Spandau Phoenix

“But we’re not supposed to go in,” Rolf objected. “Lieutenant Luhr said—”

Hauer snatched the key from Rolf’s hand and opened the cell door. “Hans, listen,” he said softly, “I need to ask—”

“Aaaaaarrgh!” With every ounce of strength in his body, Hans drove himself off the back wall and into Hauer’s midsection. The flying tackle crushed Hauer against the steel bars, driving the breath from his lungs. He collapsed in a heap on the floor, sucking for air. Hans grabbed his neck and began throttling him in blind hatred. Here was the man to pay for Weiss’s life, and so much more …

It was a simple matter for Rolf to pick up the lead pipe and knock Hans unconscious. Having done so, he viciously kicked the limp body off of Hauer and revived the captain by taking hold of his belt and lifting him repeatedly off the floor. Slowly Hauer sat up and looked at Hans lying motionless on the cell floor.

“Thanks,” he coughed.

“You owe me for that,” said Rolf. “That prick meant to kill you!”

“I don’t blame him,” Hauer muttered.

“What?” Rolf’s eyes narrowed. “What were you trying to say to him, anyway?”

Hans moaned and rolled over. His head banged against the bars.

“Shit,” Rolf grumbled, “why don’t we just kill this Klugscheisser?”

“We need him. Help me get him up on one of these boxes.”

Focusing his eyes slowly, Hans sat up. He’d vomited a little on his shirt front. “Fa …” he moaned. “Father? You can’t be part of this—”

“What did he say?” Rolf asked.

“He’s delirious.”

“Weiss is dead!” Hans screamed suddenly.

“So are you,” Rolf spat. “You pathetic fuck.”

The next four seconds were a blur of motion. Hauer’s lips flattened to a thin line. Quicker than thought he whirled on Rolf and shattered his jaw with a killing blow from his right fist. Almost simultaneously he snatched the pipe away with his left hand and brought it down on Rolf’s skull, fracturing his cranium with a sickening crunch. Rolf died before he hit the floor.

Hans had been stunned by the blow to his head, but even more by this sudden reversal. But there was no time to think. Hauer knelt over him. “Don’t ask me anything!” he snarled. “Don’t say anything! I don’t know how you got involved in this, but you’re in way over your empty head. I don’t know if Weiss was in it, but he paid the price tonight. You’re hiding something—I saw that at Funk’s little hearing, and so did anyone else who was paying attention. You can’t lie for shit, Hans, you’re too honest for it.”

“Wait—I don’t understand,” Hans stammered. “Why?”

“Quiet! We’re about to take the most dangerous walk of our lives. If someone finds this shitbag before we get out of the station, we’re dead. Can you move?”

Hans tried to rise, but his legs buckled.

“Get up!”

“I can’t. It’s my head … my balance.”

“Christ!” With a sudden violence Hauer shoved Weiss’s corpse off the gurney and onto the floor.

“Captain!”

“Listen, Hans, he’s gone! We’re alive. You just be ready when I get back.”

With startling speed Hauer battled the gurney through the dark basement, then collapsed its legs and dragged it up the stairs. In two minutes he was back in the cell, leaning over Hans.

“I’m going to carry you up to that gurney and wheel you out the back door. Can you hang on?”

Hans nodded dully.

“I want you to see something before we go.”

Hauer picked up the flashlight and held it to the right side of Rolf’s smashed skull. He dug in the blond hair until he found what he wanted, then lifted the head slightly and leaned back to make room for Hans. “First this,” he said. “Look.”

Hans looked. At first he saw nothing. Only the bloody roots of Rolf’s flaxen hair. Then Hauer’s thick fingers scratched against the dead man’s scalp, scraping some of the blood away. Hans saw it now, behind the right ear. It was a tattoo. Bloodred ink had been injected into Rolf’s scalp by a very talented needle. The design itself was less than two centimeters long, but very detailed. It was an eye. A single, gracefully curved red eye. With a lid but no lashes. Hans felt his stomach turn a slow somersault. The eye was identical to the one sketched on the opening page of the Spandau papers! You must follow the Eye … The Eye is the key to it all!

“See it?” Hauer grunted.

Hans nodded dumbly.

Rolf’s head thudded against the cement floor. Hauer stepped across the cell and dragged Weiss’s corpse over to where Hans sat against the wall. “You won’t forget this for a while,” he said. He put his hands into Weiss’s shirt and ripped it open down the front. Then he pulled up the under-shirt.

“What are you doing?” Hans asked, offended by this further indignity visited upon the dead.

Hauer picked up the flashlight and shone it onto Weiss’s almost hairless chest. Hans leaned over, straining his eyes, then he froze. Weiss’s chest was awash in blood.

“Take a deep breath,” Hauer advised. He wiped away most of the blood with Weiss’s undershirt. “Now,” he said. “See it?”

Hans felt dizzy with horror. Gouged deep into Erhard Weiss’s flesh by some unspeakable instrument was a large, six-pointed star. The Star of David. The edges of the linear wounds looked so ragged that whoever had inflicted them must have done it with a screwdriver, or a long nail. Hans felt vomit coming up like a geyser. He gagged and turned away.

“No!” Hauer snapped, grabbing his shoulder. “Get up!”

Choking down bile, Hans tried to stand. With a stifled groan, Hauer caught hold of him, slung him over his shoulder like a sack, and plodded out of the cell. Twice Hauer stumbled as they crossed the cluttered basement floor, but both times he regained his balance. The stairs took longer. Each successive step required increasing amounts of time and energy from Hauer’s sleep-deprived body.

“Stop!” Hans begged, fearing they would both fall. “Put me down. I can make it.”

Just as he felt Hauer’s broad back sag under the strain, he saw a crack of light in the darkness. The basement door. They had made it. Grunting, Hauer kicked open the door and heaved Hans onto the gurney. “Don’t even breathe,” he said, wheezing like a draft horse. “If anyone stops us, I take him out. You stay on this cart! As far as anyone knows, you killed Rolf, then I killed you. Period.”

Hauer shoved the gurney into motion and veered right, rolling his human contraband toward the rear entrance Hans had used when he arrived. Hans opened one eye to orient himself, but Hauer promptly struck him on the head. Rounding the last corner, Hauer saw the pinch-faced young policeman who had questioned Hans earlier. The guard rose from his desk before Hauer reached him.

“Where are you taking this man?” he challenged. “No one leaves the building without written orders from the prefect.”

“This man’s dead,” Hauer said, slowing to a stop. “He was alive when he walked in here. The prefect doesn’t write orders that tie him to embarrassing corpses. Now, let me pass.”

For a moment the officer looked uncertain. Then he cocked his chin up and resumed his arrogant tone. “There’s no one back here but us. It won’t hurt to ring Lieutenant Luhr upstairs.”

He lifted the phone from its cradle, then leaned over Hans’s face and stared. Hans lay completely still, but it would not have saved them. Hauer could see what was coming. The policeman’s left hand was moving up to Hans’s wrist, searching for a pulse …

Hauer brought his right fist down like a hammer on the man’s temple. Hans’s eyes shot open when the body landed on him, but he stayed on the gurney. Hauer quickly wrapped the telephone cord several times around the stunned guard’s wrists, then, spying a cloth napkin on the desk, stuffed it into his mouth and let him fall to the floor. “Hang on!” he bellowed. He slammed the gurney through the heavy door that led to the rear parking lot.

The cold hit them like a wall of ice.