The Seventh Secret (2 page)

"But why, for heaven's sake? That's not your sort of thing, Dad, going public prematurely."

"I'll tell you why," Ashcroft had replied patiently. "Now that Dr. Thiel's theory is to be tested, after so many years, it occurred to me that there might be other people like him around. Others who knew Hitler, knew of his last days, who might be encouraged to come forward with new information. Emily, I intend our book to be the last word, the absolute truth. That's why."

"Oh, Dad, I wish you wouldn't do it," she had objected.

"What do you mean?"

"Don't make this public. I'm not sure how to put it to you, except this way. You have a worldwide reputation for pure scholarship. Conservatism in what you write, accuracy in what you write, has been your trademark. Our Hitler book will be the high point of your career. Don't mar it with far-out speculations. I know you've seen this Dr. Thiel and seen or heard some sort of evidence. But it could be fake, could be wrong. It could make you—us—look foolish. Dr. Thiel's conjectures go against every solid piece of existing fact. Hitler did shoot himself and give Eva Braun cyanide in the
Führerbunker
in 1945. Their bodies were observed being carried out to be cremated. They were cremated. Those are the facts."

Ashcroft had hesitated. In their five years of collaboration, he had rarely been at odds with his daughter. But then he had said, "Maybe. Maybe, Emily. Let's be sure. I have to go ahead."

He had gone ahead, swiftly, with determination to lay the last ghost.

For the dig, he had telephoned the Oberstadt Construction Company, one highly recommended to him. Then he had made arrangements for the press conference today—limited to twelve reporters, four from television and radio, the rest from the leading newspapers and magazines.

From his
guten Tag
to his
auf Wiedersehen
, the press conference had gone well. For one hour, he had spoken without interruption from the press and at the end had accepted questions. Everyone had known about his Hitler book. But he was here, he had announced, to make one final investigation of the deaths of Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun. Some "new evidence" required that he dig at the old burial site, and sift through it once more. Despite the numerous questions, he had been guarded about the "new evidence" and how he had obtained his lead. He had not mentioned Dr. Max Thiel's name.

Now it was over, a success, and if there were any more old Nazi-era hands, eyewitnesses to dredge up, this publicity might bring them into the open.

He stood before the restaurant, enjoying the activity on the busy Kurfûrstendamm. It was one of his favorite streets in the whole world. It made Piccadilly and Piccadilly Circus look tacky. It really had the grandeur of the Champs Elysees, only it was livelier. He scanned the wide sidewalks, the numerous glass display cases on the sidewalks, the leafy green trees standing like sentinels on either side of the street.

Briefly, he considered taking a leisurely stroll up toward Breitscheidplatz with its Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, the low octagonal modern house of worship made of glass and steel, incongruously standing next to the unrepaired war-torn clock tower of the original church. Maybe make a visit to the Europa Center, with its three floors of shops, theaters, cafés, and its nineteen stories of offices surmounted by the giant circular emblem advertising Mercedes-Benz. He might linger in the new Romanisches Café, not half so good as the old one he had known in his youth, but still nostalgic and the
Kaffee
was not at all bad.

Or more sensibly he might turn away and take the few steps back to his room at the Kempinski. And have another look at the architectural plan of Hitler's
Führerbunker
before digging for the truth tomorrow.

The truth and Hitler won. No time for relaxation.

Harrison Ashcroft inhaled the warm summer air and started down the Kurfûrstendamm toward the Kempinski Corner Café , a restaurant fronted by an outdoor terrace of fables and chairs. From there he could turn into Fasanenstrasse, the side street that led to the Bristol Kempinski's marble-faced hotel entrance.

Walking briskly, in good health at seventy-two and full of purpose, Harrison Ashcroft headed for the corner. His mind was on Dr. Thiel's unusual evidence, on tomorrow's dig, on Hitler's last day.

He had reached the corner, crossed over to the Kempinski Café, and turned right toward the hotel entrance.

That moment, turning, ready to resume his walk, he heard his name called out loud, or thought he did, and instinctively looked over his shoulder to see who had called him.

But there was nothing to see but the large metal grille of the heavy truck swinging into the side street to block his view. Suddenly, the truck screeched, jumping the curb, rising high, smashing the flower planter on the corner, sending screaming diners into wild retreat.

Then the truck, momentarily out of control, swerved sharply away from the Café and roared along the sidewalk toward him.

The mammoth grille and tires loomed up over him, and the suddenness and fright of it paralyzed him.

The grille of the truck struck him full on, like a thud of Samson's fist, drove him off his feet and into the air, catapulting him into the side street itself.

He landed hard on his face, half-blinded, half-conscious, broken and bleeding. He tried to raise his head from the pavement, to protest the indignity and the obscenity, when he saw the truck's grille and thick tires once more looming directly over him as it careened back into the street.

Feebly, he tried to lift a hand to deflect it, but the tires were upon him, the last thing he would ever see in this life.

The tires rolled over him, squashing and crunching. The blackness was instantaneous. The blackness was forever.

A
fter the burial, sitting desolate in the rear seat of the funeral home's black Daimler, Emily's first instinct and desire as she began the return ride from the cemetery to Oxford was to tell her father about the funeral. She wanted to tell her father about the ceremony, so well attended by prominent people from the faculty, countless friends, all his relatives, several civil servants down from London, and even their favorite clerk from Blackwell's bookstore. She wanted to share this with her father, tell him about it as she always told him everything. But then with a jolt she realized that she couldn't because he wasn't there. He was in the ground. He was gone. It was unbelievable. For the first time in her life, he wasn't there.

