Echo of the Reich (24 page)

Now he moved even more cautiously, checking absolutely everywhere, because if the house was protected electronically, this was where the first of the devices would probably be positioned. He’d only covered about twenty yards when he saw the unmistakable shape of a house roof almost directly in front of him, and stopped in his tracks.

For almost ten minutes, Bronson stood virtually motionless beside the trunk of a large tree, assessing the situation.
He couldn’t see very much of the house itself, only a section of the rear wall, the ridge of the roof and a part of one side, but he was satisfied that it was the right building. He worked slowly and methodically, carrying out a visual search of all the trees he could see between his position and the edge of the wood where the house was standing. He let his eyes roam slowly up and down each trunk and along the principal branches, looking for the telltale sign of a camera or sensor. He was looking for anything that looked either unnaturally round or equally unnaturally square—shapes not normally found in nature.

But he saw nothing, which surprised him. He had been expecting, at the very least, a PIR detector or surveillance camera. Then he thought for a few moments and guessed the possible reason. He didn’t know what kinds of wildlife lived in this area of Germany, but he assumed that there were probably deer, maybe wild boar, and possibly even wolves and bears, any of which would have about the same heat signature as a man, and would trigger any electronic alarms they installed. It also meant that tripwires wouldn’t work, because animals that size would simply walk through them, and Marcus’s men would have to continually reset them.

Reassured by both his logic and the complete absence of any visible anti-intruder devices, Bronson crouched down and then began making his way slowly toward the edge of the wood. He stopped a couple of yards short of the side of the clearing, where several shrubs provided a natural barrier between him and his objective, and lowered himself onto his stomach. He eased himself slowly forward, sliding his body under the lowest branches of
the bushes, until he had a clear and unobstructed view of the house.

He was about twenty yards from the back wall of the house, and the first thing that struck him was how quiet it was. There were no people visible in the grounds and no signs of movement within the property—though obviously all he could see were the curtains on those windows where the shutters had been opened. There was no way of telling whether the house was occupied, because any cars would presumably have been parked in the large garage that lay on the side of the property closest to the road.

Bronson pulled the binoculars out of his jacket, and for several minutes just studied the building in front of him, making sure that his face was always in shadow to eliminate any chance of a stray reflection from the lenses of the instrument. Although they’d been cheap, the binoculars weren’t bad quality, and he was able to see the property in sharp detail. But even without anything to enhance his vision, it would have been immediately clear that entering the house would not be easy. There were seven windows in the back wall—three on the lowest level, another three directly above them, and one at the top, underneath the ridge of the roof—and each of them, except the very top one, had been fitted with a steel grille between the panes of glass and the wooden shutters. At least, that was Bronson’s assumption, because only one of the windows on the lowest level and two on the middle level had the shutters folded back, but it was a reasonable guess that what had been done to one window in a row would also have been done to the others. The very top window had neither shutters nor a steel grille, but its
height above the ground made reaching it almost impossible without a very long ladder. And Bronson didn’t think Marcus and his men were the kind of people who would leave a long ladder somewhere in the grounds for the convenience of any passing burglar.

Bronson tucked the binoculars away again, eased himself slowly backward, away from his vantage point, and retreated about five yards into the wood. Then he began moving around to his left, taking extreme care not to do anything that might attract the attention of anyone watching from inside the house. Now that he was closer to the building, he was also even more alert for the presence of tripwires or sensors, because they might have installed them close to the building, where wild animals would be less likely to roam.

It took him another fifteen minutes of slow and cautious progress, but finally he was able to look at the left-hand side of the house. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a much more encouraging sight than the back of the building had been. Over half of the windows had the shutters open, but each one had the same kind of metal grille fitted to it.

The only possible entry point he could see was a single door positioned more or less in the middle, but which through the binoculars he could see was fitted with two locks: a Yale or its German equivalent, and some kind of a dead bolt, to judge from the shape of the keyhole. The Yale, like most locks of that type, would probably yield to a bit of gentle pressure against the latch from a credit card, but the dead bolt was an entirely different proposition, and Bronson had neither the tools nor the skill even to attempt to open it.

He lowered the binoculars from his face and considered his next move. He dismissed the idea of working his way around to the other side of the building; he’d seen the level of security on two sides of the house; he doubted very much if he’d find an easy way in anywhere else. Whoever had designed the property’s passive defenses—the openings that formed the doors and windows—seemed to have done a good job, and they would certainly not have left the remainder of the house unprotected.

Although he’d still seen nobody, he knew he daren’t risk walking across the open space around the house and trying the door. It would be locked, he was certain, but there was also a good chance it would be alarmed, so even if by some miracle it had been left unlocked, the moment he stepped inside, the siren would go off. The previous evening he’d noticed a square box on the front wall of the house bearing a three-letter legend, which he was almost certain belonged to a monitored alarm company. He had much the same system in his own home back in Kent.

He hated to admit it, but it looked as if his plan to get inside the house wasn’t going to work. About all he could do was observe, and unless somebody appeared soon, that wasn’t going to achieve any results either.

Then another thought crossed his mind, something that gave him a glimmer of hope for the first time since he’d arrived at the house.

There was one door to the property that definitely wasn’t secured with a dead bolt, and that would probably be opened wide at some point during the day: the electric
garage door. There was a chance he might be able to force it, but even if that proved impossible, if anybody arrived or left the house, the door would have to be open long enough to allow them to drive in or out of the garage. And when the door was opened, there was at least a chance that he could sneak inside undetected.

