about Bernhard, and what this would all mean to the boy. Or to the man, rather. Bernhard was sixty-two, for goodness’ sake.
“What will you do next?” she asked.
“I’m leaving tonight for Berlin.”
“To see Bauer?”
“As soon as I’ve wrapped up a few loose ends.”
“What if he refuses to meet with you?”
“If the loose ends are what I think, then he’ll see me. Maybe not for long, but long enough.”
Sabine paused, and then glanced with distaste at the “Fleece” report.
“Something tells me that my story won’t be remaining a secret for much longer.”
“It will if you want it to.”
“Do you mean that?”
“Absolutely.”
She sat quietly for a moment. Watching her face, Nat figured she was reviewing all of the possible consequences, for better and for worse.
“But if you keep this silent, Bauer wins.”
“Not really,” Nat replied. “He still won’t have the one thing he always wanted most.”
“Perhaps. But he’ll still have respectability. His reputation. His family’s place in history.”
“Yes. He’ll still have all that.”
“Then use it. However you need to. Just give me a day or two. Enough time for Bernhard to get used to what it all means.”
“Is five days enough?”
“Yes. But why five?”
“That’s how long it is until the fourth of June. It’s the one and only time I’ll know exactly where to find Bauer. Alone, and out in the open.”
“Then here’s to the fourth of June.” Sabine clicked her teacup to his. “Do what you must. And good luck.”
THIRTY-THREE
Berlin—Monday, June 4, 2007
KURT BAUER BOUGHT FLOWERS from the kiosk at the Beusselstrasse S-Bahn station, just as he always did. The vendor was nearly as old as he was, and her fingers were just as gnarled. Kurt handed her three euros and grasped the bundle of wet newspaper, wrapped at the stems. It was a spring bouquet, mostly daffodils. Liesl would have liked the scent. He waited for the light to change and slowly crossed the highway.
The walkway took him over a bridge, high above a stinking canal, and then across a busy Autobahn. A desolate route, perhaps, but that was how Kurt preferred it. All too soon he would be too feeble to walk, and he would have to journey here by limousine. Too bad. Half the appeal of his monthly pilgrimage was his use of public transport and the way it let him blend into the surroundings, just like any other Berliner.
He turned the corner onto a narrow lane, which had been buckled and bowed by the large trucks of a nearby shipping firm. The lane ran alongside a high brick wall that had once surrounded the prison, the very wall Kurt had viewed from his cell for five months running. He paused to catch his breath, and shifted the bouquet to his left hand. Then he entered the stone courtyard of the Plötzensee Memorial.
It looked as if he had the place to himself. Good. Other visitors made him uncomfortable, especially young ones. If you were of a certain age and dressed in a certain way—prosperously but conservatively—they tended to regard you with suspicion, or outright hostility. As if you were Hitler himself, come to gloat over the dead.
Kurt never bothered anymore to go inside the site’s centerpiece, a brick shed that had been built to resemble the old death house. Once had been enough. The hangman’s meat hooks lined a far wall. They gave him the shakes.
He was also unsettled by other elements. There was an interpretive exhibit with grainy photos and thumbnail bios of the most prominent victims, plus a supposedly comprehensive roster of all 2,500 people who had been put to death here by the Nazis. Well-meaning, he supposed, but there was not a single mention of Liesl in all the fine print, for the unfair reason that she had been killed after her release. Kurt had long ago complained to the fools who presided over the place, but they merely shrugged and directed him to their equally indifferent superiors.
So he always paid his respects out in the elements, rain or shine, journeying deep into his memory while groping for contact with Liesl’s soul. At times he was taunted by the drifting fumes of his own factories, which were only a mile from here. The smoke traveled the same route that the bombers once had, swooping in from the west.
He raised the daffodils to his nostrils and sniffed, to mask the fumes. It was then that he realized he wasn’t alone after all. Someone had just stepped out of the shed. Mein Gott! It was the American, the researcher who had been working with that damned nuisance of a girl. Bauer recognized him from the surveillance photo, the one the Iranians had passed along. Helpful people, the Iranians. Kurt had been rooting for them. But they were of no further use now that the Americans had come up with the desired product. A pity, he supposed, although Kurt had learned long ago not to form emotional attachments in this sort of business. In the end, whoever could deliver the goods was always the preferable option.
The American stood in front of the shed, staring brazenly. Hadn’t he gotten the news that the whole thing was over? Stupid pest. And—oh, no—what was this now? Bauer spied a camera lens poking from behind the far corner of the building, aimed like the barrel of a sniper rifle. It could only be that damned girl, meaning she was in direct defiance of a court order.