Collision of Evil

  Collision of Evil

  Collision of Evil

  A NOVEL

  John J. Le Beau

  Copyright © 2009 by John J. Le Beau

  FIRST EDITION

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  ISBN: 978-1-933515-54-0

  Published in the United States of America by Oceanview Publishing, Ipswich, Massachusetts www.oceanviewpub.com

  2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1

  PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

  To my mother, Edith, my aunt Jane, and my late father,

  Lawrence, all of whom have provided a ceaseless fountain

  of affectionate support and wise counsel.

  Acknowledgments

  It goes without saying that any faults of fact or fiction in this novel are the author’s alone, but its measure of accuracy owes much to the wise counsel of a number of others. The development of this book was greatly enhanced by frequent and wide-ranging conversations with a number of terrorism specialists in the academic field, most notably Professors Nick Pratt and Christopher Harmon, both active in the counterterrorism program of the George C. Marshall Center for International and Security Studies, located in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany. Both of them have decades of counterterrorism experience to draw on, and both were entirely generous in sacrificing their time and offering their thoughts as valuable background for this enterprise. In Nick’s case, collegiality extended to sharing a windblown tent in the frigid temperatures of winter in Afghanistan. As well, John Sawicki, a fine friend and confidant, was instrumental in helping me move this work along from a series of rough thoughts to its present form.

  I salute as well the many necessarily anonymous counterterrorism practitioners with whom I have had the privilege to engage with over the years. Their commitment, energy, and deeds largely play out in the shadows of an invisible landscape, and the accolades they merit are all the greater for that.

  Finally, I am indebted to the team at Oceanview Publishing for their professionalism, interest in this book, and genuine helpfulness throughout the publication process. Their friendly and inclusive attitude is surely the binding mortar of teamwork, and is, by my lights, no small virtue.

  Collision of Evil

  SALZBURG, AUSTRIA, JUNE 2003

  Judged by the discriminating standards of Salzburg, Austria, the neighborhood was without charm and of slightly shabby appearance, with three-story concrete apartment buildings of no distinction facing onto an unremarkable street. It was late on a July afternoon in 2003, a day when brief bursts of sunlight competed with sudden passing showers, when a bomb weighing five hundred pounds was discovered by construction workers laboring on a building site. The deadly cargo was not the creation of Islamic terrorists and had, in fact, been manufactured in the United States.

  This explosive device was of venerable pedigree, one of hundreds of bombs dropped over Salzburg by the U.S. Army Air Force in 1944, as World War II wound down in its last convulsions. The other bombs dropped on that long-ago summer afternoon had exploded on impact, leveling entire apartment blocks, railroad facilities, and warehouses of Wehrmacht military stores while at the same time ending scores of lives, young and aged, military and civilian.

  This particular bomb, however, had not exploded with its siblings due to the vagaries of its construction and the soil conditions at the spot where it landed. Instead, the heavy metal, finned cylinder had burrowed deep into a muddy lot where it slept, the path of its travel and its subterranean lair concealed by earth and debris.

  The bomb continued its marathon sleep through the end of the war in 1945, the reconstruction of Salzburg in the early 1950s, the filming of The Sound of Music in the 1960s, and decades of concerts at the Salzburg Music Festival. Over time, most of the combatants who had fought in the war, for which the bomb was intended, died of natural causes. Year after year, hundreds of tourists visiting this handsome Austrian city strolled along a sidewalk only yards away from the concealed explosive, oblivious to its lethargic but lethal presence.

  The explosive package, its frame rusted and matted with deep brown earth, was only uncovered in 2003 as a backhoe dug a cellar hole for a new, architecturally prosaic building. Three bomb disposal specialists from the Austrian Department of the Interior were called and set about defusing the bomb. Something in the procedure went unaccountably wrong, however, and the antique device was shaken from its half century of slumber, exploding with a massive flash and accompanying roar sufficient to destroy nearby automobiles, damage apartments on the street, and shatter windows a kilometer away.

  The low, growling report of the explosion was heard by tourists at the Salzburg Fortress on a hill above the city. Many of the tourists were American, like the bomb itself, and were unaware of the provenance of the sound, imagining it to be alpine thunder. Of the three Austrians working to defuse the device, two were instantly killed, indeed atomized, and the third suffered severe wounds. Although none of these men had been alive in 1944, they were, in a very real sense, victims of the Second World War.

  The American crew that had dropped the bomb in the mid-twentieth century would never have believed their air raid would reap victims unborn at the time of their combat flight, in a future too distant and alien to be imagined. It is even likely that some member of the crew had visited Salzburg years after the war, both to listen to some Mozart and to contemplate once again those small, invariably personal events of wartime— “See that steeple, Ethel? I remember it. We came in low from the west, and Jimmy was trying to follow the river to guide in on the train station. We took flak from over that way —”

  The explosion of the bomb on an otherwise quiet afternoon might suggest something more than the much-uttered truism that actions produce unanticipated consequences and that the past can reach out and grasp the present in an embrace not always benign.

