“This isn’t over,” I screamed back at the captain. “You’re making a big mistake—”
Then a fist came out of nowhere and hit me in the gut. I wheezed and fought for air while folding like a cheap tent in the crew’s arms. They whisked me away, but I managed to twist and contort back to catch sight of the captain staring after me through the glass window. Now his look of rigid anger had been replaced by rigid fear. I hoped it was the bug I’d put in his ear about the Nazi scum on his ship. Hoped at the end of the day he was one of the good guys, but I was fast learning I couldn’t tell who was who or what was what anymore.
Nothing had been business as usual from the moment I stepped on the Athenia. And as I was being carted away, I realized that I might not live to see land ever again. That the big blue ball I spied from the bridge was where I might spend my last remaining moments on earth. So, I swore, then and there, come hell or high water, that I’d squeeze every last second I had left to try to see Garbo again.
Garbo had been the tall glass of water I’d been thirsty for my entire life but didn’t know it until fate joined us. It sounded idiotic, but I’d never understood what people said when they said they were in love before. Now, with Garbo—I got it. She was the juice that made my life worth living. And I needed one last drink.
17. THE FOURTH ESTATE MEETS THE FIFTH COLUMN SETH
I woke up in the dark alone. Again. This time, however, it wasn’t after a rapturous night with Garbo. No. Now I was in the dark, dank hold of the ship where powerful turbines hummed in my ears. I rubbed my eyes and sat up. I needed to consider my options.
First, I needed to get a sense of my little prison. I felt around the best I could until I realized that the door to my cell didn’t have bars, a window, or even a fucking knob on the inside. The only light in the room was a thin, dim shaft that seeped in through an inch gap between floor and door. The space had, no doubt, been designed to let in air and, in my panicked and vivid imagination, water. Seawater.
The mental image of drowning hit me like a wave. Water cold and thick as blood rushed in and quickly filled my dark crypt. I imagined that’s how my end would come. That and hearing the powerful giant engines beneath me falling silent. Choked to death by salt water mere seconds before I was. Or maybe they’d explode when engulfed, like mega-ton cherry bombs blowing me to bits. In that case, at least I wouldn’t drown.
Back in ’34, I’d covered the shipboard fire that killed 134 people and set the SS Morro Castle adrift off the New Jersey coast. I’d seen first-hand the carnage fire on the water caused. Human bodies burned beyond recognition, washing ashore or drifting as barbequed fish food for hungry sharks. Fodder for nightmares and a hatred of the sea ever since.
I sat back against some sort of wall and concentrated on that slice of light. I didn’t need to see the whole room to know things weren’t looking so good for me. Captain Cook, master of the Athenia, apparently didn’t care that Nazis were aboard. That didn’t bode well for anybody.
Jesus, was I losing my grip or what? Left unabated, my brain would turn on itself and make me a gibbering idiot. I needed to take action. But what action could I take? I was alone. Helpless. No one could have described what solitary confinement felt like before that day in Davy Jones’ lockup. That the ship might sink, and I’d drown in the drink was just the paranoid cherry on top of an already generous slice of psychological hell.
I had to embrace the darkness of my situation or be consumed by it. I escaped into the recent past. Thought of my Ingrid, the beautiful duplicitous bitch who’d landed me in here. How sweet she had smelled as the British officers pulled me out from under her. Honeysuckle, wasn’t it? Honeysuckle and betrayal.
Anger was good. I focused my gaze squarely upon that one-inch gap between door and floor. Saw a miniaturized, naked Garbo reclining in the light. At least I could congratulate myself on having had her. After all, how many guys could truthfully say they’d made time with The Divine One? Figment or not, she turned to me and gave me a disapproving stare. Even in my imagination, I couldn’t catch a break.
I knew I’d stumbled onto something never before seen or heard. I knew Garbo had reached out to me, beckoned me to her bosom, but had I just been a tool? Had the whole thing been staged? Now that I thought about it, had she acted resigned as I made love to her? Was she remote even as I held her in my arms? Whatever was going on had to do with Ingrid. My camera sitting on Ingrid’s shelf was proof enough of that.
