Spoils of Victory (34 page)

M
ason woke up with a hammering headache and a throbbing pain in his thigh. He'd come awake a number of times, like coming briefly to the surface in a warm ocean, only to descend again. But this time, he became fully aware of his surroundings. He lay in a bed cordoned off by a white curtain. An IV bottle hung above his head, with a tube attached to his arm.

O
kay, I'm in a hospital . . . again.

He raised his head slightly, magnifying the headache. He smiled before dropping his head back onto the pillow.

Abrams sat slumped in a chair, with his head flopped backward, and snorted more than snored, like he was searching for truffles in his sleep.

“How's a man supposed to get any sleep with that buzz saw going?” Mason said loudly.

Abrams stirred and rose up in his chair. “Hey, you're awake.”

“I'm aware of that. Thanks. What are you doing here?”

“They let me hang around until you woke up so I could say good-bye.”

“You weren't supposed to be anywhere near here. I promised you an ass kicking.”

“Fortunately, not in your condition.”

“How's Weissenegger?”

“Just came out of his second surgery. He's in bad shape, but they say he'll live.”

“Good. I owe him.”

“Margareta's with him. She actually seems to like the guy. Figure that one out.”

Mason chuckled then shrugged as he thought back. “I can see it. He's a little slow but smarter than I thought. It just takes him longer to get there. You know, he was the one who called Udahl. He pretended to betray me by telling him I was going to the forester's house to pick up Schaeffer. He almost had
me
convinced.” Mason turned to get a better look at Abrams. “I didn't see you get off the train.”

“The train was just about outside of Garmisch when I couldn't stand it anymore and jumped.”

“I should have handcuffed you to the seat.”

Abrams shrugged. “I knew what you were up to, but I didn't know where. So I went to warn Densmore. I got back to headquarters right after you'd called him. Good thing I did, too. Densmore was only going to take a couple of guys with him.” Abrams furrowed his brow. “How did you figure out Udahl was the guy calling the shots?”

“I didn't know for sure, but a bunch of little things kept tickling my brain: him knowing our informant was a ‘he,' for one. That kind of started it. Then he knew about me seeing Adelle after that night at Winstone's, when no one but you and she knew about that. He kept throwing me bones, then telling me not to ruffle army-brass feathers. He warned me not to touch the Casa Carioca. Insisted that I report only to him and tell him everything. Then right after that witnesses would disappear, the wiretaps were blown. In one meeting, he already had files on exactly who I suspected, even though I hadn't mentioned them. Once General Clay got involved, he threw Schaeffer at me to cover his ass. The fact that Abbott had been killed
in the war. All this floated around in my head, but I never put it all together until Schaeffer used the same phrase Udahl liked to say, ‘no rest for the wicked.' I played a hunch, leaving that letter for him, then having Hans call him.”

“You gambled your life on a hunch.”

“An educated guess.”

“That was pretty stupid.”

“Stupid's my middle name.” When Abrams declined to argue that point, Mason said, “I appreciate you helping out.”

“Don't mention it.”

Mason noticed the MP standing guard outside the door. “If he's waiting to escort you to the train station, this time he'd better ride along.”

Rather than laughing along with the joke, Abrams glanced at Mason's wrist. Mason started to raise his right arm to see what Abrams was looking at, but his arm lifted only a few inches before a pair of handcuffs stopped him. He shook his hand, making the handcuff rattle against the metal bed frame.

“What the hell is this?” Mason yelled.

A nurse rushed over and scowled. “Would you mind keeping it down? There are other patients in this ward besides your highness.”

“Not handcuffed to their beds.”

“Keep it down or I'll order a muzzle,” the nurse said and stormed off.

“Gamin's gone over the edge,” Abrams said. “He wants you kept in confinement until a court-martial hearing can determine whether you'll be charged with willful murder of a full-bird colonel. Not that rank should have anything to do with it, but in Gamin's mind, it's like killing the pope.”

“Willful murder? Are they kidding?”

The nurse stomped over to the bed and called out to the MP guarding the door, “Corporal, I need you to gag this man. He's disturbing the other patients.”

The MP turned to the room, unsure what to do.

Mason held up his free hand as if surrendering. “That won't be necessary, ma'am. I'll be a good little prisoner-patient.”

The nurse seemed satisfied that she'd gotten her point across and disappeared behind the curtain.

Keeping his voice to a roaring whisper, Mason said, “That son of a bitch. It was self-defense.”

“I don't think it originally came from Gamin. The scuttlebutt is, it came from a higher source. Someone's trying to burn you.”

