The Day After Tomorrow

93

REMMER TURNED the Mercedes off Hardenbergstrasse into the underground garage of a glass-and-concrete municipal building at number 15. One of the gray unmarked federal police escort cars followed them in and backed into a space across from theirs. Osborn could see the faces of the detectives as he got out and walked with the others toward the elevators. They were younger than he expected, probably not even thirty. For some reason that surprised him and he flashed on a whole vanguard of people younger than he was coming up behind him as professionals. It didn’t make him feel old as much as it put things out of balance. Policemen had always been older than he was and he was always in the front line of young men coming up, the others were still kids in school. But suddenly they weren’t anymore. Why he thought about it now he didn’t know except that maybe he was trying to keep from thinking about where they were going and what could conceivably happen when they got here.

They’d stayed in the private room in the restaurant for more than two hours eating lunch and drinking coffee and waiting. Then Honig had sent word that criminal court judge Otto Gravenitz would see them in his chambers at three.

On the way over, McVey had counseled him on what to say in his deposition. Merriman’s words immediately before his death were all that were important and Osborn was to give only the bare essentials of what had happened. In other words, he was to make no mention of the hired private detective, Jean Packard. No mention of the syringes. No mention of the drug Osborn had administered. What McVey was doing was finding a way to ease Osborn’s unstated but undoubtedly very real fear of going into a situation where he might be forced to incriminate himself into a charge of attempted murder.

McVey’s gesture was intended to be generous and Osborn was supposed to appreciate it and he did, except that he knew it had a second edge. McVey’s concern wasn’t that Osborn might put himself on the spot, it was that he didn’t want a complication jeopardizing his chance for a murder-for-hire writ against Scholl. That meant the hearing had to be kept simple and pointed at Scholl, both for the judge and for Honig, whose opinion obviously carried a great deal of weight If Osborn went too far with what he said, they’d get into a whole different matter, one that could shift the focus from Scholl to Osborn and seriously endanger the main argument.

“What do you think?” McVey said to Remmer as the elevator doors slid closed. “They know we’re here?”

Remmer shrugged. “All I can tell you is that we were not followed from the plane to Berlin. Nor from the restaurant to here. But who knows what eyes we don’t see. Safer to assume they know, I think, yes?”

Noble glanced at McVey. Remmer was right: safer to be on guard than not. Even if the “group” didn’t know they J were here, they had to believe they soon would. They’d seen too much of the way they worked already.

At the sixth floor, the elevator stopped and they walked out into a reception area where they were ushered into a i private office and asked to wait.

“Do you know this judge? Gravenitz? That his name?” McVey looked around at what was obviously a civil servant’s office. The plain steel desk and chair that went with it would fit into any public building in L.A. So would the inexpensive bookcase and the cheap prints on the wall.

Remmer nodded. “Not well, but yes.”

“What can we expect?”

“Depends what Honig told him. Unquestionably it was enough for him to agree to see us. But don’t think because Honig set it up or Gravenitz agreed to see us right away it’s guaranteed. Gravenitz will take convincing.

McVey glanced at his watch and sat down on a corner of the desk, then looked at Osborn.

“I’m okay.” Osborn walked over and leaned against the wall by the window. McVey hadn’t forgotten his assault on Merriman and wouldn’t. That was something else he didn’t want to think about, not now. Still, it hung there because he knew at some point it would become an issue.

The door opened and Diedrich Honig came in. Judge Gravenitz, he apologized, had been delayed but would see them momentarily. Then he looked at Noble and told him a message had come for him to call his London office immediately.

“A break, maybe?” Noble went to the desk and picked up the phone. In thirty seconds he had his office. Twenty seconds after that he was transferred to the chief homicide superintendent of the London police.

“Oh God, no,” he said a moment later. “How did it happen? He had a twenty-four-hour guard.”

“Lebrun,” McVey breathed.

“Well where in God’s name is he now?” Noble said irritably. “Find him and when you get him, hold him in isolation. When you have any information at all, relay it through Inspector Remmer’s office in Bad Godesberg.” Hanging up, Noble turned to McVey with the details of Lebrun’s murder and the fact that Cadoux had disappeared in the confusion immediately following his shooting of the orderly.

“I don’t have to bet whether the orderly’s dead,” McVey said through clenched teeth.

“No, you don’t.”

Running a hand through his hair, McVey walked across the room. When he turned back he was looking directly at Honig. “You ever lose one of your friends in the line of duty, Herr Honig?”

“You don’t do this game without it . . . ,” Honig said quietly.

“Then how much longer do we have to wait for Judge Gravenitz?” It wasn’t a question, it was a demand.