Marende (local name), Brettljause (German)
A snack (often served in the afternoon), more Austrian than Italian, consisting of speck, sausages, local cheeses and pickled cucumbers, served on a wooden board with farmers’ bread – Vorschlag – a round, flat domed loaf with a fine texture, thick crust and slightly sour taste, and wine.
Dori watched from her balcony in the upper chalet.
In the distance, the cracked town bell was striking four as she tracked Edith walking from the side of the lake up towards the Pensione Sterzberg. Behind her, a jetty jutted out into the water. Dori studied the small boats moored there then swept her glasses along the lake’s edge. She caught stealthy movement under the overhanging branches. She looked away instinctively, as if to stare would draw attention. Edith was taking the flight of steps leading up to the first-storey entrance of the Pensione.
Boxes of geraniums edged each step, the scent strong after the heat of the day. Edith crushed a leaf between her fingers, breathing in the sharp, peppery smell. Double glass doors stood open, the panes pasted with peeling posters advertising ski competitions, local attractions. The pine of the doorframe oozed, adding a resinous, creosote tang to the geraniums’ pungency. A stand of curled postcards stood at the end of the empty reception desk.
‘Ah, Signorina Graham.’ Signore Rossi’s small, sleek head appeared from behind the postcards. He smiled, a flashing of gold. ‘I’m sorry if you are waiting.’ He waved his small hands in apology. ‘Come, Herr Kushner is this way.’
He led her past a small bar, into a cavernous dining room. The pine-panelled walls were heavily varnished and dotted with painted shields: the black, red and gold of the old Empire, dragons, gryphons, lions rampant, representing who-knew-which noble families, expressing a patriotism for a place with no independent existence. Between the heraldic shields the inevitable hunting trophies, stuffed heads and skulls.
They emerged through open doors into the sunlight, blinding after the darkness of the house. Edith put on her sunglasses. Kurt was sitting at a table, drinking wine. He was wearing a high-collared, green loden coat, stags’-horn buttons undone, a natural linen trachten shirt open at the neck, cavalry-twill breeches tucked into high polished boots. He was dressed as though nothing had changed, as if he was still the prosperous Graf, owner of vast estates, out on a hunting trip. Signore Rossi added to the illusion; he could not have been more obsequious. Kurt hardly acknowledged his presence.
‘Edith!’ Kurt stood as she approached the table. ‘Come. Sit. Wine?’ He was pouring a glass, whether she wanted it or not. ‘Lagrein. It is local.’ He replenished his own glass and held it to his nose. ‘Not bad, actually. Prosit!’
Edith lifted the heavy roemer glass. The dark wine was warm and syrupy from standing in the sun. Edith caught a whiff of rancid salumi. On the table between them, Rossi’s Marende: drying bread, curling cheese and thin slivers of sweating speck. Cut too early and left too long.
‘Marende. Will you join me?’ Kurt opened a white napkin with a flourish. ‘I’m famished.’
Edith shook her head.
‘Such a treat after Germany. There is so much food here. I can’t get over it.’
Kurt made a show of selecting slices from the plate but he merely nibbled at what he had taken, despite his protestations of hunger.
Edith put her goblet down on the table. ‘What am I doing here, Kurt?’
‘Cannot old friends—’
‘We’re not friends, are we? Not anymore.’
He pushed the food aside and her took her hand. The ring he wore glowed blood red in the sunlight. Edith tensed at his touch.
‘Time is short and I want you to understand,’ he leaned forward. Edith caught the wine on his breath, the slightly rank scent of food, mixed with the vetiver of his cologne. ‘First, my work. Whatever you have been told will be lies and propaganda. What I did was important. We learned a great deal. Don’t mix me up with the fanatics but since the matériel was available, it was sensible to use it.’ He folded his arms. ‘Those dead, or dying, or destined to die could still serve a useful purpose.’
Edith took him to mean the Jews, reduced further to ‘matériel’. She kept her silence. She would let him talk. See how far he would go to justify what he had done, what others had done; how far he’d try to excuse the inexcusable. Let him condemn himself out of his own mouth.
