Part III
Chapter 16
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'What is the difference between a dream and a nightmare?'
Imogen turned the thought over in her mind, asking herself again if she would choose the nightmare - assuming she could step back in time and endure her latest conversation with Heisenberg once again. Why had he chosen to speak of her future in such stark terms? Had he seen her fate if she chose not to cooperate once in Leipzig? Worse, what if her role - stalling for more time - was uncovered? If it was discovered she had stalled Werner - and the Gestapo - long enough so that almost all of the Danish contingent from the University could escape the city?
Just what would they do to her then?
And if the worst happened, would Werner Heisenberg really stop protecting her? There was hardly anyone within the hierarchy of the German scientific establishment held in higher esteem than Heisenberg, but what were the limits to his power? She was a Jew, after all.
And now she was living in Leipzig, in an apartment just off the Augustusplatz, and she had two servants attending to her every need. And no doubt reporting her every movement to the Gestapo...yet even so she was still relatively free. Free to report to the labs. Free to attend lectures if she so chose. And free to teach...
And she was free to play the piano that Werner provided.
And so she played, working like never before perfecting her craft, soon playing even better than Heisenberg - who seemed to mind this most recent diversion not at all.
And when she began composing again, Werner soon began coming by her apartment with his wife, and they listened in rapt attention to her swelling progress. When her Second Concerto was finished Heisenberg took it to the conductor of the University Orchestra - who immediately agreed to a performance - and who with Werner agreed the work merited publication. After a month's rehearsal, the concerto was performed at the old Gewandhaus on a cold January night, and the work was generally well-regarded by all who came - with the exception of a small contingent from the Reichssicherheitshauptamt. These men regarded Schwarzwald's Second as yet another example of degenerate art, and they left the concert hall in a particularly foul mood.
And, oddly enough, all this was watched by a small, bespectacled man from Denmark - who seemed to watch the men in black leather overcoats rather more than the orchestra. He followed them out into a light snow, and though he kept to the shadows he still did his very best to avoid detection. The men, he saw, walked to Werner Heisenberg's house and waited, apparently none the wiser that they, too, had a watcher.
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Parish looked at bright splashes of pulsing strobes as the little jet bounced through yet another layer of cloud, then a vague cityscape cast in blues and blacks appeared just below, and when he saw the wing sprout all kinds of flaps and slats he knew they were landing...but where were they?
He looked at An Linh across the narrow aisle, and she seemed not at all concerned by the day's twists and turns - yet how was that even possible? Pulled from the imploding wreckage of the country she had known all her life, thrust into the maelstrom of thousands of orphans being sorted like packages to be sent off to foster homes, and all the while under no illusions at all that the man she had endured all this for had just been murdered...?
And yet here she was - if anything looking more sedate than anything else.
Then he looked at the elder Callahan once again and saw the old man was looking out his window, too - yet looking anything but sedate. And who could blame him? His son killed - or so it had seemed until this morning - and now, this - escape? Bogus cops' questions then Frank Bullitt's spirited actions had dispelled the first notion, yet the next thing he knew he was being spirited away from his house and spit into this little jet to be carried away to...where?
Let alone his home was now occupied by what? ...Commandos?
Parish looked at his watch, noted they had been airborne for almost five hours and he guessed - if the snowy landscape below was any sort of indication - that they were somewhere in the midwest, probably Detroit or Cleveland. One thing was certain, however: the Israeli commando up front wasn't being any help at all.
He felt the kiss of tires on earth, felt their rumble diminish as the little jet began braking on the slushy concrete, and a moment later they pulled to a stop outside of a small hanger. The air-stairs opened and a blast of arctic air swirled through the cabin, and just then the Israeli motioned for them to come forward. Parish saw another van outside on the tarmac, this one with its door open and engine running, and he spotted a Quebec license plate on a passing truck as he led An Linh down the steps.
