The Amber Room (33 page)

“Speculation,Herr Doktor .”

“You did not blink at my insistence on five million euros.” Grumer’s voice carried a smug tone she was liking less and less.

“Is there more?” she asked.

“If I recall correctly, a pervasive story circulated during the 1960s concerning Josef Loring being a Nazi collaborator. But, after the war, he managed to become well connected with the Czechoslovakian Communists. Quite a trick, actually. His factories and foundries, I assume, were powerful inducements for lasting friendships. The talk, I believe, was that Loring found Hitler’s hiding place for the Amber Room. The locals in this area swore Loring came several times with crews and quietly excavated the mines before the government took control. In one, I would imagine, he found the amber panels and Florentine mosaics. Was it our chamber, Margarethe?”

“Herr Doktor,I neither admit nor deny any of what you are saying, though the history lesson does carry some fascination. What of Wayland McKoy? Is this current venture over?”

“He intends to excavate the other opening, but there will be nothing to find. Something you already know, correct? I would say the dig is over. Now, did you bring the payment we discussed?”

She was tired of Grumer. Loring was right. He was a greedy bastard. Another loose end. One that needed immediate attention.

“I have your money, Herr Grumer.”

She reached into her jacket pocket and wrapped her right hand around the Sauer’s checkered stock, a sound suppressor already screwed to the short barrel. Something suddenly swept past her left shoulder and thudded into Grumer’s chest. The German gasped, heaved back, and then crumpled to the floor. In the dim altar light she immediately noticed the lavender-jade handle with an amethyst set in the pommel.

Christian Knoll leaped from the choir to the nave’s stone floor, a gun in hand. She withdrew her own weapon and dived behind the podium, hoping the walnut was more wood than veneer.

She risked a quick look.

Knoll fired a muffled shot, the bullet ricocheting off the podium centimeters from her face. She reeled back and scrunched tight behind the podium.

“Very inventive in that mine, Suzanne,” Knoll said.

Her heart raced. “Just doing my job, Christian.”

“Why was it necessary to kill Chapaev?”

“Sorry, my friend, can’t go into it.”

“That is a shame. I did hope to learn your motives before killing you.”

“I’m not dead yet.”

She could hear Knoll chuckling. A sick laugh that echoed through the stillness.

“This time I’m armed,” Knoll said. “Herr Loring’s gift to me, in fact. A very accurate weapon.”

The CZ-75B. Fifteen-shot magazine. And Knoll had used only one bullet. Fourteen chances left to kill her. Too damn many.

“No light bars to shoot out here, Suzanne. In fact, there is nowhere to go.”

With a sickening dread, she realized he was right.

Paul had heard only scattered bits of the conversation. Obviously his initial doubts about Grumer had been proved right. TheDoktor was apparently playing both ends against the middle and had just discovered the price that deceit sometimes elicited.

He’d watched in horror as Grumer died and the two combatants squared off, muffled shots popping through the church like pillows fluffing. Rachel stood behind him, staring over his shoulder. They stood rigid, neither moving for fear of revealing their presence. He knew they had to get out of the church, but their exit needed to be absolutely silent. Unlike the two in the nave, they were unarmed.

“That’s Knoll,” Rachel whispered in his ear.

He’d figured that. And the woman was definitely Jo Myers, or Suzanne, as Knoll called her. He’d instantly recognized the voice. No doubt now that she’d killed Chapaev, since she’d not denied the allegation when Knoll asked about it. Rachel pressed tight against him. She was shaking. He reached back and squeezed her leg, pressing her close, trying to calm her down, but his hand shook, too.

Knoll hunched low in the second row of pews. He liked the situation. Though his opponent was unfamiliar with the church’s layout, it was clear Danzer had nowhere to go without him having at least a few seconds to shoot.

“Tell me something, Suzanne, why the mine explosion? We’ve never crossed that line before.”

“What did I do, cramp your style with the Cutler woman? You were probably going to fuck her, then kill her, right?”

“Both thoughts crossed my mind. In fact, I was just getting ready to do the first when you so rudely interrupted.”

“Sorry, Christian. Actually, the Cutler woman should thank me. I saw she survived the explosion. I don’t think she would have been as lucky with your knife. Kind of like Grumer over there, right?”

