“Okay,” she managed to say.
They crossed the lobby, heading for the exits to the plaza outside. Eddie looked around at their modernist surroundings. “You know, I’m actually going to miss this place.”
“So am I,” Nina replied. “But there’s something I’m going to miss more.”
“What?”
“Being—” Her voice caught, choked off by a sudden rush of emotion. She breathed hard, forcing out the words. “Being the mother of your children.”
Eddie couldn’t reply, as overcome as his wife. Tears streaming, they went through the doors and out into the cold of New York.
Two days later, the weather was considerably warmer.
“Are we there yet?” said Nina in joking complaint as she wiped sweat from her forehead. Even though the rented four-by-four had air-conditioning, the temperature at midday was still stifling.
“Not much farther,” said Eddie as he guided their vehicle down the bumpy jungle track. Under normal circumstances, to rent a car in Vietnam he would first have had to apply for a Vietnamese driver’s license, which would have taken at least a week. However, on this occasion the time to process the paperwork had been reduced to a couple of hours; they were both grateful to Seretse that their United Nations documentation would remain valid for a few months.
“So this is where you came eight years ago?” She watched the brilliant greenery roll by. “It’s beautiful.”
“Yeah, it is.” He sounded almost surprised, prompting a questioning look from his wife. “I didn’t really get the chance to play tourist last time I was here. Besides, it was pissing it down.”
“At least it’s not raining today. I wouldn’t fancy trekking through the jungle in a monsoon to find Natalia’s grave.”
He gave her a slightly confused glance. “Sorry, what?”
“Natalia’s grave? That’s why we came here, remember. How far from the village is it?”
“Oh, yeah.” He seemed distracted, but there was something else to his attitude as well. Nina couldn’t quite tell what, though. Almost … expectant? “Not far.”
He guided the Nissan Patrol around a bend in the narrow track, bushes whipping at the vehicle’s flank. Ahead, a cluster of buildings came into view: the village of Ly Quang. “Is that it?” Nina asked.
“That’s it. Hasn’t changed much.” He brought the four-by-four down the hill and pulled up outside the largest building.
The sweltering heat hit them the moment they opened the Patrol’s doors. Nina screwed up her eyes as pinpricks of sweat beaded around them, then surveyed their surroundings. It was clear that the village did not get many visitors; the few people in sight had already taken an interest in the new arrivals.
One of them, a woman Nina guessed to be in her mid-thirties, regarded Eddie first with uncertainty, then dawning recognition. “Ay up,” he said. “Looks like somebody remembers me.”
The woman hurried to the car to meet him, speaking excitedly. “Sorry, I still don’t speak Vietnamese,” he replied with an apologetic shrug. “But this does.”
He took his phone from inside his leather jacket and brought up an app: an English–Vietnamese translator. A set of phrases had already been saved, a tap of Eddie’s finger prompting the phone to say the first in a mechanical voice. The woman did not seem wowed by the technology—the country’s cellular phone network had been massively expanded over the course of eight years—but her reaction to what it was saying was more excited.
“What did you ask her?” said Nina.
Eddie didn’t answer, instead tapping a second phrase. The woman listened, nodding enthusiastically, then waved for him to wait as she ran into the large building. “Eddie?” Nina asked again. “What did it say?”
“Just checking something,” he replied, though he was having trouble holding back a smile.
“What …,” Nina began, stopping as the Vietnamese woman reappeared—followed by someone else.
A blond Caucasian woman in her late twenties, whose eyes widened in delighted shock at the sight of the Englishman. “Eddie!” she cried. “My God! But that means …”
“Yeah, that means.” Eddie’s grin could no longer be contained. He turned to his wife. “Nina? I’d like you to meet Natalia Pöltl.”
Eight Years Earlier …
“But you know I am right, Eddie,” Natalia continued, desperation entering her voice. “And it is what I want to do. Please!” She wrapped her hands around his. “I will not let anyone else die because of me. You have to do it. You have to!” She squeezed his hands, then let go and turned away, getting down on her knees. “You … you know how to make it not hurt, don’t you?” she said quietly.
“Yeah, I do,” he replied. “But—”
“Then do it. It is the only way to end this.” She raised her head and closed her eyes.
