Flight of Dreams

by Ariel Lawhon

  Max sets a large, heavy hand on the bony point of Werner’s shoulder. He bends down six inches so he can speak directly into Werner’s ear.

  “You were in Kubis’s cabin.”

  “No—”

  “Don’t. You’ll save yourself a great deal of trouble if you can refrain from lying. I was just in that antechamber. And you were in the cabin. The only way this situation can go well for you is if you choose to tell me the truth right now.”

  It’s a quarter to three, and Werner doesn’t have much time left on his afternoon break. He gets thirty minutes in the afternoon once his first shift ends at 2:30. Yesterday he spent it napping in his cabin after being up half the night shining shoes for Kubis. He has sacrificed the sleep today in order to satisfy his curiosity. It’s a choice he regrets now, looking up into the navigator’s angry gaze.

  Max gives his shoulder an abrupt shake. “Why?”

  “The manifest!” he squeaks.

  “What about it?”

  “I wanted to see who owns the dog.”

  “That Schwachkopf Joseph Späh owns the dog. Everyone knows that. He turned the boarding process into a fiasco.”

  “No. The other dog.”

  Max takes a step back at this. He tilts his head to the side. “There are two?”

  “They’re both in the cargo area.”

  “How do you know what’s stored in the cargo area?”

  Werner blanches at this but decides it’s best to tell Max everything. “The American passenger. I don’t know his name.”

  “What about him?”

  “He paid me to feed the dog. No one has been doing it, and it’s a sad mess back there.”

  “Why was the American in the cargo hold?”

  “I don’t know,” Werner hedges. “But he knows about the dog.” He pauses, afraid to say the next thing.

  “What?”

  “He saw us yesterday. When we went out the hatch.”

  “He said that?”

  “He said that he wouldn’t tell anyone we were back there if I agreed to feed the dog. He said he’d give me ten dollars, American money.”

  Max snorts. “I hope you got it up front.”

  “I did. I’m going to buy my mother something when we get to Lakehurst.”

  Werner can’t tell whether Max is angry or disappointed. But Max steps away and tucks his hands into his pockets. It’s the look he gets when he’s thinking about something. Finally he says, “Come with me.”

  “I have to get back to work.”

  “This won’t take long. Five minutes at most.”

  Werner follows Max down the keel corridor, around the gangway stairs, and toward the officers’ quarters. He stops in front of his own cabin. “Open it.” When Werner hesitates Max says, “I know you have a key. You got in this morning. What I don’t know is where you got the key. You’ve been making good use of it though.”

  Werner pulls the key from his pocket and holds it lightly in his palm. “Balla gave it to me.”

  Max steps aside. Motions toward the door. “After you.”

  Werner lets himself in and Max follows behind, shutting the door. “I’ll take that, if you don’t mind. I’m sure Balla will be needing it back.”

  Good riddance, Werner thinks, but he says nothing aloud. The key has felt like a ten-pound weight in his pocket all day. He has been aware of it even when he hasn’t used it. “Why did you bring me here?”

  Max opens his closet and pulls out an olive drab duffel bag and sets it on the floor.

  “I’m sorry I went through your things. But I didn’t have a choice. I had to get you up. And you had to be dressed.”

  “Listen, kleiner Bube, I don’t care about my socks or my underwear. I want to know why you took my gun and what you did with it.”

  “I didn’t—”

  “Don’t lie to me.”

  “I’m not lying! I swear!” Werner hates it when his voice rises and cracks and sounds like a girl’s. He hates that he can’t control when and where it happens. But his heart is hammering, and his breath is short, and he is terrified that he has stumbled into some kind of trouble that he doesn’t understand. “I never saw a gun. It was dark and I found your clothes. That’s it.” An entire litany of curse words flies into Werner’s mind, but he doesn’t say them. He’s crying. Stupid boy, he thinks, you look like a baby. So he wipes his nose and stands as straight as he can. “I didn’t know you had a gun. I didn’t take it. I promise.”

