The Lisbon Crossing (9 page)

“Oh, yes, Dr. Kleinmann. Sorry. Yes…Well, we’d been keeping a close eye on him for some time. I’ve no doubt he was Abwehr.”

“Abwehr?”

“Military intelligence.”

“The SS?”

“Heavens, no…The SS is Hitler’s private police force, whereas Abwehr is a legitimate intelligence service, an arm of the Wehrmacht. In fact, there’s quite a rivalry between the two agencies.”

“Major Ritter…?”

“Gestapo through and through.”

“Isn’t he investigating Kleinmann’s death?”

“They smell blood. He’d love to be able to report to Berlin that Dr. Kleinmann was up to no good.”

“Kleinmann was Abwehr?”

“Correct. We’re almost certain that he was running the Lisbon unit. It’s quite an important posting at the moment, probably the most important in Europe.”

“Did you have him killed?”

Stropford chuckled. “No, I’m sorry to say that as much as I would have liked to, I didn’t. You see, both sides operate under a sort of unspoken cease-fire here in Lisbon. Salazar is quite adamant about that.”

“Somebody wasn’t honoring the truce.”

“Indeed.”

“Aren’t you curious who?”

“It’s of some interest…”

“But you’re more interested in the duke’s friends…”

Stropford gave me a scolding look. “I have many interests at the moment, Mr. Teller.”

“I understand,” I said. “Sorry…Any idea who did kill Kleinmann? Or what he was doing with Eddie Grimes in the first place?”

“Afraid not, on either score.”

“Well, it’s interesting, him being a spy, but I’m not sure how it helps me.”

“There’s more,” Stropford said.

“Like…?”

“You’ve expressed an interest in one Eva Lange, I believe?”

“That’s right.”

“A personal friend of Miss Sterne?”

“They grew up together,” I explained.

“In Berlin…”

“Right.”

“Yes, well,” he said, shifting his weight as he considered how to put it. “Miss Lange was in touch with Dr. Kleinmann.”

“In touch?”

“She was observed in his company, several times. Their relationship was of a…well, of a personal nature.” He emphasized the word, making sure the meaning didn’t escape me.

“She was sleeping with him?”

“We’re quite certain of it. And while we can’t be as sure about this, the inevitable conclusion, of course, is that she was in Dr. Kleinmann’s service…Er, on a professional basis as well as a personal one.”

“You think she was a spy?”

“That would appear to be the case.”

“A German spy?”

“Does it surprise you?”

“I guess it does,” I said. “Although I’m not sure why. I don’t know much about her, outside of what Lili’s told me.”

“She spent some portion of her life in England?”

“Her mother was English,” I confirmed. “Her father brought her over to Germany after her mother died.”

“That would certainly fit the profile.”

“Profile?”

“Abwehr has been attempting to send recruits into London for some time, but on a significantly increased basis since the fall of France. Many come through Portugal under the pretense of being refugees. We’ve intercepted a number of them, both men and women of various nationalities, but the one thing they have in common, unsurprisingly, is a complete command of the English language. If they were to get through, they would be able to quickly melt away into the British landscape.”

“You think Eva killed Kleinmann?”

“Can’t say, I’m afraid. Though if she was working for him, I’m not sure what the motive would be.”

“Maybe she had a change of heart.”

“Anything’s possible,” he said. “Do you intend to inform Miss Sterne?”

“I guess I’ll have to. I’m not sure how she’ll take it.”

“Mmm,” he grunted, buttering it with significance.

“What?”

“Well, perhaps it’s not my place to say it, but…well, can you be certain of Miss Sterne’s loyalties?”

“Lili?!” I almost choked.

“She is, after all, of German origin.”

“German, yes, but—”

“A number of American citizens of German heritage have returned to the fatherland since the war began. Many are being used as agents.”

“Forget it,” I said. “Lili’s a lot of things, but she’s not a Nazi sympathizer.”

“I’m sure you’re right. Still, that’s how we’re forced to think these days.” He opened the door to go but stopped short.

“One other thing…”

“Yeah?”

“It may be of interest to you that Dr. Kleinmann and Mr. Grimes were shot with two different weapons…It follows, of course, that they were likely murdered by two separate individuals.”

