The Chase: A Novel (34 page)

If only Father knew what was to come
,Lionel thought.

“I don’t think you ever loved him,” Elgin said roughly. “That is the truth. I think you were jealous of him when he was alive, and I think you are still jealous of him. Dear God!” Elgin suddenly covered his face with his hands. His shoulders shook, as if he were crying.

Lionel watched him in surprise. What was this?

Elgin looked up. “Sometimes I wonder if that shot was really an accident,” he said in a ragged whisper.

Lionel stared.

Elgin sighed, wiping the moisture from his eyes. “Are you going somewhere?” He had noticed the edge of the valise sticking out from under the bed.

Lionel’s pulse remained absolutely steady. He smiled. “No.”

Elgin faced him. “I don’t know why I bothered to come. I must go. Has it begun to rain?” There was the softest sound of drizzle against the windowpanes.

“I think so.”

“I don’t have an umbrella. May I borrow yours? I have had this bloody bronchial infection for a month now, and the last thing I need is a summer chill.” His father was looking at the empty umbrella stand beside the door.

“I lost mine,” Lionel said. “I must have left it in a cab or some such place.”

“Can I borrow a muffler, then? I parked a few blocks away.”

Lionel smiled. “There is a scarf in the valise, I think,” he said very quietly.

Elgin glanced at Lionel. “Is something wrong?”

“Not at all.” Lionel continued to smile, and he nodded at the valise.

Elgin stared briefly, then bent and lifted the valise, which was considerably heavier than it looked. He grunted and put it on the bed, opening it. He stared.

He stared at the transmitter and receiver inside the case. He did not say a word. The light tapping of drizzle continued on the windows.

Lionel walked up behind him. “Have you nothing to say, Father?”

“Is this a bloody radio? This looks like a radio!” Elgin gasped.

“Yes, Father. I’m afraid it is a radio.”

Elgin stared at him, turning white. Comprehension was in his eyes. “Oh my God,” he whispered. “Lionel, no. Tell me no!”

“Yes, Father.
Yes.
I’m a fascist and a spy for the Germans and proud of it. You call yourself a Conservative? That’s not what you are. What you are is a
fool
.”

Elgin’s eyes widened. “Dear God—”

“There is no God,” Lionel said. He did not give him time to finish. He slid the small knife swiftly across his father’s jugular vein. Too late, as the blood gushed, he realized the mess he’d made, and that he should have killed him another way. Elgin remained upright and alive for several seconds, his eyes wide with shock and disbelief, then horror. The gurgling sound of his choking to death on his own blood blotted out the sound of the rain.

Lionel caught him as he collapsed, then laid him down on his back carefully, not wanting to spill any more blood. His own pulse began to accelerate. Christ. There was blood everywhere, on the floor, on his uniform, some had even splattered onto the bed.

He had done it.

He had gotten rid of the pompous bastard.

He was free.

Lionel smiled.

He walked to a corner of the room where he kept a single burner to brew tea, and there he wiped the blade on a rag. Wadding up the rag, he put it in a laundry bag. He cleaned the floor, stripped, changed his clothes, and wiped up. Everything that was soiled went into the bag, which he intended to burn. His father remained on the floor on his back, drenched in blood, his eyes wide and unseeing.

Lionel sat down at his desk, turning his chair to face his father. He must dispose of the body, he thought, in such a way that it would never be found. He pondered how he might do that, and the story he must concoct in order to appease the authorities when they eventually learned of Elgin’s disappearance.

Lionel quickly decided what he must do. But as it was only seven in the evening, he must hide the body for the moment. He pushed his father under the bed. He would remove the body and all the evidence in the middle of the night, when his neighbors were asleep.

For the first time in years, Lionel feel asleep within moments.

