“No!” Beck almost screamed the. word. “There must be a way, there must.” He turned to me, holding out his hands. “Haider, you can come too, all of us can escape. When Felix was with the priest they studied history books together, they traced the dividing point between our worlds. It was only 1934, Haider, just forty years ago. Here, Giuseppe Zangara assassinated President Roosevelt, Huey Long won the Presidency in 1936, and America stayed neutral until Germany had developed the atom bomb and conquered Europe. Then it was too late for us, we were forced to accept the Ultimatum. But in Felix’s world Zangara missed Roosevelt and killed another man named Cermak. Roosevelt lived and went on to lead America in a successful war against Germany. Long was never elected, instead he was assassinated himself in 1936. Don’t you see the symmetry, the threads linking the two events? Our worlds must still be close together, there must be portals, keys, Felix must be one himself…”
“No, Peter. I will never return, I feel that. My life is over.” He regarded me closely, without fear, then touched Beck lightly on the arm, “And I think yours is also. The Lieutenant cannot afford to spare either of us.”
He was perceptive. With the two of them out of the way, it was unlikely the Japs would ever bother me. In fact, it looked like Beck had been my main antagonist all along. I turned to him, as it suddenly dawned on me.
“You were never authorized to kill Grauber, were you? Or von Leeb? Or me? You did it all on your own, didn’t you?”
Beck nodded. His sudden passion seemed to have drained away.
“Tokyo would never authorize assassination of Reich officials on Reich soil. Not even such small fry as you, Lieutenant. I issued the instructions to Komeito in my capacity as New York station chief and they were followed unquestioningly, just as they had been in the past.
But they were never approved by higher authority. When Tokyo learns what’s happened of course, they’ll try to liquidate me. Right now they can’t afford any international incidents.”
God, so von Leeb had been wrong. It wasn’t Tokyo that was taking chances, it was Beck.
“Then you’re a dead man either way, aren’t you?” I asked coldly.
His voice was desperate now, the pale eyes bulging. “Not if you’ll help us, Haider. Listen, we can hide Felix, somewhere in the country, they’ll never find us, we’ll discover the key to his world, together Haider, together…”
“Together,” I repeated, and shot him through the right eye. The blood squirted into the air and he fell to the carpet with a soft plop. I turned to the old Jew.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t know who you are or where you come from, all this stuff about other worlds is over my head. But as long as you’re around I’m going to be in the eye of the storm. I could hold you for Berlin, but with von Leeb gone that would just create a thousand new problems, and the more important they think you are, the more likely it is they’d decide to shut me up permanently. Anyway, it would be no kindness to you.”
“No,” he said quietly, “no, it wouldn’t.” The blue eyes fixed on mine. “There is nothing for me here. My only moments of happiness were with a little girl who resembled my daughter, my daughter as she was many years ago. And that little girl was a whore. Yours is a world of ice and fire, Lieutenant. Perhaps Father Francis was right. Perhaps you are being judged in some way I cannot understand, perhaps your script is being rewritten. And perhaps I have some role in that. I am sorry for you all.”
I shot him neatly through the forehead, and I don’t think he felt any pain. When the Japs found out what Beck was up to, they’d trace him here and find them both. The case would be closed, for all concerned. I’d have some explaining to do to the Commissioner, but I still had von Leeb’s letter and that should spare me most of the flak. And I could go to sleep for once without wondering if I’d wake up in the morning. It was a pretty good feeling.
It’s the day after now and I’m dictating all this on a Uher I requisitioned from Communications. I’m going to have to hand in some kind of report, but this is strictly for my own files—if and when there is an official inquiry I’m going to be prepared. But with Kohler and Beck out of the way it should be fairly easy to keep my hands clean, so long as Berlin doesn’t press for a full report, and that seems pretty unlikely after this morning’s headlines. Heydrich has just purged Speer and Schirach from the Council and handed the Empire a forty-eight-hour ultimatum on Siam and Indochina, which means the Contraxists are firmly in the saddle and war isn’t far away. There’s talk of evacuating the civilian population to the Catskills, and if that’s really on, the Department will be working us to death for the next few weeks. When Nygard came in with the tape-recorder he told me all leaves had been cancelled and there was talk of fifteen-hour shifts.
I’m telling you, a cop’s life is hell.
EPIGRAPH
“If the Nazis had won, of course, things on the surface would eventually have settled down to an appearance of normality. The milkman would deliver his milk in the morning, the policeman would enforce the law, the doctor would cure the sick, people would still worry about their jobs, fight with their wives, save for a new car. But they would be living in a nightmare, buried in a graveyard of human hope and dignity, trapped in a hell they would never recognize, much less question. The long dark night would have begun, and finally man would not even remember the light.”
Copyright
WARNER PAPERBACK LIBRARY EDITION
First Printing: May, 1973
Copyright © 1973 by Eric Norden All rights reserved
Cover illustration by Seymour Chwast
Warner Paperback Library is a division of Warner Books, 315 Park Avenue South, New York, N.Y. 10010.
A Warner Communications Company