TWENTY-EIGHT

October 1946

Nuremberg, Occupied Germany

    She saw the overseer at breakfast.

    “How is your mission?” he asked.

    “Under way,” was all Flora could manage. She didn’t look at him, and after a minute of apparently finding nothing to say, he finished his coffee and left the room.

    She met Private Lee back at the same fountain later that morning, and she did her best to smile after he kissed her on the lips.

    “Last night was incredible, Mona,” he said. He put his arms behind him on the fountain ledge and leaned with his face up toward the morning sun. “I haven’t been able to think of anything else.”

    At least they agreed on that, though his thoughts probably weren’t filled with as much despair as hers. “Me too, Steven,” she managed to say.

    Lee reached into his pocket. “Here’s your pen, my lady.”

    As she reached out to grab it, he smiled and jerked it out of her grasp. “It’s going cost you.”

    She steadied her voice. “How much?”

    “Another evening of your time.” He smiled. “Just like last night, but longer.”

    She held out her hand. “Let me see.”

    Flora pulled off the cover and unwrapped the papers. They were unsigned! She looked up at Lee.

    He held a note in his hand. “Goering asked me to give this to you.”

    She took the note. It was written in German, and she read it to herself.

Fraulein-our mutual soldier friend told me how sweet you taste. I encouraged him to sample you again, as it seemed fair payment for the embarrassment you caused me. I refuse to sign the papers until you help me get from Dr. Stahmer the special medicine I need to hasten my depature.

    “What does it say?” the soldier asked.

    Flora’s mind raced to find a credible explanation. “Herr Goering says he won’t sign until I spend another night with you.” She forced another smile. “He must really like you.”

    Lee grinned. “He sure does.” He laughed out loud. “That dirty old fox!”

    After making plans to meet the soldier in the evening, Flora returned to Soul Identity to speak with Archibald.

    “He must be referring to cyanide,” the overseer said after she relayed Goering’s request. “That seems to be the choice of most of the Nazi leadership.”

    “He deserves to be hung,” Flora said. “If you let him escape the noose by helping him commit suicide, you’ll turn him back into a hero.”

    He shrugged. “I do not care how he dies, so long as he signs the release first.”

    She saw his point. The clock was ticking, and if Goering hung before he signed, Archibald lost, James suffered for nothing, and Baba was as good as dead. They had no choice but to do what the Nazi wanted. “If you get me the cyanide today,” she said, “I’ll have his signature tomorrow.”

    He nodded. “Let me see what I can do.”

    While waiting for Archibald to return with the poison, Flora stopped by Baba’s room. The old lady was sitting by the window, looking at a tiny silver locket. When she saw Flora, she smiled. “Come here and look at my pictures,” she said.

    Flora knelt on the floor and glanced at the photographs inside the locket. One was of a young couple, and the other of a small boy. “Is that you and Zedza?” she asked.

    Baba nodded. “I don’t know how he did it, but one of your grandfather’s old friends found me here in Nuremberg and returned my locket.”

    “Why did this friend have your locket?”

    “Your grandfather took it with him when he went to war. Old Ned must have held onto it for the past thirty years.”

    “Old Ned?”

    Baba smiled. “A dear friend from Australia. Major Edward Callaghan, but your grandfather called him Ned. He’s here for the execution.”

    That was a subject Flora didn’t want to discuss. She tapped the photographs. “Your parents must have had to beat the boys away with a stick.”

    “I wasn’t nearly as pretty as my granddaughter.” Baba pointed at the man. “You’ve got your grandfather’s cheekbones.”

    “Tell me about him.”

    Baba closed her eyes and smiled. “A wild man, my parents said. But Radik was ambitious, and full of high ideals, and always finding ways to get into trouble.” She looked at Flora. “You’re an awful lot like him.”

    “I’ll bet he never got his friends almost killed.”

    “You still blame yourself over James Little, don’t you?”

    Flora nodded and bit her lip.

    “You must stop that,” Baba commanded. “And just so you know, your grandfather made his share of mistakes too.”

    This was new territory. Baba practically worshipped the memory of her long-deceased husband. His name had been invoked many times over the years to convince Flora to study harder, or to act more ladylike. If the great Radovan Drabarni had any flaws, Baba had them well covered with a layer of historical perfection.

    “Mistakes?” Flora asked.

    Baba nodded. “Two big ones that I know about. One of them cost him his job as foreman of the Hungarian opal mines.”

    Flora knew her grandfather had been a miner, but she thought it had been in Australia. “Hungary?”

    “At the time it was Hungary. The mines have since closed. But back in the nineties, your grandfather was in charge of mining the Dubnik opal mines. Until his first mistake.”

    “What did he do?”

    Baba looked out the window for a minute before saying anything. “Radik came home one evening and told me he had just sent a crew down an un-shored tunnel. The mine needed to complete a shipment to Budapest, and they were behind schedule. Your grandfather worried all night about a cave-in.” She stopped and sighed.

    “Did they make it?”

    She shook her head. “We sold everything we had and sent most of our money to the boys’ families. Then we headed to Australia to start afresh.”

    Flora knew the story from there. Among other jobs, her grandfather had been mildly successful in the Australian opal mines. Baba had told her about Flora’s father being born in the underground town of White Cliffs, and how Radovan had volunteered to serve in the Great War, where he was killed by the Turks at Gallipoli. After the war, Baba had returned to her hometown in Istria with her twelve-year-old son.

    “Did he ever forgive himself?” Flora asked.

    “Never,” Baba said. “And for the first two years, he was a nuisance to everybody in White Cliffs. That’s when he made his second big mistake-he tried to steal some opals.”

    “Zedza was a thief?” This was just getting worse.

    “I said he tried to steal, but fortunately Old Ned caught him in his mine before he took anything.” Baba frowned. “The mine collapsed, they both nearly died, and that finally shocked some sense into him. Your grandfather became a great man, Flora, but only after making great mistakes.”

    So her sainted grandfather had his own alternative history. “Why haven’t you told me this before?”

    “Because you weren’t ready to hear it.”

    Both of them were silent for a minute.

    “And now you think I’m ready?” Flora asked. “Now that I’m a failure too?”

    Baba stroked Flora’s hair. “You’ve proven your strength, my child. You’ve shown your convictions are stronger than your desires. Now you must learn from your mistakes and become a great woman.”

    The overseer returned that afternoon. “Dr. Stahmer anticipated my request,” he said. He held out a small brass cylinder a half-inch wide and two inches long. “He retrieved this just last week from one of Mr. Goering’s hiding places.” He unscrewed the top and flipped it over. A green glass capsule fell into his hand.

    “Is that the cyanide?” Flora asked.

    Archibald nodded. “When Mr. Goering bites down on this, he will experience a very painful, but self-inflicted, death.” He slid the capsule back into the cylinder and screwed on the top.

    Flora pulled out the fountain pen and pulled off the rubber cap. “We’ll have to hide it in here,” she said, pointing to the piston.

    The overseer grasped the piston in his hands and wiggled it loose. He unscrewed the cap and handed it to Flora.

    Flora slid the brass cylinder into the cap and reassembled the pen.

    “It is as if it were meant to be there.” Archibald looked at Flora. “You will deliver this tonight?”

    Flora nodded. “I’ll bring you the signed release tomorrow.”

    After another long evening with Private Steven Lee and another harsh scrub in the bathroom, Flora crept to her bedroom and dreamt of her overseer.