Winner Lose All Read online

  “This is how life should be,” he told her as he leaned back and closed his eyes, “no moving parts, no noise louder than the birds and the insects, and nothing more threatening than the occasional rain cloud in the sky.”

  “Yes, but I still prefer the city,” she admitted sheepishly. “You have had more than your share of noise and excitement, and I can see how this lovely country would attract you. As for me, I miss Berlin with its crowds of busy people always in a hurry, the screech of the streetcars, and the honking of the automobiles.”

  “On a Sunday afternoon, perhaps?”

  “When I was little, we would go to go the Kroll Garden, the three of us. We would picnic on the grass and listen to the big bands playing.” She giggled. “It was wonderful.”

  “Dinner at Ciro’s? The grand dining room at the Hotel Adlon?”

  “And the Opera. Mama used to take me there when Otto Klemperer was conducting,” she added enthusiastically. “There was no place like Berlin, was there?”

  “No, but I am afraid you would not like it now. All of those things are gone.”

  “That must be our punishment for the war, for the evil places like Dachau, for people like that Commandant Weiter, and for Herr Dietrich, too.”

  “It hardly seems fair, does it? All the wrong people are being punished.”

  “So far,” she looked at him and nodded, “but I can hope.” As grim as the future appeared, when she was with him, Christina was not afraid. The Major was twice her age, but that did not seem to matter to her or to him. She knew nothing about men, but she liked him and she felt warm and strangely comfortable sitting in the sun next to him.

  “You must promise me you will not leave me with them,” she asked. “I would die.”

  “I will never allow that to happen, Fräulein. Never. But you must call me Paul.”

  “Only if you call me Christina,” she answered, placing her hand on his.

  “Christina it is, then,” he replied with a curt bow of his head as he took her hand in his.

  “Paul, did they tell you about me?” she asked, as she looked deep into his eyes.

  “They? I am not sure what you mean. You are a lovely young girl, who has lived far too long in the shadow of your father; but I can see that for myself. No one had to tell me anything.”

  She smiled again, more broadly and fondly this time. She could tell from his eyes that he was incapable of lying to her. Despite the bandages, the bad leg, and the cane, she saw a steadiness and permanence to him. He was a gentleman with a sense of honor and character. More importantly, he seemed to like her for herself. She had long suspected that Papa had lied to her about him again, as he had about so many other things. Now she was certain of it. The Major knew nothing of her special gift, and even if he did, she knew he would not care.

  He looked around at the trees and the meadow before he turned toward her again. “I am afraid we shall not be sitting in the Kroll Garden or listening to the Philharmonic for a long, long time, Christina. Perhaps we had better get used to the songs of the wild birds.”

  “Wild birds?” She grinned sheepishly, deciding it was time he knew, time someone knew. “Yes… Did you know that when I close my eyes and concentrate hard, I see them by the dozens, wild and free, brightly colored, diving, flashing and swirling around inside my head. It has been that way ever since I was a young child, all the shapes and colors, flying, faster and faster.”

  “I am afraid I am not following you.”

  She looked deep into his eyes but all she saw was an innocent confusion. He does not know! Suddenly, she felt her heart pounding. “You really do not know, do you — about me, about the numbers, and about the work I do for Papa? You see, to me, higher mathematics, like numbers, equations, formulas, and algorithms, are like that. They become colorful wild things, as they flash around inside my head,” she said as she looked deeply again into his eyes.

  “It sounds beautiful and exciting. Is that how you do your mathematics homework?”

  “Paul,” she shook her head and said with an embarrassed smile, “I have not done homework since I was five years old, perhaps long before that. I do advanced mathematics, very advanced mathematics, as they call it, in my head. I cannot entirely explain it, it just happens. I close my eyes and see all the formulas and calculations unfold before me like the colors and patterns of wild birds flying about — my wild things. You see, I am the one who has been doing Papa’s work for him — all of his calculations, his equations, and formulas, all of them, for years now, ever since the beginning in Berlin. And I do them in my head… Do you understand what I am telling you?”

  “The formulas… all of them?” he finally asked, stunned, as the truth sank in.

