The Death Instinct

Chapter Fourteen

Among the grander edifices on Vienna's Ringstrasse was a five-story, pink-and-white confection of an apartment building, the first floor of which housed the elegant Cafй Landtmann. In the main salon of that coffeehouse, below a receding boulevard of crystal chandeliers, Younger met Freud at eleven the next morning. The head waiter had greeted Freud as if he knew him personally and guided them to a table at a window with elaborate drapery, through which they could see the magnificent state theater across the street.

'So,' said Freud, taking a seat, 'do you know what I want to discuss with you?'

'The Oedipus complex?' asked Younger.

'Miss Rousseau.'

'Why?'

'Tell me first,' said Freud, 'what you thought of my old friend Jauregg, the neurologist.'

Younger, Colette, and Luc had visited Dr Julius Wagner-Jauregg in his university office earlier that morning. 'His treatment for war neurosis is electrocution,' said Younger.

'Yes. His team reports considerable success. Was he surprised I had sent you?'

'Very. He said you testified against him at a trial of some kind last week.'

'On the contrary, I testified for him. There was an allegation that he had essentially tortured our soldiers into returning to the front. The government commissioned me to investigate. I reported that his use of electrotherapy had been perfectly ethical. I explained, of course, that only psychoanalysis could uncover the roots of shell shock and cure it, but that this was not yet known in 1914. My friend — and his many supporters — spent the rest of the hearing attempting to destroy the reputation of every psychoanalyst in Vienna.' A waiter brought them two small gold- rimmed demitasses of coffee and a basket of pastries. 'Foolish of me. I'd somehow forgotten how intense a hostility we still provoke. But never mind. Did he persuade you to attempt electrocution on the boy?'

'He made a case for a single treatment at low voltage. He believes shell shock is a kind of short circuit inside the brain — and that a brief convulsive charge can clear the circuitry.'

'I know. And since you disbelieve in psychology, you should be favorably inclined.'

Younger pictured the confused and harrowed expressions he had seen in the faces of shell-shocked soldiers. The scientist in him knew that the cause of their suffering could indeed have been a cross-firing in their neural circuitry. But something in him rebelled at this diagnosis or at least at the treatment. At last he said, 'I don't believe there's anything wrong with the boy's brain.'

'Ah — you think the problem is in his larynx?'

'I doubt it,' said Younger.

'Well, at least you have one thing right. What was Miss Rousseau's opinion? No, let me guess. She was distracted and had no firm opinion. She wanted you to decide.'

'How did you know that?'

'Would you say she is self-destructive?' asked Freud.

'Not at all.'

'Really? My impression was that you had a taste for such women.'

'I make exceptions,' said Younger.

'She's not attracted to abusive men?'

'If you mean me, her attraction to abusive men is regrettably weak.'

'I don't mean you,' said Freud.

'Her fiancй — Gruber?'

'The man is a convicted criminal.'

Younger looked out the window. 'She only remembers a sweet, injured, devout soldier she knew in a hospital.'

'A maternal affection? Not likely.' Freud stirred his coffee. A scowl came to his already deeply furrowed brow. 'Was I too severe with her last night?'

'She can take it. Why were you severe?'

Freud removed his glasses and wiped them clean with a handkerchief, lingering on each lens. 'She reminds me of my Sophie, my second-to-youngest,' he said. 'Beautiful, headstrong. Sophie became engaged at the age of nineteen. To a thirty-year-old photographer. It was as if she couldn't get out of the house fast enough. I believe I was taking out on Miss Rousseau an anger I harbor against Sophie for leaving us so soon.'

'Sophie — she's the one who lives in Germany?'

'She's the one who is dead.'

Freud's spoon tapped the rim of his glass, repeatedly, unevenly.

'I didn't know,' said Younger.

'It happened last January. The flu. She was living in Berlin, she and her two little boys and her husband, whom I never treated as well as I should have. When we received word she was ill, there were no trains running — not even for an emergency. The next we heard, she was gone.' He took a deep breath. 'After that, fundamentally everything lost its meaning for me. To an unbeliever like myself, there can be no rationalizations in such circumstances. No justifications. Only mute submission. Blunt necessity. For several months, my own children — my other children — and their children — ' Freud stopped, gathering himself — 'I could no longer bear the sight of them.'

Outside, the Ring was in its full daytime bloom. Cars and streetcars rolled by. A charming carriage trotted past. A governess strolled with a perambulator.

'Well, the intention that man be happy was never part of his creation,' said Freud. 'You will say it's superstition, but I have a foreboding about Miss Rousseau. What is her goal in coming to Vienna?'

'You guessed it last night. This Gruber fellow was just released from prison.'

'Come — you can't have forgotten all your psychology. What is her object?'

'To see if he still loves her, I suppose. Or perhaps if she still loves him. She made a promise. She feels she has to keep it.'

'Nonsense. I don't trust her motivation. Neither should you. Do you know what specifically her soldier was imprisoned for?'

'No.'