  He isn’t sure whether Max believes him, but the navigator relaxes. He puts a hand on Werner’s shoulder. “You have to think. Was it there? Did you see it?”

  “I don’t remember. I don’t think it was. But I can’t be sure. It was dark.”

  Max gives him a gentle shake. “This is important.”

  “I didn’t see a gun.”

  “Damn it!” Max rips his cap off and throws it across the room. He yanks on his hair until it’s standing on end in clumps. “Someone took it.”

  A thought occurs to Werner and with it comes a flutter of unease. “I can help you find it.”

  “How the hell are you going to do that?”

  He hesitates, then nods at Max’s clenched fist. “That key will get me into any cabin on this ship.”

  Max unclenches his fingers and looks at the key as if it is some piece of incriminating evidence. “That would be wrong.”

  Werner doesn’t argue. He just waits. This decision is Max’s to make. The navigator ponders for so long that Werner worries he will miss the start of his next shift. But finally Max hands him the key. “Don’t get caught,” he says.

  The cabin boy is muttering assurances, backing toward the door, when Max stops him. “Wait. You never told me who brought the other dog on board.”

  Werner blinks at him for a moment, confused. “You did,” he says.

  THE NAVIGATOR

  “I don’t have a dog.”

  “There’s one in the cargo hold listed under your name.”

  Max glares at the boy. “You’ve read my name wrong before.” Something on Werner’s face wavers. Uncertainty perhaps. “You can read, can’t you?”

  “Of course I can read!”

  “And you are certain, absolutely certain, you read my name?”

  “Yes. Three times. Just to make sure.”

  Werner is like a puppy standing there wagging his tail, waiting for a pat on the head, some morsel of approval. Max believes him. He has never known Werner to lie. To omit information, yes. And to evade, yes. But the boy is not a liar. Max needs time to think, time to sort through what this means. Why would someone put his name on that manifest? “Go back to work,” he says, “but I want to talk to you tonight, after your shift.”

  Max can tell that Werner wants to ask him something but is too afraid. He takes a guess at what is worrying him. “Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone. Besides, I need your help.”

  Werner holds up the key. “And this?”

  “Do what you can. But don’t let anyone see you.”

  “Balla will want it back.”

  “Then give it to him. Don’t argue. And don’t let on that you know anything.”

  Max watches him hurry down the corridor and around the corner. He’s due back on duty in a few minutes, but there’s something he needs to check first. The mailroom is only a few yards from the officers’ quarters, and all the keys are on a hook at his belt. His room key. The key that opens the radio room. One for the mailroom. One for the officers’ safe in the control car. And a small pewter skeleton key for the lockbox. He used it that first night when he placed the brown paper package in the lockbox, and he holds it between thumb and forefinger now.

  The owner of the package is trustworthy. Respected. Formidable. And, when Max looks up, he appears before him, as though summoned by guilt or magic or kismet. Regardless of the cause, Colonel Erdmann pushes open the radio room door just as Max reaches for the knob. Erdmann has been there, as he is most mornings, quietly observing. Taking notes. There is
no reason to suspect his sudden appearance. And yet Max does. Especially when Erdmann steps into the hall and shuts the radio room door behind him. He clears his throat and scans the empty corridor.

  “I trust that the package I placed in your care is still safe, Herr Zabel?”

  Max nods, mute. A toxic, unholy fear begins to bloom in his chest.

  “Good. You will receive the rest of your payment once we arrive in Lakehurst.”

  THE STEWARDESS

  They are unhappy because there is nothing left to do, Emilie thinks. The passengers have reached that point in the trip where cabin fever has set in. It is late afternoon, on the last full day of travel, and there is a stifled feeling in the air. A thickness. These men and women have seen and done everything. There are no more rooms to explore—at least no rooms where they are allowed. The newness has worn off, as has the exuberance. They are tired of one another and tired of the doting crew, though, if pressed, they would argue that the service could be better. They are tired of coffee and pastries and card games and the dissatisfied droning of their peers. They wish the piano hadn’t been removed last year—it would be nice to have a little music. They wish the sun would come out. They want to be in New York. Fifteen hours. That’s all they should have left until arrival. But that time has been lengthened now, a seemingly interminable age to these fatigued travelers. They are angry about the ever-increasing flight delays. Angry they won’t be on their way to some new grand adventure tomorrow morning.

