TWELVE

Present Day

Sterling, Massachusetts

    “Have you solved the great depositary robbery?” Val asked me over our picnic lunch.

    I nibbled on our shared “everything” grinder. Val introduced these to me last year, and I had become as hooked as she was to anticipating the flavor of the next bite.

    I got a mouthful of grilled eggplant and hummus. Not bad. “I still don’t know if there even was a robbery,” I said.

    We sat on top of a rock on the same hill Val had taken me to the previous summer on our very first date. This time, though, it was in daylight, and the golden autumn sun lit up some amazing fall foliage in the valley below. In front of us we could see a reservoir with an old stone church standing on its shore.

    Val pointed. “I’ve wondered many times why that church is standing all alone, with no houses around.”

    “Would you like to hear the story?” an Indian-accented voice asked from below us.

    Val and I looked down, and we saw an elderly Indian man standing at the base of the rock. He had a small pot belly, and the sun gleamed off his thinning white hair. He smiled up at us.

    “Hello,” I said. Where did he come from?

    The man placed his palms together and made a small head bow. “Namaste,” he said. “Do you two come here often?”

    “Not lately,” I said. “Do you live around here?”

    “I stay with my son and his wife, just like back in my village when my parents once lived with me,” he said. “My son lives nearby, and during the day they work and I go trekking.” He climbed up our rock with surprising agility and sat down between us. “This is one of my favorite spots.”

    “Mine too,” Val said. She scooted over to give him a bit more room. She held out a water bottle. “Would you like a drink?”

    The man took it and unscrewed the top. He tilted his head back and held the bottle a couple of inches above his lips. He poured the water into his mouth and swallowed without spilling a drop and without stopping the flow.

    The man drained the bottle and gave it back to Val. Then he stuck out his hand to me. “Myself Mukesh Rana Malhotra. Please call me Mukesh.”

    I shook his hand. “I’m Scott, and this is Val.”

    He gestured below. “You wish to hear more about that stone temple?”

    “You know the story?” I asked.

    Mukesh nodded. “Last week I met a chap standing outside its door, like he had just finished his puja. His family has lived in these villages for almost four hundred years.” He swept his arm across the scene below us. “He told me that last century this area was a valley filled with apple orchards and cider mills lining three rivers.”

    The man frowned. “But the city of Boston needed more water, and the state built this reservoir,” he said. “The villagers left the temple standing as a memorial to the one thousand displaced people who lost their homes and jobs.”

    The three of us sat silently for a moment.

    “I am somewhat displaced myself,” the old man said. “I chose to spend my life caring for my parents instead of pursuing my career. Now that they both are gone, I have come to live with my son.”

    “That is very honorable,” Val said.

    “It was dharma, my duty,” he said. “We all must do our duties.” Mukesh stood up. “I must finish my trek before my grandson comes home from school.” He turned to Val. “Thank you for the water. Please carry on with your meal.”

    “It was nice meeting you,” Val said.

    “The pleasure was mine,” he said. The old man climbed down the rock and headed off. We listened to the fading sounds of his humming as we finished our grinders.

    I put our bottles and wrappers back into the bag. “I’ve been learning about displaced people all morning,” I said. I told Val about Madame Flora’s Croatian origins, her father’s fate, and what drove her and her grandmother to Nuremberg.

    “Flora’s grandmother had to read Hermann Goering’s soul identity?” she asked. “I wouldn’t wish that on anybody.”

    “It was the price of their tickets to America,” I said. “Besides, she did it from a photograph. It was Archie and young Flora who had to face the Reichsmarschall and take his picture.”

    “Are Flora and Mr. Morgan getting along now?” she asked.

    I explained how the bickering had continued all morning. “But I’ve got her telling the story now, and it seems she knows a lot more than Archie.”

    “Can you trust what she says?”

    I shrugged. “I don’t really think I can trust either of them.”

    She nodded. “So what was lost from Goering’s collection?”

    I did some calculations in my head. “Archie claims there was over twenty-five million dollars’ worth of gold and three boxes of the Nazi’s memoirs. And in its place, a handwritten journal.”

    “Where did that come from?”

    I shrugged. “It was written in some weird alphabet.” I told her how Madame Flora acted when she saw it. “I wonder if she remembered it from Goering’s cell.”

    “I feel for her.” Val shuddered. “Imagine standing face to face with the monster responsible for the concentration camps that killed your family, knowing your grandmother will die if you don’t help him.”

    And as we climbed down the hill and drove back to headquarters, I couldn’t shake that image.