The Apocalypse Watch

  “I told you, Mrs. de Vries, he does have merit. I doubt it was even eight seconds—nearer five by my count, because of his wanting a drink so fast.”

  “I’m impressed,” conceded Karin, “but you found other things, other items?”

  “Just two. One, another receipt for repairs from a custom boot shop, also in the name of André, and the last a crumpled admission to an amusement park outside of Neuilly-sur-Seine—a free admission ticket.”

  “I never saw those!” protested Latham, pouring himself a drink at the dry bar.

  “What do they tell you?”

  “Shoes, especially boots, are extremely personal, Mrs. de Vries—”

  “Please stop calling me that, sir. Karin will do.”

  “All right, Karin. Footwear is, shall we say, idiosyncratic; a custom shop services the particular form and shape of an individual foot. If a person goes to such a store, he’s usually been there before, that is, if he’s been in Paris for any length of time. Otherwise, he would return to his original bootmaker, you follow me?”

  “I do, indeed. And the amusement park?”

  “Why was he issued a free ticket?” interjected Drew, carrying his drink back to the table and sitting down. “I really didn’t see those, Stosh.”

  “I know, chłopak, and I wasn’t trying to top you, but they were there.”

  “So tomorrow morning we hit on a bootmaker, and someone in an amusement park who gives away free tickets—not exactly a French tradition. Christ, I’m tired. Let’s go home.… No, wait a minute! What about the trap you set at Sacré-Coeur?”

  “What trap?” asked an astonished Witkowski.

  “The trap! Courier Sixteen at the top of the funicular.”

  “Never heard of it.” Both men looked at Karin de Vries. “You?”

  “I did that for Freddie many times,” said Karin, smiling awkwardly. “He used to say, ‘Make up something, the more foolish the better, for we’re all fools.’ ”

  “Just hold it, both of you,” said Witkowski, shaking his head, then looking at Drew. “Are you positive no one could have followed you here?”

  “I’ll overlook the insult, and give you my professional reply. No, you son of a bitch, because I knew better than to take three changes of vehicles, which could have been picked up electronically, but you’re too antediluvian to know that. Our changes took place underground, on the Metro, not three, but five. You got that?”

  “Oh, I do like your anger. My sainted Polish mother always said that there was truth in anger. It was the only thing you could trust.”

  “That’s fine. Now may I call a taxi and get us both home?”

  “No, that’s the one thing you can’t do, lad. Since no one knows where you are, you’ll stay right here, both of you. I’ve got a guest bedroom and that very nice couch over there.… I suspect you’ll be on the couch, youngster, and I’ll thank you not to drink up all of my whisky.”

  The frustrated Blitzkrieger unit had returned to headquarters from the “trap” at Sacré-Coeur only to be met by muted confusion. It served to heighten the elite killers’ anger.

  “There was no one!” spat out the older Paris Five, throwing himself into a chair at the conference table. “Not a goddamned man or woman who even looked like a contact! We were set up—a foolish and dangerous waste of time.”

  “Where’s our so brilliant leader, Zero One?” asked another member of the unit, addressing the three remaining Blitzkrieger who had not been sent to Sacré-Coeur. “He may be in charge between his changes of diapers, but he’s got an explanation or two to deliver. If we were set up, we were undoubtedly spotted!”

  “He’s not here,” replied another neo killer, his elbow on the table, his voice a mixture of weariness and boredom.

  “What are you talking about?” cried Paris Five, sitting up sharply. “The ten o’clock call from Bonn. He had to be here for it.”

  “He wasn’t, and no call came,” said another.

  “Could it have come in on his private line?”

  “No, it could not and did not,” answered the weary Blitzkrieger whose number was Zero Two, Paris. “When he didn’t show up, I sat in his putrid office from nine-thirty to quarter of eleven. Nothing.… Zero One may be a devoted favorite of our superiors, but I wish he’d bathe more often. That room is a stink tank.”

  “Taking a shower takes him away from his throne, and all its gadgets.”