The phone rang.

“Yeah?”

“La senhora, she has just gone to her suite,” the voice informed me.

“Thanks,” I said, and hung up. I owed Javier the desk clerk ten bucks.

I flicked the bedside lamp on and looked at my watch. Almost midnight. After Stropford left, I’d retreated into the bedroom to lie down and must’ve drifted off while mulling over his revelation. There was no reason to doubt it, but I wished there was. It would’ve been easier to tell Lili that Eva was dead than to tell her she was a Nazi spy. I thought about letting it go until morning, but I knew that would be a mistake. If she still wanted to locate her friend after hearing what I had to say, I’d have to get moving. Ritter would have Catela’s Guarda Nationale looking under every rock in Lisbon until they found her. I couldn’t be hanging around until noon while Lili got her beauty sleep.

I scraped myself off the bed, went into the living room, found my shoes, and slipped into my jacket. Taking the stairs up the two flights, I wondered what kind of mood I’d find her in.

She appeared quickly after I rang the doorbell, wearing her bathrobe, but still in makeup.

“Hello, darling!” she practically sang. “Come inside!” I stepped in. Feeling a bit on edge and not quite awake; it probably showed. “You look like you need a nightcap,” she said.

“Sure,” I said. “I’m not interrupting anything, am I?”

“What would you be interrupting, darling? Do you think the King of England is hiding under my bed?”

“Former king,” I corrected her as she handed me a large snifter of brandy.

“That’s right,” she said, raising her glass. “To former kings and aging movie stars!”

“You had a good night, then.”

She made a face. “You were supposed to say something banal like I don’t look a day over twenty-nine.”

“You don’t look a day over twenty-nine.”

“Thanks so much, darling.” She lifted the crystal to her lips, but kept her eyes locked on me. “You know something about Eva, don’t you?”

“Yes…”

“Is she dead?” Lili held her breath.

“No. At least, not as far as I know.”

“Then you haven’t found her?”

“No…”

“What then?…Come on, darling. If she isn’t dead and you haven’t found her, what could it be?”

“You won’t like it.”

“For God’s sake, Jack…”

“…It, ah…It looks like she’s been working for the Germans. As some kind of spy.”

A curious look came over Lili’s face, and I wasn’t sure what would happen next. After a long moment, she forced a snicker, turned her back to me, and crossed the room. She swung around and faced me again from a distance, leaning precariously against the drinks cabinet.

“You can’t be serious…” She laughed nervously. “If it’s a joke, it’s not at all funny.”

“It’s not a joke.”

“Then what are you talking about?”

“She was seen by the Brits.”

“Seen doing what?”

“With the head of German intelligence—”

“Nonsense!” she scoffed.

“They’re pretty sure.”

“Pretty sure?! It’s quite an accusation to make if you’re only pretty sure!”

“I’m telling you what they told me.”

“That they saw her with someone?”

“With Kleinmann.”

“Who?!”

“The guy they found in the trunk of Eddie Grimes’s car. He was head of German intelligence in Lisbon.”

“It’s absurd!” she snapped. “They saw her with a man and suddenly she’s a Nazi spy?!”

“They saw her more than once.”

Who’s saying this?!”

“Somebody who has no reason to lie.”

“Everyone has a reason to lie, darling.” She started pacing back and forth on the far side of the room, like a caged panther.

“Maybe she killed him,” I said, trying to look on the bright side.

“I hope she did!” Lili’s eyes flashed.

“Sure, why not?” I continued, trying to be helpful. “They could’ve had a falling out, a quarrel…”

She stopped pacing and threw me a look.

“What does that mean?”

“Nothing…” I tried to backtrack. “It’s not important.”

“But not nothing…”

“It’s just that…well…” I wished I’d kept my mouth shut, but it was too late now. “Eva was sleeping with this guy. With Kleinmann.”

Lili just stood there, eyes fixed on me. There was a very odd expression on her face and I felt I’d better say something.

“So maybe it didn’t have anything to do with him being a Nazi. Maybe it was just good old-fashioned sex…”

In one swift, spontaneous move, Lili exploded across the room and threw her brandy hard in my face. I stood there, frozen in shock, taking in the look of utter contempt that was on her face.

