A Fire in the Night

by Christopher Swann

  The clouds broke just as he pulled up to the cabin. He parked in the carport, grabbed his bag from Lettie’s shop, and opened the car door to the thunderous roar of the rain. He unlocked the door to the kitchen and went inside. “Hey,” he called to Annalise, and he kicked the door shut behind him, which diminished the roar of the rain a little. It pinged off the chimney cap, echoing down the flue, and made a steady drumbeat on the roof. Just above the din, he could hear water pouring in a stream from the gutter outside his office. He’d just had the gutters replaced—maybe it wasn’t fit tightly enough to the fascia. Something else to have to repair.

  He put the shopping bags down on the kitchen counter and turned to face Annalise standing in the office doorway, pointing a pistol at him with both hands. “Don’t move,” she said.

  He held his hands up, palms facing her. “Annalise, what—”

  “Shut up,” she said. Her eyes were wide with terror, but that hardness was back. “Who are you? Who the fuck are you?”

  Nick glanced past her into the office and saw the passports scattered across his desk. Shit.

  “Who are you?” she said, more loudly now. The pistol trembled in her hands.

  “I’m your uncle, Annalise,” he said, keeping his voice calm.

  “Why do you have a gun?” she said.

  “I keep the gun for protection,” he said. He didn’t move, didn’t consider moving.

  “Why do you have a bunch of fake fucking passports?”

  “Annalise, please, just put the gun down.”

  “Do you think I’m stupid?” The pistol began to waver more erratically.

  “I think you’re scared,” Nick said. “And you have every right to be. But I don’t think you’re stupid. You found me, all by yourself. Let me help you. Please. I won’t hurt you.”

  The pistol began to waver less, as if focusing all its attention on Nick’s chest. Annalise still looked scared, her eyes shining with tears, but her face was set, determined, backed by a mulish stubbornness. “Why do you have all these passports?” she demanded. “You a smuggler? A criminal?”

  Nick smiled. He couldn’t help it.

  “What,” Annalise said, “is so funny?”

  “Sorry,” he said. “I just … you reminded me of Ellie.”

  Annalise raised the pistol so it aimed at his face. “Don’t play me,” she said.

  Nick shook his head. “I’m not. Honest. She did the same thing once. Ellie. Your aunt. She busted me. She didn’t point a gun at me, but it was a—pretty tense situation.”

  “What do you mean, she busted you? Were you cheating on her or something?”

  “No,” Nick said. “I never cheated on her. She wanted to know the same thing you do. Who I am. Who I was.”

  The pistol remained steady, aimed directly at his nose. “What did you tell her?” Annalise said.

  “That I was a spy,” Nick said.

  THEY HAD BEEN in Cairo then. Early morning, before sunrise. Nick remembered hearing the muezzin calling the faithful of Cairo to the predawn Fajr prayer, the sidewalks almost completely empty as he hurried down Kamel Al Shenawy Street and turned into the court of his apartment building, his footsteps echoing off the stone. He fumbled his keys out of his pocket, his bandaged hand giving him trouble, and opened the door into the building as quietly as he could. Despite the call of the muezzin, no other tenants were stirring at this hour. Nick took the stairs rather than waiting for the elevator, which was old and loud. When he reached his floor, he padded down the hallway to his apartment, inserted another key, and was inside, the door shut behind him. He allowed himself a moment to breathe.

  A snap of a light switch and Nick froze, the apartment springing into view, lamps and couches and tables and doorways. And Ellie, in a red robe, sitting in her usual chair by the window.

  “Shit,” Nick said. “You scared me.”

  Ellie narrowed her eyes in a frown. “Likewise. It’s five in the morning, Nick. Where have you been?”

  Nick put his hands in his pockets and leaned back against the door. “I thought you had a conference in Berlin.”

  The coolness of her tone made Nick wince. “I came home early to surprise you,” she said. She sat forward. “What’s wrong with your face? Nick?”

  Slowly Nick stepped out of the shadowed foyer into the lamp-lit living room. Ellie’s eyes widened. “Oh my God, Nick, what happened?”

