Mason shook his head. “Nonsense. You’ll kill all of us once you get where you’re going, anyway.”
“No,” Felix said, “he won’t. The deal I made with him was that you’d all be dropped off in a lifeboat once we reach Panama.”
Mason pointed to the dead engine room workers. “And them? What was their part in your deal?”
Felix’s eyes darted away.
Priscilla stared up at Dr. Oelrich, eyes wide and pleading, tears trickling down her face. “Just … just save him.”
Buddy grunted out a word, unintelligible but clearly not a word suitable for a grammar school classroom or a radio show broadcast. He began to convulse.
“Please, don’t let him die,” she said.
Dr. Oelrich glanced at each man’s face with eyes that shone with a blue diamond’s brilliance. “I’ll assume that we have a deal. I assure you, if any of you fails to obey my orders in any small way, it will not be this man alone who dies. It will be all of you.”
Chapter 15
A soldier walked backward down the hallway, machine gun at his hip, eyes trained on the hostages. The other Germans were behind them, corralling them down the hallway, down the stairs, into the belly of the ship.
Priscilla held Dara and pressed the girl to her chest. Dara stared behind them at Brigham. He and Mason carried Buddy, barely conscious, arms under his armpits and knees. The wounded man whimpered with each step. The stain on his clothing widened. Blood dripped from the fabric.
Dr. Oelrich’s voice, speaking to Felix, echoed up the hallway from behind, his German accent taking on a strange, staggered cadence, like the chirp of a broken reed. “How many more are aboard? Surely not everyone was on deck.”
“Three more in the engine room.” Felix’s voice, by comparison, sounded weak and tiny, the echo barely reaching them. “And we’re missing Bennie Leland, first mate.”
He didn’t mention the captain, Priscilla thought, and remembered the spots of blood on Felix’s face. Her chest hurt, each beat of her heart spinning a bolt of pain outward. Lost in her thoughts—and numb from shock—the pace of her walk had slowed. Brigham passed by on her right, his face scrunched up in effort as he carried the man, his hands slipping on Buddy’s bloodied legs.
Buddy.
Memories of a thousand embraces passed through her mind, kisses both casual and passionate in dozens of cities; his smile before his laugh; the feel of his fingertips on her skin; lovemaking in hotel beds and showers; the grip of his large hand over hers. His words rang through her head, “… and I’ll still be here.”
His hand, limp, dangling down, brushed by her leg as Mason, too, passed her by. She adjusted Dara in her arms to free up a hand, and wiped her face. The fresh tears felt like scalding water against her cold skin. She wondered if it would be the last time he ever touched her and whether he was aware of it at all. If it was their last, it was a cruel ending to a story of two lovers, even estranged ones.
“In there,” Dr. Oelrich called, pointing past a cabin’s open door. Brigham and Mason carried Buddy inside and rested him on the cot. His body had gone limp, open eyelids revealing lolling eyes, hands frozen into bird claws at his sides. From the doorway, he appeared to Priscilla already dead, except for the subtle rise and fall of his chest with each shallow breath.
The soldiers forced them back into the hallway and down its path. As they descended deeper into the ship and the temperature of the lower levels climbed, the soldiers shrugged off their coats and let them drop to the floor. Underneath they wore standard issue Nazi Obergrenadier fatigues, well-worn and fraying, shoulder and breast patches and collar pins missing. With coat collars gone, the sides of their faces were more easily viewable, days unshaven, with scrapes on their cheeks and noses. One wore a pair of red-rimmed glasses, which magnified the bloodshot eyes underneath. These, Priscilla recognized, were men on the run, desperate and scared, relying on their military training to keep them alive.
“Take the left,” Felix yelled.
Glaring back over his shoulder, Mason complied. Behind him, Brigham scooped Dara out of Priscilla’s arms and followed. Eli, last in their small pack, came up beside her and whispered, “Don’t you think about Mr. Martin in there. You leave him out of your thoughts. I know that’s a hard thing to do, but you best try. This business is gonna get rougher and you need to have a clean head.”
