“Yes, sir. Absolutely.”
“Excellent. Our agents will be coming from the nearest field office. They should arrive before noon. Again, thank you for your efficiency. And your silence. Let me give you our number. In the event that the person known as Isaac Goldberg should return to the hospital, you are authorized to hold him, and you will notify us immediately.”
Banning wrote down the number and hung up. He followed the orders, seeing to it that the Israeli was given food and a comfortable room with reading material. Then he and Sheriff Chambers waited for the agents, whatever agency they might be from. Banning guessed the CIA, while Chambers hazarded the FBI as his choice.
“So who’s in charge of this place now that Goldberg, or whoever he is, is gone?” Banning asked Chambers.
“Guess it’s Nick Steiner. He’s been here longest.”
“Let’s get him on the horn,” Banning said, picking up the phone. “Somebody’s gotta take charge around here, even if we can’t tell him why.”
Dr. Nicholas Steiner arrived shortly after Bergmann had been isolated, just after 8:00 a.m. Banning and Chambers took him into the same room in which they’d interrogated Dov Bergmann and told him what they could, which was that a man they had in custody had broken in last night, that some “law enforcement officials” were picking him up later, and that Dr. Goldberg had disappeared along with his car and would probably not be back.
“That’s it?” Steiner asked after waiting for more information.
Banning nodded. “That’s it. Sorry we can’t tell you more.”
“And why can’t you tell me more?”
“It’s, uh … government policy.”
“Government. You mean like you? The highway patrol?” He turned to Chambers. “Or the sheriff’s office, Jud? You have important state secrets I’m not aware of?”
“State secrets is pretty much it, Nick,” Chambers said. “Captain Banning’s being straight with you. This goes … kinda deep. Or pretty high. Both, I guess.”
“Where’s Dr. Goldberg?” Steiner asked.
“Pardon?” Banning said.
“Where … is … Goldberg?” Steiner repeated, as if to a child. “The superintendent of this hospital? My immediate superior? What in God’s name do you mean, he’s ‘disappeared?’ To where?”
“If we knew that,” Chambers said, “he wouldn’t have disappeared.”
Steiner sighed and flopped back in his chair. “Maybe this place really is a madhouse.” He sat up again. “I’m just trying to determine where Dr. Goldberg is. Has he been kidnapped? Has he too succumbed to temptation like Mr. Gunn and eloped with a nurse? Or has he run off to become a basso profundo in a traveling opera company?”
“A what?” Jud Chambers asked.
Steiner gave a grunt of frustration. “Gentlemen, please. Surely you can tell me something.”
“Look,” Banning said, giving the sheriff a sidelong glance, “we can tell you this much and no more. It seems he’s gone off on his own. Of his own free will. And he won’t be back. And that’s it, okay? Case closed.”
“You’re not looking for him?” Steiner asked.
“We’re not looking for him, no.” Banning paused. “But if somebody … if anybody saw him again, we’d want to know.”
Steiner frowned and looked intently at Banning. “He’s done something, then.”
“I didn’t say that.”
Steiner nodded. “He’s done something…” He sat back again and gazed at the wall and beyond it, into the middle distance. “How little we really know each other…”
* * *
Before the car came to take away Dov Bergmann, Drs. Reed and Berkowitz had arrived at the hospital, as had Head Nurse Wyndham and Head Attendant Wiseman. Dr. Steiner called them all into a small meeting room and explained as much of the situation as he knew.
“I wish I could answer the questions you must have,” he told them, “but I don’t know the answers myself. I can only assume that Dr. Goldberg had secrets of his own, and they were enough to … drive him away. I don’t necessarily subscribe to the scenario that he won’t return—this place was his life, as far as we all know, and for that reason I think we should keep his office the way it is indefinitely. As far as I know, it’s not a crime scene, so if we need any files that the doctor had there, feel free to go in and get them. I’ve already contacted the state board and informed them of Dr. Goldberg’s … disappearance, and they’ve appointed me acting superintendent and promise to appoint a new one within three months.” Steiner paused. “Any questions … that I can answer?”
