Joseph Kanon - The Prodigal Spy

Nick nodded.

“I don’t think I can go through this again. That was like the station. What are you doing? You’ve got to tell me.”

Nick looked at her, the worried eyes. In his hands. Willing to walk through a gate, sick to her stomach. “Yes,” he said. “Everything.”

He sank back against the seat and began to talk, his voice low, almost a murmur, so that the other passengers thought they were simply a couple making plans. Molly said nothing, afraid he would stop if she interrupted, but her eyes talked back, wide and interested, then grave, finally intimate, part of it now. Outside they were passing through a Schweik landscape, passive, gentle hills wriggling across the countryside. Once they paralleled a road, passing a car, and Nick thought of Zimmerman driving his colleagues through the same rolling country to the empty cottage, giving Nick time, shrugging his shoulders when they got there, mistaken again. Another glance at his watch. How much time? It would only take a phone call to the border. But who would leave a car?

After Brno, even Molly became fidgety.

“Maybe we shouldn’t sit together,” Nick said. “In case.”

“You leave and I’ll scream.”

“You don’t have to go on with this. Now that you know. It’s dangerous.”

“Will you stop?” She glanced up, a hint of her old spirit. “At least you’re not boring. God. Imagine spending the rest of your life with Jeff Foster.”

“I’m serious.”

“So am I. Can’t you see I’m just nervous? How much longer, anyway?”

But the border, when they got there, was empty and placid, as quiet as the crossing where they’d driven in. The train screeched to a halt, then idled while Czech guards in gray uniforms boarded and did another passport run, to make sure everyone was stamped for Vienna. The conductor, following, beamed at Nick and said, “American,” as if it were a kind of secret handshake. Minutes passed. Nick watched the guards move through the cars, examining papers, everything in slow motion. One phone call. Maybe this is how the Russian Jews felt, waiting for the cage door to open.

Molly sat rigidly, not saying anything. He was sweating again. Out the window the conductor was talking to one of the border guards on the tracks, this one in blue. What did the uniforms mean? Nick looked toward the control shed at the crossing, its roof laced with wires, where the call would come in. More minutes. Then the clump of boots, the guards getting off the train, a whistle, and the barrier gate began to rise.

The engine grew louder, revving up, but the train stayed in place, as if it needed a push. Then the car began to slide forward, slowly, into the no-man’s-land between the barriers. Another crossing gate going up, another group of uniforms waiting, and they were across, shuddering to a second stop as the Austrians got on. Nick looked behind. The Czech gate was going down. Were they technically in Austria, beyond recall? The new guards, speaking German, were perfunctory but correct, somehow more sinister than the shaggy Czechs, like movie Nazis. They stamped passports and moved on, efficient. Nick kept looking back toward the Czech sector, expecting to see someone running out of the signal house, waving his hands. But it had to be all right now.

And a few minutes later it was. The train picked up speed, leaving the border behind, streaming into the woods. Molly took his hand and squeezed it, but he was too drained to respond. He had been so focused on the crossing, a pinpoint of space, that everything beyond seemed a blank. Vienna. What if the embassy knew, had people waiting for them? He moved his hand, feeling the urn, just as deadly as before. But what did the film actually say? They were out, but the air wasn’t free, full of questions.

“Everything’s going to be different now,” Molly said, squeezing his hand again. But it wasn’t. The landscape was the same, unassuming hills and fields. It still wasn’t finished. They’d want him, if they knew. But they didn’t, not even Silver. They might watch, but they didn’t know. If he was careful. Nothing was different. Even the fear was the same, not left behind barbed wires. It stayed with you, like a new sense. There was no geographical alchemy. You took Prague with you.

Larry was furious, and wounded. They had lunch in the quiet dining room of the Knickerbocker, overlooking Fifth Avenue, because he wanted to avoid the communal table at the Brook, but even here, so private that business papers were not allowed at table, people came over to say hello, a hand on the shoulder and an innocuous comment about Uncle Ho’s keeping him busy and who was the fine young fellow with him. Larry put on his Van Johnson smile, but Nick could see his irritation, each interruption wasting precious time.

It was a typical Larry meeting, caught on the run, with a return plane to Paris waiting, a phone call expected, so that Nick became marginal, someone he’d managed to fit in. But Nick hadn’t wanted it either. Molly had taken the film to a photographer friend downtown, and Nick had watched it drop into her purse with dismay, afraid to let it out of his hands for even a minute. Outside, with its swarms of bright yellow taxis, New York was rich and busy and filled with sunshine, everything Prague was not, but all he could think about was Molly being followed or the photographer-how good a friend? — amazed at the pictures appearing in the fixing tray. But Larry had insisted; he had only the afternoon. So they both sat there, prickly, like pieces of tinder ready to ignite. When Larry said, “Chicken salad and iced tea. Two,” Nick wanted to jump on him. I can order myself. A kid again.

“Why didn’t you say anything to me? That’s what I want to know. What the hell did you think you were doing?”

“I told you, he didn’t want anyone to know.”

“Well, that’s typical, isn’t it? I suppose you know your mother’s a wreck. For Christ’s sake, traipsing around behind the iron curtain without telling anyone. Now, of all times. What do you think I’m doing in Paris, going to the Louvre? Did you ever think how this would look for me?”

“No, Larry, I never thought about that.”

“Well, thanks very much.”

“It had nothing to do with you.”

“Of course it did. You’re my son.”

“I was his too.”

“I’m surprised you wanted to see him. After everything. Why didn’t you ask me to arrange it if it was so important to you? Do it the right way, not sneak around like this. Like some-” He hesitated. “Spy,” he said, unable to resist.

Nick looked at the man his father had thought would help. Mistaken about everyone to the end, except Nick. “What’s the right way? What would you have said?”

Larry looked away. “I’d have tried to talk you out of it, I suppose. What was the point, Nick? All these years.”

“The point was he wanted to see me. Before he died. I couldn’t say no to that.”

“Before he died?”

“I think he knew.”

Larry looked away, disconcerted. “What did he want, to tell you he was sorry?”

“More or less.”

“Christ. So off you go. Not a word. And the next thing I hear you’re in a Communist jail-”

“I was never in jail.”

“And now I’ve got the FBI all over me. Did you know your son is in Czechoslovakia? Oh, really. Fucking Hoover on the phone. Now I’m supposed to owe him one. God knows what that favor will be. Your son’s been arrested, but we got him out. Well, thanks, Edgar, I appreciate it. Do you have any idea what it’s been like?”

“They didn’t get me out. You don’t owe him anything.”

“Well, they still want to see you. Is there something else I should know before they start calling me again? What’s all this business about him coming back? What did he tell you?”