Blood Ties

by Warren Adler

  "I still say we should never have consented," the Baron said when the pain subsided. The "we" was pointed, meant to be sarcastic. All of their decisions had been joint. Between them they were point and counterpoint. It had always been that way.

  "You'll only make yourself sick again," Karla warned.

  "We owed him nothing. He made his choice."

  A flash of anger stimulated more pain. And he remembered his own reaction to his brother's letter from Moscow. He was dying, the letter had said, in the vaguely familiar hand. He did not ask forgiveness for himself. Only for them, his wife and child. Wolfgang was, after all, their brother. He knew their weakness. The blood. They hadn't heard from him since 1929. Then, suddenly, a few months ago, the letter. Later, they had received the acknowledgment of his death and with it an appeal.

  "You are my son's only family. He is, after all, a von Kassel. It was his father's wish that he not be estranged," Wolfgang's wife, Olga, had written, pointing out that the boy was only ten.

  So young, he had thought. Obviously, Wolfgang, the oldest, who had died in the late seventies of his life, had married a younger woman. Perhaps the Bolsheviks had not yet corrupted the child. That had been Karla's main argument. How he hated the Bolsheviks! It was they who had administered the coup de grace to the von Kassels in Estonia. They had survived everything but the Bolsheviks. The Germans, the old Balts, the Poles, the Slavs, even the Czar's lackies. They had bartered their freedom for eight centuries. But the Bolsheviks.... At least their worldwide mischief was profitable for the family. That, of course, was merely business.

  In the end they had invited his brother's wife to the reunion, although he hoped that the authorities would not let her leave. But she had managed it somehow, proving how good a Bolshevik Wolfgang must have been. They only let out people they were sure of.

  "I am prepared to tolerate her," he assured Karla, dismissing the subject for the moment. There were higher priorities in his mind. The matter with Rudi was far more pressing.

  "Albert must be told," the Baron said. "By me. Before he sees Rudi."

  "I told Hans that he is to come here immediately," Karla assured him.

  "I cannot understand it," Charles said.

  "Perhaps Rudi was lying." It was another familiar theme.

  "The von Kassels are beyond moral judgments," he said. Why should any von Kassel care about the type of brokered goods? Weapons are weapons. It was the bedrock of their business. What did it matter whose hands possessed the means of destruction?

  "I have a source of plutonium," Rudi had said, having flown to him secretly a month ago from Buenos Aires, without Albert knowing, despite the fact that Albert was the acknowledged business helmsman. "And I have a buyer. What more is required?"

  "And Albert has rejected it! But why?" the Baron had asked.

  "That, Father, is the enigma."

  The Baron had pondered the revelation in a long silence. Karla had listened quietly in the house which they shared in Baden-Baden and he had looked at her for guidance. But she had remained implacable. For Rudi, he knew, it was a major challenge, a gauntlet thrown down.

  Rudi was sweating. The heat from the fire had lit his face, bathing it in yellow light.

  "Whatever his explanation, Father, it is not adequate. This is the biggest deal in our history. What is it our business where it lands, or who uses it? That was never our business. Let them blow themselves to Kingdom come."

  The Baron had nodded his approval. Ideologies. Motives. To their business such considerations were anathema. The sign of approbation had given Rudi courage.

  "We are talking of a staggering profit." Rudi did not mention a figure and the Baron did not press for it. "It is, after all, a rather scarce commodity." He shifted his weight nervously and again wiped his forehead. "American, probably. There is some reportedly missing. But, that is not our business," he added quickly. "Nor should we care who gets it and what they do with it."

  "You should have told Albert you were coming to me," the Baron admonished.

  "He would have stopped me."

  Rudi had hesitated, watching the face of his expressionless aunt. His own face was rotund and under the vest his paunch had grown larger.

  "He would have made a subjective judgment, based on me, rather than the business facts."

  "That's absurd," the Baron said. Rudi's lower lip had trembled.

