Kaiser Wilhelm Institut. In Berlin! Zugspitzstrasse. 93. The store rooms.’
‘How –’
‘Famous in…eugenic circles. Not really known to anyone else. This was a note made by Dresler for your father, right?’
‘Yes.’
‘So he’s given him an address. Where to find the Fischer data, maybe, or some clue as to where the data might be…This is the Institut.’
‘But it’s in Berlin. How does it relate to here –’
The scientist’s smile was triumphant. Even in the pure and horrifying drama, he was helplessly exulting in his own cleverness.
‘I worked it out! There is something in this room from Germany.’
He turned and pointed. At the Herero Skulls.
‘Them?’
‘They were repatriated, from Berlin, in 1999. After years of wrangling. They used to be kept in the Kaiser Wilhem Institut. Now they are here. They have been to Germany. They were in Fischer’s possession throughout the war, and after at the Institut. The answer must be in them somehow.’
Angus moved quickly to the plinth and picked up the biggest skull. He turned the sad and smiling cranium in his hand.
‘An obscene joke. The Nazis loved obscene jokes, they paved Jewish ghettos with Jewish gravestones, so the Jews would trample their own dead. And –’ He was examining the skull, closely. ‘And where better to hide something very, very…important…than a skull like this? A sacred relic of a terrible genocide. Fischer must have known no one would ever smash it open, retrieve the secret, unless they definitely knew what they wanted, where they were seeking.’ He lifted up the skull, squinted inside, then he lifted it higher, talking quietly to the skull. ‘Sorry, brother, I am so very fucking sorry – but I have to do this. Forgive me.’
He dropped the skull on the floor. The dry aged bone shattered at once, almost gratefully. Crumbling in the dust, adding dust to orange dust.
A tiny steel cylinder glinted on the floorboards, amidst the scattered shards of bone. Angus picked it up.
‘Hidden in the olfactory cavity.’
Amy and David gathered around. Faces tensed, and perspiring.
Angus ripped the top off the slender metal tube, and pulled out a tiny, exquisitely rolled piece of paper, almost leathery in consistency, like parchment but somehow finer.
The Scotsman focussed and examined the yellowed slip of paper. Etched across the paper, in faded old ink, was a tiny map.
‘Zbiroh!’ A sigh of exultant relief. ‘Zbiroh…’
Any explanation was truncated. A shadow had just flickered the dusty light of the hut. A Namibian security guard had passed the window, and was standing at the door, pushing his way inside.
Angus shoved the map in the tube, pocketed the tube, and ran to the entrance; he flung the door open, and confronted the guard – waving his gun at the terrified guard’s chest.
The guard stepped back, retreating into the dazzling sun.
‘No! No trouble! Want no trouble!’
‘Good,’ said Angus, as he advanced, and patted the guard’s pockets. He drew out a pistol and phone, and handed them to David. And tilted a head at the sea.
Grabbing the items with gusto, David hurled the gun and the phone into the crashing waves, just metres away. Seagulls fluttered and shrieked in alarm.
Angus was gesturing at the guard. ‘OK. Stay here. Don’t move. We’re going. Take a staycation. All-fucking-right?’
They sprinted down the path to the mainland; David glanced behind – the guard was indeed standing there, black and statuesque in the sun, staring at them, perplexed, immobile, a silhouette of doubt.
The path turned onto the road and they ran right into the traffic – Angus waved a wad of South African rand at the very first Toyota sedan. The driver grinned and squealed his brakes.
The three of them jumped in, sweating and cramped. Angus snapped.
‘Airport! Fast as you can.’
The drive took ten minutes: swerving and racing through the sun-dusted streets. They tilted past the Bank of Windhoek, an old pool hall, and a Shell garage – and then they were out of town: on the surrounding flats. David was remembering Miguel. The big black cars, roaring up the canyon.
The thought was horrifying. Miguel could be around here, right now. Any minute he could just show. The big black car door flashing open.
Found you.
The whirring yellow sands were writhing across the road, making serpents of dust. They were out in the desert again. They were motoring through the wilderness. Angus took out the map and scrutinized it. And then he sat back. And yelled.
‘Look!’
Terrible panic filled David: he looked, and saw nothing. Miguel?
Angus was still pointing: ‘Look at that. That’s a rare and precious sight. Look at