Joseph Kanon - Los Alamos

He turned around. The bobbed hair. The eager eyes. “Hannah,” he said.

She looked up at him, startled for a minute, then said, “Oh, it’s you. Emma’s friend. Forgive me, I didn’t recognize—” Her voice wavered, still puzzled. “But have you joined the army?”

Hannah. He felt the hair on the back of his neck. She had approached a soldier. He stared at her, frozen, as still as the moment on the trail at Chaco. Hannah. Not a man.

“Just for the day,” he said.

But only he had made the leap. “I don’t understand,” she said, disconcerted by his stare. Then, quickly, catching herself, “But where is Emma?”

“She’s not here,” he said. “I was looking for you.”

Hannah. Eisler had been billeted at the ranch.

“Me?” she said, a nervous laugh, uncertain. “But I didn’t know I was coming myself. It’s so difficult to travel now.”

Back and forth to Los Angeles. There would be people there, the next link. No need to risk another meeting in Santa Fe.

“But you sent me an invitation.”

“No,” she said. “I’m sorry. You’re mistaken. It must have been the gallery. Of course, if I had known—” She looked away from him, turning her head as if she wanted to be rescued from the conversation. “But there she is. Emma!” she said loudly, calling her over, but Connolly had glanced up and caught her eye. He shook his head, stopping her at the door.

Hannah turned back to him, bewildered. “I thought you said—”

“She doesn’t know,” Connolly said evenly. “I’ve brought you a message from Corporal Waters.”

Did her eyes widen, or was it his imagination?

“And who is that?”

“Me.”

She looked at him for a moment in disbelief, not saying anything. “Is that your name?” she said finally, polite. “I’m sorry. I forgot. There must be some mistake.”

“No. The invitation was for me.”

Her eyes, shrewd and cautious, darted across his face, trying to see behind the words. Then she closed herself off and looked away. “You are mistaken,” she said, so simply that for an instant he wondered if he was wrong. Everything was supposed to fit. Everything counts in murder. How could it be her? Another European story?

She had turned her head, searching for something, and he followed her look out onto the patio, to the tall Mexican in a denim jacket leaning against the adobe wall. Her right hand. Ajax. A classical name. No, Hector. The constant companion. As if he were taking snapshots, Connolly looked from the patio to Hannah, then again to the Mexican, his mind back at the blackboard. Connect everything. The workboots. Hector’s job on the Hill. Of course he’d be with her, just in case. Strong enough to carry a man. Strong enough to kill one. Two people, one to drive the car back. A wrench, some tool. Had she watched? Had she turned away, like Eisler, or had she watched? Eisler was meeting her, the person off the Hill, but Hector had to return. He worked there now. The car. The back gate.

When he turned back to Hannah, he saw that she had been following his eyes, watching him fill in his crossword. “There’s no mistake,” he said. “Eisler’s dead. He talked to me before he died. I know.”

And then he did know. It was in her eyes. One look, one unguarded point of recognition. “Who are you?” she said softly.

He didn’t answer.

“ ‘I know,’ ” she said. “What does that mean?”

“I know what information Eisler gave you. All of it, every detail. I know about the meeting at San Isidro. I know what happened to Karl.” For a second her face held a question, and he realized she had never known Karl’s name. “The man you killed there. You and your friend.”

She looked at him closely, then shook her head. “Phantastische,” she said. “Poor Friedrich. A delirium. Why would he say such things? But it’s often like that at the end. The fantasies, the paranoia. And you believed him? All this nonsense in his sleep.”

“He was wide awake,” Connolly said flatly. “I interrogated him.”

“Ah,” she said, her voice wry with scorn. “So now we have the Gestapo too. Like the movies. The rubber hose. The castor oil. Some drug? Is that how he died?”

“No. He killed himself.”

She looked up at him, interested. “Why?”

“Remorse, I think.”

“Remorse.”

“Not about you. He was loyal to the end, Eisler. A good party man. But Karl-that was something else. I don’t think he’d ever seen a man killed before. That shook him. I guess he didn’t know your lover was the hot-blooded type.”

“My lover,” she said, her voice cold with contempt, and Connolly thought of that day at the ranch. Something had happened between them. Not a lovers’ quarrel. No. She’d been angry with him for putting them at risk.

“Maybe he just didn’t know his own strength,” Connolly said.

“Enough foolishness.” She turned slightly to go.

“Don’t,” he said, his voice hard.

She froze, looking up at him.

“That’s right. You don’t want to make a scene. Not here. Not in front of the customers. We’ll go somewhere else. Then we can talk some more.”

“You must be crazy. You come up to me here, in this place, with these-what? Accusations? The rantings of a dead man. ‘I know.’ ‘I know.’ You don’t know anything. Leave me alone.”

“I have a gun,” he said quietly.

She stopped. “Now the melodrama too?”

“It’s over, Hannah. There was a witness at San Isidro,” he said. “He’s identified your friend. And you.”

She looked at him again, assessing. “It’s a lie.”

“Is it?”

“Then why wait so long? All this—” She spread her hand toward the room.

“We wanted to see if they’d send someone else. But they didn’t, did they? Your friends. What if it’s a trap? Send Hannah. She’s expendable. Now that Eisler’s dead. They’re closing you down too.”

He had touched some anger. “You fool,” she said, glaring at him. “Do you think that matters? There’ll be someone else. Always. That’s why we win. Yes, we,” she said, catching his look. “Who do you think won this war? The baby GIs with their Hershey bars? We won it. Communists. Such a dirty word to you. But we knew. We stopped them. You think politics is about elections? No-bodies. So, one more, one less? What difference?”

“Then we’ll start with you.”

She tossed back her head. “Yes, start with me. Take your time. You think you have so much time? Idiot,” she said in German. “It’s already too late. What did you think? We could sit by and watch you do this? And not protect ourselves? Children-you’re all children here. Do you think we would give a gun to a child?”

“Do you think we’d give one to a gangster?”

She paused, a flicker of a smile on her face. “No. He would have to take it. While the child was playing, perhaps.”

“For his own good.”

“Yes, for everybody’s good. But very carefully. So he wouldn’t know. We had to be very careful.”

Connolly paused. “And yet here you are.”

“For exactly one more minute. Then we are going to smile-it’s very pleasant, the gallery, yes? — and people will say, ‘You see, not so serious. They must have been talking about the art.’ You think you know something? Where is your proof? Friedrich? I was always very careful with Friedrich. When they put him at the ranch, I thought it was a trap-I wouldn’t even look at him. And he thought I had arranged it, so clever. But you know, there is luck in America. Not like Germany. Everything is lucky here. They thought he’d feel at home speaking German. But we never did. All that time, we were too afraid to talk. We couldn’t believe our luck, you see. But afterward, that was more difficult. So I had to be careful. No paper. No strings. Nothing. Nothing to connect us at all. Now what do you want to do? Arrest me? With your gun? Over nothing at all? I don’t think so. Who would believe such a thing?”