I wished I’d been able to read the Nazi fan letter I’d seen in Garbo’s room before it was so rudely taken away by my good friend Heinrich. Obviously, Hitler was in love with Garbo, obsessed just like the rest of the schmucks of the world. But did the despot actually think she’d drop everything and join him? Was that why she was onboard in the first place? Had I been Garbo’s last fling before she joined up with her number-one fascist fan?
Garbo had seduced me, but why? Had she known I was a reporter? No, she definitely wouldn’t have slept with me if she had. She hated the paparazzi. To her I was just a hapless waiter. But then again, why bang the help when you could have anyone in the world? It’s as if she’d reached out to me in the dark in desperation. Needed to make contact with someone, anyone.
I couldn’t sit still. I crawled forward on all fours and sniffed the gap in the door. Maybe I could will myself through it. Collapse my ribcage like a rat and squeeze through the tight spot I’d found myself in. Rats never gave up when they were trapped. They died trying to escape. I admired their tenacity. Their mindlessness became an advantage in the face of certain death. Rodents didn’t weigh the odds, they just acted. Went for it. I started to slip my finger under the door when two high-shined men’s shoe tips reflecting a far-off light appeared.
“Moseley,” the shoes said. “You in there?”
Was I imagining this, too? Was I so pathetic as to have lost my marbles in only a matter of hours? I scooted closer to the shoes, dared to reach a single finger out and press against one. They were real, all right. I scurried back into the dark as if the shoes would see me in my diminished state and run away.
“Yeah,” I said to the size tens. “Do I know you?”
“It’s me,” they said in unison. “Nick.”
Nick? The last time I’d seen The Piano Man he’d been busy tossing his cookies into my crotch back in the ship’s bar. A warmth in my groin accompanied the memory. That just wasn’t right.
“Nick.” I smiled in the dark as if he could see me. “How’ve you been?”
“Can’t complain,” he said. “But I didn’t come down here on a social visit.”
I wanted to ask him how he’d come to know I was where I was. Had the news made it all over the ship already? Or were he and Ingrid in cahoots all along like I’d first thought? Then again, what the hell did I have to lose at this point? I knew it couldn’t possibly be a shakedown because I had nothing left to offer anyone. Or maybe I did?
“What’s the angle, Nick?” I said to his shoes and tried to sound indifferent.
“I can get you out of there,” he whispered as I raised myself up to stand against the door. “You interested?”
“Go on,” I said.
Does a bear shit in the woods? I wasn’t exactly in any position to negotiate but knew it never hurt to hear the details before you sold your soul to the devil.
“I’m assuming,” he said, “you’ve guessed by now that Ingrid is not a Swedish barmaid?
“The thought had crossed my mind.”
“She’s a British secret agent,” he said. “She used you to throw the Nazi agents off her scent.”
The mere mention of the word scent conjured a whiff of Ingrid’s intoxicating honeysuckle. I crossed my arms in the frigid darkness. British agent, huh? She could have been the Queen Mum for all I cared. Wouldn’t stop me from cleaning her clock once I got back on the outside. But first things first. I turned my attention back to The Piano Man’s shoes.
“Whose side are you on?” I asked with more than a
hint of suspicion. “And please don’t tell me you’re neutral.”
I heard Nick shuffle his feet on the other side of the door. He didn’t have to bluff. He was holding all the cards.
“Let’s just say,” he said, “I represent the interests of one very important, very powerful individual.”
Well, that narrowed it down, didn’t it? Could have been me, for Christ’s sake, except for the important and powerful part. Nick wasn’t telling me much. I’d try a different tactic.
“Okay, I give,” I said. “What do you want me to do?”
There was silence on the other side of the door. I looked down and saw Nick’s shoes turn and walk away. Heard their footsteps become faint as he soft-shoed down the hallway that led to the stairs and topside. Had I said something to offend him, my one chance at freedom?
“Nick?” I whispered as loud as I dared. “Are you still there?”
