«Of course,» said the manager. He held out his hand for the case.
«You understand, these are valuable. Not in terms of money, just academically.»
«I’ll lock them in my office.»
«Thank you very much.»
«Bitte schön. Your name, sir?»
«Holcroft.»
«Thank you, Herr Holcroft. Your table will be ready at nine o’clock.» The manager nodded, turned, and carried the attaché case toward a closed door under the staircase.
Noel stood for a moment considering what to do next. No one had entered since he had arrived. That meant the man in the leather jacket was outside, waiting for him. It was time to bait the trap, time to corner that man.
He started up the staircase, suddenly struck by a thought that made him sick. He had just done the most stupid thing he could think of! He had led the man in the black leather jacket directly to the spot where he was making contact with Erich Kessler. And to compound that enormous mistake, he had given his own name to the manager.
Kessler and Holcroft. Holcroft and Kessler. They were tied together. He had revealed an unknown third of Geneva! Revealed it as clearly as if he had taken out a newspaper ad.
It was no longer a question of whether he was capable of setting the trap. He had to do it. He had to immobilize the man in the black leather jacket.
He pushed open the door and walked on to the sidewalk. The Kurfürstendamm was lit up. The air was cold, and in the sky above, the moon was circled by a rim of mist. He started walking to his right, his hands in his pockets to ward off the chill. He passed the motorbike at the curb and continued to the corner. Ahead, perhaps three blocks away, on the left side of the Kurfürstendamm, he could see the outlines of the enormous Kaiser Wilhelm Church, floodlights illuminating the never-to-be-repaired, bombed-out tower, Berlin’s reminder to itself of Hitler’s Reich. He would use the church as his landmark.
He continued walking along the tree-lined pavement, slower than most of the strollers around him, stopping frequently in front of store windows. He checked his watch at regular intervals, hoping to give the impression that the minutes were important, that perhaps he was pacing himself to reach a rendezvous at a specific time.
Directly opposite the Kaiser Wilhelm Church, he stood for a while at the curb, under the glare of a streetlight. He glanced to his left. Thirty yards away the man in the black leather jacket turned around, his back to Holcroft, watching the flow of traffic.
He was there; that was all that mattered.
Noel started up again, his step faster now. He came to another corner and looked up at the street sign: SCHÖNBERGSTRASSE.
It angled off the Kurfürstendamm and was lined with shops on both sides. The sidewalks seemed more crowded, the strollers less hurried than those on the Kurfürstendamm.
He waited for a break in the traffic and crossed the street. He turned right on the sidewalk, staying close to the curb, excusing himself through the strollers. He reached the end of the block, crossed over into the next, and slowed his walk. He stopped, as he had stopped on the Kurfürstendamm, to gaze into the storefront windows, and he checked his watch with growing concentration.
He saw the man in the leather jacket twice.
Noel proceeded into the third block. No more than fifty feet from the corner there was a narrow alley, a thoroughfare between the Schönbergstrasse and a parallel street about a hundred yards away. The alley was dark and dotted along its sides with shadowed doorways. The darkness and the length were uninviting, obvious deterrents for pedestrians during the evening hours.
But this alley, at this time, was the trapping ground, an unlit stretch of concrete and brick into which he’d lead the man who followed him.
He continued walking down the block, past the alley, toward the corner, his pace quickening with every stride, Helden’s words resounding in his ears.
The amateur does the unexpected, not because he’s clever or experienced but because he doesn’t know any better… Do the unexpected rapidly, obviously, as if confused…
He reached the end of the block and stopped abruptly under a streetlight. As if startled, he looked around, pivoting on the sidewalk, a man undecided but one who knew a decision must be made. He stared back toward the alleyway and suddenly broke into a run, colliding with pedestrians, entering the alley—a man in panic.
He ran until the darkness was nearly full, until he was at midpoint in the alley, shadows upon shadows, the lights at either end distant. There was a delivery entrance of some sort—a wide metal door. He lunged toward it, spinning into the corner, his back pressed against steel and brick. He put his hand into his jacket pocket and gripped the handle of the automatic. The silencer was not attached; it was not necessary. He had no intention whatsoever of firing the weapon. It was to be but a visible threat and, at first, not even that.
The wait was not long. He could hear racing footsteps and thought as he heard them that the enemy, too, knew about rubber-soled shoes.
The man ran by; then, as if sensing a trick, he slowed down, looking about in the shadows. Noel stepped out of his hidden corner, his hand in his jacket pocket.
«I’ve been waiting for you. Stay right where you are.» He spoke intensely, frightened at his own words. «I’ve got a gun in my hand. I don’t want to use it, but I will if you try to run.»
«You did not hesitate two days ago in France,» said the man in a thick accent, his calm unnerving. «Why should I expect you to stop now? You’re a pig. You can kill me, but we will stop you.»
«Who are you?»
«Does it matter? Just know that we will stop you.»
«You’re with the Rache, aren’t you?»
In spite of the darkness, Noel could see an expression of contempt on the man’s face. «The Rache?» he said. «Terrorists without a cause, revolutionaries no one wants in his camp. Butchers. I’m no part of the Rache!»
«The ODESSA, then.»
«You’d like that, wouldn’t you.»
«What do you mean?»
«You’ll use the ODESSA when the time comes. It can be blamed for so much. You can kill so easily in its name. I suppose the irony is that we’d kill the ODESSA as quickly as you would. But you’re the ones we want; we know the difference between clowns and monsters. Believe me, we’ll stop you.»
«You’re not making sense! You’re not part of Wolfsschanze; you couldn’t be!»
The man lowered his voice. «But we are all part of Wolfsschanze, aren’t we? In one way or another,» he said, a challenge in his eyes. «I say it again. You can kill me, but another will take my place. Kill him, another his. We will stop you. So shoot, Herr Clausen. Or should I say, son of Reichsführer Heinrich Clausen.»
«What the hell are you talking about? I don’t want to kill you. I don’t want to kill anybody!»
«You killed in France.»
«If I killed a man, it was because he tried to kill me.»
«Aber natürlich, Herr Clausen.»
«Stop calling me that.»
«Why? It’s your name, isn’t it?»
«No! My name is Holcroft.»
«Of course,» said the man. «That was part of the plan. The respected American with no discernible ties to his past. And if anyone traced them, it would be too late.»
«Too late for what? Who are you? Who sent you?»
«There is no way you can force that from me. We are not part of your plan.»
Holcroft took the gun from his pocket and stepped closer. «What plan?» he asked, hoping to learn something, anything.