Chapter Forty-three

Twenty-seven miles from Zurich is the town of Menziken. The Geneva train stopped for precisely four minutes, the time allotted for the loading of the railway post, and then proceeded on its inevitable, exact, fated ride up the tracks to its destination.

Five minutes out of Menziken, compartments 04 and Dj on Pullman car six were broken into simultaneously by two men in masks. Because neither compartment contained any passengers, and both toilet doors were locked, the masked men fired their pistols into the thin panels of the commodes, expecting to find the bodies when they opened the doors.

They found no one. Nothing.

As if predetermined, both masked men ran out into the narrow corridor and nearly collided with one another.

‘Halt! Stop!’ The shouts came from both ends of the Pullman corridor. The men calling were dressed in the uniforms of the Geneva police.

The two masked men did not stop. Instead they fired wildly in both directions.

Their shots were returned and the two men fell.

They were searched; no identifications were found. The Geneva police were pleased about that. They did not wish to get involved.

One of the fallen men, however, had a tattoo on his forearm, an insignia, recently given the term of swastika. And a third man, unseen, unmasked, not fallen, was first off the train at Zurich, and hurried to a telephone.

‘Here we are at Aarau. You can rest up here for a while. Your clothes are in a flat on the second floor. I believe your car is parked in the rear and the keys are under the left seat.’ Their driver was English and Canfield liked that. The driver hadn’t spoken a word since Geneva. The field accountant withdrew a large bill from his pocket and offered it to the man.

‘Hardly necessary, sir,’ said the driver as he waved the bill aside without turning.

They waited until eight fifteen. It was a dark night with only half a moon shrouded by low clouds. Canfield had tried the car, driving it up and down a country road to get the feel of it, to get used to driving with only his right hand. The gas gauge registered rempli and they were ready.

More precisely, Elizabeth Scarlatti was ready.

She was like a gladiator, prepared to bleed or let blood. She was cold but intense. She was a killer.

And her weapons were paper—infinitely more dangerous than maces or triforks to her adversaries. She was also, as a fine gladiator must be, supremely confident.

It was more than her last grande geste, it was the culmination of a lifetime. Hers and Giovanni’s. She would not fail him.

Canfield had studied and restudied the map; he knew the roads he had to take to reach Falke Haus. They would skirt the center of Zurich and head toward Kloten, turning right at the Schlieren fork and follow the central road toward Bulach. One mile to the left on the Winterthurstrasse would be the gates of Falke Haus.

He had pushed the car up to eighty-five miles an hour, and he had stopped at sixty within the space of fifty feet without causing a dislocation of the seats. The Geneva Geheimpoüzist had done his job well. But then he was well paid. Damn near two years’ wages at the going Swiss rate of Civil Service. And the car was licensed with the numbers no one would stop—for any reason—the Zurich police. How he had done it, Canfield didn’t ask. Elizabeth suggested that it might have been the money.

‘Is that all?’ asked Canfield as he led Elizabeth Scarlatti toward the car. He referred to her single briefcase.

‘It’s enough,’ said the old woman as she followed him down the path.

‘You had a couple of thousand pages, a hundred thousand figures!’

They’re meaningless now.’ Elizabeth held the briefcase on her lap as Canfield shut the car door.

‘Suppose they ask you questions?’ The field accountant inserted the key in the ignition.

‘No doubt they will. And if they do, I’ll answer.’ She didn’t wish to talk.

They drove for twenty minutes and the roads were coming out right. Canfield was pleased with himself. He was a satisfied navigator. Suddenly Elizabeth spoke.

‘There is one thing I haven’t told you, nor have you seen fit to bring it up. It’s only fair that I mention it now.’

‘What?’

‘It’s conceivable that neither of us will emerge from this conference alive. Have you considered that?’

Canfield had, of course, considered it. He had assumed the risk, if that was the justifiable word, since the Boothroyd incident. It had escalated to pronounced danger when he realized that Janet was possibly his for life. He became committed when he knew what her husband had done to her.

