The Diaries - 01 (42 page)

“Should we tell
the boss, so he can talk to the polizei?” Sorgi asked.

Ellis pondered it
for a moment, then leaned close to
Sorgi’s
ear.
 
“Let’s just keep it between us for now.”
 
He put a finger to his lips and Sorgi gave a
miniature salute.

They were going to
figure this one out alone.

***

Near Karlsruhe, Germany

The ICE train’s
ride was as smooth as an old Cadillac’s on a freshly paved road.
 
People milled about the train car, walking to
and fro, stretching their legs.
 
The
restrooms were in the next car, getting some usage.
 
There was a dining car three cars ahead.
 
People would bring their coffee back.
 
Drink it.
 
Visit the restroom.
 
A group of
older women sat around a table at the head of the car, speaking about plans for
their visit to Paris.
 
A minor argument
erupted over whether or not the Mona Lisa was worth all the hubbub.
 
Had Gage been paying attention, he would have
told them to skip Mona and see the rest of the Louvre, or better yet, some of
the other museums in the grand city.
 
But
Gage wasn’t paying attention.

With a sucking
sound, the door slid open from the car ahead.
 
There he was—rumpled blue uniform. Dour look on his face.
 
The attendant.
 
Gage didn’t even tense when he saw him; he
was well-briefed on what to expect and more than confident in his
identification.
 
Making him feel even
more secure, the news stories about the wanted murder suspect from Frankfurt
had ceased altogether.
 
Kenny wanted to
help by questioning some friends in intelligence, but Gage wouldn’t allow
it.
 
There was no point in adding a
potential leak to this operation.
 
Besides, he trusted Colonel Hunter and knew he would spread just enough
disinformation to turn the investigation’s attention to the States.
 
In addition to all that, his words to the
policeman, and the fact he left him unharmed, had to count for something.
 
Gage sipped his water as the attendant
stopped before him.

“
Karte
,
bitte
.”

Gage pulled the printed
sheet of paper from the seat back in front of him, unfolded it and handed it to
the man.
 
The attendant looked it over
before asking Gage to see his identification.
 
From his bag, Gage produced a German passport showing his home as just
outside of Munich, in
Zorneding
.
 
Kenny Mars had provided it for him.
 
Apparently, his team had a suitcase full of
them in the event they needed to perform an op inside the border.
 
Gage’s hair had grown half an inch, and on
his face he had grown a short beard to match the picture.
 
Kenny had visited the pharmacy section of the
PX for Gage; all of his hair had been dyed a dark brown and his skin was now darker
thanks to tanning lotion.
 
A few light
smudges of dark makeup under Gage’s eyes aged him by ten years.
 
Unless the attendant was studying the picture
under a magnifying glass, he wouldn’t see a difference in Gage and the man in
the passport.
 
The attendant gave the
passport a cursory glance and then, from a lanyard, the man produced a stamp
and squeezed the impression on Gage’s paper, moving on to the person behind
Gage without another glance.

Gage slowed his
breathing, forcing himself to relax.
 
As
had been happening with regularity over the last week, Gage could hear Monika,
speaking to him with her unique Saarland accent.
 
She was reading from the 1938 diary, passages
Gage would never, for the rest of his years (or days), forget:

I’ve had no period for two months.
 
No period and unexplained sickness!
 
It’s all I can do to stomach working while
feeling green, but to know the unthinkable…to know I am carrying his
child.
 
It could be no other person’s;
unfortunately he was my one and only.
 
I
don’t know what else I can bear, diary.
 
I hide my heritage like an embarrassing scar.
 
I’ve lost my family.
 
I put on a happy face and work twelve hours,
making up trite excuses when I have to go and secretly vomit in the rose
garden, and now I have to hide a coming child, fathered by a man who would
certainly want it immediately killed.

Some of the girls here, either by the male
servants or the gentry, have become pregnant over the years.
 
But to them, like they might take care of an
aching tooth, they go down to those butchers in
Karlshorst
…

I will not do this.

He leaned back in
the seat, listening to Monika saying the words as she alternated her vision
from the diary to him, her eyes rimmed with tears.
 
Greta and Monika: two tragic souls, ripped
away from those who loved them.

His hand moved to
his shoulder, rubbing it, rubbing the hidden tattoo of Themis, Goddess of
Justice.
 
He let it linger there a
moment.

There were no large
suitcases accompanying Gage.
 
Unlike the
other travelers, there was no iPod in his ears, no laptop before him.
 
He had not purchased a newspaper; he didn’t
have a paperback.
 
Instead, he sat ramrod
straight in his 2
^nd
class seat, staring out the window at the gray
sky and passing farmland.
 
That’s where
the blankness ended.
 
In his mind, Gage’s
thoughts moved at Internet speed, going over scenarios and planning for each
and every contingency.
 
Beneath his feet
was his bag; it contained his implements.

His destination
was Metz.
 
His mission was clear.

Gage clenched his
powerful hands shut, staring down at them.
 
On his left hand, there was a scar from Venezuela.
 
The fingernail of his right thumb was gnarled
from an incident in Albania.
 
He twisted
his fists over, looking at the knuckles.
 
What scars might he take away from France?
 
It didn’t matter.
 
He had but one critical task in this
mission.
 
Gage Hartline was going to find
the men responsible for Monika’s death, and kill them.
 
He was going to make their demise violent, and
painful.
 
In deference to Colonel
Hunter’s recommendation, Gage planned to make his adversaries beg for the mercy
of death.

For a scant moment
he allowed himself to picture, not only how he was going to perform his
mission, but exactly what spiteful actions he was going to perform on the
mobsters.
 

