Game of Shadows (16 page)

San Sebastián, Argentina

Sean ascended the stairs, following the woman closely. He gave a precautionary look back, making sure no one else was following. They'd been alone the entire time he'd been there, but it was always possible that someone had snuck in. The area behind them remained empty, though.

"This house was built in the late 1800s by a wealthy Spaniard. His family sold it to my father when they came upon hard times. Father had acquired a great deal of wealth during the war and had wisely traded Nazi currency for gold."

"Smart," Sean said, admiring some of the paintings that lined the stairwell. The man had good taste in art as well as good financial sense, despite being a Nazi.

"Yes. Father knew that Hitler's days were numbered, though he would have willed the Führer to live a thousand years. When the war turned, he saw the writing on the wall. He knew it was only a matter of time before the Führer's empire collapsed. He had no intention of being bankrupt when it did."

She turned left and led him down a long, wood-paneled hallway adorned with several more paintings. These were of people from the past: a gallant nineteenth century German military officer, a red-haired woman in a pink dress, portraits of children from the early 1900s, and a few pictures filled with a family.

"This was my father's family before the war. His mother and father, brother and sister, and they all lived in Bayern, one of the most beautiful areas in the world."

Sean had to agree, and now that she mentioned it, he recognized some of the mountain ranges in the backdrops of the portraits. "Bayern is certainly full of spectacular scenery."

She turned her head toward him as she floated along. "You've been there?"

"Yes, ma'am. I've been all over the world. I have to say that some parts of Germany can stand up to some of the planet's most scenic places."

She smiled at his comment, clearly pleased to hear it. "I agree, though I have only been to my family's homeland a few times. Being the daughter of a former SS officer can make travel somewhat ... tricky."

He had to admit he'd never thought about it like that before.

"Fortunately," she went on, "I was able to take in the German countryside a few times before resigning to my life here."

"There could be worse places to retire," Sean said, walking past a window that gave a spectacular view of the crashing white tops of the ocean waves.

"You are most certainly right about that," she agreed.

"Your English is very good." He changed the subject to something he'd noticed before.

"Thank you. I was taught by an American schoolteacher. He had retired to San Sebastián to open a bookstore. When I was four years old, my father took me to his shop and introduced me. I spent the next several years going to that bookshop every day to learn. It's why I use conjunctions unlike many other people with European roots."

"I noticed." He passed her a sideways grin.

The two walked through a doorway at the end of the corridor and into an octagonal room. The wood paneling continued until it reached a bookshelf that wrapped around a massive desk in the center. An antechamber stretched out to the side, giving another extraordinary view of the coastline and the crescent-shaped bay down below. He returned his gaze to the interior and looked upon the area behind the desk. The bookcases ended with the three panels that cradled the desk chair. On the paneled walls hung three paintings, each placed next to each other. They were of three islands, though not tropical. They appeared more barren than anything else, difficult places to live. The rocky, jagged shores were clearly not for sunbathing, and the gray skies in the background depicted something that looked more like an alien world. He noticed that in the center painting, the sun had managed to crack through the cloud cover and a single beam of light streaked down to a place amid the soaking wet rocks and craggy coastline.

Irena flitted around behind the desk and opened a file drawer on the bottom right, then bent down and removed a black leather notebook. "This was my father's. If he left anything of record related to your quest, it would be in here." She noticed Sean staring at the paintings. "A small outcropping of islands between here and the Falkland's," she said. "Never understood what my father liked so much about those paintings."

"You kept them here in his memory?"

"Yes. I may be a snippy old woman, but I do have moments of sentimental feelings."

"You're not that old," Sean said with utmost sincerity.

"I am sixty-eight, and you let me know how old you feel when you hit that age. I know by years I'm still young, but I certainly don't feel it."

He smiled. It wasn't the first time he'd heard that line before, and he doubted it would be the last. He stepped around behind the desk and stood next to her. His nostrils filled with the flowery scent of her perfume. He picked up the notebook and began reading through it. Everything was in German, but much more legible than what he'd read in Poland.

"Do you need me to translate?" she asked in a kind tone, leaning over his shoulder.

"No, ma'am. I speak and read German," he answered in perfect German with a central mountain region accent.

Her eyebrows flicked up for a second. "Impressive. You apparently speak several languages."

His eyes continued to scan the pages quickly. Several minutes went by and turned into dozens as he poured through the pages. Irena eventually tired of standing and made her way to a leather club chair in the corner underneath volumes of old books. When Sean finished reading, her glass was empty, and his eyes tired.

"Did you find what you were looking for?"

He shook his head. "This is just a bunch of notes about his time in the army. There's no mention of the experiments in Poland, U-boats, the journey here. There's nothing." His voice trailed off, and he tried not to sound too downtrodden, but it was difficult to mask. He'd taken a huge gamble coming to Argentina. If the notebook in his hands was all there was to be found, he'd made his bets and lost. Dr. Ott's life was hanging in the balance, and time was running out.

"Are you sure there's nothing else?" he asked, beginning to hit the point of desperation.

She shifted the empty glass to the other hand and scratched the skin next to her left eye. "Like I said, my father disposed of anything related to his time with the Nazis, either before I was born or when I was so young I don't remember. Either way, I haven't seen anything in this home that might help you. If it's not in that book, I'm afraid there's nothing I can do."

Sean's face curled as he pressed his mind to think. There had to be a connection. A worrisome thought popped into his head. What if Stoepel wasn't the one with the connection? What if it was Wolfz? Right now, the police would be scouring the area after finding the killer dead on the street. They'd likely be going door-to-door, gathering information. Then he had an idea.

