The Cathar Secret: A Lang Reilly Thriller (30 page)

     The waiter returned with an older man, one Lang guessed to be the proprietor.

     "Englis'? I speak a little," the new arrival said with a heavy accent. "You 'Merican, know persons in Chicago? I have daughter in Chicago."

     "I'm afraid I'm from Atlanta."

     The man made no effort to hide his disappointment as he bent over Lang's shoulder and translated several items. Lang had
barszcz czerwony
, beet root soup, followed by
kabanos
sausages with potatoes, all washed down with a beer he could have pronounced no better than his soup or entree. The pair at the table by the door were still occupied with their stew when Lang left.

     With the rest of the day on his hands, he wandered upstairs to the painting museum. Nymphs, centaurs, virgins, and other mythical creatures languished in sylvan glens or beside reflecting forest pools. The Poles, or at least those in the nineteenth century, seemed obsessed with sensuality, if not outright sex.

     But then, who wasn't?

     Better these chubby and scantily clad women, Lang thought, than the meaningless daubings of paint splatter, unrecognizable forms, and geometric
patterns of color that passed for art in contemporary society. Better yet, there was no sculpture, modern or otherwise.

Outside, shadows were extending their dark arms eastward. A number of spots were already in darkness, and streetlights were beginning to blink into life. Lang had forgotten how early twilight came to places this far north. Twilight and a cold that made his throat burn with each breath.

     He had exited the museum on the side from which he had a view of his hotel down an intersecting side street. The area he was crossing was open, a place for outdoor cafés and drink stands in warmer weather. He had almost reached the street when a man stepped out of one of the larger pools of darkness. He was one of the men from the café. At the same time, footsteps crunching on the crust of ice covering the snow behind Lang announced the presence of the second.

     A hasty glance toward the street took in a number of people passing by. A few vendors were braving the cold to sell hot chestnuts, sausages, and cheap souvenirs from stands on wheels. It was unlikely these two were going to try anything violent in front of so many potential witnesses.

     Or so Lang hoped.

     But he wasn't going to bet his life on it.

     Pretending to study the architecture of the buildings surrounding the square, he walked with deliberate steps to the street. His followers got no closer but had now positioned themselves so that keeping the present distance from them would require him to enter the street where his hotel was located, a street not nearly as full of people as the square. He was being herded like a straying sheep. Whoever these men were, they knew what they were doing.

     Still feigning unawareness, Lang crossed the street and stopped behind a couple purchasing a bag of chestnuts just roasted on a glowing charcoal brazier. As anticipated, Lang's two shadows followed, drawing closer. The fact that they seemed indifferent to being recognized meant either they meant him no harm or they had no intent of him being in a position to identify them later. Lang was still not willing to gamble on the former.

     The customers in front of Lang received a paper cup of nuts steaming in the cold, paid, and moved on. Lang stepped up to the smoldering grill.
The red glow reflected from the vendor's face like a demon stoking the fires of hell. Warmth from the fire caressed Lang, momentarily displacing the chill. He stuck his hand in a pocket as though searching for change. If his two watchers were going to make a move, the moment one hand was so occupied would be it.

     Sure enough, they moved within arms' reach, one actually taking Lang's free arm in his hand. "Mr. Reilly? I . . ."

     The sentence was never finished.

     Snatching his arm free, Lang sidestepped the brazier, kicking it over. Red hot coals spilled over the feet of the man who had grabbed him.

     The assailant lost all interest in Lang as he danced madly in an effort to snuff out the flames that sprang from his trouser cuffs. The vendor bellowed and raged, apparently blaming the man with his pants on fire for his loss of inventory, and began beating on him with both fists.

     The second man snatched at Lang's sleeve with one hand, reaching into his jacket with the other.

     Lang didn't wait to see what came out of the coat. Taking a step back to distance himself, he rammed the tip of the cane into the man's solar plexus. As the man doubled over with an expulsion of breath, Lang raised his walking stick, bringing it down on the back of the head with a gratifying whack.