  “Yes, all of them,” she answered as she paused and looked deep into his eyes, trying to see if he really understood. “I know what it must sound like to others, but I was very young when they began. It was never mathematics or work to me. They were my childhood companions, just games I played in my head to pass the time. Then, when Papa was off at the University, I would go into his office and open his books on advanced and theoretical mathematics, physics, propulsion, aerodynamics, astrophysics, and subjects like that, looking for new problems, for new games to play. All I had to do was concentrate on a formula, some numbers, or on an equation, and they would begin to swoop around inside my head like bright, colorful flashing birds. They soar, twist, and beat their wings as they fly about, until they reconfigure themselves and settle down into the solution, right there, inside my head.”

  “I see things like that when I fly,” he smiled. “When the airplane dives, turns, streaks and flashes, then the colors sweep past me in a kaleidoscope. The dials, the controls, the ground and the sky swirl around inside my head. Perhaps that is something like your wild things.”

  “Yes, yes, something like that.” She beamed happily. “Papa calls it my gift, as if it was something very special; but then he kept it a big secret, as if I had done something bad. He made me feel so ashamed, always afraid that someone might find out. Rudy figured it out. He knew, and he told me I was wrong to think that way. He said it was wonderful and beautiful and I should stop listening to what Papa told me but I did not understand, not then.”

  “Rudy was your friend, wasn’t he?”

  “Yes, the only one I had at the Institute,” she said sadly. “Finally, he told Papa what he was doing was wrong, and Papa threatened him. He told Rudy he would have him arrested and sent to one of those camps if he ever said a word about it to anyone. I did not understand what that meant until yesterday but Rudy did. That was why Rudy was so afraid of Papa, and why he kept quiet.”

  “Do you think your father would have done that?”

  “At the time, no. Now, however, after everything I have seen the past few days, oh, yes. I am certain he would have.” Christina looked at him, and he saw her eyes were no longer the eyes of a naive eighteen-year-old girl. She had grown up at a frightening speed in the past few days and her mind now raced far ahead of his, solving the equation. “I was very young, but I remember the arguments Mama and Papa used to have. I did not know what they were arguing about; but I heard what Chief Inspector Dietrich said, and it all makes sense to me now. You see, I was Papa’s big secret. He was using me to fool the University and everyone, and I think Mama demanded he stop. Their arguments became more and more violent, and then she was dead. I doubt he meant for it to happen, but it did.”

  “How awful.” Von Lindemann finally understood.

  “That is why I will not stay with him any longer,” she declared.

  ”No one can make you do anything you do not want to do now, Christina. Not anymore,” he vowed as he looked into her eyes. “I shall not permit it.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  It had been pathetically easy for Hanni Steiner to track them and find their hiding place up in the mountains. Army trucks might be as common as dirt on the Bavarian back roads, but not a long, black Maybach. In every town they drove throug
h, someone had seen the car, and was willing to talk to a sad, pregnant woman trying desperately to find her husband. He might as well have left a trail of breadcrumbs. Then again, she knew it was part of Edward’s plan to draw her further and further south, beyond her point of no return.

  She left the Major’s small coupe around the bend and out of sight, and then climbed her way uphill through the woods to the rear of the cabin. The first warning she gave Von Lindemann and the Raeder girl that they were no longer alone on the front porch was when they heard her whisper softly behind them, “Stay where you are, Major. I do not wish to hurt anyone, but I have a pistol and I will blow a very large hole in the girl if you cause me any trouble. Is that perfectly clear? Now hand me your Luger.”

  “Young woman,” Von Lindemann answered curtly, “if you look closely, you will see that my holster is empty. Sad to say, I am not much of a threat to anyone at the moment, not even to you.”

  “Good, see that you keep it that way,” Hanni told him. “Christina, please walk over to where Herr Nossing is sunning himself in the grass. Pick up the gun I see lying next to him, and run back here with it as quickly as you can.”

  “Stay where you are, Christina.” Von Lindemann tried to stop her until Hanni jabbed the barrel of the Luger into his bandaged ribs and he doubled over in pain.