  Chapter 1

  Charles Hirter felt a surge of freshness after his long morning shower and he studied himself in the mirror as he toweled his thick hair. Although not vain by nature, he concluded that he looked as well as he felt. The long days of backpacking through the mountainous Bavarian countryside had left him taut and tanned and with a reserve of energy that had become depleted prior to this much-anticipated vacation. Had someone been able to inform him that he would be dead before the day was done, his body a wreck of blood, shattered bone, and ripped tissue, Hirter would have branded the person insane as well as tasteless. Dressing quickly into casual clothes, he collected his wallet and room key and took the stairs down to the hotel breakfast room on the ground floor, looking forward to the continental buffet that would constitute his last meal.

  He lingered over a cup of strong Tchibo coffee, toyed with the remains of a sunflower seed roll, and leafed idly through the sports section of the International Herald Tribune, grateful for the comfortable familiarity of letters strung together to form his mother tongue. A few minutes later, he continued his vacation ritual by rising from his table and wandering into the broad hotel lobby.

  The Hotel Alpenhof was decorated in faux Old Bavarian style, not surprising in view of the hotel’s location in the Upper Bavarian Alps a few miles from the Austrian border. In addition to an oversized fireplace, with logs burning day and night, the lobby contained much dark wood, a beamed ceiling, and
terra cotta floor replete with handwoven country rugs. The walls were outfitted with early twentieth century romantic oil paintings depicting hunting scenes and rural landscapes. The rustic effect was enhanced by a row of antlers above the front desk and the folkloric Trachten outfits for the staff, male and female. Although some guests might have considered the overall effect too studied, a sort of Disney-does-Germany, Charles found the decorative embrace quite cozy.

  A glance out the lobby picture window confirmed that the morning weather was sunny, although rainstorms had been predicted for late afternoon. Charles stretched, smiled at an attractive passing waitress, and decided he had better strike out while the weather held. He returned to his room for his hiking boots, backpack, and map and emerged from the hotel minutes later, rejoicing in the feel of the sun and the alpine landscape.

  During the past two days Charles had explored the narrow valley, walking several kilometers a day, returning to his lodgings in the evening. The terrain consisted of grassy mountain meadows called alm by the Germans, interspersed with brooding expanses of dark pine forest, all of it crisscrossed by clear mountain streams, winding down from the summits above in serpentine patterns.

  It was the mountains that interested Charles, and he consulted his creased topographical map for a sense of where to strike out. He traced his finger along a prospective route where the ground rose gradually. The map revealed a footpath that would take him through high meadows and eventually into a large stand of woods, which should then fall away to reveal dramatic dolomite peaks. Charles moved his eyes to the alpine massif above and formed an impression of where he was headed. “Okay,” he muttered out loud, “up and back by nightfall.” He noted he had left his rain poncho back in the room, but the skies were intensely blue with no hint of clouds and he decided to chance it. He cinched his nylon backpack straps tightly about his shoulders and started on his way.

  At mid-morning it was warm, but not uncomfortable, in the direct sun; the afternoon promised to be warmer still, but Charles reasoned that he should reach the wooded heights by that time and the temperature would be cooler in the shade. He kept a steady pace, aware that once he had reached the peaks he would have to return as well. He still had another week of vacation ahead of him and intended to enjoy all of it, and had plans to visit nearby Salzburg if the weather turned inclement.

  It was true that his vacation had not developed as originally planned. The trip had been the idea of Jeanette, his girlfriend of four years. The two of them had planned the details, sitting on the floor of his Newton, Massachusetts, apartment with glasses of wine and tourist brochures spread out before them. They had purchased two round-trip tickets from Boston to Munich at an excellent price six months in advance. Charles and Jeanette’s enthusiasm for the trip had been intense, but in the intervening six months their enthusiasm for one another had waned.

  Thinking about it as his boots dug into the rugged path, Charles concluded that there had been no single event that had ended their relationship. It was as if they were both positive magnets; they had come as close to one another as they could but could not bridge some final gap. By degree they had distanced until the time came for them to travel together. It had been Jeannette who had the courage to say that she had decided to forego the trip, using the pretext of needing to spend time with her aging parents. And so, he now found himself exploring the Alps alone.

  Charles stopped for a moment to check his bearings. The hotel was out of sight and the path had taken him higher, into rocky meadowland flush with high grass. A herd of cows grazed nearby, noting his presence in their bovine way, but otherwise paying him no heed. Charles unclipped his water bottle and indulged in a long drink while observing that the sky had now darkened. Purple cloud banks were moving in silently, as if hoping to cover the sun by stealth. For a second Charles considered cutting short his trek and returning to the hotel, but he reasoned that the clouds might pass, and he did not want to spend the afternoon sipping beer in the hotel bar. Even if it rained, he concluded, that wouldn’t kill him.

