The Day After Tomorrow

132

FOR ALL intents, Remmer had not slept for twenty-one hours, and the day before that he’d barely slept three, which was why he’d had trouble reacting to the line of highway flares on the rain-slicked autobahn just north of Bad Hersfeld. Osborn was the first to cry out, and Remmer’s automatic-pilot reaction on the brakes slowed the big Mercedes from one hundred and eighty to less than a hundred in seconds.

Osborn’s knuckles turned white against the leather seats as the Mercedes’ rear end broke loose and the car spun wildly through a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree skid, giving him his first glimpse of the catastrophe in front of them. At least two trailer trucks and maybe a half-dozen cars were spewed over the highway. The Mercedes was spinning at eighty miles an hour and was no more than fifty yards from the first overturned truck. Osborn, bracing himself for the impact, glanced at Remmer. Remmer sat motionless, with both hands on the wheel as if he were riding directly into an abyss and were powerless to do anything about it. Osborn was about to lurch for the wheel, tear it out of his hands and try to steer past the truck from the passenger side, when the nose came around. As it did, Remmer’s right foot touched the accelerator. Instantly the tires grabbed and the Mercedes snapped out of its spin and shot forward. Then Remmer backed off the gas, tapped the brakes, and the car rocketed past the wrecked truck with inches to spare. With another touch of brakes and turn of wheel, Remmer avoided an overturned Volvo. Then they hit the soft gravel on the shoulder; the Mercedes went up on two wheels, teetered, then settled back down and came to a stop.

* * *

The train was moving at a crawl as it crisscrossed the rail lines coming into the Hauptbahnhof, the main rail station at Frankfurt. Von Holden stood to the side of the window looking out as they entered the station. He was alert, as if he might be expecting something.

Vera sat on the bunk watching him. She’d spent the night half sleeping, half awake, her thoughts whirling. Why was Paul in Switzerland? Why were the police bringing her to him? Was he hurt, even dying—?

She felt the train slow even more, then it stopped. A sharp hiss of air brakes was followed by the sound of the rail car doors being opened.

“When we go out, we will change to another train,” Von Holden said directly. “I remind you that you are still in custody of the federal police.”

“You’re taking me to Paul—do you think I’m going to run away?”

Suddenly there was a sharp knock at the door.

“Police. Open the door, please!”

Police? Vera looked at Von Holden.

Ignoring her, he went to the window and looked out. People moved up and down the platform, but he saw no other police, at least not in uniform.

The knock came again. “Police. Open the door immediately!”

“A mistake, they must be looking for someone else.” Von Holden turned back.

Crossing the compartment, he opened the door just enough to peer out. “Ja?” he said, pulling on a pair of glasses, as if to see them better.

Two men in civilian clothes stood there, one a little taller than the other. Behind them was a uniformed policeman, a submachine gun in his hands. The first two were obviously detectives.

“Step out of the compartment, please,” the taller one said.

“BKA,” Von Holden said, opening the door wider, letting them see Vera.

“Step out of the compartment!” the taller man said again. They’d been sent after a fugitive named Von Holden. This man might be him, but it might not. They hid only a photograph and in it the man did not wear glasses. Besides, the BKA? What was that business? And who was the woman?

“Of course.” Von Holden stepped into the passageway. The short detective was staring in at Vera. The uniform was staring at him. Von Holden smiled at him.

“Who is she?” the taller man asked.

“Prisoner in transit. A terrorist suspect.”

“Transit to where?”

“Bad Godesberg. BKA headquarters.”

“Where is the female officer? The policewoman?”

Vera looked at Von Holden. What were they talking about?

“There is none,” Von Holden said calmly. “There was no time. It has to do with Charlottenburg.”

“Identification.”

Von Holden saw the uniform glance out the window as an attractive woman passed by. They were relaxing, beginning to believe him.

“Of course.” Reaching into his lapel pocket with his right hand, he lifted out a thin wallet and handed it to the shorter detective.

Von Holden looked at Vera. “Are you all right, Miss Monneray?”

“I don’t understand what’s going on.”

“Nor do I.”

Von Holden turned back and there were two quick sounds like someone spitting. The uniform’s eyes suddenly went wide and his knees buckled. At the same time the squat muzzle of a silencer came up against the shorter detective’s forehead. There was another pop and he jolted backward, the rear of his skull shot away. Von Holden twisted sideways as the taller detective’s nine-millimeter Beretta cleared his jacket. His silenced, palm-sized .38 automatic caught him twice, once above and once below the breast bone. For an instant the man’s face twinged with anger, then he fell back and slid to the floor.

