The Magic Bullet

by Harry Stein

  “Why’ve they tried to destroy me?”

  “Don’t exaggerate, Dan. They don’t like you—it’s a different thing. In their position you’d probably do the same to them.”

  “That’s a lie!”

  Perez laid the dead rat aside. “This is pointless. You gonna want to waste more money autopsying these guys?”

  He shook his head.

  “Logan, ask yourself: What would they even gain by doing something like that? You’ve told me yourself how rare it is that a drug active in lab animals works in human beings.”

  “I want to run the experiment again,” Logan suddenly decided.

  Perez threw up his hands. “Oh, shit.”

  “We’ve still got some of the compound left, I’ll order more rats today.”

  “Forget it. I want no part of any of this.”

  “Please, Ruben, I need you. We can’t keep them here—and I don’t think my place is much safer.”

  “In my apartment? Logan, I’m trying to get my social life going again.”

  “Please, Ruben, for me. I’m begging you.”

  It was no exaggeration. “You’re way over the top, man. You’re just gone.”

  But already Perez was thinking about where to stick the cages to hold down the smell.

  The letter arrived ten weeks after Sabrina’s return from Cologne. Even if the envelope hadn’t borne a characteristically austere German stamp—a grim latter-day statesman, as opposed to the birds, flowers, or Roman pottery that graced Italian mail—she’d have recognized the handwriting; slightly shaky yet still evocative of turn-of-the-century elegance.

  Rudolf Kistner!

  She closed her office door before sitting down to read it.

  My dear Doctor Como:

  Greetings and best wishes. Before all else, I must offer appreciation for your kindnesses on your recent visit. Thank you so much for the many details of your protocol with Dr. Logan.

  I sincerely hope you did not find me rude. I do not receive many visitors. Perhaps I am out of practice. Since your visit I have thought much about the question you ask me. Even now, I do not know if I can give the answers you seek. It is so long ago—a different age, a different way of thinking. I hope you can understand this.

  Herr Doktor Nakano was a very great chemist. The work he did was important work. But it is my duty to tell you he was not treated as he should have been in this country, and this is the shame of all of Germany.

  Was Herr Nakano my friend? I have thought much on this question also these last days. Surely, at the time I did not regard him as such. He was a master chemist, I only a young admirer—one of many who worked at the Christian Thomas Company. Not one time did I ever visit his home. Nor did I even learn until after he was made to leave Christian Thomas that Frau Nakano was of the Jewish faith. This was in 1936. After this I did not see him again.

  You must understand that I did not support the views of the National Socialists. Few in our laboratory did. We held Professor Nakano in only the highest esteem and his personal affairs were not our affair. Some even continued to correspond with him after he left for Frankfurt. It is in this way that I learned of his continued work on the compound.

  Personally, I was not one who wrote to him. This is why I was so surprised to receive from him a letter in November of 1938. I still have this letter, at the time he was living at Bornheimerstrasse 138. It was quite short, only that he wished for help in leaving Germany. I do not know why he chose me. Perhaps he wrote many similar letters to many people. Perhaps he recalled I had a friend at the Swedish legation.

  Of course, I could do nothing. You must understand that at the time it was not possible. My own late wife said she believed this was the great sadness of my life. I think not. Yet it is true that even now it troubles me. For Professor Nakano’s work was truly of the highest order.

  This is why I now write you, as earlier I wrote Dr. Logan. Perhaps it is not too late to see his work recognized at last.

  Though it was not yet 5:00 A.M. New York time, Sabrina picked up the phone and dialed Logan’s number.

  “Sabrina?” he managed, struggling from a deep sleep. “Is something wrong?”

  “Logan, you must hear this.”

  She read him the letter and waited for a reply.

  Still groggy, he hesitated. “He didn’t say anything about the research.”

  “You do not think this is important?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. What do you think?”

  “I think I should go to Frankfurt today. This afternoon.”

