McQuade hurried down the street looking for a taxi, agitated that he had let the cat out of the bag. So, he had a photograph of Heinrich Muller, but where was that going to get him? Was he going to look for him? Right now he was after the man’s loot, not his odious person. He had learnt that Muller did not die in the last days of the war, so what Horst Kohler told his wife was probably correct, and so there might be a lot more loot in that submarine than Muller had swum ashore with – but so what? The loot was either there or it was not, regardless of what he had learned from Wiesenthal, and the price he had paid for the information! The old fox had seen right through him, sniffed out his intentions, tricked him, and cross-examined him into a corner like a lawyer. God, he’d been a fool! He should have thought it all through before rushing to Wiesenthal. The very thing he had been afraid of had happened! He looked back to see if he was being followed. There were people everywhere.
He came to the Danube Canal. Several taxis were approaching. He waved and ran. ‘Bahnhof, bitte.’ He scrambled in and looked through the rear window. There were cars and people everywhere. He slumped back and sighed furiously.
Of course Wiesenthal would have him followed. Wiesenthal knew that he knew more about Muller – and Wiesenthal wanted Muller. Although Wiesenthal wasn’t a treasure-hunter he’d be very interested in whatever was in that submarine: documents, evidence of Muller’s intentions, evidence about other war-criminals. McQuade seethed.
For one thing Wiesenthal could now have him rolled, waylaid by his heavies, his arm twisted until he told them the truth.
That wouldn’t be Wiesenthal’s style? Wiesenthal would be opposed to violence? McQuade snorted. He did not believe for one moment that the man had no ‘muscle’. He was dedicated to catching the most evil bastards the world has ever seen. How could he be squeamish in that job? What are a few twisted arms compared to the suffering of five million Jews? And if he didn’t have heavies, Mossad certainly did, and Mossad certainly wouldn’t be squeamish. And Wiesenthal would certainly call in Mossad to find Heinrich Muller and that submarine. And that meant following James McQuade.
Oh, Jesus, Mossad …
By the time the taxi dropped him at the railway station, however, he had calmed down.
Okay, so he had made a fuck-up. Now, he must assume he was being followed. So he had to shake these people off. That was going to be hard in Vienna, a town he did not know, unable to .speak the language properly.
He had to go to London to use his return air-ticket to South Africa. He retrieved his bag from the locker and went to the public telephones. He consulted the directory, then dialled Thomas Cook’s, and asked about flights to London.
There were several flights, and plenty of seats. He did not make a reservation in case Wiesenthal’s boys had access to airline computers. Use your goddam head for a change, McQuade.
At the airport he waited till the last moment to buy his ticket. In the departure room he went into the toilet and deliberately missed his flight. When he emerged the room was empty. He retraced his steps to the main departure lounge, told the girl at the information desk about his upset stomach and asked to be put on the next flight to London. He was the last person to enter the plane. At London’s Gatwick airport he remained seated until the aircraft was empty. There was nobody lurking in the airport’s corridors on the way to Immigration.
He rented a car, wincing at the cost. He drove out of the airport complex, down the highway, until he came to a roundabout. He noted the cars in his rear-view mirror, and slowly circled the roundabout. Where he came to the third exit, two cars were behind him. He passed the last exit and drove on around. He looked back. Both cars had gone. He sighed in relief, and swung back towards the airport.
He took the first road into countryside, and drove past farms, scattered houses, thickets. A woodsy pub called the Fox and Rabbit, its lights twinkling. It also had a Bed & Breakfast sign. There were a few cars behind him. He turned down a winding secondary road, then stopped. He waited five minutes. Only a motor cycle came and disappeared into the dusk. He drove back to the pub.
He ordered a pint of beer and went to the public telephone. He called British Airways, asked about flights to Johannesburg. Yes, there was plenty of space on all flights. He did not make a reservation.
He returned to the bar and drank his beer.
Unless he was badly mistaken, he was not being followed. So, maybe he’d misjudged Simon Wiesenthal. Maybe he had been dismissed as a total fraud. Maybe he could relax.
Wrong. The old man had got intensely interested. ‘I want him, I want him …’ ‘It is your duty to mankind to tell me …’ The tricks. No, Wiesenthal clearly did not think Heinrich Muller was dead, and Simon Wiesenthal would not risk letting a big fish like that slip through his fingers by failing to put a tail on Dumbo McQuade.
But how had he given them the slip so easily? Yet nobody had followed him to this pub. He had to assume that Wiesenthal’s boys would be watching for him at all airports.
He ordered another beer from the barmaid, a handsome blonde Scandinavian. ‘Can I have a room for the night?’
‘Certainly can. What’s the name?’
‘McGregor,’ McQuade said.
He thought of flying to South Africa under a false name, but his return ticket was in the name of McQuade. At the check-in counter they check your ticket against the reservation. Nor could he get a refund and buy a new one in a false name because they check your ticket against your passport at the check-in counter.
God, he’d been a fool to visit Wiesenthal.
Well, maybe he could turn his foolishness to advantage. Why not make a reservation to Argentina in the name of McQuade, for three days hence, to give Wiesenthal’s boys plenty of time to find out about it, assuming they had access to airlines’ computers. Then they’d be watching for him that day at that airline’s desk. Meanwhile, slip out to South Africa!
Sheer genius. And take that one step better by making the reservation to South America via Israel. London to Tel Aviv – that looked as if he was doing more research on Heinrich Muller – then Tel-Aviv to Buenos Aires on El Al. Wiesenthal would definitely get that message. Mossad definitely had access to El Al’s computers.
Very good, McQuade … Do that tomorrow.
And there was something else he would do tomorrow: go to the Imperial War Museum, and try to read up about the loot the Nazis had plundered in Europe. Maybe he’d find out what loot Muller himself plundered. Find out more about this Strasbourg Conference of German industrialists in 1944 to rebuild ‘a strong Fourth Reich’. Maybe Heinrich Muller’s submarine had a role in that. And find out something about Heinrich Muller himself. How old he was, for example, and what specific crimes he committed. In fact, some of the questions he had failed to ask Wiesenthal. Any clues – that was what he had come to Europe for.