And for that scant
moment, Gage Hartline smiled.

In his mind he
spoke to Monika, and to Greta
Dreisbach
:
Rest in peace, ladies, justice is coming.
 

***

Frankfurt, Germany

His Mercedes
parked illegally on a dilapidated, grease-stained sidewalk, Jean jumped out and
ran to the mouth of the alleyway.
 
He
stared into the narrow opening a long moment, turning back to the U-
bahn
stop at
Leipziger
Strasse
and glancing at Henri’s map.
 
Yes, he was in the right place.
 
This is the alleyway Gage took in the video.

Slow down, Jean.
 
Take your time.
 
Millions are at stake.
 
He took a deep breath, breathing through his
long nose until he felt the tension fall from his shoulders.
 
Finally, in his typical manner when he needed
to calm himself, Jean lit a cigarette, clamping it in his mouth as the northern
wind pushed the smoke back over his face and toward the Main River.

The clouds were
low and gauzy, sliding across the sky.
 
They licked at the top of the tall buildings in the near distance.
 
A swirling mist dampened Jean’s face, forcing
him to cup the cigarette in his hand and feel the burn from the cherry at the
tip.

He entered the alleyway.
 
It was dark and dank.
 
Long and narrow.
 
The center was marked by the crown of the
road, probably built on a rise centuries before so the rain would carry out the
trash and filth.
 
And while Germany is known
as a tidy country, this particular alleyway belied that claim to fame.
 
On his left, Jean saw the back of a Chinese
restaurant.
 
He smelled their garbage.
 
To the right was the back of an apartment
building, the rusty fire escape above his head.
 
There was an apron factory, a low-rent law firm, seven warehouses that
appeared to be legitimate businesses, two additional buildings that housed
flats, and a neighborhood pub at the end.

Jean walked the
alley, glancing in each window, pulling on doors.
 
He smoked the cigarette, trying to think like
Gage Hartline.
 
Did he deposit his treasure
in one of these buildings?
 
Did he use
the alleyway as a short cut?
 
Did he
purposefully try to leave a confusing trail?

No, the diaries
were close by.
 
Henri had marked video of
Gage coming and going both times.
 
Each
time Gage turned into the alleyway and was back out within a few minutes.
 
Jean was now at the other end of the alleyway.
 
He made a right on
Wurmbachstrasse
and entered the pub.
 
It was just before
lunch.

Two old men
labored to crank their arthritic necks around to look at the soaked Frenchman
with the mane of black hair.
 
Seeing that
he didn’t have breasts, they quickly lost interest, choosing to stare into
their pilsner instead.
 

The bartender, probably
a septuagenarian himself, slid an oily menu to a spot at the end of the bar. “
Speisekarte
?” he asked, more tired than friendly.

“
Ein
Kaffe
,
bitte
,”
Jean requested with a fake smile.
 
He
used his pinky finger to move the tainted menu away from his spot.
 
The man poured the coffee, sliding two sugar
packets and a small container of cream in front of Jean.
 
He turned away and went back to his
newspaper.

“Excuse me,” Jean
asked, using his best German.
 

The bartender kept
his eyes in his newspaper, replying gruffly.
 
“Yeah?”

“Have you been
located here for a long time?
 
Do you
know the area well?”

“Purchased the bar
from the former owner in sixty-three; been here ever since.”

Jean wished the
rude old fart would turn to face him.
 
He
didn’t like to speak to someone’s back.
 
He willed himself to remain calm and continued.
 
“There is an alleyway that runs behind your
bar, bounded on both sides by many businesses, including several warehouses.”

“You’re
observant,” the man said, licking his finger and flipping the page.

Jean smoothed his
hair.
 
“My sister has passed away and had
put many of our parents’ antiques in storage.
 
We’ve narrowed it down to one of the businesses on each side of the
alleyway, but haven’t been able to find any that publicly offer storage.
 
Do you know any of the owners?”

The man closed the
paper and turned.
 
“Most of the
warehouses and businesses in this area went out of business after the euro
changeover.
 
The economy has come back,
but this area has yet to.”
 
He sipped from
a mug; Jean could see the honey colored pilsner inside.
 
The man’s liver was probably soaked every day
well before lunch.
 

The bartender
lifted the mug, gesturing to the street.
 
“Maybe some of the people in the warehouses make extra money by renting
out space.
 
But if they do, I don’t know
about it.”
 
He lifted his paper with his
free hand.
 
“Or care.”

Jean sipped his
coffee.
 
“It could take me some time to
figure it out.
 
Do you have any guesses
as to which one I should begin with?”

The old man leaned
forward.
 
“No, I don’t.
 
And unless you want something pricier than
coffee, I’d like to finish my paper.”

Jean stared at the
crotchety silverback a moment, finally digging a crumpled ten euro bill and
dropping it on the sticky counter.
 
His
plastic smile gone, he sloshed the coffee as he slid it back to the old man
before exiting into the growing rain.

The old man turned
and watched him go, eventually opening an old stir-drawer and finding the small
card with the twenty euro bill wrapped around it.
 
He unwrapped the currency and read the card,
sliding the money into his pocket.
 
He grabbed
the phone, dialing the number that had been scrawled on the card.
 
The voice mail sounded like the mechanical
voice provided by the cellular provider.
 
It picked up immediately and the old man waited for the beep.
 
“Yeah. You came into my pub one night a few weeks
or so ago and warned me there might be someone looking for a storage space
nearby.
 
Well, it happened today.
 
A slick, smartass Frenchman, trying to hide
his accent.
 
He had a long hook nose.
 
Just letting you know.”
 
He hung up and sipped his beer.