  By one in the afternoon, it was obvious that the ascent was taking longer than anticipated due to the rough, untraveled route. Although the terrain remained open ground with a scattering of boulders, the grade was steep enough that his calves and ankles ached. More troubling was that the blue skies of morning had now been entirely vanquished and the clouds were of a brooding gun metal hue. Still, Charles thought, there might be a hut up ahead where he could wait out the storm. He moved on.

  An hour later the first drops of rain pelted down with force. Within minutes the storm intensified, the water turning to hail, driven by a sudden wind and accompanied by a drop in temperature. “Shit” Charles muttered as he pulled a crumpled Boston Red Sox baseball cap from his backpack. He noted through waves of hail that the meadows gave way to a tree line up ahead, offering a prospect of protection. Breathing in deeply, he broke into a trot, skidding from time to time on the slick grass beneath his feet. He passed through the first row of pine trees and felt the cushioning carpet of needles under his boots. The assault of hail and rain diminished, absorbed by the tangle of branches above him.

  It was dark in the woods. The sky, stripped of sun by the storm, and the thick forest filtered away most of the remaining light, and color was reduced to somber greens and browns. Leaning against the bark of a large tree, Charles pulled a Corny energy bar from his jeans and consumed it in slow bites while considering what to do. Before he finished with the snack, the first flash of lightning and the jolting report of thunder nearly threw him to the ground. The blast had struck somewhere very close, and he heard the unmistakable sound of shearing timber. It occurred to him that he was now in exactly the wrong place during a thunderstorm, and he felt a knot tighten in his stomach.

  Searching for better shelter, Charles saw an outcropping of gray stone up ahead through the sentinel ranks of the trees. He forced his aching legs into motion and moved toward the rocks, slipped, and fell hard into the pine needles below, the contents of his backpack slamming into his spine. With effort, he raised himself from the dank surface and launched again toward the gray mass in front of him. Three minutes later he was at the outcropping and saw that its rough surface was the exposed base of the massif itself, thrusting up from the earth and forming an alpine peak high above. The stone was slick, rivulets of water cascading down from the torrent.

  Another flash seared his eyes, the tear of a thunderclap reverberating off the rock before him. Charles pitched forward, cutting his cheek against the jagged stone. He was aware of his heart pumping heavily in his chest. The sting of the cold water in his eyes blurred his vision, and he grasped at the wall of stone with both hands, edging along it in a crab walk, hoping to find a crevice in its surface affording better shelter. An angry gust of wind stripped off his cap, but he did not try to retrieve it and continued following the stone outcropping like a blind man, his palms starting to bleed as they ran across the sharp, uneven surface.

  He was suddenly aware that there was no longer a surface under his hands; the massif sheared away from him at a sharp angle. He moved to follow its contour again, crashing loudly through a maze of brush and fallen branches. A crevice he thought, just as he had hoped. He stumbled over loose slate and fell forward with enough force to drive the air from his lungs. Charles pulled himself up to a kneeling position. It was then that he was aware that it was no longer raining. At least, not raining on him. The sound of the storm was behind him but he was protected from its assault. Glancing up he saw darkness and understood that he had found a cave, as if a hole had been punched into the expanse of dolomite.

  As his eyes focused, he was able to make out that his refuge was narrow but appeared deep. He twisted around and saw the forest and the cave entrance a foot or so behind him. He felt the talons of fear loosen their grip and he knew that he was safe from the elements; he could wait out the storm and return to the hotel after it had passed. He pulled the backpack off his shoulders and settled it at his knee
s, digging at it until he located the small plastic flashlight. Flicking it on, he played the beam of light around him.

  He was in a rock arch, the natural ceiling perhaps seven feet above his head. The cave floor consisted of a scattering of pine needles blown in over time from the forest and a surface of pungent earth, its primordial smell filling his nostrils. Edging the light ahead of him he saw that the cave was indeed narrow but deep, disappearing into the distance. He left his backpack where it had dropped and decided to see how far the cave went; he might as well explore his find while the storm raged on. The walls were not uniform, at intervals bulging and receding from his path, but the passage remained sufficiently broad to permit him to navigate its length. He was surprised that after five minutes of walking the cave debouched into a rough chamber perhaps twenty feet across and fifty feet deep. But the pale, steady glare of his flashlight revealed more. At first, he was not certain what he was looking at.

  A series of cubic shapes, perfect squares, were stacked across the chamber. Charles finally realized that the forms he was staring at were crates, their wooden planks heavy with dust. On some of the crates Charles could distinguish black stenciled numbers beneath the veneer of grime. What have we here, deep in an alpine fastness, he wondered as he moved forward to investigate, the recent perils of the storm forgotten.