“Make sure you come home tomorrow, Sean. Please. There’s something we need to talk about.”
He heard the shower starting in the bathroom. He went to the window overlooking the street. Cars were moving slowly.
“What is it we need to talk about? Is everything okay?”
“I’ll tell you when I see you. I just wanted to check you were okay.”
“I am.” He heard her breathing.
“Is Eleni’s partner okay?”
“No, he’s not. I should go, Isabel.” He was tempted to press her about whatever was going on back in London, but he’d heard a thud from the bathroom.
He ended the call, knocked on the bathroom door. There was no answer. All he could hear was the water from the shower hammering down. He knocked again. Still no answer. He stood there. Anxiety for Jerome rose inside him.
He called out, louder this time. The water stopped. Jerome replied.
“Please, wait downstairs, Sean. I’ll be down in twenty minutes. I want to take you somewhere that will blow your mind.”
Sean stood at the door, wondered if he should stay in the room.
“Sean, are you there?” Jerome sounded worried.
He put his hand on the door.
“I’ll be downstairs,” he said.
“Thanks, Sean. You’re a true friend. Eleni was right.” There was an emotional rawness in Jerome’s voice.
He waited, pacing, in the lobby. It had leather chairs, a rack of tourist literature, pictures on the walls, sights of Nuremberg from before the war. The receptionist, a thin man who could have been Spanish or Italian, barely looked at him. Sean could see the street outside. He stood by the window. Yes, he was right, that was Eleni’s car on the other side.
The green BMW stood out among the newer cars. Was Jerome driving it? Where was he intending to take him? Sean sat down. What else could he do to help Jerome?
The first thing he’d have to do would be to find out exactly where Jerome was taking him, and why. If the police were looking for him, the best thing would be for Jerome to call them, tell them where he was staying, what he was up to. He had to avoid any more suspicion falling on him.
Minutes passed. A fluttering sensation started in his stomach. It got worse when a police car appeared outside, moving slowly down the street, stopping occasionally, as if they were looking for something. Then the car stopped in front of Jerome’s, blocking it in. Sean couldn’t see inside, but he could imagine the officers reporting that they’d found a car they’d been looking for. It stayed for only a minute though. Then it rolled on.
He was definitely going to get Jerome to call the police before he went anywhere with him. He looked at his watch. It was five past twelve. He’d been waiting well over twenty minutes. He looked at his watch again. Two men, both wearing blue boiler suits, had come into the foyer. One of them leaned over the reception desk, showed something to the receptionist. The man nodded, pointed at the elevator. Sean took out his phone, checked his email messages.
He sent two replies to colleagues at the institute. Both of them wanted to know how his speech had gone at the conference. Both of them also made passing reference to the meeting on Tuesday. He sent replies to each, telling them the same story, that Eleni had died and he wasn’t able to give his speech. He also told them he hadn’t decided whether he was going to come to the Tuesday meeting.
He smiled as he sent the emails. Both of the people he’d responded to were friends of the director of the institute. They were both clearly fishing for information. It would be good if they thought he wouldn’t make the meeting. He could surprise them.
He looked up, glanced out the window. The BMW was gone. At first it didn’t register in his mind what that might mean, then he glanced back at the empty space across the road. Had Jerome gone past him? No, that was impossible. He’d looked up each time the elevator had opened. That had only been two or three times in the past few minutes.
He took his mobile out, called Jerome’s number.
There was no answer.
He stood, went to the reception desk, asked for Jerome’s room to be called. The man obliged. They both waited as he held the phone to his ear.
Eventually he put it down. “I am sorry, there is no answer. The guest must be out.” The man looked over Sean’s shoulder. Sean turned. There was a family group waiting patiently behind him. It looked as if they were checking in.
He stepped aside.
Sean spent the next few minutes looking at his watch, debating with himself whether to keep waiting or go back up to Jerome’s room. He called Jerome’s mobile two times while he waited. There was no answer. He couldn’t wait any longer. He went up in the elevator.
The wait outside Jerome’s door seemed interminable. He’d knocked loudly three times. Then he knocked again. There was still no answer. He tried the door handle. His hand felt clammy. He heard a voice behind him. He turned, fast. There was a cleaning lady in the corridor. She’d appeared from a room two doors down.
She repeated what she’d said, but as it was in German, he had no idea how to respond. The woman smiled.
“Lost key, ja?” she said.
He shrugged. “Sorry, no. I’m looking for this man.” He pointed with his thumb at the door of Jerome’s room.
The woman looked at him oddly. “Man here go out,” she said. “With his friends.”
“When?” said Sean, surprised. He took a step back. Jerome had gone off with someone? Why hadn’t he told him?
The woman shrugged. She didn’t understand his question.
Had he missed them when he came up?
A few minutes later he was at the reception desk again asking if anyone had seen Jerome or left a message for a Sean Ryan. The man who’d been there was gone. Instead there was a thin blonde woman. Her English was poor. Sean told her Jerome’s name, wrote down the room number. She rang Jerome’s room, then shrugged and said, “Er muss gegangen,” twice, for added effect.
