Eden's Gate Read online

  When he reached the dark blue Range Rover that had been left for him this morning three blocks from the hotel, there were more sirens behind him converging on the murder scene. A big Lincoln Navigator SUV with dark tinted windows came around the corner. Lane unlocked his car and opened the door as the Lincoln pulled up. The back door opened and Speyer beckoned to him. “Come with us.”

  Gloria was in the backseat with him. Baumann was driving. “I’m not going to leave my stuff behind,” Lane said.

  “Don’t be a fool,” Speyer said. “The police know your name, and they’ll be looking for this car.”

  “It can’t be connected to me.”

  “Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

  “I was going to find out where you live and come out to see you tonight.”

  “You’d be dead before you got within a mile of me,” Speyer said with mounting frustration. He said something to Baumann who was watching the rearview mirror. His bodyguard nodded. “I’m sending Ernst with you.”

  “Whatever you say.” Lane got behind the wheel and closed the door. He took out his phone and, keeping it below the level of the windows, hit the speed dial button. Baumann and Speyer got out of the Lincoln and said something else to each other.

  “Yes?” Frannie asked, breathless. She wasn’t expecting his call so soon.

  “Change of plans. Baumann is coming with me.”

  Speyer climbed into the Lincoln’s driver’s seat and Baumann shut the door.

  “Are you in the Rover?” Frannie asked.

  “Right,” Lane said. He broke the connection and slipped the phone in his jacket pocket. Baumann came over and got in the passenger seat as Speyer took off.

  “What do we do now?”

  “We’re going back up to Center Street where we can pick up Highway Two. That’ll take us out of town, and give us some time to figure out what you’re up to.”

  “What about the cops?”

  Baumann pressed his earpiece a little closer. “They’re still busy at the hotel.” He was receiving police frequencies in the earpiece.

  Lane started the car and pulled out. By the time they reached the highway a half-dozen blocks west of town the Lincoln was nowhere to be seen. Traffic was very light. The sirens behind them had finally stopped.

  “You were told to stay at the hotel. Why didn’t you?”

  “I didn’t want to get arrested.”

  “Why not? You said you didn’t have a record, and Willy would have backed up your self-defense story. In a few days you’d have been in the clear.”

  “The gun I’m carrying isn’t registered, and it doesn’t have a serial number, for starts.”

  “Let’s see it,” Baumann demanded.

  “Not a chance in hell,” Lane told him. “At least not until I’m someplace that I consider safe.”

  The highway went east past the fairgrounds back into town, crossing Main Street a few blocks noth of the hotel. The crowds were thick downtown, but there were no signs of the police.

  “You said that you worked for South African Intelligence?”

  “That’s right, until about five years ago.”

  “Who was your boss?”

  “Roger deKlerk, and he was a dumb son of a bitch.”

  Baumann’s lips pursed. “What brought you to the States?”

  “I had a job in Vienna, and when it was over I had a choice of going to South America or coming here. I chose here.”

  “Why?”

  “Seemed like the right thing to do at the time.” He took out a cigarette and lit it without offering one to Baumann. “I don’t like being crowded.” He laughed. “And this is virgin territory, isn’t it? Ripe with opportunities and all that?”

  “Who was the old man?” Baumann asked.

  “That one will wait until I can talk to your boss. I think he’ll be interested in making a deal.”

  “Why did you come to Kalispell?”

  “I was following … the old man.”

  “What was he doing here?”

  “What, are you dense or something? He came here to find Speyer and kill him. And he damn near succeeded.”

  They crossed the Stillwater River, a couple of fishermen on its banks, as they headed toward the airport. A Delta jetliner was just coming in for a landing.

  “And you just happened to be there in the bar, hustling the captain’s wife, when all this happens,” Baumann said. “What the hell are you trying to pull?”

  “For Christ’s sake, you dumb kraut, the old man was Meyer Goldstein. He used to work for the Wiesenthal Center in Vienna as a special investigator.”

