by Gregg Loomis
But now?
She should take him to kindly old Herr Doktor Griff, she knew she should. But the doctor's house was so far away and it had been so long since she had had a child under her roof. She would give him dry clothes—she thought she still had some of Hans's—and a warm bed. She would take him to the doctor in the morning, take him there before calling the police to find his parents.
Again she looked up and down the street, this time relieved no one was in sight, no one to tell her what she should do, no one to rebuke her for not doing it. No one to prevent her from enjoying having a child again, no matter how temporarily.
She set off the short distance to the rooms she rented, staggering under the weight of a burden she was delighted to bear.
An hour later, the child still would not wake up. His breathing was shallow.
Lena put a hand to his forehead. Cold as ice. She shook her head, realizing she couldn't postpone calling the doctor until tomorrow. As much as she would like to keep him here, she couldn't take the chance that exposure might have already put him into a coma. She had heard of such things, people exposed to the winter for so long they simply slipped into a sleep from which they never awoke.
Reluctantly, she reached for the phone.
Heim had dozed off in front of the fire in his small apartment. So deep was his sleep that the sound of the phone on a table beside his chair only partially woke him.
"Ja?"
"Herr Doktor Griff?"
It took a second for Heim to become fully alert and remember his assumed name and confirm the woman had the person she sought. Lena Rauch, an old woman he had treated for a number of ailments, most imaginary. As he listened, he became not only alert but excited. The child she had found in the snow, could it be . . . ?
Minutes later, he was listening to the arthritic grinding of his ancient VW Beetle's ignition, urging the damn thing to start. At last it caught and he eased in the choke, desperate not to starve an engine with far too many kilometers on it. He tried not to be impatient. It took little to stall the machine, particularly in the cold. If the child Lena had found in the snow was that little boy, the one he had been hypnotizing for the last few days . . .
Ah, the gears protested but finally agreed to go into first and he was off, peering through a windshield the decrepit wipers seemed unable to clear of snow. He tried to curb his sense of urgency. Now was not the time to skid into something.
But he had to get there before Gratz and his companion found where their young captive was. He was not exactly sure what secrets the little boy held, but it had something to do with Oberkoenigsburg. And, he was sure, a great deal of money. Otherwise, why would those two risk kidnapping a child clearly no kin to them no matter what wild tale they told?
They had wanted to know if the boy could be retrogressed while actually at the ski resort. Now why would they want to do that? Heim was unsure but he was more than willing to try it and find out.
If he was right and money was involved, a lot of money, his problems were over. A new passport, a flight to someplace warm where snow appeared only in pictures, where the authorities were not interested in ancient history and the Wiesenthal Center would never find him. His last few years could be peaceful.
All he had to do was get the child to Oberkoenigsburg before Gratz found him. Pick the child up from the old woman under the pretext of taking him to Rothenburg's small hospital and drive to the northern edge of Austria.
He could be there in a few hours.
CHAPTER 66
Oberkoenigsburg
Geshaft Ski Kleidung
(Ski clothing shop)
LANG LOOKED AT HIMSELF IN THE full-length mirror as the ski shop's proprietor beamed behind him. Ski pants, gloves, cap, and reversible down jacket, nearly four hundred euro. He liked the jacket in particular, red on one side, black on the other. Boots, another two fifty. Lang debated renting a pair of skis to carry over his shoulder but, to the store owner's clear disappointment, decided against it. With the cane, both hands would be full. He would rather have at least one free.
His street clothes neatly packed to be picked up later, Lang stood before a counter, watching a machine feast on his credit card and feigning fascination with a map of the various ski trails the owner was describing.
More out of curiosity than interest, Lang pointed to the one ending closest to the top of the mountain. "What about this one?"
"Hoch und Schnell," High and Fast, as it is named?" the storekeeper shook his head. "Ach! Closed."
"In the middle of the season?"
"The police, there was a shooting up there and the police have closed the lift until they finish their investigation. They promise to have the lift in operation again in two more days."
Lang's mental antennae instantly went up. "A shooting? Here?"
The man shook his head again. "A ski patrol, shot. It is the only murder anyone can ever remember here. His body was found near where the few older residents say the entrance to an old mine shaft used to be. It was closed in when the resort was built a few years ago." The man tore the card receipt from the machine and presented it for signature. "It was actually in an area closed to skiers." He watched Lang sign. "But you have nothing to fear. Oberkoenigsburg has had little crime."
Knock on wood.
"Mine shaft?" Lang asked.
The man shrugged. "There are many in these mountains. Few, if any, remember the precise location of the one here."
Lang left the shop and joined the throng of skiers, feeling a little bit foolish. The clothes may often bespeak the man, but they did little for the age difference. He looked up and down the street and saw no trace of the two men who had shown an interest in him.
Now what?
For lack of a better idea, he turned to follow the crowd toward the lifts, deep in thought.
No reason to think a murder was related to the reason he was here, but its proximity to a mine made it more interesting, although Lang could not yet explain why.