Dr. Reed raised an index finger. “Was there any suggestion of, what, foul play? I mean, I heard from an attendant that there was actually a shot fired in the basement.”
“I heard that too,” Steiner said. “I’ve talked to the attendants involved, and apparently this intruder is somehow involved with Dr. Goldberg’s absence, though I don’t know how, and no one seems ready to tell us. There is the rather unlikely possibility that this has something to do with … national security, perhaps? But this is only speculation on my part, I really have no idea.”
Elliot Berkowitz raised his hand, and his voice sounded shaky. “Did Dr. Goldberg leave a note or anything? He just disappeared without a word?”
“That seems to be what happened,” Steiner said. “I’m sorry. As I’ve said, I wish I could tell you more, but I simply don’t know. Rest assured that if any information comes out, I’ll share it with you. Feel free to tell the nurses and attendants as much as you know, including the likelihood that Dr. Goldberg will not return.”
* * *
The agents who were to take away Dov Bergmann arrived shortly before noon. There were four of them, including the driver, and Captain Banning and Sheriff Chambers watched as they got out of the new black Ford sedan that parked imperiously in front of the main entrance. All of the men were wearing similar black suits and dark glasses against the sun, which had reappeared with the passing of the storm.
A sandy-haired man, the tallest of the four, identified himself to Banning and Chambers as Agent Shepard and showed an FBI ID. Chambers glanced at Banning and smiled. He had guessed right.
Banning led the men into the hospital, where they went directly to the room where Dov Bergmann was being held. Two of the agents got on either side of Bergmann, handcuffed him, and accompanied him to the car, while the tall agent took out a sheaf of papers, one of which he handed to Banning to sign.
“Prisoner transfer form,” the man said. “Cut and dried.” Banning gave it a quick once-over and signed it, then handed it back. “Thanks for your cooperation, Captain,” the agent said. “The papers you found?”
“Right here,” Banning said, handing over the portfolio found in Bergmann’s car.
“And the prisoner’s handgun?”
Banning had wrapped it in a handkerchief to preserve any fingerprints, and he gave it to the agent, who slipped it into his suit jacket pocket and handed the handkerchief back to Banning.
“We got a pair of heavy wire cutters that must’ve been his too. He used them to cut through the chain-link fence and get to the cellar door he came in. You want them?”
The agent nodded. “Definitely. If it’s evidence, we want it. We’ll also want the car he used.” Banning handed the agent the car keys they had taken from Bergmann, and had a deputy retrieve the wire cutters.
Together they all walked out to the black Ford. Bergmann, still cuffed, was seated in the middle of the backseat between two of the agents. The man called Shepard got in the driver’s seat and started the Ford, while the original driver walked out to the parking lot to get Bergmann’s car. The agent behind the wheel gave a two-finger salute to Banning as they pulled away.
“FBI,” Jud Chambers said as they watched the car disappear down the lane, Bergmann’s car in its wake. “I win.”
“I don’t recall making a bet,” said Banning, turning back toward the building.
* * *
When the state
hospital was no longer visible in the rearview mirror of the black Ford, one of the dark-suited men took a key out of his pocket and unlocked Dov Bergmann’s handcuffs. Bergmann stretched his arms and rubbed his wrists. “Sorry, Asher” he said, looking down at the back of the seat.
The man next to him gave a great sigh and shook his head. “What in hell were you thinking, Dov?”
“I got anxious,” Dov Bergmann said. “It was foolish. I thought I could get in and eliminate him on my own. Save us all the trouble of taking him back home.”
“You were to act as a scout, not an assassin,” said Asher. “Record his movements, nothing more. Instead, you not only get caught, but you spook Gephardt. He’ll go underground so far, we might never find him. Director Harel is not going to be pleased with you. Nor with the team.” He paused and looked out the window. “The only good thing,” he finally said, “is that this was the easiest extraction of an agent we’ve ever made. You didn’t tell them too much?”
