by Ted Bell
There were also flying buttresses and great arches, many with stone eagles carved into the keystones. It was, Hawke thought, somewhat impressive, even for someone like him, a chap who has rather seen it all.
“Park it here, Artemis,” Hawke said suddenly. “Out of sight of the entrance. Let’s do this right, just as we planned. Only Sigrid goes to the door. She makes some excuse for me . . . Sorry, Hawke and his business colleague Mr. Cooper are still in the Sno-Cat on a conference call to their bankers in London . . . okay?”
“I can do better, Alex, but yes, that’s fine.”
“Good. Give it ten minutes. Ask for champagne. Get him relaxed. Then say you think I’m being rude. You’re going to call me and tell me so . . . That’ll be my cue.”
“Right.”
“And remember this, Sigrid. The Sorcerer, the éminence grise of Swiss banking, was convinced that someone in Zurich was assisting the Russians in hacking not only my most vulnerable accounts but those of Her Royal Majesty, the Queen. That he was the missing link among the Russian hackers and the Chinese thieves. When I insisted on a name, he gave me one. Baron Wolfgang von Stuka.”
“You never told me that. Wolfie was stealing from you?” she said.
Hawke smiled. “Well, I knew he was a friend of yours, for one thing. And I really didn’t think you needed to know, after you and Congreve cracked the case wide open and the two of you were headed back to England. The good news is that once you and the chief inspector had exposed the primary culprits, there was also no need for Wolfie to know I was on to him. And that I knew of his role, abetting the Russian hackers. I thought I just might have to save his sorry hide for a rainy day, as it were . . .”
“A day much like today, sir,” Artemis said, grinning.
“Precisely,” Hawke said, and then to Sigrid, “Good luck, darling. I’ll wait for your call.”
Artemis swung open the door and Sigrid climbed down from the cockpit of the massive Sno-Cat, dropping the last couple of feet into the drifted snow.
The winds were high and swirling up through the mountain pass. Hawke watched her until she disappeared into a fog of whirling snow . . .
The world was precarious, Hawke had learned. People you loved could be subtracted from it with swift bad math. If one might die at any moment, one must live!
A liveried houseman swung open the great oaken doors. He stood just inside the archway, with two enormous matching Dobermans straining at their leashes. The man bowed from the waist and waved the two new arrivals inside. Two footmen took their parkas and they entered. The barking of the dogs and all the sounds of their own voices created booming echoes inside the great sunlit space that was the enormous hall.
“Your names, please, gentlemen?” he asked.
“I’m Hawke. He’s Cooper,” Hawke said. There was no reply, only a sullen nod.
Hawke turned and saw a great double curved staircase rising up into the darkness of the higher floors. Above, clerestory windows shifted the light of milky sunshine one to the other, light that fell to the medieval frescoes on the walls below. The walls to either side of the staircase were lined with full suits of ancient armor. And in much profusion, gilt-framed oils of fleshy white men. The roots of the baron’s ancestral tree, no doubt, Hawke thought.
“If you’ll follow me, gentlemen, they are waiting for you in the drawing room,” the manservant said, his English thick with guttural Germanic undertones. And they followed, with the hyperactive Dobermans slinging loopy strings of saliva in every direction and leading the way.
“Ah, there you are, Alex!” the baron boomed as Hawke was shown into the book-filled library. “I’d heard a nasty rumor you might show up here!”
Hawke smiled at him, hiding his contempt for the fabricated bonhomie, the artificial soul that lay at the very heart of this man.
“Baron, I appreciate your time. I’d like you to meet my new business partner, an old RAF man, Captain Artemis Cooper. I’ve been telling him a lot about you and—”
“Don’t believe a word he says, Artemis! Jilted lovers, they’re all the same. Come sit down and have something to drink, won’t you? Fräulein Kissl and I are sampling a dollop of Krug . . . something stronger?”
“Jilted lover?” Hawke said, staring at Sigrid. “Did I miss a memo?”
“Oh, darling,” she said, “don’t take him seriously. He’s just teasing you.”