With the bullet through his shoulder, two inches from death, Matthew Canfield in his own way had become a gladiator in much the same manner as Elizabeth. His anger was paramount now.

‘You worry about your problems. I’ll worry about mine, okay?’

‘Okay… May I say that you’ve become quite dear to me… Oh, stop that little-boy look! Save it for the ladies! I’m hardly one of them! Drive on!’

On Winterthurstrasse, three-tenths of a mile from Falke Haus there is a stretch of straight road paralleled on both sides by towering pine trees. Matthew Canfield pushed the accelerator down and drove the automobile as fast as it would go. It was five minutes to nine and he was determined that his passenger meet her appointment on time.

Suddenly in the far-off illumination of the head lamps, a man was signaling. He waved his hands, crisscrossing above his head, standing in the middle of the road. He was violently making the universal sign, stop—emergency. He did not move from the middle of the road in spite of Canfield’s speed.

‘Hold on!’ Canfield rushed on, oblivious to the human being in his path.

As he did so, there was bursts of gunfire from both sides of the road. ‘Get down!’ shouted Canfield. He continued to push the gas pedal, ducking as he did so, bobbing his head, watching the straight road as best he could. There was a piercing scream—pitched in a death note—from the far side of the road. One of the ambushers had been caught in the crossfire.

They passed the area, pieces of glass and metal scattered all over the seats.

‘You okay?’ Canfield had no time for sympathy.

‘Yes. I’m all right. How much longer?’

‘Not much. If we can make it. They may have gotten a tire.’

‘Even if they did, we can still drive?’

‘Don’t you worry! I’m not about to stop and ask for a jack!’

The gates of Falke Haus appeared and Canfield turned sharply into the road. It was a descending grade leading gently into a huge circle in front of an enormous flagstone porch with statuary placed every several feet. The front entrance, a large wooden door, was situated twenty feet beyond the center steps. Canfield could not get near it.

For there were at least a dozen long, black limousines lined up around the circle. Chauffeurs stood near them, idly chatting.

Canfield checked his revolver, placed it in his right-hand pocket, and ordered Elizabeth out of the car, He insisted that she slide across the seat and emerge from his side of the automobile.

He walked slightly behind her, nodding to the chauffeurs.

It was one minute after nine when a servant, formally dressed, opened the large wooden door.

They entered the great hall, a massive tabernacle of architectural indulgence. A second servant, also formally attired, gestured them toward another door. He opened it.

Inside was the longest table Matthew Canfield thought possible to build. It must have been fifty feet from end to end. And a good six to seven feet wide.

Seated around the massive table were fifteen or twenty men. All ages, from forty to seventy. All dressed in expensive suits. All looking toward Elizabeth Scarlatti. At the head of the table, half a room away, was an empty chair. It cried out to be filled and Canfield wondered for a moment whether Elizabeth was to fill it. Then he realized that was not so. Her chair was at the foot of the table closest to them.

Who was to fill the empty chair?

No matter. There was no chair for him. He would stay by the wall and watch.

Elizabeth approached the table.

‘Good evening, gentlemen. A number of us have met before. The rest of you I know by reputation. I can assure you.’

The entire complement around the table rose as one body.

The man to the left of Elizabeth’s chair circled and held it for her.

She sat down, and the men returned to their seats.

‘I thank you—But there seems to be one of us missing.’

Elizabeth stared at the chair fifty feet away directly in front of her eyes.

At that moment a door at the far end of the room opened and a tall man strutted in. He was dressed in the crisp, cold uniform of the German revolutionary. The dark brown shirt, the shining black belt across his chest and around his waist, the starched tan jodhpurs above the thick, heavy boots that came just below his knees.

The man’s head was shaven, his face a distorted replica of itself.

‘The chair is now taken. Does that satisfy you?’

‘Not entirely—Since I know, through one means or another, every person of consequence at this table, I should like to know who you are, sir.’

‘Krogere. Heinrich Kroeger! Anything else, Madame Scarlatti?’

‘Not a thing. Not a single thing… Herr Kroeger.’