  “So that story about his wife and children at the Wall was a lie?”

  “I don’t know. But Speyer was high on Goldstein’s list because your boss helped hide some old SS officers with ties to the KGB in trade for Nazi gold left over from the war. It’s what financed your move here, I expect. The Wiesenthal Center wanted to get its hands not only on those guys, but on what they figured was a major stash that Speyer might know something about. But Goldstein got unhinged and he wanted the past buried. Most of his family was gassed in the Holocaust, and he wanted to put an end to it.”

  “You said he tried to kill you.”

  Lane shrugged. “I lied. I followed Goldstein who I knew would lead me to your boss sooner or later. And I figured that one favor might deserve another.”

  “You want a part of the gold?”

  “Very astute,” Lane said disparagingly. “Next question: How did I know about Goldstein in the first place?”

  Baumann’s jaw tightened. “I was getting to it.”

  “My job in Vienna was for a client in Buenos Aires who wanted some records destroyed. Easy enough, but one thing led to another and I stumbled on Goldstein.”

  Baumann gave him a very hard look. “You expect me to believe such a story?”

  “I don’t care whether you do or not,” Lane said cheerfully. “I didn’t come all this way to hold your hand. I came to save your boss’s life—something you should have been able to do yourself—and ask for a job. One down, one to go.”

  State Highway 2 merged with State Highway 40, and a sign said HUNGRY HORSE, 10 MILES. Baumann told him to turn right, and they headed east toward the mountains, Glacier National Park, and the Continental Divide, one of the very few wilderness areas left in the entire United States.

  Except for its large size, Speyer’s mountain enclave would have looked at home in the Swiss Alps. A split-rail fence followed a crushed gravel driveway to a sprawling chalet. A sweeping veranda faced a broad, meandering stream and natural trout pools that reflected the not so distant snow-capped mountains. Several outbuildings, at least two of which looked like barracks, were across a field. A Bell Ranger helicopter sat on a pad beside a grass runway. A Gulfstream bizjet was parked in a hangar whose door was open. The entire compound was in a large clearing surrounded by dense forests.

  There were at least a half-dozen men dressed in plain BDUs (Battle Dress Utilities) doing work around the place. They looked up as the Range Rover came up from the highway and pulled up in front of the chalet.

  “I didn’t spot any surveillance on the way in,” Lane said conversationally. They were five miles off the highway here.

  “That’s the whole idea,” Baumann replied.

  “Then my hat’s off to you. I should have seen them.”

  One of the workmen in BDUs came over as Baumann and Lane got out of the car. He was a large, hard-looking man. He carried a Glock 17 in a shoulder holster, and he wore a flesh-toned earpiece.

  “The captain is expecting you, sir,” he told Baumann. “He’ll meet you at the pool.”

  “Get this under cover, Carl, and take it apart. I want to see an inventory as soon as possible.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I wouldn’t do that, if I were you,” Lane warned him.

  “I think we can handle it, sir,” the guard said with a smirk. He made to get in the driver’s seat.


  Lane shrugged. “Just take it back in the woods, or somewhere else, if you would. It’ll minimize your casualties.”

  A glass door in the veranda opened and Speyer came out of the house. He beckoned to them.

  “Just a minute, sir, we have to take care of something first,” Baumann called up to him. A couple of the other guards, sensing that something was going on, stopped what they were doing and looked up.

  “Like I said, Ernst, I think we can handle this,” Carl said politely. He was clearly not liking the situation he was in.

  “What did you bring with you?” Baumann asked.

  “A few weapons, some fragmentation grenades, a couple of LAWs rockets, a few RPGs, and fifty kilos of Semtex,” Lane said. “Wasn’t time to pick up the rest. I was traveling light.”

  Carl reached inside for the car keys, but Baumann stopped him. “Are they wired?”

