BEFORE STAG COULD reach his apartment in the Sony Center, he was surrounded by five men in suits. One flashed a NATO badge as Duffy stepped forward, quickly escorting him to a black sedan. In no time, he was back in the SCIF room deep inside Teufelsberg.
“The admiral says it’s urgent.” Duffy raised his eyebrows.
Stag settled in.
The admiral and a middle-aged woman in a dark suit came into the room, each looking grim. The woman identified herself as a NEST engineer. NEST was the Nuclear Emergency Support Team run by the US Department of Energy National Nuclear Security Administration, the NNSA. Stag was getting familiar with so many things he had not even known existed.
Aides placed several photographs on the large conference table.
“I need you to look at these, Mr. Maguire,” said the admiral. “Pay particular attention to the nose cone. These are the best our deza team could produce. Is this like what you saw on the mountain?”
Stag studied the photos. Some were grainy and black and white, others were color close-ups. “You’ve known about the bomb this whole time?” he said after finishing his examination.
“What makes you say that?” the admiral commanded.
“Well, obviously this is the bomb I saw. See? Here is the Todesrune.” Stag pointed to it in the photograph.
“These are pure fiction. We took our best artisans and re-created only what you’ve told us.”
“Wow. Then these are not photos of the thing I saw in Königssee? Your team does amazing work.”
“We have no choice if we’re to convince them there really might be two bombs,” Duffy interjected.
The woman in the dark suit said, “If the Katanga deposit was as rich as rumor said it was, it would be as cheap to make two bombs as it would to make one. That is a logic you can use.”
“But where am I to tell them this second bomb is right now?”
“Tell them these photos were taken at an ammo dump during the war. Perhaps the Soviet Union.”
Stag shook his head. “They’ll never believe that. If the Soviets had had this bomb, they’d have had nuclear know-how long before 1949, and they would not have been quiet about it.”
“Tell them these photos were taken contemporary to Heydrich.” Speculate the bomb was sold on the black market mistaken as a conventional weapon. Tell them only you know how to retrieve it.
“Won’t they wonder if another bomb is out there, why it hasn’t been used?”
The woman spoke up. “You give them two possibilities. They either don’t know what they have, or they do know what they have and are holding it. Either way, you can get your hands on it.”
“Or,” Stag quipped cynically, “a third possibility: It was destroyed long ago and people are unwittingly living around a nuclear waste site. And if they believe that scenario, I will be utterly useless to them.” He looked over the pictures again. It wasn’t going to be easy to convince Tarnhelm.
“Gentleman,” Duffy announced. “We’ve got our first bit of news.”
The men looked up.
Duffy held out his phone. The text on the screen said: Bombardier.
Eisschloss was her least favorite place to visit. Not that it wasn’t beautiful, Angelika thought, her eyes taking in the budding trees and greening slopes of mountains around her and the azure blue of Lake Zug just lapping at the stone patio they were now seated on. But it was just a beautiful trap. Every time she was compelled to visit, she wondered if Eisschloss would be her last vision on earth.
Now, the atmosphere at the schloss was as thick as coagulated blood. Her message had been sent to the numbers station. If they got to the airport in time, no one would ever know the world had teetered on the brink. If they didn’t, there was only worse to come. In Washington in particular.
“I need you and Genevieve here with me for the foreseeable future,” Portier said, wrapped in a paisley silk robe, a blanket over his knees. He was looking every bit the invalid he had seemingly become, but she knew it was deceptive. Portier might still be hiding the fact he was dying, but he would be plotting until his last breath.
“Mother! Come here!” Genevieve ran up from the lake, her hands cupped together. “It’s a baby frog!” she said, letting her mother peek at her captive.
Angelika patted the child’s most precious hair that was like Angelika’s murdered father’s. Bitter chocolate. “Make sure you let him go back to his home when you are through looking at him.”
Portier watched as Genevieve went back down to the edge of the lake. He took a moment, then said, “You must stay with me. It’s safe for both of you here. We don’t know what will happen.”
Oh, but you do, she thought. “Of course. We will stay as long as you desire.”
“I would desire more affection. You have always been a cold one.”
Her skin crawling, Angelika placed her hand over his. His trembled coolly. “It’s my nature. Forgive me.”
“When I get over this flu, I shall take you both to the Maldives. We shall swim in the warm, clear water and forget the world exists in its entirety.”
“Heaven,” she said with a smile, but inside, all she could think about was here they were, having tea on the patio, while the world was about to burn in all hell.