‘Of course, such processes are unpleasant to the medically untrained, just as an autopsy might be, or a dissection.’ He mistook Edith’s look of distaste and disgust for general squeamishness. ‘I would cite the importance of the research carried out by one of my colleagues, Dr Menghele, on the pairs of twins that came into his care.’ Edith stared at the table, unable to look at him. He was retreating into science now, seeking to hide his lack of humanity behind the specious screen of medical detachment. ‘It is necessary work. Important work. We need to know what makes people different. If we can find the inborn causes that create that difference, then we can discover the very keys to life.’
Edith thought of Anna and Seraphina; the Polish girls Kay had cared for and all the myriad, nameless others. Her mouth felt numb and she had to swallow. She was glad she hadn’t touched the food.
‘Is,’ Edith managed to say. ‘Not was?’
‘Oh, the work will go on! Perhaps not in the way it was performed, such … freedom – may not come again, but what we discovered is of great value. Not just what makes persons,’ he paused to find an acceptable term, ‘degenerate and how to mercifully end life but how better to treat disease and to know the effect certain … substances have on the human body.’
‘The better to kill people, you mean?’
‘The better to treat and to save! In order to do that it is important to know how the human body changes when put under,’ he searched again for an acceptable word, ‘stresses.’
‘So, you don’t think that anything you did was wrong?’
‘On the contrary it was, as I said, necessary work.’
‘Even,’ Edith fought hard to keep her voice from shaking, ‘even when it was your own son?’
‘You have no children Edith. You cannot understand what it is like to know that your son will never grow up to be a man, have children of his own.’
‘And Elisabeth?’
‘Oh, she was in full agreement, whatever she might have said to gain your trust and sympathy. It was a mercy, believe me. Wolfgang could never have lived a normal life. We were there together to ease his passing.’
So she had been there. The story she’d told about her visit to the hospital had not been fabricated, rather it had been recreated, reimagined in reversed polarity where evil became good. To be able to do that travelled so far beyond natural human feeling that Edith profoundly wished Elisabeth had lied, had made the whole thing up. In the face of such enormity, there was nothing to say. All words fled away.
‘It is progress.’ Kurt’s continuing justifications filled the silence. ‘To eliminate weakness. To promote strength. For the greater good. Ultimately, it would have led to the improvement of the whole human race. One day the world will understand the wisdom of such actions.’
‘I hear there’s to be a special trial at Nuremberg,’ Edith finally found her voice, clear and strong. ‘Just for the doctors. I hope they hang you all.’
‘A few will be sacrificed,’ he shrugged. ‘For show, that’s all. There is much interest already expressed, in what we can offer to the world. The Russians, the Americans, the British all want what I can tell them. The Americans are, of course, by far the better option. I understand from Agent McHale that I have to thank you for making that possible.’
He smiled. An unrepentant Nazi with no regard for human life. He swept back his thick, blond hair with his right hand, a characteristic movement. He was the kind who had always relied on his good looks, his charm, even though his face had coarsened; his blue eyes had lost their brightness, they were dull and hard, like unpolished lapis. And that scarring on his face. Two deep, parallel grooves gouged deep into the flesh. Put there by a woman’s long, sharp fingernails; a last, defiant wounding, to mar his beauty, mark him for life as a murdering swine.
‘Now, there is no more to say.’ He reached for a cigarette. ‘I don’t like goodbyes, you know that. I just wanted to thank you for bringing my Elisabeth to me, for all you have done for us.’
She stood up and walked to the edge of the balcony. She heard the scrape of von Stavenow’s chair behind her, heard the spin of his lighter, smelt the tang of smoke from his cigarette. The setting sun was catching the snow on the distant mountains, turning them to rose gold and copper. Below the peaks, a jagged line of pines showed, Hooker’s Green against the deepening blue reflected in the steel mirror of the lake. The view was famous, that’s what people came here to see.
It was over. She’d done what Dori had asked of her. What happened now was up to others. She was free.