“You’re talking about someone who—” She clammed up.

“Look, Lili, I—”

“Get out!” she said in a voice that sent a shiver up my spine.
“GET THE HELL OUT!”

T
here was no point in trying to sleep, even if I’d wanted to. After rinsing my face and taking a few laps around the rug, I decided to get some air. I walked down to the lobby, slapped Javier’s ten-dollar bill onto the front desk, and headed out into the night, away from the casino lights. I couldn’t really see where I was going, but that didn’t matter. The point was to be moving.

I wondered if the storm would blow over or if that was gonna be it for Lili and me. I’d seen her explode a couple of times before, but I’d never been on the receiving end. It was unsettling, those piercing eyes flashing with honest-to-goodness rage. Maybe it would pass, probably not. From what I’d seen, there was no going back when she got like that. Oh well. I was fond of Lili and I enjoyed the perks, but if that was how she wanted it, I wasn’t gonna cry any tears. I only had to pack my bag.

Eva Lange had some kind of powerful hold on her, that was for sure. Or at least the memory of her did. It was as if she was the last vestige of something Lili didn’t want to lose and saving her was the last hope she had of salvaging it. The past, I guess. Her youth. It was fading fast and now history was steamrolling over the remnants. Everything had changed, she’d said, even the people. But Eva wasn’t just anyone. She was the shy protégée who she had taken under her
wing, the beautiful cellist who’d played like an angel on their last night in Berlin. How could she be recast as a Nazi agent, much less a Nazi’s lover? It just wasn’t in Lili’s script.

That’s the problem with the past. You have this picture of what it was, but, of course, it’s nothing more than an illusion, a series of flickering images playing out on the back of your brain, like a Saturday matinee. Made to order in your very own dream factory, with all the filters and soft focus you care to add, and all the bad takes left on the cutting-room floor. It’s whatever you want it to be. Or need it to be. Comedy, romance, adventure, tragedy, it’s all rolled up in a neat little package that you can play whenever the sharp edges of the day get too pressured or frightening or downright boring. The problem is that it’s all light and shadow, with no substance. Expose it to the outside world and it disappears, washed out by the harsh reality of the midday sun. Lili existed in the moving pictures, and when they started to fail her she found refuge in the past. If the past failed her…

I felt myself slowing down. I must’ve been cruising at a hefty clip because when I turned around the lights of the casino and the hotel looked a mile away. I stood there in the dark looking back at them. I had to laugh. I could still smell the forty-year-old cognac I’d taken up the nose. Only Lili would come up with that. It was like a scene out of one of her films.

Damn!

I shook my head and started back toward the hotel. There was no walking away, of course, even if I’d wanted to, which I didn’t, not really. The thing was under my skin now and I guess the real truth was that I cared more about Lili than I’d realized. Anyway, I’d have to be a real jerk to leave the lady in the lurch over a spilt drink.

A set of headlights appeared in the distance, puncturing the darkness of the empty highway. Nothing sinister about that, I thought, but still—something didn’t feel right. The road was wide open, yet the car was crawling along at ten, maybe twenty miles an hour. A bit late to be taking in the scenery. I moved onto the left shoulder and stood there, watching the vehicle approach.

The driver spotted me at thirty yards. He flicked on his brights, gunned the engine, and veered sharply to the right, burning rubber as he cut across the asphalt, coming straight at me. It was too late to get out of the way, so I sprinted toward the oncoming car. Vaulting up and over the hood, I rolled onto my shoulder and came up against the windshield, which cracked under my weight. The momentum carried me over the top, across the trunk, and down hard onto the pavement. I rolled into a ditch, and lay there, face down, head spinning and heart pounding.

The car pulled onto the verge about twenty yards along, and sat there, idling. I tensed up, wondering if I could move if I had to. I was about to try when the car suddenly spun out across the gravel, found third gear, and accelerated up the road. Its red taillights quickly receded into the distance, then vanished into the night.

I stood up, brushed myself off, and checked for damage. My right shoulder was pretty sore, but it was functioning. Other than that, and a few scratches, I was in good shape for a guy who just went head-to-head with a speeding Buick.