She realized then who was there. In the rear seat of the Daimler next to her was Pamela Taylor, their mousy redheaded secretary and typist, dabbing yet another Kleenex to her puffy eyes and swollen nose. On Emily's other side, sitting stiffly, staring ahead at the chauffeur and the countryside, was her Uncle Brian Ashcroft, at sixty-nine her father's younger brother, head of an accounting firm in Birmingham.

They were all tearless now, cried out, emptied of emotion, and saving what was left of themselves for the post-funeral reception at her father's house—her house—several blocks from the university, where her father had lived a lifetime.

The dreadful news had come in early evening by telephone from the police in West Berlin. Miss Emily Ashcroft? There has been a serious accident. Your father, Sir Harrison Ashcroft, knocked down by a truck and killed. A hit-and-run driver. Your father died immediately. Sorry, so very sorry.

There had been more, but Emily had been unable to comprehend it. In complete shock, somehow disbelieving, she had managed to phone their old family physician, irrationally thinking he might save her father. But the physician had understood the reality, had come over at once, had given her a sedative, and had then summoned Pamela, who in turn had summoned some of Dr. Ashcroft's closest faculty friends.

It was a terrible time, the worst of her entire life.

And she could not turn to Jeremy. That had been another death—not comparable to this, her father's death—but in a way a prelude to misery. That one had been almost six months back, after Jeremy Robinson had been part of her life for a year. It had begun when Emily was summoned to London to write and host a new BBC documentary television film on the rise and fall of the Third Reich. The filming of her scenes had progressed smoothly, professionally, and when her job was done she had eagerly accepted Jeremy's invitation to a farewell dinner for two.

Jeremy had attracted her from the start. He was a most handsome and charming middle-aged man. True, a married man. With two young children. Jeremy had wanted an affair, but Emily had hesitated. She had been that route before and knew it was a dead end. When Jeremy assured her that he was in the process of divorcing his wife, and wanted to marry her as soon as it was possible, Emily had dropped her resistance and they had become lovers, although she had chosen not to move in with him.

Their affair at his
pied-à-terre
near the studio had been exciting and promising. From the beginning Emily had told her father about Jeremy. Sir Harrison had approved immediately. His own wish was for his daughter's happiness. Then, six months ago, Jeremy had phoned to cancel their customary weekend together in the country. He had been assigned to produce a dramatization of Moll Flanders for the BBC, starring the rising young actress, Phoebe Ellsmore. A plum of an assignment, but preparatory work would tie him up on the weekend. After that, he had canceled three more weekends and finally ceased phoning altogether. Then had come the shocking announcement in the press: Jeremy Robinson, having obtained his divorce, was about to marry Phoebe Ellsmore.

It had been the crudest sort of personal humiliation. For several days, Emily had not been able to face her father, but when she had he had consoled her and said she was better off knowing now what she might have got into.

Her hurt had remained, yet was gradually diminishing. Realistically she knew her pain had not been caused by the loss of love, but by wounded pride. Soon, looking back, she had been able to see that what she had really wanted was not Jeremy himself but conformity in marriage, a home, children of her own, and, mostly, a change of scenery. The idea of breaking away from lecturing, from confining research and writing, had appealed to her more than Jeremy had. She had been fond of him, of course. But when the air cleared, she had been able to see that an alliance with Jeremy would have been a disaster. After hurt had coagulated into distaste, the memory of him had begun to evaporate into the happier euphoria of good riddance.

Thank God, she'd had a fallback position. With renewed energy, she'd thrown herself into the completion of the Hitler biography. Increasingly, the book and her father had once more become the most important things in her life.

And now this, the most devastating loss of all.

Following the telephone call with news of her father's death, the living had done what must be done for the dead. Emily had wanted to fly to Berlin to be with her father, to accompany him home, but wiser heads had prevailed. Someone had helped her telephone the main police station in Berlin, and when her identity had been made clear, she had been transferred to Chief of Police Wolfgang Schmidt, who had spoken to her in English. The chief's manner had been warm, caring. He had reiterated the facts of the accident, and then tried to go into more detail. The truck out of control, jumping the curb, hitting Dr. Ashcroft on the sidewalk, flinging him into the street, and then by chance running over him. Dr. Ashcroft had been killed on the spot. The drunken driver with the truck—certainly he must have been drunk—had fled. Descriptions of the vehicle were varied because of the confusion, but efforts were being made to locate it. Chief Schmidt had little hope of success. Was deeply grieved by the accident.

After that, her uncle had forced Emily to rest. Pamela had followed through by telephone to make the final arrangements, and the body had been flown back to Oxford from West Berlin.

Now it was over. Her father peacefully asleep in the ground. His great work unfinished. And she, alone.

Dry-eyed, weak, emptied of all energy, she sat rig-idly in the rear of the soundless limousine, trying to look ahead. But she could not see beyond the wake that would take place during the next two hours.

Wanting to blow her nose, she sought her handkerchief inside the purse that lay at her feet. She brought the purse to her lap, unclasped it, and was surprised to find two envelopes lying on top of her billfold and cosmetics bag. Locating the handkerchief beneath, using it, returning it, she became curious about the two envelopes. Then she remembered. Leaving the house for the funeral this morning, she had noticed the day's mail left on her desk by Pamela. Without interest she had riffled through it, and determined that most of the small square envelopes carried condolence notes. Two longer envelopes were also there, each bearing German stamps, one postmarked from East Berlin, the other from West Berlin. Odd. She wondered who could be writing her from Germany. But there had been no time to open the envelopes and read the contents, with Uncle Brian and Pamela already at the door to escort her to the funeral. She had stuffed both envelopes into her purse, and left hastily.