Schreiber's Secret (36 page)

She glanced up at the small rectangular miracle of the modern age. The device was ideal for a court reporter. It alerted its carrier by flashing a tiny red light and vibrating before delivering a short message on the liquid crystal display.

“I see it.”

“Don’t forget.”

“Okay.”

“I love you.”

Danielle sighed heavily. “I love you too, with all my heart.” It was only after he had rung off that she realized that he had not given her his hotel telephone number. And that she had not told him about Dieter Müller.

The following morning, Edwards checked out of his hotel at seven o’clock. He was eager to reach Düsseldorf. He had decided to forgo breakfast in Straelen and have it instead in an old haunt he used to frequent in the plutocratic Land capital. The small bistro just off the Königsallee had always been open for early birds. He hoped it was still there.

He glanced down at the map by his side. It looked fairly straightforward. He would take the country lane that would lead him to the main drag. He swung the black BMW into the lane, which was barely wide enough for two vehicles. The road was empty and he would have enjoyed hurling the car at speed through the cut in the countryside. But the German police were nothing if not efficient and he did not want to risk being stopped for reckless driving.

He thought about the Düsseldorf he had known six years earlier. To some, the town held little charm. But he believed this was probably attributable more to envy than to aesthetics. The plain fact was that a city that had almost been destroyed totally had picked itself up by its bootstraps to become the epitome of the Economic Miracle. In his student days, everything in Düsseldorf had breathed money. This was hardly surprising, considering that it had become second only to Frankfurt as a centre of international banking and finance. He had enjoyed the buzz of a place where in smart society people were judged by their money and how well they flaunted it. But Düsseldorf was also the birthplace of Heinrich Heine, and it could afford to promote the arts like almost no other city. Continuing to drive steadily through the country lanes, the reporter reminisced on his visits to the opera and the theatre and the unrivalled joy of the Grosses Schützenfest, the hugely popular rifleman’s festival held every July along the banks of the Rhine. He had gone there with the Hartmanns, the family with whom he had spent two idyllic summers. He knew he should pay them a visit.

Edwards was so engrossed in his own thoughts that he did not notice the red coupé that had been following him for the last mile. Suddenly it started to hoot urgently, seeking to overtake. Well, thought Edwards, if the guy wanted to kill himself, it was up to him. He had already lowered his passenger window to allow more of the fresh morning air into the car. Now he pressed the button to lower his own in order to wave the guy past. He baulked at the sudden gust of cold air. “Go on, you bugger,” he muttered. “Pass me, then.”

He took his foot off the accelerator and waved frantically, but the red car, a Toyota Celica, did not shoot past him as he expected.

“Here, hold on, mate,” he muttered as he tried to keep his eyes on the road ahead and at the same time confront the driver who had pulled alongside him. It was only then he noticed that the other man was wearing a balaclava. His first thought was that, although the morning was fresh, it wasn’t that fresh.

“Pillock,” Edwards shouted at the man through the open window. “Fucking overtake me, then.”

Suddenly he saw the gun levelled at his head. In the next split second there was a flash as a bullet whizzed past his eyes and through the open passenger window.

“Jesus Christ!” he screamed, his first instinct being to slam on his brakes. The Toyota shot past him. There was the pungent smell of burnt rubber as it screeched to a halt at an angle that effectively blocked the road.

Mark Edwards sat rooted in his car seat as the hooded man climbed out of the red car and, gun in hand, walked purposefully towards him. The inertia brought on by abject fear was leaving him a sitting target. He was still sitting motionless when the assassin aimed his weapon.

Suddenly the instinct for survival returned. He slammed into reverse and, gearbox screaming in protest, began careering back along the lane. The engine whined with the overload of revs, the din masking the sound of several rounds that the attacker had loosed at his receding prey. Edwards did not look to check whether the man was shooting, or doing anything else for that matter. His only concern was to continue reversing at top speed until he could find a gap to back into and turn around.

