The Cathar Secret: A Lang Reilly Thriller Read online

  Solomon closed to the door quietly and slipped outside. Other than men working on the mountaintop, no one was to be seen. The distance was too great for him to be recognized from up there.

  Now where?

  Obviously going up to where work was going on was not wise.

  The town?

  No, the little group of houses was so small it would take only minutes to find out if anyone had seen him and he certainly was not going to rely on anyone risking their life for a Jew.

  Downhill. Sooner or later he would find a town or city large enough to hide in. But he would have to move quickly, get away before his absence was noted. Giving the settlement a wide berth, he half slid, half climbed through snowdrifts that reached his knees. His great coat did nothing to protect his feet in their paper slippers. His toes were soon numb.

  A few toes were a small price to pay to avoid going back to the camps.

  He had been traveling only a few minutes when he came upon what he guessed was a road, although he couldn't be sure because of the snow. A few more minutes and trees began to dot the slopes.

  He was walking carefully, aware a fall could mean a twisted ankle or broken bone, a death sentence here, when he heard a shout echoing down the slope. Had his escape been discovered? Seconds later he heard the growl of an engine. A search party?

  He abandoned the road, track, whatever it was, and slipped into the trees. He had not gone far when he came upon something he did not understand. Black dirt and snow were mixed in a mound almost as tall as his head. He climbed up and looked down into a shallow trench.

  At first he didn't know what he was seeing. Twisted shapes, one melding into another, blurred by a blanket of snow that, in places, was brown rather than white. Then he made out a hand, a human hand stretched upward as though in final supplication to a merciless God. Next to it, the upper torso of a man, his face frozen and unrecognizable in a final shriek of terror.

  There was no mistaking the crude wooden cross hanging around the dead man's neck, however.

  A mere trinket.

  Solomon had seen a harvest of death in the last few years, more bodies than mounds of potatoes in a peasant's field at harvest time. But this unfinished burial ground put a final period, an end, to any hope of surviving. No worker here was going to return to any camp.

  Including him.

  He was unsure when he started running, aware only of his own ragged breath and the whisper of snow under feet no longer able to feel. The air was so cold it burned his straining lungs. He only knew that survival lay downhill, away from the station at Oberkoenigsburg and its cog railway. At some point he became aware of shouts and the snap of pine branches behind him. He hunched his shoulders in anticipation of the shot that would end the chase. At the same time, he fought the temptation to stop in his tracks, to stand still and end it all here. An unmarked ditch in a quiet Alpine forest was a better resting place than he would get at the camps. At least here the air was cleansed by the cold and smelled only of pine, instead of the stench of human waste. And without the greasy black soot that, along with an occasional bone, was all the furnaces, the crematories, left of human souls.

  Far better.

  He might as well surrender to the inevitable. In his weakened condition, a lengthy chase was out of the question and his footprints in the snow might as well have been highway markers.

  For an instant, he thought the fatal shot had been fired even though he had not heard it. He was falling, his arms and legs flailing in search of ground that was not there. He had stepped into a dip in the earth, a hollow spot in the mountainside covered with fallen branches that had, in turn, been concealed by snow.

  He landed hard enough to knock his breath away, and he tried not to gasp as he heard voices getting louder. He glanced upward, expecting armed guards. Instead, he could see nothing but white. Whatever cavity in the earth had swallowed him had also hidden him. From above, the voices were confused, men looking for prey that had vanished as if suddenly cloaked with invisibility.

  Solomon could not believe his luck. The voices were moving off! He waited for what he guessed was a full thirty minutes before he moved. His legs were cramped from the cold, his feet probably frostbitten, and the pain in his side suggested at least one rib had snapped when he hit the bottom.

  But he was smiling, remembering the tree's "V" for victory. Now all he had to do was somehow survive long enough to escape, really escape. Just how, he had no idea.

