Zealot

  “Listen!” From within one of the piles of corpses near the entrance, MacLeod could just make out a sound. The mewing of a cat? The crying of a child? MacLeod hurried over, Avram following. Together, they began to roll bullet-ridden bodies from the pile. Death was recent—not all of the blood had dried, and it smeared MacLeod’s hands and leather jacket as the two men worked in respectful silence.

  Suddenly, a scream! And from out of the pile, a bloody hand buried a knife through the leather and deep into MacLeod’s forearm. Surprised, he pulled back, freeing the blade from his flesh, and the knife came after him again. This time, he was able to grab the arm wielding the blade and haul the wielder out from beneath the corpses.

  Screaming, crying, covered in blood, Rivka fought like a wildcat to free herself. “Let me go, you bastard!” She flailed with the knife, kicking and clawing.

  “Rivka, stop! It’s me, Duncan.” He pried the knife from her hand and gathered her to him in a tight embrace, restraining her until she would hear him. “Alts iz gut. It’s okay, you’re safe now. It’s Duncan and Tzaddik.”

  Rivka looked up at him and the veil of terror left her eyes. “Duncan?” She stopped struggling, but he could feel her heart beating out of control against him. “Duncan?” she said again, not believing what she saw.

  He touched her face. “It’s me, Rivkaleh.”

  The twelve-year-old melted against him, her relief so great she could barely stand. “Duncan…”

  “Hey, look what I found,” MacLeod heard Avram say behind him. He turned to see Avram pull a little girl, no more than five, from the midst of the charnel. She’d had a quiet little cry, as if she no longer had the strength, but it had been strong enough to lead MacLeod to her. Avram settled her on one hip and she wrapped her arms gratefully around his neck.

  “That’s Zara,” Rivka explained, still in a daze. “I tried to get her to stop crying, I tried really hard, but she wouldn’t. I thought for sure the Germans had found us.”

  “Rivka, tell me what happened,” MacLeod said.

  Rivka looked around the courtyard wide-eyed, the horror still too fresh. She tried to speak, but couldn’t. MacLeod smiled at her encouragingly and held her hand, and suddenly the words came flooding out. “They … they found our bunker. They took people out, a few at a time, and they never came back. They took Zara’s mother. And then they said if we’d tell where the other malinas were, they wouldn’t kill us. But nobody told the pigs anything. I told Zara that as soon as she heard a gun, to fall down and pretend she was dead. And the guns fired and we fell down. Then there were people on top of me and they were too heavy and I couldn’t get them off. And there was blood, there was so much blood…” Rivka began to shake as she looked down at herself, covered head to toe in other people’s gore. “Oh, God, Duncan…”

  MacLeod held her close to him once again. “Shhhh, Rivkaleh … it’s all right,” he consoled her. “You’re with me now.” He looked up at Avram. He could see little Zara was holding on to Avram like a vice, as if she’d never let him go. She was quiet now, her head resting against his shoulder, eyes tightly closed. “What do we do?” MacLeod asked.

  “We’ve got to get them out of here.”

  “Right.” MacLeod started walking out of the courtyard, leading Rivka by the hand. “We’ll get them back to Mendik’s base, then—”

  “No, MacLeod, I mean out of the Ghetto.” Avram and Zara caught up with him. “Out of Warsaw. Out of that monster’s reach.” Avram wasn’t sure there was even such a place anymore, a world safe from Hitler, but he knew now they had to try to find it. “Rivka, Zara, Moshe Singer and his family back at Mendik’s base, anyone else we can find still alive. We’ll get them out of here.”

  “Avram, there’s no way out” Mila 18 had finally convinced MacLeod how hopeless their situation was. He stopped walking, grabbed Avram by the arm. MacLeod’s face was dark, his jaw firmly set against the frustration that threatened to overtake him. “They’ve got the Wall surrounded, they’ve got tanks at the gates. They’re patrolling the streets in and out of the Ghetto. We’re trapped.” The ache in his voice begged Avram to prove him wrong. “How, Avram? You tell me how?”

  “I don’t know. Dammit, I don’t know! But we have to try.” Avram pulled away and started down the street. Zara could sense the tension that hung between them and began to cry softly again. Without a thought, Avram reached up with his free hand to pat her head, whispering calming words, and Zara settled down again.

