THE DAWN PATROL

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER X

1944

Ray told Jack he saw it in a dream, which meant it was going to happen; Cecilia was going to kill him. It was as simple as that, the way he said it. Well, she wasn’t going to do it herself, he said, but she’d have it done and she’d be there when it happened. Jack refused to believe him of course, which was only natural considering he wanted to marry the girl.

We were driving through the East End. The bombed out buildings around us made this part of the city look like a ghost town. There was a fog of dust and the smell of smoke still lingered; Royal Engineers were working in the streets, and the going was slow. The midnight bombings were not as bad as they had been during the Blitz, Jack said, but the Germans were using incendiaries now, and the damage was just as devastating.

“How long are we talking about here, Ray?” I asked.

“I can’t really say on this one.”

“Which makes it all the more unbelievable to me,” Jack said quickly. He was mad. “This is a war, goddamn it—look around—people die all the time. Just because you have a dream and see me dead, doesn’t mean it’s gonna happen.”

“He says he saw her, Jack,” I reminded him.

“And that’s supposed to make it all better? That makes it true? I’m supposed to accept it as Gospel? Well, I don’t fuckin’ believe in that shit, and you know it. If there really was a God like you think there is, He wouldn’t let this happen.”

“You’re entitled to your opinions, Jack,” Ray said softly, “but I know what I saw.”

“I need to know how long?”

“I don’t know,” Ray said again.

“A day? Two days? A week? How long? What if I just leave? What if I tell her I have to leave? Will it buy me more time?”

Ray shook his head.

“Goddamn it Ray, that’s not what I want to hear.” He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel, thinking for a moment as a slow convoy of trucks made its way through the narrow street in front of us.

“When’s this supposed to happen?”

“I said I don’t know.”

“I mean what time of day? Tonight? Is it gonna be tonight? Because I haven’t seen her for three days. I’ve been busy.” He turned and looked at me. “Isn’t that how this shit works? He dreams about it one day, and it happens the next?”

I just nodded.

“And he dreamt about it last night? So that means she’s gonna have me killed? Just like that?”

“That would be a fair guess,” Ray said.

“I’m not going on your guesses, Ray. I need more than that.”

“You can’t just dismiss what he says because you don’t want to believe it, Jack. If he says it’s gonna happen, it is,” I said.

“And you believe it?” he asked.

I nodded.

“Well, I don’t.”

“Then you’re going to die,” Ray said. “You gotta believe me, Jack. I’m not wrong. I’m never wrong.”

“Yes you are,” Jack said. “You say that if you go up in one plane it’s going to crash, or get shot down -”

“And it does,” Ray said.

“But you’re not on it. You see? You’re not dead because something changed. If you say you can’t change things, you’re wrong. Not being on that plane has changed it. Now what do I do to change it? If I’m not here, she can’t kill me – or have me killed. It’s not that she’s going to kill me, it’s where she’s going to kill me. And where is that? And when?”

“At your place,” Ray said softly. “It was at your place.”

“And is it tonight, or today?”

“Well, it hasn’t happened yet, so it has to be tonight,” I said.

“Then we still have time,” he said.

“Time for what?” I asked.

“Time to change it.”

“And go where?” Ray asked.

“To my place. We wait for her to make her move.”

*

“How am I supposed to believe she’s an enemy agent? There has to be more to it than that,” Jack said. “Goddamn it, Bobby!” he said, “and goddamn you too, Ray!”

We were sitting on the floor of his London flat, the three of us drinking sour French wine. The room was dark, except for a single candle burning on a plate in the middle of what used to be the mantle—the guttering flames throwing our shadows into the dark corners where they were lost in the gloom around us. Jack was holding his pistol in his hand.

“What’re you going to do?” I asked.

“She thinks I’m on a recon. I have to know what she knows. I have to know what she told her handlers. I have to know if it’s true. I want to know who her contacts are. There’s more at stake here than you need to know.”

“You mean you’ve been compromised,” Ray said.

“Compromised? That’s a rather strange way of putting it, but yes. I have to find out how much she knows—and if she’s passed it on.”

“You mean the invasion? They’re going ahead with it?” Ray asked, but Jack ignored him.

“How’re you going to get her to tell you that?” I said.

“I’ll question her. If I bring her in, they’ll torture her to get what they need. I don’t want them touching her.”

“What do you think she’s plannin’ to do to you?” Ray asked. “Why do you think I told you? Do you think I was lying?”

“Shut up, Ray!” Jack screamed, pointing the gun at him. Ray stiffened, and looked at me.

“Put the gun down, Jack.”

“I don’t want to hear anything he has to say. I mean it. That fuckin’ dreamin’ shit, is shit! Do you hear me, Ray? Shit!”

“Jack!”

“And if I didn’t tell you? And somehow, she kills you? What then? How do you think I’d feel about that?”

“You’ll get over it.”

“All you have to do is walk away,” I said. “We don’t have to do this. We don’t have to be here.”

Jack spat out a laugh. “You think I’ll ever find anyone like her? The things she lets me do to her? The things she’s willing to do for me—to me?”

“What’re you talking about?” I asked.

“Goddamn it, Bobby! I’m talking about fucking! It’s the only thing that matters in a place like this. In this time, in this place, the only thing that matters to me is fucking her every night, and waking up next to her every morning. Everything in between, doesn’t matter anymore—all of this,” he waved his hand around the room as if it were a fancy room at a seaside resort— “it doesn’t matter.”