Mason fell silent as he absorbed this. Whoever it was, they had to have major influence to push for murder charges when there were witnesses who saw Mason shoot Udahl in self-defense. “It's got to be someone in league with Udahl. Someone very high on the food chain. They're trying to cover their asses.”

Abrams seemed to be debating whether to say more. Mason knew the look. It would be some brand of bad news.

“What is it?”

Finally Abrams said, “Volker's dead.”

“What?” Mason started to yell it, but cut it off before the nurse carried through on her threat.

“Shot while trying to escape.”

Mason hissed a curse. “What about Kessel? He needs to be protected. Get him someplace safe. Anywhere.”

“Don't ask me. I'm a lowly specialist three and about to be shipped out of here.”

“If someone doesn't do it, he's a dead man. Maybe dead already.” Mason fell back on his pillow. “They'll come after all of us: Yaakov's family, you, me.” He pointed his finger at Abrams. “You watch your back out there.”

“I intend to.”

Mason jerked on the handcuff in frustration. “I've got to get out of here.”

“And do what?”

“I'm working on it. I have to do it fast before someone sneaks in
here and jams a pillow in my face. I need for you to tell Densmore what's going on and get him in here.”

“I'll go by on my way out.” Abrams stood. “They've got me on a supply convoy going north. No more jumping off trains for me.”

Mason shook Abrams's hand with his free one. He held on longer than usual and looked into Abrams's eyes. “You take care of yourself. I was lucky having you as a partner.”

“Who knows? Maybe we can again.”

Mason smiled and nodded, trying to mask his doubt. “All right. Get out of here before Nurse Nazi throws you out.”

Abrams paused as if he wanted to say more, but, instead, he waved a good-bye and walked away.

Now alone, Mason fell into deep thought. Udahl's crony bosses were still out there, plotting and killing off anyone who could be traced back to them. From what Udahl and Schaeffer had said the day before, the documents were still out there, somewhere. Udahl's men had searched the forester's house, Mason's billet, and Adelle's place, not to mention Winstone's villa the night of his murder. Plus, Mason and Abrams, then Densmore and a handful of MPs had all done several searches, turning Winstone's villa upside down. The documents weren't in Winstone's office or safe. If Winstone had planned to skip town, there was no way he'd leave them behind. He would have made sure they were quick and easy to access. That was why Hilda's note with Yaakov's concentration camp tattoo number made no sense. Having Yaakov hold the documents would have made it difficult to get to them quickly in case of urgent flight. And if Yaakov knew where they were hidden, he would have made sure they got into Mason's hands. It would have been his best chance of survival. They had to be in the villa. If he could just figure out where, he was certain that Hilda's note would make sense. And if he was going to determine where they were, he'd better do it fast. He thought back to every interview, every nuance, every detail. . . .

Think, Mason!

“Already going stir-crazy in here?”

Mason looked up to see Densmore standing at the edge of the curtain partition.

Densmore walked up to the bed. “You should save your energy for the court-martial.”

“You saw that was in self-defense.”

“Yes, I believe it was. I put that in my report, and said so to Gamin and that JAG lawyer, Hollister. It fell on deaf ears. In most police departments that would have been a good shooting. But we're in the army, and, of all people, you shot and killed a colonel and military governor.”

Mason had to agree: It didn't look good. “Abrams told me about Volker being killed while trying to escape,” he said. “You've got to see that was a setup.”

Densmore glanced at the door as if someone might be listening in. “Yeah, I can see that.”

“Udahl's partners are still out there and active. They're going to make sure no one's left standing. That means you, buddy.”

“You keep forgetting that if we're talking army brass, they—whoever ‘they' are—don't have to kill you or Abrams or me. Just spread us to the winds. Make sure we're shipped off as far away as possible.”

“Maybe for us, but not Kessel. You've got to protect him.”

“And how am I supposed to do that?”

“Use your imagination. You're smarter and braver than you let on.”

Densmore looked at Mason for a moment. “I'll do what I can, but, speaking of spreading us to the winds, they're transferring me, too. I'm being sent back to the States. They're going to put me behind a desk. Administrative duty. No more detective work. They might as well have killed me.”

Mason got the message. Densmore didn't need to add that it was his fault.

“You think I blame you,” Densmore said, as if reading his mind. “Well, not this time. We did some incredible work.” He paused. “I
know I've been more worried about saving my own skin and my career. . . .” He moved closer to Mason's head. “That's why I'm doing this.” He fished something out of his pocket, then looked back at the MP guard.