  Catching a three-forty flight out of Rome’s Leonardo da Vinci Airport, she landed at the Frankfurt International Airport almost precisely two hours later. By six-thirty she was standing before the building occupied, sixty years before, by Mikio Nakano.

  Like the surrounding neighborhood, the three-story, granite-fronted house had seen far better days; the heavy iron knocker on the front door and brass handrail leading up the front steps bespoke classic nineteenth-century burgher taste, but now the building had a decided shabbiness around the edges. Several large windows had been cracked and inexpertly repaired, the patch of garden was overgrown, even the knocker and rail needed a coat of paint.

  The street itself, quiet and narrow, featured perhaps a dozen such houses, most now occupied by more than one family. The street was so little traveled that Sabrina’s taxi, pulling before the house, had interrupted a raucous game of soccer.

  Briefly, Sabrina turned from the house to watch the game. A dozen or so children were involved, German and Turk, boys and, she was pleased to note, spiritedly defending one of the goals, a girl.

  Smiling, she turned back to the house, walked up the steps, and rang the bell. A middle-aged woman with bright yellow dyed hair answered it.

  “Ja, bitte?”

  “I was wondering, please, do you know where I might find the owner of this house?”

  For a moment it seemed the woman was confused: what could this strange, elegant foreigner be doing at her door? “Der Eigentümer?” she replied finally. The owner?

  Sabrina smiled, to establish she was not bringing trouble. “I had an old friend who lived here many years ago. I am trying to discover what’s become of him.”

  The woman stared at her a moment more. Then, calling over her shoulder, “Mutter, komm bitte.” She turned away and repeated the word more loudly. “Mother!”

  “Ja.”

  “There is someone to see you.”

  A moment later an elderly woman, frail but with an exceptionally kind face, came shuffling into view. She was wearing a tattered bathrobe, and Sabrina was embarrassed to have imposed on her.

  Slowly, she explained again why she was here.

  “But I am the owner,” came the old woman’s reply. “Tell me what it is you want.”

  Sabrina suppressed her excitement. “This person lived here quite a long time ago.”

  “Yes?”

  “Before the war.”

  She shook her head. “Nein, nein. I have been the owner only three years, you see. Since my dear husband died.”

  “Ah, I see. I’m sorry. Could you tell me, please, how long did your husband—”

  “Only since 1969. He bought it as an investment.” She smiled. “Not the best investment, but I manage.”

  Sabrina realized this was hopeless. “And you do not know from whom he bought it?”

  She waved her hands. “A man, Herr Klaus. He also is gone, many years.”

  “Well, thank you so much for your time.”

  She nodded. “Die Krieg ist seit langer Zeit vorbei.” The war is a long time past. “We do not think of those days much anymore.”

  Well, thought Sabrina, back on the sidewalk, what now? She had not expected anything to fall in her lap, of course. Yet, somehow, she’d let herself imagine that once she was here, a direction of inquiry would magically reveal itself.

  She watched the soccer game a few minutes longer before, out of the corner of her eye, she saw a
pproaching an elderly woman pushing a stroller.

  “Excuse me, madam.”

  Again she saw how Germans of a certain age are reflexively on guard around strangers. The woman slowed down slightly but made no reply.

  “Perhaps you can help me,” said Sabrina, falling into step beside her. “I am inquiring after a Japanese man who once lived here.” She indicated the building. “In this house.”

  “Nein, auf keinen Fall,” came the emphatic reply as she picked up her pace.

  Still, lacking any alternative, this now became Sabrina’s modus operandi. She began randomly approaching passersby on the street, anyone who looked to be over sixty-five, repeating the question.

