Allegiance (45 page)

“How's it going?” I ask.

“Good,” he says. “We're going to have twenty guys, maybe twenty-five. And I got you this.” There is an olive bundle in his arms.

“What's that?”

“You can't be running around the colony in that suit, boss.” He laughs. “Uncle Sam's your new tailor.”

I put on the uniform. Then I sit in the apartment for hours, drinking coffee and looking at my feet in the combat boots, my legs in army fatigues. The body of a soldier, or the clothing, at least. And now Miller's face is in the doorway. It is time. The night will not last; the snow is starting down. Leaves dance in the wind before us as we gather at the gate. These are my men: twenty dark figures or so, some with rifles slung across their chests. I can't remember authorizing that, but it seems like a reasonable precaution. Clouds hang low over the camp; reflected searchlight beams cast a dull glow across the sky. The cold is irresistible. The uniform is no match for it, nor the borrowed Army greatcoat I pull tight around my shoulders. The air is biting me; idly, I wonder if I have a taste in the mouth of the wind. Miller looks my way. “Let's go,” I say. The gate opens and we stream into the colony.

• • • • 

For over an hour we go down the list. At four-thirty, we come to Kinzo Wakayama. He lives in Ward Eight, Block Eighty-two. The ward is deep inside the colony and was once as much as three-quarters Hoshidan. Now, of course, it is almost three-quarters empty. We are working in teams of three. Miller is with me, and a local agent he turned up named Skousen. I kick the door open and Wakayama sits up in bed, blinking into our lights. “What is the meaning of this?” He wears military-surplus long underwear against the cold.

“I want you to sign this form,” I say.

“What?”

“I want you to renounce your citizenship.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because you are disloyal.”

Wakayama swings his bare feet to the floor. “I am disloyal because I object to this treatment? It is wrong, and you know it.”

“You are confusing these people. You are leading them to renounce citizenship that is very valuable to them.”

“You are the ones who taught them their citizenship is worthless.”

“Sign the paper,” I say.

“I will not. I am a veteran. I fought for this country. You put me in this camp. I will keep my citizenship and I will say what I please about what you have done. Is that not my right as an American?”

Miller looks at me. There is a question in his face, but I have no answer.

“You're not a real American,” says Skousen. He is a small man, his narrow jaw dark with stubble.

“And you are?”

Skousen turns to me. I don't know if I give him a signal, or if he just sees something in my eyes, but suddenly he holds a gun. “You're not going to be any kind of American for long,” he says. “You're going to sign this paper.”

Wakayama does not seem surprised. “You will shoot me?” he asks. “Remember where you are. Remember there are only three of you.” His voice sharpens. “We are more than that, even now.”

Skousen reverses the pistol in his hand, gripping it by the barrel. “I might not need a shot, chum.” He raises his arm.

An emotion reaches me as from a distance, but I do not move.
This man is one of them
, I tell myself.
He admits it. He has just threatened us.
I hear the light accent of Frankfurter's precise voice, his words about the saboteurs.
Those men were enemies, Cash. They got what they deserved
. Skousen draws his arm back further, raising the elbow. Something familiar about the motion transfixes me. It evokes the final flourish of backswing that distinguishes a Merion player. I see John Hall float across the squash court, racquet above him, poised for the strike. I see him slumped on the dirty table with the plea ebbing from his eyes.
Help me, Cash.
I take a step toward Skousen, reaching for the gun.

“I will sign under protest,” says Wakayama. Skousen lowers his hand. I pull out a pen. And Skousen walks him away to the trucks.

Miller and I stand outside the empty apartment. The wind whistles down the rows of black buildings. Castle Rock is a dark bulk on the horizon, darker than the clouds. “What did we just do?” I ask.

Miller pulls methodically on a cigarette. The glow casts shadows off his cheekbones, pulls a gleam from his dark hair. Hoover has a definite type. “That was the right thing. You don't understand these people.”

“I understand we threatened to pistol-whip a veteran to make him give up his citizenship.” For a moment I long to be back in Judge Goodman's Eureka courtroom, to hear someone say he forgives me.

