The Accomplice

by Joseph Kanon

“He going to make it through passport control?”

  “I can do it,” Otto said, trying to sit up.

  “Keep your head down.”

  “Erich Kruger’s first stamp. My new life.”

  “Are they still there?” Aaron said to Hanna.

  “Yes, same distance.”

  She turned right into Castilla and a minute later was at Libertador, waiting at the light, then shooting past the stopped traffic, lined up like horses at a starting gate.

  “Look where we are,” Otto said, the quiet winding street of mansions instantly familiar. “You wanted to see the house, one last time. Calle Aguado.”

  “They’re still behind,” Hanna said, heading into a dark curving road, a spoke off a circle.

  “It was a beautiful house,” Otto said to Aaron. “An embassy now.”

  “A nice life,” Aaron said.

  “Yes, it was,” Otto said, not hearing any irony.

  “Don’t try to lose them.”

  “Why not?”

  “They’ll go to the airport anyway, now that they see where we’re going. But this way we know where they are. No surprises.”

  “There’s the house,” Otto said. “See the lights?”

  “Such happy times there,” Bildener said.

  “It’s a shortcut to Alcorta,” Hanna said. “They won’t suspect anything.”

  “OK. How many? Can you see now?”

  “Two.”

  “Don’t go near the docks, then. That’s asking for trouble.”

  “No, through the park. The way a taxi would go.” She glanced back at Otto, still peeking out the window. “How is he?”

  Aaron made a so-so gesture.

  “I don’t think I’ll come back here,” Otto said.

  “You knew that when you started all this,” Hanna said. “Go to Brazil, be someone else.”

  Otto nodded. “So they’d leave me alone. Who looks for a dead man? But they found me anyway. At Ortiz’s. How? They must have people everywhere.” Hanna glanced at Aaron in the mirror. “Look how they found Eichmann. All those years.”

  “Did you ever meet him?” Aaron said.

  “Once,” Bildener said. “At the ABC restaurant.” Aaron thought of Fritz, attacking his wurst, the Gasthaus wood paneling. “Not a very impressive man. Ordinary. Lower class, even. You could see it in the table manners.”

  “But if they could find him,” Otto said, “a nobody, then it was dangerous for the rest.”

  “Maybe they just got lucky. A tip.”

  “No,” Otto said. “They’re methodical. Dangerous.” Something he needed to believe, the worthy adversary.

  “They’re still behind,” Hanna said. “One car away.” She turned right on Sarmiento, heading toward the river. An arrowed sign for Aeroparque Jorge Newberry.

  “Who was he? Newberry,” Aaron said.

  “An aviator. Argentine. His father was American.” Making conversation, their eyes meeting in the mirror, wanting to say something else, but not saying it, focused on the drive now, the car racing around a traffic circle.

  “Almost there,” Hanna said. “What should I—?”

  “Just do what you’d normally do. If you weren’t being followed. Drop him at Departures. He takes his suitcase and goes in. You pull out, as if you were leaving, then farther up, get back into the drop-off area. They’ll have to go after him, not you, so they won’t see you, with all the taxis and everything. By the time they realize he’s not Otto, they come out and you’re gone. You’re still their only lead to Otto, so I’m betting they’ll want to go after you, try to pick up the car again before you leave the airport.”

  “And meanwhile what am I supposed to do?” Bildener said. “If they don’t shoot me.”

  “Nobody’s shooting anybody. Not at the airport. You just go about your business while they panic because you’re not Otto, and now what do they do?”

  “My business.”

  “Buy two tickets. Get the gate number. When they leave, come back out to where Hanna’s waiting and Otto and I scram.”

  “And if they don’t leave?”

  “They will. They have to.” He paused, thinking. “But if they don’t, then find the men’s room. If you’re not back in ten minutes, we’ll have to come to you.”

  There were parking lots on the left now, the terminal up ahead. On the right, the riverfront, restaurants and yacht clubs, and stretches of park, the dark water beyond, the industrial port somewhere behind them.