  Given Sabrina’s temperament, this was nothing less than an ordeal; a matter of forcing herself, daring herself, to follow through. But she began finding it a bit easier when she assumed a more general line of inquiry, pretending to be a graduate student researching the recent history of the city. She heard about chronic shortages during the war; about children and grandchildren raised in these houses; and, several times, about how the influx of Turkish guest workers had made things worse than ever before. “Look around you,” one woman put it to her with sharp annoyance, indicating with her hand. It was now close to 8:00 P.M., and in the gathering darkness, Sabrina could no longer pick out the detail on the houses. “Once, everything here was respectable. But these people, they have no respect for property—and we are the ones who must pay.”

  “Surely there have always been foreigners here, even before,” observed Sabrina.

  The woman shook her head. “Nein, nur Deutsche.” Only Germans.

  “I have been told there was a Japanese, a famous scientist, who lived on this very street.”

  She cast Sabrina a look, at once surprised and disapproving. “I do not know.” She began moving off. “One should know not to listen to rumors.”

  “Entschuldigung.” Pardon me.

  Sabrina wheeled around. There stood the girl from the soccer game, her pretty face framed by a tangle of dirty blond hair.

  “You wish to know about this district? The people who have lived here?”

  “Yes. This is of great interest to me.”

  “Come, my grandfather will tell you. He has lived here many years, all his life in the same house.”

  Sabrina nodded. “Where is he?”

  “Not far.” She extended a small hand. “My name is Agneta.”

  She shook it. “Ich heisse Sabrina.”

  Wordlessly, the child led her around a corner and down several residential streets, before emerging onto a more widely traveled thoroughfare. Here were a number of modest commercial establishments. All but one were closed for the day: a small shop, its interior shielded from view by strings of beads covering the windows. It was only when they entered that Sabrina saw it was a Middle Eastern–style coffeehouse, patronized by men of the local immigrant community.

  Peering through the acrid smoke, she picked up only one clearly recognizable German in the place—the individual toward whose corner table Agneta was leading her.

  He stood to greet the child, his surprisingly youthful countenance erupting in a grin. “Come to visit your old grandpapa or just after another pastry?”

  His companion at the table, a middle-aged Turk, smiled broadly, showing several gold teeth.

  “Grandpapa, this is Sabrina. She has questions about the neighborhood.”

  “Well, then”—he gestured expansively with a workingman’s hands—“sit down. You have come to the right person.”

  “Thank you,” she said, taking a seat.

  “And where are you from?” he asked, picking up the accent.

  “Italy. I am Italian.”

  “Ah, a very nice place, very warm people.” He indicated the small cup of thick black brew on the table before him. “Please, you must have some Turkish coffee. For me, it is an addiction.”

  He ordered the coffee and sweet pastry for his granddaughter. “Now, what is it you wish to know? I am seventy-one years old, before that you must find it in a book.”

  He was so willing, Sabrina impulsively decided to abandon her ruse. “I am told that many years ago, before the war, a Japanese man lived on your street. A scientist.”

  Instantly, the old man’s face softened. “Ah, yes. The professor. It is so long since I have thought of him.”

  “Professor Nakano.”

  “Yes, that is it. Such a nice man. I was only a boy, of course. He lived with the family of his wife, Jewish people. He also had a laboratory there, in the basement. Everyone knew of him.”

  Sabrina gave a convincing impression of complete calm. “So I have heard. That is what I am trying to find out, what happened to him, to his work.”

  “Ah, I see.” He fell silent and took a sip from his cup. “You know, of course, those were bad times, very difficult.”

  “Yes, I understand.”

  “We, the children of this neighborhood, we liked the professor very much. He used to give us hard candy.” He glanced at his granddaughter. “You must understand, there were not many National Socialists in this district. My own parents, your great-grandparents, were Social Democrats.”

  “Did they know anything of the professor’s work?” asked Sabrina.

  “Only that it was very important, very impressive.”

  “I understand that in 1938 he was trying to leave.”

  He nodded slowly. “Yes, of course, they all were. You have heard of Kristallnacht? When the Nazi gangs came after the Jews? It was then they destroyed his laboratory. Everyone heard of it, even the children, it was very sad to us after all his hard work. This is when he sent away his things.”