The guard had his face buried in a magazine. Mason felt the vibration of metal against metal, then the distinctive click of the handcuffs being unlocked. Mason kept still so the handcuffs wouldn't slip off his wrists.

“I left a paper sack on a bench in the hallway. There are some clothes inside. A set of civvies and a uniform, both out of your duffel bag. I couldn't get my hands on a coat, but I'm sure you can manage.”

Mason glanced around the room as much as the loose handcuffs would allow.

“There's some windows to your left,” Densmore said, “but I wouldn't try jumping. We're three floors up.” He nodded toward the MP. “I'll let him take a bathroom break. He was at the forester's house and saw it all. He doesn't like you being prosecuted. He'll look the other way if I ask him to.” He held out his hand. “Good luck. Don't take this the wrong way, but I hope I never see you again.”

Mason shook his hand. “Take it easy, Patrick. And thanks.”

“Get those bastards,” Densmore said. He stepped into the hallway and spoke to the MP. The MP nodded and left without a glance Mason's way. Densmore hovered by the door for a few seconds as he watched the guard. He lifted his hat then resettled it on his head before slowly walking away in the opposite direction.

Mason slid off the handcuffs and pulled out the IV. His head spun when he stood up from the bed. Shooting pains in his thigh paralyzed him for a moment. He took a deep breath and forced the pain away. Miraculously, the grumpy nurse didn't see him limp out. He retrieved the sack that Densmore had left for him and slipped into the emergency exit staircase.

Mason had a tough time pulling on the pants and shoes, but he
managed, and five minutes later he exited the hospital. Two hotels were just blocks away; plenty of parked cars to choose from. The biting cold relieved some of the pain in his head and thigh. His head spun from the loss of blood, but the adrenaline would keep him going. . . . For a while.

That, and mule-headed resolve.

M
ason leaned against a wall in the foyer of Winstone's villa. To his left, the living room, and to his right, the dining room, then the library. Ahead lay the staircase and the hall leading to the parlor, kitchen, and garage. The upper floor accommodated five bedrooms and three baths. Then the sprawling basement. A brutal, weeks-long search even in healthy conditions.

Where to start? Documents could be folded or rolled and inserted anywhere. Wherever Mason chose, he had to do it fast. The guard or the nurse had surely reported his absence by now, and it was only a matter of time before a squad of MPs came here to look for him.

He had retrieved the tools from the library where Densmore and his MP team had left them, and a flashlight from the kitchen. The effort of finding a car he could steal in the bitter cold, then driving with his wounded leg, had taken its toll. And now here he was, barely able to stand upright, let alone think clearly, running through all of Winstone's villa renovations again in his head. He reviewed the areas already searched, by himself and Abrams, then by Densmore and the team of MPs. The most logical and obvious places had been eliminated. That left the unlikely and the illogical, of which there were countless.

This is going to be impossible.

Blood had seeped from the freshly sutured wound. Both legs trembled. His whole body shivered. The cold was getting to him. It was cold enough in the villa to condense his breath. Cold and dark as a mausoleum . . .

The cold!
Why hadn't he thought of it before? Winstone had relied on only the fireplaces for heat. He had refused to use the furnace. There wasn't even any coal in the storage bin.

Mason hobbled down to the basement and into the furnace room. Volker's mattress still lay on the floor, along with bloodstains from Weissenegger's beatings. Ironic to think that the documents could have been here, yards from Volker, this whole time.

He went up to the furnace and opened the feed door. The rusty hinges squealed in protest. He scanned the inside with the flashlight. Nothing but old ashes of burned coal heaped on the bottom. He shoved in his arm and searched the ashes, then felt up and around the furnace fire chamber.

Nothing. Reaching all the way in, his fingers brushed the far chamber wall. He cursed in frustration, making his headache rage. He felt weak from the effort, and the blood from his wound had soaked through his pants leg and created a stain as broad as his outstretched hand. He took a deep breath and stepped back, scanning the room for signs of fresh concrete or brick around the furnace. Every spot of wall and floor appeared untouched for years.

Out of having nothing else to inspect, he looked up to the ceiling. The dozen or more hot air ducts stretched in all directions and were tucked tight to the ceiling. Using the flashlight beam, he checked each one. The accumulated soot and dust appeared undisturbed. He traced each duct to its eventual destination, noting whether it was a specific room or area of the house. At the back of the furnace rose the main exhaust outlet, which climbed up through the ground-level flooring and vented into the library chimney.

The library, the room Winstone had renovated extensively, including the floor joists and supporting wall.