Nothing. My nerve endings twitched. It must have been five, maybe ten minutes before I heard footsteps heading back toward my door. I knelt on the floor of my cell. Sure enough, Nick’s shoes appeared in front of me again. My heart sped up with the ray of hope they reflected into my cell. I stood back up to receive my sentence.
“I have the key,” Nick said.
“Great,” I said in a hushed yell. “Let me out.”
“Only after you swear allegiance.”
What was this, kindergarten? I hadn’t sworn an oath to anything in my life, other than the pursuit of my own happiness. Who the hell did this guy think he was, Uncle Sam?
“To whom?” I said to the shoes.
“To me.”
Wow. Was this guy off his rocker or what? Still, what would be the harm? It wasn’t like he could hold me to anything. Once I got on the other side of that door, all bets were off. I’d be a free man. Given the circumstances, it was the only choice.
“Ok, sure. I swear.”
Again, silence on the other side of the door. I broke out in a cold sweat. Shit. He was onto me. Either that or he was really good at turning the screws on people.
Then I heard a key inserted into the lock. The metallic scraping sound was music to my ears, and I stepped ever closer to the door, determined to be out of that little box as soon as humanly possible.
The door opened and a blast of light stopped me short. A bare incandescent bulb hanging in the hallway all but blinded me. I raised my hands up and squinted, only able to discern blown-out shapes of color.
One of the shapes I made out right off was Nick’s face sporting a wide grin. I was never so happy to see another guy in my life. Nick was turning out to be an okay guy, something in rare supply aboard the Athenia. I took a step out of my cage and breathed a deep breath of freedom.
“Thanks,” I said. “You got me out of a tight spot.”
Nick smiled. “I’ll be your Huckleberry.”
Huckleberry? At first, I thought Finn, and then realized the reference was to the Arthurian legend. In more chivalrous times, a damsel in distress presented her knight in shining armor with a garland made of the sweet, black berries. Her pledge and gratitude all in one token. Nick was turning out to be full of surprises. Either he was the most well-read music man I’d ever met or a swish. I didn’t particularly care which. I was free.
“What now?” he said.
Nick backed up so I could step into the confined hallway. My eyesight limited, I could nevertheless see that he was dressed all in black. Quite a switch from the white coat and black bow-tie getup he wore the first time we met. Nick had been tickling the ivories in the Grand Salon while Ingrid was busy reeling me in. What a sucker I’d been.
“Now?” I rubbed my eyes trying to force them to refocus. “Now I find out what the hell’s going on on this tub.”
That wasn’t going to be easy. My profile had risen considerably aboard ship since the first go-round. Ingrid, the British staff, Captain Courageous, and, lest we forget, Heinrich the Nazi Monkey. They’d all be taking turns gunning for me now.
“No offense,” he said. “But what makes you think Garbo will even talk to you now?” Nick’s smile widened. He looked at me like the proverbial cat who’d eaten the canary.
“We have a special connection,” I said and gave him a wink in the half-light of the bare bulb above our heads.
“You don’t say?” he said, thoroughly amused.
I had a nice, juicy rejoinder for him. Instead, I turned and led the way down the tiny hallway in the direction of the stairs, which led to the top deck. I couldn’t tell what time of day it was, but I hoped for darkness and not broad daylight. I was beginning to see the virtue of working under cover of night. That is, in light of everyone onboard seemingly determined to keep me in the dark.
“Oh, and I should tell you,” Nick said from behind. “There’s been a recent development since you’ve been down here.”
“Do tell,” I said.
My newshound’s sixth sense began to tingle in anticipation. I feared what earth-shattering event had occurred in the past ten hours of my incarceration.
“England and France,” Nick said slowly and deliberately from behind me, “have declared war on Germany.”
An alarm bell went off in my head. A loud, blaring siren warning of imminent danger. Who was this guy, a Fifth Columnist? A secret-society type who knew things a beat before everyone else? As a member of the fourth estate, I didn’t appreciate how coy Nick was being. Then again, I didn’t have much of a choice in the matter. I needed all the friends I could get, even fair-weather ones—if I was going to get back to Garbo.
