Peter Leonard - Back from the Dead

Hess had seen her come out of the beauty salon and started after her. Leopoldstrasse was crowded with shoppers, women mostly, carrying shopping bags, keeping the Munich economy going. “I am sorry I missed your birthday,” Hess said when he caught up to Anke. She glanced at him, shrugged him off and kept moving. He grabbed her arm. “It’s me.”

Now he saw a glimmer of recognition on her face. “Ernst?” Anke was stunning as always, long blonde hair and plump red lips, long legs in knee-high black boots, long fingers with bright red nails, the smell of her perfume engulfing him.

“Keep walking. Go to your car.” He had followed her from the apartment he had rented for her, paying a year in advance.

“Ernst, what are you doing here? The police are looking for you. It is very dangerous.”

“If you didn’t recognize me no one else will.”

They walked another sixty meters and got in Anke’s Mercedes sedan, Hess’ Christmas present to her the year before. He sat in the front passenger seat and took off the cap. Anke leaned over the console, wrapped her long arms around his neck and kissed him on the mouth. “I’ve been worried sick about you, Ernst. Why didn’t you call?”

“I assumed the police had tapped your phone.” Hess was conscious of the pedestrians walking past the car and the traffic on Leopoldstrasse.

Anke was nervous, head moving, eyes darting around. “Ernst, where have you been?”

“You don’t seem happy to see me.”

“Yes, of course I am, but I am afraid.” Anke paused. “Where are you staying?”

“With you, I thought.”

“The police could be watching me. You’ll be arrested and I will too.” Anke pulled away from him and sat sideways in the seat.

“Who has been asking about me?”

“First a man with the federal police. That was more than a week ago.”

“Describe him.”

“Tall, six three, long dark hair.”

Hess pictured Zeller. “Who else?”

“Yesterday, the journalist who wrote the article about you was waiting outside my building. Have you seen it?”

Hess nodded.

“I didn’t believe a word.”

“What did she want?”

“She said you stole paintings during the war, and asked if I knew where they were. I told her the only one I knew about was the Durer.”

Hess couldn’t believe it. “Why would you tell her that?”

“You sold a painting. Why does it matter?”

“What else did she ask?”

“Did you own property other than the estate in Schleissheim and the apartment in Munich.”

“And what did you say?”

Anke was nervous now. “I said you had taken me to a villa in France one time, but it wasn’t yours.”

“You didn’t.” Hess could feel himself getting angry. “You told her it was in Nice?”

“But not where. She would have no idea how to find it. I don’t even remember where it is.”

“I can’t believe this.”

“Ernst, I’m sorry.”

“Start the car.”

“Where are we going?”

The room was dark. Hess glanced at the clock on the table next to him. It was 5:32 a.m. Anke was on her side of the bed, a bare shoulder sticking out of the covers, Hess recalling their lustful night. After drinking two bottles of champagne, Anke had been her old self again.

He slid out of bed, pulled the heavy floor-to-ceiling drapes apart and saw the dark shape of the Neues Rathaus rising up in the distance. He dressed in Max Hoffman’s worn khakis, long-sleeved plaid shirt, sport coat and baseball cap.

Light was breaking as Hess walked out of the apartment building, breath smoking in the crisp fall air. He felt relaxed and at home, seeing the city he loved for perhaps the last time.

Marienplatz was quiet and empty at this early hour. He stopped for coffee with a shot of schnapps at a cafe, then lingering, having a second cup. When he came out Altstadt was starting to come alive. He smoked a cigarette, watching trucks pulling up, workers delivering food and beer to the restaurants.

It was a short walk back to the hotel. Hess was on Salvatorplatz coming up on the Bayerischer when he saw the police cars, three of them parked in front of the hotel, lights flashing. He went to a newsstand across the street. Saw Huber step out of one of the cars and enter the hotel.

Hess glanced at the newspapers on display and froze. There was his photograph on the front page of the Suddeutsche Zeitung. The headline said: FUGITIVE WAR CRIMINAL ERNST HESS SEEN IN MUNICH.

He scanned the article that said Ernst Hess had been positively identified in southern Florida and was a suspect in several murders. U.S. authorities believed Hess had murdered an American citizen, assumed his identity and returned to Munich. Now he had a better idea what had happened. Conlin, the Florida detective, had contacted the Munich police. Why didn’t Huber tell him?

Hess bought the newspaper, folded it under his arm and walked to Karlsplatz. There was a phone booth in the Stachus. He telephoned Stigler.

“Harry, it’s the German girl,” Phyllis said on the intercom. “Should I tell her you’re busy? Just kidding.”

Phyllis transferred the call. Harry picked up the phone. “Hello.”

“Harry, they’ve got me.” It was Colette, voice sounding strange, distant.

“Fraulein Rizik is understandably upset,” Hess said, coming on the line. “She’s not herself. You better come and help her, Harry. You’re the only hope she has.”

“Let me talk to her.”

“You can talk when you see her. You’ve got forty-two hours. Someone will meet you at Frauenplatz, behind the church — the day after tomorrow, four p.m.”

Harry started to say something but Hess had already hung up.

Cordell said, “Harry, you’re fuckin’ with me, right? You’re not goin’ back ’cause you can’t. Remember those two days you spent in the prison in Munich, goin’ out of your mind? Now add like twenty years.”

“More than that,” Harry said.

They were in Harry’s kitchen, sipping drinks at the island counter.

“Okay, so you’re not crazy.”

“I don’t know.”

“Harry, let me understand something, okay? You’re gonna give yourself up for Colette, is that right?”

“It’s a challenge. Hess is saying: you want her, let’s see how good you are. Come and get her.”

“He knows the police are gonna be after you?”

“They’re after him too. That makes it more interesting.”

“Like a game, huh?” Cordell sipped the Courvoisier and Coke. “Don’t see how you can win though.”

“I don’t have a choice.”

“Then you better have a plan and a good one. Where we gonna fly into? And don’t say Munich.”

“I was thinking Innsbruck. Go through customs in Austria, rent a car, drive north through the Bavarian Alps.”

“That’s what I’m talkin’ about, Harry,” Cordell said, smiling now.

“You can’t go back either, remember?” Cordell had been implicated on Harry’s gun possession charge by the Munich police. Now he could conceivably be prosecuted as an accessory to murder.

“I’m goin’ and that’s it. Now what exactly did the Nazi say?”

Harry called a travel agent and booked two flights to Innsbruck, Austria by way of London. It was 4:45 p.m. They were leaving in three hours.

“What kind of gun do you want?” Harry said to Cordell. “If we’re going to do this we better be armed.”

“A .45 in nickel-plate be my first choice. And a rifle, Harry, something accurate at distance.”

“Where’d you learn to shoot?”

“The army, where you think?”

“You any good?”

“I can hit the target ninety-five per cent of the time from three hundred meters.”