He continued down the street until it ended at a series of three lifts, one from the bottom of the mountain below, and two that formed a "V" as they threaded their way upwards in different directions.
Lang was looking at the map the store owner had given him, trying to ascertain the place of the shooting by comparing the paper in his hand with the view he had. One thing was obvious: these slopes were neither as well-groomed nor as well-marked as those he had seen in Colorado or Utah. Nor as well-cleared. Rocks, unmarked, jutted through the snow in several spots he could see. In some parts of the downhill run, the slopes narrowed to twenty, twenty-five feet by towering conifers. The vegetation got progressively more sparse the further uphill one went until the summit jutted upward in a jumble of boulders, ice and snow.
That must be the place. The shopkeeper had said the shooting—no, the body—had been found in an area not open to skiers, and the top of this mountain looked about as inhospitable to skiers as could be imagined.
Lang was being jostled by the good-humored crowd making its way to the lift lines. He moved to stand atop a hummock of snow for a better view. The small hill bristled with skis and poles stuck upright, left for the moment by those taking a break from the slopes.
He lifted the map again and was still making comparisons between it and what he could see when he felt a blunt object jabbed into his side. There was little doubt it was the muzzle of a pistol.
"Mr. Reilly," said a German accented voice from behind him, "you will come quietly with me."
Less than ten kilometers away, a faded green Volkswagen Beetle chugged its way upwards along the crest of the Land Salzburg, the high Alpine ridge that roughly parallels the German-Austrian border just north of Salzburg. The late morning sun sparkled on the windshield despite the grime left by recently melted snow. The driver, an old man, held one hand to his forehead to shield his eyes from the glare. Occasionally, he turned to check the back seat, where a small boy was swaddled in a down comforter.
At fir
st the child had wept, something about his parents, the old man gathered. A slap across the face would likely have reduced the cries to a muted whimpering, but the last thing the driver wanted was to upset the child even more. He wanted the child as calm as possible. Over his shoulder, he extended a candy bar, a gift reluctantly taken.
It had been a near thing. The child had been close to fatal hypothermia, that process by which the body's natural heat is leached away by surrounding cold until vital functions shut down. A few gentle pats across the face woke him enough to administer nearly scalding tea. That was followed by a steady stream of high-energy foods, chocolate bars, anything with high caffeine content, to stimulate the heartbeat. As it was, shock was still a possibility. Hence the comforter and pillows to keep feet elevated, assuring maximum blood flow to the brain.
The old man was well aware of the symptoms of shock and hypothermia. He had studied both. In one of his experiments, he had compared the time it took for a man tossed naked into the snow to die against that for a man to die in boiling water. Those findings were now lost to a world too horrified by the scientific process to care about the results.
A great pity.
His thoughts returned to the present as he pulled into a parking lot next to a ski lift. It was crowded with empty cars. The mountains towered above. About halfway up, he could see the town of Oberkoenigsburg.
He had considered driving into the town itself but decided against it for a number of reasons. First, he would be less likely to be noticed here than in the ongoing carnival that was the ski resort. Second, hypnotizing the child would require relative quiet free of distractions, something he doubted he would find in the town above. Finally, a vantage of not just the town itself but its surroundings might be helpful if he really could hypnotize and retrogress the little boy to the point that his previous soul, persona, or whatever it was could point out the place Gratz was seeking.
He pretended to fumble for something in the glove box while a noisy quartet of young people unloaded skis from a rack on top of a Volkswagen Golf and headed for the lift. A brief glance around the lot confirmed he was finally alone.
He got out of the VW and climbed into the back seat.
The press of the weapon into Lang's back became greater. "And your stick, the one with a sword in it. Drop it."
Lang slowly lifted his arms, letting the cane fall into the snow. He risked a brief glance over his shoulder and recognized the man from Auschwitz. "We've got to quit meeting like this. People will talk."
Language barrier or no sense of humor, the man used the hand not holding the gun to motion. "Come."
It was clear whatever the man intended, he was not going to do it here. More the reason not to be in a hurry to leave. "What is it you want, anyway?"
Rather than answer, the man motioned again, this time with visible agitation, increasing Lang's certainty he was dealing with an amateur.
Lang took a step down from the mound of snow and stumbled, his hands flying out for support. The gunman stepped back rather than fall himself.
Mistake one.
Lang used one of the numerous ski poles stuck in the snow to pull himself slowly upright as he turned. Now the man with the gun was in front of him, taking a step back.
Mistake two.
In what seemed like an attempt to regain his balance, Lang jerked forward, freeing the pointed tip of the pole from the snow. Before his opponent could plant his foot from the step back, the ski pole jammed into his chest, shoving him further backwards and down the small slope, his arms instinctively windmilling to try to maintain his balance.
Three and out.
It took only a fraction of a second for one or more skiers to spot the gun in one hand. Cries of alarm and screams erupted as people scattered like a covey of frightened birds.