     The man went down on knees and hands, shaking his head. With a step, Lang was behind him. A swift kick sent the man sprawling into the jumble of hot chestnuts and even hotter coals. The infuriated vendor started beating on him as well, while the first man screamed in pain as he rolled in the snow to try to extinguish the embers that had been trousers, socks, and shoes.

     By this time, a crowd had formed a semicircle around what was clearly the best entertainment on Market Square tonight.

     Lang pulled the collar of his coat up and his watch cap down over his forehead and then stuck the cane under his arm. "Sorry, folks, but I think the man is closing shop for the night."

     He made his way through the congregation, looked both left and right to assure himself no one was paying him any particular attention, and made his way toward his hotel. The wail of a police siren was getting closer.

Cracow

09:20

The Next Morning

O
N THE WAY OUT OF TOWN
, Lang noted the number of cars with ski racks, no doubt headed to the nearby resort of Zakopane in the Beskid Niski Mountains. Lang's Mercedes was headed the opposite direction, toward a place far less pleasant.

     The road snaked across flat landscape that Lang guessed was farmland. Today, under its mantle of white, it all looked the same. The traffic going in their direction was not those on holiday but mostly trucks of all sizes, from the tiny, locally manufactured vehicles with canvass siding instead of doors, to the behemoth Volvos, Peugeots, and Mercedes.

     Lang was pondering the possible meaning of last evening's fracas on the square. Anyone with access to a computer could have gotten the Gulfstream's flight plan. A man on the inside or a small bribe could have gained access to the police list of passports registered by hotels across town. The
how
was easy. The hard part was the
why.

     What had those men wanted with him? Information or to make sure he didn't have the chance to . . . what? Were Wynn-Three's kidnappers part of some organization broad enough to have international connections? Someone had the wherewithal to use professional help to . . . do what?

     His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a honking horn. A mud-splattered Renault had pulled even with the Mercedes. Four men were in it,
the one in the front passenger seat pointing emphatically at the Mercedes' left front.

     "What does he want?" Lang asked.

     "Is telling us we have flat tire," the driver replied.

     "I don't feel anything like a flat."

     "Is not flat. They want us to stop, pull over. They will then take the car. Is common, er, joke in Poland."

     "Joke?"

     "You know, fool someone to get car."

     "Trick."

     "Is so."

     Lang gave the Renault a look of renewed interest. "Shouldn't you use your cell phone to call the police?"

     The driver shook his head. "Happens so many times, police have no, what do you say? Attention. Police have no attention. Never find men or car. Is best to continue. We not stop, they go away, try joke on other."

     Lang settled back into his seat. Sure enough, the Renault dropped behind them within a kilometer. Looking out of the back window, Lang saw it make a turn to head back in the direction of Cracow.

     When the Mercedes turned off the road and into a parking lot, Lang sat for a moment. In front of him a length of rail track ran along a wooden platform. Beyond it was the infamous arch. It was too far away to read the words, but he knew what it said.
Arbeit Macht Frei
, work makes you free.

     Although the camp had been the size of a medium-sized city, including other camps, most of what remained was flat open space whose very emptiness belied what had happened here. From its inception in 1940, until the camp's capture by the Russians in January 1945, thousands of Jews, homosexuals, prisoners of war, and political dissidents had walked that platform as they were disgorged from cattle cars packed so densely with humanity that those who died did so standing up.

     Just beyond that arch, an SS officer had looked over each arrival, signaling that they should form a line to the right or left. One line led directly to gas chambers disguised as showers, the other to an even crueler fate of starvation, disease, and, in most cases, a prolonged death. Children were separated from their mothers, husbands from wives. The sole criterion for
life or death was whether the prisoner appeared strong enough to provide enough work to be worth the meager rations he would be fed.