“You don’t have to do what you’re thinking. You can walk away and never see her again. No one’s gonna know.”

“Except when five hundred soldiers walk into an ambush in France, I’m gonna be wondering if that was her telling her contacts something I said, or if it’s a coincidence.”

“Are you going to tell your superiors about her?” I asked.

“My superiors? No, I’m not telling them, goddamn it! I told you, I don’t want them touching her. My superiors are a bunch of cold blooded, Neolithic bastards who wouldn’t hesitate turning their own mothers in if they thought she was a threat to King and country.”

“So you’re going to question her yourself,” Ray said.

“Did I stutter, Ray?”

I said. “You can’t expect us to help you beat it out of her.”

“You won’t,” Jack said. “You leave that to me. If I have to beat it out of her, I will. I just don’t want them doing it. I’ve seen what they’re willing to do.”

“Then why do you want us here?” Ray asked.

“To make sure I don’t kill her. I still love her.”

*

Cecelia came home shortly after midnight. There was the sound of a vehicle outside, and Jack walked to the window, inching the blanket back to look. I could see his breath in the soft light of the candle; Jack walked over to it and blew it out. We heard two distinct sets of shoes coming up the stairs, as well as voices. Jack told us to wait in another room, and closed the door - which we opened a crack so we could get a clear line of sight. Jack sat in a corner of the room, bathed in darkness; a darker shadow locked within the shadows. As far as Cecelia knew, Jack was still on his mission, and would not be back for several days.

The man with her was tall and thin, the suit he wore appeared tailored in the near darkness. The gun he carried caught the first guttering flares of the candle Cecilia lighted, placing it on the mantle. I saw here pause and look at the candle Jack blew out. She reached up and touched the soft wax.

Ray clutched my arm, making my heart skip a beat.

“Just let me get a few more candles,” Cecelia said as she rummaged about in the dark. “I usually leave a candle burning and try to get home before it burns down; makes it easier to see what I’m doing.”

“Why don’t you just leave one by the door for when you come in?”

“I may do that from now on,” she said, and I could hear her opening and closing drawers.

“Damn,” she said.

“What is it?” the man asked.

“I pricked my finger on something.”

The man laughed. “Better you should have fingered my prick, like I asked you to earlier.”

“Ha-ha. You’re a funny man, Stengler. But I told you, I doubt if you could afford me.”

“How do you know what I can, or can’t afford? I get paid very well for the information you pass along.”

Cecelia struck another match and began lighting the candles. The room slowly came into view, each candle successively bringing more of the room to light. She saw the wine bottle on the floor and the three glasses around it.

“Quick! Get out!” she called to Stengler.

The shadow in the corner came into view, and she gasped when she saw Jack seated quietly with his gun drawn.

“Who is -?” the man asked as he raised his gun.

Jack fired once; he stood over the man’s body and shot him two more times. Cecelia screamed. He bent down and picked the man’s gun up, slipping it into his pocket.

“Stop screaming,” he said calmly, as he holstered his gun. “Do you think someone’s going to come running in to help? They wouldn’t know where to start looking. Sit down,” he said, and kicked a wooden chair across the floor.

Cecelia obeyed, and wept softly as she looked at the dead man in front of her.

“I suppose I shouldn’t have killed him,” Jack said with a hint of regret. “Oh well, too late now I suppose. I take it he was you’re contact? Stupid to have let you lead him here.”

“I brought him here for you,” she said, looking up at Jack with the desperation of a trapped animal.

“For me?” Jack asked.

“I thought he was acting strange. I mean, he wanted to sleep with me, so I led him along -”

“You’re good at doing that.”

“I thought you might want to question him.”

“You did?”

She nodded, wiping her nose with the back of her hand. Her hair hung in front of her face like a curtain, and she pushed it aside as she followed Jack’s every move. He picked up a blanket and drew it over top of the body.

“I told you I wouldn’t be back for several days. What were you planning on doing with him? Tying him up?”

“Yes. I was going to tie him up.”

“And then what?”

“Wait for you.”

“And what were you going to tell people when he had to go outside to the outhouse?”

“The what?”

“The water-closet? Or were you just going to let him shit and piss himself stupid?”

“Please, Jack, must you talk like that?”

“Fuck you, Celia! You’re a fuckin’ spy and you brought him here to kill me!” Jack screamed at her. She sat back in the chair, frightened.

“I’m a what?” she stammered.

“A spy!” He yelled it at her. “Did you hear me that time? You’re a spy!” He yelled at her again, leaning in closer. “So? What? Was he going to wait for me and shoot me as I came in, or was he supposed to follow me and shoot me in an alley like some mad dog? Or, maybe he was going to wait until I went out on another mission, and then arrest me with my contacts?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She said it in a near whisper.

“Then you’d better figure it out fast, because I’m going to get Gestapo with you in a minute. I hope they taught you about interrogation at your Nazi spy school?”

“You can’t possibly think -”

That was the moment Jack punched her in the face. He shook the sting out of his hand and then punched her a second time, and a third time. She fell out of the chair and he kicked her several times, his screams and cries echoing in the empty room before he turned away in frustration. I could see tears in his eyes. He picked her up, sitting her down in the chair again.

“Now, my Love, do you want to try that again?”

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