The Keep

by F. Paul Wilson

  “We’re both going,” she replied, smiling.

  “Where?”

  Magda felt her smile falter as confusion washed over her again. Where were they going? She realized she had no firm idea, only a vague impression of snowy peaks and chill winds.

  “The Alps, Papa.”

  Her father’s lips parted in a toothy smile that threatened to crack the parchmentlike skin stretched so tightly over his facial bones.

  “You must have been dreaming, my dear. We’re going nowhere. I certainly won’t be traveling that far—ever again. It was a dream. A nice dream, but that’s all. Forget it and go back to sleep.”

  Magda frowned at the crushed resignation in her father’s voice. He had always been such a fighter. His illness was sapping more than his strength. But now was no time to argue with him. She patted the back of his hand and reached for the string on the bedside lamp.

  “I guess you’re right. It was a dream.” She kissed him on the forehead and turned out the light, leaving him in darkness.

  Back in her room, Magda studied the partially packed suitcase waiting on the bed. Of course it had been a dream that had made her think they were going somewhere. What else could it be? A trip anywhere was out of the question.

  Yet the feeling remained…such a dead certainty that they were going somewhere north, and soon. Dreams weren’t supposed to leave such definite impressions. It gave her an odd, uncomfortable feeling…like tiny cold fingers running lightly along the skin of her arms.

  She couldn’t shake the certainty. And so she closed the suitcase and shoved it under the bed, leaving the straps unfastened and the clothes inside…warm clothes…It was still cold in the Alps this time of year.

  SIX

  THE KEEP

  Wednesday, 23 April

  0622 hours

  Hours after his calamitous awakening, Woermann sat with Sergeant Oster and sipped a cup of coffee in the mess. Private Grunstadt had been carried to a room and left alone there. He had been placed in his bedroll after being stripped and washed by two of his fellow privates. He had apparently wet and soiled his uniform before going into his delirium.

  “As near as I can figure it,” Oster was saying, “the wall collapsed and one of those big blocks of stone must have landed on the back of his neck and torn his head off.”

  Woermann sensed that Oster was trying to sound very calm and analytical, but inside he was as confused and shocked as everybody else.

  “As good an explanation as any, I suppose, barring a medical examination. But it still doesn’t tell us what they were up to down there, and it doesn’t explain Grunstadt’s condition.”

  “Shock.”

  Woermann shook his head. “That man has been through battle. I know he’s seen worse. I can’t accept shock as the whole answer. There’s something else.”

  He had arrived at his own reconstruction of the events of the preceding night. The stone block with its vandalized cross of gold and silver, the belt around Lutz’s ankle, the shaft into the wall…it all indicated that Lutz had crawled into the shaft expecting to find more gold and silver at its end. But all he found was a small, empty, blind cubicle…like a tiny prison cell…or hiding place.

  Except that Woermann could think of no good reason why there should be any space there at all.

  “They must have upset the balance of the stones in the wall by removing that one at the bottom,” Oster said. “That’s what caused the collapse.”

  “I doubt it,” Woermann replied, sipping his coffee for warmth as well as for stimulation. “The cellar floor, yes: That weakened and fell into the subcellar. But the corridor wall…” He remembered the way the stones had been scattered about the corridor, as if blown out by an explosion. He could not explain that. He set his coffee cup down. Explanations would have to wait.

  “Come. Work to do.”

  He headed for his quarters while Oster went to make the twice-daily radio call to the Ploiesti defense garrison. He’d instructed the sergeant to report the casualty as an accidental death.

  The sky was light as Woermann stood at the rear window of his quarters and looked down on the courtyard, still in shadow. The keep had changed. He sensed an unease about it. Yesterday the keep had been nothing more than an old stone building. Now it was more. Each shadow seemed deeper and darker than before, and sinister in some unfathomable way.

  He blamed it on predawn malaise and on the shock of death so near at hand. Yet as the sun finally conquered the mountaintops on the far side of the pass, chasing the shadows and warming the stone walls of the keep, Woermann had the feeling that the light could not banish what was wrong. It could only drive it beneath the surface for a while.

