by Glenn Meade
16
ASUNCIÓN. TUESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 3:45 A.M.
The air in Sanchez’s office was gray with cigarette smoke.
They found the tape and the six photographs in the station locker marked number 39.
Each photograph was of the same two men. One was Dieter Winter, the other Nicolas Tsarkin. Winter’s blond hair and thin, sharp features were unmistakable when compared to the head-and-shoulders shot Sanchez received from Volkmann’s people.
The pictures had been taken with a telephoto lens. The two men were walking on the grounds of Tsarkin’s estate—the last place he saw Rudi Hernandez alive. At last, Sanchez thought, proof of a connection between Winter and Tsarkin.
If only the tape made sense . . .
They listened to it eight times. Erica translated the conversation for Sanchez, then transcribed it in Spanish, the detective reading her writing slowly, questioning the inflection of words in the handwritten script—like Volkmann, curious, perplexed—examining the cryptic words over and over, asking Erica to translate again from the German, making sure no nuance was ignored, no word overlooked.
“You want to hear the tape again?”
Volkmann nodded. Sanchez pressed the PLAY button on the player lying on his desk before lighting another cigarette and sitting back.
Deep, guttural voices filled the room once more, Volkmann almost knowing the words from memory.
“The shipment . . . ?”
“The cargo will be picked up from Genoa as arranged.”
“And the Italian?”
“He will be eliminated, but I want to be certain we don’t arouse suspicion concerning the cargo. It would be prudent to wait until Brandenburg becomes operational. Then he will be dealt with along with the others.”
Pause.
“Those who have pledged their loyalty . . . we must be certain of them.”
“I have had their assurances confirmed. And their pedigree is without question.”
“And the Turk?”
“I foresee no problems.”
“The woman in Berlin . . . you’re absolutely certain we can rely on her?”
“She won’t fail us, I assure you.” Pause. “There are no changes to the names on the list?”
“They’ll all be killed.”
“Your travel arrangements? Everything has been organized?”
“We leave Paraguay on the sixth.”
“The schedule . . . perhaps I should go through it once more?”
There was a long pause on the tape until Volkmann heard a voice speak again.
“It’s quite warm in here. Perhaps I might have a glass of water?”
They all heard the clink of glass a few moments later, the sound of water poured, the long silence, then the click on the tape, followed by a faint buzzing noise.
Sanchez leaned across and pressed the FORWARD button, until the sound of voices came again, but this time very faintly, the words fuzzy, crackling, barely audible.
“Prost.”
“Prost.”
“Prost.”
Another pause, then very faintly, “We must take our leave of you. It’s a long drive back north. The driver will take you to the safe house.”
Silence.
Sanchez waited to make sure the conversation had finished, with what sounded like the faint noise of a door being closed, then he switched off the machine.
Volkmann looked down at the transcript he had scribbled in his notebook. Sanchez asked what the word Brandenburg meant. Erica explained that it was the name of a city west of Berlin and was also the name of a German province that had once contained part of the state of Berlin. The famous Brandenburg Gate that stood near the Reichstag, the old German parliament building, was once the original entrance to the territory. Hearing the answer, Sanchez scratched his head. The explanation did not help.
“Brandenburg,” he said thoughtfully, “is not a place. But obviously a code for something else.”
Volkmann nodded. He had come to the same conclusion.
“But for what?” Erica asked.
“Exactly. For what?” Sanchez looked at each of them. “For drug movements? Possibly. But we’ll have to dig deeper, won’t we?” His shoulders drooped with exhaustion and helplessness.
“And what’s ‘the list’?” Volkmann added. “ ‘They’ll all be killed’?” he quoted. “Who? Where? How many? And who’s the Italian, the Turk, and the woman in Berlin?”
Volkmann tried to concentrate on the tape. Three different speakers, he decided, checking his notes.
“Your travel arrangements . . . Everything has been organized?”
“We leave Paraguay on the sixth.”
The sixth. Today.
He asked Sanchez to rewind the tape on those lines. Listening again to the faint voice that had spoken the reply, Volkmann felt certain it was the same voice that later said, “We must take our leave of you. It’s a long drive back north . . .” What was “north”? They had discussed that line also. To Sanchez, “north” in Paraguay meant a vast area of jungle and swamp and scrubland called the Chaco. The detective pointed to it on the nicotine-stained map on the wall.
“North” could even mean over the border . . . Brazil . . . Bolivia. Or simply a suburb far north of the city.
Volkmann said to Sanchez, “What about Tsarkin, the suicide case? He can’t be a complete cipher. Tell me again everything you know about him.”
Sanchez studied the file open on his desk, the coroner’s report, the letter from the oncologist at the San Ignatio hospital.
“He was ninety-one, a retired businessman, a naturalized citizen of this country for many years, and a former director of many companies. On November twenty-third, in the San Ignatio hospital, he was given only days to live. He had stomach cancer. The bleeding had become very bad. The hospital doctors who treated him said he was in pain and very weak, despite drugs.”
“You’re certain it was suicide?”
Sanchez yawned, put a hand to his mouth, blinked several times. “There was no question, especially considering his poor health. But after I received your report the other day, I asked one of my people to find out more about Tsarkin. I will have his immigration file checked out.”