He must have covered at least a quarter of a mile before he sighted an entrance to a farm track on what was now his right. As he swung into it and came to a halt to change into first, he noticed that the red car was copying his manoeuvre. Edwards didn’t know which road would lead to civilization. All he was interested in was getting the hell out of there.

He accelerated up through the gears faster than he had ever done before. But a grand prix driver he was not. His pursuer may have been a lousy shot, but he was already gaining.

“Bastard!” screamed Edwards as the adrenalin pumped through his veins. He negotiated the bends with all the expertise he could
muster, yet still the Toyota gained.  He slammed into third and then down into second as he fought to negotiate a double chicane. A quick glance in his mirror confirmed his worst fears. The Toyota was right on his back bumper. “Jesus!”

The BMW shrieked as he put his foot to the floor, once more creating a precious gap between pursued and pursuer. But then his heart plummeted. He appeared to be in a cul-de-sac.

“Oh, shit!” he screamed, slamming on the brakes. The G-forces sent his stomach into his mouth.

The driver of the red Toyota, also seemingly unaware of the topography of the area, did not react with a response commensurate with the circumstances. His car swerved first to the left and then to the right before hitting the lip of a ditch and hurtling into the trunk of a giant oak.

Edwards sat motionless for a few minutes as his addled brain tried to make sense of what had just taken place. Beads of sweat dripped from the tip of his nose onto his dry lips. He stared ahead, unappreciative of the idyllic country scene facing him: blue sky above, cows grazing in the meadow, their concentration suspended only temporarily by the follies of human beings. Had this gunman killed Brown? Why was somebody so interested in preventing them from knowing more about Hans Schreiber? Why was old man Schreiber so reticent? Was Henry Sonntag manipulating events from behind bars? There were a thousand questions. And he did not have the answers.

He climbed groggily from his car, checking that there was no damage to the vehicle. Miraculously, the BMW had escaped without a scratch. He peered at the twisted heap of the Toyota. It resembled a crushed beetle. His first instinct was to get the hell out. Then curiosity took over. He walked the ten yards between him and his adversary with more than a little trepidation. The man might be alive and ready to gun him down.

On closer inspection, Edwards could see that no one could have survived this wreck. The whole front of the car had caved in, smashing the windscreen. The driver was slumped over the hideously twisted steering wheel. Blood had oozed in patches over a wide area of the balaclava. The reporter placed two fingers under the base of the woollen helmet and felt for the pulse in the man’s neck. There was none. He then cupped the man’s shattered head in his hands and slowly shifted him back into his seat. Carefully, he raised the balaclava to just above the hairline.

Despite the mess of blood and broken bone, he could make out that the dead man was young, probably in his early twenties, and that his head was shaven. It was then that he noticed the tattoo on the man’s uncovered right
arm whichconfirmed him as a neo-Nazi. It rea
d
“Die Juden sind unser Unglück”
,
the Jews are our Misfortune – a favourite slogan of Der Stürmer.

Beneath the words was a swastika.

CHAPTER 17

While Mark Edwards was driving urgently towards Düsseldorf, others connected directly with the trial of Henry Sonntag in the United Kingdom were still asleep. London was one hour behind the Continent.

In deepest Hampshire, the haunt of stockbrokers, financiers and judges, Mr Justice Pilkington’s sleep was peaceful. He had worked all evening on his summation and was satisfied that the jury would be advised correctly. True, the case had been extremely emotional. Yet most murder trials were. Passions had run high, yet no more than in other racist trials on which he had adjudicated. However, the differences in the Sonntag case had been the modus operandi of the killer and the extraordinary claims made by the defence. Despite the latter, the good judge believed there could be only one verdict.

