'Urgent Startled out of his reverie, Kosov snatched up the receiver.
When he heard Captain Rykov eiplain what had happened at the Stasi
safehouse, he felt the blood leave his head in a rush. 'My God,' he
muttered. 'My God! Get back here any way you can, you idiot!'
Kosov slammed down the phone and charged into the communications room.
'Close off the Western embassies!'
he shouted. 'Use our own people-no East Germans!'
Several astonished young faces appeared at the doors.
'The fugitive is an American army major,' he said more slowly, his voice
barely under control. 'He's out of uniform and he speaks perfect
Russian. Probably perfect German too.
If he's apprehended, I want him brought here immediately.'
Kosov ground his teeth furiously. 'Any East German who attempts to get
close to him is to be shot. That is a direct order. Shoot any East
German who interferes. I want the full staff here in twenty minutes.
And get me the chief of the Stasi on the phone! Now!'
Sagging against a desk, Kosov tried to ignore the pounding in his head.
It seemed inconceivable,that Axel Goltz had been working for the
Americans. The man was practically a Nazi. Why would he turn on his
Russian masters? Especially since he could have no doubt that his
action would be suicidal. Kosov sighed hopelessly. He could do little
else until his department heads arrived. Slowly he walked back into his
office, closed the door, and sat at his desk. Borodin will throw me to
the dogs for this, he lamented. But not before I strain Axel Goltz
through a razor-wire sieve. Shoving the grainy photograph of Zinoviev
out of his way, he swallowed four aspirin without water, pressed his
forehead to the cold desktop, and waited for the phone to ring.
4:35 A.M. The Natterman Cabin: Near WoifsbUrg, FRG
The forger arrived two hours after Hauer's call. Professor Natterman's
explosion occurred two hours after that. Hauer and Hans had buried the
dead caretaker and his Afrikaner killer in the snow behind the cabin,
while Natterman stripped the bloody bedclothes and scrubbed away the
blood from the cabin's interior. The only remaining signs of trouble
were the shattered windows and door, and the Jaguar wrapped around the
plane tree out front.
Hauer's forger was astute enough to ignore all these signs.
Immensely fat and normally jovial, Hermann Rascher aPpeered to be in
mortal dread of Hauer. He lost no time in setting up his equipment.
A white screen and chair placed in front of the shattered window and an
assortment of chemicals laid out in the bathroom quickly converted the
bedroom into a small photographic studio.
Consistent with his plan of keeping Natterman in the dark until the last
minute, Hauer instructed the forger to shoot a passport picture of the
professor as if he too were to be given false papers.
But this ruse went for nothing. Despite Hauer's injunction against
discussing their plans, Natterman badgered him every moment that the
forger spent in his temporary darkroom. Before Rascher arrived Hauer
had probed the professor for his speculations on what the vital secret
of the Spandau papers might be, but Natterman had refused to be drawn
out. Now, though, Natterman was vigorously attempting to convince Hauer
it would be foolish to bait a rescue trap with the authentic papers.
'The kidnappers have obviously never seen the papers,' he insisted, 'so
it would be impossible for them to know they were being fooled. Captain,
I simply cannot agree to any plan which needlessly risks losing such an
important artifact.'
Hauer had had enough. He walked to the bedroom door to make sure the
forger was closed inside the bathroom; then he turned back to Natterman.
'You don't have to agree, Professor,' he said evenly.
'Because you're not coming to South Africa.'
Natterman looked as if someone had emptied a bedpan in his face.
Too stunned to speak, he looked to Hans for support, but found none.
Hauer kept the initiative. 'You're wounded, you can't move faster than
a slow walk, and you're over seventy, for God's sake.'
Too angry to marshal logical arguments, Natterman raged like a thwarted
child. 'You can't keep me out of this, you ... you fascist!'
While he ranted on, Hans walked to the window and tried to shut out the
argument. The snow was falling again. He shivered, realizing that
somewhere out there beyond the trees, beyond the road and the pristine
German fields, beyond the Alps, beyond a great sea and a vast, dark
continent, ]Ilse waited, frightened and alone. With a hollow coldness
in his chest, he wondered again about her last, anguished cry.
Could she really be pregnant at last? Or had the kidnappers somehow
twisted that desperate maternal hope out of her to use as extra LEVERAGE
I e? He banished the thought from his mind. That snake could eat its
tail forever, and his sanity with it. It had no bearing at all on the
rescue plan. He would keep that secret to himself. Whatever had passed
between him and his father in the last few hours, Hauer had no claim on
that knowledge yet 'Hans, listen to thisi' the professor shrieked.
'Hauer said it himself.- The police only get ten percent of hostages
back alive! Remember Munich, Hans? The 'seventy-two Olympics? It was
Hauer and his stortntwpers who opened up on the Arabs while the hostages
were tied inside the helicopters. The Jews were blown to bits! Have
you forgotten that?
TWO days ago you hated this man. He deserted you and your mother! Now
you trust him to bring our Ilse back alivet' At the mention of Munich a
strange stillness came over Hauer. It was as if a ghost had touched him
with icy fingers.
His gray eyes turned opaque as they fixed on Natterman. His voice went
cold and flat. 'I didn't see you on @ airfield that day.'
Natteman started to reply, but when he recognized the glacial coldness
in Hauer's eyes the sound died in his throat.
'I'm sorry,' he whispered. 'I shouldn't have said that. But you don't
understand, Captain. The key to this situation isn't guns and tactics,
it's the Spandau papers. And you can't even read them! We're not
dealing with Arab terrorists or crazed students here-we're dealing with
the legacy of Adolf Hitler! The key to this whole mystery is in the and
I am the only man who can unravel it!'
Hauer sighed. 'Professor, why don't you admit that the reason you want
so badly to come is that you can't bear to let those papers out of your
