A Traitor's Loyalty: A Novel (28 page)

Quinn sighed. “No, I suppose not.”

There was another minute or two of silence, then Ellie said, “I’m sorry I called you a Jew.”

“What?”

“At my flat. When I—when I didn’t think you should fight this treaty yesterday. I’m sorry I called you a Jew.”

The faintest of smiles played across Quinn’s lips. “I
am
a Jew.”

Ellie opened her mouth to respond, hesitated, and then before she could say anything, Gunning emerged from the museum and nonchalantly seated himself on the steps leading up to its entrance, a few meters below the two Waffen-SS troopers flanking the main doorway.

“Come on,” Quinn said, cutting Ellie off before she could say anything beginning with “Yes, but—.” He rose, and reluctantly so did she, and they walked casually across the piazza, converging with Barnes at the foot of the flight of steps. All three ascended the steps and entered the museum’s entrance hall without a gesture of recognition toward Gunning, who remained sitting where he was.

Ellie led them through the entrance hall into the central gallery that opened at its far end. National Socialism venerated German art as a cornerstone of Nordic cultural and racial superiority, but it also celebrated the great masterpieces of the rest of western—Aryan—Europe. The central gallery of this, the Reich’s greatest art museum, housed only a single work of art, the museum’s crown jewel: the Mona Lisa, installed here when the Führer had personally first dedicated the museum in the late 1940s.

The Mona Lisa was displayed under a glass case at the opposite end of the gallery, with the intervening walls hung with swastika banners. Ellie and Quinn walked across the gallery and sat on a bench to the side of the painting. Barnes leaned casually against the wall just inside the gallery’s entrance.

They did not have long to wait. It was only just after twenty to ten when a young Wehrmacht captain entered. He scanned the almost deserted gallery, and when his eyes fastened on Ellie he headed towards them. She rose at his approach, and Quinn followed her lead, subtly placing himself between her and the captain. The captain’s gaze shifted focus to Quinn when he saw this.

“Hauptmann Meier,” Ellie said. “I’m glad you came.”

The captain inclined his head slightly in acknowledgement and held up his hand. He held a scrap of paper between his first two fingers. “I received an invitation that was irresistible,” he said, mustering an amount of poise but clearly nervous. Ellie smiled faintly at his remark. “But now,” he continued before either of them could say anything, clearly trying to establish himself in control of the conversation, “I must insist on a further explanation.” His eyes shifted back and forth between Ellie and Quinn, belying the apparent authority he was trying to assert in his voice.

Ellie gestured to Quinn. “This is my friend . . .” She trailed off, uncertain how to introduce him.

“Matthias Kaufholz,” Quinn supplied. “Herr Hauptmann, I need you to take me to Reinhard Heydrich.”

Meier blinked at Quinn’s bluntness. “I’m afraid not, Herr Kaufholz,” he said after a moment. “I’ve come this far on the strength of a scribbled note, but you get no further without providing me with a little more substance. Why would I believe that the Gestapo is planning to assassinate the Commissar-General? At the Führer’s funeral, of all places. It’s outrageous.”

Quinn glanced at Ellie, then back to Meier. “It’s eminently logical, Herr Hauptmann. It makes perfect sense. I don’t know if they’re planning to
kill
him, but whatever it is they do, it’ll be just as good. At the funeral this afternoon, Heinrich Himmler must neutralize Heydrich so that he can overturn the Führer’s will, which names Heydrich as his successor.”

Meier blinked again, then let out a choked snort. “And just how do you come by all this information, that has remained secret to the rest of the Reich for the better part of a week now, Herr— Herr—”

“Herr Kaufholz,” Quinn said. “It’s all true, Hauptmann. And I have a document that proves it.”

Meier’s eyes narrowed as the stakes rose. “Where? Let me see it.”

Quinn shook his head. “I am afraid not, Herr Hauptmann. I show this document only to the Commissar-General personally.”

Meier let out a frustrated sigh, pursed his lips, and then finally shook his head. “I’m sorry, but no. If you’re unprepared to substantiate such outlandish accusations, then I can humor you no more.” He took a step back as if to leave, then paused, waiting for Quinn to concede.

But Quinn only smiled. “You would not have come here, alone, on your own initiative, Herr Hauptmann. You are here because you showed the note in your hand now to your superiors. Tell me, if you leave now and wash your hands of us, what happens to you when the Commissar-General is executed this afternoon? How do you explain
that
to your superiors?”

