Up in Honey's Room

but knew he’d stay with his Colt after this.

All right, when?

When you’re positive he’s gonna shoot.

You’re serious? This guy puts on his best dress and makeup and brings along a machine gun and you aren’t sure he wants to kill you?

He wished Honey would quit rubbing against him. He’d told her, “Knock it off, okay?” She was probably doing the same thing to Jurgen.

She put her head down and said, “You boys aren’t getting boners, are you?”

How’d she maintain acting natural when she could be dead the next minute? Always sure of herself. As soon as he took care of Bo he’d ask her how she stayed so cool.

Bo said, “Please don’t take what I’m about to do personally. I have no more ill feelings than if I were to come face-to-face with you in combat, the way it was in Odessa fighting the Romanians house to house.” He said, “Let me revise that. I did have ill feelings about the fucking Romanians, so hot to kill Jews and Romas and boys like myself. The SS made us wear little pink badges and threw us in death camps to kill at their leisure. It was on this occasion I decided to turn beastly myself and cut a few Einsatzgruppen throats.”

Now, Carl thought.

Call him. Tell him to put the machine gun on the floor and step away from it. You’ll have a moment. Tell him if you pull a gun-there’s your moment, while he’s thinking, What gun?- you’ll shoot to kill.

Do it.

Carl had a grip on the Luger to yank it free in the same moment the hard blunt bam of a gunshot went off in the room, made him blink and turn to see Vera holding her Luger out in front of her. Bam, she shot Bo again, took a step toward him and shot him again. Now she stared at Bo lying on the floor by the desk and shot him in the head; making sure.

Carl watched her slip the pistol inside the Persian lamb handbag she held open and watched her place the bag on the side table, where Walter sat turned to stone. Now she was lighting a cigarette. Vera drew on it and blew out a stream of smoke, looking at Carl.

Thirty-one

'She blew smoke at you, huh? Doesn’t care you’re a federal marshal.”

Carl told his dad she wasn’t blowing it at him.

“You say she was looking at you.”

“I think it was like she’s saying, ‘You got a better way?’ She seemed to have it pretty much worked out.”

“Saved you from certain death.”

“I didn’t see it that way exactly. Jurgen did, he’s telling her she saved their lives. Honey’s already over there hugging her.”

“Bare naked?”

“Yes, she was.”

“She put together okay?”

“Miss America walking around in high heels, naked.”

Virgil said, “Jesus Christ.”

Narcissa came from the stove with coffee to go with their Cuban brandy after the steak supper, saying to Carl, “Virgil’s gonna have a heart attack before you finish the story.” She sat down with them at the round table in the back part of the kitchen, raining outside on Hitler’s birthday, April 20, 1945.

“What about Jurgen,” Virgil said, “he ever get dressed?”

“Yeah, but he left before I called Kevin.”

His dad was shaking his head. “You let him go?”

Carl said, “He left, disappeared on me. He was a felon I’d of locked him up. What he is, he’s an unemployed German soldier, a friend of mine. I wouldn’t be surprised he went to Cleveland.”

“Cleveland? I thought he wanted to ride bulls.”

“One of these days I believe he will. I think he’d want to check on his SS buddy Otto. Jurgen mentioned he’s living with a beautiful Jewish girl named Aviva. Something Jurgen has to see for himself.”

“I imagine you took over the crime scene,” Virgil said. “Had everybody sit down?”

“Nobody was going anywhere except Jurgen. We all talked awhile,” Carl said. “I called Kevin and he got hold of Homicide. We all made sworn statements to the fact Vera Mezwa acted in our behalf or we’d all be dead. Vera said she had no idea Bo was gonna get us bare-ass and then shoot us.”

“You believe her?”

“Homicide does. They talked to her over three days and let her go. I told you she had it worked out. I think Vera wore herself out worrying about Bo going crazy on her from the war. She saw what he meant to do, so she popped him and became our hero. It doesn’t have anything to do with her being a spy. The Justice Department’ll bring her up or they won’t, I don’t know. I think the first thing Vera will do is get out of town and become somebody else. She already had her car packed.”

“You think they’ll get her?”

“If they want her.” Narcissa said, “What about Honey and Jurgen? You said they like each other. They gonna meet up down the line?”

“Maybe,” Carl said. “I think Jurgen’s luck’ll finally run out on him. He’ll be picked up and deported, once the war’s over. Then have to find a way to come back, Honey waiting, looking at her watch. That’s how I see her. But with Honey you never know. She might decide to go to Germany to be with him. It’s the kind of thing she’d do,” Carl said, but couldn’t see her doing it.

Virgil said, “You had the hots for her, didn’t you?”

“Why’re you asking me that?”

“He’s nosy,” Narcissa said. “Did you?”

Virgil said, “She ever put her drawers on?”

He did watch her step in the skirt and pull it over her hips, then hike the skirt to slip her panties up her legs, and a picture of Crystal Davidson doing it appeared in his mind, in color. Honey’s head came out of the sweater, her eyebrows moving up and down at him, her bra still on the table.

“Yeah, Honey got dressed, Jurgen got dressed, and Walter went in the bathroom to get dressed.”

Virgil said, “What’s gonna happen to him?”

“I don’t know,” Carl said. “I think he’s stuck with being Walter the meat cutter and looking like Himmler, the most hated man in the world. His only friend was that rascal Joe Aubrey and they haven’t found him yet. I should’ve asked Bo what he did with him. You know it? He would’ve told us. He was bragging about shooting people . . . cutting their throats.”

“You say Vera got off,” his dad said. “Did you say anything to her?”

“Honey was hugging her. I walked over and told Vera I admired her style. She said thank you, and gave me a kiss on the mouth.”

“She’s kissing you, you’re buck naked?”

“I’d pulled my pants on.”

“You’ll be telling Louly all this pretty soon, won’t you? She’s coming in?”

“Saturday.”

“That’s tomorrow.”

“Yeah, she’s flying into Tulsa on a seventy-two-hour pass. She gets to fly just about everywhere she goes, as long as there’s a military airfield.”

“Let’s see,” Narcissa said, “you gonna tell Louly about Vera kissing you?”

“Louly doesn’t have to worry about Vera.”

“You gonna tell her about Honey walking around in her high heels, naked?”