  “You have to access the terminal from the other direction,” Hanna said as they flew by it, bright with lights, all the traffic turning at a circle up ahead.

  “Everything is mixed up,” Otto said. “Why are you helping me?”

  “We’ve told you that,” Hanna said, impatient, cars cutting in on both sides as they fed into the circle.

  “Why are they chasing you? You’re with them.”

  “I should be,” Aaron said. “Things got mixed up.”

  They followed a line of taxis to the drop-off area, a curving sweep of pavement.

  “Pull up here. Before it gets too crowded. That’s what you want later. Are they behind?”

  “Yes.”

  “OK, Bildener, say good-bye and grab your suitcase. Come back out down there. The far doors.”

  “If I come out.”

  “You will. They don’t want you.”

  Bildener turned and said something to Otto in German, his voice affectionate.

  “Viel Glück,” Otto said, reaching up to put his hand on Bildener’s shoulder, the hand speckled with age, frail, like Max’s at the end. No, not frail. Strong enough to hold the chain against Fritz’s throat while he’d kicked the coffee table, thrashing, gasping. A few hours ago.

  Bildener looked at Hanna. “I suppose if they’re watching. A father’s good-bye.” He leaned over and kissed her cheek, then opened the door and took a breath, willing himself outside. Aaron handed him the suitcase from the back. An overnight bag, a short trip. Bildener started for the terminal doors. Luggage trolleys and porters and passengers saying good-byes. And then, like a flash, Nathan’s bald head, darting out from behind and moving into Bildener’s path, cutting him off, easier to do this outside, calling out a name, a quick stop as he saw the face, a look over Bildener’s shoulder to the car, eyes on Hanna, then to the backseat. He stopped, confused, something out of place, not where it should be. Aaron in the back, not getting out, maybe being held there, maybe a gun in his ribs. He lunged toward the curb.

  “Pull out. Fast.”

  Hanna jerked the wheel and screeched into the line of traffic, just missing another car. A blare of horns. Behind them, Nathan was racing back to his car.

  “Move,” Aaron said. “We have to lose him.”

  “What about Markus?”

  “We can’t worry about him now. Can you go any faster?”

  “There’s traffic.” Hanna gripped the wheel. “I can’t do this.”

  “Yes, you can. You’re fine.”

  “Like a gangster. The getaway car. Are they going to shoot at me?”

  “They don’t want you. They want me. They think I’m in trouble. Why else would I be here?”

  “With the Nazis. My god, I’m a Nazi now. With the Israelis after me. I can’t—” Shaking a little, eyes fixed on the road.

  “Israelis,” Otto said. “Schwein.”

  “And if we stop?” she said, her voice rising, an edge of hysteria.

  “They take him,” Aaron said simply, deflating the moment. “Here’s the exit.”

  She turned onto the waterfront road. “Now where?”

  “Circle back to the airport. They won’t be expecting that.”

  “We have to go to the end to turn around.”

  “If they don’t see us, it might work. Might. What happens if you keep going straight?”

  “The port. This hour, you’d be out of the traffic at least.”

  “Like sitting ducks. Better to keep some cars around us.”

  “The
port?” Otto said. “For an airplane?”

  “Ferries,” Aaron said, looking up. “They go to Montevideo, right? What is it, about an hour?”

  “Three,” she said, her voice calmer, caught up in the logistics. “There’s a town straight across. Colonia del Sacramento. You can get to Montevideo from there. But the ferry leaves from the old port downtown. I don’t think I can outrun them. A drive that far.”

  “You’re doing fine.”

  But they couldn’t just keep driving. Aaron turned and looked out the back window. The gleam of Nathan’s head. Someone else at the wheel. After him. His people. Everything mixed up.

  “A boat we could rent?” he said, throwing it out.

  “At this hour?” Hanna said, then, half to herself, “A boat.”

  “You know one?”

  “I know one we could steal.”

  Aaron looked at her in the mirror.

  “Mine. Well, Tommy’s. One of his toys. I got it in the settlement. I keep meaning to sell it.”