  “Of course. I don’t want just anybody pawing through my stuff. That’s one of the reasons I thought it wasn’t wise to leave the car parked in town. Killing a Jew is one thing, but blowing up half of Kalispell would be another.”

  Carl strode around to the back of the Rover, and inspected the door lock, hinges, and the window glass and frame. The back of the car was packed with what appeared to be ordinary luggage. He looked up. “I don’t see any leads.”

  “Inside the door,” Lane told him. “The mains are fiber-optics, embedded in the glass. You can’t see them.”

  “Can we take it from the inside?”

  Lane shook his head. “Pressure switches behind the backseat.”

  “We could put it up on a hoist and take the floor out.”

  Lane had to laugh. “Crude. But it’d be a neat trick if I was in a hurry and had to get my shit out of there.”

  “All right, smart-ass, we’ll trace the circuitry—”

  Lane wagged a finger at him. “Take the fuse cover off and it blows. Put a multimeter in the cigarette lighter and it blows. Disconnect the battery and it blows. Break the back window and …” He grinned. “Boom.”

  Even Baumann had to smile. “Are you going to tell us, or do we have to lose a few men to find out on our own?”

  “Pop the gas filler door,” Lane said. “The button is on the floor left of the driver’s seat.”

  “Thank you,” Baumann said. “As you suggested, we would like to minimize our casualties.” He nodded for Carl to get to it, and he motioned for Lane to precede him up to the house.

  They started away from the Rover, but Lane snapped his fingers and turned back. “By the way, Carl, tell your demolitions man to take it slow.”

  “What the hell are you talking about now?”

  “Oh, if he’s any good he’ll figure it out,” Lane said pleasantly. “But you might just mention to him that I had a Swiss connection in my wild youth.”

  A large indoor pool with a curved, tinted glass ceiling and walls looked down on a long valley rimmed by the mountains. A large section of the wall had been slid back, and four ceiling fans made it pleasant. Speyer, a bandage on his cheek, was seated at a patio table, sipping a glass of wine. Baumann led Lane over to him and they sat down.

  “Mr. Clark, finally. I wanted to thank you for saving my life back there, although your timing was a little close.”

  “I had the advantage, I knew it was coming,” Lane said.

  “Let me have your gun, please.”

  Lane took out his pistol and started to eject the magazine, but Speyer held him off.

  “No, don’t unload it. Give it to me as it is.” He held out his hand and Lane gave him the gun.

  There was another patio table on the deck outside the pool enclosure. A brown pottery hurricane lamp sat on the table. Speyer fired one shot, and the lamp disintegrated.

  “A nine-millimeter bullet carries a terrific impact, but have you thought about using a higher velocity weapon? Perhaps one whose magazine holds more rounds?”

  “This gun’s an old friend. We’ve been through a lot together, and it’s never let me down.”

  Speyer carefully lowered the hammer and switched the safety lever. He put the gun on the table. “The name you used to register at the hotel is a fake, although interestingly enough the credit card is valid. What does that mean?”

  “John Clark was a real person who died eight years ago in Arlington, Virginia. Car accident. It’s one of the American passports I use.”

  “What’s your real name?”

  “John Browne, with an e.”

  “Social security number?”

  “I’m not an American, so I don’t have a social security number. But I have a South African national identity code.” Lane gave him the number.

  Baumann picked up a phone and repeated the information.

  “Don’t you want to take my fingerprints?” Lane asked.

  “We already have them,” Baumann said.

  Speyer was watching him closely. “So, Mr. Browne with an e, late of South African Intelligence, what do we make of you?”

  “I came here looking for a job.”

  “You took a big chance, didn’t you? Shooting a man in the heart in cold blood and in front of witnesses is extreme in the least.” Speyer poured another glass of wine. “Carrying an unregistered weapon, driving around in a car not licensed to you, and loaded with illegal weapons and explosives. Weren’t you concerned about getting stopped?”

  “No,” Lane said unconcernedly. “I knew that you would hire me. You’d be a fool not to. I have the skills that your organization needs.”

