Читаем A good German полностью

“One more question,” Jake said. “First time I saw you, you were picking Breimer up. Gelferstrasse, July sixteenth. Ring a bell? Where’d you go?”

Shaeffer stared again, his mouth drawn thin. “I don’t remember.”

“That’s the night Tully was killed. I see you know the name.”

“I know the name,” Shaeffer said slowly. “PSD at Kransberg. So what?”

“So he’s dead.”

“I heard. Good riddance, if you ask me.”

“And you don’t want to know who did it?”

“Why? To give him a medal? He just saved somebody else from having to do it. The guy was no good.”

“And he drove Emil Brandt out of Kransberg. And that doesn’t interest you.”

“Tully?” Liz said. “The man we found?”

Jake glanced at her, surprised at the interruption, then at Shaeffer, a jarring moment, because it occurred to him for the first time that it might have been Shaeffer’s interest all along, a flirtation to see what she knew. Who was anybody?

“That’s right,” he said, then turned to Shaeffer. “But that doesn’t interest you. And you don’t remember where you took Breimer.”

“I don’t know what you think you’re getting at, but go get it somewhere else. Before I paste you one.”

“All right, that’s enough,” Liz said. “Save it for the ring. I came here to get a camera, not to watch you two square off. Kids.” She glared at Jake. “You take some chances. Now how about giving me a nice smile-I want to finish off this roll-and then you run along like a good boy. That means you too,” she said to Shaeffer.

Surprisingly, he obeyed, turning to face the camera with Jake. “Two o’clock. Don’t forget,” he said out of the side of his mouth.

“Quiet,” Liz said, crouching a little to frame the picture. “Come on, smile.”

As she bent, the sound of a shot cracked through the square, followed by a scream. Jake looked over her shoulder. A Russian soldier was running past the obelisk, dodging people who flew out of his way like startled geese. Another shot, off to the right, from a handful of Russians near the parked Horch, guns out. But in the split second of his glance, Jake saw that the guns weren’t pointing at the obelisk but had tracked farther along, aiming now at Liz’s back.

“Down!” he yelled, but instead she jerked up, surprised, so that when the bullet came it thudded into her neck. A frozen second, then another crack, a sharp whistle. Shaeffer staggered backward, hit, and crumpled to the ground. Before Jake could move, he felt Liz’s body falling forward, toppling him against the colonnade, its weight forcing him back until he was falling too, his head hitting the column as he went down. Screams everywhere now in the square, the sound of feet running on stone, another shot glancing off the colonnade. He tried to breathe under the weight, then realized that what stopped his mouth was blood pumping out of her throat, coating him. More shots, the market erupting with guns, so many guns that they seemed fired at random, not aimed, people hugging the paving stones to get out of the crossfire.

In a panic Jake tried to roll Liz away, pushing her hips as another rush of blood spurted into his face. He wriggled out from under and reached over to grab Shaeffer’s pistol from its holster, then snaked behind the column, breathing in gulps. The Russians by the Horch were still firing, shooting in all directions now as soldiers around the square crouched and fired back. Jake aimed the gun, trying to steady his weaving hand, but when he fired the shot missed, smashing the headlight of the car. A bullet from somewhere else caught one of the Russians instead, flinging his body back against the car.

And then, before Jake could fire again, it was suddenly over, the other Russians scurrying away behind the Horch, quick as rats, and gone, the square empty except for a body lying near the obelisk, everything still. He heard a gurgle next to him, then a shout in German near the Nikolai. He crawled over to Liz, feeling his shirt sticky with blood. Her eyes were open, still wide with terror but moving, and the blood had stopped gushing, just a steady flow into the pool next to her head. He pressed his hand on her neck to stop it, but a trickle oozed through his fingers, wetting them.

“Don’t die,” he said. “We’ll get help.”

But who? Shaeffer rolled slightly and groaned. No one moved in the square.

“Don’t die,” he said again, his voice catching. Her eyes were looking straight at him, and he wondered for a second if she could see, if he could will her to hold on simply by looking back at her. A girl from Webster Groves.

He turned his head to the square. “Somebody help!” he shouted, but who knew English? “ Hilfe!” As if an ambulance might come screeching down the street, where there were no ambulances.

He looked at her eyes again. “It’s going to be all right. Just hold on.” He pressed harder on her neck, his hand now completely red. How much blood had she lost? Footsteps behind him. He looked up. One of the tourist GIs, stunned by the blood.

“Jesus Christ,” he said.

“Help me,” Jake said.

“They got Fred,” he said, groggy, as if it were an answer.