  He had taken only two steps before something, the crackle of ice, perhaps, made him turn around. He had not heard the man approach. But of course the snow would have muffled the sound. He was neither frightened nor surprised to see the Schmeisser the SS guard held.

  The man said something Solomon guessed was an order to halt.

  Solomon kept walking.

  He felt the pain in his shoulder before he heard the first shot. Then there was a single long blast as bullets tore through his body. The snow cushioned his fall. As his vision grew dark, he smiled again. The bastards had lost.

  He would die free.

  CHAPTER 6

  Wynn-Three

  Atlanta, Georgia

  December 18, 2012

  WYNTON RATHER CHARLES III WAS NOT GOING to ride the Pink Pig. Even at age three, he had no trouble making his decision quite clear. Other children shouted in glee, waved to camera-toting mommies and nannies and generally had a good time as the improbably swine-headed little train made its way around the track atop one of Lenox Square's department stores.

  Not Wynton. Small feet firmly planted, round face scrunched up in near panic, his first exposure to an Atlanta Christmas tradition was not going smoothly. He had endured, even enjoyed, his brief visit with Santa, smiling from the jolly old man's lap. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he had willingly pet one of the two reindeers in the small corral in one of the mall's giant lobbies. He had not even been intimidated by the mobs of shoppers or the blast of politically correct "Winter Holiday" music.

  But the Pink Pig was another matter.

  "No twain wide, Mommy!" he had shrieked the instant they had exited the elevator to the small, peppermint-trimmed railway station with plastic snow dripping from its eaves. His little hands clutched at his mother's skirt as though demons were trying to pry him loose.

  His mother, Paige, sighed. "Okay, okay, no train ride."

  In her mind the holiday season had been pretty much of a bust. The seventy-degree temperature outside and shoppers riding around with the tops of their convertibles down hardly felt like December. It had been six years since Paige had seen a white Christmas, her last at Yale Law. Two years as an associate with one of Atlanta's biggest law firms, three more as both an associate and as Mrs. Wynton Rather Charles Jr. And this last year as a full-time parent.

  Sometimes she wondered how things might have been different. She had grown up in a small town in upstate New York. There a white Christmas came every year. She missed the crispness and color of a New York fall as well as the white carpet of winter. Now all she could do was follow Irving Berlin's advice and dream. Atlanta had as much chance of snow on the 25th of December as did Southern California, where Berlin had written his huge holiday hit.

  She had met and married Wynton, a junior partner at the firm. Then Wynn-Three had come along and she had chosen the mommy track, rather than the partnership track, at the firm. It was a career option law firms grudgingly made available as an alternative to possible future sex discrimination suits. The hours were almost as demanding—fifty billable hours a week—and the partners just as unrelenting. After totaling up the cost of a full-time nanny and the near-confiscatory taxes levied by a government more interested in wealth redistribution than productivity, she and Wynton agreed full-time parenthood represented only a minor reduction in net income. Plus, she no longer had to witness her son growing up by descriptions narrated by strangers. She had already missed his first step, his first word, and she was not going to miss anything else. Some things were pricel
ess but she still wondered how long it would have taken her to make partner.

  Now her life was filled with Dr. Seuss, infant car seats, and entertaining a three-year-old instead of corporate mergers and hostile takeovers.

  Regrets? Maybe resentment was more accurate.

  Wynton was gone before his son stirred in the mornings, returning hours after his bedtime. Sometimes Paige let herself suspect the timing was intentional but she remembered the relentless drive for billable hours that would determine her husband's move up the food chain. She caught herself relishing the few hours Wynton spent playing with his son on Sundays when no big trial loomed on that Monday's court calendar, even if his time never seemed to include diaper changing, feeding, or bathing Wynn-Three.

  That had been her job: baby poop, trying to stop Wynn-Three from throwing his food and projectile vomiting. Now at least the kid was toilet-trained and would rather eat his food than use it as a weapon. He managed to wear as much of it as he ate.

