The Accomplice

by Joseph Kanon

  “They came for Eichmann.”

  “Then why not me?”

  “So you killed off Helmut Braun.”

  “Nobody looks for a dead man. Not even the Israelis.”

  “Max thought you were dead too. Until he saw you. Your one mistake.”

  “Not the only,” he said, his voice weary, then smiled at Aaron, the smile a kind of lure. “But imagine, it’s Max who finds me at the end, not the Israelis. Not that it matters. Now they have me anyway. So now what? Jerusalem? Another glass box? Maybe the same one, it would save expense. Did they keep it? Waiting for Mengele, if they find him. Are you going after him next?”

  “No. Only you.”

  “Ah. Something for Max. You’re the faithful dog? Here’s the scent. Bring him back? So you can take me to Jerusalem?” he said, his voice rising, lifting his hands to show the handcuffs. “That’s his revenge?”

  “Not Jerusalem. Germany.”

  Otto stared. “Germany,” he said, disturbed, taken by surprise. “A trial in Germany? No, I won’t do that.”

  “It’s not an invitation. There’s a warrant out for you.”

  “A trial in Germany? To be a spectacle there? No,” he said, visibly upset. He looked up. “What makes you think they want a trial? It was enough, after the war. Now it’s—it’s another time. People want to forget.”

  “They used to,” Aaron said, nodding. “But now there’s a prosecutor in Frankfurt who doesn’t. He thinks it’s time to take a look. New trials. What Max knew would happen. Why he kept collecting evidence, even when no one wanted to see it. Not just guards, the bosses too. Doctors. You’ll be a star attraction.”

  Otto made a growling noise, not a word, just a sound. “To Germany,” he said to himself, and when Aaron nodded, “Then why do they want to know the flight number to São Paulo?” A question he’d been waiting to ask, eyes on Aaron, watching his face. Think.

  “To see how long it’ll be before anyone misses you,” Aaron said easily, the answer just coming out, as if he’d been cued. “Whether that would affect the plans.”

  “The plans. And what are the plans? Another plane? They’re going to drug me?”

  Aaron said nothing.

  “How did they know about São Paulo?” he said, not letting go.

  “That would be telling.”

  “In other words, you don’t know,” he said, his voice sly now.

  Aaron shrugged, not biting. “I’m just the babysitter.”

  “No,” Otto said. “Max’s hound. You said. How did you find me?”

  “I tracked you from Hamburg. After Max saw you.” He paused. “Why did you go? Take that risk?”

  Otto looked away. “Personal reasons. A family matter.”

  “Your wife’s funeral.”

  “You’re so well informed, why do you ask?”

  “But why? You hadn’t seen her in years. She’d never know if you were there.”

  “It’s an obligation. Family. That’s something you should understand. Why do you do this? For Max.”

  “No, for me. I don’t think you should get away with it.”

  “Oh, the hand of justice again. And who appointed you?” He looked down. “She was my wife. I thought I owed her that much respect. To be there.”

  “After all this time. Did she know? About the camps? What you were doing?”

  Otto looked away, quiet for a minute. “She was—sensitive. The bombs terrified her. That was it, I think, what made her sick.” He took a breath, moving on. “So, yes, there was some feeling there and I had to go. And then, at Ohlsdorf, some idiot with a camera—the other one, that was you?”

  Aaron nodded.

  “So you followed. But here, how did you find me here? A dead man.”

  Aaron looked over. Think of something plausible, away from her. “It wasn’t hard. Once I saw that Bildener had identified the body. I recognized him from Max’s files. At the Institute. So I knew he’d lead me to you. And he did.”

  “Markus,” Otto said, frowning. “He should be more careful. More like Trude. A sphinx, that one. It’s his temper. He just says things. He was always like that.” He stopped, looking up. “And from him to my daughter?”

  Aaron, caught, made a half nod. They looked at each other, not sure where to take this.

  “She’s not—” Otto said. “She knows nothing.”

