Стив Берри - The Kaiser's Web--A Novel

He must be stopped.

Tonight.

As soon as the final curtain fell.

Marie entered the banqueting hall located adjacent to the theater. A food table lined one wall, the serving plates heaped with pork, beef, smoked salmon, and salad. Though hungry, she avoided the crowded line and drifted toward one of her aides. The young man was instantly attentive, and she told him what she wanted him to do. He nodded and dissolved into the crowd of patrons surrounding her. She was told earlier that the press would be barred from the event, allowing for a more relaxed atmosphere, and that fact had sparked her thinking.

The aide returned a moment later and whispered in her ear. “Herr Pohl says he will be glad to speak with you in private.”

She waited a few moments to give Pohl time to leave, then excused herself and climbed a set of marble stairs to the third floor where the room she’d requested was located. It was a holding spot for the performers before they went onstage.

She stepped inside.

Theodor Pohl turned to greet her. “I was surprised by your request, but intrigued enough to agree.”

She closed the door.

Strange, she thought. The two of them were engaged in one of the hottest political battles in recent German history, almost daily launching volleys of volatile rhetoric back and forth, yet they hardly knew each other. Her contact with Pohl prior to the campaign was little beyond a few light conversations at social gatherings. Theirs was a relationship born of differing philosophies, their contrasts too great for them ever to be anything but opposites.

“Herr Pohl, I thought it best we talk.”

“I gathered. What is so critical?”

“I am aware of your parentage.”

He shrugged. “My mother and father were quite known in Hesse.”

“I do not mean the Pohls. I am referring to your natural father, Martin Bormann, and your natural mother, Eva Braun.”

He chuckled. “Have you been drinking?”

She ignored the question. “I recently was sent some information. Of course, you know this already, since it came from you.”

“This is quite fascinating. Do continue.”

“You were born in the Orange Free State, South Africa, one of two twin boys. Eva Braun, your mother, died at childbirth. You were given to the Pohls for adoption. Your brother stayed with Bormann until 1955, when he was killed in a fall from a horse. It was then that Bormann, your natural father, reentered your life, where he stayed until he died in 1981.”

Pohl moved toward a small velvet sofa and took a seat. “I take back what I said earlier about your imagination. You are truly talented.”

She’d expected bravado, so his comment meant nothing. “When I received the information detailing your relationship with Bormann and Braun, at first I believed it to be a hoax, but I have come to learn what all of it truly was.” She paused. “Bait. For me to go look and destroy myself.”

“And how did you come to that conclusion?”

She stepped toward the door and opened it.

Cassiopeia Vitt and Jan Bruin entered.

She closed the door and introduced them. “Herr Bruin’s father is a man named Gerhard Schüb, whom I am told you know quite well.”

“And who told you that?”

“Herr Schüb himself. He did not die two years ago. He is still alive.” She watched closely for any reaction. Surely seeing Vitt was a jolt—she was supposed to have been blown up—but the combination of Jan Bruin and Gerhard Schüb, both still breathing, too, had to be disconcerting.

But Pohl maintained a stiff façade.

He was good, she’d give him that.

“We’ve never met,” Bruin said. “But I was told a great deal about you from my father. I did meet your associate. Herr Engle. He came to kill me but, as you can see, was unsuccessful.”

“I have no idea what you are talking about,” Pohl declared in a low, solemn tone.

“Josef Engle is employed by you,” Cassiopeia said. “He killed four people in Chile that we know about. He most likely killed a woman here in Germany named Hanna Cress. What do they call you in private? The Kaiser. Before she died, Hanna Cress uttered that word.”

“I am curious, how do you intend to prove any of this? I will gladly submit to any test you care to run. Blood. DNA. Whatever you suggest.”

“Which is kind of you,” Marie said. “Considering that the graves of Braun, Bormann, and your brother are empty. There is nothing to compare your DNA with, or at least nothing that could provide a conclusive verification. Isn’t that convenient.”

“You located graves?”

“We did,” Cassiopeia said. “The tombs are empty. But you already knew that.”

Pohl did not answer. Instead he faced Marie. “I invite you to make this public. Please. It is precisely what the people need to hear. You have tried in vain to brand me a dangerous fanatic. Let the nation see that you are a deranged conspiratorialist.”

“So you can steer the press toward the current investigation of my family concerns? You wanted us to find those financial records. You made sure we found them. But you never factored in that Schüb was still alive. You used his name in your contacts to me to give credence to your bait. But it’s all turned around on you now.”

“Assuming any of that is true, what do you intend to do?”

“I intend to do nothing,” she flatly said.

“Then what is the point of this?”

“Simply to let you know what I know. All of us in this room know it is true. I will leave what happens next to you. Whatever that might be, it will be mutually assured destruction. You and I, and our parties, will go down together. Neither of us will be the next chancellor. Neither of us will even be in office.”

A moment of strained silence passed between them.

“I assume this Gerhard Schüb is nearby to verify what you say?” Pohl asked.

“Close by, in fact. He’s with Cotton Malone, whom your associate also failed to kill.”

Pohl shook his head. “Another ancient Nazi trying to make a name for himself. Pathetic.”

He stepped toward the door. “I’m leaving now.”

“One thing, Herr Pohl,” Marie said.

Pohl stopped at the door and turned back.

“Did I say Gerhard Schüb was a Nazi? I only mentioned he was a man you know. What gave you the impression of something otherwise?”

She couldn’t resist.

Pohl stood impassive.

“Lügen haben kurze beine,” she said in a quiet tone.

Lies have short legs.

Pohl left the room.

CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

Marie stepped out into the cool night.

Nearly two hours had passed since her talk with Pohl. After, she’d noticed that if the Hessian was flustered he concealed his annoyance behind a remarkably pleasant façade. He’d worked the reception with determination, smiling, talking, and posing for pictures with one patron after another. She, too, had moved from person to person, fraternizing with the tenacity of a party leader determined to win.

Their paths never crossed, which was fine.

Enough had been said.

Pohl had left a few minutes before her, quickly climbing into a late-model Mercedes, ignoring the press. She noticed that Cassiopeia Vitt paid close attention, hoping perhaps Josef Engle would be in the car, but no one was inside except an anonymous driver. Earlier, she’d dismissed her regular driver, and Jan Bruin now waited behind the wheel of a black BMW coupe. The rear passenger-side door was open, and she climbed into the backseat. Two security men were in a lead vehicle.

She’d not been able to dismiss them.

Her exit from the theater was illuminated by a strobe of photographic flash. Reporters and camerapeople had been kept behind a barricade on the sidewalk and were now taking advantage of their one photo opportunity. Several screamed questions, but she politely waved them off as she closed the BMW’s rear door.