  “It looks worse than it is,” Nick said, but Ellie was already out of her chair and hurrying across the room. She stopped outside of hugging distance.

  “Who did this to you?”

  “I fell into the street. Clumsy—”

  “The street didn’t give you a black eye, Nick.”

  “Streets are hard.”

  “Stop bullshitting me.” Ellie glanced down at his pockets. “Show me your hands.”

  “Ellie—”

  “Now.”

  Nick took his hands out of his pockets, revealing his bandaged hand.

  “Did the street do that too?” Ellie asked.

  He was so tired. He hadn’t slept all night, of course, and he was long past the adrenaline rush of earlier. But he was also weary to the bone of keeping this part of his life, of himself, from Ellie. “No,” he said. “The street didn’t do that.” He gestured with his uninjured hand to the couch. “Let’s sit.”

  Ellie didn’t move, arms crossed. “I’d prefer to stand.”

  “Well, I’m sitting. I don’t want to fall over and lose whatever dignity I have left.” Nick walked past Ellie and sat on the couch, his head back on the cushion. After a few moments, Ellie came and sat on the far end of the couch.

  Nick looked up at the ceiling as he spoke. “I had a meeting last night.”

  “A meeting.”

  “It wasn’t an academic meeting.” He closed his eyes, which felt like they’d been scoured with sand. “It was with a very frightened man from Sudan. Let’s call him Ahmed.”

  “Ahmed from Sudan.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Why were you meeting with Ahmed from Sudan?”

  “Because he had some information he wanted to share.”

  “With a professor of medieval studies?”

  Nick opened his eyes and turned his head to look directly at Ellie. “I’m not just a professor of medieval studies,” he said.

  She looked back at him, her face inscrutable. “Go on,” she said.

  He was so tired. He could fall asleep right here, looking at his wife. And yet he also knew he was standing at the edge of a cliff, and so was Ellie, and he wanted to be able to step back from that cliff with her. One wrong step and he would fall. Or Ellie might push him.

  “I was asked to meet with Ahmed and talk with him, find out if the information he wanted to share was valuable. He would only meet with an American, in a public place.”

  “Where?”

  “The Barrel Bar at the Windsor. I had to wear this straw hat, a fedora—you would have laughed your ass off. Anyway, I can see him from a mile away, he’s so nervous he’s practically vibrating. Took him two drinks to calm down. He’s convinced the waiter is listening to our conversation, so I call the waiter over and give him a nice tip and tell him to leave us alone for a while, which he does. And Ahmed starts talking.” Nick paused. “Would you please get me a glass of water? My throat’s dry.”

  Ellie got up and went into the kitchen and Nick laid his head back again. Outside, a car horn beeped and another responded. Ellie returned with a glass of water. Nick drank half the glass down and put it on the coffee table. “Thank you,” he said.

  “What did Ahmed want to talk about?” she asked.

  “How some people in the Sudanese government were supporting terrorists,” Nick said. “Ahmed used to be an intelligence officer. He claimed to have lots of secrets.”

  The dark sky outside the window was shading to gray, the sounds of street traffic rising as the city awoke. Ellie looked pale and exhausted and beautiful. “This is the part where you tell me ho
w you got hurt,” she said.

  Nick nodded. “Ahmed wanted a hotel room. He thought the Windsor would do nicely, but I told him I knew of another place, more discreet, where he would be safe. A private hotel out in Heliopolis. He agreed, so I paid the tab and we left. Outside, I started walking toward the metro, but Ahmed refused—too crowded, too easy for a stranger in the crowd to stick a knife between his ribs and then vanish. He wanted to take a taxi, all the way to Heliopolis. We were standing on the sidewalk, arguing.” Nick took another sip of water. “And that’s when they hit us.”

  “They?”

  “Three of them. They walked up behind us on the street and muscled us into an alley like we’d all practiced it together.” Nick closed his eyes again.

  In a low voice, Ellie said, “And you went into hero mode.”

  His eyes still closed, Nick said, “They were going to kill him. I couldn’t let that happen.”

  “Yes, you could.”

