Ratlines (39 page)
“Of course. But not now, not here. Besides, there is more I need to know. Please sit.”
Ryan took the chair across the table from Skorzeny and Celia. She reached for his hand, let her fingertips graze his.
A waiter walked towards them, but Skorzeny waved him away.
“Go on,” Ryan said. “Ask your questions.”
“The Zionist, Weiss. He worked for the Mossad. The Mossad are many things, but they are not thieves. Why was he on that boat? What was their involvement?”
“Weiss had his own agenda. He found out what Carter was up to, and he wanted a taste for himself.”
“Greed,” Skorzeny said, his eyes glittering as he smiled. “I told Mr. Haughey greed would destroy them. But tell me, Lieutenant Ryan, how did this Weiss come to know of Carter’s plan to blackmail me?”
“He was leading a Mossad team in an operation against you. His investigation led him to Carter.”
Skorzeny’s smile faded. He leaned forward. “A Mossad operation against me? What was this operation? Did they plan to assassinate me?”
“No,” Ryan said. “Weiss didn’t want to kill you. He said you were no good to him dead.”
“Then what?”
Now Ryan smiled. He held Skorzeny’s brilliant gaze, spared him none of the savage pleasure in his heart.
Skorzeny leaned closer, casually pulled his jacket aside to reveal the butt of a pistol. “Tell me.”
“The operation was successful,” Ryan said.
Skorzeny sat back, took Celia’s hand in his. The fingers dwarfed hers. Celia winced as he squeezed. “Tell me.”
“They know about the money,” Ryan said.
A furrow appeared on Skorzeny’s smooth brow. “Money?”
“The money you’ve been channelling away from the escape fund. Millions upon millions. I’ve seen the accounts myself. You’ve been robbing your
Kameraden
blind for years. Skimming off the top, Weiss called it. He had the proof.”
Skorzeny sat in silence for a moment, his mind working behind his eyes. “So he had proof. What does this matter to me?”
“It matters to your friends in South America. The rest of the Nazi scum you handle the funds for. If they find out you’ve been stealing from them, there won’t be a safe place on God’s green earth for you. Not even Franco could protect you.”
“So he would have my
Kameraden
kill me rather than do it himself? Was he such a coward?”
Ryan shook his head. “I told you, he didn’t want you dead. He wanted something far more valuable than your life.”
“What?”
“The ratlines. He wanted to know about every piece of filth you helped get out of Europe, all of them, going right back. Either you turned on your friends, or he’d make sure they turned on you.”
Skorzeny gave a laugh, the sound of it leaping high and shrill from his barrel chest. “Now Weiss is dead. His proof cannot help him.”
“Oh, but it can,” Ryan said. He spoke slowly and clearly, relishing every tic on Skorzeny’s face. “You see, he told me where to find the information he had on you. This morning, I took it to his contact at a legal firm in Dublin. They’re a front for the Israelis. The mission still stands, only with one change.”
Skorzeny released Celia’s hand. “Go on.”
“That if anything happens to me, or anyone close to me, the information will be passed to your friends. If you kill me, they will kill you.”
“Do you think this makes you safe?” Skorzeny smiled. “Why do you believe I would rather live as a slave to Jews than die by the hands of my
Kameraden
?”
“Because of your pride.”
Skorzeny’s head tilted. “Pride?”
“I think you would rather live under the Mossad’s thumb than let your friends know you stole from them. You won’t have that stain on your memory.”
“You seem very sure of this, Lieutenant Ryan. Are you willing to wager your life on it?”
Ryan asked, “Are you?”
They held each other’s gaze, Skorzeny seeming to stare into Ryan’s soul.
“When they write the books about you,” Ryan said, “What should the final chapter be? That in the end, you were nothing but a thief?”
Skorzeny sat frozen, his breathing the only sound in the room.
Evetnually, he stood.
“You will never be at peace, Lieutenant Ryan. You might be safe for now, perhaps for a year or two, maybe more, but you must know this: one day, I will make you suffer.”
Skorzeny reached for the bag.
“Weiss told me something else,” Ryan said.
Skorzeny paused, his fingers on the handle of the satchel.
“He told me about the raid on Gran Sasso you’re so famous for, Mussolini’s rescue. He told me it wasn’t true, any of it. He told me it was all propaganda, that you’ve been living a lie.”
Skorzeny went to lift the bag.
“Leave it there,” Ryan said.
Skorzeny paused.
“I said, leave it.”
Skorzeny straightened. “Now you are the thief,” he said, his voice wavering.
“I can live with that.” Ryan got to his feet. “You can go now.”
Skorzeny held his ground for a moment, then he smiled at Celia.
“Good day, Miss Hume.”
He left them there.
Celia crumbled, the tears soaking Ryan’s shoulder as he embraced her.
EPILOGUE
H
ERBERTS
C
UKURS COULD
ill afford the cost of a long distance call from the hotel, but he had to be sure. He had to hear it one more time.
He listened to the dial tone, the distorted whirr that travelled all the way from a small townland outside Dublin.
“Yes?” the voice said, deep as ever, but perhaps not as strident as it had once been.
“Otto, it’s me. Herberts.”
“Yes, Herberts,” Skorzeny said. “What can I do for you? It’s very late at night here.”
Cukurs swallowed. The Uruguayan heat crawled and slithered over his body. He had been in South America for years, but still he could not get used to the climate. He had flown from Sao Paulo that morning, the ticket paid for by his new benefactor, the businessman who wanted Cukurs for a partner.
“Did I wake you?” he asked.
“No,” Skorzeny said. “I don’t sleep well.”
“Nor do I,” Cukurs said. He removed his spectacles and rubbed at his dry eyes.
