THE AMERICAN

He squats in front of the cage, face twisted into a scowl. The dog has been left to sit in its own mess. Less than twelve hours since he was here with Joseph Späh, and the mutt has still not been fed or walked. It is pressed into one corner, tail wrapped around its hind legs to avoid lying in the puddle of concentrated urine. Ulla is stretched out in her crate opposite, curious but content, her large dark eyes alert and her chin resting on her paws. The other dog, however, is quivering with pent-up energy. It’s some odd mix of greyhound and Labrador and doesn’t seem to know what to do with its body in such a small space.

The American sets his palm against the latch and the mutt rushes forward to sniff him. It is overeager. Spastic. Desperate for affection and exercise. Its small black nose is dry and rough against his palm. The dog is hungry and dirty and confused. The sight makes the American angry, and a small bead of heat gathers at the center of his chest.

“What’s your name, mongrel?” he asks aloud.

If it was capable of answering, he is certain it would. The dog leans into his hand with such enthusiasm he’s afraid it might bend the latch. There is no collar and no paperwork attached to the crate by which to identify it, and a cursory glance at its underbelly reveals no immediately distinguishing signs of gender. Only wet, matted clumps of hair. Given the mess, he isn’t inclined to investigate further.

“Shit,” he says, “now I have to kill two people on this damned ship.”

The American unlatches the crate, then steps aside quickly as the dog bolts out. It rushes around his legs in frantic circles, tail lashing and tongue hanging out. “Thirsty? You poor bastard. I have nothing for you.”

He hasn’t come for the dog. And it’s a distraction now that he’s here. But he can’t very well ignore it. For one thing the crate is positioned right in front of the steamer trunk he has come to search. For another, he isn’t inclined to admit that the dog evokes his pity. That emotion is a weakness. One he cannot afford.

“Sit,” he says, and it does.

“Stay.” Again, it obeys, its tail whipping the floor with a single-minded desperation to please.

He slides the crate out of the way and stands, hands on his hips, as he inspects the stacked pile of steamer trunks. He can see his own, halfway down the right-hand stack, toward the bottom. It’s rather battered and old and certainly not the nicest of the lot. Then again, he doesn’t usually travel via luxury liners of any sort. He is far more at home in wet trenches, dark bars, and back alleys.

He doesn’t have much time. And the trunk he wants is a row back, halfway down the pile. He can see the iconic logo embossed on its leather exterior. It’s a bit scuffed now, after so much travel, but that only increases the charm. A woman who can afford such a trunk can also afford to travel. The trunk is holding together nicely, as is its owner. Expensive things always do. Margaret Mather is not the sort of woman who would settle for anything less than Louis Vuitton. To her credit, however, she has not indulged in excess. She has brought only the one trunk. Women in her position often bring ten.

The American shifts the contents of the pile around until he’s able to slide out the designer trunk and wrestle it to the floor in front of him. There isn’t much space to work in the small cargo area, so he has to open the lid and pull out the compartments carefully. He feels certain Margaret Mather would approve of his delicate handling of her belongings if not the indecency of his digging through them. He finds what he’s looking for in the third drawer down. It’s cliché, really, the amount of jewels, but she is an heiress after all. Although, from the time he spent with her the evening before it seems as though she really doesn’t suit them. She’s too humble for this lifestyle.

Three items catch his eye. He goes for the smaller, less obtrusive pieces, the things that won’t be immediately missed. A diamond solitaire ring. A delicate gold choker with a ruby pendant. A pair of simple pearl earrings. Anything gaudier than this and he won’t be able to trade them for the information he needs. If she misses them at all, it will take some time to detect their absence. He deposits the jewelry in his pocket, then restacks the freight exactly as it was before.

The cargo room is small, square, and unheated. Apart from the dog crates and the steamer trunks, there are some heavy cardboard shipping boxes and a large, wrapped piece of furniture but nothing else. In one corner of the room is a pile of packing blankets, and in the other a stack of old newspapers. They’ll have to do. He cleans up the mess inside the crate as best he can using a handful of wadded papers, then lines the bottom of the crate with a few others. The American curses himself for the display of sympathy even as the dog throws itself at his feet in gratitude. He scratches between its ears and under its chin.

“Stupid mutt,” he says as the dog submits itself completely and lies on its back, belly exposed, adoration pooling in its dark eyes. The American can’t remember the last time anyone or anything trusted him so quickly or so completely. “Well, no wonder. You’re a boy.”

He has always maintained that female dogs are smarter. He wouldn’t pick a male dog from a litter to save his life. They destroy everything. They piss on themselves and on everything around them. And they escape at the first sign of a bitch in heat. Not so different from many of the soldiers he has known, now that he thinks about it. But still, given the choice, he would pick a female every time.

“What are we going to do with you? Tragic little fucker. And unlucky too. No name. Shit owner.”

