unsigned. A Russian Jew had translated it for Stern on the day it
arrived in his office, June 3, 1967.
People of Zion Beware! The Unholy Fire of Armageddon may soon be
unleashed upon you! I speak not from hatred or from love, butfrom
conscience. Fear of death stays my hand from revealing the secret of
your peril, but the key awaits you in Spandau. God is the final judge
of all peoples!
Stern's colleagues had not been impressed. In Israel, such warnings
were common as dust. Each was -routinely investigated, but rarely did
any prophesy real danger. But Stern had had a feeling about that
particular note. It was vague, yes.
Was the author referring to Spandau Prison in West Berlin?
Or the district of Spandau, which covered over five square miles of the
city? Stern never found out. Two days after the 'Spandau note'
arrived, the '67 war erupted. Shells were falling on Jerusalem, and the
note was brushed aside like junk mail. Israel was in peril, but from
Egyptian tanks and planes, not the 'Unholy Fire of Armageddon,' whatever
that meant.
Later, when the smoke had cleared and the dead were buried, Stern's
superiors decided the note had merely been a warning of Egypt's imminent
war plans. After all, the note was in Russian, and it was the Russians
who had been supplying Egypt with weapons. 'A communist with a
religious conscience,' they'd said, 'a common enough breed.' But Stern
had never accepted that. Why would the note have mentioned Spandau, of
all things? And so he'd kept the note.
At the foot of the stairs, he slipped his shoes back on and glided out
into the frigid darkness. Forty meters - up the Liitzenstrasse stood
Professor Natterman, clinging to his briefcase like a diamond courier.
He flagged down a speeding yellow taxi and climbed inside.
Stern smiled and climbed into his rental car.
Four floors above the street, Ilse sat cross-legged on the floor behind
her triple-bolted door, fixed her eyes on the wall clock, and waited
with both hands on the telephone.
9.40 Pm. Polizei AbschniH 53
The clang of the pipe apparently carried much farther than a human
voice. Hans had been smashing it against the bars for less than a
minute when the basement door crashed open and a powerful flashlight
beam sliced down through the darkness.
'Stop that goddamn banging!' shouted a guttural voice.
Rolf again, Hans thought. The profanity was a dead giveaway. The same
bearded man trailed behind him, but this time the pair stayed well back
from the cell and aimed the flashlight in.
'Well?' said Rolf from behind the glare. 'What the hell do you want?
The facilities not up to your high standards?'@ Hans flexed his fists in
rage. If he could only lure one of them into the cell . . .
'This man's dead,' he said, pointing to the gurney.
Neither guard responded.
'Come in here and check his pulse, if you don't believe me.
'If he's dead, what can we do?' said Rolf, chuckling his logic.
'Get him out of here!' Hans cried.
'Sorry,' said the other guard, with a trace of sympathy.
'We can't come in. Orders.'
In desperation Hans shoved the gurney to the front of the cell and
thrust his friend's lifeless arm through the bars.
'Feel it, damn you!'
'Take it easy,' said the second man. 'I'll do it.' He pinched Weiss's
wrist expertly between his thumb and middle finger and counted to
thirty. 'The man's dead, all right.'
Rolf checked Weiss's pulse himself. 'So he is. Well, you just stay
right here with him, Sergeant. We'll send somebody down for him.
Eventually.'
Hans turned to the wall in despair. Obviously these two thugs weren't
going to be lured into the cell. When he finally turned back around,
they had gone. He picked his way to the rear of the cell and sat down
on a box of files. I can wait, he told himself. Someone's got to come
in here eventually, and when they do ...
Fifteen minutes later the basement door crashed open again. This time
Hans heard no cursing <)r stumbling from the stairs. The tread of boots
was loud and regular. Whoever was coming knew his way around down here.
'This way, idiot,' muttered a disembodied voice.
Nothing could have prepared Hans for the next few seconds. When the
boots stopped in front of his cell, the flashlight beam arced in and
blinded him completely. He squinted in pain. Then, out of the
blackness behind the dazzling light came a voice that froze his heart.
'Hans? Are you okay.
Oh God ... Slowly his contracting pupils filtered out the glare.
He saw the hand gripping the flashlight through the bars. Then, just
above it, Captain Dieter Hauer's mustached face coalesced in the
darkness. The leering grin of Rolf floated above and behind him.
Hans felt a caustic wave of bile rising into his throat.
Whatever was going on, Hauer was part of it! His mind reeled, fighting
the realization that his own father had helped murder his friend. He
felt a knifelike pain in his chest, as if his very heart had cracked.
Come in here, you bastard! he thought savagely Just come right in ...
Apparently, Hauer intended to do just that. He turned to Rolf.
'Give me the key,' he said.
'But we're not supposed to go in,' Rolf objected. 'Lieutenant Luhr
said-' Hauer snatched the key from Rolf's hand and opened the cell door.
'Hans, listen,' he said softly, 'I need to ask-'
'Aaaaaarrgh!'
With every ounce of strength in his body, Hans drove himself off the
back wall and into Hauer's midsection. The flying tackle crushed Hauer
against the steel bars, driving the breath from his lungs. He collapsed
in a heap on the floor, sucking for air. Hans grabbed his neck and
began throttling him in blind hatred. Here was the man to pay for
Weiss's life, and so much more ...
It was a simple matter for Rolf to pick up the lead pipe and knock Hans
unconscious. Having done so, he viciously kicked the limp body off of
Hauer and revived the captain by taking hold of his belt and lifting him