  “Pardon?” Involuntarily, Sabrina leaned slightly forward. “What things?”

  “Not only him, many Jews in the quarter. After Kristallnacht, they began sending their valuables, what was left, out of the country. I know about this because my older brother, he helped carry some of their trunks to the shipping office.” He turned again to the girl, adding with pride, “Your great-uncle Helmut, who died in the war. The professor’s trunk was one of the first, the very next day. I recall it very well, my brother said he was in a frenzy. Normally he was such a calm fellow.”

  “It went to the shipping office?”

  He nodded. “Beside the old City Hall. Poor souls, they could not get out themselves, but they saved what they could.”

  “Surely, they would have records there, then.”

  He smiled indulgently. “Nein. The center city was completely destroyed.”

  “Do you know if Professor Nakano got out?”

  “Of course not.” He paused. “You must remember, his family was Jewish. He was not the sort of fellow who would leave them behind.”

  The coffee was making Sabrina’s head spin—or was it what she was hearing?

  “Soon afterward,” he continued, “many of the Jews in the quarter were taken away. And the professor with them. It was said they were sent to Dachau.”

  Though none of this was surprising, Sabrina was unprepared for the force with which it registered. She knew almost nothing about Mikio Nakano, had never so much as seen a picture of him. Yet over the past year, working on the compound, she’d begun to feel an intimate kinship with him. Later that evening, thinking about the thugs destroying his lab, imagining it, she would not even try to hold back the tears.

  “The professor’s trunk was sent to America,” the old man added now, trying to be helpful.

  “You are certain of this?”

  He nodded. “He had, I believe, a brother-in-law. Many of these people had family there who had gotten out earlier.”

  She hesitated, almost afraid to ask the obvious question. “Do you happen to recall the family name of the professor’s wife?”

  “I am thinking about that as we are talking. It was so long ago and I was so young. But, yes. I believe it was … Falzheim. You know, like the town near Stuttgart?”

  “Falzheim,” mused Logan. “Ca
n you believe it, she got the name from a former neighbor, someone who actually remembered Nakano?” Ruben Perez didn’t even pretend to be impressed. “So you have the name of his in-laws—maybe. So what?”

  “It’s a start,” shot back Logan. “A good start. The guy’d been working on this process for twenty years! Supposedly he made real headway.”

  “Right. And he wrote it all down and it’s just waiting somewhere for you to find it.” He walked across the room and picked up the local telephone book. “Manhattan. Isn’t this where most of the German-Jewish refugees back then settled?”

  Annoyed, Logan took it from him and flipped to the appropriate page; not at all to his surprise, there was no such name. “I didn’t say it was going to be that easy.”

  Perez laughed. “Too bad. Next you could’ve found the cure for AIDS. That’s probably about to float up in a bottle at Jones Beach.”

  The hardest part was that, for once, his friend’s skepticism only reflected his own. Logan knew how farfetched this possibility was. On the other hand, he also knew—far better than Perez ever could—how extraordinarily difficult this compound was to decipher. At the very least, this was a lead worth pursuing.

  “But who knows,” said Logan, snapping the phone book shut, “you could be right in principle. It seems to be a pretty distinctive name.”

  He started for the door.

  “Where you going?

  “Forty-second Street, the main library there.”

  “What for?”

  “You ought to get out more, Ruben. They’ve got phone books from all over the place there. Could be it’ll turn up in Detroit or Miami.”

  Now it was Perez’s turn to flash annoyance. “C’mon, man, I was just pullin’ your chain. You gotta stop it with this shit, we got work to do.”

  “What are you gonna do, report me? I’ll be back in a few hours.”

  That estimate proved way off. Though there were perhaps seventy directories at the Central Research Library, from large and medium-sized cities throughout America, it took no more than fifteen seconds to locate on each the page where the name Falzheim might have been—but wasn’t. Even including the round trip by subway, he was back at the office in an hour and a half.