Sooner Fled

by David L Thornburg

  “Stephanie’s grandfather was murdered. Her cousin is being blamed, but I have evidence he didn’t do it.”

  Wilder shifted in the chair, and his voice took on a harder edge. “What I need you to understand is that is not your concern. If you aren’t healthy enough to testify when the time comes, one of the worst drug kingpins in Detroit will get off, free to damage countless more lives.”

  “But a man has been murdered!”

  “Again, not your business, but Damek Blazek was a third level Soviet sleeper agent, who enjoyed the privileges of living in this country for almost 60 years, all the while willing to do this nation harm if he was asked to.”

  I was stunned. The old man’s rantings weren’t so crazy, after all.

  “But what about Martinek? He’s just a kid, accused of a murder he didn’t commit.”

  Wilder leaned forward. “It. Doesn’t. Matter. If someone went around and executed all the doddering old sleeper agents left high and dry after we won the Cold War, your government wouldn’t care one bit that it happened or who did it. And neither should you.”

  He pulled out his phone. “My ride is here,” he said, standing. “It won’t be long before we have a trial date for Ponty. After that, your life will be your own, but you shouldn’t come back here. You need a clean break with your Detroit life and your Oak Valley life. So, just to be clear. No spy games. No treasure hunts. No contacting mafia bosses to renegotiate loans. No discovering reclusive authors. Just marry and bury, and preach every Sunday.”

  “They tell me I’m not very good at the preaching.”

  “They’re right,” he said, closing the door behind him.

  After about 4 hours of fitful sleep, I put on my robe and lurched to the front room to answer the doorbell. It was Stephanie, Lekso, and Grandma Teodora.

  “I thought we had an appointment to discuss the funeral service,” Stephanie said.

  “Of course. Come in.” I opened the door and stood aside as they filed in, Stephanie last. She gave me a “what’s wrong with you?” glance as she passed me. Since the explosion and fire destroyed the church building, the parsonage had been the de facto office.

  “Please have a seat. I’ll make some coffee,” I said.

  Stephanie said, “I’ll handle the coffee. You put on pants.”

  “Good idea.”

  Fifteen minutes later, I entered the living room fully clothed. “I apologize for not being presentable.”

  “Not at all,” Lekso said. “Martinek told me you were with him early this morning.”

  “How is he?”

  “As well as can be expected. We expect to meet with his lawyer about 1:00.”

  Teodora spoke up. “Tell him, Stephanie.”

  “When we went to Grandma’s house this morning, there had been an intruder,” Steph said.

  “You don’t say.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Files were all over the floor, there’d been a fire in the stove, and some things were missing.”

  Lekso said, “Like a laptop.”

  “A laptop?” I stammered. “Actually, I may know something about that.”

  “Lekso!” Teo wailed. “He vas in my house!”

  It was no use protesting. “I’m sorry.”

  “You had no right to break in!” Lekso said. “What were you looking for?”

  “Evidence to help Marty,” I said. “And I found it. I took the computer to the sheriff this morning,” I fibbed. “He wasn’t even in the house…”

  “We don’t need your help!”

  “And, there was someone else in the house with me last night. They burned a ledger or something in the wood-burning stove.”

  Lekso stood and held up his hands. “Enough! We’ve had enough of your lies. My son made a terrible mistake, and he will have to pay for it.”

  “You don’t understand. This could help your son.”

  He offered his arm to help his mother up. “I don’t think he is the best person to conduct Papa’s funeral.”

  “I should say not,” she said, getting slowly to her feet. “Ve will bury him in Prague, like I wanted.”

  They shuffled out the door, leaving Stephanie looking shocked.

  “Prague?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” she said absently. “It’s a small community near here settled by Czech immigrants over a hundred years ago. They have the National Shrine of Infant Jesus. Great place for a Catholic funeral. You still have the laptop, don’t you?”

  “Yeah, it’s in the car. Are you mad at me?” I asked.