  “Where is it?”

  “Back at the Pescadores. The yacht club.”

  “Where you had lunch,” Aaron said.

  Another look in the mirror.

  “If it’s yours, why do we have to steal it?”

  “I don’t have the keys. Carlos, at the club, takes care of it. But I can’t ask him to—”

  “It’s what, a sailboat?”

  “No, a motorboat. Tommy used to take it up to Tigre. Go around the islands. We could get across if it has gas. Decide. The traffic circle’s coming up. Turn around or back through the park?”

  “Without the keys—”

  “We can hot-wire it.”

  Aaron looked at her, surprised.

  “An old boyfriend taught me. He liked to steal cars.”

  “In your wild days.”

  “We always brought them back. It wasn’t really stealing.”

  Up ahead cars and taxis were leaving the traffic circle at Sarmiento, back to town.

  “OK,” Aaron said. “If we can lose them.”

  They entered the circle, passing the exit branch for Sarmiento, then the road to the port, sweeping around until they were pointing back up the waterfront. Hanna turned left, doing the circle again, merging with new traffic from the airport.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Who goes around twice? They’ll think I’m back on the airport road. See anybody?”

  “No.”

  “That means we’ll be behind them now,” she said, pleased with herself.

  “For a minute or two.”

  “That’s all we need. The club’s right up here.”

  A boathouse outlined in lights, a long dock with street lamps.

  Hanna turned sharply into the driveway and went past a few parked cars before stopping and turning out the lights, her hands still on the wheel, taking short breaths.

  “Give it a minute,” Aaron said. “Just in case.”

  “No, now. They have to go up past the airport to turn around. That’s our minute.” She turned to Otto. “Ready?” In charge now.

  The marina was on the other side of the clubhouse.

  “Which one is it?”

  There were several walkways of wooden planks, boats bobbing next to them, tied and covered for the night, asleep.

  “Oh god, I don’t know. Let me think. Down here maybe—unless Carlos put it somewhere else. Do they do that?”

  “Not usually. You pay for your spot. Like a garage. Does it have a name?”

  She looked at him. “Hanna I.” Then she took Otto’s arm. “Vati, come away from the light. You don’t want them to see. Here, put this on.” She took a life jacket from a pile on a bench.

  “We’re taking a boat? To Brazil?”

  “No, just across. No one will see. Here it is—I think. Help me with the tarp.”

  The Hanna I had gas, a spare tank in the hold, and bench seats on either side, a boat designed for short excursions, fun, not the endless stretch of black water in front of them, with ships hidden in the dark, waiting their turn at the port.

  “It’s nicer at night,” Hanna said, looking out. “The water. In the day, it’s brown. All the mud.”

  She was attacking the wiring under the controls while Aaron watched, fascinated. A spark, the engine turning over, surprisingly loud in the empty marina. Two headlights appeared in the parking lot.

  “It might be them. Come on. No lights.”

  He threw the tie-up rope onto the planks.

  “We have to have lights,” Hanna said. “We’ll run into something.”

  “Get out past the dock first.”

  “It’s probably just someone late for dinner,” Hanna said, backing the boat away and then heading out to open water, some moonlight catching the small waves, the reflective sheen of ink.

  “Can you go faster?”

  She was standing at the wheel, peering over the windshield, the marina lights behind them now.

  “Not in the dark.”

  “We don’t want anybody to see a light. Not yet.”

  She shrugged. “I should be used to it with you. Not knowing where I’m going. And then it’s too late.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Nothing.” She switched on a lamp at the front of the boat, lighting up the water ahead. “I’m not going to drive into a freighter. It’s pitch dark out here.”

  But in fact the city behind them was filling the sky with the milky haze of a million lights, the waterfront ribboned with them, the massive cranes at the port outlined in bright bulbs, like rides at a fair.

  “Do you know how to get there?”

  “It’s a straight shot across. We’ll see the shore lights.” She jerked her head back. “How’s he doing?”