“You said there was a safe open in the study where you found the body. And embers in the fireplace.”
“Sí. But this sometimes happens when people kill themselves. Private letters, personal things, they destroy them beforehand.” Sanchez shrugged. “Especially if they have something to hide. In Tsarkin’s case, we know now that is most likely true. We found no papers left of any interest. One of my men is checking the calls made to and from Tsarkin’s house recently, especially on the twenty-third. I mentioned that there was a call Rudi Hernandez answered. Perhaps we can find out who made it.”
It was still dark beyond the office window. Sanchez could hardly keep his eyes open. He should have finished work at five the previous day. He had telephoned his wife, told her he would be late, how late he didn’t know.
“How long before you get the information on Tsarkin’s background?”
Sanchez looked up at Volkmann and shrugged. “The office of immigration records does not open until ten o’clock. Then we can check Tsarkin’s past. When he came to Paraguay, and from where. Also, I will have Tsarkin’s servants questioned again. Perhaps they can tell us about his business acquaintances. Friends. People he socialized with.”
Sanchez looked at his watch. Almost four o’clock. He, too, remembered the words on the tape, the words the woman had transcribed: “We leave Paraguay on the sixth.”
He pushed himself achingly up from the chair and stretched his arms. The smoky air in the office stung his eyes, yet he stubbed out his cigarette and lit another. He slowly shook his head. “A question. In the hotels Winter stayed at, he always hired a suite. You asked a question. Why does one person need to hire a suite?” He paused. “You suggested it might be to impress someone. Could it have been a business contact, or a woman perhap
s?” He paused again. “A suite, it is also big enough to hold a meeting, sí?” Sanchez raised his eyebrows questioningly.
“A hotel would also be a suitable place for someone to hire a room and try to listen to what was being said in another room nearby, would it not?” He looked down, plucked the list of hotels from the relevant file, and shrugged heavily. “Perhaps it is worth investigating. Just now, it is all I can think of.”
Volkmann said tiredly, “You could be right. But which hotel? Asunción’s a big city.”
Sanchez briefly examined the list. “The hotel Winter stayed in most often, your hotel, the Excelsior. Perhaps if we tried there first? Then the Hotel Guarani.”
• • •
The receptionist insisted on calling the night-duty manager first.
The man appeared minutes later, tall and immaculately dressed in a dark suit, crisp white shirt, and gray silk tie.
Sanchez showed his identity card and stated his request. The manager offered no resistance, led them politely to his office around the corner from the lobby.
He pulled up chairs for all of them and asked Sanchez, “The date again?”
“November twenty-fifth.”
The manager rummaged in a filing cabinet drawer. He removed several thick wads of registration cards held together with rubber bands, brought them over to the desk, and sat down.
“Is there a particular name you wish to check on?”
“Hernandez. Señor Rudi Hernandez. He may have been a guest here.”
“Guest information is kept on the computer. However, the original registration cards are maintained in alphabetical order, so it should not be difficult to find.”
The manager riffled through the first block of cards he picked. “Hernandez . . . Hernandez . . . yes.” He looked up. “One Hernandez, but the first name is”—he consulted the card again—“Morites. Morites Hernandez.”
Sanchez held out his hand; the manager passed him the registration. A commercial traveler, the card declared, from São Paulo.
Sanchez glanced at Erica’s handbag and asked in English, “Señorita, do you have any correspondence from Rudi?”
“In my room . . . I have a letter in my suitcase.”
“Would you be so kind as to bring it to me?”
Erica nodded silently and left. When she returned five minutes later, she handed the letter over, unfolding the pages first, Sanchez comparing the handwriting on the registration to the handwritten letter he placed beside it on the desk.
The writing sloped in different ways; the writing on the registration cramped, secretive; the writing on the letter Rudi had sent to Erica large, stylish, the letters fat, generous.
Sanchez looked up. “No. Not the Hernandez we are looking for.”
The manager appeared slightly relieved. Sanchez said, “November twenty-fifth. How many people stayed at the hotel?”
The manager looked from Sanchez to Volkmann and Erica, this time switching to perfect English. “It was a busy night, I remember. We were full. There was a convention and several functions—”
“How many people?” asked Sanchez.
“Perhaps three hundred guests.”
When Sanchez sighed, the manager shrugged. “I’m sorry I haven’t been able to help you.”
Sanchez sounded determined. “We will need to check all of these cards.”
The man stared at him in disbelief. “All, señor?”
“Sí. All. And I will need a list, a computer list, of all the guests who stayed here on November twenty-fifth. Their names. Their passport numbers if they were foreigners. Who made their reservations. Who paid their bills. Your computer. It has all this information?”
The manager nodded, dumbly.
“Then please see to it at once,” said Sanchez.
“Señor, you realize the hour? I have other duties. Perhaps when the day staff arrives—”
Sanchez interrupted sharply. “I need this information now. It cannot wait. So please do as I ask. Otherwise I will be forced to contact your superior.” His voice softened a little. “I would be grateful for your cooperation, señor.”
