she hadn’t had such an appreciative audience in a long time. Loneliness was as effective a tongue loosener as brandy. “My daughter studied English literature, though I hoped she’d prefer Schiller and Heine as I did. It was Heine where I got her name, of course! Lorelei the water nymph. The maiden on the rock.”
“Your Lorelei was far from just a maiden on a rock to be rescued. What a wonderful shot she was—I remember a hunt at one party—”
“Yes, she was her father’s daughter. His father was a Freiherr in Bavaria, you know—my husband was the younger son, he didn’t inherit the family Wasserburg, but he used to hunt there as a young man. He taught Lorelei to shoot.”
“I thought she was Diana herself. I admit I was quite starry-eyed!”
Frau Vogt sighed. “She should have brought a nice young man like you home from Heidelberg. I was not always approving of the choices she made.” Another tacit silence, broken by a sniff. “Her Obergruppenführer was very dashing, but he was old enough to be her father, and not to mention, well . . .”
Married. Ian shared Frau Vogt’s wish that he hadn’t been, just as devoutly, because if die Jägerin had been Obergruppenführer von Altenbach’s wife rather than his mistress, she would have been much easier to trace. Paperwork flew like confetti at SS weddings; her name and photograph would have been filed in a hundred places.
Tony allowed a tactful silence to fall, not saying a word about the daughter who had become a married man’s mistress. He tipped a little more brandy into both coffee cups, murmuring instead, “Obergruppenführer von Altenbach was much admired. His work in Poland was exemplary, and his generosity unmatched. In fact, that’s what brings me here today, Frau Vogt.” Straightening his tie; the young man of business at last coming to the matter in hand. “Before his death, the Obergruppenführer laid certain provisions in place, looking to the future. Financial provisions for friends and loved ones. And no one, of course, was more important to him than your daughter.”
Ian’s fingers tightened on the curtain’s lace edge. Here it was . . .
“The Obergruppenführer set money aside for your daughter, gnädige Frau. So you see why I’m looking for her.”
Silence below. Ian craned his gaze as far as he could, but all he could see was Frau Vogt’s neat head, the sudden stillness of her shoulders. “Money,” she said at last, and the prickles were back in her voice. “After five years?”
“You know how slowly legalities move.” Tony sighed. “No one was even certain if Lorelei Vogt was alive, especially after the Obergruppenführer’s . . . unfortunate end, in Altaussee. So many people disappearing, so many opportunists. There was a real danger of fraud, with no way to identify your daughter even if she could be found. Which is why it took so long to find someone who knew her.” He gave a modest bow. “Naturally I am being compensated, but truly, it would make me most happy to know I could aid your daughter in claiming what is rightfully hers. She was once kind to a lonely young soldier when he was very far from home—if I can aid her to a life of comfort as the Obergruppenführer wished, it would be my pleasure.”
It wasn’t the first time Ian and Tony had used an inheritance as a lure. In the straitened aftermath of a war, everyone dreamed of unexpected money descending on their lives. The whisper of wealth from dead Nazis was especially potent because everyone had heard of the fortunes squirreled away by the powerful and the prescient high in the Reich. Never mind that I never found a single war criminal living in luxury behind gold-gated estates, Ian thought wryly. Everyone had still heard stories of secret Swiss accounts, priceless paintings down mine shafts, gold held in reserve for . . . someone.
Why not your daughter? Tony’s confiding tone implied. Why not you?
Damn, but you’re good at this, Ian thought with a flash of pride in his partner.
“I wouldn’t expect you to take my word,” Tony went on, slipping a card across the table. “The firm who hired me would be pleased to reassure you.”
“A quick telephone call . . .” Her voice was a blend of caution and appeasement. She wanted to trust this nice young man and everything he was telling her . . . But she wasn’t a stupid woman.