Which meant there was no longer any reason not to pull the gun out of my sling and shove the business end up against the fat covering his ribs. Merten regarded the gun as if it had been ink on his shirt.
“Is that my gun? It certainly looks like it.”
“Get in the car,” I said. Ignoring the pain in my arm, I opened the rear door of the Rover, shoved Merten onto the backseat, threw his valise after him, and jumped in alongside them both. As soon as the car door was closed, Elli hit the accelerator. The Rover twisted a little on the gravel before gaining grip and then speed. Merten sat up, sighed loudly, and stared at the gun and then at me with something like pity, as if I was a tiresome schoolboy.
“I was wondering when you’d reveal your true hand, Bernie,” he said. “And there it is. Holding a Bismarck on me. It’s very disappointing.”
“That’s good, coming from you,” I said. “I wonder if your left hand even knows what the right is doing sometimes.”
“Well, then, we have something in common, you and I. Double-crossers both. What’s the plan? Deliver me up to the Greek police and get your passport back?”
“Something like that.”
“Jesus Christ, you’re selling yourself a bit short, aren’t you? Just listen to yourself. A passport. If you’d thrown in with me you’d have been as rich as Croesus. Still could be, if you’d only listen to sense.”
“Your wealth comes at the kind of price I can’t afford to pay.”
“‘Thus conscience does make cowards of us all.’”
“You excepted, it would seem, Max.”
Merten snorted with contempt. “When did you start working for the war crimes office? Anyone would think you were a Jew yourself the way you keep mentioning them. Don’t be so gloomy, Bernie. For a German you’re very mixed up about all this. What do you care about the Greeks, or the Jews? Let them look after themselves. Me, I’m looking out for number one. Which reminds me, would you mind not pointing that thing at me? Greek roads aren’t the best. If your lady friend hits a pothole, you might shoot me, accidentally.”
“And if I did, you’d probably deserve it.”
“What would happen to your passport then?”
Merten took out his foul Egyptian cigarettes and lit one, before adopting a very serious expression.
“Listen to me carefully, Bernie,” he said gravely. “This foolishness can only end badly for us both. I can assure you that whatever moral high ground you think you’re standing on here is nothing but quicksand. I’m warning you, as an old friend. The way you once warned me, back in ’39. Let me go right now or you’ll regret it. And very much sooner than you think.”
“You seem to forget that I’m holding the gun, Max.”
“And you’re forgetting where you are. In the electric chair. With my hand on the switch. I can burn you to a stinking crisp in less than a minute, my friend.”
“I don’t know what you think you’ve got on me, Max, but you’re bluffing. Those Jews from Salonika deserve some justice and I’m going to make sure that they get it.”
“Justice? Don’t make me laugh. Do you honestly think that the lives of sixty thousand Jews can be paid for so easily? Really, Bernie, you amaze me. Not just a romantic but an idealist, too. You’re full of surprises today. There’s no human justice that could ever be enough for what happened to those poor devils. And certainly none that could be got from my own humble person. So what you’re proposing is absurd. Besides, I had absolutely nothing to do with their deaths. I was just a paper pusher. A bureaucrat.”
“But you were prepared to profit from it.”
“I certainly didn’t hear the dead objecting to what I did. And they’ve certainly not troubled my conscience since. I told you. I can’t afford to have one. No, it’s Eichmann and Brunner who deserve to be on trial. Not me. I was just a humble army captain. Not even a footnote in history.”
“Perhaps. But you’ll have to do for now.”
“What a prig you are. What a prig and what a fool.” Merten puffed his cigarette coolly, as if he didn’t have a care in the world. “Be sensible. Last chance. Let me go, Bernie. You’ll regret it if you don’t.”
“Just shut up and smoke your cigarette.”
“I tell you what I’m going to do,” he said calmly. “I’m going to smoke this cigarette to the end. And then, when it’s finished, if you haven’t stopped this car and let me go on my own merry way, you’ll be finished, too. You have my word on that.”
FIFTY-TWO
–
Max Merten threw his cigarette out the car window and then wound it up again. He was smiling like a chess grand master who was about to make a winning move; like his witless opponent, I still couldn’t see what this might be. But instead of saying anything, he stayed silent and closed his eyes for a long time and I supposed he must be asleep; when he opened them again we were only a few miles southwest of Athens.
“Almost there,” said Elli.
“Thanks for driving all this way,” I said. “I couldn’t have done it without you.”
“Sweet of you,” she said. “I’m glad to be of help.”
“Well, isn’t that nice?” said Merten. “You know there are some men who find other people’s