  She met my gaze. “Of course not. I just wonder what Uncle Lekso is hiding.”

  I looked out the window. Lekso and Teodora were talking with someone else standing by their car. “Isn’t that your dad?”

  She stood beside me. “Yes, it is.” She started to go meet him, but I stopped her.

  “Wait a second. Let’s watch.”

  They weren’t yelling, but all three seemed tense. Teo lifted her face in a dismissive gesture and got in the car. Lekso circled around to the driver side. Before he got in, he pointed at Stephanie’s father and mouthed what appeared to be a threat. After they drove away, he came up the front walk.

  Stephanie opened the door. “Dad, what are you doing here?”

  “I heard this was the temporary office for your church. I came to check on you. Peter,” he said, shaking my hand.

  “William,” I said, trying to out serious him but failing.

  “Listen, Honey, I have something to tell you. Can we talk?”

  “Sure. Come in.”

  “In private?”

  “You can say anything in front of Peter. He’s in this up to his neck already.”

  He looked at me. “Why am I not surprised?” He entered the house and sat down on the couch. Stephanie sat beside him.

  “Your grandparents are not what they seem. Damek was sent to this country by the Communist government in Czechoslovakia. He was a rising officer in the NKVD, or People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs. Lekso knows, of course, and so did your mother. I tried to keep it from you and your brothers so it wouldn’t color your opinion of them. After the changes in the USSR and Eastern Europe, they seemed harmless enough. Your Aunt Sorina could never let it go, though.”

  “I wondered why she was never around.”

  “Why Oklahoma?” I asked.

  “Oklahoma has four major military bases. We’re close to the ICBM missile silos that were in Kansas. And, it’s only a half day’s drive to the Port of Houston.”

  “That’s a lot of opportunity to do some damage,” I said.

  Stephanie looked shell-shocked. “I can’t believe it. How could you keep this a secret from me?”

  “We all thought they were out of the woods after the fall of the Soviet Union, but with Damek slipping mentally, someone thought it best to silence him. Please, be careful.”

  “I will, Dad, but who did it?”

  “Stephanie, that’s not important. Please just tell me you’ll stay out of it.”

  “But Marty didn’t do it.”

  “Maybe he did. Maybe it was Lekso. Maybe it was a foreign agent. I just need you to be safe. If they feel there is no more threat, maybe this will be the end of it.” He looked at me reluctantly, as if he was giving Jesse James the key to the bank. “Can you please keep her from doing anything foolish?”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “I do not feel reassured. Stephie, if anything happened to you, I couldn’t bear it. Losing your mother, then almost losing you when you got stabbed, then again when we were trapped in the church basement…”

  “Dad, I’ll be fine, I promise. Don’t worry.”

  “It’s what I do,” he said, standing. “Anybody want some lunch before I go back for my afternoon class?”

  I told Steph and her father I would join them at the diner downtown. First, I went to the Sheriff’s office. When I got out of my car, I noticed a non-descript late model sedan parked beside me. On a hunch, I left the laptop in the car,
under the back seat.

  Sheriff Harris met me at the door. “Preacher, I don’t have time for you today. Marty’s lawyer and family will be here any minute, and I even have an FBI agent here for the interview.”

  “FBI?” I looked past him. Agent Wilder was at Harris’s desk, using his phone, staring right at me.

  “Yeah, you’re busy. I’ll come back.”

  “No hurry,” he said, letting the door close.

  I walked across the street to the diner and sat at the table with Stephanie and William.

  “Do you think that’s him?” she asked.

  I followed her gaze to a youngish African American man sitting at the counter, a briefcase at his side. His inexpensive suitcoat was folded neatly on the chair beside him, and his paisley tie was loosened in the August heat.

  “Marty’s lawyer,” I said. I almost got up to talk to him, but William’s stare pinned me down.

  I decided I had to get the evidence to him anyway, but before I could stand, Lekso entered. He sniffed disdainfully as he passed our table on the way to the counter.

