"Jenny!"

He raced through the one-bedroom apartment, checking the kitchen, the small dining room and the bedroom. The destruction was thorough. In the bedroom, the mattress was thrown half off the bed and split open. Clothes dangled from half-open drawers and littered the floor of the closet.

The apartment was empty.

"Jenny!" he yelled, knowing there would be no answer.

Who had ransacked the apartment? And where was Jenny? If she was in hiding, how would she contact him? She didn't even know he was in Berlin.

He went back into the living room. He heard a sound behind him in the darkness of the apartment. Keegan walked slowly across the room, knelt down next to the desk and started to pick up some mail that was scattered on the floor. The floor creaked. He could feel the presence of someone else in the room. He turned slightly and as he did strong arms suddenly grabbed him around the throat in a choke hold.

Keegan slashed back and up with his elbow, buried its sharp point in the groin of his assailant. The man grunted with pain as Keegan stood and spun at the same time, throwing a hard, straight jab into the face of the man. As he did a second man jumped him, wrapping his arms around Keegan's waist, pinning his arms to his sides. A third man moved swiftly toward Keegan, who raised both legs and kicked him in the stomach, then slammed his head back into the face of the man who was holding him. The man screamed as his nose shattered. Keegan twisted out of his grip and threw a hard uppercut to his jaw. The assailant spun away and fell over a coffee table.

Again Keegan was attacked from the back, powerful arms holding Keegan's arms in check. A thick cloth was thrust over his face. He choked as chloroform stung his eyes and nose. He tried to hold his breath but he was hit in the stomach and his wind rushed out. The cloth was jammed tighter as he gasped for breath. The room began to spin around. His arms lost their strength and his legs went numb. He was aware he was still struggling but the room seemed to shrink around him and grow darker. He fell backward into a void.

He awoke slowly, as if coming out of a long coma. The smell of chloroform was still on his skin. He was blindfolded and tied to a hard chair. He felt nauseous and he swallowed hard, took several deep breaths. The feeling of malaise slowly dissipated.

"Herr Keegan, I am going to untie your hands and remove the blindfold," a voice said. "There is a man across the room from me with a gun. If you try to leave the chair, he will kill you."

The blindfold was pulled off and his hands were untied. He squinted into a blazing spotlight.

"Jesus," Keegan groaned as he rubbed the feeling back into his wrists and hands and then shielded his eyes with one hand. A large man stood silhouetted in front of him, smoking a cigarette. Behind him, another outline, this one smaller and aiming a Luger at him.

"What do you want?" Keegan asked.

"What were you doing in Frulein Gould's apartment?"

"Are you the police?"

There was a pause, then: "We are the state police. You are guilty of breaking into the apartment."

He studied the two shapes more closely. Both wore beards and had long, shaggy hair. They were dressed in work shirts and corduroy pants.

"Well, somebody obviously beat me to it," Keegan answered and an edge began to creep into his voice. "And while we're at it, where is Miss Gould?"

"I will ask the questions."

"Maybe you should check with her before you push this any farther."

"Perhaps you can tell us where she is?"

A tremor of dread rippled through Keegan. Was this some kind of ruse? If they were the Gestapo, where was Jenny and what were they doing in her apartment? And where was he and why were they grilling him?

Something didn't play right.

"You came into Tempelhof tonight on your private plane, Mr. Keegan. You walked right through customs."

"So?"

"No customs inspection?"

"I didn't have any luggage. Besides, I go in and out of Berlin all the time. They all know me."

"So they let you through and followed you to her flat."

"No way. Somebody started to follow me but I dumped them." He stopped and looked at his two abductors for a moment and smiled. "Of course. It was you guys. You're the ones I dumped. And since I dodged you and you showed up at her place anyway, you knew where she lived. Hell, you were after me. Why?"

"I will ask the questions, you just talk."

"Okay. Want me to tell you what I don't think?" Keegan said.

"So? What don't you think, Herr Keegan?"

Keegan again held a hand up so it blocked the harsh light and looked back and forth between his captors.

"I don't think you're Gestapo. You don't look like Gestapo, you don't act like Gestapo, you sure as hell don't dress like them. Your hair's too long and you wear beards. And if you were Gestapo, you wouldn't be asking me about customs. Besides, if you were Gestapo we'd be down in one of those dingy state buildings and I'd probably have electrodes attached to my testicles. Isn't that the way they do it?"

"You are very perceptive, Herr Keegan. But we knew that. What else don't you think?"

"Well, if you aren't Gestapo then my guess is you're probably just the opposite. What are you, some kind of vigilantes? Guerrillas? And what am I doing here? And what were you doing ransacking Jenny Gould's apartment?"

"We were not responsible for that."

"Then who was? The Gestapo?"

"You're very clever, Mr. Keegan, the question now is, where do you stand?"

"About what?"

"About Vierhaus. How close is your relationship with Vierhaus?"

"Vierhaus! I don't have a relationship with Vierhaus. I've seen him at a couple of parties and I got stuck in a steam bath with him once. And what the hell business is that of yours anyway? Who the hell are you?"

"Vierhaus is the head of an organization called Die Sechs Fchse," the bearded man said. "You didn't know that?"

"The Six Foxes?" he said.

"It is a special intelligence group, completely separate from the SS. He is head of this group and he reports only to Hitler."

"You telling me that Vierhaus is some kind of superspy?"

The big, bearded man nodded slowly. "He is perhaps more dangerous than Himmler or even Heydrich. Everyone knows what they are up to but Herr Doktor is a question mark. We know he advises Hitler so we know he has influence. We also know he has a soul as black as my beard."

