Teren covered her face and groaned.
The offices of the Munich BKA were located in an old warehouse turned office building. Split into two distinct halves, the building housed agents and archives. Most of the offices were small, windowless spaces, only marginally bigger than Alex’s cubicle at the FBI. The archival area, however, covered the second half of the warehouse, and was split into the library of files, and long work tables. Several of the tables were covered, and different agents seemed to be poring over different texts.
Gerd led Alex to a table that was half covered in boxes.
“All of these came from the church offices?”
“I don’t know. Before we start, we’re supposed to find an Agent something or other — I think his name was on that paper I gave you.”
Alex pulled the slip out of her coat pocket. “Yeah, Agent Michael Peters.”
There was a polite cough from behind Alex. She turned to find a middle aged gentleman standing there.
In a quiet voice he said, “That is pronounced Meech-ay-ill. I am pleased to meet you, Agent Reis.”
Holding out her hand, Alex smiled at the man. “It’s nice to meet you, Agent Peters.”
“Micha, please.”
Alex gestured to the boxes. “All from the church office?”
“No, some are from the personal office of Eisenbein, in his house. We’ve color coded them; if the box has a piece of red tape, it was taken from the church. Yellow is from the house, and those with green were found in the tomb of Baron Von Nievenheim.”
“There were records as well as the art pieces?”
“From what I’ve seen of them, they are mainly lists of items, including orders and deliveries. Many deal with the Altbusser Galerie in Zurich. Others mention American names.” He shook his head. “We have been so busy recovering all the items, the paperwork will have to wait, I think.”
“Well, if I have a chance, as Gerd and I go through, I’ll keep a list and make notes for you. Try and get things in some kind of order for you.”
Micha nodded. “That would be useful.” He glanced around the room, then back at her. “Some of us are rather embarrassed that this was going on, practically under our noses, and it took two Americans to find it. But we are also grateful. If there is anything we can do to return the favor, let us know.”
Her cheeks were getting hot, and Alex knew she was probably as red as a fire truck. “Thanks, Micha. I’m glad we could help. The one you should really thank, though, is Teren, since she’s the one that made all the connections. ” She shrugged. “I just got to tag along.”
Gerd stepped up and interrupted. “Alex, are we ready?”
Micha pointed to a desk near the front of the room. “If you need anything, I will be there for another hour or two. After that I’m going to the warehouse that we’ve placed the recovered art collection in. There is much cataloging to be done.”
“Thank you, Micha.” Alex turned to Gerd. “Okay, ready and waiting. How about we go over the files from his home first? That seems to be the fewest number of boxes.”
Gerd agreed, and the two of them moved boxes to create a work space. Alex pulled out a micro cassette recorder and her computer.
“Is there any order you think the boxes should go in?”
“No. Let’s just do them one at a time. Anything in English can be handed to me. If you see something that mentions any of the names on the list I gave you, or anything else about America, let me know.”
“It sounds like I’ll be doing all the work right now. What will you do until I find you something to read?” Gerd teased.
“Well, first I’m going to organize the notes I got from the papers we’ve already seen, and then I’m going to start going through every box looking for an address.”
“What address?”
“The one this letter is from,” she waved a white envelope in front of him. “It’s from our mysterious friend, CJ, and it’s an anonymous post-office box. I want everything associated with the address. I’m gonna find this shithead if it’s the last thing I do.”
“Scheisskerl.”
“What?”
“Shithead — it’s Scheisskerl in German.”
“Fine. Let’s go find the son-of-a-bitch.”
Teren was once again bored. This, she decided, was intolerable.
As long as she didn’t move her head quickly, or forget and touch the area, the headache stayed at a very manageable level. Of course, if she did those things, it was like setting off a grenade inside her skull.
However, the lack of headache had done away with most of the need for sleep, which left her on the couch, with nothing to do. She wasn’t allowed to read, and she couldn’t turn on the television — not that she’d want to if she could. Even if she could do either of those things, she wasn’t allowed off the couch.
She had to admit, she was more afraid of Alex finding out she’d left the sofa without help, than she was of the doctor finding out she was reading.
So, she sat on the couch, bored.
“This is stupid. I’m perfectly capable of walking by myself.” She idly punched the pillow beside her. “Lotta damn good I’m doing sitting on my ass. I’m a field agent, and I’ve gotten injured much worse than this, and kept right on working.”
Teren realized she was arguing with herself in an empty room. She grinned. “Okay, maybe I got hit harder than I thought.”
She carefully turned her head to one side, then the other, stretching her neck muscles. At one point, the vertebrae in her neck popped, and the resulting sound echoed through her head.
“Ow.” She leaned her head forward, feeling the muscles pull again. As she raised her head, she saw it.
It was her briefcase, which Alex had left sitting next to the coat rack against the wall.
That made her think of Alex’s briefcase. And the computer inside.
Which led to the thought that there was probably one she could borrow.
A grin curved her lips, and she reached for the phone.
They had gone through all of the files from the house, and started the boxes from the church. It was slow going, with Gerd having to translate most of the material. Alex was frustrated, and trying not to take it out on Gerd.
“Alex, don’t you think we should take a break? Your eyes are going to cross if you don’t look at something else for a little while.”
Alex nodded absently. “Go ahead, Gerd. I just want to read the rest of this folder.”
The German shook his head and walked away, in search of coffee.
The report Alex was reading had been written by Eisenbein, in English. His handwriting was atrocious, and the use of a language not his own made it hard for the FBI agent to read quickly. But there was something in there that she couldn’t let go.
First off, there was no addressee. Second, the name of John Treville could be clearly seen in several places. While it was hard to decipher what the references to Treville actually said, his name was legible. Thirdly, and what had really caught Alex’s eye, was the reference to George Mather.
By the time Gerd returned with his mug of coffee, Alex was near the end of the file, and had a grim look on her face.
“Gerd, would you see if you can locate the box with the files under ‘S’? I need to check something, and it’s very important.”
“I’ll look. We were on the ‘G’s though. Are you sure you want to jump ahead?”
“Yeah. If we find what I think we’ll find, we may be out of here.”
She said it very calmly, but with a current of tension that Gerd read easily. It told him that she’d found something, and it wasn’t good news.
Moments later, he pulled a box from the floor onto the table. “The letter ‘S’.”
Alex came around to his side of the table and started flipping through the folders. She was coming to the end of the file, and not finding what she was looking for.
“Oh, come on. You’ve got to be here.” The last file was flipped, and she stared up at Gerd. “Hey, what’s the German word for ‘swords’?”
Gerd blinked at her. “Sword is Schwert or Saebel. Swords, plural, would be Schwerter.”