Berry, Steve - the Amber Room

He lingered in the shadows.

Windows abounded in the upper stories, any one of which could allow a pair of eyes to spot him and raise an alarm. He needed to get inside without arousing suspicion. The stiletto was snug against his right arm under a cotton jacket. Loring's gift, the CZ-75B, was strapped in a shoulder harness, two spare ammunition clips in his pocket. Forty-five rounds in all. But the last thing he wanted was that kind of trouble.

He crouched low and crept up the final few feet, hugging a stone wall. He slipped over the wall's edge onto a narrow walk and darted for a door ten meters away. He tried the lock. It was open. He stepped inside. Smells of fresh produce and dank air immediately greeted him.

He stood in a short hall that spilled into a darkened room. A massive, octagonal oak support held up a low beamed ceiling. A blackened hearth dominated one wall. The air was chilled, boxes and crates stacked high. It was apparently an old pantry now used for storage. Two doors led out. One directly ahead, the other to the left. Recalling the sounds and smells outside, he concluded the left exit surely led to the kitchen. He needed to head east, so he chose the door ahead and stepped into another hall.

He was just about to start forward when he heard voices and movement from around the corner ahead. He quickly backtracked into the storage room. He decided, instead of leaving, to take up a position behind one of the walls of crates. The only artificial light was a bare bulb suspended from the center rafter. He hoped the approaching voices were merely passing through. He did not want to kill or even maim any member of the staff. Bad enough he was doing what he was, he didn't need to compound Fellner's embarrassment with violence.

But he'd do what he had to.

He squeezed behind a crate stack, his back rigid against the rough stone wall. He was able to peer out, thanks to the pile's unevenness. The silence was broken only by a trapped fly that buzzed at the dingy windows.

The door opened.

"We need cucumbers and parsley. And see if the canned peaches are there, too," a male voice said in Czech.

Luckily, neither man pulled the chain for the overhead light, relying instead on the afternoon sun filtered by the nasty leaded panes.

"Here," the other male said.

Both men moved to the other side of the room. A cardboard box was dropped to the floor, a lid jerked open.

"Is Pan Loring still upset?"

Knoll peered out. One man wore the uniform required of all Loring's staff. Maroon trousers, white shirt, thin black tie. The other sported the jacketed butler's ensemble of the serving staff. Loring often bragged about designing the uniforms himself.

"He and Pani Danzer have been quiet all day. The police came this morning to ask questions and express condolences. Poor Pan Fellner and his daughter. Did you see her last night? Quite a beauty."

"I served drinks and cake in the study after dinner. She was exquisite. Rich, too. What a waste. The police have any idea what happened?"

" Ne. The plane simply exploded on the way back to Germany, all aboard killed."

The words slapped Knoll hard across the face. Did he hear right? Fellner and Monika dead?

Rage surged through him.

A plane had blown up with Monika and Fellner on board. Only one explanation made any sense. Ernst Loring had ordered the action, with Suzanne as his mechanism. Danzer and Loring had gone after him and failed. So they killed the old man and Monika. But why? What was going on? He wanted to palm the stiletto, push the crates aside, and slash the two staffers to pieces, their blood avenging the blood of his former employers. But what good would that do? He told himself to stay calm. Breathe slow. He needed answers. He needed to know why. He was glad now that he'd come. The source of all that happened, all that may happen, was somewhere within the ancient walls that encompassed him.

"Bring the boxes and let's go," one of the men said.

The two men left through the door toward the kitchen. The room again went quiet. He stepped from behind the crates. His arms were tense, his legs tingling. Was that emotion? Sorrow? He didn't think himself capable. Or was it more the lost opportunity with Monika? Or the fact that he was suddenly unemployed, his once orderly life now disrupted? He willed the feeling from his brain and left the storage room, reentering the inner corridor. He twisted left and right until he found a spiral staircase. His knowledge of the castle's geography told him that he needed to ascend at least two floors before reaching what was regarded as the main level.

At the top of the staircase he stopped. A row of leaded glass windows opened to another courtyard. Across the bailey, on the upper story of the far rectangular keep, through a set of windows apparently opened to the evening, he saw a woman. Her body darted back and forth. The room's location was not dissimilar from the location of his own room at Burg Herz. Quiet. Out of the way. But safe. Suddenly the woman settled in the open rectangle, her arms reaching out to swing the double panes inward.

He saw the girlish face and wicked eyes.

Suzanne Danzer.

Good.

FIFTY-FOUR

Knoll gained entrance to the back passages more easily than he expected, watching from a cracked-open door while a maid released a hidden panel in one of the ground-floor corridors. He figured he was in the south wing of the west building. He needed to cross to the far bastion and move northeast to where he knew the public rooms were located.

He entered the passage and stepped lightly, hoping not to encounter any of the staff. The lateness of the day seemed to lessen the chances of that happening. The only people drifting about now would be chambermaids making sure any guests' needs were taken care of for the night. The dank corridor was lined overhead with air ducts, water pipes, and an electrical conduit. Bare bulbs lit the way.

He negotiated three spiral staircases and found what he thought was the north wing. Tiny Judas holes dotted the walls, set in recessed niches and shielded by rusty lead covers. Along the way, he slid a few open and spied a view into various rooms. The peepholes were another holdover from the past, an anachronism when eyes and ears were the only way to learn information. Now they were nothing but ready navigation markers, or a delicious opportunity for a voyeur.

He stopped at another viewpoint and twisted open a lead cover. He recognized the Carolotta Room from the handsome bed and escritoire. Loring had named the space for the mistress of King Ludwig I of Bavaria, and her portrait adorned the far wall. He wondered what decoration disguised the peephole. Probably the wood carvings he recalled from having been assigned the chamber one night.

He moved on.

Suddenly, he heard voices vibrating though the stone. He searched for a look. Finding a Judas hole, he peered inside and saw the figure of Rachel Cutler standing in the middle of a brightly lit room, maroon towels wrapped around her naked frame and wet hair.

He stopped his advance.

"I told you McKoy was up to something," Rachel said.

Paul was sitting before a polished rosewood escritoire. He and Rachel were sharing a room on the castle's fourth floor. McKoy had been given another room farther down. The steward who brought their bag upstairs had explained that the space was known as the Wedding Chamber, in honor of the seventeenth-century portrait of a couple in allegorical costume that hung over the sleigh bed. The room was spacious and equipped with a private bath, and Rachel had taken the opportunity to soak in the tub for a few minutes, cleaning up for dinner that Loring informed them would be at six.