  “She knows you’re alive.”

  “She had no part in that. Any of it.”

  “She helps you.”

  “She’s my daughter. My family.”

  “Another obligation?”

  Otto shook his head. “She didn’t want me to go. To Germany. She disapproves of me.”

  “But she got you the visa for Brazil.”

  Otto glanced at him, uncertain how much Aaron knew. “So I can go there. Disappear from her life. Really be dead this time. That’s what she wants, for me to die.” His voice growing faint. “And now a trial,” he said, thinking out loud. “What this will do to her.”

  “I can’t help that,” Aaron said, answering something else.

  Otto looked up. “You? No, you’re the hound. You find the game. With your good nose. Then the others shoot.” Another silence, the air in the room suddenly thick. “So why do you do it?” Otto said. “You never said before. What purpose does it serve? To make an example? For whom? The other Nazis? When you sniff them out? To see me hang? There’s some satisfaction for you in that?”

  Aaron shook his head. “You’re just the excuse. To talk about it. So people remember.”

  “But they won’t. You can’t bring them back, you know. Max’s son, any of them. Not even with a trial. That scale that’s supposed to go like this?” He motioned with his hands, balancing. “When justice is served? It doesn’t work.” He raised one side higher than the other. “The victims are gone. In the air. No weight.”

  Aaron stared at him, not saying anything. What Max knew too. But kept going anyway. As if it matters, he said. We have to act as if it matters. Otherwise—

  But Otto was talking again. “So, I’m just an excuse. At least the Israelis really hate me—there’s some dignity in that. Not just be an excuse for this circus. And what do you think the verdict will be? That’s what they’ll remember. The circus, not what happened. Nobody wants to remember that.”

  Aaron took a breath. “But they should.”

  A wry half smile. “Another Max. A sentimentalist.”

  * * *

  This time it was Jamie who wanted to meet in a park, the southeast corner of Las Heras, near the Diaz entrance. Dog walkers, mothers with strollers, kids in shorts heading for the soccer pitches, everyday Buenos Aires, except for the two men on the bench in the shade, Jamie with his hat still on.

  “Now what?” Aaron said.

  “Consider yourself back at work.”

  “What happened to my leave?”

  “It’s usually a week. If you’re still in mourning, do it on your own time.”

  “And we had to come here to tell me this?”

  “I said back at work, not back at the office.”

  “Meaning?”

  “They want you to keep doing what you’re doing. In fact, they’re sending help.”

  “What I’m doing.”

  Jamie looked away, uneasy. “They heard about the tap. They asked me, I told them. I had to. I said I authorized it because I believed you.” He turned to face Aaron. “That Schramm was alive.”

  “And?”

  “No good deed goes unpunished. Now they believe it too. And they’re all excited.”

  “I thought you said they weren’t in the war crimes business,” Aaron said, apprehensive, off balance.

  “They’re not.”

  Aaron waited. “I’ll bite.”

  “They think it’s a unique opportunity.”

  “To do what?”

  “Recruit him.” Jamie moved his hand, short-stopping him. “I know, not what you had in mind. All the Nuremberg stuff. But they’re not interested in that.
What they’re interested in is him.”

  “As a unique opportunity.”

  “At first they just wanted me to close it down—the tap, you playing detective—and then they saw the beauty of the thing.”

  “Tell me.”

  “You’ve got a guy officially dead. Who wants to stay that way. That gives terrific leverage to someone who knows he’s not. Expose him and he’s nailed as a war criminal. Work with him and you’ve got someone with a perfect cover—he’s who he says he is because he can’t be someone who’s dead.”

  “Jamie, he’s Otto Schramm. We going to recruit Bormann next? You don’t get better cover than that—he’s been dead for years. We think. Mengele? Why not all of them?”

  “Because they weren’t close to Perón. Schramm was. Is,” he said calmly, laying down a fan of winning cards.

