“You know you can’t shield me forever from the awful truth,” Sophia said. Now that I’m home and away from that horrible place, you can tell me what’s going on. What happened?”
“Let’s relax. Take a shower. Have lunch. There’s no hurry, luv. Your mum and dad are fine. There’s a shitload of stuff to tell you. I think it’s best to fill you in before we see mum and dad. You’ll understand. Then we’ll go over there,” Jonathan said.
“Why all the mystery?”
“It’s not intrigue now. I just don’t want you to lose the plot. You’ve been through hell.”
“Lose the plot?”
“Sorry. Go bonkers. I don’t want to tax you, but you have to know what happened.”
“I hate to say this, but it’s the truth. It’ll keep my horror show at arm’s length. I know I need to talk about what happened to me, but I don’t want to. I want to know how much you witnessed. But I don’t want to talk about it. I want to push it out of my mind and pretend it never happened.”
“You know better than I that won’t work. By the way I wasn’t lingering, watching you suffer. I didn’t see much. When I stumbled upon you in distress under the control of those two creatures, I acted straight away.”
“That’s good. Of course. I’ll tell you all about it in good time. I know it’ll come to bite me from behind. It’ll weigh on me, suffocating me. It’ll make it a thousand times worse. I tell patients all the time. But I want to run from it. Forget it ever happened. Hide in a dark closet.”
Jonathan rose from the chair and came over to the couch to sit by her, putting his arm around her. “I’ll help you. I promise.” He turned her face to his to kiss her lips tenderly.
“You make me feel so warm and special. I never had that from a man. My husband was so narcissistic. It was all about him.”
“I love making you feel cared for.” He reached for her face again and lingered longer on her lips.
Sophia feared that she might recoil from his kisses after the rape. Quite the opposite was true. She gravitated towards his affection like a chilled wanderer drawn towards a crackling fire found at an inn to warm her bones.
“Now. I’ll make us something to eat. Food’s always a comfort. We’ll have a nice glass of red. An omelet, maybe. Do you have eggs? Cheese?”
She nodded.
“Good. You’ll sip your wine and watch me cook. You know, I’m quite a good cook.”
She smiled.
“Lead the way to the kitchen. The next Gordon Ramsay is ready to work.”
She took him by the hand and led him into the large, sunny kitchen.
He found the wine, chose an Argentinian bold red blend, and poured two glasses.
“I see you’re a wine connoisseur. Great selection, the right Riedel glasses. We’ll get along famously.”
She took the proffered glass, examined the color, before swirling the rich, plum-colored wine, watching the long legs meander down the glass. Satisfied, she buried her nose in the wide crystal, and drank deep. “Delicious.”
“Glad you approve my choice, milady. Relax, drink your wine, and watch the master whip up cheddar chive omelets. Then, I’m going to draw a hot lavender bath for milady. While you relax with another glass of wine, I’ll tell you the whole dreadful business, whilst warming up the water when it starts to cool.”
“You are so good for me.” She watched him cook, enjoying his presence, his economical movements, and his bustling expertise.
Whenever he came over to the round red and gold mosaic table for a sip of wine, he would lean down and brush her wine-bruised lips with his.
The buttery, cheesy, chivy aroma enveloped her, making her mouth water and her heart expand with the comfort of it all. “I smell something behind the cheddar and chive. I can’t identify it.”
“My secret ingredient. I’ll never tell.” He winked at her, his sparkling blue eyes glinting with goodwill.
They ate the artfully designed omelets in comfortable silence, slowly and sensually.
“Sun-dried tomatoes. Your secret ingredient. You can’t hide that maroon amid all the yellow.” Sophia broke the silence.
“I love using them in all sorts of dishes. That concentration of flavor, revealed in the color, is invaluable. The color of claret. The texture too.”
“You’re so right.”
“I hate to break up the party. Time for your bath, sweetheart.” He refilled their wine glasses, hastily put the dishes in the sink, and led the way upstairs.
Once Sophia was ensconced in the steaming aromatic bubble bath with Jonathan sitting on a stool close to her, she began to worry about the purple, black, and yellow bruising flowering in various areas of her body like blooming poison mushrooms. She instinctively scooped the bubbles up to cover her breasts.