“As you say, Suzanne, only doing my job.”

“Look, Christian, maybe we don’t have to take this to the extreme. How about a truce? We can go back to your hotel and sweat out our frustrations. How about it?”

Tempting. But this was serious business, and Danzer was only buying time.

“Come on, Christian, I guarantee it’ll be better than what that spoiled bitch Monika puts out. You’ve never complained in the past.”

“Before I consider that, I want some answers.”

“I’ll try.”

“What is so important about that chamber?”

“Can’t talk about that. Rules, you know.”

“The trucks are empty. Nothing there. Why all the interest?”

“Same answer.”

“The records clerk in St. Petersburg is on the payroll, right?”

“Of course.”

“You knew I went to Georgia all along?”

“I thought I did a good job staying out of the way. Obviously not.”

“Were you at Borya’s house?”

“Of course.”

“If I hadn’t twisted that old man’s neck, you would have?”

“You know me too well.”

Paul was pressed to the curtain as he heard Knoll admit to killing Karol Borya. Rachel gasped and stepped back, bumping him forward, which rippled the velvet. He realized the movement and her sound would be more than enough to attract the attention of both combatants. In an instant, he shoved Rachel to the floor, rolling in mid-flight, absorbing most of the impact on his right shoulder.

Knoll heard a gasp and saw the curtain move. He fired three shots into the velvet, chest high.

Suzanne saw the curtain move, but her interest was in getting out of the church. She used the moment of Knoll’s three shots to send one of her own in his direction. The bullet splintered one of the pews. She saw Knoll duck for cover, so she bolted into the shadows of the high altar, leaping forward into a dark archway.

“let’s go,” Paul mouthed. He pulled Rachel to her feet and they raced toward the door. The bullets had pierced the curtain and found stone. He hoped Knoll and the woman would be too preoccupied with each other to bother with them. Or maybe they’d team up against what might be deemed a common enemy. He wasn’t going to stay around and find out which route they took.

They made it to the door.

His shoulder pounded with pain, but adrenaline streaking through his veins worked like anesthetic. Out in the corridor, beyond the church, he said, “We can’t go back into the courtyard—we’ll be sitting ducks.”

He turned toward a stairway leading up.

“Come on,” he said.

Knoll saw Danzer leap into a dark archway, but the pillars, podium, and altar impeded a clear shot, the long shadows no help either. At the moment, though, he was more interested in who was behind the curtain. He’d entered the church that way himself, climbing the wooden stairway at the passage’s end to the choir.

He cautiously approached the curtain and peered behind, gun ready.

Nobody was there.

He heard a door open, then close. He quickly stepped over to Grumer’s body and withdrew the stiletto. He cleaned the blade and slipped the knife up his sleeve.

Then he parted the curtain and followed.

Paul led the way up the staircase, giving the heavily framed ghostly images of kings and emperors that lined the way only a passing glance. Rachel hustled behind him.

“That bastard killed Daddy,” she said.

“I know, Rachel. But right now we’re in sort of a mess.”

He turned on the landing and nearly leaped up the last flight. Another dark corridor waited at the top. He heard a door open behind them. He froze, stopping Rachel, covering her mouth with his hand. Footsteps came from below. Slow. Steady. Their way. He motioned for quiet, and they tiptoed to the left—the only way to go—toward a closed door at the far end.

He tried the latch handle.

It opened.

He inched the door inward and they slipped inside.

Suzanne stood in a dark cubicle behind the high altar, the sweet scent of incense strong from two metal pots against the wall. Colorful priestly vestments hung in two rows on metal racks. She needed to finish what Knoll had started. The son of a bitch had certainly one-upped her. How he found her was of concern. She was careful leaving the hotel, checking her backside repeatedly on the way up to the abbey. No one had followed her, of that she was certain. No. Knoll was in the church, waiting. But how? Grumer? Possibly. It worried her that Knoll somehow knew her business so intimately. She’d wondered why there’d been no hot pursuit from the mine earlier, Knoll’s show of disappointment as she sped away not nearly as satisfying as she’d expected.

She stared back out through the archway.

