Darby glanced at Brant, who was sitting in a chair in the corner. She felt her lip twitch and nose burn. “And I’ve never had my grandfather so near.”
The bed groaned as she moved the metal railing down. Darby remembered only months before she had rested with her grandmother. Carefully she sat on the bed and stretched out. Her arms were awkward, looking for their place. She rested her head on the pillow, moved and squirmed until it felt right. Not long ago, Darby had circled Grandma’s body. Now her grandfather cradled her tightly, her head beneath his chin, his arms on hers. She breathed medicine, age, and a hint of deep spice. He touched her hair and spoke soft words in German that needed no interpretation. Wet drops, not her own, fell upon the pillow. Warm breath rustled her hair. She couldn’t move, afraid it wouldn’t be true. There were no memories of a father’s arms, no bear hugs or loving pats. That longing had never entered her consciousness until now. Darby moved closer yet until she heard the patter of her grandfather’s heart. It wrapped around her, beating and beating like a rocking chair with gentle pats upon her back. She could stay here forever.
“Darby, wake up.” Someone touched her hair and cheek. Her mouth felt dry, her eyes sticky, her arms tenderly held and tangled. She turned toward the voice—Brant’s.
“Darby, it’s morning.”
The arms were her grandfather’s, and his breath continued to lull and call her back into rest. It hadn’t been a dream. She had a grandfather. She couldn’t wait to call her mother and sister. They’d fly there in a day or two, and their lives would be changed forever.
“I have to leave, Darby,” Brant whispered.
“Why? What’s wrong?” She gently untangled herself, and Brant helped her from the bed.
“My secretary called. I’m not sure how they tracked me down since I turned off my phone, but a nurse woke me and said it was important. I’ll be gone until late afternoon. Unless you want to come with me now.”
“No, I’ll stay.”
“That’s what I thought.” Brant took a step closer and touched her hair. “Take care of him.”
“I will.”
Darby spent an hour dozing in Brant’s chair, against the pillow he’d used. Finally Gunther stirred and woke. A morning of activity began. They ate breakfast and later lunch, played several hands of cards, and Darby pushed him in his wheelchair around the hospital and through the indoor garden. They never stopped talking until Darby worried she was letting him do too much. Brant hadn’t returned by afternoon, and Darby felt a terrible need for a shower. The nurse gave strict instructions for Gunther to have an afternoon nap.
“I need to leave, but I’ll be back tonight or early in the morning,” Darby said. She’d only met him the day before, but felt she’d known him a lifetime. “I need a shower, or you won’t want me back.”
“I will ta-ake you, even if you smell badly.” He chuckled and pinched his nose. “I do this w-when you come close.”
Darby laughed, loving his smile and hearty chuckle. “We both have work to do. You must get better. I must give the best news to my family and make arrangements for them to come.”
“Yes. Yes.” Gunther beamed. “Bring my family. But fi-irst, I must tell you one, one thing. I hid it. I hid your in-heritance. I m-must tell you where it is.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Darby stared out the window as the taxi zipped through traffic. It seemed the world should be a different color or perhaps lost its gravitational pull overnight with all the changes she’d experienced in the last days. But people continued to walk with their feet on the same sidewalks as they had yesterday, and wisps of clouds still drifted in a blue sky.
She leaned her head against the cool window and closed her eyes. Her newfound joy mingled with gentle sorrow like oil mixed with water. One emotion would rise to the surface, then the other would bubble through. Her grandfather was alive! Her mother had a father. Her nieces a great-grandfather. Yet Grandma Celia, who had yearned a lifetime for her lost love, had missed him by only months. The smile and stories of Grandma’s life had sheltered the sorrow she’d never been freed from. And her joy lived only a plane ride away. What if it had happened to Darby and her love—to her and Brant?