“Don’t obscure your lovely strawberry creams.” He moved her hands away from her bosom.
“I’m self-conscious.”
“Don’t be.”
“I’ll try.”
“Understand that your mum is fine. Interrupt whenever you need.”
“So Ma was attacked or something? Someone was harassing her. She was worried. She was bombarded with tomatoes when she was on stage after an operatic performance. Then someone left a bag of shit on her bed, and when she was out, they left gorgonzola cooking on her stove. She suspected a new neighbor, but good old Maria established it wasn’t that woman.”
“Right. She wasn’t involved.”
“Was it all tied up with Rudy’s death? What a vicious ball of wax.”
“It was.”
“I have to call Maria and get Titi back. I have to end it.” Her mind was wandering rapidly.
“All in good time. No one expects you until tomorrow. Put Maria on the back burner.”
“Is Ma hurt?”
“Only superficial wounds. Her calves. Especially the left one.”
“Is she with Ta?”
“Yes. She’s fine now and he’s taking good care of her.” He handed her the glass of wine he was holding.
“That’s good.” She sighed and leaned back on her bath pillow, sipping the wine.
“On second thought, I’m asking you, imploring you not to interrupt. It’s a complex story.”
“Okay, I promise to grow some patience.”
“Good girl.” He leaned over and kissed her.
“Once upon a time,” he began, “a strong and proud young Jewish woman, herded like cattle with all the other Parisian Jews into the Drancy ghetto, waiting for the transport to slaughter, decided to fight back against the Nazis anyway she could. She was an accomplished dancer and acrobat, flirtatious and promiscuous. That was her nature. That saved her."
Sophia’s sharp intake of breath was met with Jonathan’s finger to his lips.
“She started working for the French Resistance and quickly added spying on the Germans to her bag of tricks. She slipped from French to German and Polish borders lithely. Promiscuity was a golden asset. She helped the French with closely guarded secrets revealed in the boudoir. She helped the English too.”
Sophia handed him her empty glass.
“More?”
She shook her head from left to right.
“Eventually this incredibly successful, dangerous work was not enough for her. She challenged herself further. I don’t know. Maybe her success as a spy wasn’t enough. Maybe it was just her nature. She didn’t kill many. But, when she could, she killed in a personal, ritualized way. Her signature contribution to the war effort. And…” he paused dramatically, “her madness.”
Sophia closed her eyes. “A sociopath killing sociopaths.”
“The first was in teeming, stinking Drancy. Perhaps she was sleeping with him. Perhaps she stumbled upon an irresistible opportunity. Whatever the preliminary circumstances, Hauptsturmfuehrer Christoph Furz was found neatly shot between the eyes, his eyes gouged out, and a crude swastika carved on his belly.”
“Rudy,” Sophia cried out. “Fifty years later? More than fifty.”<
br />
This time he put a finger to her lips.
“The killings continued. Not often. Not close together in time or space. There were ten that we know of in ten years. It ended abruptly in 1955. There were these signature murders in France, Germany, and England. Always unerringly the same. Always a German officer, active or retired after 1945.”
“Jonathan?”
“Yes, luv?” He came back from a faraway place, his eyes focusing on her.
“I need more wine.”
“I do as well come to think of it. I’ll be back in a tick.”
She waited, eyes wide open now, mind racing. Mathilde, Rudy, Ta. Why Rudy? He was too young to have been a Nazi. Mathilde killed Rudy. She was too old. What was going on? Her world was upside down. Ta? Innocent bystander?
The piquant enticing aroma of garlic pervaded the atmosphere, smothering the lavender.
“Are you cooking again, Jonathan?” Sophia asked before slipping under the lilac-colored water.
She awoke on her bed, clothed in a red robe, causing her to think for one confused moment she was with Maria, until Jonathan’s concerned, kindly face hovered above her.
“All right?” he asked. “You had me worried. What happened? I came back with the wine and you were submerged.”