He was still in the church, and she needed to find him and settle this matter. Loring would want that. No more loose ends. None at all. She peered out and watched as Knoll disappeared through a curtain.

A door opened, then closed.

She heard footsteps climbing stairs.

Sauer in hand, she cautiously headed for the source of the sound.

Knoll heard faint steps above. Whoever it was had gone up the staircase.

He followed, gun ready.

Paul and Rachel stood inside a cavernous space, a freestanding sign proclaiming in GermanMARMOREN KAMMER , the English beneath readingMARBLE HALL . Pilastered marble columns, evenly spaced around the four walls, rose at least forty feet, each one decorated in gold leaf, the surrounding colors a soft peach and light gray. Magnificent frescoes of chariots, lions, and Hercules decorated the ceiling. A three-dimensional architectural painting framed the room, creating an illusion of depth to the walls. Incandescent light splashed across the ceiling. The motif might have been interesting if not for the fact that someone with a gun was probably coming after them.

He led the way as they scampered across checkerboard tile, bisecting a brass floor grille that rushed warm air up into the hall. Another ornate door waited at the opposite end. As far as he could see, it was the only other way out.

The door they entered through suddenly creaked inward.

Instantly, Paul opened the door in front of him and they slipped out onto a rounded terrace. Beyond a thick stone balustrade, blackness extended to the broad tangle of Stod below. The velvet bowl overhead was thick with stars. Behind them, the abbey’s well-lit amber-and-white facade loomed stark against the night. Stone lions and dragons stared down and seemed to keep watch. A chilling breeze swept over them. The ten-person-wide terrace rounded in a horseshoe to another door at the opposite end.

He led Rachel around the loop to the far door.

It was locked.

Back across, the door they’d just come through began to open. He quickly looked around and saw there was nowhere to go. Over the railing was nothing but a sheer drop hundreds of meters down to the river.

Rachel seemed to sense their quandary, too, and she looked at him, fear filling her eyes, surely thinking the same thing he was.

Were they going to die?

Knoll opened the door and saw that it led out to an open terrace. He stood still. Danzer was still lurking somewhere behind him. But maybe she’d fled the abbey. No matter. As soon as he determined who else had been in the church, he’d head straight to her hotel. If he didn’t find her there, he’d find her somewhere else. She would not be disappearing this time.

He peered around the edge of the thick oak door and surveyed the terrace. No one was there. He stepped out and closed the door, then crossed the wide loop. Halfway, he stole a quick glance over the side. Stod blazed to the left, the river ahead, a long drop down. He reached the other door and determined it was locked.

Suddenly, the door from the Marble Hall, at the other end of the loop, swung open and Danzer leaped out into the night. He lunged behind the stone rail and thick spindles.

Two muffled shots streaked his way.

The bullets missed.

He returned fire.

Danzer sent another round his way. Stone splinters from the ricochet momentarily blinded him. He crawled to the door nearest him. The iron lock was furred in rust. He fired two shots into the handle and the latch gave way.

He yanked open the door and quickly crawled inside.

Suzanne decided enough. She saw the door at the other end of the horseshoe open. No one walked inside, so Knoll must have crawled. The confines were tightening, and Knoll was far too dangerous to keep openly pursuing him. She now knew that he was on the abbey’s upper stories, so the smart move was to backtrack and head down to town before he had a chance to find his way out. She needed to get out of Germany, preferably back to Castle Loukov and the safety of Ernst Loring. Her business here was finished. Grumer was dead, and, as with Karol Borya, Knoll had saved her the trouble. The excavation site seemed secure. So what she was now doing seemed foolish.

She turned and raced back through the Marble Hall.

Rachel clung to the cold stone spindle. Paul dangled beside her, desperately gripping his own spindle. It had been her idea to leap over the railing and hang on just as someone exited the far door. Below her boots was a cascading blackness. A strong wind buffeted their bodies. Her grip was weakening by the second.

They’d listened in horror as bullets careened off the terrace and out into the chilly night, hoping that whoever was following them did not glance over the side. Paul had managed a look as the near door’s lock was shot through and someone crawled inside. “Knoll,” he’d mouthed. But for the last minute—silence. Not one sound.