Sean just looked at her.
“Er muss gegangen,” she said for a third time.
“I’m sorry, I don’t speak German,” he said.
A voice called out behind him.
“She says the person must have gone out.”
Sean turned. A small man, he looked like an academic, was standing nearby. He smiled at Sean. “You were looking for someone, yes.”
“Can you ask her is there a message for me? My name is Sean Ryan.”
“Ah, Herr Ryan. We missed your speech last night. It was much anticipated.” The man held his hand out to Sean.
Sean shook it. “I’m sorry I couldn’t make it. Someone I know has died.”
The man stepped around Sean, spoke fast in German to the receptionist. She looked down at her desk, shook her head.
The phone she’d been using warbled insistently. She picked it up.
“Ja.”
Sean watched as her skin tone changed from honey brown to pale in a few seconds, and her jaw drop, almost comically. The phone almost slipped from her fingers. She replied briefly in German, in a high pitched tone, then slammed the phone down. She picked it up again immediately and stabbed her fingers at the buttons.
Sean and his new friend watched her. When she spoke it was in a rapid-fire stream of German with the phone in her cupped hand.
The man behind Sean let out a loud sigh. “It seems a cleaner has found blood and some damage in one of the rooms. Perhaps you can come back later, Herr Ryan.” He raised his eyebrows. That was when he saw the woman’s finger come up and point at him. It seemed as if she was talking about him on the phone.
“The police are coming,” said the man. He was staring at Sean now as well.
Sean turned to him. “Thanks.” He headed for the door.
The police would know soon enough that he’d been here, but he didn’t care. He didn’t want to wait for them either. He had to get out of there. He needed to think. He walked up the street. What the hell was going on? He looked over his shoulder, half expect
ing to see Jerome appear. Wishful thinking, he knew, but he couldn’t help it. When he reached the next corner he saw the police car he’d seen earlier, or one just like it, coming towards him.
Its blue roof light came on. The light bounced off the shop windows as it passed him, startling him. Then its siren turned on. A sickening dread grew into a knotted ball inside his stomach. The siren echoed through the street. He stopped, half expecting the police car to stop too, for a policeman to jump out and run towards him. Blood was pounding through his forehead. But they didn’t stop. They headed past him towards the hotel.
Sean turned left, kept walking. He didn’t know where he was going. He would have to go the police, he knew that, but he needed time to clear his head.
What the hell had happened to Jerome?
21
Vanessa Sheer pressed the switch, which turned on the voice encryption system. Then she dialled the number. Below, in the street, a green BMW passed by, slowly.
“Doctor Fleischer, have you checked your security systems?”
The encryption device ensured that not one of the possible dozen security services agencies interested in her would understand what they were talking about. All an eavesdropper would hear would be a recording of a bland conversation played over the ordinary telephone line. The digitally encrypted call would be static in the background.
“I have.”
“Good. There can be no mistakes.” She sat on the shiny steel and leather chair and put her right elbow on the ebony hotel suite desk. She held the phone tight to her ear.
“You have started the disbursement, ja?”
“Ja, we have tested this in each location. The refugee children will consume the bread, and the parents will bring what is left back to their homes to be eaten later.”
“The delivery method is secure?”
“Ja, the items were hand delivered by our courier. The gift was made before with no ill effect, so nothing will be suspected this time.”
“I am counting on you not to have made any mistakes, Herr Doctor.” She didn’t sound nervous. It sounded as if she was reminding him of his duty.
“No test has yet been devised to identify what we have infected the bread with.”
“I hope the dispersal pattern will be as you predicted.”
“I expect some of the carriers will be quarantined, but enough will not. I can assure you we have targeted a sufficient percentage of the group.”
“This is a good day, Herr Doctor. Your role in this will be remembered. We are the only ones who are strong enough, determined enough, to clean up the mess our weak and stupid politicians have left us with.”
“Thank you, Frau Sheer.”
“Your work on the other variants of the pathogen is complete?”
“Ja.”
“Good. The dregs of this world must be washed away as quickly as possible, everywhere.” She paused, glanced at her silver laptop sitting open on the table. “It will be interesting to see how quickly the news media gets to hear of this.”
The doctor grunted. “Terrorists will be blamed. One group of refugees fighting another. It is the easy answer for lazy journalists.”
She didn’t tell him that one of the board members of BXH in Germany controlled one of the largest media empires in Europe. His stations and online outlets would be blaming external forces outside Germany, for stirring up murderous rivalries between refugee groups.
“All the deliveries have been done?”
“All will be finished within the next thirty minutes.”
“Sehr gut.”
22
Sean walked for half an hour. The city had woken up. Restaurants and a few shops were open now. He didn’t stop at any of them. If Jerome had also disappeared that could mean he was going to be murdered, just as Eleni had been. There was an acid taste in his mouth. He felt dizzy at the thought of what might be happening to Jerome at that moment.
