Damnation

by Peter Beck

  ‘Lunatic,’ Hari said. Winter nodded, even though the pilot couldn’t see him.

  ‘Fly slowly back the way we came.’

  The helicopter turned around and Hari cancelled the announcement of his arrival.

  Winter gathered up the remains of the flapping paraglider and started scanning the forest beneath him. The firs were growing densely and it was almost impossible to see the floor of this unmanaged forest. The impenetrable undergrowth offered ideal hiding places.

  They flew along a storm glade. Juvenile firs were already sprouting between the broken trees, only some of which had been cleared to stumps. The eternal cycle of nature. Surely Max wouldn’t be so stupid as to cross the clearing. Screwing up his eyes, Winter scoured the edge of the forest. He tried to get into Max’s mindset. The forest extended for about three kilometres to the meadows. Despite the rough terrain a good runner could do it in fifteen minutes. Somewhere down there Max had parked his getaway car.

  Then he saw him. At the edge of the glade.

  ‘Down there, Hari. Ten o’clock. Two hundred metres.’

  The paraglider puffed up again, obscuring Winter’s sight. He shoved the huge, nylon jellyfish to one side. The terrorist had cut the lines as they were flying up the valley above the dense forest. Aiming for the fir trees to break his fall, he’d jumped.

  Now Max was lying face-down on the trunk of a fir tree split by a storm. Impaled. The helicopter hovered in the air. Winter could see sharp splinters sticking out of Max’s black back. Straight through the lungs.

  ‘Good God,’ Hari whispered. ‘May the Lord be with him.’

  ‘Not so sure about that,’ Winter said. ‘He’s going straight to hell. Shame we won’t be able to grill him ourselves any more.’

  Max’s head turned. The pale face was ashen. His eyes stared blankly at Winter hovering above him. Max contorted his face into a grin and tried to say something. Blood ran from the corners of his mouth. Winter stared impassively at Max until the life faded from his eyes. One of his arms fell to the side and his body collapsed further onto the stake.

  ‘Winter. He just moved. He’s still alive.’

  ‘Not any more,’ Winter said, with a hint of disappointment in his voice. Max had died far too quickly for his liking.

  ‘Take us back to the mountains.’

  The helicopter turned and they flew back up the valley.

  LATER

  That afternoon a large contingent of police cars, fire engines and ambulances flooded into the usually peaceful valley. Baumgartner was placed in a body bag. A group of paramedics and foresters dealt with Max. Hugentobler had gathered up the three fake maintenance men and handed them over to the police.

  Explosives experts flew in and defused the devices for good, with the help of experts from the operating company. Sniffer dogs searched the dam wall for hours, but didn’t find any more explosives. They were rewarded with their dog treats all the same.

  In Boston, Farmer was arrested by Smith and his people as he left his Boston brown stone. He protested against the misunderstanding and the handcuffs, but didn’t resist when the plain-clothes officers put him in the car. Two hours later he was walking free again, thanks to his lawyer, a written promise not to leave Boston and a bail of ten million dollars.

  Neither the stock markets nor the bank’s clients noticed a thing. The latter enjoyed a sumptuous party that afternoon, on a renovated steamer with huge paddle wheels. Von Tobler gave one of his splendid speeches, into which he weaved his brand new investment vehicle, enabling the super-rich to invest directly in global infrastructure projects. After all, von Tobler joked, this venerable steamer, over a century old, still yielded a substantial return. Immune to economic crises and wars. The rich guests from across the world laughed discreetly and applauded.

  Winter had driven home in the afternoon and laid the granite slabs. The terrace was finished just before sunset. The sky was already changing colour when he set out the two loungers.

  Seven weeks later, on a sunny, September day, Al-Bader and Winter played their second round of golf at Château de Plaisance. This time they reached the eighteenth hole without any notable incidents. Apart from Winter’s ball finding water on the fourteenth hole.

  Al-Bader won by three strokes.

