The Runner (44 page)

Seyss stood on a fringe of lawn at the top of a gentle slope that fell away to the riverbank. Behind him the forest encroached at his back. Lining the lawn from the villa to the Havel, were members of the crack division assigned to guard the residence of their supreme leader. To a man their faces were turned to the terrace, eyes watering at the romantic musings of their own Pyotr Ilich Tchaikovsky.

From his vantage point, Seyss had a clear view of the gathering. Churchill, Truman, and Stalin stood shoulder to shoulder at the forefront of the assembled guests. He measured the distance to his targets as seventy feet. A chest shot with a pistol from this distance would be simple. A head shot, more difficult. A hand brushed his holster, thumb freeing the pistol guard. Using the last three fingers, he eased the revolver a centimeter or two from its well-oiled cradle. Once he drew the weapon, he would have to move fast. Aim and two shots, aim and two shots.

The cauldron must be made to boil.

It was time.

Raising his nose to the fragrant night air, he took a tentative step forward. His muscles itched. He felt loose and energetic. He saw himself down in the blocks, imagined the feel of the clay as his fingers danced over the starting line. This was the part he’d always liked best, the prelude to the race, sizing up himself and the competition, his uncertainty hardening to conviction.
Macht zur Sieg.
The will to victory. The memory of it all made him smile. He rolled his neck to either side, breathing deeply, his eyes focusing on the targets. Truman dressed in a charcoal suit, an appreciative grin pasted to his face. Churchill in a khaki uniform, arms drawn over his chest, liking none of it. Seyss took a deep breath and swallowed hard. His mouth was dry and suddenly he didn’t want to smile anymore.

Sächlichkeit,
a voice urged him, and his entire body stiffened.

One last race.

T
HE GUESTS HAD ASSEMBLED ON
the terrace forming a large crescent around the musicians. They stood with their backs to the villa, forty men in dark suits enjoying the lively music. Judge rushed to the edge of the gathering, eyes scouring the group for the distinctive pea green of a Russian officer’s uniform. He found only three or four soldiers, generals all, each above fifty.

“Shit,” said Honey. “The troops are in the woods.”

Dozens of Russian soldiers lined either side of the lawn, emerged from their positions to enjoy the music. Every man shouldered a machine gun, a pistol in his belt. Many more remained partially shrouded, shadowy figures inhabiting the forest’s border. Any one of them had a clear, unobstructed shot at the Allied leaders.

Judge skirted the crowd. Harry Truman, Winston Churchill, and Josef Stalin stood ten feet away. Caught up in the music, they were impervious to the frantic hunt being launched around them. He saw Vlassik whispering urgently in Stalin’s ear and Stalin shooing him away with an expression of grave irritation. Judge turned his eyes to the soldiers closest to the terrace, squinting to make out the features beneath their woolen caps.

“I see him.”

It was Ingrid and her voice was ice. She clutched at his arm, using her free hand to point toward a cluster of soldiers half hidden beneath the overhanging branches of a centuries-old pine. “There.”

Still pointing, she released Judge’s arm and began to jog, then run across the terrace.

“Erich!” she yelled. “Erich, don’t!”

A gunshot cracked the night air and Ingrid seemed at once to stop and rise on her tiptoes. A flower had bloomed high on her back, larger than any rose Judge had ever seen, and as she collapsed, his heart fell with her.

Seyss emerged from the shadows, sprinting, pistol extended in front of him, firing in time to his step. His cap blew from his head and Judge saw his face, hard, determined, fearless.

The musicians played a few bars longer, first one violinist cutting short a bow, then the other. Finally the pianist dropped his hands from the keyboard, looking altogether mystified. The guests remained where they stood, the combined civilian and military leadership of the three most powerful countries on earth, warriors all, and not a soul among them moving.

By now, Judge was running too. Firing and running, closing the distance to the president. Honey dropped to one knee, and steadying his arm, began to blow off rounds. Somewhere in the tumult, Judge could hear the spent shells tinkling to the ground like coins from a winning slot.

Ten feet separated him from the president. A last step and he was there. Throwing himself in front of Truman, he grabbed the man’s shoulders and chucked him to the ground. Then he was falling, too, spinning in time to see Seyss’s gun spit fire, feeling a sudden and terrible pain spear his hip.

Seyss came nearer, his runner’s stride relentless, and Judge imagined he could see his finger whitening as it tensed around the trigger. All his efforts were for naught, for Francis, for Ingrid, for himself, and now for the president. The White Lion would succeed. The thought sparked in him a terrific rage, a fury that cauterized his pain and momentarily erased his worry for Ingrid.

Raising his pistol, Judge fired twice, striking Seyss in the shoulder and the thigh. He could hear the bullets’ impact, a dull and concise thud, could see filaments of his uniform waft into the air.

Still Seyss’s pace did not slacken.

Judge waited a moment longer, until Seyss’s body filled his entire field of vision. He yelled “Stop!” and squeezed off his final round, even as another slug knocked him to the ground.