The taxi proceeded down tiny Goldgasse, and Darby was struck with a wave of exhaustion. For some reason, behind closed eyelids she thought of Maureen. Her sister was tucked away asleep at home, and her life was about to be changed along with all of theirs. Darby missed her sister as she hadn’t since childhood. They’d been closer then, and Darby didn’t know why she’d allowed them to drift so deeply into their own lives. She vowed to turn that around. She’d also call Tristie in Montana—perhaps fly up for a visit. Her woman friendships were essential to life. She knew that not just from Tatianna and Grandma Celia, but it rang true within her. She’d missed a lot in the last years, but no more.
Darby’s head remained against the window, hair cascading across her face. Her feet felt too heavy to move when the car stopped, though her mind continued its race around the discoveries of the last two days. She moved away from the window as the cab driver prepared to open the door, but he was looking somewhere else. Across the car, through the other back window, she could see a man’s slacks, belt, and tucked-in shirt. It had to be Brant. She’d be able to see on his face the completion of decades of trials. She’d fall into his arms and find spring after a long winter. The heaviness upon her shoulders would lighten, even leave. Brant. The man she knew she loved, as Grandma Celia had loved Gunther Müller.
The opposite door opened.
“Darby Evans.” The face was not Brant’s. “Remember me? Richter Hauer. We met in a restaurant when you were with Brant.” It took a second for her mind to match this man with bloodshot eyes and a few days’ stubble to the arrogant man she’d met months before.
“Ah, I think so. Yes. I remember.” Why was this man closing the door and the taxi driver returning to the front seat? “I’m getting out here.”
“Brant called me and asked that I escort you to his office. He had a meeting he couldn’t get away from.” The cab driver hadn’t moved. “Go ahead.”
“Wait.” Darby reached for the door handle. “I have some calls to make and need a shower, some rest.”
“Brant said it was urgent. I tried to catch you with Gunther, but you’d left. Gunther told me you were coming here. On my word, what a shock to discover we are related in a way, right? My step-grandfather is your grandfather.” He smiled at her with an incredulous look. “Miracles do still happen.”
Darby hesitated. This man must have talked to Brant and Gunther to know these details.
“Go ahead!” Richter called again. The driver glanced questioningly at her in the rearview mirror, then the car moved forward down the dark street. Darby didn’t speak as her thoughts tried to slog through a molasses of tiredness, facts, and suspicions. Brant didn’t like Richter, she remembered. So why . . .
Darby eyed Richter as he peered anxiously behind them. His hands were grasped together strangely. Suddenly, she realized she shouldn’t be with him. He looked at her quickly, and she saw danger in his eyes.
Richter grabbed her hand. “I need you to come with me. Everything will be all right. Just do as I ask.” When Darby’s mouth opened to cry out, he squeezed her hand in warning. “My grandmother, Ingrid, kept her lover’s Lüger collection after the war. She passed them down to me.” Richter forced her hand against his jacket. She could feel something . . . a gun?
Richter glanced behind them again, leaned forward to instruct the driver, then sat back. The car stopped, waiting for traffic. Darby looked back toward her hotel, where she’d been going a moment before. A moment before she had been safe, ready to call her mother and sister and then rest and see Brant and Gunther, and now . . .
“I’m in a difficult position, Darby.” His face hovered too close to hers. “I must have something that
I have long sought. Only you can help me. I have no doubt that Gunther told you where he hid the Lange inheritance.”
Darby’s mouth opened, but she could not speak.
“Please, Darby. I have little time.”
The cab turned onto Residenzplatz. Life seemed so normal. People strolled, carriages waited to give rides, artists hawked their paintings on the street. “What do you want?”
But she knew. Richter raised one eyebrow, knowing she understood. Was this why Ingrid had deceived her grandmother so long ago? Had the greed for the Lange inheritance not only cost many lives, but also enticed deception long after the Nazis had been destroyed?
The taxi halted, and Richter tossed a bill forward. Darby realized they’d only gone a few blocks from her hotel when Richter grabbed her hand and yanked her outside. Panic raced wildly through Darby. Should she scream? Run into one of the shops? Then Richter pinned her close to him.