“Well, you already realize that they know who their Dr. Goldberg really is. But they don’t know who I am. They … suspect. But I never told them.”
“Let’s hope,” Asher said with a smirk, “that the orders from their government preserve their silence. And, with luck, if Gephardt should reappear, they’ll call the number I gave them.” Asher lit a cigarette and offered one to Dov Bergmann, who took it. “Now. I think we should go to Gephardt’s house and search it. Such a good Nazi is bound to keep some of his treasures.”
The man on the other side of Bergmann said, “Do you think that’s wise?”
“It’s always wise to gather more evidence, Yitzhak,” Asher said, “and if anyone should question us, after all”—he took out the fake FBI ID he had shown Captain Banning—“we do work for their government.”
The agents easily broke into Kurt Gephardt’s suburban split-level house. No one came out of nearby houses to question or challenge them. In a bedroom closet was an entrance to the attic. When they pushed aside the plywood panel, they immediately found a shoe box filled with memorabilia of Gephardt’s Nazi years, including civilian citations in Gephardt’s name, and a photograph of Gephardt posing with Dr. Karl Brandt, Hitler’s personal physician and the overseer of Aktion T4.
They took the box, locked up the house, and drove away, never to be seen near Fairvale again.
15
The reactions that greeted the disappearances of Ronald Miller, Myron Gunn, and Eleanor Lindstrom were only dust devils compared to the hurricane that blew into the State Hospital for the Criminally Insane when the news of Dr. Isaac Goldberg’s vanishing was announced. Nurses, attendants, cooks, janitors, the entire staff, felt rudderless as the news—and the rumors—spread.
Even though the evening shift, including Ben Blake and Dick O’Brien, had gone home, word had spread about the man in the basement with the gun. With no one knowing anything about Goldberg’s disappearance, it was only logical to assume that the two events were connected. And conversations throughout the day produced scenarios even more exotic than the reality of what had occurred.
The more anti-Semitic staff members thought that Dr. Goldberg was a Communist, and that the arrested man was a CIA assassin. Others thought that the intruder was a jealous husband of an as-yet-unidentified nurse with whom Goldberg was carrying on an affair. Still others suggested that the shooter was a vengeful Nazi who came to finish what the concentration camps had not been able to accomplish.
Only a very few subscribed to the theory that Dr. Isaac Goldberg was not whom he seemed to be. One of those was Tom Downing, the attendant who’d discovered that Ronald Miller was missing. He was the first, in a conversation in the break room, to link it to the Eichmann case, which he had followed closely. It was mere imagination rather than any evidence that had brought him close to the truth.
“What if,” he said to Eddie Abbott, another attendant, “Goldberg wasn’t Goldberg at all, but somebody like Eichmann? He just pretended to be Goldberg. For years, you know?”
“That’s screwy,” Eddie said.
“Nah nah, stay with me—the guy who broke in, he was one of those Jewish agents, and he came to kill him. Goldberg knows the jig is up, and he takes a powder.”
“So Goldberg’s like a Nazi or something? But why pretend to be a Jew?”
“Who’s gonna suspect a Jewish guy of being a Nazi, right? It’s the perfect disguise…”
Dr. Elliot Berkowitz, getting a hot chocolate at the coffee machine, overheard the conversation, and the idea, absurd as it was, gave his stomach a twinge. When Dr. Steiner had told them about Dr. Goldberg’s disappearance, Elliot had felt lost and displaced. He knew why. He had come to look upon Goldberg as a father figure, and had grown dependent upon him. The older man’s approval had been nurturing for Elliot.
He had looked for other father figures once he was old enough to learn of his natural father’s death, but every single one had betrayed him in some way, had fallen short of the image he had of his own ideal father, who had been taken from him by the Nazis.
And to think now that the man whom he had trusted and respected, his brother in faith, could be one of the monsters who had slain his father and much of the population of Europe was more than his spirit could bear. He uncomfortably recalled Goldberg’s defense of Wagner, and wondered if it was due to more than aesthetic appreciation.