  “Mr. Lewis?” he asked.

  The lawyer replied, “Yes. Mr. Blazek?”

  They shook hands, and Lewis gathered his jacket and briefcase, and followed Lekso out the door.

  Stephanie stood. “Where are you going?” William asked.

  “To the meeting with the lawyer,” she said. “After all, I’m the only person at this table they’re not mad at.”

  “She really is stubborn,” I said after she left.

  “She got it from her mother,” William said, picking up the menu. “Now, what’s good here?”

  After William left, I went to my house and tried to do some work, but I got more distracted as the hours slipped away. As 5:00 came and went, my short night caught up with me and I dozed at my desk.

  The phone woke me up as the long evening shadows drifted across the room. It was the house’s land line, not my cell.

  “Reverend Andrews,” I said, rubbing my right eye with the heel of my hand.

  The voice on the other end was deep and distorted. “If you want to see your pretty little girlfriend again, bring the laptop to the Blazek house. Come alone.”

  The click was as final as a nail driven into a coffin.

  I made sure the laptop was still under the seat and drove as fast as I could to the Blazek house. Stephanie’s little pickup was parked in the driveway. I braked hard and was out of the car before it stopped rocking. Computer in hand, I ran up the porch steps and through the doorway. I skidded to a stop in the living room, where Stephanie and Teodora were sipping from teacups.

  “Dear me,” said Teo.

  “Who else is here?” I demanded.

  “No one,” said Stephanie.

  “Then someone is coming. I got a phone call. You’re both in danger.”

  “No,” said Teo, letting the shawl on her lap drop to the floor, revealing a small handgun. “You two are in danger.”

  “Grandma?” asked Stephanie.

  “I couldn’t let that doddering old fool ruin 50 years of preparation by shooting off his mouth.” All trace of her accent was gone. “He was always the weak one. As his commanding officer, I had to clean up the mess. Now give me the computer, young man.”

  She stood, and at full height she was much taller than when stooped over the sink. Her hand was steady as she pointed the gun at me.

  I opened the laptop and prepared to rip it into two pieces. “Why do you need this?”

  She laughed. “Go ahead and tear it. I just need to make sure Martinek gets the blame for Damek’s death.”

  “Your own grandson?” Stephanie said.

  “Living here all his life made him soft. This is something he can do to repay the motherland. It was supposed to be cut and dry, but you two just wouldn’t leave it alone. I had to break into my own house to destroy evidence. Now there has to be two more murders and a missing old lady.”

  She cocked the hammer with her thumb. I’m sure it was my imagination, but I thought I could see the tip of the bullet in its chamber.

  “What about Uncle Lekso?” Stephanie said, her voice cracking.

  “He’s also weak. At least he kept that dishrag of a wife in line.” She braced the hand holding the gun with her other hand. The recoil could be bad for older bones, I presumed.

  She fired, then fell backward over her chair, landing in a pile on the floor.

  I wasn’t hit. I looked at Stephanie, who shook her head.

  “A dishrag? The old bitch.” We both looked at Aunt Sorina, standing in the doorway with her gun pointing to the ground.

  She advanced to Teo. Lekso ran into the room. “Sorina, don’t!”

  Sorina stood over Teo, and fired again. Grandma Teodora’s body twitched with the impact, and then was still.

  Lekso took the gun from her. “Now what do we do?”

  “Simple. Take the computer and get our son out of jail.”

  I was alone in the front pew of the beautiful and ornate sanctuary of the National Shrine of Infant Jesus, looking at two coffins. What do you say at the funeral of two Cold War spies?

  Stephanie sat down in the pew behind me.

  “Aren’t you supposed to be with the family?”

  “I am,” she said. I turned to look at her.

  “Look,” she went on, “I was so high and mighty about you not being truthful with me, and here my family was hiding something much worse. At least everything you’ve done, you’ve done to help others.”

