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Authors: Daniel Silva
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During the final hours of the war, he fled west and surrendered to the Americans. He was interned at a U.S. Army detention facility south of Berlin, but managed to escape and make his way back to Austria. The fact that he escaped from the Americans didn’t seem to count against him, because from 1946 until the State Treaty of 1955, Vogel was a civilian employee of the American occupation authority.”
Gabriel looked over at her sharply. “The Americans? What kind of work did he do?”
“He started as a clerk at headquarters and eventually worked as a liaison officer between the Americans and the fledgling Austrian government.”
“Married? Children?”
She shook her head. “A lifelong bachelor.”
“Has he ever been in trouble? Financial irregularities of any kind? Civil suits? Anything?”
“His record is remarkably clean. I have another friend at the Staatspolizei. I had him run a check on Vogel. He came up with nothing, which in a way is quite remarkable. You see, almost every prominent citizen in Austria has a Staatspolizei file. But not Ludwig Vogel.”
“What do you know about his politics?”
Renate Hoffmann spent a long moment surveying her surroundings before answering. “I asked that same question to some contacts I have on some of the more courageous Viennese newspapers and magazines, the ones that refuse to toe the government line. It turns out Ludwig Vogel is a major financial supporter of the Austrian National Party. In fact, he’s practically bankrolled the campaign of Peter Metzler himself.” She paused for a moment to light a cigarette. Her hand was shaking with cold. “I don’t know if you’ve been following our campaign here, but unless things change dramatically in the next three weeks, Peter Metzler is going to be the next chancellor of Austria.”
Gabriel sat silently, absorbing the information he had just been told. Renate Hoffmann took a single puff of her cigarette and tossed it into a mound of dirty snow.
“You asked me why we were going out in weather like this, Mr. Argov. Now you know.”
S HE STOOD without warning and started walking. Gabriel got to his feet and followed after her. Steady yourself, he thought. An interesting theory, a tantalizing set of circumstances, but there was no proof and one enormous piece of exculpatory evidence. According to the files in the Staatsarchiv, Ludwig Vogel couldn’t possibly be the man Max Klein had accused him of being.
“Is it possible Vogel knew Eli was investigating his past?”
“I’ve considered that,” Renate Hoffmann said. “I suppose someone at the Staatsarchiv or the Staatspolizei might have tipped him off about my search.”
“Even if Ludwig Vogel really was the man Max Klein saw at Auschwitz, what’s the worst that could happen to him now, sixty years after the crime?”
“In Austria? Precious little. When it comes to prosecuting war criminals, Austria’s record is shameful. In my opinion, it was practically a safe haven for Nazi war criminals. Have you ever heard of Doctor Heinrich Gross?”
Gabriel shook his head. Heinrich Gross, she said, was a doctor at the Spiegelgrund clinic for handicapped children. During the war, the clinic served as a euthanasia center where the Nazi doctrine of eradicating the “pathological genotype” was put into practice. Nearly eight hundred children were murdered there. After the war, Gross went on to a distinguished career as a pediatric neurologist. Much of his research was carried out on brain tissue he had taken from victims of Spiegelgrund, which he kept stored in an elaborate “brain library.” In 2000, the Austrian federal prosecutor finally decided it was time to bring Gross to justice. He was charged with complicity in nine of the murders carried out at Spiegelgrund and brought to trial.
“One hour into the proceedings, the judge ruled that Gross was suffering from the early stages of dementia and was in no condition to defend himself in a court of law,”
Gabriel looked over at her sharply. “The Americans? What kind of work did he do?”
“He started as a clerk at headquarters and eventually worked as a liaison officer between the Americans and the fledgling Austrian government.”
“Married? Children?”
She shook her head. “A lifelong bachelor.”
“Has he ever been in trouble? Financial irregularities of any kind? Civil suits? Anything?”
“His record is remarkably clean. I have another friend at the Staatspolizei. I had him run a check on Vogel. He came up with nothing, which in a way is quite remarkable. You see, almost every prominent citizen in Austria has a Staatspolizei file. But not Ludwig Vogel.”
“What do you know about his politics?”
Renate Hoffmann spent a long moment surveying her surroundings before answering. “I asked that same question to some contacts I have on some of the more courageous Viennese newspapers and magazines, the ones that refuse to toe the government line. It turns out Ludwig Vogel is a major financial supporter of the Austrian National Party. In fact, he’s practically bankrolled the campaign of Peter Metzler himself.” She paused for a moment to light a cigarette. Her hand was shaking with cold. “I don’t know if you’ve been following our campaign here, but unless things change dramatically in the next three weeks, Peter Metzler is going to be the next chancellor of Austria.”
Gabriel sat silently, absorbing the information he had just been told. Renate Hoffmann took a single puff of her cigarette and tossed it into a mound of dirty snow.
“You asked me why we were going out in weather like this, Mr. Argov. Now you know.”
S HE STOOD without warning and started walking. Gabriel got to his feet and followed after her. Steady yourself, he thought. An interesting theory, a tantalizing set of circumstances, but there was no proof and one enormous piece of exculpatory evidence. According to the files in the Staatsarchiv, Ludwig Vogel couldn’t possibly be the man Max Klein had accused him of being.
“Is it possible Vogel knew Eli was investigating his past?”
“I’ve considered that,” Renate Hoffmann said. “I suppose someone at the Staatsarchiv or the Staatspolizei might have tipped him off about my search.”
“Even if Ludwig Vogel really was the man Max Klein saw at Auschwitz, what’s the worst that could happen to him now, sixty years after the crime?”
“In Austria? Precious little. When it comes to prosecuting war criminals, Austria’s record is shameful. In my opinion, it was practically a safe haven for Nazi war criminals. Have you ever heard of Doctor Heinrich Gross?”
Gabriel shook his head. Heinrich Gross, she said, was a doctor at the Spiegelgrund clinic for handicapped children. During the war, the clinic served as a euthanasia center where the Nazi doctrine of eradicating the “pathological genotype” was put into practice. Nearly eight hundred children were murdered there. After the war, Gross went on to a distinguished career as a pediatric neurologist. Much of his research was carried out on brain tissue he had taken from victims of Spiegelgrund, which he kept stored in an elaborate “brain library.” In 2000, the Austrian federal prosecutor finally decided it was time to bring Gross to justice. He was charged with complicity in nine of the murders carried out at Spiegelgrund and brought to trial.
“One hour into the proceedings, the judge ruled that Gross was suffering from the early stages of dementia and was in no condition to defend himself in a court of law,”
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