Germany seemed distant to her. Home, more so, yet she could see them clearly: mother sitting in her armchair, the French windows open to the smell of roses after rain; Louisa in her kitchen, pushing back her heavy hair with her wrist, waiting for the rattle of Ted’s key. She would not be going back, not now, not for a long time, if ever, so this was a farewell of sorts.
Harry was waiting for her. She would be starting a new life. She saw him now, that slight quirking between his brows, there even when he smiled, as if happiness was an accidental surprise. I will be there soon, my love, to smooth that furrowing. I will be there quite soon now.
She looked up to a sharp, mewing cry. A hawk, or could it be an eagle? Turning and turning in a gyre, higher and higher … A sound pulled her back. It came with no warning; no sudden shudder of premonition. A sharp crack, as of a twig breaking. High above, the bird wheeled in its flight, heading towards the mountains with a flick of its powerful wings.
Dori watched from her balcony in the chalet above, the higher elevation and relative position afforded a good view of what might be happening in Pensione Sterzberg. She saw Edith come to the edge of the balcony, saw von Stavenow follow, saw him light a cigarette and felt a flutter of alarm. Edith was very exposed standing there. As, of course, she was … She swept her binoculars across the opposite shore and caught a sudden flash in the trees. Binoculars, maybe, or a rifle sight catching the sun …
She turned to run.
The first shot sent the birds on the lake rising up in a sudden cacophony. The noise grew, echoing away up the narrow valley. Rifle shots. One percussion followed by another and another. Dori felt heat on her cheek, a stinging, warm wetness, heard a whining yip close to her ear. She crouched down as she ran, using the flimsy balustrade as cover. When she looked back, she could no longer see Edith, just von Stavenow racing down towards the jetty. She leaned over the balcony and fired shot after shot. The Berretta was useless at any distance. Nevertheless, she carried on firing until the hammer clicked and clicked and clicked.
Below, an engine caught, stalled, caught again with a deep rumble and sustained roaring. Waves slopped and lapped on the shore. A small boat was pulling away from the jetty and heading for the middle of the lake, turning in a wide arc on its own creamy wake.
Dori ran down the steps from her balcony, crossed to Pensione Sterzberg and raced up the flight on the outside of the chalet. At the top, she grabbed onto the balustrade, sending a geranium flying, petals scattering. Edith lay where she had fallen. Blown back by the force of the shot, surprise still on her face. There could have been no moment of recognition, no time to react. Dori knelt and tried for a pulse, knowing there wouldn’t be one, feeling for it anyway.
Nothing. She was dead.
Dori removed her glasses, one lens shattered, the other darkened with blood. Her eyes were half open, their greeny, grey blue already clouding to a sea-glass dullness. Dori gently closed them, brushing a scarlet petal from her cheek. She touched the waves of golden hair spreading out like a halo, merging with the crimson pool that darkened the wooden floor. There was nothing she could do.
She was aware of people around her. Rossi’s hands paddling the air. Cries of ‘Orrore! Orrore!’; maids, women from the kitchen crossing themselves, hands at their mouths, eyes wide, one girl crying, her face turned into the shoulder of an older woman while Dori crouched over Edith, glaring up at them, as protective as a mother cat.
‘This is a mess.’
Drummond strode through the group. He walked round, head down, inspecting the body.
‘Carabinieri?’
He turned sharply to the people standing on the fringes. Rossi shook his head.
‘Well, don’t. No police,’ he said briskly and took a bundle of lire from his pocket. ‘We’ll take care of this.’
He knelt down next to the body and examined the hole drilled in the temple.
‘Head shot. Neat job.’ He looked at the Berretta still in Dori’s hand.
‘I shot after him but …’ she shook her head quickly.
He looked down at the small gun. ‘Next to useless.’
‘A sniper in the trees over there,’ she shook her head again and gave a shuddering sigh at the futile hopelessness of it. ‘Somewhere. Other side of the lake.’
Drummond’s narrowed eyes scanned the opposite shore. ‘Long gone now. That’s for certain.’
‘Von Stavenow got away in a motorboat. It went up the lake.’
‘We saw. We had to leave the inflatable in case he spotted us. Came in by foot. Another few minutes and we’d have had him.’