  "Well then," Rudi said. "It is certainly the other. That's why I came here, Father. The rejection of the deal, my deal, is not the real reason for my coming. I am troubled about the other. At first I thought, 'Oh, it is the usual put-down of fat Rudi.' Then I decided there is more to this than my own..." He hesitated again and swallowed. "...paranoia."

  "What other?" the Baron asked, hoping his second son would not grow maudlin.

  "The idea that we must not get involved in nuclear weaponry, that we must not be responsible for the destruction of the human race."

  "He said that?"

  "Yes, Father."

  "The human race?"

  "Yes, Father."

  "We are now the keepers of the human conscience?" the Baron snickered. "We are arms dealers not moralists."

  "I argued those points. But they made little headway."

  "A tiny bullet or a hydrogen bomb. There is no difference. No difference at all. A commodity. Merchandise. If this is true, Albert is getting soft in the head." The Baron tapped his fingers on the armrest of the chair, his anger growing.

  "You must calm yourself," Karla interjected.

  "If this is so, then you see—he is taking the very heart out of the business."

  "There was no moving him, Father. I brooded over it. I realized what a big step it would be—to come here. If he had rejected the idea on business grounds. That would be another matter. The other is, well, deeply disturbing."

  "You are certain?" the Baron asked.

  Rudi flushed. He had never been subtle, and was easily insulted.

  "Would I have come here if I thought otherwise?"

  Charles observed his son's defensiveness. If only his body had not faltered, he thought. He would have taken command again. Surely, not Albert! Not like Siegfried. In the end would there be only Rudi?

  "All of you have underestimated my business acumen. It is my own deal. It is the biggest deal in the history of the von Kassels. Huge profits. Payment in gold. The sellers trust me. And I found the buyers."

  It was not the first time that the sale of atomic products had come up within the family. But atomic weapons and fuels were controlled, never available through von Kassel sources. One must seize opportunities.

  "But why...?" the Baron began, still trying to fathom Albert's motives.

  "Perhaps he has lost his courage," Rudi said, determined to make the point of his own daring.

  "Albert?"

  "It is not jealousy, Father," Rudi pleaded, revealing the truth of it. But suspecting his father's interpretation he added, "And even if it were, Albert's actions are suspect. Dangerous, maybe, for our future." The implication resounded in the room.

  The Baron listened patiently, probing beyond the words.

  "What are you suggesting?" he asked.

  "We must put it on the table," Rudi said. "At the reunion. It must be resolved ... one way or another." The tone, for Rudi, was uncharacteristically ominous.

  "Of course," he mumbled, remembering his grandfather's old admonitions: We are not God. All weapons are inert. When we begin to think we are responsible we are doomed.

  Rudi brightened. He had made the desired impact. He walked to the decanter and poured himself a brandy, as if in celebration. The Baron watched him, the soft back and shoulders so reminiscent of Helga. How could Rudi know that this resemblance was the real handicap? But time, as von Kassels knew, did not fade old images. Time was the infinite tunnel in his mind, bored out of the solid rock of blood and tissue, encasing all the memories of the race. There, in the endless void, he could be the sweating Knight encased in armor, his eyes surve
ying the blood-soaked fields of Tannenberg or, earlier, in the heat of a Syrian desert, wielding the curved scimitar into the hard sinew of an infidel's neck, the boiling blood scarlet fountain rising in a plume and spilling on the parched earth.

  Time. The Baron was the guardian of time. And, because of that, all the raw memories of his wife's betrayal could be resummoned in the prosaic movement of his second son. Surely, Rudi had sensed what the Baron had failed to articulate.

  Worse, it was a weakness to feel love. Love of progeny could create dangers, his grandfather had assured him. Von Kassels must bend nature to the collective will. There is no need of love, the old man had said, only continuity. That was all. One must be dispassionate about one's creations. He had not understood that until later. "Do not love me," his grandfather had intoned.

  His oldest, Siegfried, seemed a betrayal from the beginning. Where were the warrior genes of the von Kassels? He shook his head as if the question required a visible answer. Was it possible that even Albert could not lead the family interests into the future?