'I do. She told me herself — in tears, the day after you left Vienna last year. He beat up an old man. So at least the police say. I advised her that a ruffian who marches with the Anti-Semitic League was not a fit husband for her. I counseled her not to see him again. I thought she took my advice.'

'Evidently she reconsidered,' said Younger.

'There is a condition into which many young women fall. They attach themselves to violent men. They forgive any mistreatment. They think it love; it isn't. What they really want is to be punished for their sins, real and imagined — or for someone else's. There's something wrong with Miss Rousseau's attachment to this Gruber. I sense it. My advice to you is not to let her out of your sight. She's throwing herself into the arms of a criminal.'

'Maybe he'll beat her, and she'll come to her senses.'

Freud raised an eyebrow. Younger wondered if his own habit of doing so — raising a single brow — was copied from Freud. 'You feel,' said Freud, 'she's made her bed with this man, and you're inclined to let her sleep in it?'

'I don't control where Miss Rousseau sleeps.'

'You wish to see her punished — for choosing another man. You retaliate by letting her go.'

'Letting her go? I crossed an ocean trying to change her mind.'

'You can't change her mind. But you might be able to protect her.' 'From what?' asked Younger.

'From this Gruber. From a decision she'll regret the rest of her life.'

Younger, back at the Hotel Bristol, found a note waiting for him:

Dear Stratham:

I'm running to catch a train. I didn't go to the Radium Institute. I went to the prison, and they told me that Hans had left Vienna and gone to Braunau am Inn. I think it's his hometown. There's only one train a day for Braunau, and it leaves in half an hour. I expect to be back tomorrow. Luc is upstairs in my room. Please look after him. Some day I hope you'll understand.

Yours,

Colette

Younger stared at the note a long time. He ran his hands through his hair. Then he had a messenger sent for Oktavian Kinsky, the aristocratic carriage driver.

An hour later, Younger and Luc were waiting in the hotel lobby when Oktavian appeared, nattily dressed in the leather jacket and crisp cap customarily worn by chauffeurs of open-air automobiles. 'I know you wanted a motorcar, Monsieur,' said Oktavian, 'but this was the best I could do on short notice. Quite sufficient, however. I'll have you in Braunau in six hours.'

He pointed outside, where, in front of the hotel, stood a gleaming motorcycle with polished chrome trim and an attached wood-paneled sidecar.

'No good,' said Younger.

Oktavian saw the problem: Luc was dressed for travel as well, and the sidecar would hold only one passenger. 'Is the young fellow coming? I didn't realize.'

Younger walked outside. Oktavian and Luc followed him. 'The boy and I will go ourselves,' said Younger.

'But the vehicle isn't mine,' Oktavian replied. 'I don't think-'

'You'll have it back tomorrow. I guarantee it. I'll take this too, if you don't mind.' Younger relieved Oktavian of his leather jacket. 'And the cap.'

'Oh, dear,' said Oktavian.

The top of the sidecar had a hole in it for the passenger's torso. It opened into two leaves, revealing a cushioned seat and a small storage compartment. Younger fitted the leather jacket onto Luc, pulled the cap down over his ears, deposited him onto the seat, and closed the two leaves, locking them into place. Not long after, they were on the open road.

As he drove, Younger taught Luc how to lean into the curves to increase their speed. The jacket and cap were comically oversized on the boy, but they kept him warm. Younger said nothing about the purpose behind their mission, and Luc didn't ask. All in all, it wasn't bad riding — until the rains came.

The first crack of lightning split the sky in front of them without warning. A thunderclap rent the air immediately afterward, like a howitzer exploding directly over their heads. Luc seized Younger's arm in alarm. Younger momentarily lost control of the handlebar, the motorcycle swerving and nearly spinning out beneath him. When he'd straightened them out, Younger barked at the boy roughly. 'When you're scared,' he added, 'move slower, not faster.'

The walled village of Braunau, on the river Inn, was quaint and utterly German in character, a mere stone's throw from Bavaria. Colorful pointed-roof houses adjoined one another in picturesque little town squares, all presided over by a high-steepled church. There was no railway station — just a platform and ticket booth.

Younger pulled his motorcycle up to that platform in the gathering darkness. He wiped the grit from his eyes and the water from his forehead, wishing he'd had goggles. The trip hadn't taken six hours. It had taken ten — a combination of the rain slowing them down, the necessity of feeding Luc, and their getting lost on three different occasions. Younger opened the top of the sidecar and pulled Luc out; the interior was drenched, as was the boy.

Younger asked the ticket agent if there were any blankets on hand. There were. Younger threw them to Luc, ordering him to take off his wet clothes and dry himself. 'The train from Vienna,' Younger said to the man. 'Has it come?'

'Yes — two hours ago,' answered the agent.

'Did you happen to see a girl, dark hair, traveling by herself, get off that train?'

'French?' asked the agent.

'Yes.'

'Very beautiful?'

'That's her.'

'Nein.'

Younger waited; no further information came. 'What do you mean, nein?' he asked.

'I wasn't here when the Vienna train arrived, Mein Herr,' said the man. 'But your fraulein must have been on it. I sold her a ticket.'