  For Emilie the remaining hours cannot pass quickly enough. She sits in the promenade with Matilde Doehner and her children. Irene is crying her way through a difficult cross-stitch pattern. She has pricked her finger three times, and a tissue lies wadded in her lap in anticipation of a fourth. It’s the frustration more than anything else that has the girl in tears. She wants to get it right but can’t. Emilie can sympathize with this. She has spent the majority of her life feeling the same way.

  “Would it help if I held the hoop? That way you’d have both hands free,” Emilie says. Helping Irene gives her something to do. It’s a way to forget her anxiety of what will happen when they land.

  Irene looks up at her, embarrassed to be caught with tears dripping off the end of her nose. Emilie wipes them away with her apron and receives a smile in exchange.

  “I don’t know. Maybe. It’s this stupid flower. It’s supposed to be a tulip but it looks more like a bloodstain. It’s gross.”

  Emilie wants to reassure her that the small bouquet of red, yellow, and blue flowers is pretty, but it’s not. It looks as though a cat has gotten hold of three balls of yarn while high on catnip. The cross-stitch is a disaster. It cannot be salvaged. Emilie pries the hoop from Irene’s tense fist and drops to her knees before the girl. She holds the hoop steady and urges Irene to continue.

  When Irene’s hand has stopped shaking in anger, Emilie leans forward and whispers, “Can I tell you a secret?”

  The girl nods.

  “I don’t know how to cross-stitch. So you’re already better than I am.”

  It’s only a small thing, but to a girl of fourteen, being superior to a grown woman in any area is a very big deal. Irene sniffs, lifts her chin, and turns her attention back to the hoop. “Your mother really should have taught you.”

  Emilie suppresses the urge to laugh. It feels good, this sudden mirth, but she shows nothing more than a twitching smile. The stewardess has long since mastered the art of restraint. One day Irene Doehner will learn that restraint trumps superiority every time. But the poor girl has many years to go before she will be open to such a lesson.

  After several long moments Emilie can sense that Matilde Doehner is watching her. When she looks up, the mother winks and mutters something about herculean efforts and the patience of saints. It feels good to be part of this small domestic scene.

  Little Werner chooses this moment to roll out of his chair and flop around on the carpet like a dying bird. “I’m bored!” he begins to squawk over and over again. Emilie has to admit that his thin, piercing voice is eerily avian. His siblings, however, do not see the humor in his actions. Walter kicks him and tells him to shut up. Irene begs her mother to make him stop.

  “Werner,” Matilde says, her voice low, almost disinterested, “get control of yourself.”

  Perhaps the children have run out of coping skills as well, because the boy decides to test his mother. He continues thrashing around, arms and legs akimbo. “Bored, bored, bored. So bored!”

  Matilde sighs. “Irene, go get your father.”

  Before Emilie can draw her next breath, Werner is on his feet begging and pleading and promising to behave.

  “You made your choice,” his mother says. “Sit on your hands and wait.”

  Hermann Doehner isn’t all that tall for a man, but he has a kind and handsome face. He is mostly bald, but his blue eyes and dark brows make up for this. He enters the promenade, hands on hips. Lips pressed together. Irene trails behind him, trying not to look triumphant.

  “Come with me,” Hermann says.

  Little Werner shakes his head. “I don’t want to.”

  He leans over his son. Whispers. “I expect better of you.”

  Hermann sets a hand on Werner’s shoulder and smiles at his wife. It’s a look that says boys will be boys. But it also says that he will take care of this and she needn’t trouble herself. He plants a kiss on Matilde’s forehead, looks at Emilie, then says to his wife, “Have you asked her yet?”

