101
Present Day
Munich
TWO DAYS AFTER THOMAS Bauer’s great-granddaughter Monica whisked me away from the train station, it’s finally time to meet the man I’d been supposed to meet in Vienna: Franklin Helldorff, son of Peter Helldorff, who changed his last name to Linderman as an adult.
As far as I can tell, I have not been followed. No sign of the young Asian woman with the wigs and facial piercings, not since I jumped off the train prematurely two days ago and quickly sped away in Monica Bauer’s car.
I reach the intersection as directed, standing next to a hotel and a café that advertises Turkish food. Several cars are parked along Hackenstra?e. I start walking toward them. The one closest to me is a silver SUV. The driver’s-side door opens.
It’s the Asian woman. Her face is free of piercings and her hair is short and dark—no wig, from what I can tell.
I stop in my tracks, unsure of myself.
She cocks her head, confused. She waves me forward.
I don’t understand. What does she expect? Why is she waving to me?
The woman looks around, gets back into the SUV. I am completely confused. Have I been wrong about her?
I slowly approach the car. The rear passenger-side window buzzes down. An elderly man with a weathered face, dark sunken eyes, and a gray beard attempts a smile. “Professor,” he says in a weak, raspy voice. “I am Franklin Linderman.”
I walk around to the other side of the car and get in, carrying my small roller suitcase with me. “Eleanor Robbins,” I say, extending my hand once I’m inside the car.
He reaches over with some effort to take my hand, and gently squeezes it.
Franklin was born in 1933, putting him north of ninety years old, and he looks every bit of it.
“It’s my great honor to meet you, Professor.
I apologize for the precautions. You’ve met Jenny.
” He nods toward the woman in the driver’s seat.
“Honestly, I saw her following me around Vienna,” I say. “I didn’t realize she was with you. I thought she was with the… others.”
“Ah. Oh, listen to that. You thought she was a threat to you.” Franklin says something to the Asian woman in a language I don’t understand, but sounds vaguely Germanic to my ear.
Franklin manages a chuckle. Jenny does not.
She is continuously checking her surroundings, reminding me that people are looking for Franklin, that we are in danger.
“I do not worry for my safety,” he tells me.
“I am quite near my expiration date.” He brings a fist to his mouth and lets out a prickly cough, then clears his throat.
“It is your safety that concerns me, Professor. I was reluctant to meet with you for this reason. But I did very much want to address you face-to-face.” He scoots in his seat with some effort and looks at me.
“May I record our conversation?” I show him my phone.
“Yes, yes, of course. A fine idea.” He coughs once more as I hit the Record button. “May I call you Eleanor?”
“Of course.”
“I do not remember my father, Eleanor. He was killed a year after my birth, on the Night of the Long Knives, the Rohm Purge, whatever you may call it. You know this already.”
“Yes, I do.”
“My mother? She adored my father until the day she died. She became aware over time of his… mistakes. She learned what he had done. It pained her deeply. It pains me as well. I always hoped in my lifetime that the truth would emerge.”
I nod. What goes unspoken is that his grandson, Francis, died trying to bring out that very truth.
“I do not ask you to gloss over my father’s role. I only ask that you treat him humanely. He was a young man with ambition. He surely did not appreciate the gravity of what he was doing at the age of eighteen.”
“I will make sure to be clear about that,” I say. “I’ve read as much in his journals, and in Thomas Bauer’s journals, by the way. As have you, obviously.”
“Yes. Monica was very kind to show them to me.”
“Franklin,” I say. “May I get to business? There was a sixth envelope in Hitler’s safe the night that Thomas Bauer stole it, correct? Your father took it, yes?”
Franklin nods. “He did, of course. And kept it.”
“Was it a reel of film?”
“It was.” Franklin’s eyes narrow. “I don’t… I don’t understand.” He turns and speaks to Jenny, who says something in response.
And then Franklin lurches forward as the rear glass windshield shatters. Blood explodes from Franklin’s face, splattering the seat in front of him.
In the blink of an eye, the man sitting next to me is slumped forward, dead from an assassin’s bullet.