17
NORTHEASTERN CHACO. 5:40 A.M.
The sounds of the jungle awakened him.
He rose from the bed, drew away the mosquito net, and dressed slowly. As his eyes adjusted to the semidarkness, he took in the room, bare now except for the bed and suitcases and the clothes hung on the back of the door where one of the Lima boys had left them, freshly washed and pressed for the journey. He thought of the boys now as he buttoned the soft cotton shirt. Their deaths had been necessary to protect him.
When he finished dressing, he went downstairs to the kitchen. He found a tired-looking Kruger sitting at the pinewood table smoking a cigarette, a glass of water in front of him.
“We burned the remaining provisions,” Kruger said. “If you wish to eat breakfast, there’s only some bottled water and dried nuts.”
The silver-haired man nodded. “Just water, Hans.”
Kruger stubbed out his cigarette in an empty cigarette packet lying on the table, then crossed to the sink in the corner and unscrewed the cap on a plastic bottle of drinking water. He took one of the remaining glasses and rinsed it first with the tepid water before filling it almost to the brim and handing it across.
The silver-haired man took a sip, looked out beyond the open kitchen window at the dark mass of jungle rising up to the distant rain forest. Already the night sky was streaked with an aching blue. It would soon be light. The unceasing sounds of the jungle throbbed outside. A bird flew past, a banana flit, its yellow plumage discernible even in the twilight. He looked back at Kruger and said, “The boys . . . ?”
“It’s done,” Kruger responded. “Schmidt made sure it was as quick and painless as possible. And that no one could identify them.” He saw a look of pain crease the man’s face.
“We’ll wait until first light to burn what’s left in the house. Franz and his men should arrive in the next hour to pick up the vehicles. A few more items have to be loaded onto the truck. Half an hour’s work, no more. Then we’ll begin the final check and cleanup.”
The tall, silver-haired man looked toward the corner of the old, wooden outhouse. A place where he had spent solitary hours in childhood, serving his sentence alone.
He put down the unfinished glass of water on the pine table. “I wish to take a walk before we leave. The men can stay here. I would prefer to be alone, Hans.”
The silver-haired man saw the look of alarm on Kruger’s face, and he smiled gently as he placed a hand reassuringly on his shoulder.
“I’ll be perfectly safe, Hans. There’s no danger, I promise you.”
“As you wish.”
The man crossed to the door and stepped outside.
Kruger watched him go, then glanced at his watch.
Six-ten.
Three more hours. Three more hours and he would finally be quit of this godforsaken place.
ASUNCIÓN. 5:55 A.M.
It took them almost an hour to find the hotel registration card.
Volkmann found it, the three of them sitting around the desk, a pile of cards and a page from Hernandez’s letter in front of each of them. The signature on the card was in a different name, Roberto Ferres, but the style was unmistakably the same: the sloped and dotted letters, the amplitude of the script, matching Hernandez’s writing exactly.
Once they found the card, Sanchez requested a list of guests staying on the first and second floors. Now the information lay in front of him, several reams of folded computer printout sheets. Sanchez held the registration card in his hand and looked at the harassed manager.
“The room that Señor Ferres hired on the first floor: the bill was paid in advance?” The information was on the registration card, but Sanchez asked just the same. There was an amount included in the bill for a bottle of champagne and canapés. That had puzzled him.
“Yes, in cash,” the manager replied, glancing at the card in Sanche
z’s hand.
“Was the room key returned?”
“There is no need for our guests to return keys. The locks are opened with plastic disposable key cards. For security, they are changed by computer each time a new guest checks in. You wish to see the room where this gentleman stayed? I believe it is unoccupied at present.”
“Perhaps later.” Sanchez knew it was pointless. By now, the room would have been cleaned a dozen times. He looked at his watch. Six-fifteen.
Sanchez asked, “If there was a disturbance in Señor Hernandez’s . . . Señor Ferres’s . . . room, would it have been reported?”
The manager looked slightly alarmed. “What kind of disturbance?”
Sanchez shrugged. “A fight. A disagreement. Excessive noise.”
“My staff are very diligent. If anything unusual happened, they would have reported the matter, and it would have been recorded.” The manager smiled briefly. “Sometimes it happens. Couples argue. Throw things. You think something happened in this gentleman’s room?”
“Perhaps. Perhaps not.”
“I can check the daybook for complaints on that floor if you wish.”
“I would appreciate it. Also, if this gentleman left anything behind in the room. Perhaps personal belongings. You can check?”
The manager nodded, then left them once more.
Sanchez rubbed his eyes and said to Volkmann and Erica, “The champagne and food . . . I am puzzled. Why would Rudi want to order them?”
He unfolded the ream of computer printouts. The list started with the first room number on Hernandez’s floor. Slowly, carefully, he read through the printout, eyes scanning the information presented. Room number. Guest. Bill charges.
After a while, he blinked several times, rubbed his bloodshot eyes, looked up.
“At last, a light shines in the darkness.”
Volkmann and Erica stared at the detective.
“Someone booked a suite on the same floor as Rudi’s room.” Sanchez smiled broadly for the first time. “A Señor Nicolas Tsarkin.”