A perfect dot appeared on Seyss’s cheek as a puff of pink smoke burst from the rear of his head. His step faltered, but only for an instant. Still he ran, but his stride was looser, his mouth open, his eyes no longer focused. The gun rose in his hand, but just as quickly fell. Arms flailing, he tumbled recklessly to the ground, his pistol clattering to the flagstone.

Seyss lay a foot away from Judge. He was dead, his blue eyes frozen on the infinite distance.

Judge rested his head on the terrace and stared into the night sky. A single star twinkled above him.

“Ingrid,” he shouted, his voice sandy and weak.

And waiting, he begged the star, and whatever force had made it, for an answer.

But by now every security officer in Potsdam had descended onto the terrace. The FBI men and their machine guns were pushing their way through ranks of uniformed NKVD regulars. British agents had surrounded a wholly unperturbed Winston Churchill, who Judge heard call for “a whiskey, a bloody great big one, and make it snappy.” Stalin stood nearby, huddled with his top commanders.

Peering through a forest of milling legs, Judge fought for a sign of Ingrid. Then he saw her; she lay prone, her legs crossed at the ankle, her form unmoving. Clenching his stomach, he called her name through gritted teeth. “Ingrid!”

Abruptly, his view was blocked by a familiar figure kneeling at his side.

“Are you all right, young man?”

President Harry S Truman folded his jacket into a square and placed it under Judge’s head.

Judge touched a hand to his hip and it came away warm and wet. The other slug had taken him in the shoulder. Curiously, his entire body was numb. The pain, he realized, would come later. He pulled himself forward an inch or two to regain sight of Ingrid Bach.

“Keep still,” Truman said, his earnest features etched with concern. “We’ll get a doctor here in a jif.”

Suddenly Ingrid’s legs twitched. General Vlassik was kneeling at her side, speaking to her. Applying a compress to her shoulder, he helped her sit up. Her face was pale, her blouse soaked through with blood, but she was alert. She was alive.

Judge closed his eyes for an instant, sure it was his Francis Xavier who had answered his prayer. “Yessir,” he said.

Truman brushed his hand against Seyss’s uniform. “Jesus. One of theirs. And I thought Stalin had security wrapped up damned tight.”

“No,” Judge protested, fighting to raise himself on an elbow. “He’s not a Rus—”

A firm hand pressed him to the ground, cutting short his words. Crouching alongside the president, Darren Honey gave a discreet but unmistakable shake of the head.

“Not what?” Truman asked.

Judge looked at Honey a moment longer, then he knew. They had wanted this to happen. Honey. Vlassik. The OSS and whoever was behind it.

“Nothing,” said Judge. “I wasn’t sure if he was dead.”

“He’s dead all right, damned Communist.” Harry Truman glanced over his shoulder. Seeing Stalin, his jaw hardened. His eyes shot back to Judge, but he was looking right through him. “Maybe I can’t trust that sonuvabitch after all.”

Judge turned his head, losing himself among the tall pines that bordered the rolling lawn.
No,
he thought to himself,
you probably can’t. And maybe it’s better that way.
Maybe mistrust was the best form of vigilance.

And closing his eyes, he saw himself standing on the docks of the Brooklyn Navy Yard with Francis: two brothers with their hands locked together in farewell. Curiously, he was unable to speak, unable to offer any warning about the future, even to say good-bye, and after a moment, Francis turned and disappeared into the busy crowd, leaving him only the question in his eyes and the weight of his expectations.

EPILOGUE

“D
AMMIT,
W
OODRING,
”
BELLOWED
G
EORGE
P
ATTON,
“have you got this fine example of American engineering gassed up and ready to go yet? We have ourselves a few dozen pheasants to nab for Sunday dinner. They won’t wait all day, you know.”

Private First Class Horace C. Woodring snapped open the rear door of the custom-made Cadillac model 75 and fired off his crispest salute. “Yessir, General. She’s all set. Guns and the dog will ride up ahead with Sergeant Spruce in the jeep. If you’ll just climb in, I promise I’ll have you in the woods bagging those birdies inside of two hours.”

Patton roared with laughter and slid into the roomy backseat. “Get in, Hap,” he called to his long-time adjutant, General Hobart Gay. “I told you Woodring was the best. He’s the fastest there is. Better than a Piper Cub to get you there ahead of time. Isn’t that right, Woodring?”

“A private never disagrees with a general.”

The cheerful driver waited for Gay to settle in next to Patton, then shut the door behind him. Sliding behind the wheel, he spent a moment adjusting the rearview mirror so that he could keep sight of Patton at all times. It was rare to see the general in such high spirits. His mood had been almost unremittingly grim since his transfer to the Fifteenth Army in early October. Losing command of his beloved Third Army had dealt him a crushing blow, though everyone agreed afterward that he’d never been cut out to be military governor of Bavaria, or any other place for that matter. Not with his mouth. Not old “Blood and Guts.”

The last straw had come at a press conference in September. Before an assembly of some fifty reporters, Patton had publicly voiced his sentiments about the Nazis being no different from Republicans or Democrats, while admitting that he’d made use of many former Nazi officials to run the Bavarian government.