  The old beeches and oaks along the fairways were still in their summer attire. By contrast, the interspersed birches with their white trunks already sported yellow leaves. An Indian summer on Lake Geneva. Since their round in August, which had been rudely interrupted, the temperatures had fallen. Both men wore light jumpers and were now sitting in the half-empty restaurant.

  The well-earned beer came accompanied by towering club sandwiches. They hadn’t talked much during the round, focusing instead on the little white ball. As they toasted, Al-Bader said, with exaggerated formality, ‘Winter, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you most kindly on behalf of the Al-Bader family. We are pleased that the murder of my elder brother has been solved. Allah be merciful on his soul. Without you, it would have taken far longer and indeed may never have been cleared up at all.’

  After the first sip – the one that always tasted the best – Winter replied with overplayed modesty, ‘My pleasure. It’s my job and all part of the bank’s service.’

  Wiping the foam from his lips, Al-Bader grinned. ‘You know what I mean. It’s just a shame you declined my offer,’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  He’d politely, but firmly turned down Al-Bader’s generous offer of employment. He wanted to finish renovating his farmhouse and finally furnish his own home.

  Winter changed the subject. ‘How is the moving of the pyramids from America to Switzerland going? Are you content?’

  ‘Yes, very. Yesterday we formally completed the transactions. Von Tobler is a genius.’

  Before Al-Bader’s first Pyramid Investment Partners board meeting, von Tobler had made use of the trials and tribulations concerning Farmer to make Al-Bader a detailed offer for administering the investment projects. The CEO had conjured up his own team which was also managing the recently-established investment vehicle. Once again, von Tobler had struck gold with his unerring instinct.

  At the board meeting in Riyadh, von Tobler had convinced the other representatives of the rich Arab families that their money would be best looked after by his discreet, totally neutral and traditionally solid Swiss bank. For a modest fee the bank assumed the onerous administration of the investments as well as the back-office work.

  At a stroke the volume of the new investment vehicle had increased tenfold.

  And von Tobler’s success had given him some time and breathing space. In the financial group there was no longer talk of more integration. According to a well-informed source, the chairman of the group had personally engaged Baumgartner on his staff. Even Baumgartner had his advantages. At any rate, rumours of a takeover petered out.

  ‘I’m pleased to hear that, of course,’ Winter said.

  ‘Please tell Dr von Tobler that I’d be delighted to welcome him on my stud some time soon. We share a passion for breeding beautiful horses.’

  Al-Bader attacked his sandwich.

  Winter just nodded. Von Tobler was now his immediate boss. Känzig had left the bank with immediate effect for personal reasons and was looking for new challenges. He had disappeared. But Dirk had told Winter that he’d heard from someone that Känzig had gone to a heath resort in Nice to decompress after the recent stresses and strains. Many years ago it would have been called an ‘asylum’. But the main thing was that they were rid of that particular nuisance.

  Winding a strip of wild, smoked salmon on his fork, Winter said, ‘Yes, a year or two ago von Tobler bought himself a rambling estate in Essex from bankruptcy assets. For his retirement, or more accurately his unretirement.’ He left these words hanging thoughtfully in mid-air, then asked, ‘What was the reaction of the other families?’

  ‘The Baktars and the other families were furious when the report from the speci
al audit was produced, and Farmer was arrested and released a second time.’

  Al-Bader had fired the professor with immediate effect. But he couldn’t completely prevent the losses on the options. The special audit ordered by his twin, the one that had cost him his life, had been confirmed by the preliminary investigation of the district attorney. The State of Massachusetts was preparing a case against Farmer for misappropriation. Al-Bader took another sip of beer and gobbled up the rest of his club sandwich. ‘We’ve been asking around. The only documented connections to right-wing extremists date back twenty years. It will be difficult to prove incitement to murder in court.’

  ‘It was malicious intent. With your money and via Secer AG he bought access to our bank. In the past they dug tunnels, now they steal money electronically.’

  ‘Yes. Farmer was planning to rob his friends. He wanted power. And he was greedy. With the Secer project he saw the opportunity to make a few billion. That buys you a lot of power. And all he needed to realize his plans was to call on his old brothers in arms.’