CHAPTER 15

August 23, 1940

She’d been given a three-day leave, and today was the last day; tomorrow she would have to report back to her WAAF unit at Fighter Command. Rachel chose not to think about it. It was too pretty and pleasant a day—it was almost the kind of day where one could forget that the country was at war. The skies were blue and cloudless (she tried not to notice any vapor trails left over from air fights with the Luftwaffe), the day was warm and breezy, and it made her want to sing her thanks for being alive and whole. Just two days ago, the air station at Croyden, where Joshua was stationed, had been attacked. Only one soldier of the Royal Artillery had been injured this time; a few weeks ago, that had not been the case. Eleven airmen and one officer had been killed, not to mention hundreds of civilians, all in one monstrous air raid, which had been followed within days by another. According to Joshua, Croyden had looked more like the moon than the planet Earth.

After the first devastating raid, several squadrons had been transferred to the Midlands while the station was repaired. Rachel could not be more thankful that Joshua had survived the attacks unscathed, and she was grateful that thus far her father and sisters also remained unharmed and in good health.

Rachel had spent her leave at her home in the East End, and now she was on her bicycle, leaving London behind, on a pure whim. She would enjoy the day to its fullest, as if there were no war, because tomorrow and the next day and the day after that, she would spend twelve to fourteen hours daily wearing a pair of headphones, listening to and deciphering the conversations of the Luftwaffe as they battled the RAF overhead. There was no real end in sight.

Rachel was not complaining. She was proud to do her duty and proud to be a WAAF in Great Britain’s time of need.

A butterfly drifted over the handlebars of her bike. A lorry passed her on the two-lane country road she rode on. She had ridden by Greenwich some time ago. The industrial blight of London’s South End had been mostly replaced by pastures and grazing cows. True, some of the pastures were pockmarked with craters left by bombs. But even where the earth was scorched, Rachel could see tiny new blades of grass and yellow wildflowers emerging from the ashes and dirt.

She was alive, Joshua was alive, and in a way, the fact of war was a godsend. Because after it was over, if her father had his way, she and Joshua would marry.

Rachel tensed a little, slowing her bike as several couriers on motorcycles whizzed past her, followed by a rare civilian motorcar. Rachel felt like a traitor—how could she think, even for a moment, of the war as a godsend? The war was a terrible thing—the Germans had overrun Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland, not to mention Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. And she did love Joshua. It was just that she wasn’t ready to get married so soon.

Joshua wanted to marry immediately. She had known him for four years, ever since she was fourteen, and they had been given permission to date a year and a half ago, when Joshua had turned eighteen and promptly enlisted in the army. Even then, as much as Papa liked Joshua, he hadn’t liked her dating when she was still only sixteen. Rachel had been eager to begin dating him—the thought of being courted with candy and going to the cinema with a boy who had admired her for years and who was now in uniform seemed so glamorous. The reality was a bit different. The cinema, the candy, holding hands, even the kissing, it was all nice enough. Somehow, though, Rachel had expected more.

She had never forgotten the way Harry Elgin had looked at Sarah and the way Sarah had looked at him. She had never forgotten the kiss they had shared, which she had witnessed on the day of his death. They had both been so young, but there had been so much passion. Rachel was too honest with herself not to know that she did not have that kind of passion. She loved Joshua, but her blood didn’t run wild when she saw him or when they kissed. Rachel was afraid it was a matter of character. Sarah was the passionate, fiery one; she was outspoken, aggressive, brave. Rachel remained kind and caring, the peacemaker, and until she had enlisted, both a surrogate mother to her sisters and a surrogate helpmeet for Papa.

So maybe the passion she did not feel had little to do with her love for Joshua and everything to do with her own calm nature.

Of course, he was perfect for her. He came from a good, hardworking, Orthodox family, Papa adored him, and so did she. One day they would marry. Rachel had no doubt. She’d have half a dozen children. Papa would move in with them. It would be a wonderful life.

She ignored a pang inside her breast and pedaled faster.
We’ll win the war first
, she thought to herself. There was nothing wrong with putting duty ahead of self-interest. Even Papa would agree with that.

But yesterday they had fought for the first time over the telephone. Joshua had asked her again to set a date, and she had declined. He had clearly been hurt, but Rachel had cajoled him back into a cheerful disposition. Her stomach hurt a little, just recalling that unpleasant argument. Why did he have to be so impatient?