'A ticket where?'

'She bought a one-way on the night train to Prague. No baggage. You only just missed her; the train left less than an hour ago. Most unusual. Imagine, a girl like that traveling at night by herself.'

Younger ran his hands through his hair. 'I'm looking for a Hans Gruber. Do you know where he lives? Or his family?'

Younger found the house the ticket agent had described to him — a small, fenced, rustic affair, clean but dilapidated. The roof looked like it might collapse at any moment. A thick-set, hard-eyed old woman answered the door.

'Frau Gruber?' asked Younger.

'Yes,' she said. 'What do you want?'

'I'm a friend of Hans's.'

'Liar.' The old woman's voice was both shrewish and shrewd. The sight of the blanket-wrapped boy at Younger's side did nothing to soften her. 'Go away. He's not here. He's in Vienna.'

She tried to shut the door, but Younger stopped her. 'That's not what you told the girl,' he said. 'You told her Prague.'

She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. The old yellow teeth broke into a nasty laugh. 'You think I don't know what he'll do with her? I know his tricks. He'll take the shirt from her back. He'll make her whore for him and throw her in the rubbish bin when she's used up. Just like all the others.'

Younger's reaction to these predictions was surprisingly ambivalent. On the one hand, he felt Colette might actually be in danger if she married Gruber. On the other, he felt the odds of her marrying Gruber had distinctly decreased. 'Tell me where in Prague I can find him.'

'I know why you're here,' said the old woman. 'He owes you money. I see it in your eyes. Well, he owes me first.' She shook her head bitterly 'Taking the family stipend all these years, just because the government addresses the envelopes to him. Then he dares come back here and sleep under my roof. Get out of my doorway or I'll call the police. You expect me to help you get money from Hans? Anything he has belongs to me.'

'How much?' asked Younger.

'What's that?'

'How much does he owe you?'

The old woman was only too happy to work out the sum; it was a large one. Younger took from his wallet, in crowns, a significantly larger amount. Her eyes twinkled.

Younger left the woman's house with an address in Prague and with Luc clad in a dry and clean, if ancient, brown wool suit of boy's clothing. From the ticket agent, he had a good idea how to get to

Prague. 'You get some sleep in there,' he said to Luc as the latter climbed into the sidecar. 'We have a long road ahead.'

Luc fastened his eyes searchingly on Younger.

'All right, there's no mystery to it,' said Younger. 'Your sister is looking for a man she met during the war. They were supposed to be married. We're following her.'

Luc still looked at Younger.

'No, I don't know what I'm going to do if we find her,' said Younger. 'It's probably pointless anyway. By the time we get to Prague, they're likely to be in a church with the wedding bells already pealing. At which point I'll look pretty foolish.'

The boy tapped Younger's arm. He fished around inside the compartment for something to write on and found some of Oktavian's engraved cards. On the back of one, he wrote a message and handed it to Younger. The card said, 'My sister wants to marry you.'

'That is demonstrably false,' answered Younger, mounting the motorcycle and kick-starting it.

Luc tapped at his sleeve and handed him another card. This one said, 'I don't like my sister.'

'Yes, you do,' said Younger.

It was nine in the morning when, in a light rain, they rattled over the cobblestone streets of Prague's Novй Mesto, or New Town, where 'new' refers to the green days of the mid-fourteenth century. The jumbling of epochs throughout the great city was incongruous. Gothic churches jostled with ornate neoclassical domes; baroque palaces sported box-like towers from the Middle Ages; and the streets were studded with nineteenth-century statues of eighteenth-century generals rearing back on their steeds, swords in hand. In the drizzling rain, all was gray; even the gold spires on the churches and the salmon-pink houses seemed gray.

Younger's eyes were bloodshot. He had driven through the night. Next to him, slumped over in the sidecar, Luc lay sleeping.

On a wide avenue bordering the slow and turbid river Vltava, Younger pulled up outside a cafe showing signs of life. He got out, lit a cigarette, and crossed the avenue to a parapet where he could look out at the water. Downriver, boats passed into tunnel-like vaults below a medieval stone bridge. Yawning, Luc — awakened by the vehicle's halt — joined him. Across the river, the land sloped up to a considerable height, at the summit of which, reflecting the glinting rays of a morning sun, stood the sprawling Prazsky hrad, the castle of Prague.

'It's the largest castle in the world,' Younger said to Luc. 'Before the war, it was home to emperors and kings. It's empty now — being rebuilt, they say. Renovated for government use. Smell that? Something's baking in that cafe. Let's go have a look.'

It took them another hour to find the street that old Frau Gruber in Braunau had written down for Younger. The Czech language was incomprehensible to him; even when he found someone with whom he could get by in German, no one recognized the street name. This may have been because the street was located in the oldest quarter, which was a maze of labyrinthine alleys, or because Younger couldn't make its pronunciation intelligible.

At last they found the little street, near an ancient stone gunpowder tower. From surrounding rooftops, a tribunal of life-size saints, carved from centuries-darkened marble, gazed down on them in postures twisted in either bliss or agony. Two- and three-story houses, hundreds of years old, lined the narrow street, their opposing balconies so close that the occupants might almost have been able to shake hands across them.

