City of Spies

by Nina Berry

  She took it all without screaming back or punching him in the throat, but she stopped smiling. By lunch break the set simmered with tension, silent except for the blare of the music playback and Victor’s braying voice.

  But lunch at least brought a chance for Pagan to sit, on a towel, and take off her evil shoes. A kind set nurse dabbed her two fresh blisters with ointment and was just finishing bandaging them as Mercedes walked up.

  “M! Sorry I can’t stand up,” Pagan said. “Thanks, Sandy,” she added to the nurse, who was getting up to go. “That’s a huge help.”

  “Bleeding for your work, I see,” Mercedes said, raising her eyebrows at the mound of white frills that surrounded Pagan like a frothy sea. “Who says movie stars have it easy?”

  “At least I get to dress up as a wedding cake on a warm summer day,” Pagan said, taking a plate with a sandwich and potato chips on it from an assistant as Rada wrapped a huge napkin around her neck to protect the dress. “Thanks, Brian. Can I get a Coke, too? You’re a doll.” To Mercedes she said, “There’s lots of food, but let me guess. You already ate.”

  “Can’t be late to meet with the astronomy professor.” Mercedes bounced on her toes in anticipation. She never got this excited about anything. Pagan almost didn’t recognize her nervous smile. “Is Devin around? I want to thank him for setting this up.”

  “Not yet, but I’ll tell him if I see him.”

  Mercedes sat down next to her, careful to avoid stray flounces. “How’s it going?”

  “Well, so far the director’s insulted my nose, my weight, my dancing, my enunciation, my fingernails—he wants to use a hand double for the close-ups where Dave holds my character’s hand—and my upbringing.” Pagan kept her voice low. “So—great!”

  “He’s thorough,” Mercedes said, her voice dry, looking around. “Which one is he?”

  Pagan slung her eyes over to a table set up in the shade where Victor had corralled Dave and men from the crew to sit with him for lunch. She had not been invited, which suited her just fine, thanks. “He’s the pendejo holding court over there, with the gray streaks in his hair. He’s lucky my mother’s not here. She’d make short work of him.”

  Mercedes regarded Victor Anderson with her flat, assessing gaze. “Anyone wearing those pants has no right to insult anyone.”

  Pagan laughed as Mercedes got to her feet. “Do you have to go already? You were just helping me back to sanity.”

  “Can’t be late.” Mercedes’s small smile of happiness returned. “Good luck with...whatever it is that happens today.”

  “Same to you!” Pagan said to her friend’s back as she strode down the colonnaded hallway toward the stairs up to the observatory. At the very least, this trip was turning out to be a success for Mercedes. Even if Pagan had to endure weeks of Victor Anderson and never got into Von Albrecht’s house or saw him or any of that, at least her best friend was getting to fulfill some of her dreams.

  Loud, angry voices echoed off the stone columns and the marble floor from across the courtyard. Pagan craned her neck and bit into her sandwich. A security guard was waving at a group of people on the opposite side of the courtyard and yelling in Spanish. They were yelling back.

  She could just catch the words: “Esta es nuestra escuela,” meaning, “This is our school,” and something about “tenemos el derecho”—“we have the right.” It sounded like some students were angry they couldn’t cross the courtyard, which was currently being repolished by a team of people with cloth mops.

  The security guard responded with canned phrases like, “We have the permission of the school president,” and “Signs were posted,” as another guard walked over to back him up.

  Quick arguments followed, until a more reasonable female voice interrupted with words Pagan couldn’t overhear. She could see, however, that a pretty dark-haired girl in a chic white shift dress was making the students’ case.

  She must have been convincing, because a few minutes later, Pagan was done with her sandwich and the group of students had been allowed to go around the outside edges of the courtyard to get across it. Their path brought them within twenty yards of Pagan, as they headed off the same way Mercedes had gone.

  The girl in the white dress had her dark hair up in the latest beehive style, her big dark eyes perfectly lined in black. She held hands with a tall, lanky young man with his long hair slicked back wearing a trendy bowling shirt, cuffed jeans and boat shoes. The dozen or so teens following them looked a lot like the crew that had gathered around Dieter last night at the café, but Pagan didn’t recognize any of them.

  “Of course Dieter picked this place to meet,” the girl was saying in Spanish. “His father probably pays off the security guards to harass us.”

  Dieter? His father? She had to be referring to Dieter Von Albrecht. But from her scornful tone, it sounded like these kids weren’t part of Dieter’s gang. Maybe a rival group. Devin had said he’d try to let her know if Dieter or Emma, or even Von Albrecht himself, were headed her way. But there’d been no sign of him.

  There wasn’t time to call or wait for Devin. As the girl in the white shift and her friends headed away from the courtyard, Pagan put her Coke down and took off after them, giant skirt swaying.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Colegio San José, Buenos Aires

  January 11, 1962

  BOLEO

  Whip. When the woman’s ocho suddenly changes direction, producing a whip-like action with her leg.

  The kids Pagan was following had disappeared into the cool dark of the hallways, but their footsteps echoed against the stone walls. She skittered, light-footed in her slippers, as quickly and quietly as she could to just out of sight as they turned first down one hallway, then another, voices bouncing off the Colegio’s carved ceiling.