  Hardly the intellectual stimulation of the law practice.

  A tug at her hand brought her back to Lenox Square. "Potty, Mommy!"

  Her nose told her the plea came too late. Wynn-Three had been toilet-trained for almost a year. It had been months since he had had an accident. Ever the pragmatist, though, she still carried a spare pair of his underwear in her purse. She looked around for the ladies' room, one hopefully with a changing station.

  Odd the Pink Pig really had frightened the child. Few things did. Sudden noises only caught his attention. He knew no strangers. He took being left with a sitter for a few hours while she went to the gym with equanimity. The kid was unshakable. But scared shitless of a kiddie train with a pig's face on it?

  Well, not exactly shitless . . .

  She spotted the restroom sign and headed in that direction, Wynn-Three's hand gripped in hers.

  From law review to changing diapers. It had been her choice, one she sometimes regretted. The neighborhood women, those who stayed at home to tend to their families, were friendly enough but hardly stimulating. Debates as to the best canned baby foods left her unfulfilled. Hints as to how to remove stains held no interest for her. Listening to lengthy accounts of this child's first day in pre-K or that kid's cute comment bored her. Worse, it hardly made for interesting dinner table conversation when Wynton did come home.

  The thought of growing dull terrified her. A woman might get fat and lose her looks. That was why the gym was there and plastic surgeons drove Rolls-Royces. A wife could go from zero to bitch in three-point-six seconds no time. Local shrinks pay for their children's college by treating such problems. But getting dull? That was terminal as cancer and treated much the same way: by separating it from the host body by surgery on one hand, by divorce on the other.

  Dull terrified her.

  Three miles away, Wynton Rather Charles Jr. was staring at his computer screen, reviewing the transcript of a deposition he had taken nearly a year ago. He was smiling, appreciating how apparent his careful preparation had showed in every question.

  The phone buzzed.

  Without taking his eyes from his masterful cross-examination, he pushed the speaker button. "Charles."

  "It's me. Can you talk?"

  The corners of his mouth twitched down. From the background noise, he knew she was on her cell phone. Paige called him two or three times a day, almost always with something that could have waited until he got home. She had worked here. She knew how busy he was.

  "It's Wynn-Three," she began without waiting for an answer to her question.

  Wynton frowned as he punched the button again, muting the phone. It would not do for someone, perhaps a senior partner, to walk into his office and find him chatting with his wife as if one of the largest class actions the firm had ever defended wasn't going to trial next month.

  He wished he could personally witness all the achievements and adventures of his son, he really did. But there was little point in dwelling on the subject. He had heard the child's first words over the telephone in a Chicago hotel room, spent two of the first three birthdays away from his family.

  The price of a high-pressure law practice at a big firm.

  "So, what now?" Wynton made only half an effort to replace his impatience with feigned concern. It wasn't a particularly successful try.

  "Well, excuse me!" Paige snapped. "I should have known better than to think you'd care!"

  He swallowed hard, resting his forehead on an open palm. "I didn't mean it that way. You know what a pressure cooker this place is. Of course I want to know what's going on with number-one son and heir."

  Her tone softened, "Only son and heir for the foreseeable future. Until you make senior partner, anyway. Seems Wynn-Three is terrified of the Pink Pig."

  Wynton's mind bounced around his skull like a rubber ball until recognition came to him. "Pink Pig? You mean that children's tram they put up at Lenox every Christmas? I thought kids loved it."

  "Not your son."

  He inhaled deeply, giving himself time to think. A three-year-old frightened of the Pink Pig was sufficiently newsworthy to interrupt what he was doing? Did she think there was something he could do about it from here? He knew better than to tread any other way but lightly. Paige had become increasingly prickly about her duties as a mother as compared to his as family hunter-gatherer.

  "Maybe he and I can talk about it when I get home," he suggested, hopeful of a quick and amicable resolution of whatever issue was really on the table. The trouble was, lately he was never sure exactly what that might be.

