Garden of Beasts

silent. Gardner? he wondered.
    “Ach,” the SS officer asked, “why are you looking at me? Have you seen such a man or not?”
    “No, sir. I’m sorry. I haven’t.”
    Gardner? . . . Who was he? . . . Wait, yes, Paul remembered: It was the name on one of Robert Taggert’s fake passports.
    Kohl had given that documentation to the SS, not Paul’s own.
    The commander looked down at the sheet of paper again. “The detective reported that the man was driving a green Audi sedan. Have you seen this vehicle in the area?”
    “No, sir.”
    In the mirror Paul noticed two of the other officers looking in the back of the truck. They called, “Everything’s fine here.”
    The commander continued. “If you see him or the Audi, you will contact the authorities immediately.” He shouted to the driver of the truck barricading the road. “Let him pass.”
    “Hail Hitler,” Paul said with an enthusiasm he believed he hadn’t heard anyone else use since he’d arrived in Germany.
    “Yes, yes, hail Hitler. Now move along!”
    •   •   •
    An SS staff Mercedes skidded to a stop outside Building 5 of Waltham Military College, where Willi Kohl was watching dozens of troops prowl through the forest in search of the young men who’d escaped from the classroom.
    The door of the car opened and no less than Heinrich Himmler himself climbed out, wiped his schoolteacher glasses with a handkerchief and strode up to the SS commander, Kohl and Reinhard Ernst, who was out of the car now and surrounded by a dozen guards.
    Kohl raised his arm and Himmler responded with a brief salute and then studied the man closely with his tight eyes. “You are Kripo?”
    “Yes, Police Chief Himmler. Detective-inspector Kohl.”
    “Ah, yes. So you are Willi Herman Kohl.”
    The detective was taken aback that the overlord of German police would know his name. He recalled his SD file and felt all the more uneasy at the recognition. The mousy man turned away and asked Ernst, “You are unharmed?”
    “Yes. But he killed several officers and my colleague, Doctor-professor Keitel.”
    “Where is the assassin?”
    The SS commander said sourly, “He escaped.”
    “And who is he?”
    “Inspector Kohl has learned his identity.” With a temerity that Ernst’s rank allowed—but Kohl would not dare use—the colonel said abruptly, “Look at the passport picture, Heinrich. He was the same man who was at the Olympic stadium. He was standing one meter from the Leader, from all the ministers. He was that close to us all.”
    “Gardner?” Himmler asked uneasily, gazing at thebooklet the SS commandant held up. “He was using a fake name at the stadium. Or this one is fake.” The small man looked up and frowned. “But why did he save your life at the stadium?”
    “Obviously he didn’t save my life,” Ernst snapped. “I wasn’t in danger then. He must have rigged the gun in the shed himself to make it appear that he was our ally. To get under our defenses, of course. Who knows whom else he was going to target after he’d killed me. Perhaps the Leader himself.
    “The report you told us about said that he was Russian,” he added sharply. “But this is an American passport.”
    Himmler fell silent for a moment, eyes sweeping the dry leaves at their feet. “The Americans would have no incentive to harm you, of course. I would guess that the Russians hired him.” He looked at Kohl. “How do you happen to know of this assassin?”
    “Purely a coincidence, State Police Chief. I followed him as a suspect in another case. Only after I arrived here to conduct surveillance did I realize that Colonel Ernst was present at the college and that the suspect had designs to kill him.”
    “But surely you knew of the earlier attempt on Colonel Ernst’s life?” Himmler asked quickly.
    “The incident that the colonel was just referring to, at the Olympic stadium? No, sir. I was not apprised of that.”
    “You weren’t?”
    “No, sir. Kripo was not informed. And I just met with Chief of Inspectors Horcher no more than two hours ago. He knew nothing of it either.” Kohl shook his head. “I wish we had been informed, sir. I could have coordinated my case with the SS and Gestapo so that this incidentmight not have happened and those soldiers not died.”
    “You’re saying that you did not know that our security forces were looking for a possible infiltrator as of yesterday?” Himmler asked with the leaden delivery of a bad cabaret