Younger knocked at the house posted with the number he was looking for. He wasn't sure what he would do if someone answered, but no one did. He tried the door; it was locked. He also tried questioning passersby, asking for Hans Gruber. They had no idea what he was saying — or if they did, the name meant nothing to them.

'We'll just have to wait,' he said to Luc. A short way down the street, he parked the motorcycle in a space between two old buildings and lit a cigarette.

By early afternoon, Colette still had not appeared. Nor had anyone fitting the description of Hans Gruber. It occurred to Younger that old Frau Gruber might have lied to him about the address. He didn't think so. Another possibility was that she had made a mistake about the address, but if that were true, then Colette would make the same mistake and eventually turn up — assuming she hadn't beaten them there, which Younger considered very unlikely, given the propensity of the Austrian trains to break down and arrive at their destinations up to twenty-four hours late.

At a nearby store, Younger bought a loaf of bread and some thick slices of ham. When he returned with these goods, the boy handed him another message: 'Am I a coward?'

Younger fixed a sandwich for the boy and another for himself. 'I'm going to answer you with a bromide,' said Younger. 'In English, a bromide is a platitude, a commonplace — something everybody knows. Actually, it's also a bromine salt, but never mind that. Being afraid doesn't make you a coward. That's the bromide — but it happens to be true.'

Luc wrote on a new card: 'You're never afraid.'

'Oh, yes I am,' said Younger. 'I'll tell you a secret. Bravery consists of not letting anyone else know how scared you are. Sorry to have to tell you, but by the time they're your age, some boys have already proven they're heroes. You might as well know the truth. I knew a boy once — no older than you — who did about the bravest thing I've ever seen. This boy had been kidnapped. He was tied up. And he still had the presence of mind to point my attention to a test tube of uranium dioxide that happened to be rolling off a table at just that moment. Saved us from being killed by a rather ugly fellow. Actually a very ugly fellow. So ugly he looked better with his hair on fire.'

Night had fallen when Luc woke him up. The street was now full of light and noise from several boisterous taverns. The air was cold. Younger s mouth tasted stale; his whole body was stiff. Luc pointed eagerly: a slim female silhouette in a lightweight coat was approaching the house with determined steps. It was Colette. She knocked on the door. This time someone answered, and she disappeared up a flight of stairs. Younger waited, scanning the windows overhead for signs of life.

He was considering what to do next when Colette reappeared in the doorway and proceeded down the street, passing directly opposite Younger and Luc. A few steps on, she turned and vanished into a stone archway.

They followed, cautiously. The archway led to a surprisingly large, crowded, open-air beer hall in the courtyard of what might have been an abbey centuries before. A small orchestra played merrily. Lanterns hung from branches. Men sang, unpleasantly loud and off-key. Women were plentiful, but none was unaccompanied except Colette. There was dancing on a flagstone dance floor. Colette, it seemed, was looking for Gruber.

Younger was sorely tempted to show himself. But he suspected that if he presented himself straightaway, before she had even met her Heinrich, Colette would be furious and indisposed to listen to him. His interference might even, Younger reflected, make her more stubborn. It seemed better to let Gruber sink his own ship. If Frau Gruber was right, Heinrich would be a cad and a ladies' man — a type that might possibly have fooled Colette when he was sick and wounded, but that would surely repulse her now. And if Colette wasn't repulsed, there would be time for Younger to confront her later and to make a last appeal. In addition to which, Younger had to admit to a certain curiosity; he wanted to see how Colette and Gruber would behave when they saw each other.

So Younger installed himself with Luc in a dark corner of the crowded garden as far as possible from Colette. He pulled the oversized driver's cap low over the boy's head, although in the darkness and crush of bodies, there was little chance of Colette spying them. She seemed preoccupied, in any event, with her own business. Under one of the hanging lamps, conspicuous in her solitude, Colette took a seat on a bench at one end of a long wooden table. Almost ostentatiously, it seemed to Younger, she removed her coat and revealed a dress like none in which he had ever seen her before.

Her arms were bare, her back exposed. Her hemline, which almost revealed her knees — no, which did reveal her knees when, seated, she crossed one leg over the other — conspired with her high-heeled shoes to attract virtually every male eye in the beer garden. Never did a back express so clearly that it was made to be looked at. The men at the table behind her manifestly thought so. They pounded each other on the shoulders, pointing to the newcomer, and made the predictable male noises and gestures.

Among those men, despite never having laid eyes on him before, Younger instantly recognized Hans Gruber. He was unmistakable: the only tall, blond, strapping, blue-eyed man in the garden. He was an exceedingly well-looking man — in his late twenties, rakish in clothing, confident in demeanor, generously ordering drinks not only for himself but for a coterie of friends as well.