He remembered the two men who had gone up in the elevator. Had they come after the police car? He wasn’t sure. But one thing was sure, he would have to go to the police station soon. He’d probably be arrested at the airport if he didn’t.
He put a hand in his pocket. The Inspekteur who had interviewed him had given him a card. He found it. He called the number.
A man’s voice answered. It wasn’t the Inspekteur’s.
“Do you speak English?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“This is Sean Ryan,” he said. “I have some information about the disappearance of Jerome Ruzibiza.”
There was a pause. He heard clicking, the sound of someone tapping at a keyboard.
“Herr Ryan,” said the voice. “Where are you?”
“I don’t know.” He looked at the wall at the corner of the street. There was no street name there. “I will come to the police station. I’ll be there soon.”
“Good. We will be waiting for you.” The line went dead.
Waiting with lots of questions. He saw a taxi, waved at it. The driver didn’t see him. He turned into a bigger road ahead on the right. Maybe the taxi driver had seen him and just didn’t want to stop. Had the police put out an alert for him?
He took his phone out of his pocket, pressed the button on the top. They might be able to track him from the call he’d made, but at least with it off, they would have some difficulty finding out where he was going before he went to the station.
He turned onto another street lined with shops, saw another taxi cruising. This one stopped for him. He was back at his hotel five minutes later. He’d been nearer than he’d thought. He went to his room, packed his bag. If the police planned to interview him for longer this time he wanted to have everything ready to leave the hotel when he needed to.
He left his room key at reception and headed out.
He asked the next taxi driver to follow the tram tracks out of the city. He’d figured out which tram line Eleni had lived on. It became confusing when two tram lines diverged, but after heading down the wrong one for a few minutes he told the driver to go back until they found the other one, line four, and follow it again.
When they reached Eleni’s apartment building he told the taxi driver to wait. The man had no English, but he nodded when Sean said, “Funf minuten, bitte.”
He wanted to take pictures of the stickers outside Eleni’s apartment. They would be something tangible to show the police how she was being harassed. He went straight to the lamp post he’d seen the sticker on.
It was clean. Not even the little bits of the stickers that they’d left behind the following day remained. He looked on the next lamp post, just in case, but there was nothing there either. He went to the door of their apartment building, found the right bell, pressed it. Then he waited.
No one came. He pressed it again. It had been a long shot that Jerome would be here.
He looked up at the windows opposite, saw a lace curtain flicker. He was being watched. He crossed the street, looked back at the building Eleni and Jerome lived in. He stared up at the apartment he’d been in only the day before. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but he glanced up again at the building he was now beside, to see if he was being watched. But no lace curtain moved this time.
As he turned back he saw movement in the window of Eleni’s apartment. Someone had passed the window. Was it Jerome?
He went to the door, pressed his finger to the buzzer, held it there. After thirty seconds he let it go. The taxi driver was staring at him from the far side of the street.
Then the door opened. A large man with long black hair said something fast and unfriendly to him in German. Then he moved to close the door in Sean’s face. Sean put his foot against the door.
“Is Jerome here?” he said.
“What you want?” said the man. He was barring the door with his bulk, as if his life depended on it.
“Who are you?” said Sean.
“Caretaker. Jerome, he run away.” He made a waving gesture with his hand, then sneered, as if Sean
was a dog pissing on his doorstep.
Sean wanted to react, but arguing in broken English with this idiot wasn’t going to achieve anything. He shook his head, turned away, headed back to the taxi. The driver had the engine running. He tried to read the address of the police station out to him, but in the end he just handed the Inspekteur’s card over. The driver nodded, suddenly serious, and gave the card back to Sean. He looked at Sean warily after that.
After he dropped Sean at the door of the police station, Sean looked back. The taxi driver was hunched over. He appeared to be writing something.
“Don’t get paranoid,” he said, to himself
Thirty minutes later he was wondering if he’d been wrong about that. He was taken within seconds of his arrival to a different interview room to the one he’d been in before. This one had a metal table and four metal chairs, painted yellow. They were all screwed into the painted concrete floor.
“Why did you visit the apartment Eleni Kibre lived in thirty minutes ago?” said the young police officer who was interviewing him. His English was almost perfect.
“Your information is very up to date.”
The officer didn’t smile. He simply repeated the question.
“I went to see if the neo-Nazi stickers I’d seen yesterday were still there.”
The policeman took his time responding. There was no other officer in the room with them this time. The security camera high in one corner was probably recording everything. It glared back at them.
“Why do these stickers interest you?”
“My friend has been murdered.” He paused. “If that happened to a friend of yours, wouldn’t you be interested in the intimidation she was being put through?”
“You know who murdered her?”
“It wasn’t her partner. I know that.”
“In sixty-five percent of murders in Germany, the victim knows the perpetrator. You have the same in your country, I think.”
Still no smile.
“What makes you think her partner didn’t do it?” He raised his eyebrows. He seemed to be hoping that Sean would reveal something.
The Nuremberg Puzzle Page 8