When I got back to the Palacio, I had Javier phone Alberto, in spite of the hour. I was in the mood to get to the bottom of this.

T
he Alfama was spooky at this hour, the narrow streets still and silent and full of shadows. My steps bounced off the empty cobblestones and echoed into the distance, where a dog barked at the unwelcome trespass.

I’d left Alberto in the car while I walked the hundred paces up the hill to find the crumbling edifice that Popov called home. Harry Thompson had said he moved around a lot, like a rat, and from the look of things he lived like one, too. The place needed a wrecking ball.

I took the scrap of paper out of my pocket, turned it toward the light and examined it again:

R
UA DAS
T
AIPAS, N.
35

TOP FLOOR

This was it, all right. I stepped back and checked the uppermost floor. Dark, like the three levels below it. I wondered if coming down here in the middle of the night had been such a good idea after all, but it was too late to worry about that now.

The entranceway was a few steps below street level, an old door decorated with a hundred years of peeling, faded paint. It appeared to be out of use until I got closer and saw it had been padlocked from the outside. A new fitting, recently installed. Apparently my rat was in residence but was out on the scrounge at the moment. I’d come this far, I might as well wait, I thought. If Popov didn’t show in a couple of hours, I’d go to Plan B. In the meantime, I’d try to figure out what the hell Plan B was.

Alberto came to life with a start when I opened the door and slid into the backseat.

“
Sim,
senhor…?” he grunted.

““Go back to sleep,” I said, and he happily complied, pulling his cap down over his eyes and falling into a noisy snooze almost immediately.

The stiffness in my shoulder was setting in. I didn’t doubt that the asshole in the Buick was the same asshole who’d tried to break into my room the night before, and it was pretty clear now what he had in mind. He was almost certainly a hired hand, but whose? My first thought was Ritter. If Eva was really a German agent, like Stropford said, then maybe he…

Ridiculous. Even if the major wanted to get rid of me, the Gestapo didn’t hire guys to run you down in the middle of the night. They weren’t that subtle. It was possible, of course, that Eva herself wanted to bump me off, but that didn’t make much sense, either. She might not want to be found, but I wasn’t the only person in Lisbon looking for her, and I certainly wasn’t the one she needed to worry about.

I was tired and out of ideas. Guessing was a waste of time, anyway. There was nothing to go on. I settled back into the seat and began my vigil. I’d find out soon enough who had it in for me. Assuming, of course, that I didn’t turn up dead first.

I
t was starting to look like dawn when I spotted Popov rounding the corner. Alberto peeked out from under his cap, but he didn’t seem bothered when I stepped onto the sidewalk. He grunted softly and turned over.

The Slav was walking quickly, head down, hands stuffed into the pockets of a dark raincoat, even though there hadn’t been the slightest hint of precipitation since I’d arrived in Lisbon. Aside from an Arab-looking man who was opening the metal shutters on his shop while his wife washed and swept the pavement, we were the only two on the street. I kept a reasonable distance up the hill, even though Popov didn’t seem to be aware of anything but his feet. He was furtively removing the padlock from his door when I caught up with him.

“Remember me?” I said.

“Sure, sure,” he said. “Of course I remember. Jack Teller. How you’ve found this place?”

“Tough to keep anything a secret around here,” I said. “Shall we go up?” I had my fist jammed into my jacket pocket so he couldn’t be sure if I was asking or telling. It wasn’t lost on him.

“Why not?” Popov tried a smile and failed. He looked terrible. White as a sheet and wrung out, he was suffering from some kind of skin rash, especially around the eyes, making them red and puffy. Pulling the door open, he led me into a pitch-black hallway that smelled of damp plaster and, for some reason, onions. I held the door open as he struck a match against the wall and used it to light an oil lamp that was hanging on a rusty nail. He pointed me toward a dark stairwell.

“After you,” I insisted.

The steps moaned and creaked under our weight and the wooden banister was hanging by a thread, but we made it to the top landing. Popov removed another padlock and pushed the door open. It was too dark to see much of anything, so I waited by the door while he crossed the room and opened the rear-window shutters, allowing the soft early-morning light to filter in.