  “Do what I said, Christina,” she said with a sharp, cruel edge on her voice. “You two make such a darling couple. I will hate myself later, but I really will shoot him if you do not.”

  Christina rose from the bench, pale and weak-kneed. She took a deep breath and with a determined, awkward stride, she walked downhill to where Emil Nossing lay sprawled in the grass. He turned his head and smiled at her as she stepped next to him, bent down, and picked up his gun.

  “Christina?” Nossing reached out, but he was far too slow as she backed out of his reach and scampered away. “What are you doing, girl? Come back here.”

  Terrified, she ran all the way back to Hanni and handed her the gun. “There! Now stop threatening us!” she screamed.

  Paul Von Lindemann pulled her down to the bench next to him and put his arm around her shoulder to comfort her. “Leave it be, Christina,” he counseled.

  “That is excellent advice, Major,” Hanni told him as she slipped the new pistol into her belt and pointed hers at Emil Nossing. “Stay on the ground, right where you are, Emil.” She saw the truck driver and the two concentration camp inmates peering around the corner of the cabin at the loud voices. “You three,” she called to them. “Go over there and lie on the ground beside Herr Nossing, all of you,” she ordered. “All right, now where is Scanlon?” When neither of them answered, she pointed her revolver at Von Lindemann again, knowing the girl was the weak link.

  “Gone! He took the truck, and he is gone.” She leaned against him. “Now leave us alone!” she screamed.

  “What is going on out there?” a man’s voice called out from inside the cabin.

  “Ah, Herr Bracht. Who is in there with you? Otto Dietrich and Herr Raeder?” Hanni asked as she stepped onto the porch and walked toward the doorway, careful to keep well back out of his line of sight, but all she heard was silence. She turned the pistol back on Von Lindemann and asked Christina. “All right. You tell me who is in there. Is it Herr Bracht?”

  “Yes!” Christina glared up at her.

  Hanni edged closer to the doorway, pistol up and at the ready. “Eugen, I truly do not want to hurt anyone,” she warned, “but I think you also have a gun in there. Please toss it out to me.” She waited, but all she heard from inside the dark cabin was dead silence. “I know you have one, because only a large caliber pistol pointed straight at the Chief Inspector’s precious nose could possibly keep him quiet this long.”

  As she waited again in vain, concentrating on how to get the last gun away from Eugen Bracht, that maniac Luftwaffe Major sitting behind her suddenly pushed himself off the bench and lunged at her. Despite his bandages and the excruciating pain he must have been in, he managed to cross the four feet of deck that separated them and fall into her, wrapping his good arm around her legs and pushing her across the dark, open doorway. In that terrible instant, Hanni found herself exposed, backlit against the bright blue sky as an orange finger of light stabbed at her from inside the cabin only ten feet away. That was immediately followed by a loud “Blam” as a 9-millimeter slug smacked into the doorway next to her head. The wood exploded in a hail of splinters and something hot and sharp tore into the side of her face. Hanni’s instincts took over. Her arm swung the Luger to the spot from which the orange flame had come, and she pulled the trigger, once, twice, three times, until she heard a body fall on the floor and she knew she had killed the other shooter. With her training, that is exactly what she expected to happen.

  One threat was down, but she still had Von Lindemann wrapped around her legs. “You damned fool,” she screamed, white-hot with anger as she swung the heavy pistol across the side of the Major’s head, once, twice, until he released his grip and she was able to pull her leg free. She raised her fingers to the side of her face and saw blood. The splinters from the doorframe had cut her cheek.

  “I told you I did not want to hurt anyone!” she screamed down at Von Lindemann, but the Major could not hear her. He was out cold, but she kept the Luger pointed at his prostrate form anyway. Hanni felt angry enough to pull the trigger and would have if Christina Raeder had not thrown herself on top of Von Lindemann and shielded him with her body.

  “No!” Christina looked up at her, wide-eyed, certain she was about to pull the trigger.