The major renovation work would have provided an ideal opportunity to create a well-concealed hiding place. That prompted him to step back and peer over the ventilation duct, where he caught sight of a short duct leading directly to the foundation wall. There was no reason to have a heating duct there. It served no purpose, as that level of the foundation wall was still below ground level.

After a frantic search, Mason found a ladder under the basement stairs. It took all his strength and willpower to bring the ladder to the furnace wall and climb the ladder's steps. His leg threatened to seize. His body felt both hot and icy cold. When he finally reached the duct, he felt a surge of excitement: Upon the top of the duct were faint handprints in the thin layer of dust. With a tenuous balance on the ladder, he used both hands to tug on the duct. The putty fixing the duct to the wall held firm. Mason took a deep breath and yanked several times. Finally the duct came loose and fell to the floor.

Victory and defeat. He'd found the hiding place, but inside was a small, brand-new safe embedded in the fresh concrete of the foundation wall.

He laid his head against the wall to recover his strength. His legs trembled. He found it harder to think straight. He closed his eyes, but that brought on a wave of vertigo. He must have had a few brain cells still firing, because the image of Hilda's note, Yaakov's tattoo, came to his mind: A47235.

He tried that as the combination, making the
A
into a 1: 14-72-35. The safe's lever refused to budge. He tried varying the combination, leaving off the
A
, or using a different number for it. Nothing worked.

He stopped. It didn't make sense. Why use Yaakov's tattoo number? Anyone who happened to make the connection would have assumed the same as Mason.

He quickly exchanged the letters in Yaakov's name for numbers:
25-1-1-11-15-22. Too many numbers. He tried putting the two 1s together as 11. Still nothing. His frustration grew, and threatened to cloud what reasoning power he had left. He took deep breaths and tried to concentrate.

Perhaps it was a combination of the tattoo number and the numbers represented in Yaakov's name to get the three-number combination. But how many possible combinations could that yield? How long before his mind shut down completely? Assuming
A
equaled 1, he began to add sequentially the tattoo numbers, then Yaakov's name. Each successive attempt yielded nothing. He lost track of the ones he'd tried. He repeated himself. It became harder and harder to add simple numbers in his head.

He pounded the wall. “Come on!”

There had to be a methodical approach. With his mind closing down, the only way for him to perform this simple task was to speak out loud and use his fingers. In a final desperate attempt, he added all the tattoo numbers together plus the first letter of Yaakov's name—46. Then the next three letters of his name—13. And finally the last two letters—37. He tried the combination, moving the dial slowly, making sure he counted the correct number of rotations for each: 46-13-37. He slammed down on the latch. The safe opened.

The absolute relief nearly caused him to tumble off the ladder. He laid his head against the wall to catch his breath, then he removed a series of folders bundled together and a cloth sack from the safe. He tucked everything under his arm and slowly descended the ladder. The relief had also brought on absolute exhaustion, which caused his sight to fade as if a heavy shadow enclosed him in darkness. . . .

You've got to get out of here, Mason.

Now that he had the prize, he didn't know if he could stand the utter frustration if the MPs came calling and clapped him in irons. No telling what would happen to the documents if they were taken back to headquarters. He had to put one foot in front of the other,
climb the stairs, and go out into the cold—assuming he could even drive.

Someplace safe. Someplace where he could have time to read the documents and recuperate some of his strength.

*   *   *

M
ason sat at the kitchen table. He had a blanket draped over his shoulders, and he nursed a second cup of coffee. One of the twelve file folders lay before him.

Laura came up to the table and slid a plate with a sandwich and potato chips in front of him. Mason started to open the folder, but Laura said, “Eat first. You need to get your strength up.”

Mason let the folder cover drop closed and picked up the sandwich.

Two of the younger children in Yaakov's extended family ran into the kitchen, laughing and screaming as they played tag. Berko came out from the back of the house and scolded them and told them to go back to the bedroom. He smiled and nodded at Mason in a silent thank-you and another good-bye, then he left Mason and Laura.

It wasn't until Mason had reached Laura's house and recovered his senses that he'd finally looked into the cloth sack from Winstone's hidden safe. Inside was a bundled stack of bills amounting to fifty-five thousand dollars. A fortune by Mason's standards, but that amount was only a fraction of the profits from Winstone's schemes. From a meticulous ledger Winstone had included with the files, Mason learned that Winstone had managed to smuggle over a million dollars of ill-gotten gains into a bank in Switzerland. The fifty-five grand was his and Hilda's traveling money, probably a majority of it meant for bribes.

Mason had decided to give Berko fifty thousand of it to allow him and his family to pay—bribe—their way to Palestine. He'd offered the remaining portion to Laura for her troubles, but she'd declined, saying that Mason would most definitely need the five thousand for what he had planned.