From another direction, a stranger with a greasy mustache stumbled up to Colette's table, apparently meaning to engage her in repartee, but tripping over her bench in his haste. Colette swiveled deftly, so that the man fell not into her lap but onto the table instead, howling at the blow to his shin and knocking over a collection of glasses and bottles. In the ensuing quarrel, Colette showed not the slightest interest, removing a cigarette holder from her purse. Younger had never seen her smoke.

A cupped pair of male hands appeared with a lit match. The hands belonged, of course, to Hans Gruber. Colette accepted the light. She looked up at him and spoke, but the noise of the place was such that Younger could only see the moving lips. It was not obvious to Younger that Gruber recognized her. Or perhaps, as his hands lingered near her lips and they spoke together, their faces not far apart, he was recognizing her just now.

They continued conversing for a while — she smoking, he occasionally thrusting off other men who sought an audience with her. Gruber ordered a drink for her; it was delivered; Gruber paid for it; she drank it. Presently he led her to the dance floor. And dance they did, with Hans's right hand caressing Colette's waist.

Younger grimaced, inwardly.

Their dancing lasted an hour or more, punctuated by rambunctious consumption of alcohol in abundant quantity, not only by Gruber, but by Colette and two short, stocky friends of his, who lacked female companionship of their own but seemed to take as their goal the furtherance of Gruber's conquest. At one point Gruber downed a triple stein of sudsing beer in one go, cheered on by chants of his name. During a lull in the music, Gruber helped Colette into her coat and led her merrily out of the beer garden, his two friends trailing behind them, laughing uproariously.

Younger let them pass out of the garden before setting off after them. He and Luc got to the street just in time to see Colette entering the back of an open-roofed four-seater. Gruber got in next to her, and the car drove off. Gruber sang loudly — and not badly, Younger had to admit — his arm draped over Colette's shoulder. Younger hurried to the motorcycle.

Six-pointed stars and Hebrew letters on storefronts indicated that they had entered a Jewish quarter. Younger could not have said exactly what he was doing — surreptitiously trailing Colette and her beau as they drove through Prague — but he kept at it. Younger had followed Gruber's car on a meandering, inebriated path. More than once, the car rolled up onto the sidewalk before rediscovering the street.

They were now on a boulevard called Mikulasska Street, lined with trees and art nouveau facades lit capriciously by gas lamps. An old woman scurried across the street, carrying something heavy in her arms, as if running for cover.

'What's she doing out at this hour?' asked Younger, speaking his thoughts aloud.

Shouts came from unseen precincts. Packs of boys could be seen running down side streets. Up ahead was a commotion. Gruber's car stopped just past the disturbance. Younger came to a halt as well, next to a ring of more than a dozen young men on the large sidewalk. At the center of their circle, a gentleman in evening clothes — a slight man with glasses and a walking stick — was being pushed and taunted. Someone yanked away his cane and threw it at a shop window, breaking the glass.

'Festive,' said Younger.

Gruber hopped out of his car and ran toward the crowd. He pulled aside one gawker after another to reach the center of the circle, where the taunted gentleman in evening clothes stood.'Jiidisch?' asked Gruber.

The frightened man didn't reply. The onlookers seemed as suspicious of Gruber as they were hostile to the gentleman.

'Jiidisch?' Gruber repeated, not malignly, but as if it were an important point of information.

Luc looked at Younger, who explained quietly, 'He asking if the man's Jewish.'

The bespectacled gentleman in evening clothes evidently understood the German word. He nodded just perceptibly: perhaps he nursed a hope of rescue from the foreigner. The admission was costly. Gruber removed the man's glasses, let them fall to the ground, and crushed them under his shoe. The crowd erupted with approving shouts. The gentleman tried to back away, but Gruber caught him by a lapel and punched him in the face, causing him to fall backward through the broken windowpane. The crowd cheered still louder. Hans, wiping his hands, pushed through the circle of onlookers and returned to his car.

Younger considered going to the aid of the assaulted man, but Gruber was even then climbing back into his car. Probably Colette had no knowledge of what he had just done. Younger could see her in the backseat, letting Gruber throw his arm around her again. The car restarted and drove away. Younger left the fallen man to his fate.

Gruber's car rolled slowly up the boulevard. Younger followed, keeping his distance. After several blocks, they entered an old square in the center of which a bonfire burned. People clapped their hands and sang around it. Others, loaded with piles of heavy tomes, emerged from an old and considerable building on the opposite side of the square. When these people reached the bonfire, they fed it with the books.

'It's a good old-fashioned pogrom,' said Younger.

Gruber's car crossed the square, circumventing the revelers, and about a half mile farther on, pulled up at the gate of a small, grassy park. Younger stopped a block or so behind him. The interior of the park was dotted with wrought-iron lampposts and scattered trees, whose russet leaves shimmered silver in the moonlight. Gruber and Colette got out. His friends remained within, drinking and carousing.

'Wait here,' said Younger to Luc.

Younger dismounted and slipped through the darkness to the perimeter of the park, where he encountered a high, barred, iron fence. Through the bars, he could make out Colette and Gruber strolling arm in arm. Younger moved along the fence, watching them penetrate farther into the center of the park. Gruber was carrying on in rapid German; Colette laughed flirtatiously, although Younger had trouble believing she could understand what he was saying. To Younger's disgust, Gruber twirled Colette every now and then as if they were still dancing in the beer garden.

