“What the hell was that?” He’s trying to yell but his throat is too hoarse, so the sound comes out like a gurgle.
“A brandy bottle, I believe.”
“You hit me?”
“You tried to go back to sleep.”
“Wouldn’t you?”
“Not if I wanted to keep my job. Which I do. As should you. So it would be really nice if you could stand up so I can help you to the shower.”
Werner has always known Max to be shrewd and intelligent and fiercely clever. So it’s no surprise that a small light goes off in his mind. It’s not enough to register the severity of the situation, but it’s a move in the right direction. Max slaps his wrist, looking for his watch. “What time is it?”
“Almost five.”
Max slumps at the news, relaxed. “So I’m not late for my shift?”
“Not yet. But you can’t go in looking like that. Shower. Coffee. Water. That’s what I was told you needed. And in that order.”
“Who told you that?”
“Wilhelm Balla.”
Werner has never heard such creative insults as what comes out of Max’s mouth at the sound of Balla’s name.
“Will you let me help you up? I can’t drag you all the way to the shower.”
Max considers this. Tries to stand. Wobbles badly. “I suppose so,” he says.
It’s something of a vaudeville act the way that Werner gathers the clothes and flashlight with one hand while keeping his friend vertical with the other, and even more impressive that he is able to get Max out the door and down the hall without falling over. If he’d not had so much practice with his father he would never have been able to pull it off. As it is, however, they barely make it to the shower without toppling over one another or crashing through one of the thin foam board walls.
“In you go,” Werner says, with Max draped over his shoulder as if he were a crutch. He gets the navigator situated as upright as possible beneath the shower nozzle, sets the clean clothes in a pile on the other side of the curtain, and turns the water on.
Max yelps and curses and stumbles backwards. The wall stops him from going ass over teakettle, but he swats at his face like a man being attacked by a swarm of bees. He tries to swipe the water out of his eyes but only succeeds in hitting himself.
“The rest is up to you,” Werner says. “Your clothes are here and I’ll be back in ten minutes. You might want to drink some of that water while you’re standing there.”
THE AMERICAN
The dog tag is missing. This realization is not new. He first discovered it was gone while at dinner last night with Captain Lehmann. The American had slipped his hand into his pocket, intending to pull it out with dramatic flair and set it on the table. He didn’t bother digging around. He could feel that it was gone. So he’d taken a sip of wine instead and allowed his mind the few seconds necessary to find a different course of action. He had given Lehmann the stewardess’s name as a boon, an act of good faith. Emilie Imhof. He’d spoken it with all the confidence of an informant, making it seem less like blackmail and more like charity by going first. So magnanimous of him. And in return? Well, his reward would come today. Lehmann had been skeptical, of course, and he wanted to test the American’s claim.
The tag is small. And the information engraved on it long since memorized. The American had simply requested pen and paper from Wilhelm Balla—it appears as though he’s stuck with the steward for the duration of the flight—then written the information down for Lehmann. He didn’t expect the captain to have a memory like his. Lehmann told him it will take a bit of time to collect the data. But he doesn’t mind waiting a few hours. It’s a reasonable sacrifice so long as he can move closer to his goal. The American’s real problem, and the thing that has kept him up half the night, is that the dog tag has fallen into the hands of a stranger. This is an unforgivable error on his part. Not just a miscalculation. A catastrophic mistake. The worst kind of misfortune.
Because the chance to kill the owner of that dog tag is the only reason he agreed to this mission. And he would sooner throw himself out the access hatch, onto the engine rotors, than miss it. But someone has his bartering piece. And if that someone is smart enough to figure out the owner’s identity and warn him, then many years of carefully planned revenge will be lost. And that is a scenario that the American simply cannot accept.