Part 8 (1/2)

I said, ”Mengele.”

He almost beamed. Instead, the smile remained, like a malignant tumour. All I needed to remove it was a knife. ”Always a pleasure to be recognised.”

He was known as the Butcher of Auschwitz; his medical experiments on prisoners in the death camp had been bloodied, grotesque, inhuman; he had specialised in experiments on twins, on midgets, but he had picked anyone he liked from the long queues leading up to the gas chambers. He had selected them by pointing his whip, idly.

ODESSA had helped him disappear after the war; there were rumours, never proven, that he had lived in Argentina, though similar claims had been made for Egypt, Korea and one even placed him for a time in Borneo, where they'd captured Eichmann in '59.

Apparently, however, they were all equally wrong.

”Where do they come from?” I said. ”The angels.”

He laughed, a short, unpleasant sound as cold as the walls and as ugly as his smile. ”Isn't that the million-dollar question?” He looked pleased with himself for using the expression; it sounded odd in German. And, ”You'll find out.”

I let my muscles relax and got ready to make a move; I could take out the guy on my left and use his gun. It would be risky, but it might just work and what alternative did I have?

I was about to swing. Then, before I'd even begun to turn, something heavy connected with the back of my head without warning, and I fell into a darkness as solid and as hard as ice.

Chapter Twenty.

There was something cold against my back and my head hurt; I tried to move, but my arms and feet were restrained and it was useless to fight. I opened my eyes to see a face above me like an ill, inconstant moon, watching me with calculated interest: Herr Doktor, putting on surgical gloves by the light of a lamp that was pointing directly at my face. His hands cast shadows over me. He flexed his fingers, cast fleeting dark spiders over me, and seemed satisfied.

Which wasn't exactly how I felt.

The light hurt, but the light also served to focus my mind and I remembered.

Falling into a darkness as solid and as hard as ice....

I'd awoken in a world ruled by darkness; shapes s.h.i.+fted in the absence of light, the sound of wings beating against impossible winds. The smell of sterility.

I could see despite the darkness, see in a strange inversion of light and dark in which the darkness was palpable and formed its own vision. There was no up or down, only the sound of the winds like a beating heart, and all around me silent, majestic angels flew, free and inhuman, through a world of nothingness.

Killarney. The voice reached through my ears and into my brain; the same voice I had heard before. In the world of ice which was, I was beginning to see, the same world, though perhaps viewed differently.

Killarney.

”What do you want?” I said. And, ”This is only a dream.”

In dreams you sometimes find truth.

”Are you incapable of talking straight? Because I am getting sick of the sphinx routine.”

Careful, human, the voice said, and I felt myself lifted into the winds and held as they blew about me; angels swarmed and flew away from me.

I was held in a giant hand, obsidian-dark and craggy like a rock. ”Point taken,” I said, but my voice seemed to be carried away by the winds and disappeared before it reached my ears.

You have not long before you return to your world, the voice said. When you wake up you will be in danger.

”Really.”

I felt giant fingers tighten on me; the sound of the winds was heightened.

You have only a short s.p.a.ce of time left.

”Who are you?” It was a question I was rapidly getting used to asking.

When you wake up, the voice said, ignoring me, you must locate the key. Locate and destroy it.

”You mean Eldershott.” It was a statement, not a question. I remembered my last dream--if it was a dream, which I was no longer sure of--and remembered the words. The giant had called Eldershott the cipher and the key. I wish I knew what in h.e.l.l it was talking about.

I will be near you when the time comes. Be ready.

I felt myself lifted, higher and higher into the winds, and then the giant fingers opened and I was hurled down, down, down into a darkness as solid and as hard as ice....

”I see the patient is awake. Good.” His voice was as emotionless as before, but the horsewhip was missing; I couldn't decide if that was a good or a bad thing.

His face loomed above mine. ”You know, you are an incredibly resourceful woman. Really one of the most remarkable I have ever met. It will be an honour to study you.”

”Where is Eldershott?” I had to keep him talking, anything to keep away the array of s.h.i.+ning, utilitarian knives on the rack. Injecting a note of indignation into it: ”What have you done with him?”

”Done? Done?” He beamed at me from above, a human angel of death. ”We have done nothing to Dr Eldershott. I would thank you to remember his t.i.tle. The man was undervalued by your people. Vastly undervalued. Dr Eldershott is a genius, and I certainly don't say that easily.”

”Genius in what?” I demanded. ”He's only a cryptographer, for G.o.d's sake! What did you need him for, a more secure code for your radios?”

It seemed to be working. Mengele seemed almost eager to talk, and I knew then that he wasn't planning to keep me alive.

”Only? Do you have any idea--” He broke off suddenly. ”I can tell you really don't know. It would suggest that either your Control found it more useful not to brief you or, and this is remarkable, that your masters in London themselves have no idea of the work we do! How extraordinary!”

”What,” I said calmly, ”are you talking about?”

Instead of answering, Mengele turned and barked an order beyond my field of vision. Then he turned back to me. ”Don't think that you can save yourself by drawing me to talk,” he said. ”All you would do is lengthen, however little, the wait for that which is inevitable.” He sighed theatrically. ”It would be a shame to kill you. As you can see, I am surrounded by very loyal servants, but servants are all they are.”

”A big family of them.”

”You noticed? I guess it is hard to miss.” The eyes, searching my face. ”The product of a breeding programme I have been running since the late thirties. Strong and, as I said, loyal. Unfortunately their intelligence isn't the highest--but where we are going they will have little need for that. Loyalty will suffice.”

”Where you are going?” I said, and he was about to answer when I heard the shuffle of feet and Eldershott's worried, red face gazed down at me, his head floating like a disembodied balloon right next to Mengele's.

Chapter Twenty One.