  “He’s a mad child in an electronics toy store—”

  “Careful,” interrupted yet another. “Dissension’s frowned upon, I remind you.”

  “Legitimate criticism isn’t,” pressed Paris Five. “Where is One and why isn’t he here? I gather you haven’t even heard from him.”

  “You ‘gather’ correctly, but then, we all understand the friction between you two.”

  “Admitted and irrelevant,” said Five, standing up, his lean frame over the table, supported by strong, splayed-out hands. “However, his behavior now is unacceptable, and I’ll express that to Bonn. Our team is sent out on a false mission filled with jeopardy—”

  “We all heard the embassy tape,” the weary Paris Two broke in. “We agreed it was the priority.”

  “We certainly did, I foremost. But instead of leading this priority assault, our first Zero chose the secondary Bois de Boulogne on the pretext that he could not return from the Sacré-Coeur in time for the call from Bonn. There was no call and he’s not here. An explanation is definitely required.”

  “Perhaps none is available,” said a previously silent Blitzkrieger at the far right end of the table. “However, there was another call, our informer at the American Embassy.”

  As one, the unit from Sacré-Coeur reacted like startled cats. Again Five spoke. “It’s absolutely forbidden for him to contact us directly, especially by telephone.”

  “He felt the information warranted his disobedience.”

  “What was it?” demanded Three.

  “The subterranean, Colonel Witkowski.”

  “The coordinator,” added Paris Two quietly. “His impressive connections in Washington are familiar to our—our people over there.”

  “What was it?” insisted Five.

  “Our man stationed himself in an automobile outside the colonel’s apartment on the rue Diane. It was instinct, based on the telephone intercepts of Frederik de Vries’s widow in Documents and Research.”

  “And?”

  “Over an hour ago a man and a woman ran into the building. They were in shadow, and he couldn’t really see the man but thought he knew him. The woman he did know. It was the widow De Vries.”

  “The man’s Latham!” exploded Paris Five. “She’s with Harry Latham; it can’t be anyone else. Let’s go!”

  “To do what?” asked the skeptical Blitzkrieger, Zero Two.

  “To complete the kill that One miscalculated.”

  “The circumstances are different, and considering the colonel’s background in security, the location is extremely dangerous. In Zero One’s absence, I suggest we get clearance from Bonn.”

  “I suggest we don’t,” Paris Six broke in. “Sacré-Coeur was enough of a fiasco, why open a window, much less a door? If we bring in the kill, it erases the fiasco.”

  “And if you fail?”

  “The answer to that is obvious,” replied another from Sacré-Coeur, touching the outline of the shoulder holster under his jacket with his right hand, his left reaching for the collar of his shirt, wherein were sewn three cyanide capsules. “We may have our differences, our frictions, if you like, but the baseline is our commitment to the Brüderschaft, the emergence of the Fourth Reich. Let no one mistake that commitment.”

  “I don’t think anyone does,” said Two. “Then you agree with Paris Six? We go to the rue Diane.”

  “Certainly. We’d be idiots not to.”

  “We present Bonn with a triple kill our leaders can only applaud,” added the angry, frustrated Paris Five. “Without Zero One, who’s screwed us up enough. When he ret
urns, he can answer to us as well as to Bonn. I suspect, at best, he’ll be recalled.”

  “You really want to command this unit, don’t you?” asked Two, looking up wearily at the imposing figure of Five.

  “Yes,” answered the elder assassin, elder because he had reached the age of thirty. “I’m the oldest and more experienced. He’s a mad teenager who acts and makes decisions before he’s thought things out. I should have been given the position three years ago, when we were assigned here.”

  “Why weren’t you? After all, we’re all mad, so madness doesn’t count, does it?”

  “What the hell are you saying?” pressed another Blitzkrieger, sitting up and staring at Zero Two.

