Bipolar WINTER. Samuel David Steiner

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СКАЧАТЬ Can I come back tomorrow?”

      “Depends,” the owner said then smiled. “I accept donations.”

      Aldo chuckled as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a green 500-peso bill, handing it to him. The man was a bit rough around the edges, but Aldo was quickly becoming fond of him.

      The old man’s eyes sparkled. “You may. Come before I open.”

      “I’ll be here,” Aldo said eagerly. “Thank you.”

      On the way back to the hotel, Aldo picked up some sandwiches de miga at a deli. The crustless, double-layered sandwiches were something he’d heard about from a visiting priest at the university and had wanted to try one ever since. He ordered four, knowing he’d be up for a while and would need something to tide him over.

      When he got back to his room, he propped the pillows against the headboard and switched on his laptop. Reviewing the notes he’d taken at the bookshop, he filled in a few holes from memory and underlined key points. Then he searched the internet for any more information on Josef Mengele.

      All over the web, he found information to support the stories he’d just read. The online versions were more vague as though they had been censored, but they still helped confirm the accounts mentioned in the journals. He also discovered testimonies that Mengele had escaped Germany after the war through ratlines established by ODESSA and eventually found his way to Buenos Aires.

      Aldo sat up as a terrifying thought occurred to him. Could members of the Seventh-day Adventist Church have been involved with ODESSA? It seemed impossible that the Seventh would have aided in the escape of such a notorious murderer, but that was what he needed to find out.

      Aldo kept reading until his eyes started to drift shut. Unable to keep them open any longer, he brushed his teeth and turned off the lamp beside his bed.

      He woke a few hours later soaked in sweat, his heart racing with images from his nightmare still fresh in his mind. An operating room, his body strapped to a cold metal table, his abdomen sliced open and organs removed one by one as he watched, unable to do anything except plead for death.

      Aldo dropped his head back against the headboard and took a deep breath. Those poor children. To have gone through something like that… Such horrors seemed like fiction to him, but for those children, it had been a terrifying reality. In moments like this, the thought of having children of his own scared him. What if his son or daughter were taken away from him? What if he weren’t strong enough to keep them safe from a monster like Mengele?

      He shook off the what-ifs and grabbed a bottle of water from the mini bar. After taking a few big gulps, his heart finally slowed and he settled back under the covers, praying he’d sleep peacefully.

      The next morning, Aldo dressed quickly and hurried back to the bookshop. While he had found plenty of information about Mengele’s life before and during the war, Aldo had not seen much about his days in Argentina, and what he did uncover was just speculation. There had to be something to connect Mengele with the Seventh, something outside their involvement with Nazi pursuits in Germany.Even if the Seventh had been part of ODESSA, their activities were concentrated in Europe. Aldo hoped the old man’s collection would provide more clues.

      Arriving at the darkened bookstore, Aldo looked at his watch, realizing he was an hour early. With a sigh, he walked back down the street to a café he had passed. The brightly lit shop was filled with the rich smells of espresso and freshly baked pastries. Since heavy foods like eggs and meat weren’t typical breakfast fare in Argentina, he ordered an espresso and four medialunas. The waiter brought out the croissant-style pastries with a small dish of creamy brown spread he called dulce de leche. It reminded Aldo of caramel sauce and was a bit too sweet so early in the morning, so he ate the pastries plain.

      When Aldo returned to the bookshop, he saw the owner leaning against the side of the building, waiting for him. After entering, the old man immediately locked the door behind them, and then led the way to the back corner. Stopping before the shelves of romance novels, he tipped his head, indicating that Aldo could do the honors. “I’ll get you in four hours for lunch,” he said before closing Aldo inside the room.

      After a moment of deep breathing to calm his claustrophobia, Aldo dropped into the corduroy chair and picked up where he’d left off. He continued reading throughout the morning, not learning anything new. His stomach was grumbling by the time the old man came to let him out. I’ll have to find an alternative for breakfast. Pastries aren’t going to cut it.

      “Thanks,” Aldo said, shutting the bookshelf behind him. He walked up to the front door, noticed it was locked and glanced back at the old man.

      “Closing for lunch,” the owner said. “Meet back in forty-five minutes.”

      “Sure. Want me to pick up something for you?”

      The old man shook his head and held up a crumpled lunch sack.

      Aldo found a deli nearby and inhaled a sandwich. He still had twenty minutes, so he looked around for a grocer. Finding a small corner store, he purchased a bottle of water and a few protein bars, pocketing them for later.

      He spent the entire afternoon in the concealed room, reading book after book. When the owner came at closing, Aldo glanced at his watch and groaned. “Six o’clock already?” He reached into his pocket and handed him another 500-peso bill. “Same time tomorrow?”

      “Yes,” the old man said, stuffing the money into his pants pocket.

      The next two days went by just as quickly, but for all the reading he had done, Aldo barely filled a handful of pages in his notebook. On his fifth day in the room, just after lunch, Aldo found a small, leather bound book. As he flipped through it, a piece of parchment fell out. He picked it up and unfolded it, discovering a hand-drawn map. A chill ran down his spine as he studied it.

       Is this what I think it is?

      The map showed Frankfort, Germany toward the top, with dotted lines connecting other cities. Innsbruck, Austria was at the center and Genoa, Italy at the bottom. On the thin paper was a small illustration of a ship departing from Genoa for some unknown location across the Atlantic. No markings indicated the borders between countries, just dotted lines showing what looked to be ship routes.

      As Aldo studied the book, his suspicions were confirmed. Sophia Burwitz, the author, was the daughter of a member of ODESSA and Stille Hilfe. Aldo’s German was rough, but he thought Stille Hilfe loosely translated to Silent Help.

      What he knew of ODESSA came from the few mentions of it he found during his research into Mengele and a film with Jon Voight from the seventies, The Odessa File. He wasn't convinced that ODESSA or Stille Hilfe were real, but according to this account, Burwitz had lived among members of those clandestine organizations dedicated to helping SS officers escape Germany at the end of World War II.

      Burwitz detailed the long trek from Memmingen, Germany to Innsbruck, Austria where the escapees then hiked through the Brenner Pass. The route she described matched the map he held in his hands. The officers were then put on a ship bound for South America. A teenager at the time, Burwitz managed to keep her journal secret throughout the journey, hiding it among her belongings or beneath a floorboard in her cabin aboard the ship.

      As he read, Aldo jotted down the names of ODESSA members in his notebook to look up later. Based on her account, though, it seemed less and less likely that the Seventh was involved. ODESSA СКАЧАТЬ