  MacLeod wished it was that easy. He, too, wished he could comfort Rivka and the others, free them from this prison, but how could he give hope to others when he himself saw no hope left? No way out. He’d begun to see that Miriam, Anielewicz, all of them, had been right after all. Theirs was not a choice between life or death. The choice for them was between death or death. Death on their own terms or at the whim of the Nazis.

  “The sewers?”

  “What?” MacLeod almost didn’t hear what Rivka had said.

  “The sewers,” she repeated. “I got under the Wall through the sewers once. It’s really disgusting and deep in parts, but I’ve done it.”

  MacLeod looked to Avram with renewed hope, only to see him shake his head. “We’ve tried. Even if you managed to find the tunnels under the Wall, you come out of one of those manholes on the Aryan side, they’ve got you. There’re informants on every corner, just waiting for some Jew to stick his head up. We’ve probably lost a hundred couriers in the sewers. Not an option.”

  A thought came to MacLeod. “Who says we’d have to come up on the Aryan side? How far beyond the city do the sewers go?”

  “No one knows. We’ve never been able to map them. You don’t know what it’s like down there, MacLeod. It’s a labyrinth. You could wander for days and come up to find you’re back in the Ghetto again. Or in front of Gestapo headquarters. If you don’t drown in shit higher than your head, first. I said no.”

  MacLeod disagreed. “I like those odds better than what we’ve got up here. Look, I saw a compass back at Mendik’s. If we could keep to one heading, say north, we might eventually have to reach the end of the tunnel, right?”

  Avram was unconvinced. “Maybe. If they don’t all starve to death first.”

  “If we don’t do something, they’re going to starve anyway. So, when we reach the end of the tunnel, if we’re not out of Warsaw, we’re at least beyond the active patrols.”

  Avram finally saw. “Right…” He began to piece it together. “And from there, you could get to the forest. You can hide ten people in the forest for a couple of days, no problem. We’ve done it before. They’re so intent on the Ghetto right now, they probably won’t even be looking out there.”

  “And a couple of days is probably all I’d need to arrange some transport out of the Reich. I’ve still got some connections.”

  Avram looked happier than he had since the Germans had entered the Ghetto three weeks earlier. “MacLeod, you are a genius!”

  MacLeod shook his head, humble. “Don’t start passing out the Nobel prizes yet. We’ve got a long way to go.” He quickened the pace. “Let’s get back to the others.”

  Rivka looked up at MacLeod with undisguised awe as they hurried down the alley. “I always knew you’d save us, Duncan.”

  MacLeod looked helplessly at Avram, who shrugged and laughed in relief. “No pressure, MacLeod. No pressure at all.”

  They stopped at Mendik’s malina only long enough to collect Rubenstein, Landau, and the Singer family, and to gather what they would need to attempt to escape the Ghetto. The compass, the lantern and oil, a dimming flashlight, all the food and water they could find, which sadly only amounted to a day’s worth of crumbs when split among a dozen people. They hurried to make ready before dawn, when the Nazi patrols would return in force.

  In the predawn silence they slipped from the bunker beneath the ruins of the Bundist library in two groups. MacLeod led Landau, Moshe Singer, and his wife and son through the alleyways. Singer’s son, Jaco
b, no longer a child but not quite yet a man, shouldered the responsibility of caring for Zara, while his father and Landau covered MacLeod with their pistols as he took the point on their trek to Muranowska Square. At the last minute, Rivka, who had been assigned to Tzaddik’s party, declared she couldn’t leave Zara’s side, and traveled with MacLeod instead.

  They passed through the streets like ghosts, unseen, unheard, and finally rendezvoused with Tzaddik’s party at the edge of the square, in the shadowed doorway of a long-closed bank. Muranowska Square marked the northernmost boundary of the Ghetto. Rubenstein and Singer’s nephew, Tosia Gross, were in the square, Rubenstein already down the manhole into the sewers to make sure it was unguarded. Tosia stood at the mouth of the hole, exposed, unprotected, waiting for Rubenstein’s signal. He looked around nervously, not comforted by the fact Tzaddik’s rifle covered him from the shadowed doorway.

