The Heritage Paper

Chapter 47



Ben Youkelstein needed to get inside to talk to Rose Shepherd. She’d left out an important detail during their first meeting—her real identity. The murder of Greta Peterson now made perfect sense.

He cursed himself for not putting this together sooner. The Wolf reference—Hitler’s early alias—was a clue she handed him on a silver platter.

Through the darkness outside the prison, he saw a man leave the premises and walk briskly toward an awaiting vehicle.

It couldn’t be, he thought.

But that was just wishful thinking.

And it changed everything.

He waited for the man to drive away, before heading inside. He called for Nina Flores, but was told that she’d left for the evening. He then asked for Sister Goulet.

The person behind the desk informed him that she was in a meeting, and wouldn’t be available for a half hour. He couldn’t wait that long, so he made up a story that he’d left his wallet behind in Rose Shepherd’s room earlier this afternoon, and hoped to retrieve it. A reasonable request, he thought. But like most of modern society, the prison was a bureaucracy and Rose Shepherd would have no visitors without being cleared.

He thought to mention that he believed Rose Shepherd was actually Eva Braun, and her murder of Greta Peterson was connected to a group called the Apostles, who were plotting to raise the Reich from the ashes. But he figured that would just get him a one-way ticket to the psych ward. He had too much to do to spend his final days in a straitjacket. So he impatiently waited.

Thirty minutes later, Sister Goulet met him with a smile. He told her his “lost wallet” story and she led him to Rose Shepherd’s prison suite.

When she opened the door the smell of bitter almonds attacked his senses.

Rose Shepherd was sprawled out on the floor in front of her favorite chair. The television was blasting out the ten o’clock news with wall-to-wall coverage of tomorrow’s election. Sister Goulet rushed to the woman on the floor.

Youkelstein didn’t move. This time he was sure that Eva Braun was dead.