They stopped under the soft light of a gas lamp. Gruber slipped her coat off and let it fall to the ground. He turned Colette around so that he faced her back. His put his hands on her stomach and seemed to be nibbling at her ear. Younger recalled an evening when he himself had done something similar: Colette had been rather less acquiescent. Roughly, Gruber turned her round again. They were face-to-face. He stroked her mouth with his thumb. Colette's purse fell to the grass. Gruber drew her in, bent to kiss her — then abruptly staggered back, palms raised in the air.

Colette was holding a small pistol. There had been no report; she hadn't shot him. But she pointed it straight at his heart with two hands. She was saying something to him in German. From her cadence Younger had the impression she was reciting memorized words, but she spoke too quietly for Younger to understand. Gruber dropped to his knees, pleading, begging. Colette was breathing hard; her shoulders heaved up and down. Then she grew still, her pistol aimed at Gruber's eyes, the range point-blank.

But she hesitated. A full thirty seconds she hesitated, Gruber supplicating all the while. At last she took a backward step, then another and another, until she turned and fled into the darkness.

Younger heard a collision and a muffled cry. A moment later, Hans's stocky friends appeared in the cone of light falling from the lamppost. Between them, they held a struggling Colette, her feet not quite touching the ground. She must have run right into them. One of the men had a fat hand covering her mouth; the other pressed Colette's own gun into her ribs.

Gruber got up. He spat, wiped his nose on his sleeve, and took the pistol from his friend. He slapped Colette across the face, called her a foul name in German, and inserted the gun into her mouth.

'You there, Gruber!' bellowed Younger, straining at the bars of the fence. 'Let her go!'

His voice took the men by surprise. They heard Younger, but couldn't see him. Gruber spun around, waving the pistol blindly in Younger's direction.

'We're coming for you, Gruber,' shouted Younger. 'We're going to rip your heart out of your chest and stuff it in your mouth and make you eat it.'

Younger was of course lying: there was no 'we.' Or so Younger thought until a little figure dashed up next to him and fought its way through the bars of the fence, which were too tightly spaced for a man, but not for a boy. Younger grabbed Luc by his leather jacket just as he squeezed through. His feet spun like a flywheel, slapping at the ground, but he went nowhere.

The sound of these footsteps had an immediate effect. Evidently believing that he was being chased, Gruber broke for the park gate, ordering his friends to bring the girl. The two men obeyed at once, dragging Colette between them. Younger, yanking Luc back through the fence, sprinted away as well, carrying the boy over his shoulder. He had farther to go, but he reached the motorcycle almost as quickly as Gruber and his friends reached their car.

'Stay when I tell you to, damn it,' ordered Younger, jamming Luc back into the sidecar and this time pinning the boy's arms and shoulders into the closed interior, so that he couldn't squirm out. 'Brave lad.'

Younger fired up the motorcycle's engine and pulled out in chase.

Gruber had taken the wheel of his car. He drove savagely through the narrow streets. He didn't slow when he sideswiped a parked car or even when he sent pedestrians diving out of his way In fact he sped up once when a man in the middle of the street had nowhere to go; on impact, the man was sent sprawling. In the backseat, Colette was sandwiched between Gruber's two friends, who held her fast.

Younger pursued, but could not close the distance between them. Suddenly they emerged onto an avenue bordering the river, where Younger, opening the throttle, was able to make up ground. Gruber turned under a Gothic pointed arch onto a medieval bridge, hurtling past twisted baroque statues on either side, again sending pedestrians scurrying away. As they reached the far side of the river, Younger was right behind him.

But Gruber made a sharp turn off the bridge, and though Younger tried to follow, the motorcycle skidded out beneath him, spinning a hundred and eighty degrees and slamming into a shuttered wooden stall. Younger had the bike going again in a moment, but he had lost ground. Down the street, Gruber turned hard again, tires screeching, heading uphill. Following, Younger entered a neighborhood with zigzagging streets that grew increasingly steep. For a moment Younger lost Gruber's car completely. Then, in the distance, he saw it take a hairpin turn and disappear up a steep alley.

Younger raced to follow. The street underneath turned into a cobblestone ramp lined by houses on one side and a stone wall on the other. They were ascending to a great height. Low steps intervened every fifty feet or so; Younger bounced in the air every time they climbed over one of them, with Luc in the sidecar airborne next to him. They flew by a roadblock, which was broken and swinging: Gruber's car had obviously smashed through only moments before.

At the summit, Younger entered a huge dark plaza. He stopped the bike. The massive Gothic cathedral of St. Vitus loomed up one side, and the enormous Prague castle on the other, engulfed in shadows.

The plaza was empty, littered with rocky debris and construction equipment. In some places the ground had been dug out in vast holes. In other places mounds of earth were piled twelve feet high. All was silent. Strange oblong shapes broke up the moonlight. There was no sign of Gruber.

