Flight of Dreams (13 page)

H
e squats in front of the cage, face twisted into a scowl. The dog has been left to sit in its own mess. Less than twelve hours since he was here with Joseph Späh, and the mutt has still not been fed or walked. It is pressed into one corner, tail wrapped around its hind legs to avoid lying in the puddle of concentrated urine. Ulla is stretched out in her crate opposite, curious but content, her large dark eyes alert and her chin resting on her paws. The other dog, however, is quivering with pent-up energy. It's some odd mix of greyhound and Labrador and doesn't seem to know what to do with its body in such a small space.

The American sets his palm against the latch and the mutt rushes forward to sniff him. It is overeager. Spastic. Desperate for affection and exercise. Its small black nose is dry and rough against his palm. The dog is hungry and dirty and confused. The sight makes the American angry, and a small bead of heat gathers at the center of his chest.

“What's your name, mongrel?” he asks aloud.

If it was capable of answering, he is certain it would. The dog leans into his hand with such enthusiasm he's afraid it might bend the latch. There is no collar and no paperwork attached to the crate by which to identify it, and a cursory glance at its underbelly reveals no immediately distinguishing signs of gender. Only wet, matted clumps of hair. Given the mess, he isn't inclined to investigate further.

“Shit,” he says, “now I have to kill two people on this damned ship.”

The American unlatches the crate, then steps aside quickly as the dog bolts out. It rushes around his legs in frantic circles, tail lashing and tongue hanging out. “Thirsty? You poor bastard. I have nothing for you.”

He hasn't come for the dog. And it's a distraction now that he's here. But he can't very well ignore it. For one thing the crate is positioned right in front of the steamer trunk he has come to search. For another, he isn't inclined to admit that the dog evokes his pity. That emotion is a weakness. One he cannot afford.

“Sit,” he says, and it does.

“Stay.” Again, it obeys, its tail whipping the floor with a single-minded desperation to please.

He slides the crate out of the way and stands, hands on his hips, as he inspects the stacked pile of steamer trunks. He can see his own, halfway down the right-hand stack, toward the bottom. It's rather battered and old and certainly not the nicest of the lot. Then again, he doesn't usually travel via luxury liners of any sort. He is far more at home in wet trenches, dark bars, and back alleys.

He doesn't have much time. And the trunk he wants is a row back, halfway down the pile. He can see the iconic logo embossed on its leather exterior. It's a bit scuffed now, after so much travel, but that only increases the charm. A woman who can afford such a trunk can also afford to travel. The trunk is holding together nicely, as is its owner. Expensive things always do. Margaret Mather is not the sort of woman who would settle for anything less than Louis Vuitton. To her credit, however, she has not indulged in excess. She has brought only the one trunk. Women in her position often bring ten.

The American shifts the contents of the pile around until he's able to slide out the designer trunk and wrestle it to the floor in front of him. There isn't much space to work in the small cargo area, so he has to open the lid and pull out the compartments carefully. He feels certain Margaret Mather would approve of his delicate handling of her belongings if not the indecency of his digging through them. He finds what he's looking for in the third drawer down. It's cliché, really, the amount of jewels, but she is an heiress after all. Although, from the time he spent with her the evening before it seems as though she really doesn't suit them. She's too humble for this lifestyle.

Three items catch his eye. He goes for the smaller, less obtrusive pieces, the things that won't be immediately missed. A diamond solitaire ring. A delicate gold choker with a ruby pendant. A pair of simple pearl earrings. Anything gaudier than this and he won't be able to trade them for the information he needs. If she misses them at all, it will take some time to detect their absence. He deposits the jewelry in his pocket, then restacks the freight exactly as it was before.

The cargo room is small, square, and unheated. Apart from the dog crates and the steamer trunks, there are some heavy cardboard shipping boxes and a large, wrapped piece of furniture but nothing else. In one corner of the room is a pile of packing blankets, and in the other a stack of old newspapers. They'll have to do. He cleans up the mess inside the crate as best he can using a handful of wadded papers, then lines the bottom of the crate with a few others. The American curses himself for the display of sympathy even as the dog throws itself at his feet in gratitude. He scratches between its ears and under its chin.

