Amerika (52 page)

‘I mean you can’t land this plane without me. And I refuse to do so. You can shoot me, but you’ll still be out of luck. Nobody here can get this bucket of bolts down in one piece. We’ll all die. I’ll just be dead a little sooner, that’s all.’

‘But Miss James...’

She laughed. ‘Are you kidding? I can handle straight and level, pal, but landing this monster? Find somebody else.’

I said, ‘Now, this is the part in the movie where your Nazi goon says, ‘I am multi-engine rated on seaplanes,
Herr
Bauer, stand aside.’ Right? Go ahead and say it, Hauptmann.’

A long silence. Both men looked like idiots. Ava said softly, ‘Mexican

Standoff anybody?’

Bauer smiled. ‘It seems we have reached one indeed. You have your ‘gun,’ so to speak, captain, and I have mine thanks to
Herr
Ziegler. And
Hauptmann
? He has a real one. None of us wants to surrender. So what shall we do?’

‘You tell me.’

He reached inside his leather coat pocket, I tensed and he paused.

‘Don’t worry, it’s not a gun.’ He took out an envelope and handed it to me.

‘Please open it. I will be interested in your reaction.’

Two small black-and-white photographs: Abby sitting in a chair in an empty room, hair tousled, and lips pressed in a thin line of worry and her frightened eyes as big as saucers. The other photo, she and my mother, Rosie on a shabby couch, arms around each other, their knees touching, and their wide eyes staring at something just beyond camera range.

‘As you can see, your family misses you,’ Bauer said. ‘Land this plane, let us have Doctor Friedman and the bomb, and you can have your family back.’

‘Where are they, damn it?’

‘Safe and sound in Key West. But if you don’t cooperate, I can’t be held responsible for what will happen next.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘They’ll be killed, of course.’

‘You bastard...’

‘Orders, captain. I have mine and you have yours. Mine are to stop this plane from completing its mission, no matter the cost. I suggest you help me by complying. The choice is yours, of course. But I should think losing your wife and infant son was hard enough. To lose little Abby and your mother would be tragic beyond belief - at least to me.

‘But perhaps I have overestimated you all along. Perhaps you are not a sensitive family man trying to put his broken family back together again.
Nein
, you are made of much sterner stuff
, Ja?
Willing to let innocent people die for the sake of principle. I salute your iron will. As does
Der Führer.’

I handed the photographs to Orlando, who shook his head slowly, like an ox bemoaning something unspeakable.

Bauer stood there, leather jacket and all, with his bullet-headed henchman beside him, master of the situation, every contingency planned, every ‘i’ dotted, every ‘t’ crossed.

I felt like I did when Pop used to beat me in chess; that painful moment where after evaluating every conceivable escape route for my king, I was forced to reach out and tip my king to the board in defeat.

‘Deal,’ I finally managed to say, then turned and slowly walked toward the cockpit.

Bauer called out after me, ‘A wise choice, captain. Not a pleasant one I’m sure, what with your patriotism and desire to right the wrong with your comrades in arms here. But Abby will thank you one day when she is all grown up and has a family of her own. She will thank you for her life.’

I turned around and came back. ‘No she won’t. She’ll ask me why I didn’t keep my word. Why I didn’t act on my beliefs, why I didn’t fight you and your Nazi goons to the very end.’

He seemed amused at this. ‘And what will be your answer?’

I exchanged a quick glance with Orlando. He nodded imperceptibly.

‘Well?’ Bauer pressed.

‘I will tell her that I failed her, failed my friends, and failed my country.’

He made a face. ‘A most painful confession.’

‘Could you do the same if you were in my place?’

He deliberated for a while. ‘I don’t think I could.’

‘Well, you know something? Neither can I.’

I slammed my fist into Bauer’s stomach as hard as I could. The fat gave way to bone and I felt something crunch, and a sharp pain in my wrist, but Bauer’s explosive grunt made it worthwhile. At the same instant, Orlando ripped Hauptman’s gun away, but not before it went off in a spray of bullets, and the flight deck filled with the haze of gunpowder.