It took a half-hour to drive into the city, and after a bit of dodging the dense evening traffic the van pulled into a covered entryway to the Chateau Frontenac Hotel, and when the van's door slid open Parish noted they were being met by an elegantly dressed older man, surrounded by an entourage of anxiously observant men who all seemed to be equipped with earpieces...
...and, Parish noted, the elegantly dressed older man seemed most interested in the senior Callahan.
"Ah, Mr. Callahan?"
"Yessir?"
"My name is Feldman. I am to see to your group's needs for the next few days. Will you come with me, please?"
Parish looked this character over while he spoke and saw not one bit of deference as he spoke; indeed, he saw nothing at all in the man's curious demeanor, not even a hint of curiosity as they fell in behind him. They marched along straight to a bank of elevators and rode up several floors in silence, then followed the man to a room at the end of a short hallway. He knocked on a seemingly ancient oak door, and, after a brief moment, the door creaked opened.
And there stood Harry Callahan.
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Not a half-hour later, Saul Rosenthal watched a black Mercedes pull up to the Heisenberg residence just as the Gestapo team emerged from the stately house, only now, and more ominously, Werner Heisenberg seemed to be in their custody. Rosenthal had no way to follow the team so, keeping to the shadows once again, he made his way carefully to his preferred spot overlooking Imogen's apartment building - and there he waited...in the gently falling snow. The lights were still off so he suspected she might not have returned from the concert hall, and, true enough - not an hour later he saw a car turn down her street.
And not a minute later he noticed the other car staking-out her return. They pulled up parallel to the car he suspected Imogen might be in, just as the first car pulled to a stop in front of her building's entry.
And as Imogen emerged from the car the Gestapo surrounded her, then roughly pulled her to their car. Rosenthal watched and carefully noted the time, then slipped deeper into the shadows before moving again.
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Parish stepped back as An Linh rushed past on her way to Harry's outstretched arms, yet he was most surprised by the elder Callahan's initial reaction. Lloyd at first registered astonished delight on finding his son alive, yet when the Vietnamese refuge soared by he seemed to focus on his son's reaction most carefully, and only then did he wipe an errant tear away.
Jim Parish held his own feelings in check as he watched An Linh implode under the weight of such an unexpected shock, yet when he thought about his own reaction later that evening he found he thought about the reunion with a sense of wonder. How this tiny orphan survived a savage upbringing to land a job at the most prestigious bar in Saigon was only a tiny part of her tale; recognizing that in Harry Callahan - and Callahan alone amongst all the Caravelle's varied patrons - she had somehow found a way to peace...and that was, in Jim's mind, the most wondrous story of all.
The elegant old man, Leopold Feldman, was the Israeli consul, so it was under Israeli auspices that An Linh, Parish, and Lloyd Callahan would remain the next few weeks. Parish soon met and grew to respect Sam Bennett, but he was more than surprised to see that Bennett's sister Stacy was madly, yet stoically in love with Harry.
That first evening the group went down to the Frontenac's elegant main dining room, and they were seated next to huge, arched windows that afforded magical views of the Saint Lawrence River far below. An Linh seemed physically enjoined to Harry, while Jim Parish managed to grab a seat next to Stacy Bennett, leaving Sam Bennett to talk shop with Al Bressler and Lloyd Callahan. A gaggle of Israeli agents dined at several nearby tables.
Though Jim Parish didn't feel too out of sorts when he learned Stacy was some sort of higher-up within the FBI, when he learned she was working out of the Boston office he instantly warmed to her.
"I miss Cambridge," he blurted out when she mentioned she was working in Boston.
"Oh?"
"Yeah, I did my undergrad and went to med school there."
Stacy seemed impressed by this and turned away from Harry. "Harvard, or MIT?"
"And why not Radcliffe?" he replied.
"You don't fit the profile," Stacy said, adding: "Your ass isn't big enough."
Parish's eyes lit up as he nodded his approval. "Well, Harvard it is, then. What about you? I take it you're a Yalie."
"Fuck you," she sneered, "and the horse you rode in on."
"Ah, hit a nerve, did I? Your boss went to Yale?"
"Yup."
