The Last Survivor (A Wilde/Chase Short Story) (3 page)

He gave her a cheeky grin. ‘Hey, I got four kids. My wife never stopped eatin’ my food the whole time. C’mon, babies need calories.’

Nina laughed. ‘Okay, you convinced me. Give me a ham and pecorino.’ He beamed and reached for one of the stuffed dough crescents.

The blond man who had followed her from the apartment and on the subway journey to Little Italy stopped twenty feet behind her, pretending to check the produce on another stall. The moment she left with her purchase, he set off again too, trailing her through the crowd.

Natalia’s face was practically pressed against the cab’s window as she gawped at the towering skyline of Manhattan. ‘Wow!’ she gasped. ‘That is so incredible!’

‘It’s a bit bigger than Ly Quang, innit?’ said Eddie, remembering her little Vietnamese hideout. They were crossing the East River on the Queensboro Bridge, giving them a spectacular view of the island. He pointed at a tall green glass tower on the far bank. ‘That’s the United Nations, where me and Nina used to work. Thought I was shot of it, but we got dragged back to the International Heritage Agency a few months ago. Although if we hadn’t been,’ he admitted, ‘we wouldn’t have found the cure for what Nina had – what you’ve got.’

She turned away from the view to regard him with a mixture of hope and worry. ‘What you found … do you really think it will work for me? It will cure the eitr?’ Natalia’s grandfather, a Soviet scientist, had conducted secret and illegal experiments with the toxin, using his own family as test subjects – and infecting them with a cancer that had been passed down through the generations.

‘I hope so. I really do,’ he replied. ‘It worked on Nina, and we know it cured stuff for the Nazis who were after the spring.’

‘But I was not poisoned by the eitr – I was born with the infection in my DNA. This water, it may not work on me.’

‘We’ve got to try,’ Eddie insisted. ‘If there’s a chance, you’ve got to take it.’

A hesitant smile. ‘You are right. Thank you.’

He smiled back. ‘No problem.’

They crossed the river into Manhattan, the cab turning north towards 78th Street. ‘Nina told me in Vietnam that she was going to write a book about all the things she has done,’ said Natalia. ‘Has she finished it?’

‘Not yet. We got a bit sidetracked with the whole bunch-of-Nazis thing, but she’s been working on it since then. It’s pretty much
all
she’s been doing, actually.’

She tipped her head quizzically. ‘And you are not happy about that?’

‘No, I don’t mind,’ he insisted. ‘Unless she wakes me up at four in the morning to do it!’

‘But something is bothering you.’

Eddie chuckled. ‘It’s that obvious? Yeah, a bit. We had an argument about it this morning, actually. She …’ He hesitated.

Natalia gave him an apologetic look. ‘You do not have to tell me if you do not want to.’

‘No, it’s okay,’ he said, wanting to get it off his chest. ‘It’s not that she’s spending all her time working that’s the problem – I’m used to that. It’s … the way she’s writing it.’

‘How so?’

‘There were other people involved in finding all that stuff, but she hardly mentions them. That’s what we were arguing about. I don’t think she was trying to steal the credit,’ he added, time and reflection having softened his earlier accusation. ‘It just felt like she was trying to avoid thinking about them. Which considering what happened to some of them I shouldn’t be surprised about, but still …’

She understood his meaning without having to enquire further. ‘I am sorry.’

‘Thanks,’ he said quietly. Neither of them spoke for a long moment, until the silence was interrupted by his phone. ‘That’s probably her.’

But the call was from an unknown number. ‘Hello?’ he said, expecting it to be a telemarketer.

It was not. ‘Eddie, is that you?’

He instantly recognised the young man’s voice. ‘Jared? Yeah, it’s me.’ Jared Zane was an agent of the Mossad, the feared Israeli intelligence agency, who had joined forces with Eddie and Nina to locate and destroy the enclave of escaped Nazi war criminals in Argentina. ‘How’d you get this number?’

‘The Mossad has everyone’s number.’ Jared had a genially mocking relationship with the Englishman over their age difference, there being the better part of twenty years between them – but today there was no humour in his voice, which immediately put Eddie on alert. ‘Eddie, listen, this is urgent. We didn’t get all the Nazis. There was a survivor. And he’s in New York.’