  “OK,” Aaron said, “let’s start over. Tell me how this works again.” Trying to slow things down, his mind racing. Otto under Agency protection, invulnerable.

  “Most of the big guys down here, when they get thrown out, they either get a bullet in the head or go live on a beach somewhere. Drink rum and fuck the local talent. What they don’t do is come back. But Perón wants to.”

  “Does anybody want him back?”

  “Plenty. The fan club never gave up, and the others—well, look who they’ve had since. So Perón looks better and better. Forget the economy almost tanked before they threw him out. Now he’s the good old days.”

  “It’s a long time to be away.”

  “But he keeps in touch. You have to hand it to him, he knows how to play the game. He’s even got the Church thinking he looks good again. I thought when he left in ’55 he’d be stuck in exile with Stroessner in Paraguay. End of story. But no, he goes to Panama next, then to Trujillo in the Dominican Republic.”

  “To the beach.”

  “But not drinking. Receiving delegations. Of Argentines. Even Trujillo thought he was a troublemaker. And then, the jackpot, Franco takes him in last year. Spain’s still the mother country to a lot of people down here. It gives him credibility. So now he’s like a fucking government in exile, plotting with this one, that one.”

  “And?”

  “And we don’t have anybody close to him, who can tell us who’s coming to visit, who he’s talking to. We’re operating in the dark.”

  “Assuming he’s worth bothering about in the first place.”

  “We have to assume that. Argentina’s important and he’s always hated us. He still thinks Germany should have won. Not to mention, he has a nasty habit of nationalizing companies when things get tough. We don’t want that. We want him to stay in Madrid and enjoy the bullfights. We want to know what he’s up to.”

  “Which is where Otto comes in.”

  Jamie nodded. “Perón knows him. As Schramm. Then as Braun. And now that Braun’s dead, he’ll know him as somebody else. Pick a name. A loyalist, someone Perón can trust. With messages. With—you name it. Really trust. Because he’ll have this special leverage over him—he knows who he is.”

  “The same leverage we have.”

  Jamie nodded.

  “So Otto’s blackmailed twice.”

  “That’s the beauty of it.”

  “If you think gossip about a tin-pot dictator is more important than trying a war criminal.”

  “That’s one way of looking at it. But it’s not the way we’re looking at it, so do yourself a favor and make your peace with it. It saves time in the end.”

  “It’s wrong, Jamie. We can’t do this.”

  Jamie looked straight at him, the silence speaking for him.

  “So we let him get away with it.”

  “He did get away with it. They’re dead.”

  For a minute neither said anything.

  “Twenty years now they’re dead,” Jamie said finally.

  “But he’s not.”

  “And what good is that to us? Or maybe they send him to Spandau. He can see Hess at breakfast. What good does that do? Five, ten years and he’s sorry and he won’t do it again? We know what he did. We knew in ’45. This is about now. Nineteen sixty-two. What do we do with him now?”

  “Make him one of us.”

  “We work with a lot of people. They’re not all Eagle Scouts. You know that. This way we get something out of him. What do we get if he’s sitting in Spandau?”

  “I didn’t come here to save his ass.”

  “But now you’re here. And you’re back at work. This is what we do, remember?”

  Aaron looked at him, saying nothing.

  “If it makes you feel any better, he’s not exactly getting a free pass. You’re on a leash like this, you’re only as good as your last piece of information. It’s always hanging over your head—what we know. Not a happy life if you’re the worrying type. Kind of house arrest.”

  “Don’t,” Aaron said.

  Jamie lowered his voice. “You need to get comfortable with this,” he said slowly, serious. “You need to be on board.”

  “Because?”

  “You’ll be making the approach.”

  Aaron felt air rush out of him, as if he’d been punched.

  “Me,” he said, almost a whisper.

  Jamie nodded. “You won’t have to sell it very hard, but you don’t want to take no for an answer either. So.”

  Several voices in his head, everything happening too fast. Throw a switch.

  “That’s assuming we find him,” he said.

