Astronomy(28)

“ ‘Ghouls’?” Malmagden laughed.

“You know the one—Nietzsche, I think? He has the dark patch running between his eyebrows. Him.”

“You are an exceptionally imaginative young lady.”

“They were your personal guard in Berlin,” she said. “They still work for you? Or are they working for someone else now?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Because I always thought they were the reason your Zentralbund buddies left you alone. If your guard has gone to work for one of your rivals, hey . . .” She lifted her hands, You figure it out.

Malmagden became quiet; that mercury business, that may have horrified him, but that was Hartmann’s problem. Malmagden’s ghouls were close to his heart.

“Please,” he said, “I cannot talk further. I have to go back now.”

Something had taken a wrong turn. She had miscalculated with her riff about his personal guard. Susan had worried she couldn’t scare a guy like Malmagden. She had succeeded entirely too well. In fact, he was checking his watch. He wanted to go back to his cell.

“You have no idea what you are dealing with here,” Malmagden said. He called to his two American protectors. But Dale Bogen had them wrapped up in a cutthroat game of Crazy Eights.

He pounded at the door.

“You know something about two hundred tons of lead and concrete shipped through a warehouse on Münterstrasse in the last few days?”

Malmagden laughed. “In the last few days? I’ve been in prison.”

“Is it a weapons program? You guys building yourself some sort of Gadget?”

“You risk my life in ways you do not understand. I will not talk to you further.” He banged at the door louder. Any second now, Enders and Hobbs would be down to collect him.

Susan saw the murderer of Hope and Crosby making his escape. And Shrieve was leaning back from the table in his casual manner.

“Let me suggest you get back here and sit down,” she said lightly. “I’m not done talking with you yet.”

“What would you do?” Malmagden addressed the door. He had no intention of turning around. “Beat me with the hose?”

Rubber hose was something she had a passing acquaintance with. “Takes a certain expertise to use a hose efficiently,” she said. “I’m in sort of a hurry tonight.”

Like magic, the Walther PP was in her hand.

The room got heartbeat quiet. Malmagden turned to face her. His eyes grew infinitesimally larger. Slowly, calmly, Charley Shrieve leaned forward in his chair.

“Come on, Red. Belay that shit.”

“You want to know what’s going on at Faulkenberg Reservoir? Just leave us alone a couple minutes. Let me take care of this.”

“What if you shoot off his kneecap and he doesn’t talk?”

“That’s the nice thing about knees,” she pointed out. “They come in pairs.”

“Malmagden was simultaneously trying to look amused and curl his knees away from her toward the wall.”

“You’re not scaring him. Krzyzstof here, he’s got things after him that aren’t even human.”

Malmagden was watching the gun. He was holding his droll expression even as he reached back to work the doorknob.

“Listen to the young gentleman,” Malmagden urged in a voice that did not sound droll or amused in the least. “If you truly understand the principalities I dealt with, then you know what would happen if they learned of my betrayal.”

“There you go, Red. He can’t name names. But that doesn’t mean he won’t help us out, does it Krzysztof?”

Malmagden became still. He studied Shrieve in a calculating way. They were speaking in fine print, she realized. She had fulfilled her role in this little charade: They were doing some kind of deal.

“We don’t want you to get in trouble.” Charley smiled reasonably at everyone. Things were going to be all right; he would see to it personally. “Red here, she doesn’t want you to get in trouble. She’s just a little pent-up. It’s been a long war. But we’re all friends. Aren’t we, Red?”

All she could think was the stink of the sewers, those two Volksstürm kids asking her hopefully if she could get them cowboys’ licenses after the war.

“Yeah,” she said. “We’re family.”

* * *

Shrieve had to break at one point to find a stenographer cleared for Watermark Eyes Only transcription. The torrent of names and details was more than Bogen could keep up with.

That left her and Malmagden to stare at each other. Malmagden, she thought, looked almost apologetic. No matter; she knew him better than that. To Malmagden’s mind, he had done nothing but save the world—from a plague of his own creation, but saved the world nonetheless.