  The damn dress, though, was going to be a problem. Its hem was tailored for her to wear heels of a certain height, so in these slippers several inches of it dragged heavily on the ground, which meant she had to grab it with both hands and hold it up, very Scarlett O’Hara–like, to keep it out of the dust and keep herself from falling on her face. It may have looked fluffy as a cloud, but all that fabric and wiring weighed enough to make her wrists ache.

  Her heart was bumping with exhilaration, and her skin thrummed with anticipation. Even more than alcohol, the risks of spying gave Pagan a thrill. Victor Anderson was fading below the horizon of her awareness like a sunset dying into twilight. Bring on the night; she was doing what she was meant to do. She was going to make a difference.

  The hallways narrowed away from the courtyard and the movie shoot, and the floor here was plain stone instead of black-and-white marble. She passed wooden doors set into alcoves, doors that probably led to classrooms.

  Ahead, around a corner, two voices were speaking low. Pagan slowed and caught the scuffling of moving feet, of dozens of people breathing, of some maybe holding their breath. It was the sound of tension, of conflict waiting under the surface for the right moment to erupt.

  Two young male voices argued, speaking in Spanish inflected with that strange German/English tinge that marked them as being from Buenos Aires.

  One sounded more German than the other. Dieter.

  “Los muelles,” he was saying. Pagan was pretty sure that meant the docks.

  “I know where,” the other boy said in less German-tinged Spanish. “Just don’t forget to bring that garbage you call a car, and I’ll be happy to leave you in my dust.”

  Dieter let out one scornful “Ha!” and followed with a stream of invective Pagan had a hard time following except for “in your dreams” and “Christ-killers.”

  Hand it to Dieter to give her such an unpleasant way to discover that the rival group must consist of Jewish kids.

  The other boy shouted a word Pagan didn’t know, and feet skidded on the s
tone floor. Something—a fist?—thudded against flesh. Grunts, scuffling, and voices rose in alarm.

  “Para, para!” A girl’s voice cut through the confusion. Stop it! “Not here!”

  Pagan recognized the voice of the girl in the white shift who had convinced the security guard to let them edge around the courtyard.

  The sounds of violence stopped. The boys threw a few more angry words at each other, but the chance for an all-out rumble eased.

  “Fine,” the rival gang boy’s voice spoke. “The docks, tomorrow night. We’ll learn who’s boss then.”

  Dieter uttered a low, satisfied chuckle that made the hair on the back of Pagan’s neck stand up.

  “That we will,” he said.

  Footsteps clattered, getting closer. The Jewish gang of kids was heading back their way, and it was better she not be seen.

  Hoisting her skirt high, she lunged heavily into an alcove just as the girl in the shift and her boyfriend in the bowling shirt rounded the corner. Damn this dress for being so big and so white. If the kids looked slightly to their right, they’d see her for sure.

  “Don’t let him draw you in like that, Hector querido,” the girl was saying. She was strikingly beautiful up close, with thick dark hair and brown eyes like velvet. “I couldn’t bear to see you in jail.”

  “You’re right,” her boyfriend, Hector, said as the couple passed the alcove. He had his arm around her shoulders, their heads together. “Can you get away tomorrow night?”

  “What Papa doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” she said with a laugh, and they were out of sight, the dozen or so other boys trailing after them, muttering to one another.

  Something big was set for tomorrow night for these kids. And if Dieter’s tone was any indication, that something was bad. Scary bad.

  Dieter. As quietly and quickly as she could, she padded out of the alcove to peer around the corner where the meeting between gangs had just taken place.

  This hall was wider and longer than the rest, and completely enclosed. The last of Dieter’s crew was disappearing behind two large doors at the far end. The doors swung closed, and the hallway lay empty.

  Pagan ran down it, skirt skimming the floor so it must have looked like she was floating along instead of galumphing, which is how she felt. The midday heat was stifling in the airless hallway, and sweat dripped down between her shoulder blades.

  Okay, so the dress was the opposite of ideal espionage attire. She couldn’t follow Dieter’s crew into any tightly enclosed spaces. But maybe, if she was lucky, she could overhear some of their plans.

  She put an ear to the door and heard their heavy treads, getting farther away. She eased one door open and peered inside.

  A winding staircase ascended and descended inside a wood-paneled vestibule. She could hear the deep voices of Dieter’s boys booming up from its lower depths. Otherwise, the place was empty. Dusty photographs of swirling galaxies and a drawing of the solar system hung in plain frames on the walls.

  This had to be the entrance to the observatory that Mercedes was visiting. Pagan moved to the foot of the stairs and stared up. Her best friend was up there somewhere while Dieter Von Albrecht and his fascist buddies tramped into the basement below.

  “Nein!” Dieter’s voice bellowed from down below in German. “Not from here, Idioten. From my house.”

  Interesting that he’d switched to German while with his gang; maybe because it was less likely for local students to understand them. The stairs were wide enough for two people to use side by side, albeit awkwardly, which meant it was big enough for Pagan and the cursed dress. She heaved it up yet again and glided as soundlessly as she could down the curving staircase.