  “I thought you said you were close.”

  “Close isn’t there.”

  “No. That’s why the reinforcements. They get here tomorrow, the day after. We don’t want to take a chance on losing him, so you have a team now. Another tap if you want it. Martínez? You thought he might—”

  Aaron shook his head. “There’s no contact there.”

  “How do you know?”

  Play it out. “Tap him, then. It can’t hurt. You already have a file on him.”

  “As long as your arm.” He paused. “You all right?”

  “Just thinking. What if he says no? Won’t do it?”

  “What choice does he have?” He looked over. “But you’ll make that clear to him. The options. That there aren’t any.” He leaned back on the bench. “It’s the kind of thing that gets noticed at Langley. After that leave business. I mean, what the fuck was that? People don’t take leave. But now you’ll be flavor of the month. New asset in place, perfect leverage. Give Madrid something to do for a change. Nice.” He looked over. “This could do a lot for you. Even put BA on the map for five minutes. So don’t fuck it up.”

  “And if he gets away?”

  “He won’t. You’ll make sure.”

  “I’m not a field guy.”

  “But you’ve got the direct lead. You’ve got her.”

  “What do I say to her?”

  “You don’t say anything. You just find him.”

  “And then he disappears?”

  Jamie opened his hands.

  “No. She has to know he’s OK.”

  “All right. We’ll arrange it. A little good-bye. Of course, we do this, she’ll know. About you. She’s not going to like that.”

  “No,” Aaron said, a clench in his stomach. “Any of it.”

  “On the other hand, he’ll be safer with us than he is here. Remind her of that. We don’t want any trouble.”

  Aaron shook his head. “You don’t know her.”

  “Not like you.”

  11

  “WE’RE NOT HAVING THIS conversation.”

  “Some beginning,” Nathan said, looking at him, eyes suddenly sharp.

  They were walking down Córdoba, past the central synagogue, on their way to the safe house. It had rained earlier, a surprise storm, and wisps of steam were rising off the road as it dried out in the hot sun, mixing with the diesel fumes from the buses.

  “I had a meeting yesterday.”

  Nathan waited.

  “Someone from the Agency.�
�

  “I’m supposed to hear this?”

  “What do you think?”

  Nathan stopped for a second, turning to him. “I think you’re crossing a line.” He stared for another moment. “Are you sure you want to do that?”

  “They want to use Otto as an asset. I make the approach. They’re sending a team to find him. Once they get here, it’s just a matter of time. We can’t wait. We have to get him out.”

  “They don’t know you found him?”

  “Not yet. I’m close. But if he gets away—”

  Nathan looked at him. “You’re prepared to do this?”

  “I came here to bring him to trial.”

  “Even if it means—”

  “This is more important.”

  Nathan made a wry face. “They give you the heave, call me. I could always use someone—”

  Aaron smiled. “I’m not that Jewish.”

  “It’s not a question of how much.” Nathan pointed his thumb back to the synagogue. “The Jews who built that thought they were German. But the Germans didn’t think so.”

  “We can’t wait for Thursday. If it is Thursday, the plane. And how do we get him to go now? We put him on the plane, he’d be kicking and screaming all the way to São Paulo.”

  “Unless we calm him down.”

  Aaron shook his head. “We need a private plane.”

  “Just like that. Who has that kind of money? Besides your people.”

  “They’re not going to be my people much longer if we don’t get him out of here. They find him and I’m—”

  “On the wrong side,” Nathan said, nodding. “Not where you want to be. We don’t either. We can’t get into a pissing match with the Agency. They’re our friends. They want to protect a Nazi, we have to look the other way. Klaus Barbie, in Bolivia. We know he’s there, but we can’t touch him. Eichmann was different. He never worked for them. And guilty as hell, so who cares if the Israelis want a little payback? But not with our people.” He turned to Aaron. “How do they want to use him?”

  “Keep tabs on Perón. Be one of his buddies in exile.”