“The bitch duped us,” said Gottfried. “She dumped Karl’s phone in the lobby trash bin.”

“You mean . . .” said Eva.

“Karl and Erich were never here,” said Gottfried. “And if the woman was here, she’s long gone. God knows if any of those messages were even from Karl. If she had the phone . . .”

“Then the assassin could still be with her,” said Eva.

“How could you fucking let this happen,” shouted Ingrid at no one in particular.

“Calm down,” said Gottfried. “The police are still looking for the woman. She’s bound to turn up sooner or later.”

“Yes,” said Ingrid, “and if she has the message it gets taken into evidence. We need to find the woman first, get the message, and then hand her over to the police.”

“So what now?” said Eva. “We’ve blown up your house, we’re further from finding the message than ever.”

“Now we’re fucked,” said Ingrid, dropping her head against the steering wheel.

“Not necessarily,” said Dietrich, looking at his phone.

Alex Lansdowne watched the images on his television and shook his head. His visitors of the previous night had apparently gotten themselves into some significant trouble. They never should have poked their nose into Ingrid Weiss’s business, he thought. He had assumed that when they got to Munich, Weiss would put on a performance and convince them they had got the wrong end of the stick. He never thought she would blow up her own house and he certainly didn’t think Ruthie Drinkwater and her friends would blow up anything. Perhaps he never should have told them about Ingrid. Perhaps he should have mentioned that he had a digital copy of Himmler’s library catalog, obtained when the book was on the market a few years ago. But Alex had done what he always did with intruders: just enough to get rid of them. And he had been honest with them, telling them that he did not choose sides. He had given them no reason to trust him; he had merely sent them packing so he could get on with his day. It had occurred to him that he might be able to use them to add some interesting Nazi artifacts to his collection, and he had taken the necessary steps to preserve that possibility. But now, with a European-wide police investigation underway, he feared he might end up more deeply involved in this whole affair than he had previously hoped. He switched off the television and picked up his phone.