“Stupid mutt,” he says as the dog submits itself completely and lies on its back, belly exposed, adoration pooling in its dark eyes. The American can't remember the last time anyone or anything trusted him so quickly or so completely. “Well, no wonder. You're a boy.”

He has always maintained that female dogs are smarter. He wouldn't pick a male dog from a litter to save his life. They destroy everything. They piss on themselves and on everything around them. And they escape at the first sign of a bitch in heat. Not so different from many of the soldiers he has known, now that he thinks about it. But still, given the choice, he would pick a female every time.

“What are we going to do with you? Tragic little fucker. And unlucky too. No name. Shit owner.”

He scoots the reluctant dog back into the crate with his foot, then wipes his fingers on his trousers. He doesn't want to smell like a kennel for the rest of the day. He has already showered and changed his clothes and has no interest in repeating the process. The airship has only one shower, and it doesn't offer much in the way of water pressure or warmth. It does feel good to be clean though, despite the fact that his hair is still damp and his scalp is starting to get cold in the unheated room.

When he locks the crate the dog looks at him as though it's being abandoned.

“You're not my problem,” he says. But the American knows better. He points an accusatory finger at the dog. “Damn it. Pathetic lazy owner. I don't have time for this.”

The dog presses its nose between the wicker slats and whines in response.

“Well, I can't look after a nameless mutt. What should I call you?” He mentally scrolls through every dog name he has ever heard, but they feel trite under the circumstances. So he studies the lean body. The narrow snout. The dappled gray coat. The huge floppy ears. Its keen, intelligent eyes. The way its muscles quiver with anticipation and the longing for freedom. “I bet you're fast,” he mutters.

And then he has it.

“Owens,” he says. “Can't do much better than that. Let's just hope you give these fucking Nazis as much trouble as your namesake. Yes? Good.”

The dog appraises him solemnly.

“I'll make sure you get something to eat soon.”

The American closes the door to the cargo hold and tries to ignore the plaintive whimpering within. He turns away with a whispered oath and begins the trek back to the passenger area. It's a straight shot, though dimly lit, and he can see the security door at the distant end of the keel catwalk, the light above it shining like a beacon. The next shift change won't happen for another thirty minutes, so there's a good chance he can get back to the passenger quarters without running into any of the midshipmen. But when he reaches the bank of crew quarters near the stern, he sees two figures maneuvering down the catwalk toward him. Dark shapes moving with purpose. One is clearly an officer—he can tell by the cap and the jacket and the confident stride—and the other is significantly shorter. Leaner. Gangly. A child maybe? No. That wouldn't be logical. He filters all the possible options until his mind settles on the cabin boy. Yes. What is his name? Werner something. Franz. Werner Franz. Fourteen years old. A toothy boy with the look of perpetual curiosity about him.

The American has two options. Continue forward and face the difficult task of explaining why he has been wandering around prohibited areas of the ship, or duck into one of the crew quarters and run the risk that it is occupied. He has stopped and is reaching his hand slowly toward the door of a cabin when the officer and cabin boy turn onto an access walkway and disappear behind a series of duralumin girders. He makes a quick decision and creeps forward along the catwalk. Closer now, he can see them approach a small exit hatch in the side of the ship. He recognizes the navigator, locates the name in his encyclopedic mind. Max Zabel.

Surely not.

Zabel pushes the lever upward, then pulls the door in. The air immediately shifts and grows colder. The American can hear the whistle of air and the roar of an engine. Slowly, steadily he creeps closer until he can almost hear their conversation, until he can see the look of poorly disguised terror on the cabin boy's face. Then Zabel steps outside the airship, followed hesitantly a few moments later by Werner. The American glimpses a minuscule patch of cloud when he finally comes level to the access walkway. He's fairly certain where the two have gone, though he can't imagine what would have necessitated a trip to an outboard engine.

His curiosity is too strong to let this chance pass. The American treads quickly down the walkway, then sticks his head out the open hatch. The engine gondola lies ten feet below. The access hatch into the gondola is shut. Zabel and Werner are somewhere within, doing God knows what inside the gondola. The American backs away from the hatch; even he is not bold enough to explore outside the ship.