“I’m epileptic. I didn’t tell you? Funny, I thought I had. I was seizure-free for the longest time. I think it started up again with Maria. If things get too overwhelming, I go out. Like an extinguished bulb. I’m surprised it didn’t happen in Barbados. Oh, wait. It did. I came to tied up and with that Natasha woman locked onto my clitoris. Unpredictable.” She shook the remaining cobwebs away.
“You could have drowned. You’ll tell me more about that Natasha woman when you’re ready.”
“Once again, Sir Galahad, you saved me. I feel clear and empty now.”
“Like the day after a booze up when you’re hangover- free and clear and empty.”
“I don’t know about that.”
“Here’s your wine, Ginger. Do you want me to finish the story?”
“Yes, please. That caused the seizure. All the questions were swirling in my head, giving me a brain fog.”
He propped her up on her pretty pillows. “Tell me if you grow weary and need a nap.”
“Only when it’s over. I want to know everything.”
“The killings stopped. The case was cold. Somehow the British Secret Service, MI6, was involved on the periphery. After all, these countries were their stomping ground in World War Two. But, did anyone really care about dead Nazis? After all, that was a communal goal. So what if one rogue serial killer was prettying it up with gouged out eyes and belly swastikas?”
Sophia took Jonathan’s proffered wine glass. She had forgotten about everything except the story zooming into the present and her family’s involvement.
“Forty four years later. After the last one in Europe. Boom. A copycat killing in Philadelphia. My boss, an indefatigable workaholic, who’ll leave no stone unturned, gets me involved. I always get the impossible cases. And that’s how I met you, so I’m not complaining. Interpol is publishing all sorts of useless information. A friend gets me onto Maria, former CIA for help and Bob’s your uncle. The killer strikes again right in South Beach, killing your mum’s friend. Maria finds him and I happen to be on the scene.”
“That slime bucket.” Sophia sneered.
“Long story short. We discover through a convoluted series of events and scattershot pieces of information that Mathilde, Mata Hari Mathilde, I call her, had persuaded her son, Guy, earlier this year to carry on the good work and kill the son of a Nazi, who persecuted her in Drancy. Her son lives in Philadelphia and she was visiting. How she found him out, I don’t know. The Americans helped lots of Nazis emigrate for their scientific skills or torture skills. She might have been following these nefarious shenanigans, which was making her blood boil.”
“The revenge fantasy made a reality,” Sophia interjected.
“Exactly so. And Rudy was a big prize. The illegitimate son of none other than Klaus Barbie, the Butcher of Lyon. Barbie ended up in Bolivia, helped by the Americans in exchange for his torture expertise and anti-red activity. He helped bring Che down. He lost a son in a sports accident and Rudy was his replacement, spawned by his Bolivian housekeeper.”
“I knew that guy was an exceptional swine. He made my blood run cold. And my mother. So attached to him. Attached to a Nazi’s son.” She shivered. A thought struck her. “Does Ma know he’s Barbie’s son?”
“No.”
“Let’s keep it that way. So what happened to Ma? Was Ta a part of any of this?”
“One thing at a time. As far as your dad, he’s an innocent as near as we can make out. Mata Hari Mathilde liked him, she wanted him all to herself, and your mum was getting in the way. Hence the vengeful harassment.”
“Tell me about Ma. What did Mathilde do? Another one I couldn’t stand. Some people said I was jealous because Ma and Ta had other mates. Hah. I was right all along about both of them.”
“Your mum and Mathilde went to the Holocaust Memorial. As I understand it from Ta, they had never gone together before, although Ta and Mathilde as well as Ta and Ma had gone many times.”
“Come on, Jonathan. The suspense is killing me. What happened at the Holocaust Memorial?” Sophia drained her goblet in exasperation.
“Mathilde proceeded to force Ada to climb the arm sculpture covered with figures. She forced her at knife point, stabbing her calves several times.”
Sophia stared at him, wide-eyed, disbelief written all over her astonished face. “What?”
“Yes. It’s true. And your brave mum somehow kicked her off the arm. She died at the foot of the monument.”
Sophia handed Jonathan the empty wine glass, collapsed back on the pillows, utter amazement robbing her of words.
