Contract With God (2 page)

‘Here’s the report, Dr Graus.’

Josef and his wife exchanged looks as they heard the name of the doctor they needed to see, the person who held their son’s life in his hands. They turned towards the far corner of the ward and saw a small group of people gathered around one of the beds. An attractive young doctor was seated at the bedside of a girl who looked about nine years old. Next to him an older nurse held a tray of surgical instruments while a bored-looking middle-aged doctor took notes.

‘Dr Graus . . .’ said Odile hesitantly, steeling herself as she approached the group.

The young man gestured dismissively to the nurse without taking his eyes from what he was doing.

‘Not now, please.’

The nurse and the other doctor stared at Odile in surprise, but said nothing.

When she saw what was taking place, Odile had to grit her teeth in order not to scream. The young girl was deathly pale and appeared to be semi-conscious. Graus was holding her arm over a metal basin as he made small cuts with a scalpel. There was hardly a place on the girl’s arm that hadn’t been touched by the blade and the blood flowed slowly into the basin, which was almost full. Finally the girl’s head slumped to one side. Graus held two slender fingers to the girl’s neck.

‘Good, she has no pulse. The time, Dr Stroebel ?’

‘Six thirty-seven.’

‘Almost ninety-three minutes. Exceptional! The subject remained awake although her level of consciousness was comparatively low, and she showed no signs of pain. The combination of laudanum and datura is undoubtedly better than anything we’ve tried up to now. Congratulations, Stroebel. Get the specimen ready for dissection.’

‘Thank you, Herr Doktor. Right away.’

Only then did the young doctor turn towards Josef and Odile. In his eyes was a mixture of annoyance and disdain.

‘And who might you be?’

Odile took a step forward and stood next to the bed, trying not to look at the dead girl.

‘My name is Odile Cohen, Dr Graus. I am Elan Cohen’s mother.’

The physician looked at Odile coldly and then turned to the nurse.

‘Get these Jews out of here, Fräulein Ulrike.’

The nurse grabbed Odile’s elbow and with a rough push positioned herself between the woman and the doctor. Josef rushed to help his wife and struggled with the hefty nurse. For moments they formed a bizarre trio, pushing in different directions without anyone gaining ground. Fräulein Ulrike’s face grew red from the effort.

‘Doctor, I’m sure there’s been a mistake,’ said Odile, fighting to get her head past the nurse’s broad shoulders. ‘My son is not mentally ill.’

Odile managed to free herself from the nurse’s grip and turned to the doctor.

‘It’s true that he hasn’t talked much since we lost our house, but he’s not mad. He’s here because of a mistake. If you let him go . . . Please let me give you the only thing we have left.’

She placed the package on the bed, making sure she didn’t touch the body of the dead girl as she carefully removed the newspaper wrapping. Despite the dimness of the ward, the golden object cast its glow on the surrounding walls.

‘It’s been in my husband’s family for generations, Dr Graus. I would rather have died than give this up. But my son, Doctor, my son . . .’

Odile began to cry and fell to her knees. The younger doctor barely noticed since his eyes were transfixed by the object on the bed. However, he managed to open his mouth long enough to destroy any hope the couple had left.

‘Your son is dead. Go away.’

 

As soon as the cold air outside hit her face Odile regained some strength. Holding on to her husband as they hurried away from the hospital, she was more fearful than ever of the curfew. Her mind was concentrated solely on getting back to the far side of the city, where their other son was waiting.

‘Hurry, Josef. Hurry.’

They quickened their pace through the steadily falling snow.

 

In his hospital office, Dr Graus hung up the phone with a distracted air and caressed the strange gold object on his desk. Minutes later, when the sirens from the SS vehicles reached him, he didn’t even look out of the window. His assistant said something about fleeing Jews, but Graus paid no attention.

He was busy planning young Cohen’s operation.

FATHER ANTHONY FOWLER, agent working with both the CIA and the Holy Alliance.

FATHER ALBERT, ex-hacker. Systems Analyst with the CIA and liaison with Vatican intelligence.