Miller cradles the cigarette butt between thumb and forefinger. With his other hand, he flicks it away in a shower of sparks. “He wasn't really a citizen. He's subversive.”

“He fought for this country. Did you?”

“Flat feet,” says Miller. “That's why I'm in the Bureau. I know, walking punchline. You?”

“No,” I say. “I didn't.”

“Don't feel bad for old Kinzo,” he says. “You did the right thing.” He turns away from me, headed deeper into the colony.

“Where are you going?”

“There's one more,” he says.

“Who?” My list is complete.

“The Bureau identified him.”

I shrug. “Okay.” I move to follow Miller.

“You don't have to come,” he says. “I can handle him on my own.”

“This was my idea,” I say. “I'm there with you.” He shrugs in turn.

We walk for several minutes in silence, until we come to Ward Ten, Block Forty-Seven. I have never been inside the colony, but the address is familiar. I stop, puzzled. Miller is in front of me, pushing the door open. I hear voices startled from sleep. By the time I make it inside, he has them out of bed. There are three children and a woman. There is Harry Nakamura. Nothing in his face indicates that he recognizes me. “Go to Mr. Oshige,” he tells his wife. He turns to Miller. “They may leave?”

Miller nods. “Our business is with you.”

“What do you want?” Nakamura asks after his family has left.

“We want your signature,” Miller says.

“Wait,” I say. “There's a mistake here. He's not on my list.”

“He's on mine.”

“Why?”

“He's an agitator.” Miller looks at me, shadows pooling under his cheekbones. “You know different?”

I hesitate. “Yeah, I think I do.”

“Come on,” says Miller. “I backed you with Kinzo.” He flashes his smile. “Don't turn on me here.”

I shake my head. “Opler can straighten this out,” I say, and start vaguely toward the door. It's a daft idea, for Marvin Opler is on the other side of the colony fence, a long walk away, and surely curled warm in his blankets under Franklin Roosevelt's watchful gaze. But I don't make it to the door anyway, for behind me there's a sudden grunt and a thud of bodies coming together, and a clattering as something hard skitters across the floor. I look down and see a black pistol turning in small circles at my feet.

I
PICK UP
the gun. It is a blued Smith and Wesson .38 Special, a standard Bureau service revolver. The same kind I saw in Skousen's hand. Across the room, Miller and Nakamura are on the floor, locked in a peculiar embrace. “He went for you,” says Miller breathlessly.

I turn the idea over in my mind. It is not convincing. “And yet it looks to me like he's the one holding you down.”

Miller writhes in an unsuccessful effort to free himself. Now I can see the empty holster under his coat. “He attacked me,” he says. “I told you he belonged on the list. Do you believe me now?”

I shake my head. “No,” I say. “Get up.”

Nakamura releases him, and Miller gets to his feet, brushing dust from his clothes. Nakamura stands half a pace away. “You should choose your friends more carefully,” he says to me.

“He's not my friend.”

“So it would seem.”

I point the gun loosely in Miller's direction. Nakamura takes another step away, clearing the shot for me. “Who do you work for?”

He laughs incredulously. “You'd take his word over mine? Look at him!”

The
bozu
haircut is a nice touch, I think. It might have saved Harry Nakamura's life in the past weeks. It might have saved mine tonight. “Who do you work for?”

“Same man as you.” Miller parts his lips and widens his eyes. I couldn't pull off that look with Frankfurter, and Miller can't do it with me. He is a better liar than John Hall, but not by much. Too theatrical in his incomprehension. He flashes his white smile, and for the first time I see in it something deceptive, something unfinished.

I shake my head. “I don't work for a man.” He says nothing. “So you're one of the good guys,” I say. “And he was going for me.”

“That's right,” says Miller, but his voice has lost its enthusiasm.

“Maybe so,” I say. I heft the pistol experimentally, reverse the grip. The barrel is cold in my hand. “Maybe he's disloyal. And maybe he jumped you. Hit you with your own gun. Left you to bleed out on the ground or freeze to death in some ditch. And maybe the MPs will find your body in the morning. Maybe that's how it goes. Or maybe you're working for someone else and you'd like to tell me who it is.”