  "Not unless you get home a lot earlier than usual."

  He didn't like the direction things were heading. That is, toward him. He took the coward's way out. "Oh, hi! Have a seat and I'll be right with you!" he said to the empty room. "Can I call you back?"

  They both knew he would not be calling.

  CHAPTER 7

  480 Lafayette Drive

  Atlanta

  That Evening

  WYNTON REACHED ACROSS THE CANDLELIT table to refill Paige's wineglass before topping off his own. ". . . and the jury consultant says we have a better than ever chance of . . ."

  To Paige, listening to what was going on at the firm was like looking at travel brochures of a far-off land she once visited but to which she would never return: interesting but irrelevant.

  She nodded toward the casserole dish in the middle of the kitchen table. "More beef bourguignon?"

  Wynton patted his mouth with his napkin. "I'm stuffed, thanks. Really good, though. I appreciate your taking the time."

  Paige snorted over her wineglass. "Time? What else do I have to do once I get the house cleaned up, make sure we have groceries, get the bills paid and Wynn-Three fed lunch and down for his nap? As long as I can pile stuff into a Crock-Pot while he's asleep and don't have to screw with it till it's done, I can cook it. Not like I have every minute already filled."

  Wynton recognized a vague accusation, perhaps a continuation of this afternoon's conversation. He took a sip from his glass and was thinking about how to change the subject when he heard a voice from upstairs.

  Paige raised her eyes as though able to see through the ceiling. "Your number-one son and heir is awake. Why don't you spend some quality time getting him back to sleep while I clean up."

  After-dinner KP duty usually was Wynton's job, one he would gladly swap for a little extra time with his son. "Sure."

  He returned fifteen minutes later, a puzzled expression on his face.

  Paige looked up from the sink, her hands holding a plate. "What?"

  "He wet the bed. When's the last time he did that?"

  She shrugged. "Six, eight months. You changed the sheets?"

  "Of course."

  "And his pajamas?"

  Wynton crossed the kitchen and drained the last of the wine from his glass. "I may not get to spend as much time as I'd like with him, but I'm not a total fuck-up. I also washed him up and dried him. The kid must have had a helluva nightmare
; he was in tears. He kept saying something about the train. The Pink Pig must have frightened him more than you thought. I had to promise not to put him on the train before he'd let me leave."

  Paige reached over to put the plate into the dishwasher and began drying her hands on a towel. "That's weird, wetting the bed. He had an accident this afternoon, too. Where the hell do you suppose he got a fear of trains?"

  Wynton shook his head. "Kids come up with childhood phobias. I understand regression in toilet training isn't uncommon, either."

  Paige considered asking him when he had started reading the childcare magazines instead of the latest appellate court decisions, thought better of it, and said, "Maybe he's just excited about Christmas. This will be the first time he's been old enough to understand that some of those gifts under the tree are for him."

  Wynton held up the empty wine bottle, frowned, and dumped it into the recycling bin. "He understands that, all right. It was all I could do to keep him from ripping them open last Sunday."

  Paige tossed the towel on the counter. "Problem solved. Let's go sit in front of that tree and open another bottle. Is there any firewood left?"

  "Firewood? In this weather?"

  "Okay, so turn on the AC. It's the holiday season, remember?"

  Wynton carefully weighed watching the basketball game he had been looking forward to against Paige's idea of a "romantic" evening in front of the fire despite the unseasonable warmth. With the way the Hawks were playing, it was not worth disappointing her. Besides, she could probably use some adult company after a day with Wynn-Three.

  "We should have over half a cord left."

  Wynton got the fire lit and turned off the lights. Paige was staring into the fireplace, her face reflecting the glow of the flickering flames. "I wonder if we should put Wynn-Three into nursery school?"

  "I thought you wanted to watch him grow up. That's why you left the firm, remember?"