  The two men leaned back. Farmer was hard to grasp.

  ‘What do you think? Will the evidence be adequate to convict Farmer?’ Winter asked.

  As far as he knew, which was based on a lengthy midnight telephone call with Smith and a walk with Meister, all that could be proved was that Farmer and Baumgartner knew each other. They’d met a few years ago when Pyramid Investment Partners sold a share of Secer AG to the financial group.

  And Baumgartner knew Max. The two of them, both fatherless, had grown up on the same working-class estate. Back then the two schoolmates were a good foil for each other. The powerful Max protected Baumgartner the weakling, who in return helped him out in school. When they were teenagers, this odd couple discovered a passion for weapons and explosives. Together they tortured small animals and terrorized the children of immigrants.

  Max had left school early and, after spending some time in prison for affray, enlisted as a mercenary in Africa. There were several records of him on file as right-wing and, according to unconfirmed reports, he’d taken part in various civil war atrocities in Africa. Max had hired the fake service-technicians from an extreme right-wing splinter group in Langenthal.

  Baumgartner had scraped through his business studies degree and had got the job at the financial group thanks to his connections in a duelling association at university. His criminal record was clean.

  Whenever Max spent time in Switzerland he stayed in the loft apartment of Baumgartner, who was single. They’d been big-game hunting several times, and in May had spent a week together in Nantucket.

  Although Farmer didn’t deny their meeting, he claimed that Baumgartner had brought Max along to ask Pyramid Investment Partners about the financing of a solar project in Africa. Farmer continued to play the generous benefactor. As both Max and Baumgartner were dead and buried, they couldn’t tell their stories any more.

  Smith didn’t believe Farmer’s account and assumed that the trio had spent the weekend in Nantucket planning the attack, Farmer taking the lead.

  Smith had also arrested and interrogated the TAA thug that Ben had photographed at the airport when they re-entered the United States. But this man kept quiet and eventually had had to be released. Smith suspected that he’d been sent by Farmer to clear up. He was due to meet Max and Baumgartner and eliminate both of them once the work had been done.

  According to Smith, Farmer had a whole host of influential friends in the States for whom he’d made lots of money. All in all, Smith was sceptical that the evidence would be sufficient for a trial, let alone a conviction.

  Rocking his head from side to side, Al-Bader pushed away his empty plate and said, ‘I don’t know if he will stand trial for murder. In Western democracies the wheels of the law turn very slowly. But it doesn’t bother me any more.’

  ‘Why not? He killed your brother and Anne!’

  Very early that morning Winter had visited Anne’s grave, bringing her flowers from his wild garden. He still found it hard to think of her and mention her name.

  Al-Bader must have read his thoughts, for he said, ‘I miss my brother, too. But it was Allah’s will. We will meet again in Paradise. And as I can see, you’re not up to date with the latest news.’

  Winter frowned in surprise.

  Holding up his palm, Al-Bader stood and said, ‘I’ll be right back.’

  Winter blinked into the autumn sun. Had something eluded him? Farmer’s career was over. Smith would take care of the prosecution personally. For Winter the matter was over. The uniformed waiter arrived, cleared away the plates and Winter accepted the dessert menu.

  Al-Bader returned. A confident smile on his lips and a well-read newspaper on his hand.

  ‘Here you go. I read this today at breakfast.’

  Al-Bader offered Winter a folded copy of the New York Times.

  Winter raised his eyebrows and swapped the menu for the paper.

  With his manicured finger, the sheikh tapped silently on a small article in the right-hand column: ‘Brutal attack on well-known money manager!’

  While Al-Bader gave serious attention to the sinfully expensive puddings, Winter read a short report about an anonymous money manager who had been attacked and mugged after leaving a restaurant in Boston old town. Normally this sort of incident would have barely made the miscellaneous stories of a local paper. But the victim in this case was a prominent private equity manager who was also under suspicion of having misappropriated funds from his investors, totalling hundreds of millions of dollars. The law enforcement officers, who’d arrived within three minutes, discovered that both of the money manager’s hands had been chopped off. An intensive search for the missing hands in the area surrounding the crime scene was unsuccessful. The man had lost a large quantity of blood and was in shock. He was taken to intensive care in a private clinic, where the senior doctor described his overall condition as stable. Given the nature of the crime, the authorities were not ruling out the possibility that fanatical Muslims could be responsible.

