Ring of Lies

by Roni Dunevich

  Orchidea knocked on the door. The metal was icy.

  Lights came on in the house. The silhouette of a man with a huge potbelly moved past the big windows, a bolt slid aside, and the heavy double door opened. Light flowed out onto the path. The potbellied man filled the doorway, throwing a large shadow on the front yard.

  Breathing heavily, Dr. Petrus Abu Luka held out a small, clammy hand and moved aside to allow them entry. He smelled of cigarettes. In his fifties, with one leg shorter than the other, he walked with a pronounced limp. He was dressed in a white jellabiya sheer enough to afford a clear view of his underwear.

  They crossed the modest living room and entered the doctor’s office, with its distinct medicinal odor. The walls were painted a pale blue, and the meager furniture consisted solely of a desk, three chairs, a gray tin cabinet, and a narrow, battered examination table. On the wall was a clock with a tapestry face, an embroidered inscription in Aramaic, and a diploma from Damascus University.

  Begging their pardon, Dr. Abu Luka left the room. They looked around themselves and then at each other. The sound of the doctor’s limping walk echoed through the high-ceilinged living room. Their host returned carrying a hammered copper tray with three small cups of coffee.

  He then locked the door and closed the shutters. He gave them a meaningful look and rolled his eyes toward the ceiling before taking out of the cabinet a cardboard box with the Bayer logo.

  They heard a noise above them. The doctor froze.

  Orchidea stared at the locked door.

  “Passports,” the doctor whispered abruptly.

  They handed him their passports. He paged through them, looking for the secret mark. Finally, the worry lines vanished from his brow. Dr. Abu Luka’s face glowed with perspiration. He removed the contents of the cardboard box and arranged them on the desk like a display of spoils of war.

  After transferring the items into a gray nylon carryall, the doctor got to his feet. They followed him to the door. As they were leaving, he patted Paris on the shoulder, his round face dripping with sweat, and handed Orchidea a small white box.

  “What’s this?” she asked.

  “Freshly baked kanafeh. My wife made it this evening.”

  He sent them on their way.

  DIARY

  23 MARCH 1944

  The deputy commandant has good eyes. Resolve shines from them.

  Tonight, it cracked.

  2 APRIL 1944

  The deputy commandant said that Germany would regain its honor through occupation and force, but not by extermination of the Jews. Not for that did I join the army of the Reich, he said.

  Are his eyes truly good, or is he laying a trap for me?

  3 MAY 1944

  My children are still small, and Jasmin and I are young. We have our whole lives.

  I hope the German is not luring me into a trap.

  17 MAY 1944

  He knew that I was Resistance. He knew that I’d know how to take him to the Catacombs. He knew that we are Jews and that our papers were forged.

  So why didn’t you turn me in, I asked.

  Because you suit me.

  18 MAY 1944

  He signaled me with his eyes to follow him to the toilet. My body grew terribly cold and my heart was pounding. He stood at a urinal and urinated.

  I remained at a distance.

  He gestured for me to approach.

  I was embarrassed.

  I have decided to desert, he whispered.

  20 MAY 1944

  The monster could pursue you for the rest of your life. Are you prepared? the deputy commandant asked me tonight.

  I nodded unhesitatingly. He is likely to do that, he added. The commandant will never forgive you, and he will hunt you down until one of you dies.

  I nodded again.

  Finally, I saw a spark of hope in his eyes.

  21 MAY 1944

  The deputy commandant said that the commandant had worked with a man named Adolf Eichmann. He is in charge of the extermination of millions.

  Millions of what? I asked.

  Jews, millions of Jews.

  He must have been exaggerating. Perhaps he’d been drinking.

  DAMASCUS | 03:49

  Every sound sent a chill down Orchidea’s spine. Every approaching vehicle made her seize up.

  Jabal Qasioun overlooks Damascus from the north. Muslims believe that it is the place where Cain killed Abel. Red lights flickered on the peak. The face of Assad was plastered everywhere, screaming: Don’t forget who controls you; don’t forget who controls Syria.

