The Hunt

them but it is quite annoying. The static from the wires wakes her up.”

“Get heavier shutters,” Vierhaus suggested.

‘Ja, ja,” Eicke said and laughed.

“Listen Teddy, I have a favor to ask. You have a prisoner there called Sternfeld.”

“The teacher?”

‘Ja. He may have information about a group which calls itself the Black Lily. The Fuhrer is most anxious to get all the information he can about this organization. I thought perhaps you might employ some of your more persuasive methods on this Sternfeld.”

“I am sorry, Willie. You are a little late.”

“Late?”

“Sternfeld is dead. About a month ago.”

“What happened to him?”

“He was allergic to hard work,” Eicke said with a chuckle. “But pneumonia actually did him in.”

“Damn!”

“Sorry,” Eicke said. “Do we have anyone else here who might have information?”

“I don’t know,” Vierhaus said. His disappointment was obvious in his tone. “I will look into it.”

“Well, Willie, if you find we do just give me a ring,” Eicke’s gruff voice answered. “We could make the Brandenburg Gate sing the ‘Horst Wessel’ if we had to—but we have no luck at all with corpses.” And he laughed.

Vierhaus leaned back in his chair and finished his coffee. He had to break the Black Lily and unless Adler came up with new information, Vierhaus had only one lead left. Jennifer Gould.

Adler awoke with a splitting headache. He was lying on a cot in a dark room. He sat up slowly, his feet groping under him for the floor. Then he saw his satchel, sitting beside the bed. The top was flared open and the satchel was empty. A light suddenly burst on. It was about thirty feet away, a spotlight aimed straight at him. A man sat silhouetted on a chair in front of it.

“Who are you?” Adler demanded, squinting into the light. “Why are you doing this to me? I have nothing . .

The silhouetted man’s arm moved. There was a flare of light as he threw something toward Adler. The file folders from his satchel smacked the floor and slid to his feet, the contents splayed out around them.

“You are wrong, Herr Adler,” the silhouetted man said in a flat monotone that sounded as if he were purposely disguising it. “You do have something. What is this, work in progress?”

“That is none of your business.”

“We know everything you have done. Fifteen families, sixty- four people, all sent to the work camp at Dachau. You have become an executioner, killing your own people.”

“They are not my people.”

“They are the same blood.”

“Leave me alone!” Adler said miserably.

“We have an offer for you, Herman Adler. We will take you out of Berlin tonight. By this time tomorrow you will be in a neutral country with a passport and tickets to either England or America. But first, you must tell us what you reported to Vierhaus.”

“I cannot leave Germany . .

“Of course you can. You live in a hovel like a cockroach and you betray your friends. You cannot keep it up, Herr Adler.

Accept our offer and you will be a free man with a job awaiting you.

“As what, an apprentice gem cutter to some English snob? I am a German! This is my country.”

“No. It is no longer your country or my country. We can’t vote, own property, go to decent restaurants, have a job. For God’s sake, man, they took your property, your bank account, your home, everything you own. How can you spy for them?”

“I am trying to stay alive!” Adler cried out passionately.

“We all are. That is why you cannot keep this up.”

Adler squinted across the room at him. “And what are you going to do if I refuse? Kill me?”

The silhouetted man paused for several seconds. He stood and walked out of the halo of light. Adler squinted and turned his face, blinded temporarily by the spotlight. The man stood in the darkness, the tip of his cigarette glowing intermittently.

“No,” he said, finally. “What we will do is this. We will print your face on the front page of The Berlin Conscience with a story listing every Jew you have given to them. We will see that every Jew in Germany knows who you are and what you do. Since you will no longer be of any use to the Judenopferer Vierhaus or anybody else, they will either kill you or send you to Dachau with the people you have betrayed. Think about that.” He used the harsh term Judenopferer, which meant “Jew sacrificer” rather than the slightly less offensive Judenhascher.