  “My situation hasn’t changed. I can’t offer you anything but uncertainty and deceit.”

  “If that’s the hand we’re dealt, let’s play it together.” She put her hand on my shoulder. “Grandma Teo was right about one thing. We make a good match.”

  The funeral director touched Steph’s shoulder. “Miss, if you will join the family, we are ready to seat the mourners.” She followed him to the family room, and I took my place on the platform.

  After everyone was seated, the family came in. Stephanie was beautiful in a black dress. She sat with her father. Lekso and Martinek sat beside them. Sorina was being held without bail.

  Three priests officiated, in robes of black, white, and violet. There was a hymn, a reading from the Gospel of Luke, the Lord’s Prayer, and the Liturgy of the Eucharist, where everyone received the body and the blood in the form of wine and a wafer. All in the congregation except me knew when to stand and sit. Then it was time for the Words of Remembrance.

  As I stood and looked over the congregation, I saw Agent Wilder slip in and sit on the back row. He caught my eye, and shook his head slowly, as if he couldn’t believe I would disregard his advice to not get involved so utterly.

  I started with the basic facts of Damek and Teo’s lives, my tongue twisting over the names of their hometowns in Czechoslovakia. Their birthdays were two years apart – Teo was older. The dates of death were separated by one day.

  “Most here today don’t know the real facts of their lives and deaths. I submit that we can never know the essential truth of another’s life, without dedicating our lives to do so. And I will leave it to wiser people than me, perhaps some in this room, to know what it means to leave one’s home and move to another world, first as an outsider, then, hopefully, as an inhabitant of the new place, the dweller in a new home.

  “There is a way in which we are all strangers in an unknown land, trying to find what home means. It’s better if we find someone to make the journey with us, so that we can search together.”

  I stood with the priests at the back of the sanctuary as the family filed out. Stephanie shook the hands of the priests then took her place beside me.

  Everyone else was dismissed, from the front rows to the back. One of the last to exit was Agent Wilder.

  He did not shake my hand, but stopped directly in front of me.

  “We have a trial date,” he said. “Go home and pack. I’ll pick you up in three hours.”

  Chapter 5

 
; Blessed are the Returned

  My best friend from my new life was helping me pack so I could go back to my old one.

  John Gray owned the car dealership in Oak Valley, the small town in rural Oklahoma where the FBI had stashed me as part of the Witness Protection Program. He was also a deacon in the church where I pastored while waiting for my past to catch up with me.

  “When will Agent Wilder be here?” he asked.

  “Any minute now.” It was hard to know how to pack not knowing when, or even if, I would be back.

  “Hurry back when you are done testifying. You know you’ll always have a place here.”

  I turned to him. “I don’t know how this will play out. The FBI told me to go someplace new when the trial is over. It’ll be safer for me and everybody else.”

  “You’ve been such a help to me and my family, I can’t stand the thought of not seeing you again. And you know Stephanie feels that way. Where is she, anyway?”

  Stephanie was the secretary of Oak Valley Community Church. We had grown very close in the months I had been in town.

  “She’s probably with her family,” I said. Three hours earlier, I had officiated at the double funeral of her grandparents. She was standing with me when Agent Wilder told me to pack to return to Detroit. I yearned to see her before I left, but in many ways it would be easier if I didn’t.

  No such luck. I heard her small pickup pull into the driveway. I looked out the window as she got out. At the funeral she wore a black knee length dress, but she had changed into denim shorts and a Bruce Springsteen tee shirt. Her brown ponytail bobbed as she reached into the back of her truck and grabbed a suitcase.

  “Uh oh,” said John, looking over my shoulder.

  I met her on the porch.

  “Is Wilder here, yet?” she asked, setting the suitcase down.

  “No,” I said. “What are you doing?”

  “I’m going with you.”

  “I don’t think you can. It might be dangerous.”

  “That’s why I’m going. We talked about being in this together. Besides, I’m not sure you would last a day without me to watch out for you.”