'So far, you're battin' a thousand. Hell, why do need me? You already know the answers.'
'Not quite. Indulge me. In 1945 the Agency, then OSS, decided they would bring some Nazis to the US, those that might be helpful, like Von Braun. Skorzeny was one of them' because he knew where the rest of the train's treasure was and he sure as hell wasn't going to tell anyone while he was awaiting sentence from some war crimes tribunal.'
Reavers shifted again, becoming tired of the game. ''You're guessing.'
'True, I am. But I'm right, aren't I?'
'Go ahead,' Reavers said noncommittally. 'I'm listening.'
'I'd bet Skorzeny never told you and someone decided to send him back.'
Reavers nodded. ' 'Cept you couldn't jus' put him on a plane or ship and deport him. Wasn't that easy.'
Lang began to scratch. 'This damn priest's robe's gettin' hot. Mind if I take it off?'
Reavers gestured with his pistol. 'Take off whatever you like, 'Cept I see a weapon, you're dead meat.'
'Thanks.'
As he slipped the cassock over his head, Lang stooped to lay it on the ground. With the hand away from Reavers, the one in the dark, he picked up the crowbar. Now. he was armed. What use the tool was going to be against automatic weapons was unclear.
Stall.
'So, the Agency made arrangements to ship him off to the only Fascist country left, Franco's Spain. But there was one very serious, unanticipated problem.'
For the first time, Reavers appeared interested. 'And that would be?'
'While he was in the States, Skorzeny fathered a son. Having been born there, you couldn't just bundle off a U.S. citizen, even one a few months old. I'd guess his mother was making threats, too.'
'Bitch!' Reavers spat. 'Never met her, came on board long after she had a fatal auto accident, but I unnerstan' she was a real pain in the ass, always askin' for more money.'
Lang was trying to look into the lights, ascertain exactly where they were. 'That wasn't the only problem. The kid, Skorzeny's son, knew damn well who he was, insisted on visiting his father in Spain almost every year from 1960, when he would have been fifteen or so, until Skorzeny died in 1974. In case you're interested, the tip off was 1974. The visits ended the year Skorzeny died.'
Reavers was not amused. 'You couldn't know that about where the kid went, not unless you knew…'
Lang was guessing now, putting odd pieces together to gain precious time. 'That Harold Straight is Skorzeny's illegitimate son? Look at the man, Reavers! Add a scar down his right cheek and he couldn't belong to anyone else. You guys created a whole identity for him but you left the Immigration and Naturalization records of his frequent travels to Spain. Seemed a little peculiar that in all the rhetoric of his he never mentioned foreign travel. You invented an identity for him, too. Problem was, it wasn't secure enough. The media, even his political opponents, ran their background checks on computers, I bet. First time someone wants to see the actual records, birth certificate, maybe, school records, et cetera, you have him killed. That was a huge red flag, Reavers.'
Reavers nodded again. Was that sweat beginning to glisten on his face? 'Yeah, 'bout the time of Skorzeny's death, I was the new boy on the block, trying to cover up Paper Clip. We knew there'd be a public howl, always is, we do somethin' isn't 'xactly Goody Two Shoes. My predecessor had some of our best forgers fiddle the local paperwork up there in Minnesota. 'Course, anyone who knows documents is likely gonna spot a fake sooner or later but we figger'd the newsies, they'd take a quick look an go away. Fact is, by '74 we'd gotten all the goody outta all those Krauts and congressional committees were beginin' to ask embarassin' questions. We didn't want no more honey, just wanted the bees off'n us. By that time the Skorzeny kid was a big deal in state politics, sure-fire to make it to Washington in some capacity. His old man, Skorzeny, was sort of a mystery man, few if any photos lying around to compare to Straight. That's why we had to take care of Huff. Pity.'