  It was easier to catch their conversations here. The wooden walls sent sounds echoing up and down. Like their Spanish, the German these boys spoke was spiked with words, slang and intonations from other languages that made it a challenge to follow.

  “Today we’ll deal with some of the animals,” Dieter was saying. “But most will have to wait for the big move tomorrow night.”

  “Who do you think built the tunnels, anyway?” another boy asked. “They look so old.”

  Tunnels. Is that where they were going? And what was this about animals and a big move tomorrow? It was horribly possible that by “animals” they meant people. And they’d just set up a meeting with the Jewish kids for tomorrow. Did they have some terrible “move” planned against the other gang then?

  “Whoever it was, they had no idea of the glory they’d be used for,” Dieter said. “Our names will ring in history after my father’s done. You’ll see.”

  “That girl Naomi’s pretty,” another boy said. “For a Jew. She either hates you or loves you, Dieter. Did you see the looks she gave you?”

  The boys all laughed, low and suggestive, in a way that made Pagan’s skin crawl.

  “I’ll give her something to love and hate,” Dieter said. “Just you wait.”

  More laughter, bouncing off the close walls, bounding up the steps at her.

  Pagan’s hem chose that moment to slip out of her weary grip. The heavy skirt thumped onto the wooden stair with an audible thud.

  She froze, sweat breaking out over her forehead.

  The footsteps below slowed.

  “What was that?” said a voice, closer than Dieter’s had been.

  “Sounded like someone dropped something,” replied another, farther below.

  “But I’m the last one, which means...”

  Pagan’s heart was beating so hard she could barely hear what they said next. She turned awkwardly on the narrow stair, grabbed her blasted skirt hard with both hands and ran back up.

  Damn it, damn it! She had no idea how far below her the nearest boy was, but she had no doubt he could outrun her.

  Steps were pounding up the stairs toward her now. More than one set. Maybe all of them were coming after her.

  She swerved around another corner, the banister slipping under her perspiring hands. Once out of the vestibule, the only place to run was down that long hallway, with no turns for at least twenty yards. If they didn’t catch her in the stairs, they’d see her there for sure.

  They were nearly close enough to see the white of her dress turning up the staircase ahead of them now. She forced herself to run faster, ignoring how her girdle jabbed into her ribs, how her sweaty feet flapped inside her slippers and nearly tripped her.

  When they saw her, her cover would be blown. Devin’s entire operation, her chance to help catch a possible war criminal, to learn more about her mother’s mysterious past—all of it would vanish.

  All because she’d been stupid or arrogant enough to follow a group of fascist thugs in a ball gown with a hoop skirt. Whatever horrible thing happened now, she’d brought it on herself.

  Breath coming in ragged gasps, she made it to the vestibule. She reached for the double doors as footsteps descended the stairs from above as well as below her.

  Were there members of Dieter’s gang above her, too?

  She didn’t wait to see. She shoved one of the swinging doors and yanked her big skirt through. The door swung shut with a thump as two voices, one male and one female, exclaimed aloud in surprise.

  The female voice. It was familiar. Pagan turned, slippers skidding.

  “Why were you following us?” the male voice was saying in Spanish.

  “I wasn’t,” the girl said with flat certainty in Mexican-tinged Spanish that was all too familiar. “Who the hell are you?”

  Mercedes.

  “Here’s who was following us, Dieter,” the boy called. “I’ve got her.”

  “No, you don’t,” Mercedes said with the confidence that would brook no denial.

  The boy cried out, more in astonishment than pain, and something large thumped to the floo
r.

  Pagan came to a full halt, her heart in her throat, unable to call out her friend’s name.

  “If you get up, I’ll just have to put you down again,” Mercedes explained.

  Oh, thank God. She must have thrown the boy to the floor. Pagan never should have doubted her. Gang life and violence were old hat for Mercedes, something she’d wanted to leave behind forever. And here Pagan had brought it right up the observatory stairs to harass her again.

  “You!” Dieter’s voice cut clearly through the thick wood of the doors. “What are you doing following us?”

  Pagan, gasping for air, moved back toward the doors. She had to go in there, tell them it wasn’t M who’d been following them. She hesitated, her hand on the wood. She should be rushing in there to her friend’s defense. But here she was, waiting instead.

  “I was up in the observatory, arranging a time to come back to see the Southern Cross actually,” Mercedes said in a voice of supreme calm. “Why would I give a damn about any of you?”

  Mercedes could be quite persuasive. Maybe she could handle this on her own without further danger, and without blowing Pagan’s cover. Pagan hated that she wasn’t rushing to her friend’s defense, but if she did, she might never get inside the Von Albrecht house.

  “You were at the café last night,” Dieter said. “Protecting those indios in the band. I think maybe you should come with us now, so we can find out what the real story is. Come on...”

  Pagan couldn’t see him lay a hand on her friend, but through the door came a pained male grunt, and the other boys called out in astonishment.

  For the second time in a few seconds, something fell heavily to the floor, and Dieter let out a long groan of anguish.