  They entered Damascus through Al-Sades min Tishreen. Since 1973, everything has been called Tishreen: Tishreen Park, the Tishreen newspaper, Tishreen Street. Tishreen means October, and October 1973 marked the first victory over the Zionists after a long line of humiliations.

  Paris turned onto Al-Tawara Road. They passed through three tunnels that crossed the northern sectors of the city and turned west onto Al-Ittihad Road. It was the middle of the night, but the Sunni capital with its thousands of mosques was buzzing with life.

  The fronds of the short palm trees on Shukri Al Quatli Street flapped in the wind. The street runs alongside the Barada River, which flows through Damascus, held in check by concrete embankments.

  Le Méridien Hotel has always been a favorite of the Syrian government. Some say that the government actually owns the hotel. Not long ago, the name was changed to Dedeman.

  They took their trolley bags with them, leaving the black duffel bag they got in Brussels and the gray carryall they got from Dr. Abu Luka in the trunk of the car.

  They were greeted by a doughy reception clerk who was barely awake. Paris handed him their French EU passports. The man’s ears were as hairy as a squirrel’s. The portrait of Hafez al-Assad peered out from between the pages of one of the passports, gracing a thousand-Syrian-pound note.

  The ceiling of the lobby was supported by marble-faced columns in alternating vertical stripes the colors of maple syrup and tahini. Their room on the seventh floor, designated the Royal Club, had a pale parquet floor and peach walls. The balcony afforded a view of Jabal Qasioun.

  “Do you want to wash up?” Orchidea asked.

  “You go first.”

  Both of them noted the single king-size bed.

  The hot water was soothing. She hadn’t thought to get her pajamas out of her suitcase, and now she would have to come out in her underwear. She looked at herself in the mirror. Her breasts moved under the thin white T-shirt. Treacherous nipples.

  She opened the bathroom door. Paris was sitting on the bed in his underpants. He rose, grabbed his toiletry kit, and walked past her, taking care not to brush against her. His body was even more solid and muscular than she had imagined.

  Paris whistled in the shower. Orchidea smiled as she looked through the glass door of the balcony at the prestigious Abu Rumaneh district. The dark triangle of Zenobia Park stood out clearly. Beyond it were the houses of the Al-Muhajireen sector, clinging to the slopes of Jabal Qasioun.

  Paris came out of the bathroom, lay down on the bed on his side, and turned off the light. It was dark in the room. He’d used the tiny bottle of soap provided by the hotel, and he smelled like an apple orchard in full bloom.

  Hostile Damascus was right outside. It had all happened too fast. Justus was killed, the Orchid Farm was broken into, the inhalers were stolen, her staff was murdered. Orchidea wrapped herself in her solitude, sinking into a bout of birthday blues.

  Paris was still awake, his breathing steady. She was too restless to sleep, and anyway, morning was only a couple of hours away. Everything seemed so hopeless.

  “Hold me,” she said.

  DIARY

  22 MAY 1944

  He handed me the red card with the golden eagle insignia on it—his Nazi Party membership card—his laissez-passer, his entry permit to the Drancy camp, and his Obergruppenführer certificate. He gave me his officer’s bars and put his life in my hands. And all he sai
d was, Take me to them.

  23 MAY 1944

  The pharmacist on the Rue de Buci took us to the back room, where the salves were prepared. There, he opened a concealed door in the floor, and the deputy commandant and I went down a steep flight of stairs. The air in the sewage tunnels was dank. We entered the labyrinth of the Catacombs.

  The comrades undressed him and checked his blood type, which was tattooed on his underarm. I handed over his papers. Gaston took a revolver and removed all but one bullet. Only then did he give the gun to the deputy commandant and say, Follow me. He took him by the arm and led him to the young SS officer our comrades had captured the night before near the Madeleine. Shoot him, he said, and then he touched my arm and we went to an adjoining room.