I  wrestled  Bauer  to  the  floor,  Ziggy  beside  me, pounding  on Bauer’s face, half-crying, half-shouting, ‘Bastard, bastard, bastard’ while the detective squirmed and twisted, trying to get at something inside his coat.

I tried to shove Ziggy out of the way and pin down Bauer’s arms but got tangled up and somehow Ziggy got between me and him.

Two quick shots.

Ziggy’s body jerked as he screamed. I dove for Bauer’s Luger as it swung toward me. My hands closed around his thick wrist, stunned at his strength.  Iron muscle beneath that fat and fighting me hard, his breath hot on my face as I rolled on top of him.

Shouting sounds. Orlando’s booming roar, the thump of bodies falling as Bauer and I fought for control of the gun. He twisted around and rolled on top of me. I clamped my hands on the barrel pointed straight at me, his face contorted in rage, teeth bared like an animal, eyes slits, and then from out of nowhere Ava’s arm snaked around his neck and yanked back.

The pistol wavered in momentary surprise, I twisted it up and backwards  until  the  barrel  dug  into  Bauer’s  double  chin.  My thumb scrabbled on top of his trigger finger and yanked. Ava screamed and ducked as the top of Bauer’s skull left the rest of his head in a spray of blood and brains and hopes and dreams.

The steady drone of the engines returned. Orlando, machine gun in hand, stood over the
Kampfschwimmer’s
body, his legs awkwardly twisted like a rag doll dropped on the floor. Professor Friedman slumped in the captain’s conference chair, a stunned witness to what had just happened.

Mason rose up on one elbow and said, ‘Jesus.’

Orlando kicked the
Kampfschwimmer’s
body and said, ‘Amen to that.’

Ava cradled Ziggy’s head in her lap, while stroking his forehead as he struggled to breathe.

‘I was wrong,’ he moaned.

‘Shut up, and live, okay?’

He shook his head. ‘Doesn’t hurt. Bad sign, right?’

‘Why didn’t you tell me? I could have helped.’

‘Wanted to, but…. too late.’

‘Ziggy, I’m so sorry. About everything.’

He smiled. ‘That’s okay, we got even… with them in the end… didn’t we?’

‘We sure did.’

A long pause. His eyes closed. A sense of calm settled over his face. In between breaths, ‘Do me… a favor… sweetheart.’

‘Name it.’

‘Don’t tell my folks about... about me being…. Tell them that...that...’

‘You were a hero.’

‘Yeah, something like that. You’ll know how to say it. You’re a great actress.’

‘I won’t have to act.’

He smiled and then he died.

Orlando and I dragged the dead Germans into the baggage storage compartment to get them out of sight. I didn’t care how we handled them, I just wanted them gone. We flopped down Bauer’s body first and tossed the
Kampfschwimmer
on top of him like so much cordwood. But when it came to Ziggy, I changed my mind and we laid him out alongside the others and folded his hands across his motionless chest.

‘Rest in peace, you little shit,’ I said.

Orlando chuckled. ‘I’ll give Brother Ziggy credit, he almost pulled it off.’

‘Not ‘almost.’ He did pull it off. They know we’re coming. The surprise element’s out the window.’

‘But we still have the bomb.’

‘Correct.’ I said. ‘And how exactly do you suggest we drop it?’

‘Mason’s going to say, ‘Bombs away?’’

‘Don’t get wise with me. You know what I mean.’

Orlando paused to gather his thoughts. I never hurried the man because it was always worth the wait.

The plane hit more turbulence and Ziggy’s hands slid off his chest. I put them back again.

He finally said, ‘If McGraw’s warning got through, they’ve scrammed the reactor and skedaddled. That means there’s nobody there to help the compliance folks.’

‘To do what?’

‘Grab the plutonium and head for high ground. And they can’t because it’s radioactive. They’ll need all sorts of protection and that takes time. So they’ve got to try another way to keep us away. Compliance fighters, most likely.’

‘What do you want to be the sky will be filled with them within the hour?’

Orlando frowned. ‘I’m not a betting man. Besides, even if I was, I’d lose that one.’