  “Then see that he does not interfere with me again. Do you hear me, girl?” her angry blue eyes warned. She turned away and peered carefully into the dark cabin, keeping her pistol at the ready. “And next time, do not fall in love a man in uniform. He will get you in trouble.”

  “Is that you out there, Hanni, dear?” she heard Otto Dietrich call to her from the deep shadows inside the cabin. “It is about time you arrived. I was beginning to think you no longer cared, and had lost your deft touch.”

  She took a quick glance and saw the Chief Inspector handcuffed to a heavy iron stove. He lay stretched out on the floor, trying to reach a Luger lying on the floor near Eugen Bracht’s limp hand. Unfortunately for the Chief Inspector, the pistol was just beyond his reach. Unfortunately for Eugen Bracht, the aeronautical engineer had three large bullet holes in his chest as his lifeless eyes looked back at her. Hanni quickly stepped inside the cabin, picked up the Luger, and tucked it into her belt.

  “But, Hanni, I thought we were partners,” Dietrich said with a disappointed grin.

  “Of course, Otto, fifty-fifty,” she smiled benignly. “You can keep the handcuffs, and I will keep the guns.” She stepped closer and made certain that Dietrich and Wolfe Raeder were safely chained to the heavy iron stove. “Apparently, Edward did not trust you either.”

  “Sad to say, but your young Lochinvar has been quite nettlesome these past two days,” the Chief Inspector admitted. “I am afraid he will be coming back very soon, too soon — and he will not be alone.”

  “I know, there is fighting in Bad Tolz. I heard the artillery and saw the smoke on the horizon. Look out,” she said as she leaned forward and pressed the Luger against the section of steel chain that connected their handcuffs.

  “Wait! No!” Dietrich and Raeder screamed in unison as they pulled apart and tried to get as far away from the muzzle of her gun as they could. When the chain was taut, she pulled the trigger. There was a deafening Blang! inside the small log cabin as the Luger fired and the heavy nine-millimeter bullet hit the chain and the iron leg of the stove. The chain snapped, and the two men fell sideways onto the floor.

  “My God, woman!” Wolfe Raeder screamed at her. “Are you trying to kill us?”

  “No, but the day is still young, Herr Doktor. Now, get up and get moving,” she answered with a crazed look in her eyes as she pointed the Luger at him. Wolfe Raeder did not wait for a second in
vitation. He leaped to his feet and ran from the cabin thoroughly terrorized.

  “Did I ever tell you how much I love your style, Hanni?" the Chief Inspector asked fondly as he stood and slowly dusted off his already badly stained suit pants. “I shall need a clean suit, but you and I will make such marvelous partners when we reach Moscow.”

  Her blue eyes turned icy cold. “Your next partner will be in hell, Otto, and it will not be me.” After all those weeks and months of pain he inflicted on her, she finally had the Chief Inspector alone, at gunpoint, and utterly helpless. Her eyes narrowed as she raised the Luger. “Personally, I prefer the accuracy of one of the Russian automatics, but nothing makes a statement like a big 9-millimeter. It will make such a lovely mess of your face. No more movies, no more arrogant grins, and no more Otto,” she said as she took aim.

  Dietrich saw the look in her eyes and turned white, realizing this crazy woman might really do it this time. “No, no,” he raised his hands, “I…”

  “Why not? No one here is going to care. I will have Emil Nossing drag your dead carcass outside and the birds can pick at you after we leave. In a few days, no one will even recognize what is left of the great Chief Inspector Otto Dietrich. So why not?” The rage made her face flush, and she felt her finger tighten on the trigger.

  “No, no, you would not do that, Hanni. You need me,” he said as he raised his hands and tried to back away from her, but she matched him step for step until she had him backed against the wall.

  “Need you? I do not think so,” she said with the muzzle of the Luger only inches from the bridge of his nose, but she did not pull the trigger. She wanted to, but she did not, not yet. “I need that pig Raeder but you are merely an extra present I plan to give to Comrade Beria. So I would not overplay my hand if I were you, Otto. Beria has a special cell waiting for you in his basement. Every now and then, he likes to get personally involved in the work down there; but I am told he tends to get excited and go a bit overboard.”