  The prisoner had been gagged with a sock, but his gaping eyes were uncovered. The deputy commandant sobbed. There was a stench of sewage, and the air was soaked with sorrow.

  The deputy commandant wept out loud.

  Then there was silence.

  A shot thundered.

  GRUNEWALD, BERLIN | 06:43

  An irritating hum was coming from Alex’s hand, waking him from a sound sleep. When he tried to turn over, he banged his elbow on the wall, sending a shooting pain through his arm. Attempting to sit up, he hit his head on the ceiling. The cold air smelled of onions.

  It took him a moment to remember where he was: in the pantry cupboard. His phone was vibrating, lighting up the cramped space.

  It was Exodus. Unconsciously he clenched his stomach, as if he were expecting a kick.

  “Justus Erlichmann made a single deposit in the account of a company called Dopo Domani Holdings,” she said. “It’s registered in the British Virgin Islands. We can’t find any reason for it, or any records.”

  “How much?”

  “One million, two hundred thousand euros.”

  “When?”

  “Seventeen days ago.”

  “Maybe it’s one of his donations to the neo-Nazi organization?”

  “No way. Those were made regularly, through fixed channels. Are you all right?”

  “Why?”

  “You sound weird.”

  “I’m in a closet.”

  Muttering to herself, Exodus hung up.

  It was almost seven, and he was wide awake. He pushed the sliding door aside. His body was stiff from fatigue and cold. He rolled off the shelf and stood up. He stretched, vowing never to sleep in a cupboard again.

  Dopo Domani Holdings, €1,200,000. What was Justus up to this time?

  Alex heard a soft thud somewhere nearby. He tensed and raised his Glock, swiveling around to survey the darkness.

  Something was moving inside the house!

  Holding his breath, he began scanning the rooms, adrenaline racing through his veins, tingling and spurring him on.

  The sun wasn’t up yet, and the house was lit only by the nighttime lights that filtered in from outside. He inched along the library wall in the living room but didn’t see anything. As he climbed the stairs to the second floor, he heard a click and turned around sharply.

  No one was there.

  Alex reached the upstairs landing. Nelli’s study lay in silence, and the guest room opposite was equally quiet. In Justus’s workroom at the end of the hall, the disgusting swastika still adorned the tail of the Messerschmitt, but the room was empty. He entered the large master bedroom, his finger tightening on the trigger of the silenced gun. The wide bed was empty.

  All that remained was the cellar.

  Alex went down two flights and stopped in front of the wine cellar. A dim, warm light shone on shelves upon shelves of expensive bottles.

  Maybe an animal, some forest creature, had penetrated into the house? The kitchen and the living room were silent.

  He sat down on the soft gray sofa in the living room to wait for sunrise, but he soon nodded off again. He awoke from a nightmare and could still hear himself groaning. The sky was as heavy as graphite. Exodus was calling again, and he was grateful to her for pulling him up out of the depths of his nightmares.

  “There’s something strange, Alex. Are you awake?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Erlichmann was a billionaire and a lawyer, and he was involved in dangerous activities.”

  “What’s strange about that?”

  “We haven’t found his will.”

  GRUNEWALD, BERLIN | 07:13

  Justus’s will might shed light on his dark side.

  But you don’t hide a will in a secret drawer. Ancona and his voles had already searched the house and hadn’t found it.

  The house was empty. The damned heating didn’t work, and the cold was painful. Alex needed time to think. He left the house and was surprised to hear birds chirping outside. It was pleasant and comforting.

  In a café near the Grunewald S-Bahn station he ordered espresso and a vanilla cream croissant. It was still early, not quite light out, and few people were up and about. He wondered if he wasn’t taking too much of a risk showing his face like this, but he needed a break from the oppressive mood in Justus’s house. He had to find a clue that would lead him to the German’s will.

  In the corner was an Aryan lady in her seventies who, by the look of things, had this morning put her makeup on twice. She was leafing through a newspaper. On the floor beside her was a young Doberman. The lights in the café were reflected in its black fur.