In those late hours, he often wondered why it wasn’t the screaming souls of thirty thousand Jews that kept him from sleeping, but rather the simple idea—no, the certainty—that one day they would come back to take their due from him.
Skorzeny asked, “My friend, tell me, what can I do for you?”
“I’m in Montevideo. In Uruguay. Anton Kuenzle is waiting downstairs for me. He wants me to go with him to look at properties for our new business.”
“Good,” Skorzeny said. “I told you he would make you rich. You’ve been too long in the wilderness, my friend. It’s time you regained the success you deserve.”
Cukurs wiped sweat from his brow. “But can I trust him? He …”
“He what?”
“He looks like a Jew.”
Skorzeny laughed. “Herberts, listen to me. I’ve known Anton since before the war, back in Vienna. We joined the Party together. Believe me, you can trust him.”
Cukurs let the air wheeze out of his lungs. “I’m sorry. Of course I can trust him. You made the introduction, after all.”
It had been fifteen months ago in Buenos Aires, at a dinner party held to celebrate the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas.
“Please don’t apologise, Herberts. Go on, go and see him. Let him make you rich.”
“One day they’ll come for me,” Cukurs said. He clamped a hand over his mouth, too late to trap the words inside.
“But not today,” Skorzeny said. “Life is too short to live in fear.”
Cukurs felt the urge to weep, the tightening in his throat, the heat in his eyes.
Skorzeny said, “Trust me.”
A
LBERT
R
YAN STRETCHED
out on the smooth pebbles, felt the sun on his bare legs and chest. Forte Vigliena rose up above, the ancient lookout with its bleached parapets standing guard over the Mediterranean. The small cove’s beach was barely large enough for two people, tucked beneath the eastern seawalls of Ortigia, the tiny island off the coast of Sicily where Ryan had wandered as a young soldier.
Celia sat on a rock reading a paperback, her lower lip pinched between her teeth in concentration, her feet bathed in the clear water. Schools of small silvery fish plotted courses through the rocks. Celia’s naked shoulders glistened in the light, shining with the water she had splashed across her skin to cool herself. A wide-brimmed hat shaded her face.
A transistor radio sat on the pebbles next to Ryan, tuned to the BBC World Service. The newsreader spoke about Herberts Cukurs, the infamous slaughterer of thirty thousand human beings, who had been assassinated in South America. He read a statement that had been anonymously delivered to news agencies in Berlin and Bonn.
“Taking into consideration the gravity of the charge levelled against the accused, namely that he personally supervised the killing of more than thirty thousand men, women and children, and considering the extreme display of cruelty which the subject showed when carrying out his tasks, the accused Herberts Cukurs is hereby sentenced to death.”
All but a confession by the Israelis. When Ryan searched his soul for pity for the dead man, all he could find were the images of children and the flies on their dead lips.
The news reader continued.
“Accused was executed by those who can never forget on the twenty third of February, 1965. His body can be found at Casa Cubertini Calle Colombia, Séptima Sección del Departamento de Canelones, Montevideo, Uruguay.”
Ryan wondered who had sent Cukurs to his death, who had set him up. But in his gut, he knew.
“What are you listening to?” Celia asked, wading towards the pebbles. Water beaded on her long and slender legs.
“The news,” Ryan said.
“Good or bad?” She sat down beside him, her skin cool and slick against his.
He did not answer.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Once again, I have many people to thank for their help in writing this book.
All the publishing professionals who have offered guidance, support, friendship, and on various occasions have prevented me from making a complete fool of myself: Nat Sobel, Judith Weber, and all at Sobel Weber Associates; Caspian Dennis and all at Abner Stein Ltd; Geoff Mulligan, Briony Everroad, Alison Hennessey, and all at Harvill Secker and Vintage Books; Bronwen Hruska, Juliet Grames, and all at Soho Press.
Those who have been so generous with their knowledge and experience in helping me research this book: Ruth Dudley Edwards for her first-hand accounts of the Irish corridors of power, and for acting as a wonderful sounding board; Mary McVeigh for her insights into the Dublin of the early 60s; James Benn for pointing me in the direction of some invaluable historical information, as well as being a great travelling and shooting companion; Jay Faulkner for the fencing tips; Armagh Branch Library and the Irish & Local Studies Library for giving me a place to write and research. Any errors or liberties taken with historical reality are entirely my own.
My friends and family for their constant support: My lovely wife Jo, who somehow puts up with me, even when I least deserve it; our daughter Issy for helping me finally understand the point of it all; the wider Neville and Atkinson clans for being such supportive families; my best friend and go-to poetry consultant, Dr. James Morrow; Betsy Dornbusch, without whom I would have given up writing years ago; David Torrans and all at No Alibis in Belfast for running one of the best bookstores on the planet; Hilary Knight for working so hard on my behalf; my many friends in the crime fiction community whose kindness knows no bounds; our faithful, excitable and hairy friend Sweeney, who took me on many long walks while I figured out what to do next.
SOURCES
The following books are just a few that have helped enormously in researching this novel:
Fugitive Ireland: European Minority Nationalists and Irish Political Asylum, 1937-2008
, by Daniel Leach, Four Courts Press.
Commando Extraordinary: Otto Skorzeny
, by Charles Foley, Cassell Military Classics.
Rescuing Mussolini: Gran Sasso 1943
, by Robert Forczyk, Osprey Publishing.
Haughey’s Millions: Charlie’s Money Trail
, by Colm Keena, Gill & Macmillan.
JFK in Ireland: Four Days that Changed a President
, by Ryan Tubridy, Collins.
News from a New Republic: Ireland in the 1950s
, by Tom Garvin, Gill & Macmillan.
Finally, I must thank the late Cathal O’Shannon, whose documentary
Ireland’s Nazis
first planted the seeds of this story in my mind.
Table of Contents
Chapter One