  The men felt it, too. He could see that. But he was determined to keep their spirits up. When Alexandru arrived this morning, he would send him back immediately for a cartload of lumber. There were cots and tables to be made. Soon the keep would be filled with the healthy sound of hammers in strong hands driving good nails into seasoned wood. He walked to the window facing the causeway. Yes, there were Alexandru and his two boys now. Everything was going to be all right.

  He lifted his gaze to the tiny village, transected by the sunlight pouring over the mountaintops—its upper half aglow, its lower half still in shadow. And he knew he would have to paint the village just as he saw it now. He stepped back: The village, framed in the drab gray of the wall, shone like a jewel. That would be it…the village seen through the window in the wall. The contrasts appealed to him. He had an urge to set up a canvas and start immediately. He painted best under stress and most loved to paint then, losing himself in perspective and composition, light and shadow, tint and texture.

  The rest of the day went quickly. Woermann oversaw the placement of Lutz’s body in the subcellar. It and the severed head were carried down through the opening in the cellar floor and covered with a sheet on the dirt floor of the cavern below. The temperature down there felt close to freezing. He saw no sign of vermin about and it seemed the best place to store the cadaver until later in the week when arrangements could be made for shipment home.

  Under normal circumstances Woermann would have been tempted to explore the subcellar. The subterranean cavern with its glistening walls and inky recesses might have sparked an interesting painting. But not this time. He told himself it was too cold, that he would wait until summer and do a proper job of it. But that wasn’t true. Something about this cavern urged him to be gone from it as soon as possible.

  He realized as the day progressed that Grunstadt was going to be a problem. The soldier showed no sign of improvement. He lay in whatever position he was placed and stared into space. Every so often he would shudder and moan; occasionally, he would howl at the top of his lungs. He soiled himself again. At this rate, with no intake of food or fluid and without skilled nursing care, he would not survive the week. Grunstadt would have to be shipped out with Lutz’s remains if he didn’t snap out of it.

  Woermann kept close watch on the mood of the men during the day and was satisfied with their response to the physical tasks he set for them. They worked well despite their lack of sleep and the death of their comrade. They had all known Lutz, known what a schemer and a plotter he was, that he rarely carried his full share of the load. It seemed to be the consensus that he had brought on the very accident that had killed him.

  Woermann saw to it that there was no time for mourning or brooding, even for those few so inclined. A latrine system had to be organized, lumber commandeered from the village, tables and chairs made. By the time the evening mess was cleared, few in the detachment seemed willing to stay up for even an after-dinner cigarette. To a man, except for those on watch, they headed for their bedrolls.

  Woermann allowed an alteration in the watch so that the courtyard guard would cover the corridor that led to Grunstadt’s room. Because of his cries and moans, no one would spend the night within a hundred feet of him; but Otto Grunstadt had always been well liked by the men and they felt a
n obligation to see that he did himself no harm.

  Near midnight, Woermann found himself still wide awake despite a desperate desire to sleep. With the dark had come a sense of foreboding that refused to let him relax. He finally gave in to a restless urge to be up and about and decided to tour the guardposts to be sure those on sentry duty were awake.

  His tour took him down Grunstadt’s corridor and he decided to look in on him. He tried to imagine what could have driven the man into himself like that. He peeked through the door. A kerosene lamp had been left burning with a low flame in a far corner of the room. The private was in one of his quiet phases, breathing rapidly, sweating and whimpering. The whimpering was followed regularly by a prolonged howl. Woermann wanted to be far down the hall when that occurred. It was unnerving to hear a human voice make a sound like that…the voice so near and the mind so far away.

  He was at the end of the corridor and about to step into the courtyard again when it came. Only this wasn’t like the others. This was a shriek, as if Grunstadt had suddenly awakened and found himself on fire, or pierced by a thousand knives—physical as well as emotional agony filled the sound this time. And then it cut off, like pulling the plug on a radio in midsong.

