Read Soul Intent Online

Authors: Dennis Batchelder

Tags: #Action & Adventure, #Revenge, #General, #Suspense fiction, #Thrillers, #Soul, #Fiction, #Nazis

Soul Intent (5 page)

BOOK: Soul Intent
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Hermann Goering needed his soul identity read, but for that to happen, either Baba had to get to him inside the prison, or the Nazi had to get out.

It sure didn’t seem like Goering would be getting out. The trials had uncovered so many evil deeds that Flora didn’t think any Nazi deserved to live. James reminded her to keep an open mind, as only the prosecution had presented their case, but Flora’s had been shut ever since she and Baba learned of her father’s fate in Dachau.

Hating the Nazis only made her job harder. She rinsed the spoon with some hot water from the kettle. How did she let herself get roped into helping Goering join Soul Identity?

It must be her awe of the mighty organization Mr. Morgan worked for—awe of their vast funds, and their ability to obtain food in a city where many German inhabitants were still dying of starvation. How did they obtain their unlimited rations, anyway?

It was more than awe—it was the new clothes she wore, and it was the vitamins and medicine they supplied Baba. Flora had been seduced by the easy life. Every day she found herself drawn deeper into the comfort Soul Identity offered.

But she wasn’t drawn into their plan—Goering’s Last Shot, James called it—the Nazi leader’s grasp at immortality by entrusting his memories and what remained of his fortune to Soul Identity’s depositary, in the hope that one day his reincarnated soul would return in a fresh body to take up the Nazi mantle.

Flora shivered as she imagined a future Soul Identity member, excited to see what a previous soul line carrier had left for them, only to be burdened with Goering’s evil Nazi machinations.

She knew what she wanted—what she needed—to do. She must destroy Goering’s memories and return the money to its rightful owners, the Jewish and Gypsy survivors.

Mr. Morgan had pointed out that it wasn’t that straightforward. “Our number one job is to protect our members,” he declared. “Whether we agree with their philosophies or not, we must safeguard their collections until future carriers are found.”

Would the depositary accept ill-gotten riches? Mr. Morgan said they wouldn’t. He said their lengthy investigation into Hermann Goering’s belongings was precisely because of this concern. “We will not accept goods to which others have a claim,” he promised. “We will not be a knowing party in any theft.”

So Flora had helped the overseer catalog and research Goering’s treasures. The paintings and jewels were deemed too risky to deposit, and James arranged for them to be “discovered” by the OSS’s Art Looting Investigation Unit. Those riches now sat in Munich, part of over one million other recovered works of art and gemstones slated to be returned to their rightful owners.

The gold, however, still lingered. All seventy-two bars of it.

Mr. Morgan unwrapped the bars last week, after they arrived as a special delivery from Goering’s lawyer. Flora shrank from the hated German eagle and swastika stamped on the top of each bar, but she copied down the serial numbers and dates of each one.

A gold bar weighed four hundred troy ounces, exactly twelve and a half kilograms. At thirty-five dollars an ounce, the seventy-two bars were worth more than a million dollars.

At the trials, the prosecution showed how the Nazis pulled the gold teeth and fillings from the bodies of their concentration camp victims and sent them to the Reichsbank for re-smelting. Flora was convinced that her father’s teeth made up part of Goering’s gold now housed in the basement.

But Mr. Morgan had no such fears. After researching the serial numbers, he claimed it was impossible to identify the bullion’s source, and therefore it would remain as part of Hermann Goering’s wealth. So they had repacked the gold in sawdust, six bars to a keg. The gold and three boxes of Goering’s papers sat locked in the basement, and as soon as the Nazi pig became a certified Soul Identity member, they would be transported to the depositary’s Swiss facility.

The thought that the bad guys always seem to win was stuck in her head as Flora returned to the front room. “Your coffee, James,” she said.

“Thanks, doll.” James glanced up, then back at the drawing. “Just leave it on the desk,” he said. “We’re onto something here.”

“You found a way to get Baba inside?” Despite her misgivings, the challenge of breaking into a prison intrigued her.

“No,” Mr. Morgan said. “James is correct on that point—it is quite impossible.”

“Then Mr. Goering cannot join Soul Identity?” she asked. Maybe the world still had some justice left in it.

Mr. Morgan frowned. “He will join. And you will help us.”

“Haven’t I helped enough?”

The overseer took a deep breath. “Miss Drabarni—”

“Flora,” she said.

“Miss Drabarni.” His words were cold. “You will continue to help us until Hermann Goering is a member and his remaining collection is safe in the depositary. I should not have to remind you that your grandmother is counting on you. Am I clear?”

She stared at him, unblinking, and forced herself to regain control before her tears betrayed her. “Yes, Mr. Morgan,” she said without a tremble.

“Thank you, Flora.” He spoke with a warmer voice. “Now, have you ever used a camera?”

nine

September 1946

Nuremberg, Occupied Germany

 

James reached up and massaged his brow with his fingertips. “How many more pictures are you going to take?” he asked Flora.

She attached the new portrait lens onto the camera. “As many as it takes to get one that works,” she answered.

Despite how the overseer had manipulated her, Flora had enjoyed the last month with her Kodak Six-16. The camera was a mechanical marvel, and she loved loading the film by turning the winding key slowly until the bubble indicator showed a ‘1’. She loved opening the front of the box and drawing down the bed until the lens and shutter clicked into position. She loved determining the f-stop and shutter speed, and revolving the lens mount to the right focus.

Most of all, Flora loved capturing moments within her photographs. Every time she looked through the view finder and pressed the exposure lever, she felt as if she was stopping time in its tracks and recording a piece of history.