BROTHER CESÁREO, Dominican. Curator of Antiquities at the Vatican.

 

CAMILO CIRIN, Inspector General. Also Head of the Holy Alliance, the Vatican’s secret intelligence service.

 

ANDREA OTERO, reporter for the newspaper
El Globo.

RAYMOND KAYN, multimillionaire industrialist.

JACOB RUSSELL, Kayn’s executive assistant.

ORVILLE WATSON, terrorism consultant and owner of Netcatch.

DR HEINRICH GRAUS, genocidal Nazi.

 

CECYL FORRESTER, biblical archaeologist.

DAVID PAPPAS, GORDON DURWIN, KYRA LARSEN, STOWE ERLING and EZRA LEVINE, assistants to Cecyl Forrester

MOGENS DEKKER, chief of security for the expedition.

ALOIS GOTTLIEB, ALRYK GOTTLIEB, TEWI WAAKA, PACO TORRES, LOUIS MALONEY and MARLA JACKSON, Dekker’s soldiers.

DR HAREL, physician on the excavation.

TOMMY EICHBERG , head driver.

ROBERT FRICK, BRIAN HANLEY, administration/technicians

NURI ZAYIT, RANI PETERKE, cooks

 

NAZIM and KHAROUF, members of the Washington cell.
O, D and W, members of the Syrian and Jordanian cells.
HUQAN, head of the three cells.

STEINFELDSTRAßE, 6
KRIEGLACH, AUSTRIA

 

 

The priest wiped his feet carefully on the welcome mat before knocking on the door. After tracking the man for the past four months, he had finally discovered his hiding place two weeks ago. He was now sure of Handwurz’s true identity. The moment had come to confront him.

He waited patiently for a few minutes. It was noon and Graus would be having his customary midday nap on the sofa. There was hardly anyone in the narrow street at that hour. His neighbours on Steinfeldstraße were at work, unaware that at Number 6, in a small house with blue curtains at the windows, a genocidal monster was peacefully dozing in front of his TV set.

Finally the sound of a key in the lock warned the priest that the door was about to open. The head of an elderly man with the venerable air of someone in an advertisement for medical insurance appeared from behind the door.

‘Yes?’

‘Good morning, Herr Doktor.’

The old man looked the person who was addressing him up and down. The latter was tall, thin and bald, about fifty years of age, with a priest’s collar visible under his black coat. He stood on the doorstep with the rigid posture of a military guard, his green eyes observing the old man intently.

‘I think you’re mistaken, Father. I used to be a plumber, but now I’m retired. I’ve already contributed to the parish fund, so if you’ll excuse me . . .’

‘You aren’t by any chance Dr Heinrich Graus, the famous German neurosurgeon?’

The old man held his breath for a second. Aside from that, he did nothing that might give him away. However, that small detail was enough for the priest: proof positive.

‘My name is Handwurz, Father.’

‘That’s not true and we both know it. Now if you’ll let me in, I’ll show you what I’ve brought with me.’ The priest raised his left hand, in which he held a black briefcase.

The door swung open in response and the old man limped quickly towards the kitchen, the ancient floorboards protesting with each step. The priest followed but paid little attention to the surroundings. He had peered in through the windows on three separate occasions and already knew the location of each item of cheap furniture. He preferred keeping his eyes fixed on the old Nazi’s back. Even though the doctor walked with some difficulty, the priest had seen him lifting sacks of coal from the shed with an ease that a man decades younger might have envied. Heinrich Graus was still a dangerous man.

The small kitchen was dark and smelled rancid. It had a gas stove, a counter on which sat a dried-up onion, a round table, and two unmatched chairs. Graus gestured for the priest to sit down. The old man then rummaged through a cupboard, took out two glasses, filled them with water and set them on the table before taking a seat himself. The glasses remained untouched as the two men sat there, impassive, regarding each other for over a minute.

The old man was dressed in a red flannel bathrobe, cotton shirt, and worn trousers. He had started going bald twenty years earlier, and the little hair he had left was completely white. His large round glasses had gone out of style before the fall of communism. The relaxed expression around his mouth lent him a good-natured air.

