They climbed to the top, and though Sam would have preferred to anchor off the trees higher up, the rope he’d brought wasn’t long enough for a simple two-line rappel, especially after he cut off a six-foot section to improvise a harness.
Returning his attention to the air shaft at the base of the lone tree, he decided it looked more natural than any man-made opening. Still, as Gustaw had described, they could hear the water running below.
Remi pushed against the birch. “You think it’ll hold our weight?”
He kicked at the papery white trunk, feeling a slight vibration beneath his boot. Though thin, the tree seemed to be solidly rooted. “I think so,” he said, grateful that both Sergei and Gustaw were experienced climbers. “I’ll go first.”
Years of fallen leaves cushioned the floor, the scent of must and mold rising with each step as Sam turned around to examine the cavern. Sunlight filled the shaft but also filtered in through the few cracks near the bottom where Gustaw had removed some of the rocks from what had once been the entrance. Behind him, water trickled down the rock wall, then disappeared below into a crevice.
Sam turned again. If there had been a cavern, it looked like the explosion had sheared off a massive wall of rock across it. His first inclination was that they’d reached a dead end. But as he shined his flashlight around, he saw darkness at the top of the rock wall, making him think the cavern continued on the other side.
“Everything okay?” Remi called down.
He looked up, saw her silhouetted at the shaft opening above him. “Fine. Come on down. Not much here. Hoping there’s something deeper inside.” After an easy climb up to the top, he swept his light across the area. All that was left of the cavern entrance was a V-shaped passage leading off into the darkness. That’s what told him there was more to see, and he waited for the others to climb down. Once there, Sam led the way, over the broken rock, past all the destruction from the explosion, then into the narrow opening that eventually widened into a fully finished tunnel. Twin steel rails of train tracks emerged from the rubble behind them, continuing on into the tunnel, where they disappeared into the darkness. The size and scope of the tunnel reinforcements gave Sam pause, trying not to think of the horrors suffered by the men forced to build it. The others must have felt the same. No one spoke as they followed the tracks until they ended at the entrance of two separate tunnels.
“Which way?” Sergei asked.
Sam shined the light down the right tunnel, noting the bricked arch and supports as far as the eye could see. The left was about the same size but had not been reinforced. “Good question.”
“The left,” Gustaw said, checking his compass. “That seems to be the general direction of the castle. Maybe it even leads there.”
“What about the right?” Sergei pointed that direction. “At least it’s finished.”
“Actually, neither,” Remi said from behind them. All three turned. Remi was pointing toward something on the wall. What at first glance appeared to be an uneven portion of the reinforced bricked tunnel wall was actually a sliding door set on a rusty track. The brick was carefully layered over it as camouflage.
“Good eye,” Sam said, returning to her side. He pushed, then leaned into, the door, but it held firm. When Sergei joined him, the door squealed in its track, finally opening. Sam handed his flashlight to Remi. “You found it. You get the first look.”
Remi entered, and Sam nearly ran into her when she stopped short. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“There’s a dead guy on the ground.”
35
Sam aimed the beam of his flashlight into the space. Even though Remi had warned him, the sight of a mummified Nazi soldier was not what he’d expected. The man had been shot in the forehead, his body mostly preserved by the cool air circulating in the tunnel. “Totenkopf,” Sam said, noting the skull and crossbones insignia on the man’s collar. It was a duplicate of the insignia that Gustaw had found near the forest entrance. “Could have been a prison camp guard brought in to oversee the work. I wonder who killed him?”
“And why?” Remi added.
“Russians, maybe?” Gustaw said. “When they were rousting the Nazis after the war?”
“Interesting theory,” Sam replied, shining his light around the cavern, noticing the stacks of wooden crates filled with canned goods. “If it was the Russians, they would’ve stripped it of anything of value. Definitely the food. There’s enough canned goods here for an army.” In fact, the crates, lined up several deep along the wall, were about the shape and size of a railcar. Gustaw looked over at Sam. “I suppose this explains why we saw what we did on the ground penetrating radar. That Renard lost his life over canned food—”
“He lost his life,” Sam said, “because there are evil people in the world.”
“I know…”
“Look at this,” Remi said, her attention fixed on the floor beside the desk. “An Enigma machine. A shame someone destroyed it.”
Sam glanced over to see a splintered crate and, within it, the remnants of the machine, some of the wiring exposed near the front, the keys and rotors smashed to bits.
Sergei walked up next to Sam. “What’s an Enigma machine?” he asked.
“For codes,” Sam said, leaning down and picking up one of the smashed rotors. “Sort of like a typewriter to send out ciphered messages.” He showed the rotor to Sergei, pointing out the few letters that hadn’t been scraped off the circumference. “Each rotor had the alphabet on it,” he said. “This machine used three rotors at one time. Some of them used four. A message was typed in and coded by the rotors. The person on the receiving end needed to know which rotors were used and in what order to decode the message.”
Remi moved to the desk, picking up a green book, opening it. “Maybe the dead Nazi was in charge of inventory control…” She turned a page. “A list of what’s in the cans.”
Sergei looked over her shoulder. “I don’t suppose there’s a listing of treasure chests…?”
“Unfortunately, no.” She glanced at Sam as he tossed the broken rotor onto the Enigma pile. “If I had to guess, they were preparing the ultimate bomb shelter. With what’s listed here, and the water they diverted, they could live for months.” She set down the book, then opened the top desk drawer. “Fountain pen, pencils…”
Sam walked over to the dead soldier, crouching down beside him for a closer look. “I’d say he was executed.”
“Maybe he was an embezzler,” Sergei said. “Lesson learned.”
“Doesn’t make sense,” Sam replied. “Why seal the chamber, break the Enigma machine, and leave all that food behind…?”
Gustaw reached into one of the crates, pulling out a can. “Only one explanation. They didn’t want anyone to find it or know what it was for. There has to be a reason.”
“If,” Remi said, “this is the location from the Königsberg map, maybe he was killed for the same reason that all those guards were killed at Königsberg castle. Dead men tell no tales.”
Sam looked up at her. “That is the best explanation yet.”
She smiled.
“Don’t let your head swell. If you’re correct, we still have to figure out what secret he was protecting.” He patted the dead man’s pockets. Finding nothing of significance, he stood, looking around the room. “Let’s do an inventory. Maybe something will turn up. Remi, finish going through the desk. We’ll search the crates.”
After looking through a half dozen, Sam glanced over at Remi, who was crouched beneath the desk. “What’s wrong?”