Hawke was not amused. He was barely able to contain his anger at all this false bravado and the sleazy solicitous attitude toward the lot of them.
“Got any rum?” Hawke asked. “Gosling’s Rum?”
“Sorry, old chap, we don’t drink that Bermuda horse piss up here at Weisses Kreuz. Sigrid, pour this man a whiskey, will you?”
She looked at Alex who shook his head no.
“Captain Cooper, what can I get for you?”
“Diet Coke?”
“Diet . . . what?”
“Never mind—maybe a brandy.”
Von Stuka shrugged, plainly irritated, and handed it to him. He returned to his seat next to Sigrid on the silk brocade settee and plastered on that smile again. It took all of Artemis’s will to keep from putting his fist through that face.
“So, Lord Hawke, to what do I owe the honor of your presence here in my family home?”
Hawke, who was in the midst of lighting a cigarette, paused and took a long slow puff before he answered. “In point of fact, I am looking for my son, Alexei. He was kidnapped in St. Moritz on Christmas Day. You haven’t seen him, by any chance, have you, Baron? Caught a glimpse of him, perhaps?”
“Me? No. Of course not. Why would you think that I had seen him?”
“Just a hunch.”
“A hunch.”
“I think the man who perhaps kidnapped Alexei is a friend of yours, that’s all. A business associate, shall we say. And that you’ve been doing business with him lately here in Switzerland.”
“I have no idea who or what you’re talking about, Lord Hawke. But I deeply resent your coming into my home under false pretenses, and I resent your line of questioning. Perhaps you two should leave. Miss Kissl can remain here with me. I’ll see that she gets home safely.”
“This is not a social call, Baron. I am a ranking official of Her Majesty’s government. A senior intelligence officer with MI6 investigating a serious crime with international implications. You have two choices. You can answer my questions truthfully here or I can have you arrested for suspicion of collusion with the Russians in the theft of monies from accounts belonging to Her Royal Majesty the Queen . . . not to mention my own personal accounts.”
“This is outrageous!” the baron shouted. “How dare you make these allegations!”
“It is outrageous, isn’t it?” Hawke said. “Alas, you must answer to them. You’ll remember my good friend Chief Inspector Congreve of Scotland Yard. He was here with me investigating the White Death affair, as I’m sure you’ll recall. He is at the Yard, standing by now for a call from me. Ready with a warrant for your arrest for crimes committed against Her Royal Majesty and the United Kingdom.”
“Out! Get out of my house,” the baron shouted.
“Shut up and listen to me. If I don’t hear exactly what I want to hear, there will be officers of the Swiss polizei and Scotland Yard detectives knocking at your door within the hour. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to use the loo for a minute—no, no, stay put, Baron, I’ll find it—”
Hawke stood, nodded at Artemis, and headed for the door. As he opened it, he heard Artemis say, “So, Baron, let’s talk about your lovely island estate . . . Seegarten, on Lake Zurich? I believe that’s what it’s called.”
“What about it?” he screamed, furious at his sudden impotence in the midst of his own domain.
“You sold it recently, Baron. Lord Hawke and I are here to find out why. And who bought it from you.”
“None of your fucking business,” the man said and leapt to his feet, yanking open one of the drawers in his desk, reaching
inside for a gun.
“Put the gun down, Baron,” Hawke said.
Hawke stood in the doorway, his own gun in his hand now, his old Walther PPK. He quickly crossed the room and sat on the arm of the couch, three feet from Wolfie, his weapon loosely trained on the man.
Artemis stood up. He had his Glock 17 aimed at Von Stuka’s head. “I said drop the weapon!”
Wolfie turned his head and was staring down the muzzle of the Glock. His shoulders slumped and he let go of his pistol and slammed the drawer shut.
Hawke said, “Sit back down, please, Baron. No, not by her. I want you in the armchair over there beside the fireplace. If I have to shoot you, we don’t want any blood on her pretty white jumpsuit, do we?”
Von Stuka removed himself to the chair, his handsome face livid with anger.