A moment later Von Holden and Vera were coming down out of the train and walking across the platform, mixing with the crowd from the train moving toward the interior of the station. Von Holden had the nylon case over his left shoulder; his right hand grasped Vera’s arm tightly. She was white with horror.

“Listen to me.” Von Holden was looking ahead, as if engaged in no more than casual conversation. “Those people were not police.”

Vera walked on, trying to regain her composure.

“Forget that it happened,” he said. “Erase the image from your mind.”

Now they were inside the station. Von Holden looked around for police but saw none. A clock over a newspaper kiosk read 7:25. Looking up, he scanned the overhead schedule of trains. When he saw what he wanted, he directed Vera into a fast-food kiosk and ordered coffee. “Drink it, please,” he said. When she hesitated, he smiled encouragingly. “Please.”

Vera picked up the cup. Her hands were shaking. She realized how frightened she still was. Taking a sip, she felt the coffee’s warmth run down inside her. She sensed that Von Holden had turned away; when he came back he was holding a newspaper.

“I said those people were not police.” He leaned close, talking so as not to be overheard. “Inside Germany there is a new kind of Nazi movement that has come together since unification, underground at the moment but determined to become a major power once again. Last night one hundred of Germany’s most powerful and influential democratic Germans gathered at Charlottenburg Palace in Berlin. They were there to be enlightened about what was going on in their country and to pledge their support in fighting it.”

Glancing at the clock over the kiosk, Von Holden opened the newspaper. On the cover was a dramatic photo of Charlottenburg engulfed in flame. The headline, in German, read “Charlottenburg Brent! “—Charlottenburg Burns!

“It was fire-bombed. Everyone there, was killed. This new Nazi movement was responsible.”

“You have a reason for telling me.” Vera knew he was keeping something back.

In the distance, Von Holden saw a half-dozen uniformed police running toward the train they had just left. Again he glanced at the clock: 7:33.

“Walk with me, please.”

Taking her arm, Von Holden moved off toward a waiting train.

“Paul Osborn discovered the men he was with were not who they seemed.”

“McVey?” Vera didn’t believe it.

“For one, yes.”

“No, never. He’s an American, like Paul.”

“Is there some coincidence that the French policeman McVey was working with in Paris was shot and killed in a London hospital at almost the same hour yesterday that the body of the prime minister was found?”

“Oh God—” Vera could see Lebrun standing with McVey in her apartment. It was the horror of the German occupation of France all over again. Pick a thousand faces and trust not one. It was the essence of what François Christian had been fighting against in France. What he feared most—French sentiment slipping under the influence of Germany. While Germany itself, torn by strife and cavil unrest, sleepwalked into the hands of fascists.

“It’s the reality of what we’re dealing with,” Von Holden pressed. “Organized, highly trained neo-Nazi terrorists operating in Europe and the Americas. Osborn found out and came to us. We took him out of Germany for his own safety. The same is true for you.”

“Me?” Vera stared at him in disbelief.

“I am not the one they were after just now, it was you. They know of your involvement with Francois Christian. They will assume you know things whether you do or not.”

All too clearly Vera saw Avril Rocard approaching the farmhouse outside Nancy, the dead French Secret Service agents sprawled on the ground behind her.

“How did you know about François?” she asked painfully.

“Osborn told us. That’s why we got you out of jail, before McVey and his friends could extend their influence further.”

Now they were turning down a platform, walking in a crowd alongside a waiting train. Von Holden was looking for car numbers. A loudspeaker announced the arrival of one train, the departure of another. How had the police known he was on the train? He scanned the faces and body movements of the people around them. Attack could come from anywhere. In the distance came the blare of sirens. Then he saw the car he was looking for.

At 7:46, the Inter City Express pulled out of the Hauptbahnhof. Vera settled uncertainly into a crushed red velvet seat in a first-class compartment next to Von Holden. As the train accelerated, she leaned back and turned to look out the window. That McVey could have been other than what he seemed was impossible. Yet Lebrun was dead and so was Francois Christian. And Von Holden knew too much about all of it not to be believed. And now a hundred more had died in the Charlottenburg fire, to say nothing of the men Von Holden had killed in the railroad station. At another time, under other circumstances, she might have thought more clearly. But too much had happened, too quickly and too brutally.

Most terrifying of all, it had been done beneath the specter of a rising German political movement far too horrendous to contemplate.