None of this fooled the priest.

Dust particles floated in the shaft of light created by the weak rays of the December sun. One of them landed on the priest’s sleeve. He flicked it away without taking his gaze from the old man.

The smooth certainty of the gesture did not go unnoticed by the Nazi, but he’d had time to recover his composure.

‘Aren’t you going to have some water, Father?’

‘I’m not thirsty, Dr Graus.’

‘So you’re going to insist on calling me by that name. My name is Handwurz. Balthasar Handwurz.’

The priest paid no heed.

‘I have to admit you’re pretty sharp. When you got your passport to leave for Argentina, no one imagined that you’d return to Vienna a few months later. Naturally it was the last place I looked for you. Only forty-five miles from Spiegelgrund Hospital. The Nazi hunter, Wiesenthal, searched for years in Argentina, unaware that you were a short ride away from his office. Ironic, don’t you think?’

‘I think it’s ridiculous. You’re American, aren’t you? You speak German well, but your accent gives you away.’

The priest lifted his briefcase onto the table and removed from it a worn folder. The first document he held up was a photo of a younger Graus, taken at the hospital at Spiegelgrund during the war. The second was a variation of the same photo, but with the doctor’s features aged thanks to a software program.

‘Isn’t technology great, Herr Doktor?’

‘That doesn’t prove a thing. Anyone could have done that. I watch television too,’ he said, but his voice betrayed something else.

‘You’re right. It doesn’t prove anything, but this does.’

The priest took out a yellowing sheet to which someone had stapled a black-and-white photo, on top of which was written in sepia letters:
TESTIMONIANZA FORNITA
, next to the stamp of the Vatican.

“‘Balthasar Handwurz. Blond hair, brown eyes, strong features. Identifying marks: a tattoo on his left arm with the number 256441, put there by the Nazis during his stay at the concentration camp at Mauthausen.” A place you never set foot in, Graus. Your number is a false one. The person who did your tattoo made it up on the spot, but that’s the least of it. Until now, it’s worked.’

The old man touched his arm through the flannel bathrobe. He was pale with anger and fear.

‘Who the hell are you, you bastard?’

‘My name is Anthony Fowler. I want to cut a deal with you.’

‘Get out of my house. Right now.’

‘I don’t think I’m making myself clear. You were second in command at Am Spiegelgrund Children’s Hospital for six years. It was a very interesting place. Almost all the patients were Jewish and they suffered from mental illness. “Lives not worth living”, isn’t that what you called them?’

‘I don’t have the slightest idea what you’re talking about!’

‘Nobody suspected what you were doing there. The experiments. Cutting children up while they were still alive. Seven hundred and fourteen, Dr Graus. You killed seven hundred and fourteen of them with your own hands.’

‘I told you—’

‘You kept their brains in jars!’

Fowler smashed his fist on the table so hard that both glasses toppled over and for a moment the only sound was that of the water dripping onto the tiled floor. Fowler took a few deep breaths, attempting to calm himself.

The doctor avoided looking into the green eyes that seemed ready to cut him in half.

‘Are you with the Jews?’

‘No, Graus. You know I’m not. If I were one of them you’d be dangling from a noose in Tel Aviv. My . . . affiliation is with the people who facilitated your escape in 1946.’

The doctor repressed a shiver.

‘The Holy Alliance,’ he muttered.

Fowler did not reply.

‘And what does the Alliance want from me after all these years?’

‘Something in your possession.’

The Nazi gestured at his surroundings.

‘As you can see, I’m not exactly a rich man. I have no money left.’

‘If I were after money, I could easily sell you to the Attorney General in Stuttgart. They’re still offering 130,000 euros for your capture. I want the candle.’

The Nazi stared at him blankly, pretending not to understand.

‘What candle?’

‘Now you’re the one being ridiculous, Dr Graus. I’m talking about the candle you stole from the Cohen family sixty-two years ago. A heavy candle without a wick, covered with gold filigree. That’s what I want and I want it now.’

‘Take your bloody lies elsewhere. I don’t have any candle.’