Eddie felt a sudden coldness. ‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes. We recovered Kroll’s computer from the Enklave – it had been burned, but we were still able to get most of the data from its hard drive. There was a file from Frederick Leitz’ – a middleman through whom the Nazis had dealt with the outside world – ‘with a list of all the fake passports he’d arranged for Kroll’s people. One of them, a US passport, was used to enter JFK yesterday.’

‘And he got in? Why wasn’t he arrested when his passport came up as flagged?’

‘It hadn’t
been
flagged. We only recovered the files a few days ago. And,’ faint frustration entered his voice, ‘the list wasn’t sent to Interpol until today. My superiors didn’t think there was any rush – we believed all the Nazis were dead. The passport was flashed up immediately, but its holder was already in the States.’

Eddie snorted. ‘Shut the stable door, will you? The horse’s buggered off. An’ I thought Mossad were supposed to be efficient!’

‘We’re telling you now,’ Jared replied spikily. ‘Or rather, I’m telling you, as a friend. I might get into trouble for it, but I’ll take it if it keeps you and Nina safe.’

‘You think this guy’s coming after us?’

‘He knows who you are – or rather, he knows who
Nina
is. When Kroll was about to execute us at his rally, he told his people her name and that she worked for the United Nations. There isn’t any other connection to New York that I can think of. Eddie, you both need to be careful. I’ll send you this man’s passport photo so you’ll recognise him if he finds you.’

A horrible thought came to Eddie. ‘Shit, what if he already has?’ Fear rose in him: Nina was out in the city alone, and with no idea of the potential threat. ‘Jared, I’ll call you back!’

He hurriedly ended the call, telling the driver to turn around and head for Little Italy, fast. ‘Eddie, what is happening?’ Natalia asked in alarm.

‘Nina might be in trouble,’ he replied. He tried to call her, only to go straight through to voicemail. ‘Fuck! Her phone’s off!’

Nina continued her leisurely stroll along Mulberry Street. The crowds grew as more people came out to enjoy the sun and the food, which she decided was both an annoyance and a blessing; the latter because the longer the lines at each stall, the more it would discourage her from stuffing her face. ‘Sorry, kid,’ she said, putting a hand on her abdomen as she passed one particular stand. ‘No biscotti for you today. Although …’ She gave a longing look at the delicacies. ‘Well, you do need me to eat so you’ll grow up big and strong, don’t you?’

She reversed course, swerving around a pudgy elderly couple following her. Someone behind them complained loudly as a blond man made a sharp change of direction away from her, pushing past them. Thinking no more of it, she joined the line.

The stall was popular; it took her a few minutes to be served. While she waited, she listened to snippets of conversation from passers-by. A young boy asked his father when ‘the big flying ship’ was going to arrive, and was told that the airship’s overflight was due in ten minutes. She smiled at the child’s literalism, and at the thought that if all went well, it would not be long before she would be fielding similar enquiries of her own.

She finally bought her chocolate and hazelnut biscotti and resumed her walk. Her mood had improved no end, to the point that she had almost got over her earlier infuriation with Eddie. There was still a lingering resentment of his accusation that she was refusing to face up to Macy’s death, however. If he had any idea what she endured every night, he would know how utterly unfair that was …

In her preoccupied state, she didn’t notice that the blond man had once again taken up position behind her, using the crowd to hide himself. His eyes never left her as he followed his target down the street.

Eddie made another attempt to call Nina, only to get her voicemail yet again. ‘Turn your bloody phone on!’ he barked before hanging up. ‘How much further?’

‘Almost there,’ said the driver. ‘Two more blocks.’

Natalia peered down the street. ‘There are a lot of people,’ she said, seeing pedestrians heading along East Houston Street towards the festival’s northern end. ‘How will you find her in the crowd?’

‘Good question,’ he replied, having already worried about exactly that. He had checked the festival’s website on his phone during the cab ride, finding that the closed section of Mulberry Street was over half a mile long, and also extended into several side streets. ‘Looks like I’ll be doing a lot of shouting.’

‘I will help you,’ she offered. ‘Does she still have red hair?’

‘Yeah, of course,’ said Eddie, slightly surprised. ‘Why wouldn’t she?’

Natalia’s eyes widened. ‘Oh! I am sorry. Her hair is so bright, I thought it was fake.’ She blushed.