A few miles further west, Sir John Scrivener, QC, was sleeping fitfully. He had clutched at straws, trying to introduce an element of doubt into the jury’s mind. His client’s early outburst had not helped and Sir John had had to admit that the evidence against him was substantial. He had been worried about Sonntag testifying, fearing that the man would be hoisted by his own petard. Instead, Sonntag had performed admirably. The barrister felt that they had succeeded in sowing an element of doubt in the minds of the jury, if not the judge.

In Thaxted, rural Essex, some two hundred miles to the northeast, The counsel for the prosecution was enjoying the satisfying slumber of one confident of success. The Crown would demonstrate once again its ability to protect its subjects from those who would do them harm. There were many who saw Nigel Blomberg, QC, as a future Lord Chief Justice, none more so than Nigel Blomberg himself. The Sonntag affair was the sort of case on which reputations were made.

Meanwhile, in a small terraced house in Balham, south London, a man at the opposite end of the court spectrum was already awake and drinking a welcome mug of hot chocolate. Fred Higgins was an early riser; always had been. It was usually the case with ex-servicemen. Following his national service, spent fighting slant-eyed rebels in Malaya, the logical progression for Higgins was to join the police force. This he had done, serving with distinction for nigh on thirty years. On retirement from the Met, Higgins had applied for a post as attendant at the most famous criminal court in the world. Now several years in the job, he thought he had seen them all – the murderers, the robbers, the rapists. But the Sonntag case was the first in which he could recall having to clear the public gallery.

The man in the white shirt and scarlet shoulder-flashes had often had to admonish errant family members of accused or victim. Usually a stern word and  a finger-wagging had achieved the necessary. However, he had never experienced emotions running as high as they were in the current trial in No.1 Court.  As Fred Higgins sipped his hot chocolate, he prayed that the coming day would not see a repeat of those scenes.

Mark Edwards drove down Königsallee, delighting in the bustle of the city’s most fashionable boulevard. People were already sitting in many of the pavement cafés. The hard-faced matrons of Düsseldorf would soon be parading in their finery outside the many fashion and jewellery stores. That the recession now meant that many of them could not afford to enter the stores was immaterial. To be seen was the thing.

The Englishman turned left into Graf Adolf Strasse, past Berliner Allee and left into Oststrasse. He pulled up outside number 12. The block looked pretty functional. It was obvious that it had been built since the war.  When he rang the doorbell of Flat C, he was praying that this might be the lead he needed to unravel the conundrum that had begun to obsess him. 

“Welcome, Herr Edwards.”

The man who opened the door was fat and balding. Aged about sixty-five, he had a round face with a thin clipped moustache and wore old fashioned circular spectacles.

“Thank you,” said Edwards. “Herr Brandt I presume.”

“Yes, Oskar Brandt,” the man smiled. “Do come in. My wife is just making some coffee. Would you like some?”

“Thank you, Herr Brandt, that would be nice,” said Edwards, relieved that his host had greeted him so warmly.

The next few minutes were spent exchanging pleasantries, before Brandt raised the inevitable question. “Now, Herr Brown was saying something about the fact that our Franz’s real father lives in England and wants to make contact with his son.”

“Yes, that’s right,” the Englishman lied. “Our client, Hans Schreiber, realizes that this is an unusual request after all these years. But he is terminally ill and wishes to see his only son before he dies.”

A puzzled frown crossed Brandt’s face. “Oh, I’m sorry. I will try to be as much help as possible, but that may not be very much.”

“What do you mean?” asked Edwards as
Fräu Brandt, a plump and kindly matron, brought them their coffee. She eyed her husband enquiringly.

“I mean I think you made a wasted journey, Herr Edwards,” said his host. “The surname of Franz when we got him at the age of eight was Vimmer, not Schreiber.”

“I don’t understand.” It was all Edwards could think of to say. Then he remembered Brown’s letter. There had to be some explanation, but at this point he had no idea what it might be. The only thing he could do was pursue the matter. It was still his only lead.

“Look,” he said cajolingly, “there’s probably some simple explanation for all this. Tell me more about Franz anyway.”