Dori bowed her head. ‘I didn’t anticipate—’
Drummond helped Dori to her feet, lifting her gently. She leant against the balcony, her knuckles whitening as she gripped the varnished rail, sticky from the day’s heat.
She hardly registered Drummond’s men, dressed in boots and khakis, moving onto the balcony to stand guard, arms folded.
‘You,’ Drummond turned to the hotel proprietor, indicating the hotel servants still collected together. ‘Get this mob out of here, show’s over, and brandy for the lady. Pronto!’
‘I’m all right.’
She looked out at the water. It had regained its calm, mirror surface. The famous view that people came to see. She couldn’t look at Edith, at the hole in her temple, small and round, bluish at the edges, leaking blood. Dori closed her eyes, tears threatening to spill.
Drummond covered her hand with his own. A surprisingly tender gesture.
‘Don’t break down,’ he whispered. ‘We don’t have time for it now.’ He gently pushed back her hair, turning her face to expose the wound on her cheek. ‘You’re hurt.’
‘It’s nothing.’ She put her hand to her cheek. It came away wet.
She looked at the blood on her hand and turned away. He was right, she mustn’t break down now, but she was close to it, damn close to it, closer than she’d ever been. This was all her fault. Should never have involved Edith in this business. Should have taken better care of her. It should be me lying there. She braced her arms against the balustrade to stop herself shaking. It should be me.
‘No point in taking on,’ Drummond said quietly. ‘Let’s concentrate on the job in hand.’ He looked out at the lake. ‘Where do you think he went? To meet the lady wife?’
‘I suppose so. Merano.’
‘I want to see her room.’ He glanced down at Edith. One of the women had covered her with a sheet. ‘Come with me, Dori. These chaps will look after things here.’
Drummond looked round for the hotel owner who was hovering by the door, eyeing the body with nervous concern, weighing up the consequences and wondering how he was going to remove the stain from the wood of his balcony floor.
‘Show me her room. Now.’
Rossi hesitated then shrugged.
Rossi led the way to the chalet above. Dori looked around the room. All Elisabeth’s belongings had been removed. All that was left was the lingering musk of her Worth Je Reviens perfume. Drummond opened the wardrobe and the drawers. All empty. A leather suitcase stood by the door.
‘This hers?’
The proprietor nodded quickly.
Drummond hauled the case onto the bed. It was locked. He took a knife from his pocket and selected a blade. The locks opened with a pop. He began to rummage through the contents.
‘No, Signore!’ The proprietor ran forward, hands fluttering in objection. ‘Is not your property!’
Drummond hit him hard, an open palm across the side of the face, sending the gold-rimmed glasses flying.
‘Where is she, you little shit?’
‘I don’t know!’
‘I think you do. At least you know where she’s going to. A lady doesn’t leave all this behind. She’ll want it sending on. To where?’ He picked the little man up by his shirt and slammed him against the wall. ‘Where did she say to send it to? Tell me.’
‘I can’t say, please, Signore!’ The words came out in a squeak. His face was oiled with sudden sweat. Dori could smell his fear, sharp and rancid. ‘I have to live here! If I tell you they kill me!’
Drummond hoisted him higher, twisting the collar into a ligature.
‘If you don’t tell me, I’ll let my boys loose on you. They’ll rip you apart and throw the bits into the lake for the fishes. How’d you like that, eh?’ Drummond slammed him harder, the man’s head hitting the wall with a dull cracking sound, dislodging flakes of plaster. ‘Eh?’
The little man went limp. Drummond let him drop and stood over him, legs apart, waiting for him to recover.
‘No, no, please!’ He looked up, pleading as Drummond reached down to haul him up again. ‘No more! I beg!’ He hid his face with his hands and scuttled crablike, trying to escape.
‘You better tell me, then.’ Drummond squatted down to his level.
‘She say send to Roma. Rome!’
‘Where in Rome?’
Drummond reached for his throat. The man cowered back, trying to evade his grip.
‘Vatican. German College.’
Drummond leaned back, as if he was satisfied, allowing the man to scurry out of his grasp. He picked up his glasses and was off down the stairs.