No one sees him as he slips back through the security door and into the passenger area. He makes a quick pass through the lounge to make sure the chief steward is tending passengers and is not in his stateroom. Sometimes fate cooperates in his machinations, and being placed in a cabin next to Heinrich Kubis is fortunate indeed. Not that he has to act drunk and confused when he picks the lock and sneaks into the room—there's no one around to see him—but that is something he can fall back on should he be discovered.

The steward's cabin is identical to his with one exception: a small antechamber used to store shoes and polish. Beyond that there is a meticulously made bed and the usual accouterments of someone in the service profession: first-aid box, sewing kit, miscellaneous grooming paraphernalia. The American cares nothing about these things. He has come for the shipping manifest, and he finds it on the top shelf of Heinrich Kubis's closet. The information he wants is hidden deep within the book, and his body is strained tight as he searches for it. If Kubis returns he will have to hide beneath the bed. And if he is discovered there? Well. That's a choice he'd rather not make this early in the flight.

The dog's name is not shown on the manifest, only its owner's: Edward Douglas. He reads it several times and curses so vehemently he has to wipe spittle from the page. The name is written in black ink, along with everything else, and it takes a bit of creative penmanship for the American to alter this record.

I
t is freezing outside the airship. Not quite dawn. And the elevation, combined with the speed at which the
Hindenburg
travels, has turned the scattered clouds into little specks of ice that pelt against his cheeks. Max braces himself against the brisk rush of Atlantic air. It smells of ocean and frost and the oily hint of engine exhaust. The slipstream moves visibly along the structure like silver ribbons in the pre-dawn light. The sky is a perfect soft pewter gray, and the water beneath them matches as though one is reflecting the other—bands of stratus above, calm sea underneath. The ship glides elegantly between the two, its shadow a charcoal smudge on the gentle waves below.

The barrage of sound coming from the engines is enough to split Max's head wide open. His senses are at war with one another, sight and sound registering two different things: beauty and turbulence. To his left is the propeller, twenty feet long and spinning like a flywheel. One slip, one wrong move, and death will come in the most gruesome way.

Perhaps Werner will think twice before dabbling in blackmail again. His face is strained with the effort not to look juvenile or afraid. And yet he pulls away from the hatch.

“Too late for that now,” Max yells into the wind. “This was your idea. So come along. But mind your step. I'm the one who will have to write your mother if you go tumbling off. We're six hundred feet up. So the fall will kill you. But we can't turn back for your body. Understand?”

Werner nods feebly, and his skin turns a sickly shade of puce.

Max wants to laugh but doesn't. No one has ever fallen from this airship. Or any other that he's aware of. The zeppelins rarely travel fast enough to blow anyone off the ladders. Eighty miles an hour at most. But a bit of fear would do the boy good. He backs out of the hatch and takes one step onto the ladder that leads down into the engine car. “Crook your elbows around the windward edge like this. See?” He nods at his arm, the way it's bent around the handrail. “It will keep you steady against the wind. Go slow. Watch your feet. And you'll be fine.”

Again Werner nods, skeptical.

“Chin up, kid. It's loud as
Hölle
down there.”

Max descends the ladder without further instructions and stomps twice on the hatch door below to announce their arrival. It slides to the side and he drops into the engine room. He already has a certain fondness for the kid, but when Max sees Werner's slender body turn and back out of the opening, he feels a pride that he can only describe as fatherly. Werner is afraid. And hesitant. That much is certain. But he has not said or done anything to give Max cause to regret bringing him along. The boy obeys without question. And he summons the courage when it counts.

“What's he doing here?” August Deutschle is one of three mechanics assigned to this engine and, thankfully, the friendliest of the lot. The look he gives Werner leans more toward curiosity than irritation.

“The little bastard blackmailed me.”

“I like him already.” August grins, quick and wide. “And I'd pay good money to know what he has on you.”

“The day you have money for anything other than booze and gambling will be a miracle.”

“I find it when I need it.” Already the wicked glint is growing in his eyes. “Ten marks says I can get the boy to tell me.”