  Suddenly, Tosia dropped to his knees by the manhole, listening intently. Then he waved frantically to Avram and MacLeod.

  “This is it,” Avram said. “You first, mamelah,” he directed Mrs. Singer. She looked at him fearfully and then at her husband.

  “Moshe?”

  Avram reassured her. “He’ll be right behind you. Now, go, the sun is nearly rising.” He gave the woman a gentle push and she ran across the square to her nephew, who helped her into the hole and guided her down the ladder to where Rubenstein waited. “Now you, Moshe,” he directed her husband, who hurried toward the hole, head looking rapidly in all directions, waving his pistol wildly.

  MacLeod leaned closer to Avram. “If we’re not all shot by Moshe Singer first, this might just work,” he whispered.

  “Just don’t let him get behind you.”

  The Singers’ upstairs neighbor was the next down the manhole, helping the little boy who had no family, no name. The sky was starting to lighten in the east. Jacob dashed out of the shadows with Zara clinging tightly to him. At the hole, Tosia managed to loosen Zara’s hold on his cousin and take her from Jacob, who scrambled down the hole. Then he handed Zara down.

  “You’re next, Rivka,” MacLeod prompted.

  “Can’t I wait for you?” she asked.

  MacLeod laughed. “I’ll be right behind you, I promise. Now, go!” She turned to go.

  “Rivka, wait!” Avram told her. She turned to him, eyes wide and questioning. He bent down and kissed her gently on the forehead, tousling her pigtails with one hand. “Be brave, Rivkaleh,” he whispered. Then he swatted her on the backside, saying “Go!” and she took off across the square.

  “Avram?” MacLeod could sense something was troubling his comrade.

  Avram ignored him, turning to Landau instead. “Send Tosia down, then you follow. Hurry, it’s almost dawn.” Landau stepped from the shadows and made his way to the manhole.

  “You’re not going.” It wasn’t even a question. MacLeod could read the certainty on Avram’s face.

  “Take this,” he said, handing MacLeod the rifle. “You’ll need it. I can find another one.”

  “Why, Avram?” MacLeod pressed. “Tell me why.”

  “My place is here, MacLeod. With my people. As long as there’s one Jew left alive in Warsaw, I have to be here. I have to help.”

  “Then I’ll stay with you.”

  Avram shook his head, touched deeply by MacLeod’s gesture, but adamant. “No. You’re their only hope. You get them out of here. You get them safe.” Then he grabbed MacLeod firmly by both shoulders and stared intensely into his eyes, as if imparting his commandment upon him: “And then you find a way to stop that bastard, you hear me?”

  Both men’s eyes began to tear, and MacLeod could feel his lower lip begin to quiver. “I swear,” he answered in a voice deep with sorrow, then he embraced Avram to his he.

  After a moment, Avram pulled away. “Daylight’s coming,” he said, trying to put on a brighter face. “Time to roll.” He started across the square toward the manhole, MacLeod following, holding the rifle.

  MacLeod started down the ladder into the sewer. “Hey, Tzaddik,” he called up out of the hole. Avram looked down at him from the street. “God be with you.”

  “You, too goy.” Avram slid the manhole cover into place, leaving MacLeod in darkness.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Paris: The Present

  “You’re a goy, you’ve always been a goy.” To Avram, there was no longer anyone in the room but MacLeod. Constantine, Methos, both had faded into the background of his awareness, leaving him alone with the man he felt was his betrayer. “I never expected you to understand what it’s like. To never have a place you can call your home. To be hunted down like a dog in the street because of what you are. But I never thought you’d be the one to side with the murderers.”

  MacLeod understood all too well. He knew what it was like to be run to ground like an animal by a pack of English butchers and their hounds, his only offense wearing a kilt in defiance of English law. He knew what it was like to be exiled and outlawed from his homeland on pain of death. But he knew as well that all explanations would be lost on Avram in his current state.

  “She’s not a murderer.” MacLeod tried again to get him to hear, knowing as he did he might as well be shouting into the wind. “She’s trying to create peace between both your peoples.”

