The Day After Tomorrow_ A Novel - Allan Folsom [268]
Scanning the station again, Osborn stepped from behind the train, crossed the platform and walked toward the far end of the station. He moved quickly, his jacket open, his hand near the gun. All his senses were alert. A movement in a shadow, a footstep behind him, someone appearing suddenly from a doorway. He flashed back to Paris and the tall man dead on the Montparnasse sidewalk outside La Coupole, with McVey lifting his pant leg to reveal his artificial limbs that could let him be tall or short or somewhere in between at will. Was Von Holden filled with the same tricks? Or had he others, even more bizarre and ingenious?
Osborn stayed out in the open where he could be seen by everyone. He passed an old man walking slowly, using a cane. Osborn wondered if he’d live that long.
An old man with a cane!
Osborn whirled, his hand under his jacket, ready to jerk out the revolver and fire. But the old man was just an old man and kept going. Again the announcement train whistle, and Osborn turned back toward it. Ahead he could see the American railroad enthusiasts. They were going for the Jungfraujoch train too. If he could catch up, he could blend in with them.
“Achtung! Achtung! Doktor Osborn. Telefon, bitte!” The public address page echoed through the station. Osborn stopped in his tracks. Von Holden not only knew he was there, he knew his name.
“Doctor Osborn of the United States, telephone, please!”
Osborn looked around for a telephone. He saw them at the edge of the building. A double phone booth, side by side. Both were empty. His first inclination was to ask someone where the paging operator was located, but he didn’t have time. Through the open door he could see the last of the Americans boarding the train. What was Von Holden doing? Was he positioned somewhere outside with a high-powered rifle targeted on the telephones? Was some kind of high-tech explosive device connected to the phones and set to go off automatically on pickup, or be detonated by remote control like the blast at the Hotel Borggreve?
A final announcement for the Jungfraujoch train was followed immediately by the announcement of an incoming train. Then came another page for him. Outside, conductors were hurrying the last of the passengers onto the, Jungfraujoch train.
Think! Think! Osborn said to himself. You know nothing about Jungfraujoch station or what Von Holden plans to do when he gets there. If this is a trick, and you miss, the train, he’ll be a full hour ahead of you. Enough time to get away completely now that he knows you’re this close. But if he’s still here and watching and you get on the train, all he has to do is wait for it to leave and he’s home free. Takes the next train out and it’s the last you ever hear of him. Maybe he was never going to Jungfraujoch in the first place. On the other hand, what if he was? Jungfraujoch is the last stop on the line. If he is going there, because of the Berghaus thing, think why! What’s his objective? If he’s carted whatever he’s got in his rucksack all the way from Berlin to Interlaken—especially after escaping the fire at Charlottenburg and killing the Frankfurt policemen—whatever it is must be very important, maybe even crucial to the Organization. If so, he may be delivering it to someone at Jungfraujoch, someone even more powerful than Scholl. If that’s the case, what would be more important, the mission or the lone man trying to stop it? If he kills me here, he’s set. But if something goes wrong and he misses, or he’s captured, then whatever he’s doing ends here.
“Attention, Doctor Osborn. Telephone, please!”
No! Don’t fall for it! He’s having you paged but it’s a trick! He’s already on the train ahead of this one! Suddenly Osborn moved. In two steps he was out the door and running for the train. A moment later he reached out, grasped the rear handrail and swung on board. Almost immediately the train started off.