"Irena," he forced out the first name awkwardly, "do you know any other Germans living in the area with similar backgrounds to yours?"

One of her eyebrows rose a quarter inch. "By similar backgrounds I'm assuming you mean with parents who were in the Third Reich?"

He nodded.

"There were only a few in this area a decade after the war ended. Some were arrested and charged for war crimes, mostly the higher-ranking officers. After the extradition, the small number that remained was left to live out their lives with the guilt of what they'd done."

Sean listened closely before he asked his next question. "You don't, by any chance, know a man named Alfred Wolfz, do you?"

Irena glanced down at her wine glass. Her finger unconsciously ran around the rim in a circle, making a quiet squeaking sound. "Alfred Wolfz was the son of an SS officer, from what I understand. His father was taken away when he was twenty, the result of an ongoing inquisition. Alfred was left with a small estate and enough money to survive. Last I heard, he lives somewhere in town en route to the mountain resorts. I haven't seen him in years, despite San Sebastián being a relatively small city. Part of that is by design."

Sean's eyes narrowed, and his brow wrinkled together.

She answered his question before he could ask. "Alfred is not a kind person, although I believe much of his attitude and countenance is derived from being relieved of his father in such a traumatic way. His mother killed herself shortly after, throwing herself into the ocean from the cliffs not far from here." The finger outlining the rim of the glass pointed to a vague spot somewhere beyond the mansion's exterior. "After all that, I'm not surprised that Alfred became bitter. In fact," her voice got quieter, more secretive, "I think deep down Alfred always honored his father's Nazi heritage."

Sean immediately thought of the odd museum in the top of Wolfz's home, a creepy tribute to the Third Reich that he kept hidden from the rest of the world. It wouldn't be hidden for long.

"If Wolfz knew anything," Sean said, setting the book down and stepping back around the corner of the desk, "it won't help us now. He was murdered."

Irena's face contorted into a scowl. "What? When?"

"Less than an hour ago. I went to visit him before I came here. He'd been shot. He was already dead when I arrived. There was nothing I could do. The killer was still in the house." Sean relayed the harrowing story of the rooftop chase, the shootout, and the man's demise as he tried to escape but instead fell to his death.

Her eyes stared vacantly through the wall just behind Sean and to his right. "I thought I heard the sirens, but didn't know what all the fuss was about. This city is usually very peaceful." The room grew silent for a moment. The only sounds were the ticking of a clock that hung behind the desk and the wind howling through the shutters outside. Irena was pensive for a minute before she spoke again. When she did, she peered at Sean with a look she'd not shown before: worry. "Do you think the people who killed Wolfz will come after me?"

Sean forced a comforting grin onto his face. "It's possible. But I'm not going to let them hurt you."

She motioned to the outline of his weapon again. "With that?"

The question reminded him of his lack of ammo. "Actually," he said, forlorn, "this thing is useless without any bullets. But we'll figure something out. You may need to lie low for a while. Is there anywhere you can go and hide out?"

"Yes," she nodded. "I have a cousin in Montevideo up in Uruguay. I can stay with them for as long as I need."

"That might be a good idea."

"What about your Swiss scientist? Are the terrorists going to kill her?"

He crossed his arms and stared at the floor, his mind conjuring up visions of somehow rescuing Dr. Ott. The visions, however, were blurry. He had no idea where she was or how to convince the terrorists to give him more time.

He walked over to the end of the antechamber that protruded off the main building and stopped at the window. He gazed out at the setting. Gray clouds filled the sky, rolling in at a jet's pace. The skiers would be happy. From the looks of it, their slopes would soon be getting another several inches of powder.

"I'm sorry I can't be of more help," Irena said, still sitting in her chair back in the study. Her voice reverberated through the area.

Sean's eyes drifted from one window to the other. The designer of the little sitting space had created an area with a 180-degree view of the bay and ocean beyond. He squinted to focus his vision farther into the distance. On the horizon, he saw the rough outline of three shapes. From his current position, they seemed small, but he was certain they were fairly large land masses.

"Are those islands out there, off to the east, the ones from the paintings?" he asked out of vague curiosity.

"Yes. As I said, I have no idea what my father liked about them. Ugly, worthless plots of land. He bought them when I was young."

Something sparked inside Sean's head. His heart pounded faster, and his breath quickened. "Did you say he bought them?"

She gave a nonchalant nod. "Yes, though I have no idea why. The land is worthless. It would be hard to build anything out there, and the weather is so unpredictable out that far. Living there would be nightmarish."

Sean paced around the room for a second, back and forth in front of the desk. "That room over there with the three windows," he pointed at the antechamber. "That wasn't an original part of the building's structure, was it?"

She shook her head, suddenly seeing how frantic he'd become. "No. He built onto it when I was a young girl. That's why the stone is a different color to the rest of the house." The last fact was one he'd not been able to observe since the viewing room was in the back of the house and he'd come in through the front. Still, the interior was slightly different, and the seam in the floor told him that there had once been an external wall there.

He stopped pacing in front of the desk and turned to face the wall behind it. The three paintings loomed silently, offering more now than they did half an hour before.

"That's it," he said after staring for thirty seconds at all three pictures.

He moved around behind the desk and slid the chair into its place. Standing close to the painting in the middle, he focused all his attention on it. "This beam of light right here." He pointed at the needle of sunlight that cracked through the clouds of the scene and shone onto a point in the rocky coast. "Why is the sun shining in this picture and not the others?"