The Sixth Key(145)

‘And is that what happened?’ the Writer of Letters asked. ‘Did he go back to Germany?’

‘Yes. In the end Rahn decided to take the risk but when he arrived in Berlin, he found that Weisthor had disappeared and he was now directly under the command of SS-Gruppenführer Wolff. After Rahn’s confession, Wolff sent him directly to Buchenwald for reserve duty to wear away his homosexuality – in other words, to toughen him up. In the meantime, at Buchenwald he saw new heights of atrocities and this steeled his desire to work for the Black Swans in any capacity.’

‘So what did he do?’

‘When he was allowed to return to Berlin,’ I said, ‘Rahn continued his duties while managing to help fifteen young Jews escape to Switzerland. He also gathered highly valuable information on Himmler and others in his circle for Canaris. When things began to get too hot, however, with more accusations from diverse quarters, this time about his genealogy and a possible Jewish heritage, he was advised to ask Himmler to approve his immediate dismissal from the SS.’

‘And?’ the Writer of Letters asked.

‘Himmler looked him in the eye and reminded him of Wewelsburg. He told him that a member of the Inner Circle could never resign. He had only two choices – an enforced death in a concentration camp, or suicide.’

‘Which one did he choose?’

‘He chose the latter . . .’

‘He committed suicide?’

I nodded, having read it in a translator’s note in that copy of Rahn’s book in the library. ‘It was March 1939,’ I continued. ‘He took a bus to Söll, a village in the Austrian Alps, and checked into a small hotel. Here he wrote two letters, one to La Dame and another to Deodat.’

‘La Dame?’ the Writer of Letters looked surprised.

‘Yes, they had been corresponding for some time . . . The next day he travelled deeper into the mountains by bus and alighted at a stop known as Der Steinerne Steg, where he took a path that led into the forest. After that, no one ever saw him alive again.’

‘So, the official line was that he was caught in a snowstorm?’ the Writer of Letters asked.

‘That’s right.’

‘But was he?’

The night hung heavy and it was cold; I could barely see the Writer of Letters smiling at me, anxious to hear the rest. ‘On the twenty-fifth of May 1939, in an edition of the SS Newspaper Das Schwarzes Korps, there appeared a notice which read:

During a blizzard in the mountains SS Obersturmführer Otto Rahn died tragically. We regret his death and we have lost a decent SS member and the creator of marvellous historic and scientific works.

‘It was signed by the head of personnel, SS-Gruppenführer Wolff,’ I said. ‘In the inner circles his suicide was viewed as a declaration of his faithfulness, even in death, to the SS.’ I felt like I needed a brandy.

‘Do you mean that Rahn became a member of the undead?’ the Writer of Letters asked.

‘The body is, to this day, interred at Worgl Söll. It was badly decomposed when it was found on the eleventh of May 1939. Rahn was reported to have died on the anniversary of the fall of Montsegur – the thirteenth of March. However, his parents were never allowed to identify the body.’

‘So what do you think . . . did he commit suicide or not?’ the Writer of Letters asked.

‘Personally, I don’t know.’

He nodded his head, pensive. ‘Do you know who this grave belongs to?’

I blinked. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. ‘It can’t be Rahn’s.’

‘I’m not asking you about Rahn.’ He paused for a moment. ‘Cros is the one who is buried in this cemetery. If you recall, he wanted to be buried in secret and no one was to know where his grave was; there was to be no name, no date,’ the Writer of Letters said.

‘Because he was afraid they would snatch away his soul?’ I asked.

The Writer of Letters shook his head slowly. ‘No.’

‘Why the elaborate arrangements then, and all the secrecy?’

‘Cros had very good reasons for his concern and I think it’s time we take a closer look at him,’ the Writer of Letters said.

To my great relief he now took up the reigns of the story and began to illuminate it for me. ‘Cros was only a young man just out of the seminary when he was asked to investigate matters pertaining to the priest Saunière. The Bishop of Carcassonne had chosen him precisely because he was young and precisely because he belonged to no group and owed allegiance to no order. In the beginning, Cros had no idea about Le Serpent Rouge and had never heard of the Cathar treasure. He thought he was investigating corruption among a number of priests who were allegedly selling masses for the dead. He only realised what lay behind the investigation when Gélis approached him secretly, offering to sell him a parchment he had found in his church. Gélis told him he feared for his life and needed money to leave the country. At first Cros had refused but when Gélis told him the whole story, about what Saunière had found, he realised what the Bishop of Carcassonne was after, and that things were far more complicated than he realised. He bought the parchment from Gélis hoping to glean from it some information. But when Gélis was murdered soon after, Cros, now afraid, lay low, realising the danger he was in.