Younger didn't like it. Gruber's car could be hiding anywhere, while if Younger drove into the open plaza, he and Luc would be exposed — wide-open targets. A flock of birds screamed from a distant corner of the square, rising and peeling away, but Younger heard no motor, nor saw any vehicle lights. 'Maybe they aren't here,' said Younger quietly, not believing his own words.

He killed his headlight. With a light hand on the throttle, he guided the motorcycle around the dug-up terrain, skirting the large equipment and the dangerous pits. Still there was no sign of Gruber. They came to two great conical mounds of earth, close together. Younger rolled the motorcycle between them.

Just ahead was a vast and panoramic vista overlooking all Prague — its river, its bridges, its many districts sparkling with lights. At the edge of the precipice, there had been a retaining wall, but it was demolished. Younger began to fear that he really might have lost his prey.

The response to this inward conjecture was the roar of an engine behind them and a crash. Gruber's car had rammed them from the rear, forcing them several feet closer to the cliff. Gruber backed up and rammed them again. Younger had no escape route, caught between the two hillocks on either side of them and the precipice ahead. Gruber's car now locked against the rear of the motorcycle and sidecar; its engine screamed, pushing them forward. Younger's brakes had no effect. He put the bike in reverse and gunned the motor. This slowed their forward motion, but didn't halt it. They came to the very edge of the precipice — and lurched to a stop. The remains of the demolished retaining wall, maybe five or six inches in height, had saved them.

Gruber backed up one last time. Younger tried to yank Luc out of the sidecar by the collar of his leather jacket, but the boy was crammed into it too well. Younger couldn't get him out. He heard the roar of Gruber's car; he heard its gears engage. Younger jumped onto the top of the sidecar. He seized the boy by the armpits, pulling and twisting at him just as the final impact came, which punched the motorcycle over the curb. Younger was thrown into the air, with the boy in his arms, as the motorcycle plunged over the cliffside and banged down the mountainous slope, flipping over, hitting ground and flipping again, finally crashing into a stone wall at the bottom of the hill, where it exploded into flame.

Younger looked down at the explosion from a spot a few yards down from the top of the cliff. He and Luc had rolled down the treacherous slope together until Younger arrested their descent by the clever stratagem of slamming into a tree trunk. The explosion sent pieces of the motorcycle high in the air, several of which rained down on either side of Younger and Luc. The boy wasn't breathing properly: his eyes were wide, but he wasn't taking in breath at all. Younger had a heart-stopping instant. Then Luc began to gasp brokenly.

'You're all right,' said Younger. 'Just the wind knocked out of you. Stay here.'

Younger ran up the slope. When he climbed back into the plaza, he saw Gruber's car at the other end — about to leave the square by the same cobbled lane they had come up. Younger put fingers to mouth and whistled piercingly in the night.

Gruber's car stopped. Younger whistled again. The car backed up and wheeled around, its headlamps illuminating Younger, perhaps a hundred feet separating them. For an instant there was no movement except the wind ruffling the tails of Younger's long overcoat. The great towers of the castle were shrouded in darkness; moonlight cast a faint glow on the flagstones. Younger opened his arms wide, beckoning Gruber to come at him.

The car's engine clamored. Younger began walking forward. The car jerked into motion; Younger broke into a trot. Gruber accelerated; Younger ran. In the center of the plaza, when the collision was imminent, Younger leapt high in the air. The car's hood passed under him. He hit the windshield with his shoulder, shielding his face behind an arm.

The glass gave way, knife-like shards flying into Gruber's face, and the car spun out of control. The front passenger seat broke from its anchorage when Younger smashed into it, plowing into one of the men in the backseat, who cried out in pain, his legs pinned or perhaps broken.

Next to that pinned and unarmed man, in the middle of the backseat, was Colette. 'Stratham?' she said.

'Don't move,' he replied.

Gruber's second stocky friend, on the other side of Colette, had her pistol in his hand and tried to point it at Younger as the car skidded to a halt. Younger seized that hand, placed his own thumb over the gunman's trigger finger, and forced the man's first two shots to fire harmlessly into the air. Then he thrust the man's arm across Colette's chest, so that the gun pressed directly into the ribs of the other man — the pinned man. Younger squeezed off three shots, after which he jackknifed the gunman's arm so that the pistol pointed at the gunman's own temple. The last look on the fellow's face was incomprehension; he didn't seem to understand how a weapon he himself was holding could be aimed at his head. Younger caused the pistol to fire.

Gruber, in the front seat, had been desperately scraping glass from his bloody face and eyes. At the sound of the gunshots, he thrashed wildly at his door, unable to find the latch. At last he began climbing over the door instead.

Younger got hold of Gruber's ankles and stood up on the front seat of the car, holding Gruber upside down. Gruber's hands scraped at the flagstone like the paws of a rodent trying to burrow into the earth. Younger lifted him several feet off the ground and dropped him, face- first, onto the stone.