Richter had parked his car near the restaurant where she’d first met him, the day she’d first met Brant. The more she sought an escape the more trapped she realized she was—like a butterfly in a jar.
“Just show me where it is, and nothing will happen to you. I promise.” He walked her beside a white BMW and almost dropped his keys as he unlocked the door.
“No.” She planted her feet, remembering too well her foolish impulse to jump in the car that took her to Bruno Weiler’s house. And this was different. All the television shows said to never, ever be forced into a car. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“You are. Get in.” He pushed her toward the open door. She tried to get away, but Richter grabbed her with a fierce hold. “I have a gun, right here in my pocket. Come with me, and you’ll be safe. But I can’t let you walk away.”
She hesitated a minute too long so Richter pushed her inside. “Move across. You’re driving. Take the keys.”
“Where am I going?”
“You tell me.” Richter shut his door firmly.
Darby searched the tourists and carriages and shopkeepers for anyone to help. This can’t be happening!
“So tell me where we’re going,” he insisted.
Darby didn’t say anything. He pulled out the gun and rested it on his lap.
It really was an antique Lüger. It appeared almost ridiculous pointing toward her instead of resting inside a museum case.
“I’ll tell you where it is, and you’ll let me get out.”
“You tell me where it is, I’ll get it, then I’ll let you go.” He stared at her as she carefully moved through traffic. She could see him from the corner of her eye.
“It’s in Hallstatt.”
“Hallstatt?” Richter thought for a moment. “You mean the grave?”
Darby nodded.
He looked surprised. “Why didn’t I think of that before?” When Richter glanced at her, Darby knew they thought the same thing. “I wish you had,” she said.
Brant had just convinced himself that he had not seen Darby with Richter in a taxi, leaving Goldgasse together. Then Richter’s car had pulled from a side street down the one-way exit. Darby was driving. Brant was on his way to see her, to watch her sleep, to share her phone calls. His important meeting had been nothing—another frustrating interruption. Frau Halder didn’t know who the urgent message had come from, but she’d taken it seriously. Brant sometimes had mysterious clients meet with him secretly, but this time, no one showed up at his office.
He had parked beneath a tree on one of the streets surrounding the plaza, then begun walking when he saw Darby inside the taxi from across the street. He wondered why she was leaving Goldgasse. Then he saw Richter beside her.
Shocks of denial pounded through him as his mind tried to decipher what he’d seen. He should have followed them when they passed in Richter’s car, but he sat too long. It couldn’t be.
Brant suddenly remembered the “coincidental” meeting the first day he’d met Darby. Richter had come to the restaurant by chance. Then something had happened in Vienna two days before, or someone. Darby hadn’t explained why she disappeared for the night. Was everything a lie? His mind brought up all sorts of ideas. Perhaps she wasn’t even an American, but someone Richter and Ingrid had recruited to finally get the Lange inheritance while Gunther was recovering.
And this morning. He had been called away from the hospital. Did it give opportunity for Darby to ask Gunther where he’d hidden it? Only Brant knew Gunther had hidden the heirlooms at all. Gunther had only withheld the location.
Brant looked back toward his car and wondered what to do, and how this could be true. But it seemed the truth was before his eyes. He’d been betrayed once again.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Daylight faded in the valley as Darby and Richter drove the north edge of Hallstatt Lake. Night would come soon. Darby noticed the last reflection of pink on the water as she drove. This man promised her safety once she revealed the hidden treasure. Could she really believe him? He’d already told her several lies. Could this be, perhaps, her final glimpse of sunlight? She checked the rearview mirror again. No one had followed them from the city. Surely Brant would wonder where she was, be searching for her maybe. But he was too far behind.
God, you can’t want this to happen. Not after everything. Not after this journey you’ve led me on.