''Yeah, shot him in the back of the neck, same way the Russkies executed prisoners at the Lubyanka while you were there. He was getting too close to learning about Skorzeny's son. He wouldn't have let that go, would have kept digging till he found out the boy was very much alive. From there, it's a short step to seeing Straight as your man, the Agency's champ, right?' Lang was almost certain he had located the source of the light; the same two men with automatic weapons were holding powerful torches. Could he get them both at once? No matter, he had to try. 'Put Straight in the White House and surprise! The old Cold War level of funding comes back. You've got a rubber stamp for every plot gets hatched out at Langley. Want to blow up Saudi Arabia? Go to it! Sabotage the French economy, rig an election in Turkmenistan? Your man, Straight isn't in a position to say no. That's really what all this is about, isn't it, keeping me from finding out the Agency is trying to put its very own stooge in the Oval Office?'
Reavers's amiable manner vanished. 'Damn right! An' we'll succeed, 'least America better hope we do. Bunch of mamma's-boy bed wetters runnin' the country, 'fraid of a bunch o' rag-heads we shudda bombed back into the Stone Age right after 9/11. We need Straight like…'
'Like Germany needed Hitler in 1933.' Lang was coiling his body, getting ready to throw the crowbar. 'Wouldn't do that, I was you,' Reavers advised. 'Throwin' things like that, somebody's gonna get hurt. More'n likely, you. Be a good boy and drop the crowbar.'
Now or never, as the books say. Lang dropped a shoulder, ready to sling the crowbar at the nearest light. If he hit it, the man holding it, or even came close, there was a chance the distraction would give him a split instant to dive for protection behind one of the mounds of dirt, tombs, or columns.
'Hold it!' Reavers shouted, the Sig Sauer coming up.
'No, you hold it!' The voice came from Lang's left, Reavers's right. A very definitely feminine voice. 'And moving those lights you should not consider even!'
Lang thought he was seeing some sort of wraith, perhaps one of those Roman spirits he'd thought about minutes ago. But ghosts, particularly those of Romans, probably didn't wear nuns habits as did this one. Tall, her face hidden by the shadow of her wimple, she stood at an angle where she could clearly see Reavers and his two men without being blinded by the light. Lang could see only the top half of her body. The rest was in shadows, giving the impression she was somehow floating in air.
Reavers froze, turning only his head. 'Now look, Sister, you got no dog in this fight an' there's no reason for you to get hurt. You jus' mosey on back to where you came from, an' everthing'll be just hunky-dory.'
She didn't move. 'Down drop your weapons and put hands high. Now!'
It was a ghost! Lang knew that voice, that inflection, even the choice of words.
Reavers came to the same conclusion. Or at least a similar one. 'Fuchs, the Kraut bitch! That idiot I sent to the hospital…'
Reavers complaining how hard it is to get good help.
He spun, raising the Sig Sauer.
It was a big mistake, the last one he would ever make.
From somewhere beneath the floating head, a quick jet of flame leaped into the darkness and there was the sound like someone clearing their throat, a weapon with sound suppressor.
To Lang, everything seemed to move at a sluggish pace, to take on the tempo of a film in slow motion.
Reavers stood on tiptoe and did a graceful pirouette that belied both his size and the fact that he was wearing boots instead of ballet slippers. The anger in his facial expression was replaced by one of astonishment as his eyes crossed at his nose as though trying to see the grayish-red hole between them.
Just as Reavers's knees buckled, Lang was on him, snatching the gun from his limp grasp before diving into the shadows.
Lang crashed into unforgiving masonry.
It went dark.
A darkness of centuries, the gloom of the pre-creation universe, a night so black it could be felt as well as seen.
It also was very, very quiet.
The quiet of the tomb, Lang thought, suppressing a post-traumatic giggle at his own wit.
Seconds, minutes, hours, could have passed before a man spoke. 'Okay, we got us a Mexican standoff here. We go out and then you do. Nobody else get hurt.'
There was too much of an echo in the enclosed space to be sure as to the source of the voice, but it came from close by.