The last thing he needs is Werner developing a taste for gambling or extortion. Besides, the truth is harmless enough. “Let's just say he caught me conversing off duty with a certain female crew member.”

The mechanic slaps Max on the shoulder hard enough to rattle his teeth. “About damn time!”

He's about to explain that it wasn't
that
sort of conversation when Werner shimmies down the ladder and onto the gondola with only a minor amount of terror. He's sure-footed and well balanced. Once Werner's rubber-soled boots land on the outer hatch ledge August gives an approving nod. “He'll do.”

Max moves aside to let Werner drop down beside him. He rewards the boy with a proud smile and a pat on the back, then returns his attention to August. “What's this with the engine telegraph dial?”

“So they finally figured it out? Good. I was afraid one of us would have to go in.”

“I got here as quickly as I could.”

“But why you? I thought they would send Ludwig Knorr or maybe German Zettel. He's handy in a pinch.” August looks at his watch. “And on duty right now.”

It's a good question, and one he should have stopped to consider sooner. Max pulls the message from his pocket. Unfolds it. Rereads the hastily scribbled surname.
Zettel.
The chief mechanic. He turns slowly to Werner and gives him a withering glare.

“Why?”

There's no point explaining the question. The boy clearly knows what Max is asking. “It was a mistake,” Werner says. His eyes have grown wide, his back rounded into a defensive posture as though he might bolt. Yet there's nowhere to go but up, and he needs Max's help for that.

“I don't believe you.”

“I'm telling the truth. Honest! I thought it said Zabel. At first. And then, while I was waiting for you outside the err…you know, while I was waiting for you and uh,
her
to be…done, I reread the note and saw my mistake. But I'd already interrupted you. And you were mad enough. So I gave it to you anyway.”

“And?” He knows there is more. With Werner there is always more. Layer upon layer of motive.

“And German Zettel doesn't like me. There's no way he would have brought me along.”

“I truly hope this”—he waves his arm around the thunderous engine gondola—“was worth it.”

August laughs. “Clever little bastard, indeed. I'll keep him around. Unless you decide to kill him. In which case I'll help you throw the body overboard. He's probably heavier than he looks.”

It has been a long time since Max navigated the turbulent waters of adolescence, but he remembers his own wild mood swings and those of his parents as they tried, without much success, to keep him out of trouble. So he's not entirely surprised that the pride he felt at Werner's courage a few moments ago has taken a drastic left turn and has been transformed into anger at the boy's idiocy. He says nothing but turns to the control panel and taps on a glass-covered dial. It sits toward the bottom, grouped with other similar meters. But this needle spins frenetically, never settling on a number.

“Can you hear it?” August asks. “The engine. I can't adjust it with that thing broken.”

Max can hear the engine. And he can also feel a slight shudder in the floor beneath him. This engine is working out of sync with the others. The mechanics have the noisiest job aboard the airship, and Max has never quite known how they don't lose their hearing within a week. The cacophonous roar of the diesel engines drowns out everything but the loudest yell. It's an alarming sound and Werner has backed himself up against the wall, hands over his ears and face scrunched in concentration. Max suspects that this is a defensive position and that the boy is waiting for Max to cuff his ear. The thought is tempting.

All of the mechanics wear thick leather aviator caps and earplugs beneath the flaps, but he knows that they rely mostly on lip reading and a sign language of sorts—adapted shorthand for the temporarily deaf. Each of them is limited to short double shifts, two hours during the day and three hours at night. The downtime is supposed to provide a respite from the noise, but since their quarters are located near the stern, they never really escape the deafening clamor of the Daimler-Benz motors. Max knows that the mechanics often wake when the engines are shut down for midair repairs. The silence is startling to them. It's an odd job, this, and few men are well suited for it. Given Werner's response to the danger and the noise thus far, Max would guess the boy is not one of them. Not that Max can blame Werner. He would sooner quit aviation altogether than spend one full day in this engine gondola, dangling over the Atlantic Ocean, slowly going deaf, and—depending on their destination—either half-frozen or melting right out of his uniform. Max Zabel aspires to consistency, calmness, and, above all else, self-control. He is a man who avoids extremes at all costs.