Turns out, I was about right. Approximately twenty minutes from the target, the Messerschmitt’s jumped us. ‘Jump’ isn’t the right word; the squadron of Me109’s surrounded us like an inescapable escort; above, behind, side to side and below. The lead aircraft, probably the squadron commander, floated just off our starboard wing, his cockpit lights up full, like always.

‘Déjà vu,’ Ava said.

I waved at the pilot and said through my frozen smile. ‘Ready back there, Orlando?’

Orlando said, ‘Whenever you are.’

I turned up the flight deck lights full so that the Luftwaffe pilot could see
Herr
Inspector Bauer and
Hauptman
Eiger leaning over the navigator’s chart table, heads down, seeming to examine the maps. Propping up the dead
Kampfschwimmer
had been relatively easy. Mason, an experienced sailor, lashed the body’s arms, trunk and hips to the table so that he appeared natural standing there. Bauer’s body was the problem. Half of his skull was gone, but thank God for his snap brim fedora. Pulled just right over his right eyebrow, it hid the exit wound perfectly.

Making the dead man move had been Orlando’s bright idea. I expressed doubts he could pull it off but he said, ‘The blind shall see and the dead shall walk.’

After we had secured Bauer’s body, Orlando cut a slit in the right shoulder of the leather jacket and slid his arm in and up alongside. That, plus using his left hand to move Bauer’s head, Orlando, kneeling behind him, was ready to become a macabre puppeteer.

I said, ‘Do it.’

Orlando said, ‘Lazarus, I say unto thee, arise!’

Bauer looked up and around and out at the pilot. He raised his arm in a Nazi salute and held it. The pilot hesitated a moment, and then snapped off a smart, conventional salute in return.

He drifted back to a more distant position, assured that we were complying with
Herr
Bauer’s orders. I slowly lowered the flight deck lights as Orlando moved his puppet a bit more for good measure, and then stopped.

We held our breaths forever it seemed. But nothing happened. Just a squadron of German warplanes peacefully escorting us to our final destination.

‘My God, I think they bought it,’ Ava said. ‘But what happens when we start the bomb run? The instant they see that, they’ll shoot us down.’

‘Not with Bauer on board.’

‘Don’t kid yourself, he’s expendable and you know it.’

‘I do, but I’m counting on their getting official permission before they start shooting. Nazis love their little rules and they follow them to the letter.’

‘They’ll get permission sooner or later, I promise you that.’

‘Yeah, but by then maybe we’ll have dropped the bomb.’

‘And maybe not.’

‘Got any other ideas, First Officer James?’

She laughed. ‘I’m not the resident pessimist, just trying to make sure you cover all your bases.’

‘Yeah, we’ll if you’re going to steal second base, sooner or later you’ve got to start running.’

I throttled back the engines.

‘What are you doing?’

‘Beginning our initial descent. They’re expecting us to land peacefully, remember? Just watch how they follow.’

I made the rate-of-descent as slow as I could. I needed to buy time.

‘Orlando, head back to and start rigging the chute on the bomb.’

‘On my way.’

Pilot to bombardier.’

‘Bombardier, go ahead.’

‘We’re using the chute. Can you comply?’

A slight pause, then ‘Doing the numbers now. I’ll take control of the aircraft in about...five minutes.’

‘Roger. Professor Friedman, can you recalibrate in time?’

His voice in my headsets tinny and tight. ‘Jawohl, I can do this.’

Ava touched my arm ‘The instant that bomb goes off, they’ll shoot us down like a mad dog.’

‘Wrong. The instant they see our bomb bay doors open they’ll start shooting.’

‘How long will they stay open?’

‘Probably a minute or so, maybe longer, from what Mason said.’

She winced and said, ‘I guess at this point, we really don’t have much a choice.’

The pre-dawn light turned the eastern horizon soft rose. I had witnessed countless sunrises over countless oceans while flying with Pan Am and the sight always brought the feeling of relief; daylight had won once again won over the darkness. But this time, when I saw the first shades of a new day coming to America, I felt frightened, but then happy, proud, and most of all determined as hell.