She took his hand and squeezed it. “I can’t.”
“I know you can’t,” he whispered. “But you will.”
Felix called for them to stop at a door opposite his metal shop. Prodded inside, they were enveloped in darkness until Felix fingered a wall switch and a single overhead bulb flickered to life. A wall of iron bars had been erected, dividing the room into two sections, one side an empty storage cabin, the other, a simple jail cell. A plain welded gate hung open. “Step inside.”
They filed inside.
“The walls are reinforced metal. I’ve been working on this room for a while. Put in a lot of hard work. I can guarantee you’re not escaping from here, so just bed down and make yourselves comfortable.” Felix stepped up to the bars and pointed to Brigham. “I’ll take that book now.”
Brigham glowered at his captor. “No.”
Dr. Oelrich’s eyebrows raised in amusement.
“That’s not a very smart answer,” Felix said.
Putting Dara down, Brigham said, “Come in here and get it.”
Impotent rage flooded through Felix’s face. Striking the cage’s bars with the heels of his palms, he yelled, “GIVE ME THE BOOK—”
Dr. Oelrich placed a long, feminine hand on Felix’s shoulder. “Mr. Lane, you’ll find that volume will do little to change his mind. What you must learn to do is recognize vulnerability and utilize the resources most adept to exploiting that weakness. For instance …”
Dr. Oelrich motioned for the largest of the soldiers to step forward. As the muscular, balding man approached the bars, the doctor turned his attention to Brigham. “The men in my employ have been ex-communicated from the Party, each for their individual reason. This is Horst Gruen. Horst is a man with peculiar tastes in, shall we say, the means of physical satisfaction. The Feldgendarmerie arrested Horst after complaints surfaced about his mishandling of prisoners. The abuse of women would never have resulted in such persecution. But his visits to the men’s informatory were met with less tolerance. And then there were the children …”
Brigham’s defiant expression withered. His eyes flickered to Dara at his side. Gripping her hand, he guided her behind him.
“From our example on deck, I hope you understand that I simply do not threaten.” Doctor Oelrich grinned. “As before, I’ll offer you a choice. It should necessitate much consideration. Either you hand over the book Mr. Lane has requested, or Horst takes the little girl. Do not fool yourself, either, that you could stop him if he came for her. You’ve already seen his skill with a knife.”
Brigham dug into his back pocket and removed the paperback. He held it out to Felix, all the while staring, unblinking, at Horst. Felix snatched the book away, smiled, and clapped it to his chest. “Shoulda lent it out to me back when I first asked, now, shouldn’t ya?”
“I’ll take that back from you,” Brigham said, turning his gaze toward Felix. The machinist staggered back a step. “I promise you that.”
Dr. Oelrich laughed. “You’ve learned nothing from this demonstration, have you? Felix’s motivation may have been the book, but not mine. I seek subordination. You, clearly, still need to be broken in.”
Turning away and stepping into the hallway, Dr. Oelrich muttered to Horst, “He’s yours.”
Horst rushed inside the cell, moving faster than Priscilla thought a man his size should be capable, and grappled his arms around Brigham, swinging him around, locking his head in one armpit. Brigham fought, swinging his fists in awkward backward and upward punches, but Horst held tight and tightened his grip, yanking Brigham’s head, each violent jerk threatening to snap his neck.
“Keep …” Brigham croaked as he was dragged from the cell, “… her …safe …”
Priscilla swept the girl off the floor and held her to her chest. Retreating to the far wall, she hid Dara’s eyes from the sight of Horst holding Brigham up while the other soldiers took turns ramming his gut with the stocks of their rifles. Dropped, he doubled over, clutched his midsection, and spit up a wad of dark blood.
Mason turned away from the scene. Anger bloomed across his face. He swore under his breath. It was no mistake that they’d let the gate door remain open. It was a test. But there were no stupid heroics, no wild bolt through the door to stop the savage beating.
