“If you’re talking about the bond that Hedva Tannenbaum gave the woman, it is useless,” Lev said. “The policeman brought her here with it. We took the number and our people checked it. It was a single issue. Tannenbaum had no other dealings with that bank.”
“I ain’t talkin’ ’bout no bond,” Fearless said. “I’m talkin’ ’bout the money, the money you guys is lookin’ for.”
“Why would we believe that you can help us?” Manly asked Fearless.
“Morris Greenspan killed himself last night,” Fearless said. “He left a note. He been workin’ for a man called hisself Minor, and then he fount out what Sol did with the money. But then he fount out who Minor was.”
There was a question in John Manly’s gaze.
“Zimmerman,” I replied.
Manly sat back and considered. There was an arrogant twist to his lips. He looked at each of his friends, making eye movements that I couldn’t read.
“Where is this note?” Manly cocked his head to the side as if he were trying to see if the suicide note was hanging out of one of our pockets.
“Where’s Zimmerman?” Fearless asked.
Manly answered, “We will pay you to tell us where the money is,” not as an offer but as a foregone conclusion.
That sounded like a good first step to me. All we had to do was talk about a number; no thugs or blood or blackjacks.
Fearless stood up and said, “Come on, Paris.”
Ari stood up too.
“No,” Manly said. “Sit down, both of you.”
There wasn’t much give in either of the gladiators. So I asked a question.
“Where you guys from?”
“We are foreigners,” Manly said.
“From Israel, I bet.”
That somehow broke the standoff. Both Fearless and Ari took their seats.
“We are here to reclaim the wealth of our people,” Lev said. His strained voice warbled with emotion that he bore like an open wound.
“Lev —” Manly began, but he was stopped by an upheld hand. I was surprised to see that the pale kid was the senior statesman among the bunch.
“This man, this Abraham Zimmerman, he helped the Nazis to steal it, and we are here to get it back.”
“Steal what?” I asked. I was pretty sure of the answer, but I wanted to see what they would say.
“They took everything,” Lev said. “The gold from our teeth, the hair from our heads. They took our pocket watches and our wallets. And if you were rich and you hid your jewels and paintings and furs, then Zimmerman was sent in to sell your freedom for what you had hidden away. He and his Nazi friends hid them again…” Lev’s words trailed off, and he stared into space.
“Where is Zimmerman?” Fearless said, always wanting to cut to the chase.
“We don’t know,” Lev said after making the grimace of a man swallowing a bitter draft.
“What’s this all about?” I asked the pale kid. Somehow I felt a connection with him.
“Zimmerman is a Jew…,” Lev began.
When Ari heard this, he spat on the floor.
“We already know the part about Zimmerman robbing the rich Jews who thought they could buy their way out of the slaughterhouse,” I said.
Lev caught the last word and looked into my eyes.
“Yes,” he said. “Many of those wealthy men had converted their money into art treasures and gold. David Tannenbaum found out about the sale —”
“— of those jewelry-making tools that the Rothschild’s jewelers had at one time,” I said, finishing the sentence.
“He knew that these tools had belonged to his nephew and so contacted our government,” Lev said, continuing, “but they told him that we could do nothing without proof.”
“Why don’t you just go over to those accountants and make ’em give it up?” Fearless suggested.