The blow stunned Gruber, but didn't knock him out. Younger saw on the dashboard the steel shaft that had separated the two panes of the windshield. He grabbed it, jumped over the door, and hoisted Gruber off the ground, holding him up against the car. Gruber's face was bloody, his eyes frightened. Colette, prying herself loose from between the two dead men, climbed out of the car as well.

'I guess the engagement's off,' Younger said to Colette, without looking at her.

'He wasn't my fiancй,' she answered. 'He-'

'I know what he is,' said Younger.

'No,' said Colette, 'he-'

'I know,' repeated Younger.

'Luc,' cried Colette. The boy was standing only a few feet away, lit up by the car's headlamps.

Younger looked at the cowering Hans Gruber. 'I'm trying to think,' Younger said to him in a low voice consisting mostly of breath, 'of a reason to let you live.' 'It wasn't me,' said Gruber. 'It was all of us. Everyone did it.'

'That's not a reason,' said Younger in the same unvoiced voice.

'They ordered us to do it,' said Gruber imploringly.

'I don't believe you,' said Younger.

'Stratham-' said Colette.

'The only thing I can think of is your cravenness,' Younger observed, studying Gruber's pleading face. Younger thought it over. Then he said, 'But that's not a reason either.'

Younger ran the steel windshield shaft through the underside of Hans Gruber's chin straight up into his skull. The blue eyes froze. Younger looked at those eyes for a long moment — then let the corpse slump to the ground.

'We'll take his car,' said Younger.

Dragging the other two bodies out of the backseat, Younger left all three corpses in a heap. Luc gazed down at the dead men. Then he took his sister's hand, and the two of them got into the vehicle. As they crossed a bridge over the Vltava in their windshield-less vehicle, sirens and alarms began to wail.

Several hours later, Younger opened a sleeping compartment aboard a rumbling train. A single candle cast an unsteady light. On the lower bunk, both Luc and Colette were stretched out. The boy was sleeping.

'Is that you?' Colette whispered in the darkness.

'Yes.' Younger loosened his tie, went to the washbasin, rinsed his face. They had just crossed into Austria. He had waited in the corridor to see if any police boarded. None had.

'You're a good killer,' she said unexpectedly.

He picked up Luc and laid him in the upper bunk. The boy stirred but didn't open his eyes. Colette, startled, sat up, and pulled the sheet protectively up to her neck. She was afraid, evidently, that he was going to lie down next to her.

He was about to reassure her that he had moved the boy only because he had found another compartment for himself, so that she and Luc didn't have to share a bunk. But the words didn't come out. Instead he was seized with fury. He tore the sheet from her. Dressed only in a slip, she drew her knees close to her and encircled them with both arms, green eyes sparkling faint and anxious in the candlelight.

He shook his head. 'What does a man have to do before you trust him?' he asked. 'Die?'

'I trust you.'

'That's why you're acting like I'm about to rape you.'

She drew farther back into the shadowy corner of the bunk, clutching the silver chain she always wore around her neck.

He could not have explained his own violence. If it was rage, he had felt its kind only a few times, during the war. He reached down, took her by the wrists, pulled her up standing before him, and yanked the chain from her neck. She said nothing. He spoke quietly, his words just audible over the noise of the locomotive: 'I admire it — I do. You lied to me for years. You did it so well, pretending to be aggrieved at how much I kept from you. And now you play the little God-fearing virgin again, with your cross in your hands and your faith that He'll protect you. Didn't anyone tell you that good Christian girls don't hunt a man down for six years to kill him?'

'It's not a cross,' she said.

He opened his palm: at the end of the silver chain was a locket.

'It's how I knew his name,' said Colette. She took the locket from him, prized its two halves apart along a tiny hinge, and removed from within a small thin metal oval. 'When we found Mother, her fist was clenched. I opened it, one finger at a time. This was inside. She had torn it off the man who — who killed her.'

Younger held the little oval: it was a soldier's dog tag. Angling it, he made out the etched letters spelling Hans Gruber.

'I wore it every day,' she said, 'since 1914. If I had told you the truth, would you have let me come to Vienna to find him?'

He didn't answer.

'Wouldn't you have tried to stop me?' she asked.

'Yes.'

She turned to the compartment's window and twisted at its catch. It wouldn't turn. She pulled at it with both hands. Finally the upper pane dropped open, and a ferocious wind blew in with the roar of the rushing night. She fell back into his arms, her long black hair blowing about, getting in her eyes and his. He saw the delicate line of her cheek and the anxious radiance of her eyes looking up at him, flickering in the candlelight. He held her close, so close her chest was pressing against his, and put his lips to hers. For a moment her whole body surrendered to him; then she pushed herself away, took the dog tag from him, and flung it out the open window. It disappeared into the night without a trace, without a sound.

She turned to face him, shivering in the cold air that swirled through the compartment, hair billowing, bare shoulders catching the light of the candle. He could see that she wouldn't resist him. If he put his hands on her, she would let him: Was it a debt she felt she owed him? He glanced at the slumbering form of the boy and shut the window.

For his part, Luc — not asleep — waited for the unpleasant sound of kissing or other things that grown-ups do. It never came. Instead he heard the door open and close as Younger left the compartment.