  ‘You think that’s Farmer?’ Winter asked.

  ‘I’m certain.’ He grinned and looked past Winter for a moment.

  Winter wondered how far their friendship went. What did Al-Bader really know? Was he behind the attack on Farmer? ‘A Muslim who has taken the Qisas principle of Sharia Law seriously?’ he said.

  ‘Or a Christian who’s taken the Old Testament literally? An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.’

  Turning to the approaching waiter, Al-Bader took off his sunglasses, tapped them on the menu and asked in French, ‘Would you kindly bring me an orange and rosemary croquant with…’ – he consulted the card – ‘… poached pear and Araguani chocolate duo?’

  ‘With pleasure, sir.’ The waiter nodded obediently.

  Winter put the paper aside and ordered a Coupe Danmark.

  Al-Bader pushed his sunglasses back on his head. His brother had worn the same make. The young waiter with the white apron disappeared and Winter asked, ‘Are you still on course in Cairo?’

  ‘Ask me again in a few years. It’s going to take time. As an investor you need staying power and a little…’ – he rubbed his thumb and index finger together – ‘… baksheesh.’ Then Al-Bader wanted to know what Winter thought about investing in a further development of Shanghai port.

  When the artistically arranged desserts sailed in a few minutes later, Al-Bader licked his lips and asked mischievously, ‘And how is Fatima?’

  Winter paused, and then said, ‘I daresay she would feel safer if they apprehended the men behind the attack at the pyramids.’ Nobody had been able to prove a connection between Farmer and the explosion that killed Kaddour.

  Two weeks ago, Winter and Fatima had spent a week together in London. Fatima had taken Winter to her favourite restaurant. But on the Sunday afternoon somehow they’d started talking at cross purposes and from there it was only a matter of time before Fatima insisted on catching an earlier flight back t
o Cairo.

  Since then Winter had heard nothing from the very busy diplomat’s daughter at the head of Orafin.

  But during their walk along the rose beds in Regent’s Park she’d told him the Al-Bader family was now the third-biggest shareholder in the newly established project development company, behind the Egyptian state and Orafin.

  Now Winter threw the ball back at Al-Bader. ‘Didn’t you see her at the board meeting of the Cairo nuclear power station?’

  ‘No, I sent a good-looking cousin,’ Al-Bader said with a grin, and ordered a Piedmontese Nebbiolo grappa to digest his meal. When the waiter returned with the slim bottle, Al-Bader took it from his hand. ‘We’ll have the whole bottle.’

  Winter took out his vibrating mobile. Von Tobler. He ignored the call and put the phone back in his pocket.

  Having filled the two little glasses to the rim, Al-Bader toasted Winter. ‘To us!’

  ‘To the future!’

  They downed their glasses and shivered with the cold. The alcohol burned their throats. The autumn evening had turned cool and soon the first snow would be falling.

  ‘Got any plans yet?’ the sheikh asked.

  ‘No, but another winter is on its way.’

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Despite it being only my name on the cover, many people worked on Damnation. In 2008 I wrote the first seventy pages and gave them to my partner (and toughest critic), who silently read them. Today I can still remember the moment when she told me that it reads like a ‘real’ book. After that, I hunkered down, finished the manuscript and sent it out. The reaction from the publishers was underwhelming to say the least. I reworked the manuscript and gave it to a dozen test readers, who improved it again with their honest feedback.

  I also found myself an agent, Katharina Altas, who convinced the German publisher Emons to transform my manuscript into a proper book. I owe a lot to Hejo and Ulrike Emons, Christel Steinmetz, my editor Irène Kost, who whipped both story and hero into shape, and Dominic Hettgen, who told everybody to read my thriller.