  “Peace?” Avram’s laugh was without humor. “You think this is peace? They’ll spend weeks of negotiations building up this fragile house of cards that no one likes, only to tear it down before the ink is dry on the page. They only want one kind of ‘peace,’ MacLeod. The kind that comes at the point of a sword. The kind that comes when the enemy is totally annihilated The kind of peace the Germans brought.” The two men stood toe-to-toe once again. Avram’s head might only come to MacLeod’s chin, but filled with rage he seemed larger. “I wonder what Miriam Kavner would think of her ‘hero’ now?”

  Behind him, Constantine and Methos exchanged a look. Constantine was horrified at the row taking place between two good friends in his normally staid and quiet home. Methos was wishing he had popcorn to go along with the evening’s entertainment.

  “Miriam believed there were things in life more important than politics,” MacLeod said carefully, stepping away from their battle stance.

  “You said it yourself—this isn’t ‘politics.’” Avram spit out the word. “This is about murder. This is about Treblinka. This is about Warsaw. This is about making sure they never happen again. Never again!”

  MacLeod knew there was nothing more he could say to Avram to sway his mind. Maybe later, some other time, they could talk as they once had. Friend to friend. Man to man. “I’m sorry you feel this way, Avram.”

  “You’re sorry, all right. One sorry piece of shit.” He grabbed MacLeod tightly by the forearm, forced him to look him in the eyes. MacLeod didn’t pull away. “You remember what we did with collaborators in the Ghetto, MacLeod?”

  MacLeod answered, “I remember,” but gave no ground.

  “You’d better.” Avram shoved him away and stormed out of the study. They could hear the slam of the front door echo through the house.

  MacLeod stood where he was, staring at the study door until long after his sense of Avram’s presence had faded into the night, replaying in his mind what had just happened. Was there any way he could salvage Avram’s friendship? And yet still not compromise his own values? If there was an answer, he couldn’t see it.

  “Well, that went about as well as could be expected.” Methos’s cheery voice split the silence once again. Unfolding himself from the settee, he reached for his raincoat. “I think I’ve had about all the entertainment I can stand for one evening,” he said with a self-satisfied grin.

  Constantine looked at Methos askance. “You don’t have to look like the cat that swallowed the canary, Pierson. Don’t tell me you actually wanted that to happen.”

  “Of course I did,” Methos said with no trace of remorse.

  MacLeod was more than a little annoyed. “And I suppose for
your next trick, you’ll rub salt in old wounds?”

  Methos heaved a dramatic sigh, as if he couldn’t believe he actually had to explain himself. “Look, the first step toward peace is always getting the grievances out on the table. Drag them out into the light of day, and suddenly they’re no longer the monsters under the bed. They’re something rational human beings can discuss and, with luck, come to terms with. But the first step is to get them out in the open.”

  Both MacLeod and Constantine seemed unconvinced. “If that was your clever scheme, it failed,” MacLeod said, sagging into the leather chair and retrieving his drink.

  “I’m afraid Avram is far from rational at the moment,” Constantine added.

  “Hey, Rome wasn’t built in a day, you know. Patience. You have to wage peace like you wage war. This was only the first skirmish, not the whole battle.” Methos slipped his coat on as he headed for the door of the study. “Ciao, guys,” he said, then stopped, turning to Constantine. “We still on for Saturday?”

  “Of course we are. I feel lucky,” Constantine said with a greedy smile. Methos’s wicked “ha ha ha!” could be heard down the hallway as he left. Constantine saw MacLeod’s raised eyebrows and explained, “Departmental poker game. Pierson’s been on a winning streak lately. I intend to crush him like a bug.”

  “He never struck me as the gambling type.”

  “Ah, one hell of a poker face, though. And if he thinks he’s got a winning hand, he’s unstoppable.” Constantine could tell from his face MacLeod’s mind was not on poker. “Look, Duncan, two thousand years ago Avram watched the Romans drive the Jews out of Palestine, and there wasn’t a day in those two thousand years—certainly not even an hour, when he was with me—he didn’t think about returning. And now, finally, the Jews have it back. Giving it up again … it must be impossible for him even to contemplate.”

  “But does that give him the right to do what the Romans did? To drive people out of their homeland? To rob them of their culture? Their identity?”