Neil Olson - The Icon

Andreas studied the man as he passed. Lanky, carrying a little extra weight. Exactly the right build for Müller, but too young, and the pink, freshly scrubbed face was not familiar. No one else emerged from the building for the next hour, while the sky grew brighter, and Andreas could feel Benny shifting restlessly in his seat.

“For all you know,” the older man said, “he may have left an hour after he entered.”

“I realize that.”

“To do this properly you must be prepared to wait hours. All day.”

“I’m aware of the procedure. I simply don’t like it.”

“That’s because you’re an analyst at heart.”

“I’ve done my share of fieldwork.”

And got expelled for overaggressiveness, thought Andreas, but it would not be the thing to say. A lot of good operatives got labeled overzealous by their uncreative handlers. It was the switch from analyst to operative that troubled Andreas. The skills were totally separate. For all their sharing of information, the two had never conducted an operation together. Yet Benny had been quite successful since going freelance, and had never steered the older man wrong.

Another forty minutes passed. Andreas nearly nodded off twice, and his legs were going to sleep. Benny continued to fidget and check his watch, finally popping his door open.

“Follow me in a few minutes,” he said, then was out and walking briskly before Andreas had time to object. An unpleasant surge of adrenaline coursed through him as he watched Benny move down the street, pass the target house on the opposite side, cross over at the far intersection, and turn back. Without deliberation, Benny bounded up the stairs of the brownstone and disappeared into the vestibule. Andreas swung his door open and got out.

Cool air struck him at once, and he felt his stiff legs shake as he maneuvered his way across the broken sidewalk to the steps. Benny’s large frame crowded the vestibule, but Andreas could see that the big man had already opened the inner door. They slid into the stairwell. Steam heat clanged in the pipes and fluorescent light flickered. The floor was black-and-white tile; battered mailboxes lined one wall and a steep flight of steps went up the other. Andreas left about ten feet between them as they ascended, and was surprised by the other man’s speed. Neither of them made a noise.

The apartment door was steel-encased and painted brown. Benny ignored the mirrored peephole and put his ear to the door. The pipes continued to clank and bang, but Andreas heard nothing else in the building, no stirring of the occupants. After a minute, Benny took a razor-thin, flexible plastic card and wedged it into the seam between door and frame, taking a full minute to explore from top to bottom. Searching for a deadbolt, Andreas understood, but what would he do if he found one? Was there a hacksaw or drill in that capacious jacket as well?

Benny stood, holding up one finger: only the single, visible lock. Next he drew out a set of master keys and began trying one after another, making unavoidable noise now. Either he’s not in there, thought Andreas, or he’ll be waiting to blow our brains out. Then another thought struck him. No anti-crowbar flange, one lock. Would Müller stay in a place like this? Trapped in an apartment was trapped, of course, whether there was one lock on the door or ten. The trick was avoiding discovery at all. Still, it was troubling.

The moment the lock clicked, Benny pushed the door open and slid in, free hand stuffed inside his jacket. Andreas waited two or three seconds, then followed. It was a typical railroad flat-a long, narrow strip of rooms-and the men had entered at the kitchen. The place was dark and they heard nothing. Benny went right, toward the muted light from the street windows; Andreas, left, into the empty bedroom. There were gray curtains blocking the dim light from the alley, a small bed near the window, and a single scarred bureau. A lonely landscape print hung on one wall, but the others were bare, the green carpet was thin and stained, and the whole room gave off an air of barrenness and transience. No one lived here; no one stayed here long. No one seemed to be staying here at all, though the bed looked slept in, then badly made up.

A closed door faced him. Andreas considered whether anyone would be stupid enough to trap himself in the bathroom like that, then remembered that he was not carrying a weapon and Benny was three rooms away. He sighed at the idiocy of the whole undertaking, then yanked the stiff door open. The place was tiny, large enough to shit, shave, and shower, and not a spare inch more. No old Nazi cowering behind the shower curtain. Andreas caught sight of himself in the mirror, his ridiculous old man’s face, pinched and lined and soured by decades of suspicion. He was a pragmatic man, an attentive man, and not particularly vain, and yet he often forgot that he was old. Mirrors always took him up short.

He looked away from the unpleasant visage, and his gaze fell to the sink. The porcelain was damp, and a thin film hung around the drain. He rubbed at it a bit, rolled the pasty matter between thumb and finger. It was the sort of residue one found often when there was a woman in the house. Foundation, makeup, exfoliate, any of the dozens of powders necessary to the maintenance of the public face. Of course, men used these things also. Possibly hair dye was included in the mix. Andreas closed his eyes, pictured the man with the briefcase who had left the building earlier. Add a few lines to the face, white hair, glasses. The limp would be easy enough to fake. And voilà, the ghost of Müller. The weight of it made him grip the low sink with both hands, nearly ill. Fool, he cursed himself silently.

Benny could be heard wandering back through the apartment, no longer trying to move quietly. Andreas went over and sat on the bed as the big man filled the door frame.

“No one.”

“So it would appear.”

“You were right,” Benny said in disgust, “he must have gone out again last night.”

“I think not. I believe that we actually saw him leave.”

Benny ignored the comment, went to the bureau, and began pulling drawers open.

“Have you checked this?”

“You will find nothing there. No coats in the closet. No toothbrush in the bathroom.”

His companion slammed closed the empty drawers, then wheeled on him.

“He’s gone, then?”

The older man’s mind had already begun to drift out over the city, across the East River into Queens. He’d had only Fotis’ word to go by on Müller. That, and his own desperation for it to be true, a desperation the schemer could smell on him all these years later. It was the most obvious ploy imaginable. What were you distracting me from, he wondered. Why am I always so many steps behind you? Nearly sixty years and still the student. Poor Andreou, indeed.

“No, Benny. He was never here.”

No activity was visible around his godfather’s house, and

Matthew climbed the steps with an awful sense of foreboding. Father Ioannes followed a step behind, glancing at the flower beds, while bald Jimmy waited in the car, an arrangement of which he had strongly disapproved. Matthew rapped hard on the door, reminding himself that he had the right of anger here. He had been deceived, or so it now appeared. There was no movement within. He knocked again, harder.

“Try the door,” the priest suggested.

It seemed to surprise neither man when it opened, but Matthew’s sense of dread became a black hole, swallowing all constructive thought. He stepped into the house. The parlor was empty but caught the day’s weak light through its windows. A recent history of the Byzantine Empire lay on a chair by the door, a bookmark at page ninety-one. A half-filled water glass was on the table. Through the gauzy curtains Matthew watched Jimmy quickstepping down the sidewalk, disappearing into the alley between house and warehouse. The situation was getting away from him. Where were Nicholas and Anton? Where was Fotis?