  “Don’t mistake me, I approve of our madness. I’m the son of a diplomat and grew up in five different countries. I saw firsthand what you’ve only been told. We’re right, absolutely right. The weak, the mentally and racially inferior, are inserting themselves in governments everywhere; only the blind do not see that. One doesn’t have to be a social historian to understand that intellectual levels everywhere are being dragged down, not propelled upward. That is why we are right.… But my question to Paris Five started this. Why was Zero One chosen, my friend?”

  “I really don’t know.”

  “Let me try to explain. Every movement must have its zealots, its shock troops who inhabit that dark area beyond madness that compels them to hurl themselves against impenetrable barricades to make a statement heard across the land. Then they disappear into the background, supplanted—or at least they should be supplanted—by superior people. The gravest error the Third Reich made was to permit the shock troops, the thugs, to control the party and thus the nation.”

  “You’re a thinker, aren’t you, Two?”

  “The philosophical theories of Nietzsche have always appealed to me, especially his doctrine of perfectibility through self-assertion and the moral glorification of the supreme rulers.”

  “You’re too educated for me,” said Zero Six, “but I’ve heard the words before.”

  “Of course you have.” Paris Two smiled. “Variations have been drummed into us.”

  “We’re wasting time!” Five broke in, standing erect, his eyes squinting slightly, riveted on Two. “You are a thinker, aren’t you? I’ve never heard you talk so much, especially about such matters. Is there something else beneath your words? Perhaps you believe that you should command our Paris unit.”

  “Oh, no, you’re very wrong, I’m not qualified. What I may have in my head I lack in practical experience, as well as by my youth.”

  “But there is something else—”

  “Indeed, there is, Number Five,” interrupted Two, their eyes locked. “When our Reich emerges, I have no intention of fading into an obscure background—any more than you do.”

  “We understand each other.… Come, I’ll choose the team for the rue Diane—six men. Two of you remain here to expedite emergency procedures should they be necessary.”

  The chosen six rose from the table, three of them going to their rooms to change into black sweaters and trousers, the remaining Blitzkrieger studying a large street map of Paris, concentrating on the area of the rue Diane. The three properly dressed killers returned; the team checked their weapons, gathered up the equipment designated by Zero Five, and the telephone rang.

  “This situation’s now intolerable!” screamed Dr. Gerhardt Kroeger. “I shall report you all for gross incompetence and refusal to keep in communication with a Brüderschaft of the highest level!”

  “Then you would be doing yourself a disservice, sir,” said a controlled Zero Five. “Before the night is over, we’ll have the kill you so greatly desire, as well as two additional targets Bonn will be pleased to know you were instrumental in directing us to.”

  “I was told that nearly four hours ago! What happened? Let me talk to that insulting young man who claims he’s your leader.”

  “I wish I could, mein Herr,” replied Five, choosing his words carefully. “Unfortunately, Zero One, Paris, has not kept in touch with us. He elected to pursue a secondary source, a highly questionable source, if you’ll forgive me, and he hasn’t called in to report. In truth, he’s over two hours late.”

  “A ‘questionable’ source? He said it was the highest risk. Perhaps something happened to him.”

  “In the delights of the Bois de Boulogne, sir? Again, highly unlikely.”

  “Then what happened at the first location, for God’s sake?”

  “No more than a trap, mein Herr, but my team, Zero Five’s team, eluded it. However, it led to a third source, an unimpeachable one, that we’re going after now. Before the sun comes up you’ll have proof of the primary target’s death, the prescribed method of execution very much in evidence. I, Zero Five, will have the photographs delivered to you personally at your hotel.”

  “Your words relieve me; at least you speak more reasonably than that damned youngster with the eyes of a cobra.”

  “He’s young, sir, but very accomplished in the physical aspects of our work.”

  “Without a head on his shoulders, that sort of talent doesn’t mean a thing!”

  “I tend to agree, but, please, mein Herr, he is my superior, so I never said what I just said.”

  “You didn’t say it, I did. You merely agreed to a generalization.… What was your number? Five?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Bring me the photographs and Bonn will be apprised of your worth.”

  “You’re most kind. We must leave now.”