  Woermann froze for an instant, his nerves and muscles unwilling to respond to his commands; with intense effort he forced himself to turn and run back down the corridor. He burst into the room. It was cold, colder than a minute ago, and the kerosene lamp was out. He fumbled for a match to relight it, then turned to Grunstadt.

  Dead. The man’s eyes were open, bulging toward the ceiling; the mouth was agape, the lips drawn back over the teeth as if frozen in the middle of a scream of horror. And his neck—the throat had been ripped open. Blood splattered the bed and walls.

  Woermann’s reflexes took over. Before he even knew what he was doing, his hand had clawed his Luger from its holster and his eyes were searching the corners of the room for whoever had done this. But he could see no one. He ran to the narrow window, stuck his head through, and looked up and down the walls. No rope, no sign of anyone making an escape. He jerked his head back into the room and looked around again. Impossible! No one had come down the corridor, and no one had gone out the window. And yet Grunstadt had been murdered.

  The sound of running feet cut off further thought. The guards had heard the shriek and were coming to investigate. Good…Woermann had to admit he was terrified. He couldn’t bear to be alone in this room much longer.

  Thursday, 24 April

  After seeing to it that Grunstadt’s body was placed next to Lutz’s, Woermann made sure the men were again kept busy all day building cots and tables. He fostered the belief that an anti-German partisan group was at work in the area. But he found it impossible to convince himself; for he had been on the corridor when the murder had occurred and knew there was no way the killer could have got by him without being seen—unless he could fly or walk through walls. So what was the answer?

  He announced that the sentries would be doubled tonight, with extra men posted in and around the barracks to safeguard those who were sleeping.

  With the sound of insistent hammering rising from the courtyard below, Woermann took time out in the afternoon to set up one of his canvases. He began to paint. He had to do something to get that awful look on Grunstadt’s face out of his mind; it helped to concentrate on mixing his pigments until their color approximated that of the wall in his room. He decided to place the window to the right of center, then spent the better part of two hours in the late afternoon blending the paint and smoothing it onto the canvas, leaving a white area for the village as seen through the window.

  That night he slept. After interrupted slumber the first night, and none on the second, his exhausted body fairly collapsed onto his bedroll.

  Private Rudy Schreck walked his patrol cautiously and diligently, keeping an eye on Wehner on the far side of the courtyard. Earlier in the evening, two men for this tiny area had seemed a bit much, but as darkness had grown and consolidated its hold on the keep, Schreck found himself glad to have someone within earshot. He and Wehner had worked out a routine: Both would walk the perimeter of the courtyard within an arm’s length of the wall, both going clockwise at opposite sides. It kept them always apart, but it meant better surveillance.

  Rudy Schreck was not afraid for his life. Uneasy, yes, but not afraid. He was awake, alert; he had a rapid-fire weapon slung over his shoulder and knew how to use it. Whoever had killed Otto last night was not going to have a chance against him. Still, he wished for more light in the courtyard. The scattered bulbs spilling stark pools of brightness here and there along the periphery did nothing to dispel the overall gloom. The two rear corners of the courtyard were especially dark wells of blackness.

  The night was chilly. To make matters worse, fog had seeped in through the barred gate and hung in the air around him, sheening the metal surface of his helmet with droplets of moisture. Schreck rubbed a hand across his eyes. Mostly he was tired. Tired of everything that had to do with the army. War wasn’t what he had thought it would be. When he had joined up two years ago he had been eighteen with a head full of dreams of sound and fury, of great battles and noble victories, of huge armies clashing on fields of honor. That was the way it had always been in the history books. But real war hadn’t turned out that way. Real war was mostly waiting. And the waiting was usually dirty, cold, nasty, and wet. Rudy Schreck had had his fill of war. He wanted to be home in Treysa. His parents were there, and so was a girl named Eva who hadn’t been writing as often as she used to. He wanted his own life back, a life with no uniforms and no inspections, no drills, no sergeants, and no officers. And no watch duty.