“Your Ma is a tough old bird.”
“Yes, she is.” Sophia fell into a post-seizure sleep immediately, her lust for information satisfied.
Fifty Two
Ma, averse to being reminded of Rudy through his personal decorative touches throughout the apartment and balcony, was installed in Ta’s apartment. She was in bed, wrapped in a yellow kimono with a black-eyed dragon decorating the back.
Ta, ever the indefatigable nurse bee, having just returned with the day’s shopping, opened the groaning door, creaking on its rusty hinges, to welcome Sophia and Jonathan into the cramped kitchen space, dominated by a mound of bulging grocery bags on the scarred maple wood table.
Sophia ran to Ta and embraced him awkwardly. Theirs was not a touchy-feely relationship. “How is she? How are you?”
“Nu. What can I say? Mir schleppt sech.” A resigned grimace played on his lips. “Sitz. Sitz.” He gestured to two sturdy cherry hardwood chairs with fabric seats that had seen better days. Lingering odors of garlic and cauliflower permeated the air. The drain board by the old sink was piled high with mismatched dishes, cups, and glasses.
Sophia and Jonathan obediently perched on the kitchen chairs. Ta produced three shot glasses and a bottle of Slivovitz, rounded with pretty purple plums on the label.
“Zophitchka is that you? Wie bist du? Come here,” Ada proclaimed from the bedroom, her voice booming down the narrow hall, coming off the kitchen.
For a few seconds, Sophia and Jonathan looked at each other, marveling at the deep, rich voice, irresistible to their ears. Sophia, thoroughly familiar with that voice’s capabilities, was nevertheless roused by its indomitable, plaintive timbre. These contradictory elements made her opera great. They clinked their full shot glasses before downing them, nodding to Max, who was doing the same.
“Zophitchka,” again the wondrous call, sailing down the corridor, commanding attention.
“Coming, Ma.” Sophia stood and hurried down the dark, narrow hall.
“I’m okay,” Ada said, opening her arms for Sophia, brandishing her bandaged calves to full effect, and smiling like a martyred soul.
&n
bsp; “Jonathan told me everything. Mathilde was the one bothering you. Mathilde killed Rudy. What a sick puppy. A dark horse, who somehow won Ta over.” Sophia shook her head, once she extricated herself from Ada’s steely grip. An unbidden thought flickered through her consciousness like a guttering candle. These two will never die. They’re too strong. She shook her head again, hard, to dislodge the nonsensical caprice.
Ada snorted in full derisive mode. “I knew.” She tapped her forehead.
“What do you mean you knew? You thought it was that poor wretch Magda.”
“I knew deep inside my soul, meine neschume. It wasn’t jealousy. I knew she stunk. Like a skunk.” She shook her powerful shoulders.
“I was surprised. I thought she was silly and vain, but harmless. Some psychologist I am.”
“You did your best.” Sophia was sitting on the side of the messy bed, overflowing with Ada’s presence. Ada patted her hand.
“I did nothing. I feel guilty.”
“What could you do?”
“I don’t know. I feel guilty.”
“I wished you were here to comfort me.” Ada reinforced the guilt expertly, instinctively.
Wanting to escape the imagined culpability, Sophia said, “Are you two getting back together?”
“We’ll see.” Ada smiled smugly.
“I hope so.”
“Zophitchka, you’re not a klein kind. Your father has horrible taste in women. Schreklich. Except for me,” she added hastily, when she realized what she was saying.
“You have to save him from himself.”
“And I think I have to save you the way you’re talking.”
“I’m glad it’s over. That climb and Mathilde with a knife going after you. Terrible.” Sophia squeezed Ada’s delicate fingers.
“Meshuggeneh koorvah.” Ada spat out the words.
“It’s over. We’ve got better days ahead.” Sophia was thinking of herself. Better days. Put her Barbados ordeal behind her. No Mamma’s Boys, no Maria, and no Kurt. Just Jonathan. And Titi. She missed Titi, but she had to steel herself for the last supper with Maria. It was going to be tough. She sighed.
Time's Harlot: The Perils of Attraction, Seduction, and Desire Page 23