  A stocky German with silvery stubble was wolfing down a pink sausage. A young blond girl with thin black eyebrows came in and looked Alex over. It was too early for smiles. Alex bit into his croissant. The girl carried her cup over to the counter. His hand slipped automatically to the gun under his jacket. She sat down on a barstool next to him, tilting her head back slightly so that her nose was in the air. The imprint of a wrinkled blanket was etched on her cheek.

  She was holding a huge set of keys, like a prison guard’s.

  Keys.

  A key.

  The key!

  Alex sped back to the house and rushed into Justus’s study. The safe was locked. He called Ancona, waking him up. “Give me the code to the safe in the Erlichmann house,” he said.

  “I must have the code written down somewhere. Give me a few minutes.”

  “Ancona.”

  “What?”

  “Now.”

  Alex heard distant grumbling, followed by slipper-clad feet shuffling along the floor, papers being ruffled, and tuneless whistling.

  Ancona gave him the code. “Don’t hang up,” Alex said.

  The dial turned, clicking quietly, and the safe door swung open. The key was still hanging from the BMW fob. He examined it under the desk lamp. At the top was the mark B-776.

  “I’m sending you a photo of a key. Your expert said it belongs to a bank vault. Tell him to find out what bank it’s from.”

  He hung up.

  Alex went outside and studied Henry Moore’s reclining woman. The lights on the lawn flattered her ponderous bronze curves. Snow had collected on her large breasts and small head. It was quiet on the Erlichmann lawn. The sun was coming up, and the cold was becoming bearable.

  Orchidea was celebrating her birthday in Damascus with unreadable Paris. And Alex was on his own. But he was still alive. Jane wasn’t. He touched the bronze woman. She was as cold as the moon.

  The trees of the forest were reflected on the glass wall. A pair of wild geese with long necks crossed the sky above him.

  Ancona called.

  “Berghoff Bank. B-776 is a secure basement vault for sculptures and large paintings like the ones in the living room. The bank has only one branch, on the Ku’damm near the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church. It’s open from ten in the morning to one in the afternoon, and again from four to seven in the evening. You need two keys to open a vault—the customer’s and the bank’s master key—and they’re familiar with every one of their customers. If you’re thinking about getting into Justus’s vault, forget it. The bank hasn’t had a break-in since it was founde
d in 1882.”

  A large icy drop of water fell on Alex’s neck from the linden tree he was standing under. He shivered.

  He went back into the living room to try to devise a strategy to get through Berghoff Bank’s security.

  He had a long day ahead of him.

  DIARY

  25 MAY 1944

  The commandant was here this evening. He ate and drank, and his eyes blazed. The Gestapo is investigating the disappearance of the deputy commandant and conducting surprise searches. My heart shudders now. For in the end, the truck will stop in front of the café. The Wehrmacht soldiers will climb down, and their hobnailed jackboots will desecrate the old black-and-white-checkered marble floor. They will smash the furniture and rip out the brass railings that were the work of an artist. The only things they won’t be able to shatter are the windows, because they have already been shattered by bullets and the shockwaves from the bombings. Hateful wooden boards hide the light of day, impose darkness.

  When will the sun return and warm the floor of the café?

  27 MAY 1944

  A dozen Wehrmacht flamethrowers washed the innards of the Catacombs with hellfire. Someone betrayed us. Some comrades suffocated; others burned.

  7 JUNE 1944

  Despite the fierce resistance of the Wehrmacht, Allied forces have succeeded in establishing an iron grip on the Normandy coast. It is a long way to our capital, but Paris will be liberated. Paris must be liberated.

  ABU RUMANEH, DAMASCUS | 09:59

  His dark face looked as if it had been drawn in pencil and then brutally erased. His neck and left hand were disfigured, as well. In place of his right arm was a rigid, old-fashioned prosthesis that didn’t move. The man had been burned from head to toe.

  Omar Hattab, the head of the Syrian Mukhabarat, was just under six foot two. He was wearing a dark gray suit and a blue tie that was wound around his long neck like a noose.