But how long did I have left? With world war a sudden reality, there would be no stopping the Nazis from getting what they wanted. It was only a matter of hours, maybe less before we’d be surrounded. And what could one man, or woman, even in love, do against those odds?
18. WHORES OF A DIFFERENT COLOR JAMES
Sarah barged into the hospital room and startled both of us back from the Athenia. I landed back in a world of hospital corners and orange-scented disinfectant to find Sarah visibly shaken. She came to stand between our beds, fidgety with nervous energy.
“I just called security on that asshole in three,” she said.
I looked from Sarah to Seth, then back. And then my brain cleared. Martin. Martin was the asshole in three.
“What?” I stammered. “What did he do?”
“An underhanded grope,” she said and wrung her hands. “While I was checking his IV line.”
“I’ll kill him,” I blurted.
The immediacy of the statement took Sarah off guard. Seth recovered, returned to earth and cocked a skeptical eye at me. He wriggled his nose. The newshound in him sensed something was up. Like he smelled a rat. “Kill who?”
“Just some creep down the hall,” Sarah said.
I felt my face blush while Seth watched my reaction. I cast my eyes down to my hands pressed into my lap. I couldn’t look at either of them. The inevitable look of disappointment coming my way.
“Tell us about him,” Seth said.
Was he talking to me? I looked up and saw that Seth was still watching me.
“What’s he in for?”
No, he was asking Sarah. While looking for my reaction.
A rush of fever enveloped my skull, blood thumping in my ears. I felt an imaginary spotlight on me. Again. The energy in the room had shifted violently. I pressed my fingernails into my lap until my knuckles turned white. I forced myself to become rigid, braced for impact. I was a ship in heavy seas.
“Just some guy who ran off the road yesterday,” Sarah said, and crossed her arms.
Seth reached out a hand for Sarah. She took his hand in her own. He drew her to his bed until she sat down on it. My hands became fists. All I could do was watch.
“Is his name Martin, Sarah?” he said.
“How did you know?” she said with a look of astonishment.
Seth wasn’t looking into the past anymore. Now I felt sure old Scrooge was visiting my future. Had seen throu
gh my thin visage, knew that I didn’t have the balls to kill Martin. That instead I had fallen back in league with him. Seen that I wasn’t worthy of having the Garbo story. Foretold I was not deserving of the beautiful woman who sat next to him and held his hand. Seth had seen all my darkest fears about myself come to pass.
“What’s going on?” Sarah said.
I looked up into her hazel eyes and saw that the beautiful woman had been unglued by her experience with my ex-boss. That I’d already failed her before we’d even had a chance to get to know one another. Establish trust. Then I looked at Seth.
A moment of silent recognition passed between me and the old man. He could tell I’d known Martin was on the premises and had kept mum to both him and Sarah. I was fully exposed now.
I opened my mouth. My jaw hung on its hinges for a full second before any sound came out. I felt like the old TV in our room, warming up before an image materialized.
“Sarah,” I said meekly.
“James,” she said, her eyes narrowing.
“The guy who groped you,” I said. “I know him.”
Sarah’s face went completely blank. No judgment. No questioning expression. My imagination had suspended her in the moment. She was a freeze-frame of ripe, redlipped lust and vulnerability interwoven in my mind in one perfect image.
My idleness had to be over. A new era of ownership and responsibility was being forced upon me. The next words out of my mouth must be testimony. Testimony that I had changed. Could change. Or at least had the potential to if given the chance. If it wasn’t too late.
“He’s my boss. Or, at least he was before he fired me.”
Sarah’s eyes opened wider, turned to Seth in incomprehension. He met her stare. Then they both blinked and turned back to me.
“Your boss?” she said. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I didn’t want either of you to know”—I swallowed—“what kind of asshole I’d associated myself with. I’m sorry.”
The moment hung there between the three of us as Sarah took in the information Seth had obviously already processed. He reached up his left hand to Sarah. Patted her on the shoulder. While all I could do was pray. I prayed that my lack of faith in myself wasn’t contagious.
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