What could make Dr. Goldberg run away? Knowing that he had been found out made perfect sense, but only in the event that the threat was ongoing. If the man who meant him harm had been captured, the threat was over—unless there were others who would continue to carry out the threat. What if those others were Mossad? And wouldn’t that tie into what Dr. Steiner had said about national security, perhaps, as he had so delicately put it?
A wave of nausea passed over Elliot, and he sipped slowly at the watery hot chocolate. Then he remembered Dr. Steiner telling them that they were to feel free to enter Goldberg’s office should they need any papers that he had.
Elliot had given Dr. Goldberg two of his case files to evaluate, and he thought that he could make a good argument that he needed them to record additional data, should he be found in Goldberg’s office. He threw what was left of his hot chocolate in the trash can, and left the two attendants arguing quietly over Downing’s Mossad theory.
There was no one outside Dr. Goldberg’s office, and Elliot knocked gently on the door. When there was no answer, he looked up and down the hall, then went in, closing the door behind him.
The lights were off, and only a small amount of sunlight came through the curtained windows. Elliot turned on the desk lamp and looked around the room. The polished stones that made up the Star of David on the wall drew his attention, reflecting back the lamplight in muted tones. He’d often admired the simplicity of the work, with its different colored stones creating the patterns that made up the symbol of his nearly forgotten faith.
But there was no time now to admire it.
First, Elliot found the case files that Dr. Goldberg had been reviewing. They were on top of a pile of papers on the desk. Holding them in his left hand, to immediately show to anyone who might disturb him, he began to open and look inside the seven desk drawers, one above the central knee space, and three on either side.
The center drawer held pretty much what one would expect—pens, pencils, rubber bands, a stapler, and paper clips. But there was also a cellophane package of Oreo cookies right in the middle, half of them gone, and Elliot smiled as he remembered Dr. Goldberg saying, Would you like a cookie? in that droll Teutonic dialect as he held out the package to him. Why the hell not? he thought, and put an Oreo whole into his mouth, chewing as he proceeded to search the other drawers.
He went in order from up to down on the left side, then the right, so it wasn’t until he opened the final drawer on the bottom right that he found that for which he had been searching, and praying not to find. It was inside a small white box of shiny cardboard that might have once housed a cheap pair of cuff links or ti
e clip. But when he took off the lid, he found a watch chain.
Elliot thought the metal was brass, and it was heavily tarnished. The chain was made up of four swastikas, three small ones joined by two single links each, and, at the end opposite the clasp, a larger one dangling from only one link.
A memento. A keepsake that must have had deep meaning for this sudden stranger who was not, could not, be Dr. Isaac Goldberg.
Elliot set the chain on the desk, put the lid back on the box and replaced it, then shut the drawer. He walked around the desk, looking at the chain as if it were a snake poised to strike. Then he reached out and picked it up again, weighing it in his hand. He would keep it, keep it to remind himself never again to seek a father, never again offer a child’s heart to any man.
He slipped the chain into his pocket, and felt tears blur his eyes and cloud his vision, so that when he looked up at the gleaming stones in the Star of David, he saw for the first time another pattern in the overall design. It was made up of paler stones set in rows. The effect was subtle, but looking at it with tear-filled eyes made it much easier to see the symbol the pale stones created from the X crossing the central hexagon of the six-pointed star, and from the lines on the northeast and southwest sides of the hexagon, and the left side of the top point and right side of the bottom point.
What was revealed was what had been there all along: a large swastika centered in and superimposed perfectly over the Star of David.
* * *
The social hall opened late, so Norman Bates didn’t hear of Dr. Goldberg’s disappearance until midafternoon. Patients were engaged in conversations with attendants, and there was a constant hubbub of talk in the large room. Even those patients who were usually mute were expressing themselves orally if not actually verbally, howling or moaning, sensing that something was very wrong.
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