That was a kind of a plan, he supposed, and it was the only one he had, so Bronson slid backward away from his observation post and slowly, with infinite care, began to work his way around the perimeter of the clearing toward the front of the house.

When he reached a spot from which he could see that part of the property clearly, he wriggled into position in the undergrowth and began his observation. As he’d expected, the garage door was shut, and there was still no sign of activity anywhere in the property. He focused the binoculars on the box he’d noticed on the front wall, and could clearly see the logo. It showed the company trigraph inside a stylized fortress wall, and there was a small red light flashing regularly in the center, which just confirmed his suspicions.

He guessed that showed that the system was armed, and that probably meant the house was empty, because most homeowners would set their alarms only when they left the premises. And if it
was
empty, with any luck somebody would be coming back to it during the afternoon—or the evening, if he was unlucky. If it was a single man, Bronson hoped he’d be able to overpower him, and force him to hand over the Walther and the recording made by the camera.

He was aware that there were a rather large number of
variables and uncertainties in the scenario he’d envisaged, but he was optimistic. He also knew it was probably going to be a long afternoon, so he made himself as comfortable as he could, placed the binoculars to one side, and rested his head on his crossed arms.

It was a hot day, the sun was warm on his back, and the sound of buzzing insects and birdsong was gently soporific. Ten minutes later, Bronson was sound asleep.

24 July 2012

A metallic clattering noise woke him, and for a few seconds Bronson had no idea where he was or what he was doing. He’d fallen asleep with his head lying across his folded arms, and his neck ached abominably. Then realization returned. Moving slowly and carefully, because the human eye is particularly well adapted to detect movement, he lifted his head to face the house.

The air was noticeably cooler, and the sun had almost set. The front of the house was now illuminated by the last of its rays, giving the wood a golden glow, and infusing the building with an appearance of benign and rustic comfort that Bronson knew was entirely illusory.

He raised the binoculars to his eyes, although he had already guessed the cause of the sound that had awakened him: the garage door was wide-open. The garage’s interior lights were still switched off but he could just make out the shapes of two men standing together on the left-hand
side of the open door. The odd word of German floated into the quiet of the evening, but even if Bronson had been able to speak the language, he doubted if he could have followed their conversation, because he was simply too far away.

It looked to Bronson as if they were waiting for something, or someone—perhaps for Marcus or one of the other men to arrive, which wasn’t good news. He could have tackled one man, perhaps even two using the threat of his pistol, but it was clear that that window of opportunity had now passed. To implement his very sketchy plan, he would have needed to be standing somewhere near the garage door when it opened. Now, it would be impossible to cross the seventy or so yards of open ground between his present position and the garage without being seen.

And then he heard the sound of a car approaching, and guessed that this might be the vehicle the men were expecting. He glanced to his left and saw through the trees the irregular flickering of a set of headlights, the note of the engine changing as the car slowed down. Moments later, a vehicle turned off the road and drove down the track toward the property, its lights shining into the interior of the garage and revealing the presence of four other cars already inside.

That changed the odds considerably. Even if each car had been driven there by a single individual, that still meant there were at least four people in the house, and possibly as many as sixteen. Adding to that number the occupants of the vehicle that had just arrived, Bronson knew he could be facing up to twenty men, many of them
armed if his past experience was any guide. To approach the building now would be suicidal. The best he could hope to do was wait until at least some of the men had left. Assuming, of course, that they would be leaving. He would just have to wait, and watch, and see what happened.

He’d been expecting the car to drive into the garage, and had assumed that was the reason why the two men were waiting by the open door, but then he realized that the number of cars already inside would have made maneuvering somewhat difficult. Instead, the car swung around to the left and parked on the gravel drive. Its lights were extinguished, the sound of the engine died away, and then the car doors opened.

Four men climbed out and walked around to the vehicle’s trunk. Each man reached inside and took out a bulky bag, about the size of the weekend bag that Bronson had locked in the trunk of his car; then they strode across to the door of the garage. As they did so, the interior lights flickered into life.

Two things struck him immediately, both unexpected. The first was the way that the two men waiting there were dressed. Despite the warmth of the evening, both were wearing long and heavy overcoats that came well below their knees, and apparently had on some kind of boots, because Bronson could see the glint of black—presumably leather—below their coats. The second was what they did as the four new arrivals approached. They stood rigidly to attention and nodded deferentially as the other men stepped inside the building. Whoever the guests were, they appeared to be people of some importance.

But it was the overcoats that puzzled him. Now that the sun had gone down, the evening was getting cooler, but the air was still warm, and presumably the house had a central heating system, so why were the two men dressed in that fashion? It couldn’t be because they were cold; that didn’t make sense. In fact, Bronson could only think of one possible reason for what they were wearing, and he didn’t like the idea at all.

He switched his attention back to the events unfolding in front of him. One of the men was still standing by the open door of the garage, while the other was escorting the four guests to the door at the rear of the garage, and in a few moments all five men had disappeared from view.

Bronson toyed with the idea of trying to get across to the house and into the garage while there was only one man on duty, but he guessed there was only one logical reason for the second man to remain by the open door, and that was because additional visitors were expected. Moments later, he was proved right when a second car turned into the driveway and parked near the first. Again, four men emerged from the car, collected bags and then disappeared into the garage. The only difference this time was that as soon as all four men were inside, the garage door closed behind them and the thin sliver of light visible under the door was extinguished.