  He was coming to the rear corner of the courtyard on the northern side. The shadows looked deeper than ever there…much deeper than on his last turn. Schreck slowed his pace as he approached. This is silly, he thought. Just a trick of the light. Nothing to be afraid of.

  And yet…he didn’t want to go in there. He wanted to skirt this particular corner. He’d go into all the others, but not this one.

  Squaring his shoulders, Schreck forced himself forward. It was only shadow. He was a grown man, too old to be afraid of the dark. He continued straight ahead, maintaining an arm’s length from the wall, into the shadowed corner—and suddenly he was lost. Cold, sucking blackness closed in on him. He spun around to go back the way he had come but found only more blackness, impenetrable, as though the rest of the world had disappeared. Schreck pulled the Schmeisser off his shoulder and held it ready to fire. He was shivering with cold yet sweating profusely. He wanted to believe this was all a trick, that Wehner had somehow turned off all the lights at the instant he had entered the shadow. But Schreck’s senses dashed that hope. The darkness was too complete. It pressed against his eyes and wormed its way into his courage.

  He sensed someone approaching. Schreck could neither see nor hear him, but someone was there. Coming closer.

  “Wehner?” he said softly, hoping his terror didn’t show in his voice. “Is that you, Wehner?”

  But it wasn’t Wehner. Schreck realized that as the presence neared. It was someone—something—else. What felt like a length of heavy rope suddenly coiled around his ankles. As he was yanked off his feet, Private Rudy Schreck began screaming and firing wildly until the darkness ended the war for him.

  A short sputtering burst from a Schmeisser jolted Woermann awake. He sprang to the window overlooking the courtyard. One of the guards was running toward the rear. Where was the other? Damn! He had posted two guards in the courtyard! He was about to turn and run for the stairs when he saw something on the wall. A pale lump…it looked almost like…

  A body…upside down…a naked body hanging from a rope tied to its feet. Even from his tower window Woermann could see the blood that had spilled from the throat over the face. One of his soldiers, fully armed and on patrol, had been slaughtered and stripped and hung up like a chicken in a butcher’s window.

  The fea
r that had so far only been nibbling at Woermann now asserted an icy, viselike grip.

  Friday, 25 April

  Three dead men in the subcellar. Defense command at Ploiesti had been notified of the latest mortality but no comment had been radioed back.

  There was much activity in the courtyard during the day, but little accomplished. Woermann decided to pair the guards tonight. It seemed incredible that a partisan guerrilla could take an alert, seasoned soldier by surprise at his post, but it had happened. It would not happen with a pair of sentries.

  In the afternoon he returned to his canvas and found a bit of relief from the atmosphere of doom that had settled on the keep. He began adding blotches of shadow to the blank gray of the wall, and then detail to the edges of the window. He had decided to leave out the crosses since they would be a distraction from the village that he wanted as the focus. He worked like an automaton, narrowing his world to the brushstrokes on the canvas, shutting away the terror around him.

  Night came quietly. Woermann kept rising from his bedroll and going to the window overlooking the courtyard, a useless routine but a compulsion, as if he could keep everyone alive by maintaining a personal watch. On one of his trips he noticed the courtyard sentry walking his tour alone. Rather than call down and cause a disturbance, he decided to investigate personally.

  “Where’s your partner?” he asked the lone sentry when he reached the courtyard.

  The soldier whirled, then began to stammer. “He was tired, sir. I let him take a rest.”

  An uneasy feeling clawed at Woermann’s belly. “I gave orders for all sentries to travel in pairs! Where is he?”

  “In the cab of the first lorry, sir.”

  Woermann quickly crossed to the parked vehicle and pulled open the door. The soldier within did not move. Woermann poked at his arm.

  “Wake up.”

  The soldier began to lean toward him, slowly at first, then with greater momentum until he was actually falling toward his commanding officer. Woermann caught him and then almost dropped him. For as he fell, his head angled back to reveal an open, mangled throat. Woermann eased the body to the ground, then stepped back, clamping his jaw against a scream of fright and horror.