The soldiers kicked at Brigham, boot heels to his face and kidneys, until Dr. Oelrich called from the hallway that it was enough. “He’ll be useless to Holst if you kill him. He prefers his playthings still squirming.”
One of the soldiers slammed the gate closed and locked it. A loud metal-on-metal scrape and rattle announced the bolt was secure, echoing as Felix and the Germans disappeared into the hallway with Brigham. When the echo finally died, Dara’s wailing filled the void.
Eli knelt, closed his eyes, cupped his hands, and began to recite the Lord’s Prayer. Mason dropped himself beside the larger man, picking up the recitation at which art in Heaven; his Irish accent sounded thin and tinny next to Eli’s bassy warble.
Dara went limp in Priscilla’s arms, crying but muffling her sobs with her good hand. She lowered her to the floor and watched her scoot over to the men and kneel beside them, hands clasped, eyes closed. She didn’t join in their prayer—Priscilla doubted she knew it in English, if at all—but her face took on a solemn expression.
Priscilla remained standing, not praying, and dropped her hands into her pants pockets. Much like her faith, they were empty.
Chapter 16
Bennie Leland had never eaten ortolan, although he’d been tempted each time he dined at any of the port restaurants on the French coast. The idea of eating a songbird both compelled and repulsed him equally, the legendary taste drawing his curiosity, but the idea of biting down on a whole bird—hollow bones crunching—set his stomach on a roll. The delicacy was expensive and would have meant sacrificing all of the other niceties of Cherbourg shore leave: fruit wine and capitalist women.
He wished he’d tried the bird, now, thinking of Captain Hilliard’s body, and wondering if he’d share the same fate and never have another chance. He’d found the old man dead, throat open, his face purple and swollen to twice its normal size. The captain had suggested trying the ortolan twelve years earlier on their first voyage to France. He almost had, too, but had balked when he saw both the price on the menu and a voluptuous redhead on the street. Next time, he told himself, and had meant it.
There had been six next times—and he always thought there would be another, but now, listening to the German soldiers’ boots clapping against the deck floors, he doubted it. He couldn’t hide forever, even if he knew the Limpkin better than anyone, and an unarmed man stood no chance against trained killers with machine guns. No, he realized, his survival would depend on escaping from the ship without being noticed, to slip on deck and steal one of the lifeboats. The problem was that it took two men to work the winches.
He shut off his thoughts, worried they might distract him from hearing, and closed his eyes. Ear to the wall, he listened to the muffled voices inside the next cabin. His German was rudimentary at best, but he understood enough of their words and could derive even more from the cadence of their voices. The leader gave orders, sending each of his men in a different direction, one to the hallway outside the hostages’ cell, another to the bridge to steer the ship, and the last to—where? The wall muffled too much of the words to tell. But, given the other orders, he could guess: the engine room.
Faintly, underneath the rumble of boots against floor planks, Bennie heard a steady, uneven wheeze. Buddy Martin. From behind one of the bridge’s steamed-over windows he’d watched the German in command gun him down. From the sound of his suffering, he didn’t have much time left.
As the sound of stomping boots faded, Felix’s uneven voice chirped, nervous and fearful, the words lost somewhere in the wall, only a sound like a songbird.
“… not at all,” the German commander said. There was the sound of shuffling, like papers being crinkled and shifted. “… only need them to believe this man is still alive …”
A loud thud sounded, followed by Felix’s gasp.
“… he doesn’t need to actually be alive.”
The wheezing was gone, vanquished.
Felix choked, stumbled. He fell against the wall, swearing, blaspheming, spitting until he gagged and almost vomited. “-at did you do that fo-”
“That,” the German said, “was mercy.”
“… you said you’d save him if …”
“Yes, I did say that.”
“You lied.”
“I did.” The German paused. His footsteps came closer to the wall, to where Felix leaned. “And you told them they’d be dropped off in a lifeboat off the coast of Panama.”
“They won’t?”
The German snickered. “You really are a naïve little man, are you not? Of course they won’t be allowed to go free. It would be too great a risk to take.”
