Max pulled a clipping from the folder, a copy of a birth announcement from the Berlin papers. “He was the oldest son of Otto Beck, a prominent German art dealer. Beck’s was one of Berlin’s oldest galleries, started by Otto’s grandfather as an artist’s supply shop, selling oils, stretchers, and canvas. The artists were always poor, so Beck’s sometimes traded supplies for their work. Otto’s father began selling the paintings. Business flourished and by 1900 Beck’s occupied a large two-story building. The family lived on the upper floor, while the rest of the building was devoted to a gallery and workshops where Beck’s craftsmen restored and repaired paintings. Artists, collectors, and curators brought damaged works from all over Europe.
“Walter worked for his father for a few years. He had a good head for business but no particular love of art. He was young and ambitious and got swept up in the socialist fever of the thirties. He joined the Nazi party. His father disapproved but Walter didn’t care. He read the political climate and he understood Hitler. He moved quickly up the ranks, and his training in his father’s gallery landed him a position with the Sonderauftrag Linz.”
“English, Max.”
“It means ‘Special Operation Linz,’ a secret project of Hitler’s. He was a frustrated artist, of course, and thought most of Europe’s art was his by right. He was obsessed with building a museum in Linz, a city he was going to remake into the cultural capital of Europe after the war. Before the war his agents toured museums, galleries, and private collections throughout Europe, compiling exhaustive lists of the most important artworks. The result was a guide to what Hitler’s armies were to confiscate—to loot—the instant German forces overran an area. Beck helped compile that guide, which is how he came to know where our painting was hidden.
“Beck should have spent the war in Paris, where all the best art was, but he was an arrogant man and made the mistake of getting into an argument with Alfred Rosenberg himself. Rosenberg was the Nazis’ ideologue, one of the most powerful men in Germany, and Beck found himself reassigned to the eastern front. He was an excellent officer, but even by SS standards he was exceptionally cruel. Russia, Czechoslovakia, Poland—Beck managed to make himself one of the most wanted criminals of the war.”
There were more yellowed clippings, most in languages Joe Cooley did not recognize—eastern European, he thought, and some in Hebrew. Most carried the same photograph. He could not read the captions, but he was looking at a hunted man.
* * *
The German column pulled to a halt on a ridge near the ancient village of Stawicki. There were five troop carriers, two tanks, and various smaller vehicles, the ragtag remnants of a routed army that had banded together in retreat. SS Colonel Walter Beck emerged from an open staff car carrying a pair of field glasses. He stretched his legs, then calmly trained the glasses on the distant road behind them. The Russians were not in view. Thanks to the mines laid by Beck’s men, they would probably be another few hours, giving him time for the present business. Beck knew the war was hopelessly lost and that he would soon be hunted by men who would not forget. Surrender would mean execution. He would run, but first needed to acquire the means to ensure the hunters would never find him.
He turned his attention to the village. From outward appearances, this war had somehow passed the village by. He could see the steeple of the old church, and beyond that the clock tower of the town hall; everything seeming at peace. He could send his men to find what he sought, but the villagers would long ago have carefully hidden their precious treasure. He did not have time for games of hide-and-seek.
“Bring the village priest, and the mayor and his family,” he said to a lieutenant.
“At once, Standartenführer.”
“And twenty-five villagers,” Beck added.
As the officer set off with a truck, an aide set up a portable table and chair. Beck sat down with a bottle of wine and turned his face toward the sun, enjoying its warming glow.
The truck soon snaked its way back up the road, halting near Beck, who sipped his wine as soldiers barked orders, prodding the villagers out of the truck. There were only women, children, and old men. The priest, the mayor, and the mayor’s wife, daughter, and child were brought before the colonel. The mayor was a heavyset man with florid cheeks, the priest old, lean, and cross.
“I must protest,” the mayor began. “We are noncombat—” A soldier struck him in the stomach with the butt of his rifle. The mayor fell to his knees and bent over, gasping and retching.
“There is no need for unpleasantness,” Beck said, “if you do as I say. I merely require several items from your church.”
“Our church has already been stripped bare,” said the priest. “There is nothing of value left.”
“Quite the contrary,” Beck said. “Carracci and Caravaggio. Reni. Lanfranco.” He smiled. “Does my memory serve? All gifts of Count Krasinski to his brother the bishop.” A flicker in the priest’s expression was all the confirmation Beck needed.
“Excellency,” the mayor blurted, his face bright red, “those paintings were all taken away before the war, to Gdynia. Yes, to Gdyn …” He couldn’t catch his breath.
“Help me, here, Father,” Beck said to the priest. “Surely you recall. Behind a false wall in the crypt, or beneath a carefully laid pile of rubble? No doubt a search will turn them up. Most likely near the reliquary, I suspect.” He sipped his wine. “Which, by the way, I shall require as well, although you can keep its contents—a finger of Saint Barnabas, I believe? Or a rib of Hedwig or the hair of Casimir or the toe of Sarkander? Forgive me, I cannot recall that detail, but I would not dream of removing such a precious relic from your devotions.” He looked at his watch. “I have very little time, I’m afraid. The Bolsheviks are pressing.”
“We cannot give what we do not possess,” said the priest.
“Very well.” Beck stood, dropped his leather gloves on the table, unsnapped his holster and removed his Luger. He picked an old man from the crowd and shot him. A woman fell to her knees beside him, shrieking in grief as his body twitched in death. Beck shot her as well. Villagers screamed. Beck’s soldiers stood fast around them, weapons at the ready.
“Well, Father?” Beck asked. “What are you prepared to sacrifice to protect a few paintings? What is the going price in your church for oil and canvas, for a few baubles? A dozen lives? Everyone here? Or will you martyr a whole village?”
The priest closed his eyes, crossed himself, and bowed his head in prayer. Beck raised the Luger to his temple. The priest flinched at the touch of the hot metal but kept praying. Beck considered the possibility that only the priest knew where to find what he wanted. He returned his pistol to its holster and turned to the mayor, still on his knees. “You have not introduced me to your family,” he said, stepping forward to the young woman and her baby who stood behind him. “Your lovely daughter, I presume?” The mayor’s fat cheeks quivered with fear. His daughter gasped and shrank back, clutching her baby tightly. Beck reached for the child and pried it from her grasp. The baby began to cry.
“Please, no,” she pleaded quietly, tears streaking her cheeks. Beck cooed at the baby. “What a lovely child,” he said. “You must be so proud.” Playfully bouncing it up and down, he walked to the edge of the escarpment, its slope scarred with jagged rocks.
He tossed the baby into the air, as an uncle would do. The baby’s cry rose in pitch.
The mother moaned and slumped. “Father, tell them,” she pleaded with the priest.
Beck tossed the child higher, her cry now searing. A woman fainted; another screamed. “Yes, Father,” Beck said as the child soared. “Tell me.”
The priest prayed.