“Well—” Meier faltered, then visibly gathered himself. “Well—if that’s true, if I am here on the authority of the Commissar-General’s office, then what is to stop me from simply arresting the two of you, searching you for this putative ‘document’, and extracting whatever other information you might have—” he paused, then, a subtle menace lacing his voice, concluded, “—by persuasive force?”

Quinn smiled thinly. “For one thing, Herr Hauptmann,” he gestured over Meier’s left shoulder, “there are more than two of us.” Meier turned to follow the gesture, then started when he found Barnes standing immediately behind him. “I am afraid,” Quinn said, “that at the moment you seem to be in a little over your head.”

The captain looked uncertainly from Barnes to Quinn to Ellie, all of whom were watching him intently. Ellie gave him a faint, encouraging nod. Finally, he sighed in concession. “Very well,” he said. “If that is how you insist it be, then you must meet the Commissar-General.”

MEIER LED them back through the entrance hall and out the museum’s main entrance, where a Mercedes with tiny swastika flags on its bonnet stood waiting for them at the base of the steps, its engine already running and a Wehrmacht private standing at attention at the front passenger door. Barnes’s eyes met Gunning’s briefly as the four of them descended the steps, but Barnes made no signal, and Gunning made no move to get up.

At their approach, the private swung the car’s back door open for them. Meier stepped aside, inviting the three of them to go first. They hesitated, then Quinn made to climb into the car, but Meier stopped him with a hand resting gently on his shoulder and nodded toward Gunning.

“I think,” he said, “that
all
of you should come along.”

Quinn looked at Barnes, who sighed, turned and nodded to Gunning. The sergeant reluctantly rose and walked down the steps to join the party.

Meier’s hand was still on Quinn’s shoulder, blocking his way into the car. The captain fixed him with a meaningful stare. “Perhaps I am not in quite so far over my head as you surmised, Herr Kaufholz?”

Quinn returned his stare for a few moments, then broke it without responding and climbed into the car. Ellie came next, followed by Barnes, Gunning, and finally Meier. The private swung the door shut behind them and got in the front passenger seat, whereupon the car immediately pulled away from the art gallery.

They turned in a wide arc across the piazza toward In den Lauben, forcing several surprised tourists to hurry out of their way; automobiles were not ordinarily allowed in the piazza. As they sped up In den Lauben, they sat in silence and watched the buildings scroll past through the tinted windows, not wanting to speak in front of Meier.

Soon they had to slow down as they encountered a large crowd of tourists, and the Mercedes had to force its way slowly through, the pedestrians giving way reluctantly. Meier checked his watch and hissed impatiently.

Their crawl slowed progressively further as the crowd thickened and seemed to be having a difficult time moving out of the way. At last, when they were forced to come to a complete halt, they saw why: the road ahead was cordoned off. They had come to the communal hall, the site of the funeral, and ahead of them In den Lauben was blocked off because it became a part of the funeral’s processional route.

Five stony-faced Waffen-SS troopers had gathered on the cordon’s other side to see who was causing the commotion by driving through a prohibited area, but when they saw the Mercedes with its small swastika flags, their eyes widened and they immediately busied themselves hauling two of the metal barriers out of the way to allow the car to pass. A few moments later and they were on their way again, speeding down In den Lauben and crossing over the river on the massive Nibelungen Bridge. The bridge was named for both the mythical demigods and for the local factory, now demolished to make way for the Hermann Göring Works, that bore their name, where the Tiger tanks so critical to Germany’s victory on the Russian steppe had been manufactured.

Then they were across the bridge, and a few moments later the car pulled off the avenue into a stretch of open parkway. Quinn looked out the window and saw them approaching a massive, imperious stone building, dwarfing its neighbors. The swastika fag fluttered proudly before the building’s porticoed main entrance, with the Warsaw Pact flag flying slightly lower beside it, and then the flags of Germany’s European satellites.

Quinn glanced at Ellie, who was peering past him out the window at the building. “Strength through Joy?” he murmured. She nodded without looking away from the view. This was the Strength through Joy Hotel, preserve of Reich ministers, Wehrmacht generals, industrial magnates, and foreign dignitaries.

