Daniel Silva - A Death in Vienna

“His name is Radek, Adrian, not Vogel, and the question is why. Why was Radek so concerned about Eli Lavon’s investigation that he would resort to murder? Even if Eli and Max Klein were able to prove conclusively that Vogel was really Erich Radek, he would have never been brought to trial by the Austrian state prosecutor. He’s too old. Too much time had elapsed. There were no witnesses left, none except Klein, and there’s no way Radek would have been convicted in Austria on the word of one old Jew. So why resort to violence?”

“It sounds to me as if you have a theory.”

Gabriel looked over his shoulder and murmured a few words in Hebrew to Shamron. Shamron handed Gabriel a file containing all the material he had gathered in the course of the investigation. Gabriel opened it and removed a single item: the photograph he had taken from Radek’s house in the Salzkammergut, Radek with a woman and a teen-aged boy. He laid it on the table and turned it so Carter could see. Carter’s eyes moved to the photo, then back to Gabriel.

“Who is she?” Gabriel asked.

“His wife, Monica.”

“When did he marry her?”

“During the war,” said Carter, “in Berlin.”

“There was never a mention of an SS-approved marriage in his file.”

“There were many things that didn’t make it into Radek’s SS file.”

“And after the war?”

“She settled in Pullach under her real name. The child was born in 1949. When Vogel moved back to Vienna, General Gehlen didn’t think it would be safe for Monica and the son to go with him openly-and neither did the Agency. A marriage was arranged for her to a man employed in Vogel’s net. She lived in Vienna, in the house behind Vogel’s. He visited them in the evening. Eventually, we constructed a passage between the houses, so that Monica and the boy could move freely between the two residences without fear of detection. We never knew who was watching. The Russians would have dearly loved to compromise him and turn him around.”

“What was the boy’s name?”

“Peter.”

“And the agent that Monica Radek married? Please tell us his name, Adrian.”

“I think you already know his name, Gabriel.” Carter hesitated, then said, “His name was Metzler.”

“Peter Metzler, the man who is about to be chancellor of Austria, is the son of a Nazi war criminal named Erich Radek, and Eli Lavon was going to expose that fact.”

“So it would seem.”

“That sounds like a motive for murder to me, Adrian.”

“Bravo, Gabriel,” Carter said. “But what can you do about it? Convince the Austrians to bring charges against Radek? Good luck. Expose Peter Metzler as Radek’s son? If you do that, you’ll also expose the fact that Radek was our man in Vienna. It will cause the Agency much public embarrassment at a time when it is locked in a global campaign against forces that wish to destroy my countryand yours. It will also plunge relations between your service and mine into the deep freeze at a time when you desperately need our support.”

“That sounds like a threat to me, Adrian.”

“No, it’s just sound advice,” Carter said. “It’s Realpolitik. Drop it. Look the other way. Wait for him to die and forget it ever happened.”

“No,” Shamron said.

Carter’s gaze moved from Gabriel to Shamron. “Why did I know that was going to be your answer?”

“Because I’m Shamron, and I never forget.”

“Then I suppose we need to come up with some way to deal with this situation that doesn’t drag my service through the cesspool of history.” Carter looked at his watch. “It’s getting late. I’m hungry. Let’s eat, shall we?”

FOR THE NEXT hour, over a meal of roast duckling and wild rice in the candlelit dining room, Erich Radek’s name was not spoken. There was a ritual about affairs such as these, Shamron always said, a rhythm that could not be broken or rushed. There was a time for hard-nosed negotiation, a time to sit back and enjoy the company of a fellow traveler who, when all is said and done, usually has your best interests at heart.

And so, with only the gentlest prod from Carter, Shamron volunteered to serve as the evening’s entertainment. For a time, he played the role expected of him. He told stories of night crossings into hostile lands; of secrets stolen and enemies vanquished; of the fiascos and calamities that accompany any career, especially one as long and volatile as Shamron’s. Carter, spellbound, laid down his fork and warmed his hands against Shamron’s fire. Gabriel watched the encounter silently from his outpost at the end of the table. He knew that he was witnessing a recruitment-and a perfect recruitment, Shamron always said, is at its heart a perfect seduction. It begins with a bit of flirtation, a confession of feelings better left unspoken. Only when the ground has been thoroughly plowed does one plant the seed of betrayal.

Shamron, over the hot apple crisp and coffee, began to talk not about his exploits but about himself: his childhood in Poland; the sting of Poland ’s violent anti-Semitism; the gathering storm clouds across the border in Nazi Germany. “In 1936, my mother and father decided that I would leave Poland for Palestine,” Shamron said. “They would remain behind, with my two older sisters, and wait to see if things got any better. Like so many others, they waited too long. In September 1939, we heard on the radio that the Germans had invaded. I knew I would never see my family again.”

Shamron sat silently for a moment. His hands, when he lit his cigarette, were trembling slightly. His crop had been sown. His demand, though never spoken, was clear. He was not leaving this house without Erich Radek in his pocket, and Adrian Carter was going to help him do it.

WHEN THEY RETURNED to the sitting room for the night session, a tape player stood on the coffee table in front of the couch. Carter, back in his chair next to the fire, loaded English tobacco into the bowl of a pipe. He struck a match and, with the stem between his teeth, nodded toward the tape machine and asked Gabriel to do the honors. Gabriel pressed the Play button. Two men began conversing in German, one with the accent of a Swiss from Zurich, the other a Viennese. Gabriel knew the voice of the man from Vienna. He had heard it a week earlier, in the Café Central. The voice belonged to Erich Radek.

“As of this morning, the total value of the account stands at two and a half billion dollars. Roughly one billion of that is cash, equally divided between dollars and euros. The rest of the money is invested-the usual fare, securities and bonds, along with a substantial amount of real estate…”

TEN MINUTES LATER, Gabriel reached down and pressed the Stop button. Carter emptied the contents of his pipe into the fireplace and slowly loaded another bowl.

“That conversation took place in Vienna last week,” Carter said. “The banker is a man named Konrad Becker. He’s from Zurich.”

“And the account?” Gabriel asked.

“After the war, thousands of fleeing Nazis went into hiding in Austria. They brought several hundred million dollars’ worth of looted Nazi assets with them: gold, cash, artwork, jewelry, household silver, rugs, and tapestries. The stuff was stashed all through the Alps. Many of those Nazis wanted to resurrect the Reich, and they wanted to use their looted assets to help accomplish that goal. A small cadre understood that Hitler’s crimes were so enormous that it would take at least a generation or more before National Socialism would be politically viable again. They decided to place a large sum of money in a Zurich bank and attach a rather unique set of instructions to the account. It could only be activated by a letter from the Austrian chancellor. You see, they believed that revolution had begun in Austria with Hitler and that Austria would be the fountain of its revival. Five men were initially entrusted with the account number and password. Four of them died. When the fifth took ill, he sought out someone to become the trustee.”