     The quiet of the winter day was broken only by the call of distant crows and the sound of the wind across the snow. In this setting, Lang imagined it mourned for those whose graves were unmarked shallow pits of cremated remains.

     "You are going in?" The driver was standing outside, holding the door open.

     Lang climbed out. "You're coming?"

     The driver shook his head as he looked across the sparsely populated parking lot. "No. I leave Mercedes, it be gone."

     Car theft of one form or another must be the Polish national pastime.

     Lang pointed to the nearest car. "No one has stolen that."

     The driver's face twisted into an expression of scorn. "Old Zil, Roosian made. No one want."

     Make that
selective
car theft.

     "Also," the driver added, "I bring many people here. None stay long."

     Lang glanced at the red-roofed tower that loomed beyond the arch, the low buildings that had been dormitories for the damned. He believed it.

     Lang walked toward the main building, his coat collar turned up against the cold. He tried not to think about the footsteps he was following. His cane tapped against the wood but he was too occupied to hear. Inside, a smattering of tourists clustered around a series of exhibits annotated in multiple languages. Iron stoves glowed, creating islands of warmth in a sea of frigid air. Lang wondered if the lack of central heat was intended to stir the visitor's empathy with those who had lived and died here. A woman, her steel-colored hair in a no-nonsense bun, sat in a ticket booth, a heavy wool sweater draped over her shoulders.

     Lang went over and handed her a ten zloty bill. "You have a record room, I believe," he ventured in English.

     She tore a ticket in half, handing him the stub and dropping the remaining part into a metal dish. "Go right, next building."

     The next building looked new. Besides a number of larger-than-life-size photographs, four keyboards sat on pedestals in front of computer screens. It took a few minutes for Lang to enter an English language program, follow instructions, and call up a copy of white-on-black microfiche, something
he had not seen in nearly twenty years. He was looking at writing in the old German cursive that went out of use shortly after World War II.

     Taking out his wallet, he extracted one of his business cards on the back of which was written "14257," the number Wynn-Three had scratched into his arm. Scrolling down a list, he came to:

14257: Mustawitz, Solomon,
Jude.
4 Okt 1942

     Lang guessed the date was the day the unfortunate Mustawitz had arrived here. Unlike the numbers and names above and below, there was no date of death. In a different handwriting, though, was a cryptic notation, "Nach Oberkoenigsburg."

     At least that was what Lang thought it said. He was not sufficiently familiar with the old-style handwriting to be sure.

     He stepped back from the machine, frowning as he copied the notation onto the back of the same card. To Oberkoenigsburg? Was that the Ober-something-or-other on the recording?

     He returned to the machine and switched to an alternate listing. This one was arranged chronologically rather than alphabetically. Several hundred names were under the heading of October 4, 1942, with a number assigned to each. It was possible, then, to locate a prisoner either by date of arrival or number. But not by name.

     Intentional dehumanization or the belief that after someone arrived here, names no longer mattered? Knowing the German penchant for efficiency, Lang would have guessed the latter, but knowing the horror of the Holocaust, Lang believed it was the former.

     He stared at the computer screen for a moment, debating whether he wanted to see the rest of Auschwitz: the crematoria, the gas chambers, a restored dormitory, and the other points of interest promised by the photographs in the entrance hall. No, the sheer length of the list of names was depressing enough, and he would learn nothing more about Mustawitz from a full tour.

     Lang was eager to be gone.

     Perhaps too eager.

     He did not notice the man who fell in behind him as he nodded to the woman in the ticket booth and stepped outside.

     Before he took his second step, his iPhone beeped. The screen told him Sara, his secretary, was calling.

     "Yes, Sara?"

     "Good morning, Lang. At least, I
think
it's morning where you are. How's the weather?"

     Lang was fairly certain she wasn't incurring international roaming charges for a meteorological report, but he said, "I'm freezing my—" He recalled Sara's grandmotherly distaste for vulgarity. "Freezing. What's up?"