Mossad sent that letter.'
'Do you really think this woman might pose a danger to him?'
Shaw shook his head. 'I doubt Stern's in England. Or even in Europe,
for that matter. He's probably sunning himself on Mykonos, or something
similar. 'Which reminds me-did you find that freighter for me?'
'Oh, yes, sir. Lloyd's puts her off Durban; she rounded the cape three
days ago.'
Shaw rummaged through the stack of papers on his desk until he found a
map of southern Africa. 'Durban,' he murmured, running his finger
across the paper. 'Twenty knots, twenty-five ... two days ...
yes. Well.'
Shaw brushed the map aside and thumped the stack of papers before him.
'This is the Hess file, Wilson. iNo one's cleared to read it but me-did
you know that? I tell you, there's enough rotted meat between these
covers to make you ashamed of being an Englishman.'
Wilson waited for an explanation, but Shaw provided none. 'About the
Israeli letter, sir?' he prompted. 'It's basically a.polite request to
leave this Stern alone. How should I reply?'
'What? Oh. The Israeli prime minister is an old terrorist himself, you
know.' Sir Neville chuckled. 'And still looking after his own, after
all these years.' His smile turned icy.
'No reply. Let him sweat for a while, eh?'
'Yes, sir.'
'And him-y those hard boys along, would you? I thought I had it tough
with the P.M. climbing my back. An hour ago I got a call from the
bloody Queen-Mother herself She makes the Iron Lady sound like a French
nanny!'
As Wilson slipped out, Sir Neville butted and went back to the Hess
file. On top lay a very old eight-by-ten glossy photograph.
Scarred and faded, it showed a man in his late forties with dark hair, a
strong jaw, and a black oval patch tied rakishly across his left eye.
Shaw jabbed his heavy forefinger down on the eye patch.
'You started it all, you sneaking bastard,' he muttered. He slammed the
file closed and leaned back in his chair. 'Sometimes I wonder if the
damned knighthood's worth the strain,' he said.
'Protecting skeletons in the royal bloody chest.'
10.-07 Pm. #30 Lfitzenstrasse
Outside the apartment another car rattled down the street without
slowing. Number twelve. Ilse was counting. Wait until midnight, her
grandfather had told her. If Hans isn't home by then, get out. Sound
advice, perhaps, but Ilse couldn't imagine running for safety while Hans
remained in danger. She fumed at her own obstinacy. How could she have
let a stupid argument keep her from telling Hans about the baby? She
had to find him. Find him and bring him to his senses.
But where to start? The police station? The nightclub district?
Hans might meet a reporter anywhere. Rising from her telephone vigil,
she went to the bedroom to put on some outdoor clothes. Outside, a long
low groan built slowly to a rattling roar as a train passed on the
elevated S-Bahn tracks up the street. During the day trains passed
every ten minutes or so; at night, thank God, the intervals were longer.
As Ilse tied a scarf around her hair, yet another automobile clattered
down the Liitzenstrasse, coughing dnd wheezing in the cold.
Unlike the others, however, this one sputtered to a stop near the front
entrance of the building. Please, she prayed, rushing to the window,
please let it be Hans.
It wasn't. Looking down, she saw a shiny black BMW sedan, not Hans's
Volkswagen. She let her forehead fall against the freezing pane. The
cold eased the throb of the headache that had begun an hour earlier. She
half-watched as the four doors of the BMW opened simultaneously and four
men in dark business suits emerged. They grouped together near the
front of the car. One man pointed toward the apartment building and
waved in a circle. Another detached himself from the group and
disappeared around the corner.
Curious, Ilse watched the first man turn his face toward the upper
floors and begin counting windows. His bobbing arm moved slowly closer
to her window. How 'odd, she thought.
Who would be out counting apartment windows at midnight in-?
She jumped back from the window. The men below were looking for her. Or
for Hans-for what he'd found. She groped for the light switch to turn
it off, then thought better of it. Instead she ran into the living
room, opened the door, and peered cautiously down the hall.
Empty. She dashed down the corridor and around the corner to a window
that overlooked the building's rear entrance. Three men huddled there,
speaking animatedly. Ilse wondered if they might be plain-clothes
police. Suddenly two of them entered the building, while the third took
up station in the shadow of some garbage bins near the exit.
The metallic groan of the ancient elevator jolted Ilse from the window.
Too late to run. They would reach her floor in seconds. With her back
to the corridor wall, she inched toward the corner that led back to her
apartment. She felt a tingling numbness in her hands as she peeked
around it. A tall young man in a dark suit stood outside her door.
Remembering the fire stairs, she started in the other direction, but the
echo of ascending steps made her thought redundant.
Hopelessly trapped, she decided to try to bluff her way out.
Feeling adrenaline suffuse her body, she stepped around the corner as if
she owned the building and marched toward the man outside her apartment.
She cocked her chin arrogantly upward, intending to walk right past him
and into the lift that would take her to the lobby.
After all, she had appeared from another part of the floor-she might be
anybody. If she could only reach the lobby ...
The man looked up. He began to stare. First at Ilse's legs, then at
her breasts, then her face.
I can't do it! she thought. I'll never make it past himIn a
millisecond she saw her chance. Stay calm, she told herself. Steady
... Fifteen feet away from her apartment she stopped and withdrew her
apartment key from her purse. She smiled coolly at the guard, then
turned her back to him and bent over the door handle of apartment 43.
Be here, Eva! she screamed silently. For God's sake, be here!
Ilse scratched her key against the knob to imitate the sound of an
