He crossed the street, passed by the stoop where Carter waited, and headed toward the alley. Carter gave him five seconds and then followed. At the alley turn, the man was about ten yards ahead.
Carter caught up to him before the man heard his footsteps.
"You are Herr Peter Rohenstaffer?"
He turned to flee, but Carter tangled his own leg between the other man's and he went down. As he came up, the Killmaster grabbed his tie and put him against the wall.
"About three weeks ago you made a gold buy in London for Oskar Hessling…"
"Leave me alone! I don't know what you're talking about!"
"You ferried the gold to Zurich and deposited it for Hessling."
"Who are you?"
"A man who wants an answer… one answer."
"Go to hell."
He tried to bring a knee up into Carter's crotch. The Killmaster caught it on his hip and exploded his right fist into the man's gut.
"How did you find out Hessling was dead?"
This time he tried a foot to the shin. It connected, and Carter bit his lip in pain.
"Okay, mein Herr."
Carter dropped another in his belly, and tattooed his head against the brick wall.
"Stop! God, stop, you'll crack my skull…!"
Carter stopped, and flexed the muscle of his right forearm. Instantly he felt Hugo's smooth hilt in the palm of his hand. He put a half inch of the blade up Rohenstaffer's right nostril and gathered a handful of the man's hair to hold his head steady.
"I don't have time to play games, and I don't care if you live or die. Talk!"
"Tony called me… told me Oskar was dead." The man was close to sobbing.
"When were you supposed to pick up the second bundle?"
"Last night. Hessling was going to call me right after the payoff was made. Tony called instead."
"How much?"
"Same as the other, two hundred and fifty American."
"Why would Tony call you?"
"He knows I'm Hessling's outside man."
"So you know all Oskar's action?"
Silence.
Carter drew a little blood with Hugo.
"Mein Gott, don't kill me!"
"What's in the briefcase? Files? Records?"
"Yes."
"Anything in there about the job that paid a half mil American?"
"No, that was a private deal. Hessling handled it all after the contact."
"But you made the first contact?"
"Yes. It was a woman over the phone. She left ten thousand earnest money in a drop. I figured she was serious, so I put her onto Hessling."
"What did she want for her money?"
"I don't know." Carter tickled the man's nose a little more. "I don't know, I swear!"
Carter pulled the blade from his nose but left it close. "After the deal was set, you must have made some of the arrangements. Hessling wouldn't get his hands dirty."
"I don't know if I did or not. I do a lot of things for him."
"Like steal a BMW motorcycle… or have it stolen."
Rohenstaffer nodded.
"Where did you deliver it?"
"The airport parking lot. I left it with the keys and split."
"What else?"
"Nothing."
"There must be something else. You know that kind of fee calls for something big. Don't tell me you haven't guessed."
The eyes went wild and started rolling. Carter knew he was losing him. This time Hugo's needle-sharp tip went to his neck.
"I didn't know until I heard it on the news!" he sobbed. "I swear it! I figured it was going to be a hit, but I never guessed it would be the American!"
"You bargained for the gun, didn't you?"
"Yes. I only know him as the Turk. He sells out of a whorehouse in Wedding called the Nightbird Hotel."
"I think you're telling me the truth."
"I am, I swear."
"What else?"
"Uh… uh, the car. I don't know whether it had anything to do with the hit or not, but I set up Gertrude Klammer to deliver a rented Mercedes to a garage on Wiebe Strasse."
"You're a good man, Rohenstaffer."
Carter dropped him with a slice to the back of the neck. He knelt and went to work on the briefcase with Hugo. It opened in seconds. Beneath a couple of shirts, some socks, and underwear, he found a gold mine.
He threw out the clothing and closed the briefcase. After stashing the heroin on Rohenstaffer, he jogged back down the block and slid into the SSD car beside Bruchner.
"Well?"
"Big business. He's sleeping peacefully back in the alley."
"The junk on him?"
Carter nodded.
Bruchner climbed out of the car and walked back to the two policemen. He exchanged nods and words, and returned.
"They'll handle him. Damned dope peddlers. Anything else?"
"I'll tell you on the way. Do you know the Golden Calf on the Ku'Damm?"
"Who doesn't" Bruchner chuckled. He whirled the car into a U-turn and headed back toward the center of the city. "What's in the briefcase?"
The life and times of Oskar Hessling. You can make copies for your people and the locals. The originals are bait for Hans-Otto Voigt."
"What's at the Golden Calf, besides cheap snoops and whores?"
"A very nervous woman by the name of Gertrude Klammer."
Eleven
Bruchner backed him on the stairs while Carter knocked. There was no answer.
"Fräulein Klammer?"
The only sound was the chatter of the drinkers in the bar below and an occasional moan from one of the other rooms.
"I'm going to pick it."
Bruchner nodded.
Both the bartender and the man at the desk had told them that the woman was in her apartment and had been all day.
Carter's hands sweated as he used the two picks on the lock. He already had a pretty good idea of what he was going to find.
He wasn't wrong.
"Bruchner!"
"Ja?" Carter nodded him in and closed the door. "Mein Gott."
There were two rooms: a living room and a tiny bedroom alcove behind tattered curtains.
Gertrude Klammer was arranged neatly on the bed, her eyes open, staring at the maze of cracks in the ceiling plaster. The angry red gash around her neck told the tale of her last seconds.
"Garrote?"
Carter nodded. "Piano wire, very fast and very quiet."
Bruchner lifted the phone while Carter went to work on the two rooms. He didn't expect to find much, but then he was only looking for one thing.
Whoever had done the number on Gertrude Klammer hadn't been interested in looking for anything. The place was as neat as a pin.
"They'll be here in fifteen minutes. I told them to use the back entrance and keep the excitement down."
"Good," Carter replied. He had just about finished, and had found nothing.
"You think it was the shooter, covering his tracks after he found out Hessling was dead?"
"Could be." Carter moved to the corpse.
The things one gets used to doing, he thought, gingerly pushing a finger into the fleshy part of the neck. The indentation stayed about three seconds. The woman had been dead about five hours.
The body was fully clothed, with no bruises or any other sign of a struggle.
Had Gertrude Klammer known her attacker? It would appear so.
Carefully Carter undid the buttons of her blouse, took a deep breath, and ran a finger under the right cup of her bra.
Nothing.
The other side was more productive: a thin, folded slip of paper. Carter glanced at it and handed it to Bruchner.
"The receipt for the Mercedes."
"Yeah," the Killmaster said. "That means I got the truth out of Herr Peter. Get on the phone and put a team out to find this Turk."
"Will do."
"Mind if I take your car back to the Victoria? I've got a lot of studying to do, and I want to get the Hessling papers copied."