He managed a brief smirk. ‘I’ll tell her you said that.’

Now she looked mortified. ‘No, please do not!’

The taxi pulled up at the intersection of East Houston and Mulberry; the Englishman hurriedly paid the driver and jumped out. The young German grabbed her bag and followed him. ‘Where do we go?’

He pointed across the street, where a banner and innumerable Italian flags marked the festival’s northern entrance. ‘Down there.’ They hurried over the crosswalk, pushing into the crowd. ‘Nina!’ he yelled, drawing annoyed looks from those around him. ‘Nina, are you here?’ He searched for anyone with red hair. There were a few, but none were his wife. It struck him that not only had she been here for some time, but she might not even have entered the festival at this end of Mulberry Street; she had probably come by subway, and there were several stations nearby. ‘God, she could be bloody anywhere!’

‘I cannot see her,’ said Natalia.

‘Me neither.’ Eddie forced his way through the throng. Stallholders shouted from either side of the street as they hawked their wares. He spotted a stand selling gelato, but there was no time to indulge himself – that would have to wait until Nina was safe.

Nina was halfway down the length of the festival, in no hurry as she took in the sights and sounds – and smells – around her. The mouth-watering aromas of numerous cheeses tempted her towards one particular stall, but before she could check out the wares on offer, sounds of excitement rose, people looking up with a collective
ooh
of wonder. She followed their gaze – as the sun was blotted out.

The airship had arrived, and it was far more impressive in real life than on a television screen.

The craft, an Airlander, was considerably smaller than the goliaths from the days when airships dominated the skies – it was less than half the length of the ill-fated
Hindenburg
, the largest aircraft ever to fly – but its design meant that it still dwarfed any contemporary airliner. Rather than the traditional cigar shape of a Zeppelin, it had two conjoined gas envelopes sitting side by side, making its hull enormously wider than the fuselage of a Boeing 747, as well as being considerably longer. Despite its bulk, though, it drifted overhead as leisurely as a cloud.

Both flanks of the airship had been turned into giant screens. Nina wasn’t sure exactly how they worked – there seemed to be some kind of netting draped tightly around the hulls, which she guessed held countless coloured LEDs – but the end result was certainly impressive, bright and clear enough to be visible even against the daytime sky. Right now, they were displaying an animated flag, the tricolour of Italy waving over the homeland’s New York namesake. Whoops and cheers came from the crowd’s Italian-American contingent.

Phones and cameras were raised to take pictures of the ambling colossus. Nina at first didn’t plan to follow suit, giant advertising platforms not being her thing, but then she remembered that Eddie had been keen to see it. She took out her phone and thumbed the home button. Nothing happened; she had turned it off. Normally her phone was permanently switched on, but she had been so annoyed with Eddie that she hadn’t even wanted the distraction of the device telling her that he was making a call for her to snub. With a huff, she pushed the power button and waited for it to boot up. She moved to one side of the street to let the gawking throng move past, standing beside a covered stall. At least the airship wouldn’t have flown off before she could take a photo.

The screen lit up. ‘Finally,’ she said, about to open the camera app – only for a long list of notifications to drop down. Multiple missed calls, all from Eddie, and several texts—

EMERGENCY!!!!! CALL ME RIGHT NOW!!!!

That was the most recent, and the others were equally alarming. All manner of horrifying scenarios flashed through her mind. Had he been in an accident? Or had something happened to Natalia? She hurriedly brought up her contacts list to call him back—

Two things happened at once.

The first was that she heard her name being shouted. Even over the festival’s hubbub, she knew that it was Eddie.

The second was someone thrusting a hard metal object against her spine.

A gun.

‘Come with me,’ a voice hissed as her arm was grabbed. ‘If you resist, I will hurt you.
Move!
’

She looked around in shock, seeing a large blond man right behind her. He jabbed the gun harder against her back and pushed her roughly into the crowd, heading south.

‘Nina!’ Eddie’s voice again. She twisted to look back. Everyone was watching the airship, all eyes turned towards the sky – except her husband’s. He was about fifty feet away, gaze sweeping rapidly from side to side as he scanned the crowd …

And locking on to her.

‘Eddie!’ she cried. Worry filled his face, before being replaced in an instant by angry determination. He broke into a run, shoving through the festival-goers after her.