“Gonna kill them?”
The answer was a laugh.
And that changed things for Bennie, not so much the obvious implication of his shipmates’ impending murders, but the attitude behind it, that three men, a woman, and a child could be reduced to the punch line of a madman’s joke. That was too much to accept, too much to allow to happen.
Bennie’s thoughts returned, scrambling for answers. There were knives in the kitchen, of course, and fire axes throughout the ship, but nothing that made his chances against a soldier with a machine gun look promising. A frantic search for Captain Hilliard’s service revolver had come up empty. He wondered if any of the engine room boys had smuggled a gun aboard—it was likely, he thought—and if so, where would they have stashed it?
It was insane, of course, and he knew it. One man armed with blades or maybe even a six-shot revolver against trained soldiers with automatic weapons. But he couldn’t bring himself to abandon the others now, not after what he’d heard, and the thought of jumping overboard and attempting to swim through the icy Atlantic back to England seemed ludicrous anyway. He’d rather die quickly, a bullet to his forehead, than let hypothermia slowly drain away his heat and resolve until he was just a floating mass of bloating flesh. Die with honor, like his father.
Again he wished he’d tried the ortolan.
“Come, now, let us see our treasure,” the German said as Bennie pulled his ear away from the wall. He would wait until their footsteps faded and then slide out into the hallway, doubling around to the aft stairwell, and skirt downstairs to rifle through the engine boys’ cabins.
Chapter 17
The sound of the cabin door opening startled her. Priscilla leaped to her feet and guided Dara behind her. Mason and Eli joined her, forming a wall, protecting the child.
Felix came to the bars, sweating, and pointed at Priscilla. “You. He wants to see you.”
Dara’s hand tugged at the thigh of her pants, urging her to stay. She eased the girl’s hand away, gently, and stepped forward. She thought of how useless Brigham’s refusal had been. Turning, she made eye contact with Dara, and said, “I’m just going for a moment. I’ll be right back.”
Dara shook her head. “You won’t come back.”
… you die all alone in dark, with smile …
“No, I’m coming right back. I am.” Her words did little to reassure the girl. Pink rings already surrounded Dara’s eyes. Fresh tears budded in each of their eyes.
Mason bit his bottom lip and ran a hand ove
r her shoulder. She turned to face him. While there were no tears in his eyes, his expression was worse, heartbroken and impotent. He asked, “Can you make me the same promise?”
She couldn’t. But she pushed herself into his arms and nuzzled into his chest just for a moment, wiping her wet face on his shirt. His hands resisted her leaving, barely loosening their grip, but she pushed away and without looking back went to the gate.
Felix unlocked and opened the gate. He reached for her wrist, pulled her through, and re-locked the gate before she could even find her balance.
She didn’t resist. Although the revolver hung from his belt and not his hands, she knew he could have overpowered her without any weapon at all. For a fleeting moment she considered trying to snag the gun—maybe with a quick enough lunge she could free it and turn it on him—but the idea was followed by an image: after an unsuccessful attempt, the revolver’s barrel turned on Eli, then Mason, then Dara.
Staring down at her feet, she obeyed Felix when he prodded her out into the hallway. Up a deck and down a familiar dark hallway, he led her to the hold, and then inside.
Dr. Oelrich stood over the long, bloodstained crate with a deep frown on his face. “Miss Priscilla Stuyvesant? That is your name, is it not?”
She didn’t answer.
He pointed at a clipboard on the floor, inventory sheets fanned out like a deck of cards. “That is the name on the shipping manifest. I trust there are no other women aboard the Limpkin, so you must be she.”
Shifting her weight, Priscilla let her distrust and impatience show, mouth tight, eyes squinted. “What do you want?”
“I want to know,” he said, “what you did with them.”
Her brow dropped. “With what?”
With one foot, Dr. Oelrich kicked the lid off the crate. Packing materials shifted, revealing nothing underneath. “With the mummies. I want to know where you’ve hidden them.”
Eternal Unrest: A Novel of Mummy Terror Page 13