  Nick’s eyes opened. He stared at Ellie.

  Ellie’s voice barely kept her fury in check. “Don’t give me that look. You are a fucking history professor.”

  “I was a Marine too.”

  “You’re not a Marine now. I don’t know what you are.”

  “I’m your husband who couldn’t let a man be killed in front of him.”

  Ellie raised a hand as if to slap him, held it in midair, then let it drop. “Did you kill those men?” she said.

  He nodded, still looking at her.

  “You couldn’t let a man be killed, so instead you killed three.”

  “I didn’t—” Nick shook his head. “They were going to murder him, Ellie. And then they would have killed me. He came to me—”

  “He didn’t come to you,” Ellie said.

  “I was the one who was there,” Nick said. “I was the one who met him. So he was my responsibility right then.”

  She sighed and closed her eyes. After a long pause, she said, “Who were they? The three men.”

  “Local thugs. They were hired by someone in Sudan to take care of Ahmed, probably.”

  She opened her eyes. “What happened to them? The—bodies?”

  “The Egyptians took care of it.”

  She gestured toward his bandaged hand. “Did they take care of that too?”

  Nick looked at his hand, wrapped in gauze. “One of the thugs pulled a knife. It’s not serious. A Marine corpsman wrapped it up, actually.”

  “A Marine corpsman,” Ellie said. “What, he just happened to be walking by?”

  “He was at the US embassy, actually. Where I had to explain what happened to the deputy chief of mission. Ahmed practically begged for asylum. The DCM was pissed.”

  For the first time, Ellie smiled. “Fitzgerald? I bet he was. He’s hated your guts ever since you made him look like a jerk in front of Ambassador Yarsawich.”

  “In my defense, Fitzgerald was hitting on my wife at that embassy party.”

  Her smile faded as she considered Nick. “So you’re one of the alphabet boys,” she said. “Military intelligence? CIA?”

  “The second one.”

  “Since when?”

  He held her gaze. “Since I got out of the Marines.”

  She stood and walked the length of the room, arms folded across her midriff, then walked back. “Jesus, Nick.”

  “I know,” he said. “I’m sorry. I should have told you sooner.”

  Ellie continued pacing the floor. “Why didn’t you? And don’t give me any ‘sworn to secrecy’ bullshit.”

  He reached out and took her hand, stopping her. “I didn’t want to make you worry,” he said. “It was stupid. I’m sorry.”

  She didn’t look at him. She also didn’t remove her hand from his. He sat there on the couch, in the lightening dawn, holding his wife’s hand in his unbandaged one while she stood half turned away.

  She let go of his hand. As soon as she did, he missed her touch. Then, to his relief, she sat down on the couch next to him. “So now what?”

  “Now,” he said, “I have to prep for a lecture on the First Crusade this afternoon, and I don’t know where my notes are.”

  “That’s not what I mean.”

  “I know.” God, his eyes, they were so dry. And he was so tired. “I can quit. It’ll take a few months, but I’ll do it.” And we could have kids, he almost said, but he stopped himself. He wasn’t going to pretend his career—either of his careers—was what made him not want to have children. He wouldn’t lie about that, not to Ellie. And he wouldn’t offer the possibility of having children as some sort of peace offering. He’d been dishonest enough.

  “You’d have to quit your teaching job,” she said, a question posed as a statement.

  “This one, yes, probably,” he said. “But there are other schools.”

  She took his bandaged hand in hers and looked at it as if searching for something in the folds of gauze. “You don’t want to quit,” she said, and for a moment he had no response to that simple, undeniable fact.

  “I was actually worried that maybe you were having an affair,” she said.

  He let out a bark of laughter. “That’s ridiculous,” he said. “I would never—”

  “More ridiculous than you being a CIA agent?”

  “Officer,” he said, and when she raised an eyebrow, he said, “We prefer intelligence officer to agent.”

  She looked at him for so long that he grew scared, imagined her walking out the door and never returning. That would break him, he knew.

  Then she raised his bandaged hand to her lips and kissed it. “Oh for fuck’s sake,” she said.