  Otto was sitting on the side bench, looking out at the city, his head tilted up, almost military, an admiral.

  “All right. How are you doing?”

  “I’m here, aren’t I?”

  He stood closer to her, putting his hand on her shoulder. “When this is over—”

  She stiffened, backing away from his touch, retreating. “What? We’ll be lovers again? Kiss and make up? What a little boy you are.”

  “You know I—”

  “Don’t say it.” She looked at him. “I think you do. Whatever that means to you. But it doesn’t matter. Now it’s never going to be over, all this. Not for me. I know,” she said, waving off any interruption. “It’s the right thing. Don’t tell me again. So, the right thing. But what about me? What do I do during the trial? Sit there and watch? And they’re watching me. Hide? All you see is him. But think what it means for me.”

  They were going more slowly now, away from the shore, the motor a softer purring than before.

  “I can’t change what happened,” Aaron said. “What he did.”

  “No. Or forget it. You’re going to make sure we don’t do that.”

  “We can’t forget it. We owe it to them.”

  She looked over at him. “The trial won’t be the end for you either.”

  “What trial?” Otto said from the stern, suddenly alert. “What are you talking about?”

  “Nothing,” Hanna said. “Just talk. Are you warm enough?”

  Otto touched his sleeve. “You were right about the coat. It gets chilly on the water.” He looked up. “But how did you know we’d be on the water? We were going to the airport.”

  “The Israelis found us. We had to go a different way.”

  Otto thought about this for a second. “How do they know everything? They must have someone working for them. One of us.”

  “Don’t talk crazy. Who? Markus?”

  “No, not Markus. I don’t know. Maybe Julio. Except you killed him,” he said, looking at Aaron. “And you were with them at that place where they kept me.”

  “Vati, enough.”

  “How do you know who he is? You trust people. And look where we are,” he said, turning his head. “In the middle of the ocean. He could kill
me here and no one would know.”

  “Don’t talk like that.”

  “One shot and over the side. Mission accomplished.”

  “Then why didn’t I kill you in the cemetery?”

  “I don’t know. It’s confusing.”

  “That’s not who he is,” Hanna said.

  “No. Max’s boy,” Otto said, vague again. “I sent him to the gas. Did you escape? But that’s not possible. Nobody could. We made sure of that. The times for the gas were exact. And then the capos checked—that everyone was dead. It didn’t take long. And it was easier for them. A few minutes and—”

  “Stop,” Hanna said, staring at him.

  “Yes, I know, nobody wants to hear now. But how else to do it? We couldn’t afford to be sentimental. Max,” he said, looking at Aaron, Max’s boy again. “I made him do it. The experiments. I saved him to do it. He thought he was too good for that, our work. But you have to do it, like the rest of us. What could he do? Object? Nobody objected there. That’s why it worked so well. But he never understood about you.” He looked up at Aaron. “How I made it easier for you.”

  “That’s what you want?” Hanna said to Aaron. “For everybody to hear him talking like this?”

  “And now he’s sent you to kill me. He said he would find me someday, but he died. So he sent you. And you,” he said to Hanna. “You believe him. He tricked you, just like your husband, if you call him that. They’re all alike. Their pound of flesh. Of course he blamed me. From university even, he was jealous. My fault, my fault, that he wanted to save his own skin. Did he say no? He did it.”

  “Stop,” Hanna said softly, her body tense, a clock winding tighter. She put her hand on the control, idling the engine, and they began to drift, the motor less audible, as if calming the boat would slow down the flow of words.

  “Why are we stopping?” Otto said, getting up, his voice frantic. “Is this where you plan to do it? Out here? And you, my own child. But weak, like your mother.”

  “Enough.”

  “To listen to a man like this. Max’s boy. Why else would he be here, except to kill me? So Max has his revenge. Years it took him. I was too clever for him. But now—”

  “He’s taking you to Uruguay. And then to Germany.”

  “No, Madrid,” Otto said, correcting a minor error.

  “No, Germany. No more lies. To Germany. To stand trial.”