  "Thank you, Father," Rudi had said, the gratitude unduly fawning. If only he could see inside my head, the Baron had thought, irritated by his son's revelation. It had spoiled the prospect of a peaceful death.

  Karla rose from the chair, walking across the room to peer out of the arched watchtower window.

  "It is misty below," she said, preempting his question.

  "But you have told Hans?" he repeated. She turned and looked at him sternly. He nodded and emptied his teacup, leaning back heavily on the propped pillows.

  He must have dozed. When he opened his eyes, a tall woman had materialized at the foot of his bed. Eyes, partially hidden behind high slavic cheekbones, watched him. The youthful aspect of the face surprised him and, for the moment, the drugged mind cleared. Karla must have been trying to reach him earlier, for he knew instantly that it was the Russian woman.

  "...so at last Charles," the woman said. Somehow, he had expected more respect. The title at least.

  "Wolfgang's description of you both was surprisingly accurate." The face was clear now, the features revealing no aspect of ingratiation.

  "And see our nephew, Charles. Aleksandr," Karla said, oddly animated. She was holding the boy by the shoulders, a thin lad with a vaguely familiar face, like the young Wolfgang.

  "So much like Wolfgang, don't you think?" Karla said.

  "Yes," he agreed, studying the boy as Karla moved aside and propped up the pillows.

  The boy reached for his mother's hand and looked up at her, imploring. She bent down.

  "He smells," the boy said. It was meant to be a whisper.

  His mother silenced him with a fierce look.

  So the stink of death is clear to Wolfgang's son, Charles thought. Appropriate, that Wolfgang's son should be the harbinger of his death.

  "Your brother spoke of you often," Olga said with what seemed like proletarian directness. Charles nodded. With contempt, no doubt. Even as a boy Wolfgang had been contemptuous of the von Kassels, their myths and enterprises. So why had she come?

  "It was his wish in the end that we come."

  "His wish?"

  Karla patted the boy's head until he pulled it away. His mother shot him an angry glance.

  "Toward the end," Olga said, "he was quite nostalgic, talking of your old place in Estonia. Actually, we went there last year for the first time." She hesitated. "He cried like a baby when he saw the old family cemetery."

  "You saw it, the old graves."

  "Quite remarkable. All those ancestors being there together. And I understand you still pay for its maintenance. I thought that quite interesting. Wolfgang, you know, is buried there."

  He did not know. The idea was revolting, the old Bolshevik lying there, the enemy in our midst.

  "So he decided to come home, did he?" Charles said, deliberately displaying his contempt with a sneer.

  "He would have it no other way," Olga said. The boy was growing restless, hanging on his mother's skirts. Karla removed a plate of cakes from a nearby table and proffered them with a kindly smile. He could understand her interest. She had lost her only sons in the war. The boy looked at his mother, who nodded, and he took one of the cakes. Again, she patted his head and he did not move away.

  "So you have fulfilled his death wish," Charles said. She was quite attractive, he realized. No more than thirty. Wolfgang must have been in the late sixties when he married her, he calculated. He was surprised at his own curiosity.

  "They must think of you as a loyal Bolshevik to have let you come," Charles said, shooting a glance at Karla. But she was busy with the boy and ignored him.

  "Wolfgang was a Party member."

  "Yes. We are aware of that."

  "If he had lived, he would have come as well."

  "You expect us to believe that?" Charles snapped. His attitude diverted Karla from the boy.

  "I told you he was getting nostalgic."

  "For what? For us? He despised us."

  "Yes. That is true in a sense."

  "In a sense?"

  "He could not get it out of his system. There was some compelling mystique that kept you in his thoughts. Although..." She hesitated. "He was contemptuous of everything you are, everything you stood for. I say this not to hurt you and without embarrassment."

  "You came to tell us that," Charles said. "As if we did not know." He looked at Karla. "She came to make a speech about how much he hated us."