  Stanley Witkowski sat in the darkness, peering down through a window at the street below. His broad, leathery face was set, immobile, as every now and then he brought a pair of infrared binoculars to his eyes. The object of his concentration was a stationary automobile at the far right corner of the block, no more than a hundred feet across from the entrance to his apartment building. What had caught the veteran intelligence officer’s attention was the flash of a face in the front seat picked up by a street lamp. Sporadically, the face came into view, then receded in the shadows as if the man were waiting for someone or watching for something on the opposite side. The hollow pressure in the colonel’s chest, a pressure he had felt hundreds of times in the past, was a warning to be accepted or rejected with the passing minutes or hours.

  Then it happened. The face came into view again, but there was a car phone pressed against the man’s right ear. He appeared to be excited, angry, his head angled upward, his gaze directed at the upper floors of the apartment building, Witkowski’s building. The observer then thrust the phone away, again in anger or frustration. It was enough for the colonel. He rose from the chair and walked rapidly to his bedroom door and into the living room, shutting the door behind him. He found Drew Latham and Karin de Vries sitting on the couch, to his distinct pleasure at opposite ends; Witkowski hated personal relationships in their work.

  “Hello, Stanley,” said Drew. “You chaperoning? If so, you’ve nothing to fear. We’re discussing the post-Cold War situation, and the lady doesn’t like me.”

  “I didn’t say that,” countered Karin, laughing softly. “You’ve done nothing to cause me to really dislike you, and I do admire you.”

  “Translation. I’ve been shot down, Stosh.”

  “Let’s hope that’s figuratively speaking,” said the colonel icily, the tone of his voice bringing Drew up short.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You said you weren’t followed, youngster.”

  “We weren’t. How could we have been?”

  “I’m not sure, but there’s a man in a car down in the street who makes me wonder. He’s been on the phone and he keeps looking up here.” Drew quickly rose from the couch and started for Witkowski’s bedroom door. “Turn off the lamp before you go in there, you damn fool,” Witkowski barked. “You can’t allow any light to bleed through that window.” Karin reached over and switched off the single floor lamp above her. “Good girl,” the intelligence officer
went on. “The eye-red binoculars are on the sill and stay low, away from the glass. It’s the sedan across the street at the corner.”

  “Right.” Latham disappeared into the bedroom, leaving Witkowski and De Vries alone in the relative darkness, only the spill of the streetlights below providing what illumination there was.

  “You’re really worried, aren’t you?” asked Karin.

  “I’ve been around long enough to be worried,” replied the colonel, still standing. “So have you.”

  “It could be a jealous lover, or a husband too intoxicated to go home.”

  “It could also be the tooth fairy trying to find the right pillow.”

  “I wasn’t being facetious, and I don’t think it’s fair for you to be.”

  “I’m sorry. I mean that. To repeat what my old acquaintance—friend would be misleading, I’m not in his league—Sorenson said in Washington, ‘Things are moving too fast and getting far too complicated.’ He’s right. We think we’re prepared, but we’re not. The Nazi movement is coming out of the dirt like white slugs in a garbage heap, many real, many not, merely specks of light-colored refuse. Who is and who isn’t? And how do we find out without accusing everybody, forcing the innocent to prove they’re not guilty?”

  “Which would be too late once the accusations are made.”

  “You couldn’t be more accurate, young lady. I lived through it. We lost dozens of deep- and middle-level agents. Our own people blew their covers, sucking up to politicians and so-called investigative journalists, none of whom knew the truth.”

  “It must have been very difficult for you—”

  “The standard resignations included such phrases as ‘I don’t need this, Captain,’ or Major, or whatever I was at the time. And ‘Who the hell are you to ruin my life?’ and most terribly, ‘You clean my slate, you son of a bitch, or I go ballistic and blow your whole operation out of the water.’ I must have signed fifty or sixty ‘confidential memorandums’ stating that the individuals involved were extraordinary intelligence operatives, an awful lot of them far more flattering than they deserved.”