He scoots the reluctant dog back into the crate with his foot, then wipes his fingers on his trousers. He doesn’t want to smell like a kennel for the rest of the day. He has already showered and changed his clothes and has no interest in repeating the process. The airship has only one shower, and it doesn’t offer much in the way of water pressure or warmth. It does feel good to be clean though, despite the fact that his hair is still damp and his scalp is starting to get cold in the unheated room.

When he locks the crate the dog looks at him as though it’s being abandoned.

“You’re not my problem,” he says. But the American knows better. He points an accusatory finger at the dog. “Damn it. Pathetic lazy owner. I don’t have time for this.”

The dog presses its nose between the wicker slats and whines in response.

“Well, I can’t look after a nameless mutt. What should I call you?” He mentally scrolls through every dog name he has ever heard, but they feel trite under the circumstances. So he studies the lean body. The narrow snout. The dappled gray coat. The huge floppy ears. Its keen, intelligent eyes. The way its muscles quiver with anticipation and the longing for freedom. “I bet you’re fast,” he mutters.

And then he has it.

“Owens,” he says. “Can’t do much better than that. Let’s just hope you give these fucking Nazis as much trouble as your namesake. Yes? Good.”

The dog appraises him solemnly.

“I’ll make sure you get something to eat soon.”

The American closes the door to the cargo hold and tries to ignore the plaintive whimpering within. He turns away with a whispered oath and begins the trek back to the passenger area. It’s a straight shot, though dimly lit, and he can see the security door at the distant end of the keel catwalk, the light above it shining like a beacon. The next shift change won’t happen for another thirty minutes, so there’s a good chance he can get back to the passenger quarters without running into any of the midshipmen. But when he reaches the bank of crew quarters near the stern, he sees two figures maneuvering down the catwalk toward him. Dark shapes moving with purpose. One is clearly an officer—he can tell by the cap and the jacket and the confident stride—and the other is significantly shorter. Leaner. Gangly. A child maybe? No. That wouldn’t be logical. He filters all the possible options until his mind settles on the cabin boy. Yes. What is his name? Werner something. Franz. Werner Franz. Fourteen years old. A toothy boy with the look of perpetual curiosity about him.

The American has two options. Continue forward and face the difficult task of explaining why he has been wandering around prohibited areas of the ship, or duck into one of the crew quarters and run the risk that it is occupied. He has stopped and is reaching his hand slowly toward the door of a cabin when the officer and cabin boy turn onto an access walkway and disappear behind a series of duralumin girders. He makes a quick decision and creeps forward along the catwalk. Closer now, he can see them approach a small exit hatch in the side of the ship. He recognizes the navigator, locates the name in his encyclopedic mind. Max Zabel.

Surely not.

Zabel pushes the lever upward, then pulls the door in. The air immediately shifts and grows colder. The American can hear the whistle of air and the roar of an engine. Slowly, steadily he creeps closer until he can almost hear their conversation, until he can see the look of poorly disguised terror on the cabin boy’s face. Then Zabel steps outside the airship, followed hesitantly a few moments later by Werner. The American glimpses a minuscule patch of cloud when he finally comes level to the access walkway. He’s fairly certain where the two have gone, though he can’t imagine what would have necessitated a trip to an outboard engine.

His curiosity is too strong to let this chance pass. The American treads quickly down the walkway, then sticks his head out the open hatch. The engine gondola lies ten feet below. The access hatch into the gondola is shut. Zabel and Werner are somewhere within, doing God knows what inside the gondola. The American backs away from the hatch; even he is not bold enough to explore outside the ship.

No one sees him as he slips back through the security door and into the passenger area. He makes a quick pass through the lounge to make sure the chief steward is tending passengers and is not in his stateroom. Sometimes fate cooperates in his machinations, and being placed in a cabin next to Heinrich Kubis is fortunate indeed. Not that he has to act drunk and confused when he picks the lock and sneaks into the room—there’s no one around to see him—but that is something he can fall back on should he be discovered.

The steward’s cabin is identical to his with one exception: a small antechamber used to store shoes and polish. Beyond that there is a meticulously made bed and the usual accouterments of someone in the service profession: first-aid box, sewing kit, miscellaneous grooming paraphernalia. The American cares nothing about these things. He has come for the shipping manifest, and he finds it on the top shelf of Heinrich Kubis’s closet. The information he wants is hidden deep within the book, and his body is strained tight as he searches for it. If Kubis returns he will have to hide beneath the bed. And if he is discovered there? Well. That’s a choice he’d rather not make this early in the flight.

The dog’s name is not shown on the manifest, only its owner’s: Edward Douglas. He reads it several times and curses so vehemently he has to wipe spittle from the page. The name is written in black ink, along with everything else, and it takes a bit of creative penmanship for the American to alter this record.