And the photographs she’d taken! She started with buildings and landscapes. Mr. Morgan suggested she practice taking pictures in both bright sunlight and shadows, and she rambled all around Nuremberg’s bombed-out ruins. Sometimes James came with her, and when he did, sometimes he let her drive the Jeep.

Flora loved going out in the early mornings, when the golden sun cast long shadows from the wreckage, before the weight of the day crept into the homeless Germans’ faces.

Her black and white photographs covered the walls of her bedroom in the Soul Identity house. She had pictures of the ruins and the reconstruction, of stray cats and dogs, of fields and trees and soldiers and the homeless. And of children. Lots of children.

James helped her earn some money by selling framed copies of her photos to the American soldiers and VIPs who came to gawk at the Nazis on trial.

But with all of her picture-taking practice, she had been unable to capture a photograph of James’s eyes detailed enough for Baba to calculate his soul identity.

For starters, Baba needed color. The war had destroyed the German photography laboratories, and Kodak only processed color film in the States. It had taken Soul Identity’s best procurement team the entire month to pay for and establish a Kodak branch office in Nuremberg.

Then, the first ten rolls of the Kodachrome film produced fogged slides. Mr. Morgan found another source, and the images had cleared up.

Now the problem was the detail. To get close enough for clear eye images, the Six-16 needed a portrait lens, but the first lens arrived with a built-in diffusion filter. Its soft-focus effect left Baba unable to see any iris details. Mr. Morgan scrambled to order a replacement, and it just arrived yesterday.

She and Mr. Morgan planned to pose as a photographer and reporter so they could get into the Reichsmarschall’s cell. She would have just one chance to capture a clean picture of the Nazi’s eyes, because Goering’s lawyer, Dr. Otto Stahmer, could only request a single meeting for any individual. Dr. Stahmer’s message had come this morning: the Nuremberg Prison Commandant, Colonel Andrus, had approved their application. She and Mr. Morgan would meet Goering at noon tomorrow.

Based on photographs she had gleaned from various news magazines, she had arranged half of the dining room to resemble Goering’s cell: a small table and chair against a white wall with almost no outside illumination.

Flora pointed at a chair against the wall. “Sit there and lean back,” she told James.

He sat.

She placed the Six-16 on the back of another chair exactly six feet from James’s head. The lighting in Goering’s cell would be poor, and the chair would help her keep the camera steady during the long exposure.

“Now look into the lens and don’t blink,” she said.

Flora shot all six pictures in the roll, experimenting with the shutter speed and the f-stops. She rewound the film into the cartridge and placed it in its canister. “Let’s get to the laboratory,” she said.

 

While they waited for the technicians to develop the film, James took Flora on a walk through Nuremberg’s downtown. The economy had recovered in this district, mostly because of the trials and the money the press and tourists spent. Flora saw construction crews working on almost every building in the square.

James stood with his hands on his hips in the center of the
platz
and slowly turned a full circle. “You’d hardly know that over ninety percent of this city was destroyed,” he said. “This old town district is beginning to look pretty spiffy.”

Flora nodded and they walked on. She grabbed James’s arm as they paused in front of the Grand Hotel. “Can we go in the club?” she asked. She had read about it in the papers, and could only imagine how glamorous it was inside.

James shook his head. “They only let active duty officers, press, and VIPs in. We don’t have a pass.”

Tomorrow she’d have a press pass. Maybe she could convince James to take her next weekend.

They walked another half hour until they reached the Palais du Justice. The articles said that the prison cells were deep in the basement, and the Nazis had their own elevator to get to and from the courtroom.

“Are you ready to go in there tomorrow?” James asked.

Playing with the camera and exploring around town with James the past month had been fun, but tomorrow she had to pay for it by confronting the man she considered responsible for her father’s death. Worse, she would help him prolong his memory and bury his loot. She stopped and wrapped her arms around her chest to keep from shivering. “I can’t believe I have to help that monster win.”

James looked at her. “It’s the price of freedom, darling,” he said. “We may work on the train, but somebody else decides where it stops.”

Flora just shook her head.

 

They were quiet on their walk back to the laboratory, where the technician handed them six mounted 2x2 color transparencies. They remained quiet as James drove back to the Soul Identity house.

In the dining room, Flora pulled the drapes shut and James readied the Kodaslide projector.

While the projector warmed up, she looked over at Baba and the overseer. “It should work this time, Mr. Morgan,” she said.

“It had better work—we are out of time,” he replied.

James dropped in the first slide and projected the first image of his eyes onto the wall. They looked no better than the ones she had taken through the diffusion filter.

“Can you focus it any clearer?” Flora asked.

James turned the projector lens. “That’s as good as it gets.”

“Try another one,” she said.

James had blinked in the next three slides.

“How many pictures did you take?” Mr. Morgan asked.

“There’s two more.” Flora held her breath.

This time James’s eyes were clear. Baba stepped over to the wall and peered at his projected irises. “Can you make them any bigger?” she asked.

James slid the projector back to the far wall and refocused.

Baba stood looking at James’s projected eyes. She ran her fingers around the irises. “Flora, get me a proof sheet,” she said.

Flora tacked a blank proof sheet against the wall, aligning the projected eyes with the two top circles. She handed Baba a pencil and stepped out of the way.

While Baba spent the next half hour tracing the lines from James’s irises onto the proof sheet, Flora squeezed small amounts of blue, brown, black, white, and yellow oil paint from their collapsible tubes onto a palette. She mixed in some turpentine, and when Baba was done, she handed her the palette and a tiny paint brush.

Flora moved the proof sheet to an easel. Baba stood next to the projected image and mixed the paint on the palette into shades matching James’s blue irises. She walked to the easel and filled in the colors on the proof sheet. After an hour, she had completed painting the first eye.

“What the—” James said as he pointed at the wall.

BOOK: Soul Intent
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