"How do you know that?"

"Because it is my business to know it, Herr Keegan."

"Well, just what the hell is your business, anyhow? And what's all this got to do with me? I'm not a German."

"You claim to be in love with a German."

Keegan's temper exploded. Where was Jenny and who were these jokers and what was all this wind about Vierhaus and superspies and the Gestapo? He jumped up suddenly, sending the chair spinning off behind him. It clattered against the wall. The man with the gun got edgy and held it at arm's length pointed straight at Keegan's head.

"That's none of your goddamn business!" Keegan snarled, walking up to him until the muzzle was an inch from his forehead. "And I'm tired of you waving that thing in my face. Either put it away or use it," he said flatly.

"Don't be foolish, American."

"I think you're all bluff. You didn't bring me here to waltz, you brought me here because you want something. Now why don't you just get to it and stop waving that piece around."

"Don't make light of the . . ."

"Hey, why the hell am I here?" Keegan demanded. He moved forward until the muzzle of the pistol was touching his forehead. "There, you can't miss. Now, either you pull that trigger or tell me what the hell you want. I told you I don't know anything about Vierhaus. And how do you know about my relationship with Jenny . . . and what the hell business is it of yours anyway?"

The bearded man stared at him for several seconds. He reached out and lowered the arm of the man with the gun.

"My name is Avrum Wolffson," he said finally. "Jenny is my half sister."

"Your sister!" Keegan said with shock. He stared at Wolffson for several seconds, then said, "Well, she ought to get after you for playing with guns."

"Do you make a joke of everything?"

"Why not? Life's a joke. And the older you get the funnier it gets. Look, I came over here to get my fiancee and take her back to Paris. I get here, her apartment is a mess. She's gone. I get a face full of chloroform, I wake up in a warehouse someplace with hot lights and guns in my face and you guys giving me the third degree, now you tell me you're her brother? What the hell is going on?"

"I had to make sure you were not connected with Vierhaus."

"Why? Because of Jenny? Is this some kind of bizarre family tradition, to try and scare the hell out of her suitors? I'm in love with your sister. I've asked her to marry me. I mean, why would I do such a thing?"

"I don't know, but you and I were the only ones who knew where she lived. Somebody got to her place and she's gone. And I didn't tell anybody, so that leaves you."

Keegan was getting angrier but he controlled himself.

"I didn't tell a soul," he said.

The big question now was, why was anybody after Jenny? Why?

"Why do they want her?" Keegan asked.

"You really do not know, eh?"

"If I knew would I ask you?"

"Perhaps. If you were trying to convince us you are not involved."

"You're very paranoid."

"Yes, it keeps us alive."

Wolffson lit another cigarette. He held the tip of it up and blew a stream of smoke across the end of the cigarette, watching it glow, giving himself more time to make his decision.

"Come on, Wolffson, why would the Gestapo be dogging me?"

"The light is on her. She is the target."

"What do you mean, the target?"

"I mean the Gestapo is onto her. She has been betrayed and we think your friend Vierhaus is the one who is after her."

"Betrayed? By who? And for what?"

"Some miserable Judenopferer turned her up."

"A what?"

"A Judenopferer is a Jew who hunts other Jews. The word literally means 'Jew sacrificer.' They spend hours going over court records, looking for the most remote Jewish connection, they listen to rumors, infiltrate families . . ."

"You still haven't told me why."

"To get to me."

Keegan sighed. "Okay, I'll play. Why do they want you?"

"Have you ever heard of an organization called the Black Lily?"

"No . . . Wait a minute. I did hear that expression once. At the American embassy."

"The night you refused to help Reinhardt?"

Keegan did not answer for a long time. He felt his pockets for his cigarettes and matches and lit a cigarette and then slowly started to nod.

"That's right," he said. "The night I turned my back on Reinhardt." He rubbed his eyes. "Look, Wolffson, I know a lot of things now I didn't know then. But I don't know what the Black Lily is. And can we do without the hot lights? I'm getting a headache."

Wolffson turned around and made a motion with his hand. The heavy light went out and a small table lamp was turned on in its place. A third man was sitting at a table nearby. The room appeared to be a one-room flat. It was small and contained a bed and dresser, a table and two chairs, a stuffed easy chair and a floor lamp. Black cloth was taped over the windows. In a corner there was a small table that held a hot plate with a coffee pot simmering on it.

The man at the table was unarmed and his nose was flattened and bruised. He was clean shaven, had a conventional haircut and wore wire-rimmed glasses. The shorter man with the gun had a bandage taped to his jaw, which was badly bruised and swollen. He was burly, his muscular arms straining rolled-up sleeves, and had fierce, angry eyes, the demeanor of a man holding himself in check but about to explode. A thick black beard added to his ominous presence. The tall man's left eye had begun to swell. He, too, was in excellent physical condition but his look was intense rather than mad and his beard was more scholarly than menacing. He was calm and totally in command.

None of them could have been more than twenty-five or twenty-six years old.

Well, thought Keegan, looking at the bandages and bruises, I got in a few licks anyway.

"One gun?" he said. "You have one lousy gun?"

"We are on the run, have been for months. But it is now more intense. You know what it means in German, Freiheit?"

Keegan thought for a moment. He wasn't familiar with it. He shook his head.

"It would be in English something like . . . freedom. We don't blow things up. We don't kill people. We distribute pamphlets and try to help people who are in trouble with the government. Jews, Germans, gypsies, no matter. If they become targets and we know about it, we try to get them out of the country."

"In America, back in the slave days, we called it the Underground Railroad."