“It’s called Good Cop, Bad Cop, Baron,” Hawke said. “Only in your case it’s called Bad Cop, Bad Cop. How do you like it so far?”
Sullen, with his head down, the man did not reply.
“I want to know, Baron, and I want to know now. Who . . . did . . . you . . . sell . . . Seegarten to? Tell me the name of the buyer now, or this is going to get really unpleasant.”
This fruitless interrogation went on for ten minutes before Hawke stood up and said, “Let’s take a break, you know, stretch our legs a bit. Get some fresh air. Come on, Wolfie, on your feet, boyo. Captain Cooper and I would like a little tour of your castle . . . Artemis, fetch our ponchos, would you please? It’s cold out.”
Sigrid, who’d been silent the whole time, said, “Alex, do you want me to call Chief Inspector Congreve? Tell him we need the Scotland Yard officers and polizei up here?”
“Not yet, darling. I’m going to give him just one more chance to save his silly ass. Right, Baron? You up for this? The captain and I want to see the view from the top of one of your four towers . . . it’s going to be cold and windy up there, but we’re all big boys, right? Ready? Come, let us away . . .”
Chapter Seventy-Five
The view from the tower at the top of the world was spectacular. The snow was not coming down as fast and Hawke could see for miles across the Alps-studded vista. He smiled at Wolfie and leapt up onto the narrow stone parapet, a low wall that encircled the very pinnacle of the tower. Looking down (never a good idea) gave him a start. Far beneath him was a massive crevasse, its stone jaws wide and deep.
“You two need to get up here and see this view!” Hawke exclaimed. “All right, Captain, if you’d be so kind, please help our host here up onto the parapet with me, would you?”
“Get up on the wall,” Artemis growled, lifting him. “Get up there now.”
“Give me your hand,” Hawke said, reaching down to help Artemis lift him up.
With Hawke pulling and Artemis pushing, they got him, trembling and whimpering, up on the parapet. It was like the man had known all along that this was where they were taking him and—
“Take his belt off, Artemis, and hand it to me,” Hawke said, and removing his own thick leather belt, he buckled it into a loop. He then took Wolfie’s belt and made another loop connected to his own.
“Okay, Baron, showtime. Artemis here is going to be the good cop now. He’s the one who’ll keep you from falling to your death. Don’t worry, we’re professionals. We’ve done this parlor trick many times before. Once high above Times Square on New Year’s Eve, in fact. Turn him around, Artemis, with his back to the crevasse, heels of his boots over the edge of the parapet. That’s right. Now, Baron, listen up. I’ve got a good grip on this belt. You need to hold on to yours too, because I’m going to lower you out over the edge until you’re horizontal above the ground. Sound like fun?”
“No, no, please!”
“Another foot, Artemis, that’s right, I want him fully extended horizontal over the ground.”
Hawke carefully extended his loop, lowering Wolfie slowly out until his only contact with the tower was the soles of his boots. He was now, literally, standing on the side of the tower, parallel to the ground below, a hundred and fifty feet in the air.
“Who bought Seegarten, Wolfie? You want to live, tell me. Tell me right now . . .”
“Hawke! I don’t know, I tell you. You think I want to die like this? Bring me back up, please, and—”
“Who bought it? Just give me the name and I’ll haul you up . . . You’ve got fifteen seconds . . . starting NOW!”
“Fuck! My lawyers handle everything and—”
“Now, I said! I’m going to give you a count of ten. Ready? Ten . . . nine . . .”
“I don’t know, someone in the South of France. Never learned his name. Only an account number. Never! I swear it!”
“Eight . . . seven . . . Come on, Wolfie, you must have dealt with someone! Who negotiated? Who made the offer? Who arranged the bloody wire transfer of thirty million bloody dollars? Who was it? Tell me now or you’re a dead man, Baron. I’m not bloody kidding—you lied to me. You stole from me.”
“It was . . . shit . . . it was an American. Working for the buyer, I think, or just representing him here in Switzerland.”
“And the magic name is? Five . . . four . . . three . . .”
“Joseph Stalingrad. Calls himself Uncle Joe. He’s from Los Angeles, California.”