He did not know that she had recently been assigned to the top-secret Y unit. That had happened when her CO had discovered that she was fluent in French and Italian and could get by in German. She was immediately removed from her position as a radar operator and now spent all of her time listening to the enemy flying in the air above her.

Rachel’s stomach growled, reminding her that she had packed a small picnic lunch and that she needed to find a pleasant spot to stop. She had also brought a book to read. She slowed her pedaling as several trucks passed her. Ahead was a fork in the road. Both roads appeared to lead to a smaller country lane. There were no road signs—they had been removed to fool the enemy should the Germans ever invade. A huge concrete box was also ahead of her, signaling the unpleasant presence of some sort of factory. Nowadays almost every factory, once used for civilian purposes, had been converted to wartime industry. Rachel did not want to think unkindly of the series of buildings with their sooty smokestacks, but they were a blight on the otherwise picturesque countryside and a reminder of the war that she wished to briefly forget.

She decided to take the left fork, which would take her north toward Eltham, a pleasant little town. And in the next instant she heard an all too familiar mechanical screaming high above.

Rachel slammed on her brakes and almost went over the handlebars, looking up.

A huge plane coming at an impossible speed seemed to be diving down toward her.

Abruptly it changed direction, moving back up toward the sun. But drifting down in its wake were black objects.

A second later, the bombs landed and the gray structure exploded. Rachel dove to the ground as another series of explosions sounded. The screaming of the German bomber faded as it left the scene.

Rachel spat out a mouthful of dirt and sat up and looked into the sky. She could see a tiny black speck, and then it was gone. She didn’t bother to shake her fist at it. Still, this was the very first time she had been so near a bombing. She was shaken to the core.

Then she looked toward the factory.

It was in flames. She could hear sirens, and she thought she heard cries and screams. No longer thinking about herself, she grabbed her bicycle, leaped on it, and pedaled quickly toward the factory. By the time she arrived, she saw that several other civilians had gathered, along with an ARP warden, his motorcar, and several bicycles parked before the burning building. An entire half of the structure had collapsed on top of itself. Through an entrance on the erect side, people were staggering out.

Rachel left her bike and ran toward one of the workers, a woman who was coughing but unharmed. Rachel grabbed her. “Do you think there are people trapped in there?” she asked as a stream of factory workers continued to run out, a few wounded now appearing with the others. She was aware of another car coming to a stop in the lot before the building.

“Thank God it’s mostly machinery in sections D and F,” the woman said, wiping her grimy cheeks. “But there are at least the two supervisors and a team of engineers who work round-the-clock in those sections.”

A makeshift ambulance was pulling into the parking lot. It had clearly been converted from a vehicle used by a company that made vacuums, as one of the company’s slogans remained on the back door.

“Are you all right?” Rachel asked the woman, who nodded. Then she pulled free of Rachel, calling out to a friend. Rachel watched her run to a co-worker who was holding her arm awkwardly to her chest.

“Rachel? Is that you?”

Rachel heard a vaguely familiar voice and she turned. Her eyes widened as she saw her cousin Lionel Elgin, whom she had not seen in about a year—and whom she preferred to avoid. “Lionel.”

He walked over to her, looking quite smart in his dress uniform. Rachel had heard that he was in an intelligence unit and posted to the ministry of information. He paused beside her, his eyes meeting hers. Then he stared past her. “It looks as if they might have a few blokes trapped under the rubble. It might take the rescue squads some time to arrive.”

“My thoughts exactly,” Rachel agreed, as they started walking briskly toward the caved-in side of the building. It had become a way of life, she thought, to help those in need. Clearly, even her eccentric cousin had risen to the occasion of war. She heard a soft moan. “Do you hear that?”

“Yes, I do,” Lionel said grimly. Simultaneously, they broke into a run.

Half a dozen women and older men joined them, and within moments, everyone was determinedly moving blocks of cement and girders of steel aside. For the next thirty minutes or so, Rachel and Lionel worked with the others soundlessly, managing to uncover and bring to safety three badly wounded workers. An ATF unit had arrived to help them and put out any fires. Finally the rescue squad arrived, and they were asked to move out of the way.