For an instant, Lang considered pressing his advantage. Police would be here shortly if the number of cell phones he saw were any indication. The last thing he needed was to spend the rest of the day answering questions. Instead, he snatched a pair of skis from the snow mound, praying for a reasonable fit and snap-on bindings.
He got lucky.
With a shove, he was sliding past the milling crowd and toward the slope.
The crack of a pistol shot and more screams told him he was making his exit right just in time.
He was past the lift, the operator's mouth a silent "O" as people turned in their moving chairs to see what was happening. Then Lang was headed down the slope, tuneless wind whistling in his ears.
Far below was a parking lot. How he was going to get back up here to the rented BMW was a problem he would deal with when he got to the bottom. He . . .
The sudden sound was like a chain saw, and Lang could only wish that was what he was hearing. A look behind him took in a snowmobile in the colors of the ski patrol racing toward him.
It was a good bet it wasn't a reprimand for careless skiing.
As if to confirm this, another gunshot echoed down the slope. He was well out of range but that wasn't going to last long. The snowmobile was rapidly closing the gap. Even shortening his traverses, the moves by which a skier controls his speed, wasn't going to help. Graceful stem christies were not what was required here. Lang had his skis pointed straight downhill and was going faster than he ever had on any slope before. But the machine was still gaining.
Then he saw something that gave him an idea.
Desperate, but an idea nonetheless.
* * *
Dr. Heim was speaking slowly, the little boy lying across his lap in the car's back seat. It would only be minutes before the child was in a hypnotized state. If Heim could pry the secret loose from the person the boy had been, he would have achieved something he was aware of no hypnotist having done before: retrogressing a subject on site.
Another great pity: he would never receive recognition for the feat.
The kind's eyes were beginning to droop, his breathing getting deeper when he heard the commotion on the slopes.
Gunshots?
Surely not.
Leaning forward to see through the windshield, Heim saw skiers on the snowy hillside that filled the glass. They did not seem to be coming down the hill in the regular graceful maneuvers he had seen before but were scattering like a flock of chickens upon spotting a hawk. He saw a snowmobile moving at what had to be top speed. It seemed to be chasing a single skier.
Whatever was happening, it was likely to reach a conclusion right at this parking lot, a conclusion that might well involve the police.
He pushed the front seat forward, got out of the back, and climbed behind the wheel. He had no intention of being here when the authorities arrived.
He turned the key only to produce a series of dead clicks. He tried again with the same result.
What was it the mechanic had said a month or so ago? Something about a solenoid? Heim had dismissed the warning as an attempt to pad the bill. Now the words had the weight of prophesy.
He took another look up the slope where fleeing skiers had almost reached this parking lot. Potential treasure or not, he was not about to be apprehended with a kidnapped child. He had no qualms about disposing of the child; the question was, where?
Lang was now thankful the slopes here were not the broad avenues of Aspen or Park City. With the quick shift of his weight that bit the ski's edges into the snow, thereby giving direction, he cut to his right and into a group of trees. They were close enough together that he had to dig an edge into the slope to reduce his speed to a point of control. The trees seemed to somewhat muffle the snarl of his pursuer's motor. Here it was all shadow rather than sunlight. His eyes had to adjust. Here also the snow bore only a few marks of skiers, mostly unpacked powder that would slow the machine down.
But not too much, he hoped.
He slowed down, barely moving until a flash of color told him the snowmobile had entered the trees. Then he set off at a brisk pace. The sound of the two-cycle motor adding power told him he had been seen. As
if he needed confirmation, another bullet thudded into a tree trunk a few feet away.
Lang had intended to let the snowmobile get close but not that close.
Now it was matter of remembering what he had seen just before ducking into the grove of trees. He only had an interrupted view of the slope he was paralleling and he would have but the one chance.
There it was, just as he had calculated: a slight clearing where the snowmobile driver would have a clear look at him, hopefully not in pistol range.
Lang darted into the clearing, picking up speed again. The tone of the motor behind told him the machine was doing the same. In an instant, he was out of the woods and crossing the narrow slope. He could only hope the transition from dim forest light to brilliant sun reflecting on snow impaired his opponents' vision as it did his own. With a twitch of the skis, he rounded a stairwell of moguls, bumps, and the black outcrop of rock he had seen before darting into the trees.
The snowmobile had neither the agility of skis nor the foreknowledge of the stone jutting up among the bumps.
The impact sent it airborne like some ungainly missile. In midair, it did a roll, dropping its driver onto hard, packed snow, before splintering against trees on the other side of the slope.
Lang stopped long enough to look uphill. A cursory glance at the angle of the man's neck told him that this enemy would never be a threat again.
Whatever was happening on the slope was drawing attention away from the parking lot. It was just a matter of time until Heim found an old Renault with French plates and an unlocked door. He felt around the floorboard. Anyone that careless . . . Sure enough, the key was under a worn mat. Leaving keys in the car was not totally uncommon in resort areas where drivers feared that the activity on the slopes might cause their car keys to fall out. Heim would bet that the owner's wallet was in the glove box for the same reason.