  Speyer considered that for a moment. “We could kill you, I suppose. Dispose of your body and that would be the end of it. Nobody would come here looking for you. Willy is trustworthy. The local police are thinking about turning over the investigation to the state police who will in time turn it over to the FBI. But that might take weeks because so far there’s no identification on the man you killed.”

  “Interpol will have his prints.”

  “This is Montana. The investigation might not go that far.”

  “Then you have nothing to worry about.”

  “I never did. It’s you who has everything to worry about.”

  Baumann tensed a little. Lane knew that this could go either way. Speyer was in the middle of something big. They knew that much from the German Federal Police, who had asked for help, but they did not know what it was. Speyer would have to be very sensitive right now, alert for anything that smacked of a coincidence.

  “I don’t think that you’re a man who throws away valuable assets, Herr Kapitän. And that’s exactly what I could be to you. In part because I am expendable.”

  “That’s a good point,” Speyer said. “You’re handy with a gun, and from what I’m told you know something about demolitions. What else can you do that would make you a valuable asset?”

  “I can fly the jet and the Bell Ranger I saw coming in. My French and German are pretty good, and I can get by in Spanish in a pinch.” Lane grinned. “I’d like to say that I carry a five handicap in golf, but I never did like the game so I couldn’t beat a nine. Do I have a job?”

  “What else?” Speyer asked.

  “The usual. Hand-to-hand combat, survival training, codes and code breaking, surveillance and tailing, wiretapping, sport diving, and I’m a C-rated fencer in foil and épée.”

  Speyer and Buamann exchanged a look. “What if I say no? What then?” Speyer asked.

  “I would think that you were damned ungrateful,” Lane said. He shrugged. “I would hope that there’d be no trouble here. I mean you’d let me go and all that. I suppose I’d go down to Buenos Aires. I can get another job there. But I was looking for a change of scenery. Something different.”

  “Gold?” Baumann asked.

  “I wouldn’t turn down some serious money if it came my way,” he said. “But I’m willing to earn it, if you know what I mean.”

  Speyer took a drink. “Did you leave anything of interest in your hotel room?”

  “Toiletries kit, a few
items of clothing, an overnight bag. All bought here in the States, and all untraceable.”

  “You mentioned that the car is untraceable, too.”

  “I bought it from a chop shop in Miami two weeks ago. It’s registered to Paul Asimov in Detroit. I have a valid driver’s license in that name, too.”

  Speyer sat back. “I’ll give you marks for inventiveness and balls.”

  “Thanks. What about the job?”

  “We’ll see,” Speyer said. “You’ll stay with us until we can do a background check. If everything looks good we’ll talk some more. I may have a use for you after all.”

  Baumann rose and motioned for Lane to do the same.

  “Ernst will show you to your room,” Speyer said. “One thing, though, don’t try to leave the property just yet. I’d hate to see something happen to you out there in the valley. There are wolves and bears around here. We don’t mess with them and they don’t mess with us unless someone wanders around where they shouldn’t be. We’ve placed bait stations around the perimeter.”

  “I catch your meaning.”

  “Good,” Speyer said.

  The chalet’s great room soared three stories to the sloped ceiling. A spiral staircase led to a broad balcony off which the bedrooms were located. A massive stone fireplace dominated the center of the room, while the main wall was glass, the view nothing less than spectacular.

  “No one bothers you up here?” Lane asked.

  “The captain has a number of investments in the area, and his privacy is respected,” Baumann said.

  They crossed the great room and went upstairs to a large, very well-appointed bedroom at the end of the hall, with a view only slightly less spectacular than from downstairs. A big bathroom included double sinks, a mirrored wall, walk-in shower, hot tub, and a toilet and bidet. A television was set in a large armoire just like in a hotel. But unlike the hotels Lane had stayed in, this room was equipped with a closed-circuit television camera mounted in the ceiling.