‘Rome! Lying little toad.’ Drummond stood up and wiped his hands on his trousers as though the contact had soiled them. ‘The case says Genova. All carefully labelled. Good mind to let the boys loose on him. Throw what’s left into the drink. But we’ll let it ride for now. Let him tell them what a clever little chap he’s been, throwing us off the scent.’
Adeline and Kay were sitting outside the hotel in that soft golden light peculiar to evenings in Italy. They were smiling, Giorgio about to take a snap of them with Adeline’s camera. Dori walked towards them, eyes cast down to her long shadow. Time divided into before you knew and after. The moment before you could be laughing, talking, just as they were, and then came after when there could be no more jokes, no innocent, idle chatter. Nothing would ever, could ever be the same again.
‘What’s the matter? What’s happened?’ Kay rose from her seat. ‘You’re hurt. Has there been an accident?’
Adeline was on her feet, looking behind them. ‘Where’s Edith?’
Dori shook her head, the tears that she’d been holding back spilling. How many times had she seen smiles and laughter freeze like that? Seen eyes wide in a moment of foolish wonder then the crumpling contraction of grief and despair? Too many times – in London pubs and Paris cafés, forest clearings and lonely airfields. It should be me, she thought, not for the first time, not for the last time. It should be me.
‘It all went tits up,’ Drummond said. ‘Edith was shot. Edith’s dead.’
Only the slight shake in his voice softened the brutality of his words. He would not, could not show more emotion. Feelings always had to wait until ‘afterwards’. It might not be for days, weeks, years but it always came.
‘Where is she?’ Adeline demanded, looking from Dori to Drummond, her voice rising, her face creased with shock and anquish. ‘Where have they taken her? I must go to her. Stay with her. It’s not right that she should be on her own.’
‘To the local doctor’s office, Signora,’ Giorgio supplied gently. ‘That is where they will take her. Angelina will go with you. Make sure everything is done.’
He went inside, turning round the ‘open’ sign on the door to ‘closed’. Angelina came out with him and put an arm round Adeline.
‘Where’s Jack?’ Drummond asked Kay as they watched the two women cross the square.
Kay turned, frowning at the harshness in his voice.
‘He’s just got back. He went straight up to the room.’
‘Dori, come with me.’
Dori followed him into the hotel and up the stairs.
‘Open up, Sergeant.’ Drummond hammered on the locked door. ‘Or I’ll break it down.’
Jack let them in. Towel round his waist, torso still wet from the shower.
‘So? What happened?’ Drummond stood, arms folded, confronting him.
Jack sat down on the bed and covered his face with his hands. ‘I went over the other side of the lake to cover the balcony, like you said. It was rough terrain, lots of trees and rocky outcrops. Took me a while to get into position. Turns out someone else had the same idea. Through the ’scope, I could see Dori watching from the balcony above. Edith and von Stavenow below, sitting, talking. Edith suddenly stands up, comes to the front of the balcony, von Stavenow following. Then bang, bang, bang. Shots from somewhere below me. Von Stavenow jumps over the balaustrade and down onto the grass. I got off a good few and I saw Dori fire. I think one of us winged him. Then he’s in a boat and away. After it dies down, I wait. Chap comes out of a shallow cave just below me, cool as you like. So I bash his brains in, stuff him back and block the entrance.’
‘Any idea who he was? Who he might have been working for?’
‘No identification. No labels in his clothes. Eytie Carcano M19 rifle, French scope, Mauser ammo. Good kit. A professional. Knew what he was doing.’ Jack picked up an empty brass cartridge case and gave it to Drummond. ‘I saw Edith go down,’ he said quietly. ‘Is she …’
Dori inclined her head.
‘Thought so. That’s a shame.’ He gave a heavy sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘That’s a damned shame. She was good, a good woman.’ He bowed his head so they couldn’t see his face. He coughed to clear his throat and wiped his eyes with his fingers. ‘You should’ve given her close cover.’ He looked up at Dori. ‘Got him while you were at it.’
‘I could say the same thing.’
‘Stop this,’ Drummond put up his hands. ‘What’s done is done. That’s not going to help anyone.’