The car turned into a square archway set into the hotel’s base and descended the ramp into its parking levels. An SS guard in a booth stopped them at the entrance, but their driver flashed an ID and the guard nodded him through.

Their driver ignored several open spaces on the first parking level, instead heading unerringly for a space on the second. Quinn suspected that the hotel—which would currently be full of officials from across Germany and Europe—had assigned specific sections of its parking levels to all of its guests.

As soon as the engine was cut off, he tried his door but found it locked. Instead, the private got out of the passenger seat and opened the door on the far side.

Gunning waited for Captain Meier, sitting opposite him, to get out first, but Meier, all charm, gestured that Gunning should precede him. The sergeant shrugged and climbed out, followed by Barnes, Ellie, and Quinn. Meier was the last to get out.

The Wehrmacht captain led them to a well-lit corner of the level, where a Waffen-SS trooper stood guard at the entrance to the lift. Meier showed him a pass, and the storm trooper pressed the button to summon the lift.

It arrived after a few moments. They all filed inside, and a bellhop, whom Quinn imagined was probably also Waffen-SS, asked, “Floor, Herr Hauptmann?”

“Fifth floor.”

“Yes, Herr Hauptmann.”

They rode up in silence. A bell chimed softly, the lift doors opened, and Meier stepped out into a foyer. Quinn, Ellie, Barnes, and Gunning followed.

A pair of rigid guards, Wehrmacht now, rather than Waffen-SS, with their rifles held across their chests rather than slung over their shoulders, flanked the lift doors. As the doors slid softly shut behind them, a lieutenant sitting behind an ornate wooden desk, seeing Meier, rose and snapped to attention. Out of the corner of his eye, Quinn saw the guards relax almost imperceptibly at the motion.

Meier did not even acknowledge the lieutenant, striding purposefully down a corridor opening off the foyer with the four of them in tow. Everything was a picture of Victorian grandeur, but subtly themed towards National Socialism: the lamps were held in gilt wall sconces shaped like eagles, and the brown crisscross pattern on the beautiful red carpet turned out, on close inspection, to be subtle, interlocking swastikas.

At the end of the corridor, a door stood open, a Wehrmacht soldier at attention outside it. Meier led them through the doorway into what was quite obviously an antechamber. Three doors, all closed, led from the room; two of the walls were lined with wooden-legged, marble benches; and another lieutenant sat behind another desk.

“Hauptmann Meier to see the Commissar-General,” Meier said.

The lieutenant nodded, rose, and headed over to one of the closed doors. He cracked it open and slipped inside, pushing it closed behind him.

After a moment or two the door opened again, wide this time, and the lieutenant stepped outside, followed by another officer. The newcomer was about sixty, grey-haired, with the red and gold badge of exalted rank on the collar of his field-grey Wehrmacht uniform. He had a sharp, triangular face and a confident gleam in his dark eyes as he surveyed the four of them. Meier snapped to attention, but the other ignored him. Quinn recognized him: Colonel-General Otto-Ernst Remer, Heydrich’s chief of staff and commanding officer of the Wehrmacht’s Eastern Command.

“The Commissar-General will see you, Hauptmann,” Remer said, stepping aside to allow them through the door.

Meier nodded formally and headed through the doorway. The others followed.

The office was large and spacious, elegantly but spartanly furnished. In the center of the room, three couches were arranged around a low, oval table. Beyond that, situated so as to catch the best of the light from the large windows on two walls, stood an ornate mahogany desk with a high-backed, gilt and velvet chair. Red curtains with fringed golden sashes framed the windows.

Two men stood over the desk, studying some documents laid out on it and conferring quietly. At the
group’s entrance they looked up, and Quinn recognized both of them.

The man on the left, in blue uniform, was the same age as Remer, though he looked slightly younger; despite a touch of grey at the temples, his hair and neatly trimmed mustache were still black. Under his right arm he held a marshal’s baton. This was
Reichsmarschall
Adolf Galland, Commander-in-Chief of the German Luftwaffe.

But it was the man on the right who dominated. At sixty-seven Reinhard Heydrich was the oldest of the three men by almost a decade, but had Quinn not known that already, he might have pinned him as the youngest. He was tall and broad shouldered, dwarfing his companions, with eyes that were still a sharp, piercing blue, set over a prominent, bell-like nose, much like Quinn’s own. His hair, parted high on his forehead, remained a pale, flaxen blond.