  "I did not say hate," Olga corrected.

  "Why then?"

  She had been watching him coolly behind her high cheekbones, with alert brown eyes. But suddenly she was flustered and her eyes darted around the room.

  "Why then?" he repeated. Again, he looked at Karla. "I was against it." He pointed to his sister. "I listened to her."

  "Please, Charles. You are exciting yourself."

  "I'll never understand it," Charles said. "She is after money, a piece of the von Kassel fortune. I told her that. Bolsheviks are greedy bastards."

  "I'm not a Bolshevik," Olga protested.

  "No. Of course not. Not now. Not here."

  "Please, Charles," Karla pleaded.

  "Wolfgang deserted us. Remember, Karla? It was the night the Bolsheviks burned us out. The night we fled to the woods. The night Father was murdered."

  "If it were not for Wolfgang, they would have murdered you as well," Olga said gently.

  "Yes," Charles said. "I have heard that before." His anger had left him spent again. He warned himself. There was still too much to be done. That was old business, irrelevant. He had promised himself not to stir himself up about it. Closing his eyes, he let his head sink into the pillows.

  "You are the boy's only family," Olga whispered. "I have none." She turned to Karla. "I promised him. So I am here. Beyond that, I dared not speculate. He said you were monsters. I came anyway."

  "He is a von Kassel," Karla said, looking at the boy, who continued to stuff himself with cakes.

  Charles heard them move away from the bed, then the closing of the door. When he opened his eyes again, Karla stood over him.

  "The boy is a von Kassel," she said firmly. He did not know whether a reply was necessary. Besides, his strength had ebbed. He did not want Albert to see him so depleted.

  When he opened his eyes again, Karla was looking out of the window.

  "Albert?"

  "Yes."

  The Baron rose in the bed and struggled to its edge. Karla helped him into his dressing gown and edged his glasses over the bridge of his nose. Grabbing her still strong upper forearm, he let her guide him to the window and into the wing chair that faced it. He saw the Daimler thread its way over the ribbon of road out of the mist and into the brightness, moving through the castle gate to the main entrance. The figures of his son and his female companion emerged. The sight of Albert always filled him with pleasure, and for a moment, the old man's eyes watered.

  "Who is the woman?" Karla wondered aloud.
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br />   "We will know soon enough," the Baron responded, watching until the figures were out of sight. The Baron's color had risen.

  "Is it a serious liaison?" the Baron asked.

  "Siegfried says not."

  "Siegfried," the Baron hissed with contempt. "My philosopher."

  "It will come," Karla said.

  "But when?" the Baron sighed. He was remembering Emma now, his first wife. Poor sad Emma. Barren Emma. It was another intruding image of late. Like Helga. What he had done was necessary, he told himself.

  "He must marry. Have sons. It is his duty," the Baron said.

  "He will," Karla replied.

  "He must be made to understand," the Baron began. "Three sons, and all we have is one set of silly female twins."

  It was so typical of Rudi, his wife Mimi had told the Baron when she had presented the infant twins for the first time at a family reunion. "Rudi always has to do things twice. As if he can't get it right the first time." Rudi had actually beamed, as if the double helping revealed a special superiority. But the humor had paled with the years. No more offspring had emerged. Albert was thirty-five now. It was time.

  On the other hand, Siegfried and Heather's childlessness was welcome. Bad seeds. The woman was probably barren. Like the unfortunate Emma.

  "There are so many loose ends," the Baron sighed. Infirmity had softened him. It was the one element of himself he could not reveal to Karla, although he was certain she suspected. The imminence of death had a leavening effect on the psyche. He dared not call it conscience. Von Kassels, after all, were above conscience, as they were above nations, above emotional diversions that forced the stream of blood into unproductive eddies and whirlpools.

  "You will not tell them about Helga," he said again, as he had during the past few months. For years he had never mentioned her name, had blocked it from his mind. Was it necessary commanding her silence? Karla's face froze into a mask of contempt.