Miller looks at me blankly. He's trying to judge my character; he's remembering, I think, how it went with Kinzo. Finally he speaks. “You wouldn't do that.”

There is uncertainty in his voice. I have gotten better at bluffing. Or perhaps it is not a bluff. My fingers tighten on the gun and suddenly I'm not so sure. “I don't think you want to find out,” I say. I am realizing that I don't either. “You tried to jump me from behind. You think I'm too soft for payback?”

“I wasn't going to hurt you.” The evident absurdity of the statement cracks his facade; he sounds petulant now. It is a sign of weakness and I am heartened. “I was told to get rid of this guy, that's all.”

“Why?”

“He's a troublemaker.” Miller shrugs. “Interfering with the renunciations.”

“And you wanted them to keep going.”

He shrugs again. “You had your list, I had mine.”

“And who gave it to you?”

Miller looks at Nakamura. “I can't tell you in front of him.”

“Sure you can.”

He whispers something, frowning urgently. I take a step closer to make out his words.

It is a mistake. He jumps for the gun in my hand. I pull back, but he hits my
wrist, knocking it away. Again the blue-black shape slides across the floor. I dive in pursuit, grab it, and roll into a shooting crouch. There is no target. Miller has headed straight for the door, and as I come up I see it shutting behind him.

I rise to my feet and follow. I can hear his footsteps clattering away, and I look in the direction of the noise. But the lights are weak; already he is lost in the shadows. I drop the pistol to my side and stand looking out into the night. It was not much exertion, but my heart is racing. I stand and wait for it to slow.

“You would not have struck him,” says Harry from behind me.

“I wouldn't have killed him,” I say. “I don't know about the hitting.”

“That is why I spoke, because I know.”

I peer out into the dark. “You can just tell these things,” I say. “You know when someone's about to—” I do not complete the thought. There is the crack of a gunshot and a piece of wood springs from the doorframe by my head. Miller has found another gun, or a friend with one. I duck back inside the room and push the door closed. “I'd hit him now, if I could get to him.”

Harry looks at me in alarm. “Who is out there with firearms?”

“My team,” I say.

“And how many of them are yours?”

“I guess not all. How can I know?”

Harry nods. “There was not time to ask them questions about American history,” he says.

It seems unfair. I want to explain that I did the best I could, but the conditions are poor for a discussion. There is another gunshot, deeper this time. A rifle, I think, and the bullet tears easily through the plywood and tarpaper wall. A blue-patterned plate on the shelf explodes in fragments that dance around the room.

We drop to the floor. There is another shot, and another. At least two rifles now, and plenty of blue-patterned shards. Harry's family did not smash all their china in protest, but the failure is being remedied.

“With this much shooting, Best will send the troops,” I say. “They'll be here in minutes.”

Another shot comes through the wall. It is lower, hitting a tea set on the
bottom shelf. For a moment I wonder why they persist. Then I understand. This is not covering fire, designed to keep us inside while Miller makes good his escape. The men behind the rifles mean to kill us.

“We do not have minutes,” says Harry. I hear running feet outside and know he is right. I shoot back through the wall. Judge Skinner hunts and took me once to a pistol range.
It's going to kick, Cash
, he said, and I hear his voice now and steady my hands, though it is no use to me, shooting through plywood into the night. I have no idea where the men outside are. They know that we are in the small box of the apartment, and they are working their way through it, methodical as reapers. The shots make me flinch, though they should not. The ones you hear have missed you already. I fire back one more time, wondering if moving will help my odds. They know I am on the floor. But perhaps I could crawl to a part of the room they've hit already. Part of me is pleased to note that I am still thinking calmly. The rest is thinking that all pleasure will soon be over. There is no way out of this.

I hear a creak behind me, and when I look back, Harry has pulled up the floorboards. Underneath is a shallow pit. “In the time of the stockade we hid men here,” he says.