  “WHAT DO YOU mean, you’re a spy?” Annalise said. She was still aiming the pistol at Nick’s face.

  “Was,” Nick said. “I was a spy. I retired from that too.” He nodded toward the passports on the desk. “I kept those as insurance, I guess. If I needed to go somewhere without anyone knowing who I am.”

  He could see Annalise was struggling to digest this. “So you weren’t a professor?”

  “No, I was. I was a professor.”

  “So that was, what, your cover?”

  “Sort of,” he said. “I was an actual professor. Taught classes. Wrote books.”

  Annalise lowered the gun so now it pointed in the general vicinity of his stomach. “I saw the one on your shelf about Richard the Lionheart and Saladin.”

  “You did?”

  She nodded.

  “Annalise?” Nick said. “Can I put my hands down now? My arms are getting tired.”

  She looked warily at him. “You won’t hurt me?”

  “I won’t hurt you,” he said. “I swear on Ellie’s grave.”

  They stood there for a moment, eyeing each other. Then Annalise laid the pistol down on the table.

  He was able to refrain from sighing with relief, but it was a close thing. Instead he lowered his hands and gestured at the shopping bags. “I got you some clothes. I hope they fit.”

  “Okay,” she said. “Thank you.” She shifted from one foot to the other but didn’t make a move toward the bags. Nick felt like they were two awkward dancers who didn’t understand the music.

  “I need to leave in a few minutes,” he said. “I have to make a short trip. Do some research.”

  She stood very still. “Is this about whatever my dad wanted me to give you? That map?”

  “Yes. And about whoever wants it.”

  “What kind of research? I mean, can’t you just look on the internet?”

  “Need Wi-Fi for that.”

  “No Wi-Fi, no phone.” Annalise sounded like she was stranded on an island, taking stock of the situation. “Wait, when you go back out, can you get a charger for my phone? I can pay for it. I’ll pay you back for all the clothes and everything—”

  He waved her off. “Don’t worry about the clothes. And a cell phone will work fine in town, but off the main roads the reception is pretty bad. Won’t work out here.”

  She nodded, thinking. “You said yo
u had to make a trip. Where are you going?”

  “Charlotte.”

  Her eyes widened. “How far away is that?”

  “I’ll be back by tonight.”

  “I’m coming with you.”

  Nick shook his head. “Nuh-uh. You stay here. You’ve got clothes, there’s food in—”

  “No way,” she said. “I’m not staying here alone all day. I’m going with you. What’s in Charlotte, anyway?”

  “Annalise—”

  “You’re not leaving me here alone,” she said.

  They stared at one another for a long moment. Nick thought about how she would be a distraction, how he would have to make her stay in the car while he did whatever he needed to do.

  You’ll be worried about her even more if you leave her here, Ellie said.

  “Please,” Annalise said, and Nick could see the fear in her eyes.

  Don’t leave her alone, Ellie said.

  Nick sighed. “Go use the bathroom and get changed. We’re leaving in fifteen minutes.”

  Annalise smiled and went to grab the shopping bags, walking past the pistol on the table without giving it a second look. As soon as she left the room with the bags, Nick went to the laundry room off his kitchen and grabbed a small day pack, then retrieved the pistol from the table. By the time Annalise reappeared, in a red T-shirt and new jeans, Nick had the day pack over his shoulder, the pistol buried in the bottom of the pack under a red plastic poncho.

  “Clothes fit okay?” he asked, getting two bottles of water from the fridge.

  “Yeah, thanks,” she said. “I mean, these are mom jeans, but they’re comfortable. No offense,” she added. “I’m just glad to have new jeans. And underwear. And, well, everything. Thank you.”

  Nick refrained from smiling. “Grab that blanket off the couch,” he said.

  Annalise picked up the blanket. “Why do you need this?”

  Nick headed for the door to the carport. “Actually, that’s for you.”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  Nick made Annalise lie on the floor of the back seat with the blanket over her until he had driven through Cashiers all the way to Lake Toxaway, nearly half an hour. “Now can I sit up?” Annalise asked for the fifth time.

  “Yes,” Nick said, eyes on the road.