Greg Iles - The Spandau Phoenix

to put up with such outrages. Perhaps after tonight's business had been

concluded, Horn would see that the best policy was to kill the girl and

be done with it. The husband could be killed as soon as he turned over

the Spandau papers, and the Berlin police could take care of the girl's

grandfather at their leisure. Things were SO Simple, if people would

only focus on the facts. As Smuts passed through the spectacular

gallery rooms, he tried in vain to ignore the stench rising from his

boots.

958 A.m. Tempelhof Airpoil. American Sector, West Berlin, CRG Detective

Julius Schneider climbed out of the Iroquois helicopter gunship and

shook his head in wonder. Colonel Rose, bundled to the eyeballs in a

goosedown parka, stood on the tarmac beside a drab Army Ford. Sergeant

Clary waited faithfully at the wheel. Rose's face was clean shaven, but

his eyes were red and swollen. He waved Schneider into the Ford.

Pressing his hat to his head to keep the icy wind from blowing it off,

the big German ran to the car and climbed in.

Rose skipped the formalities. "The shit has hit the fan, Schneider.

Remember my FBI guy? The one who was going to get that Zinoviev file

for us?"

Schneider nodded.

"Well, he got it. He Fed-Exed a copy to me at nine-thirty this

morning." Rose shook his head. "Ten minutes later he was arrested on

charge& of espionage. His computer query on Zinoviev apparently rang

some kind of warning bell at Langley, and that set the dogs on him. I

guess the FBI computers aren't as secure as the Bureau likes to think

they are."

"What was in this Zinoviev file?" Schneider asked.

"We won't know till tomorrow when I get the file. If I get the file. If

the FBI knows he shipped it, they can probably stop it before it gets

here. If it does get here, I've got Ivan Kosov waiting to double-check

what he can in the KGB files." Schneider scowled. "Why do you need

Kosov?"

"When my buddy called, he told me a little about the Zinoviev file,

Schneider. He said the file claims that the United States, Britain, and

the Russians have all known for years that Prisoner Number Seven was not

Rudolf Hess."

Schneider's eyes narrowed.

"I asked him why, ifthat was true, the Russians had kept quiet about it

all these years You know what he told me? He said it didn't matter what

the Russians knew about Hess, because in 1943 Winston Churchill

blackmailed Stalin into silence."

Schneider looked bewildered. "What do you mean?

Blackmailed him with what?"

Rose shrugged. "MY guy said it had to do with Zinoviev's part in Hess's

mission, but that it was too complicated to explain on the phone. He

said I wouldn't believe it when I saw it, but that the Russians were the

good guys in this mess. I told him I would believe it, and that I

thought the Brits were still neck-deep in some kind of stinking

coverup." Rose's eyes flickered. "He told me I might be right,

Schneider. But I guess we'll have to wait for our copy of the Zinoviev

file to find out."

"Where is your new partner now?" Schneider asked.

Rose hooked his thumb toward Tempelhof's observation deck, eighty meters

away. Above the rail Schneider saw a solitary figure wearing a hat and

a raincoat, the only person braving the cold of the deck.

"There he is," Rose said. "A week ago I'd have considered it sacrilege

to bring that bastard to the home of the Berlin Airlift.

Today I trust him more than some of my own people."

Schneider looked skeptical. "Why are you here now?"

"To give you a little tactical update, my friend. One hour ago Prefect

Funk arrested one of your brother officers on espionage charges. Seems

this guy was passing secret information to the British government."

"Scheisse! " Rose nodded in disgust. "You should regard everything we

knew as of this morning-including the names on Hauer and Apfel's false

assports-as blown to the Brits. If you get anywhere near those cops,

Schneider, you keep your eyes peeled for British spools."

Rose looked out the window at an F-16 fighter parked in a concrete

revetment twenty meters away. "One more thing," he said. "Kosov told

me to tell you to watch your back. He wouldn't tell me why. I think

he's in the same spot I am, Schneider. He doesn't know who to trust.

He wants to help me, but he's being muzzled from above. I think he's

waiting for some kind of clearance to come clean with me."

Schneider grunted. It wasn't easy for a German to see any Russian in a

positive light. "Don't trust him too much, Colonel," he said.

"Kosov would sacrifice you without a thought."

"You worry about your own ass," Rose advised. "Kosov's got enough to do

without yanking my chain. Moscow went nuts when they found out about

Axel Goltz's mutiny. The KGB is interrogating every Stasi agent in

Berlin, trying to figure out what's going on. If they crack this

Phoenix thing, they'll be lining those tattooed bastards up against the

Wall by the dozen and passing out blindfolds and cigarettes."

Rose punched a stiff forefinger into Schneider's barrel chest.

"If you find Hauer and Apfel, you bring 'em back here with the papers.

Hauer's probably the 'only guy who can straighten this mess out now. And

those Spandau papers are the only thing that could buy my ass out of the

sling. Oh yeah, one more thing. If you happen to find the guy who

killed Harry Richardson"-Rose smacked the car window with the meaty end

of his fist-"you have my permission to gut and skin the son of a bitch.

Briefing concluded, Detective."

Schneider smiled coldly. "Auf Wiedersehen, Herr Oberst."

He climbed out of the Ford and clambered into the waiting gunship.

He was still 150 miles from Frankfurt Airport, and thirteen air-hours

away from South Africa. Plenty of time left to figure out how he was

going to find Hauer, and plenty of time to figure out what he was going

to say when he did. The questions he could not get out of his mind were

the ones Rose had barely touched on. What was Phoenix, reany?

Was it a secret subsect of Der Bruderschaft? If so, if it was a

neo-fascist group that had penetrated both the police and political

hierarchies, Schneider feared not only for his police department, but

for Germany itself The primary goal of all neo-Nazis was German

reunification. It was easy there enough to see that a premature grab

for that goal could suit in catastrophe fOr the country. Russia might

be flirting with glasnost and perestroika, but faced with the specter of

two fascist-led Germanys pressing for reunification, the nation that had

lost twenty million citizens to Hitler's armies might respond with

unimaginable force and fury.

Kosov's warning to COIOnel Rose about "watching his back" brought

Schneider back to more immediate concernsWho besides Kosov even knew

that he was involved in the Phoenix case? Schneider remembered Harry

Richardson's mutilated corpse baking in the overheated, apartment. Did

Kosov know the animal who had killed him? Schneider thought of the

mysterious B written in Richardson's bloodHad Kosov been able to read

its significance? If so, why couldn't he give Rose a name to go with

his warning? Could Harry Richardson have been killed by a Russian only

an hour after Kosov released him at the Wall? Schneider knew Colonel

Rose saw the British as the villains in this case, but he suspected it

was somehow more complicated than that.

As a homicide detective, he had found that 99 percent of all