Had Tatianna thought those same words? What doubts and fears did she have during those last steps before death? Darby wanted to be strong, setting her jaw and holding her head high. But inside she felt weak and shaky and feared she might crumble at any moment. She prayed for strength over and over again.
Richter had been quiet the last few miles. She imagined him hatching his plan to retrieve the inheritance, and then what? Darby needed her own plan and could only think of the Gerringer home in Hallstatt. If she could somehow get to them, perhaps she’d make it.
“Take a right at the next curve,” Richter said.
“That’s not the way to Hallstatt,” Darby said, her voice rising. This was not in her plan.
“There’s something I must do first.”
Brant had tried roads and places in Salzburg but couldn’t find Richter’s car anywhere. He’d stopped by Darby’s hotel, called a dozen times, driven to Richter’s favorite places, and started once toward Munich and Ingrid’s house. Instead, he phoned again on his return to Salzburg, but no one answered. He’d gone to Gunther’s, only to leave without talking to him. For how could he break this news to the old man now? But could the old man be in danger? The police would believe none of this—it was all speculation.
Late afternoon faded quickly into night. He drove into a parking lot and hit the brakes hard. Think, think, he told himself. If only he’d tailed Richter and Darby immediately. Brant picked up his car phone and tried Richter’s cellular but received only a recording that indicated the power was off. He called Darby’s hotel again, feeling like he was repeating her trip to Vienna. Could that have only been days ago? Again, there was no answer in her room. The front desk said they hadn’t seen her. Next he dialed Ingrid in Munich. The line picked up.
“Frau Müller is in Gosau today,” the housekeeper said. “She’s finishing work there before closing the house.”
Brant hung up before saying good-bye. Gosau was over an hour away. And what if Darby wasn’t there?
He squeezed the steering wheel. There were only two options he could think of. Either Darby had betrayed them and was involved with Richter and Ingrid, or Darby was in trouble. His eyes said she’d tricked them. His heart told him differently. Yet his feelings had certainly failed him before.
Brant battled back and forth. Darby had appeared in Salzburg at the same time he began to suspect Richter and Ingrid were involved in something. She’d disappeared in Vienna for an entire night and never given an explanation as to where she’d gone. Richter was looking for her when Bra
nt picked her up at the train station. And the ring—the one piece that had convinced him. Ingrid most likely had seen it on Celia’s finger years ago. She could have made a duplicate and given it to Darby. The evidence and seeing Darby drive off in Richter’s car all pointed one way.
But then he remembered other things. Darby so childlike and afraid after her room was broken into. Could that have been part of the act? Was she capable of faking their night at the dinner concert and her interest at the Holocaust conference? Were her laughter and kisses only for dramatic effect? And if Darby was partnered with Ingrid and Richter, why hadn’t she gone straight to Gunther for the information they sought?
Then the image of Darby asleep next to Gunther made him ignore the facts and believe in her. He’d watched them sleep so deep and safe and secure. Though they’d just met, they were not strangers, but grandfather and grandchild brought together at last.
“If she’s not involved, then she’s in danger,” he said aloud.
Brant turned the car out of the parking lot while hitting the buttons on his phone. He didn’t want to worry his old friend, but he needed to know one thing: Where was the inheritance hidden?
The sign said Gosau. Darby turned the car to the right. “Are we going to Ingrid and Gunther’s house?”
“Just follow my instructions.” His voice revealed his own conflicting thoughts. “I need a few supplies. We can’t dig with our hands, now can we?”
Darby remained silent as they drove miles of twisting mountain road through dense forest and along a silver stream that caught the last lights in the sky. The car was warm and comfortable with the scent of men’s aftershave, but Darby felt sick. The road rose from the forest into a long mountain valley and into tiny Gosau. Richter directed her up myriad streets to a hillside house—Gunther and Ingrid’s, she assumed. The smaller house next door must have been where Brant had spent his childhood summers. She imagined him as a boy exploring forest grottos and visiting Gunther on the porch of the larger house.
Winter Passing Page 29