There was more to Eisenhower’s decision to relieve Patton of his command than that. Much more. But Woodring kept those facts to himself. After all, he reminded himself, he was only a driver and not privy to such sensitive information.

Making a sweeping left turn, he powered the Cadillac onto the autobahn, his keen blue eyes searching the asphalt for signs of ice. Sunday, the ninth of December, had dawned raw and cold. At 7:00
A.M
., the thermometer hanging outside the motor pool had read thirty degrees Fahrenheit. Two hours later, a timid sun had broken through the cloud cover. Expanses of newly fallen snow hugged both sides of the highway, sparkling like twin fields of diamonds.

Their route took them south from Bad Nauheim along the Kassel-Frankfurt-Mannheim autobahn toward the wild, game-rich forests of the Rhine-Palatinate. Approaching the town of Bad Homburg, Patton insisted they exit the autobahn and visit the ruins of a restored Roman outpost in the foothills of the Taunus Mountains. Woodring obliged. In his few weeks driving for the general, he’d learned to expect detours—Patton always wanted to visit this hospital or that cemetery—and had factored a little extra time into that morning’s timetable.

For ten minutes, Patton slogged through the muddy ruins in his knee-high leather boots, crowing about “his friend Caesar” and “conquering Gaul” and “the glory of battle.” Woodring smiled inwardly. The crazy old goat truly believed he’d fought at Julius Caesar’s side.

Just before ten, the two-vehicle convoy left Bad Homburg, continuing on its southward trek. Patton sat forward in his seat, a rapt expression illuminating his dour features. They were driving over territory the Third Army had taken eight months before. Past Frankfurt. Past Darmstadt. Past Wiesbaden. Patton didn’t stop talking for a moment’s time, pointing out bridges his men had captured, beaming with undisguised pride at his soldiers’ derring-do, and, of course, his own.

Near eleven, Woodring left the autobahn for a second time, transferring to National Route 38. In another quarter of an hour, he spotted a sign indicating that they were nearing the city of Mannheim. Soon he began to recognize familiar landmarks. A kiosk. A hotel. A police station. He’d traveled this part of the route a dozen times in the dead of night. Flashing past on their right was a marker showing that they’d entered the village of Kaefertal. The road was littered with debris: half-tracks lying upside down, charred Tiger tanks, horsecarts splintered and upended. The town looked as if the war had ended yesterday.

“Look at the derelict vehicles,” Patton exclaimed, grimacing at the passing sights. “How awful war is. Think of all the waste.”

“It’s terrible, sir. Just terrible,” answered Woodring, but his eyes were glued to the road in front of him, not on the parade of broken armor. Approaching from the opposite direction was a large two-and-a-half-ton truck, a standard army transport. Seeing it, Woodring flashed his lights once and got a flash in return.

Two hundred yards separated the vehicles. One hundred. Woodring moved the Cadillac toward the center of the road. At fifty yards, he accelerated to thirty miles per hour, raising an arm to point out a crumpled Mercedes staff car off the right-hand side of the vehicle.

“Would you look at that?” said Patton, half standing in the cabin, craning his neck to get a glimpse.

It was precisely then that the oncoming transport turned left, directly into the Cadillac’s path. Woodring sat back in his seat and calmly spun the wheel to the left, waiting a half second, then braking with all his might. He heard Gay say “Sit tight,” and a split second later, the two vehicles collided. With an angry scream of metal, the truck’s right front fender plowed into the Cadillac’s hood, crushing the radiator and releasing a geyser of steam. Patton, already leaning on the front seat, was thrown forward, his head striking the dashboard, then flung back like a rag doll into the passenger seat.

The accident was over in a second, the truck come to rest at a right angle to the Cadillac.

Woodring flung open his door and rushed to the rear of the vehicle. Patton lay in Gay’s arms, bleeding profusely from wounds to the forehead and scalp.

“Hold tight, General, we’ll get an ambulance here pronto. You’re going to be fine, sir.”

“I believe I am paralyzed,” said Patton, his gravelly voice absent any fear. “I’m having trouble in breathing. Rub my shoulders, Woodring. Work my fingers for me. Rub my hands.”

Woodring did as he was told while Gay supported the general from the rear. Running a hand behind Patton’s neck, he felt a distinct outcropping an inch or two below the skull.

Patton looked at him imploringly. “I said rub my hands, dammit.”

Just then the truck driver stuck his head in the open door. Woodring met his gaze and nodded. Everything had gone off as planned. Patton’s neck was broken at the third vertebra. It was a mortal injury. He’d linger a few days, a week at most, but there was nothing any doctor could do to save him. By Christmas, he’d be dead and buried.

George Patton was staring up at Woodring, a tear welling in his eye. “Jesus,” he moaned. “This is a helluva way to die.”

Woodring sighed grimly, pleased he wouldn’t have to speed things along. The OSS taught a man to do almost anything. He’d killed Nazi generals while they slept on the eve of D-Day, chased a fugitive war criminal across Germany, even helped save the life of the president of the United States. Hardest, though, was getting used to being called a different name every day. Woodring. Honey. Who knew what was next? Maybe someday someone would use his real name: Honnecker.

For now, though, it was still too German.