Laura watched as he ate. “You're like a man born in the wrong century.”

“How do you mean?”

“You should be wearing a suit of armor and declaring the Crusades an honorable cause. You'd have believed it was all about faith and divine grace, and not a land grab for power.”

“I can't tell if that was an insult or a compliment.”

“I think you know.”

Mason looked at her while he bit into the sandwich. He didn't
know
, but figured it was a little bit of both. They sat in silence, him eating and her preparing her camera.

Laura finally said, “I've known you for a little over six months, and in that time you've been to the hospital three times.”

“I'm going to have to learn to be quicker on my feet.”

“You use your head once in a while, and you might cut your trips to the hospital in half.”

“Then I wouldn't have an excuse to see you.”

Laura shook her head, even as she smiled. “What am I going to do with you?”

“Ditch Ricky and fall back in love with me.”

“It's Richard.”

“Where
is
Richard, by the way?”

“He's in Nuremberg for the Nazi trials. Göring is on the stand. Richard has an interview with Göring; he's doing a whole piece on him, from his rise to power, up to the trial.”

“Everyone wants to do stories about the Nazis.”

“Evil gets bigger headlines.”

“Why aren't you with him?”

“My work.” Laura leaned on her elbows. “Maybe I should do a piece about your rise and fall.”

“I'll rise and fall, and rise and fall again. But if some of the army brass get their way, I'll stand trial for something I didn't do.”

Laura laid one of the files in front of her. “Then let's see what we can find to make sure that doesn't happen.”

Mason pushed the empty plate aside. He opened a folder and began to read. Laura would finish reading a page, then photograph it and make notes.

Some of the files were divided by individuals: Herr Giessen, Bachmann, Plöbsch, Eddie Kantos, Volker as Herr Z, Schaeffer and Kessel, Udahl a.k.a. Abbott. Others were collections of wiretap transcripts, photographs, sighted meetings, or informant testimony—mainly Yaakov and Hilda Schmidt. Taken in chronological order, the files unfolded a lucid account of not only the growing power and complexity of Udahl and Schaeffer's organization, not only the rise and fall of Herr Giessen and Bachmann, but also Winstone's journey from determined yet naive investigator to an operative falling to seduction and corruption. Winstone's own rise and fall.

That revelation did not come in Winstone's own words, but Mason could read between the lines: Winstone had spent six months on the investigation, the progress slow at first, then the details poured in, with his best investigative work coming from his own involvement in intrigue.

Winstone began to profit from the very web of crime that he was investigating—until near the end. That was when he uncovered the bigger players. The ones with enormous power. By then it had gotten out of hand, and he'd decided to flee with Hilda to Switzerland. But Mason doubted he would have found a truly safe haven. The men he'd uncovered had a very long reach.

Perhaps now that Mason knew more than Winstone, he, too, would no longer find sanctuary. He would always be looking over his shoulder, spending all his life on the run. There was a momentary sense of loneliness and sadness at that notion. Then he brushed those thoughts to the side.

Much of what the documents revealed Mason had discovered in
the last number of days. Eddie Kantos appeared to be the pivot around which all revolved: his relation with Giessen and Bachmann, his meeting Schaeffer and Udahl, using Willy Laufs as his go-between with the Italian crime families. He coordinated the smuggling routes using a contingent of Polish ex-POWs and Polish army brass and regulars, taking truckloads of luxury goods Germans had traded on the black market for food and medicine: gold watches, furs, diamonds, works of art, and the morphine and cocaine left by the collapsing German army. In exchange, petrol, heroin, household goods, and wine came up from Italy. Kantos had provided both groups' leaders rich contacts with German royalty and industrialists, and subsequently he'd provided, along with Otto, the same service to Winstone.

The documents told of Schaeffer and Udahl building their network through those alliances, and a loose partnership with Giessen and Bachmann. How they had helped Volker and ex-SS members slip Nazi war criminals out of Germany and into Italy and beyond, thereby accumulating favors from the German network, including informants and the locations of huge stashes of antibiotics, narcotics, hospital supplies, precious metals, SS coffers of diamonds and gold, and uranium left by the retreating German army. All the detritus of the crumbling Nazi war machine.

Winstone had written pages of reports about his investigation being stifled every step of the way. The same obstructions Mason had experienced: blown wiretaps, records missing or diverted, witnesses disappearing or reversing testimony. He recounted waking up one night and finding someone in his room and rifling through his desk. How he had hired Polish DPs as house guards, but that even they seemed to be working for Schaeffer.