  “I was just getting to that.”

  “If she says no we’ll blame it on this little rascal.” Hermann leads a white-faced Werner out of the room.

  Matilde watches her husband go with a calculating expression but doesn’t explain his comment. Instead she says, “Just think, this time tomorrow we will be touring New York City. Hermann has booked us a suite at the Astor Hotel in Times Square. I hear they have copper bathtubs and room service. We’re only in New York for two days, but we’ll be going to Carnegie Hall and Broadway and the Central Park Zoo. On Saturday we’re boarding an ocean liner for Havana where we’ll have a week on the beach. Palm trees and pineapple juice. Can you imagine?”

  No. Emilie cannot. But she smiles politely anyway.

  “It’s one day from Havana to the port in Veracruz. Plus another day or so to travel inland, and then it’s Mexico City and home to our cool, tiled house and windows that don’t need glass, only shutters. We have a terrace and a garden and fifteen banana trees in the yard. There is no winter in Mexico, did you know that? It is warm and beautiful all year long.”

  “It sounds absolutely lovely.”

  If Emilie had been paying attention she would have realized that Matilde has been working up to this all along. “You could come with us, you know?”

  A long, uncertain pause. “I beg your pardon?”

  “You’re very good with the children. They like you.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

  “It was Hermann’s idea. Not that I oppose, mind you. But it’s just the way businessmen think. Acquiring assets and such.”

  She understands now, or at least she thinks she does, but Emilie wants Matilde to spell it out because she is tired of false hope. “What are you asking?”

  “I’m offering you a job, Fräulein Imhof. We would like you to come to Mexico with us and be our governess.”

  Her response is cautious. “I have a job.”

  “Not one you like, if you don’t mind me saying. We can give you a better life. Something stable. A little luxury—that never hurt anyone. Hermann has already promised he will pay you twice what you’re making here. And”—she holds up one palm to stop whatever rebuttal Emilie is preparing—“we can help you with the trouble you’re in.”

  “How could you possibly know about that?”

  She shrugs, as though it’s obvious. “There are no secrets on board an airship like this. You of all people should know that.”

  Emilie wants to reach out and grab the lifeline
that has been offered to her. She wants Matilde to tell her everything, to help her believe that this could be possible. But she is afraid of having one more precious thing ripped away. She knows firsthand that hope deferred makes the heart sick.

  Emilie adds this offer to her list of possible scenarios. She weighs it against Max’s proposal and what little she knows of the American’s shadowy machinations. Gertrud has told her very little of the latter, but what Emilie does know leaves her feeling uneasy. She is startled by how very tempted she is to accept the Doehners’ offer. Emilie considers the possibility, but no matter how she tries to imagine a new start in Mexico, she cannot reconcile it with the reality of her situation. Lehmann and Pruss will never let her off this ship.

  Matilde could have been a diplomat. She could have been anything really, so great is her skill with people. She doesn’t rush Emilie, or try to persuade her. She simply offers the patient, indulgent smile so often graced on her children, the one that encourages them to make the right decision. “Think about it,” she says.

  THE AMERICAN

  The American has a theory about small men. They are exhibitionists. He has never known a small man to be quiet. Or humble. They are never farmers or dentists. They need to be seen. Every small man he has ever known is loud and gregarious. They become entertainers or jockeys or soldiers. Musicians. Actors. Take up reckless jobs or ones that draw attention to themselves. Occasionally you’ll find one who becomes a surgeon, but only because this heroism causes him to be adored by others. Small men are tense and wiry. They spring when they walk. They notice everything around them. They have opinions and make them known. The American has heard the arguments about such men feeling inferior and overcompensating with theatrics. He thinks this is bullshit. It is, he believes, a simple matter of having more heart than body to contain it. Given the choice he’d go into a foxhole with a small man over a giant any day. He has found them to be indestructible. And, if honest, he would admit that such men are small targets. That’s always a plus in his profession.