“Where is he now?”
“Bring me up!”
“Where is Uncle Joe now?”
“Living at Seegarten. Now an armed island fort. Land-mined, attack dogs, and the walls surmounted with barbed wire. Apparently he keeps himself surrounded by guards twenty-four hours a day, snipers on the rooftops.”
“I don’t imagine your former neighbors are very happy about this. Doesn’t sound exactly neighborly.”
“Bring me up! I told you, for Christ’s sake!”
“One last thing. What do you know about Operation Overkill?”
“Overkill? Jesus. Some kind of invasion, I don’t fucking know. That’s all. I swear to you.”
“Invasion of what?”
“No idea. A major operation . . . massive.”
“Who is planning this operation?”
“This Joe character and someone named Beau. The Joe and Beau Show is what he calls it. I don’t know what the hell they think they can invade, but—”
“Haul him up, Captain Cooper. And let’s get the hell down from here. Scared the living daylights out of me, so I can only imagine how our poor Baron must have felt . . .”
As soon as the three of them, Hawke, Artemis, and Sigrid, were back in the Sno-Cat and headed down the mountain, Hawke lit another cigarette and said, “All right, gentleman, lady, game on. Hostage rescue operation. Sigrid, you first. I’m going to need a base of operations. Compound on the lake. Walled. Fortifiable, and—”
Sigrid smiled. “Sounds exactly like Seegarten, Alex. Ready made. Why not just attack it and seize that place for yourself? Spoils of war sort of thing.”
Hawke turned in his seat and looked back at her.
“Woman is a genius. Next, Artemis, I’m putting you in charge of the operation. Assemble the hostage rescue team in Miami. We leave tonight on my airplane. After you drop Fräulein Kissl and me off in Oxfordshire, your flight plan is Miami. Once everyone is assembled, ferry them all back to Zurich just as quickly as you can put this together.”
“Who do you need?” Artemis asked.
“I need Stokely Jones and Harry Brock, CIA. Both located in Miami. And I need my mercenaries, Thunder and Lightning, who run their operation out of a castle called Fort Whupass on Martinique, Lesser Antilles.”
“Who?”
“Friends of mine, Artemis. Stokely will call them as soon as you know what I want. T and L. Best hostage rescue team for hire in the world.”
“With all due respect, sir, sounds like a bit of overkill, pun intended, for a single hostage.”
“Stalingrad and Putin have turned Seegarten into a heavily armed compound. There will be heavy resistance. But I’m also thinking ahead, Captain. According to the baron, w
e may also have some kind of invasion on our hands. Putin’s building an army from the ground up.”
“He’s hired a man whose specialty is building private armies. Colonel Beau Beauregard.”
“Operation Overkill is real, then? What the hell is it?”
“That’s what we’re going to find out. But first I’m going to bring Alexei home.”
“You really think he’s in there? In Seegarten?”
“Yeah. I do. I strongly suspect that Alexei is there, and that he is under the tenuous protection of Uncle Joe Stalingrad. Things are heating up fast, and the danger level for Alexei from Putin is ramping up with it.”
“He’s not going to do anything rash right now, Alex. He’s got too much to lose.”
“Look, I know Putin. He gets rattled in times like this, times of international crisis. Distracted. Hell, that night I visited him at his dacha? Pentagon sent me to get him to sign that stand-down treaty for the joint chiefs? By the time I left with that signed treaty in my hand, he was so damn crazy drunk he could barely stand up . . . and he was shooting at me! Shouting that if I ever interfered with him again, he’d kill both my son and me.”
Artemis said, “You need to put an end to this thing, sir. Once and for all.”
“You think I don’t know that?” Hawke said.
Chapter Seventy-Six
Lake Zurich
Thunder and Lightning. That’s the moniker the famous mercenary team had acquired in the mid-nineties, when they started making an international name for themselves. Before they became legend in the head-banging warrior world of the soldier of fortune. They were recruited on battlefields that spanned the globe. Usually it was the last man standing in the smoking ruins who got the nod.