He stared down at the young woman. “Are you sure this is what you want?”
“Yes” came the reply.
He was silent for a long moment. Then he slowly raised the gun.
“Please,” whispered Natalia. “Do it.”
Chase hesitated—then pulled the trigger.
Natalia shrieked, flinching … before slowly opening one eye, not daring to speak for several seconds. “You … did not shoot me.”
Chase’s gun was pointed toward the sky, smoke curling from its barrel. “ ’Course I didn’t bloody shoot you. I’m not a psychopath!”
“But—you have to! If the Americans or the Russians take me alive, they will use me to—”
“They won’t,” he said firmly. “And you know why? ’Cause they’re going to think you are dead.”
Natalia stood, regarding him in confusion. “I do not understand.”
“You will. You won’t like it, but you’ll understand.” He set off, heading southwest. “Come on.”
“Where are we going?”
“To find your dead body.”
Bewildered, she followed him. “Eddie, what are you talking about?”
“I’m going to keep my promises—both of them,” he told her. “I promised to protect you, and you made me promise not to let anyone carry on your grandfather’s work. And I just had an idea how to do both of those things.”
They continued through the jungle. The valley floor was muddy, still sodden from the storm, but the relatively flat ground let them move at a decent pace. Before long the trees thinned out as they neared the steep earthen wall of the valley’s west side.
Chase looked up at it. “Okay, somewhere at the top of that’s the camp where they were keeping you and your friends. So a bit south of it there’ll be a big mudslide.” His gaze moved along the stepped cliff, spotting an area largely stripped of vegetation about a quarter of a mile away. “That’s where we fell down.”
They picked their way along the valley until they reached the swath of destruction. Chase turned his attention to the ground, trying to match what he remembered from the darkness of the previous night with what he saw now. “There!” he finally said, pointing out a shape half buried in the mud.
Natalia recoiled when she realized what it was: the body of a woman. “Who is she?”
“One of the Russians—she came after me when I was carrying you out of the camp, but we all got washed away by the mudslide.” Feet squelching in the sludge, Chase went to the broken-necked corpse. Insects had already started to feast on it; revolted, he swatted the flies away before picking up the body. Its head lolled horribly.
The young German was appalled. “What are you doing?” she shrilled as he carried the dead woman toward her.
“Saving your life. Take your clothes off.”
“What?”
“You need to swap clothes with her.” He laid the body on the ground and, with a degree of disgust at himself even though he knew it had to be done, started to undress it. “I’m going to do what you asked me to: put a bullet in your head and burn your body. Except she’s going to be you—that’s hopefully what Lock and his people’ll think,
anyway.”
Realization dawned. “You are going to trick them into thinking you have killed me?”
“Yeah. I’ll make damn sure that they find me and see what’s left of the body. If it’s so badly burned that they think they won’t be able to get anything useful from it, then they’ll leave—and they’ll stop looking for you.”
“But if they find you with the body, they will kill you!”
“They can try,” Chase said, with a confidence he didn’t feel. “The main thing is that you’ll be safe.” He looked away as Natalia started to remove her clothing, concentrating on the unpleasant task of stripping the dead Russian. “Once you’ve gotten dressed, I want you to go back to the village and stay with your friends. I know roughly where we are, so if you head east”—he gestured over his shoulder with a thumb—“you’ll get to the river, and then you can follow it back to that crossing we used. If you even think there’s anyone nearby, hide until you’re sure they’ve gone—and for Christ’s sake don’t step on any more land mines!”
Even without looking at her, he could tell she was dismayed. “You … you are going to leave me?”
“No,” he replied. “You’re going to leave me. And here’s another promise. I’ll never tell anyone—anyone—that you’re still alive until I’m absolutely sure that nobody’ll be able to use you to restart your grandfather’s experiments. You won’t ever see me again unless I’m one hundred percent sure of that. Otherwise there’s a risk I might lead somebody to you.” He removed the last piece of the Russian’s clothing. “Here. Put these on,” he said, still not looking around at Natalia as he held up the bundle.
She took the damp and dirty garments from him, then passed him her own. “Let me help.”
Chase shook his head. “No. Soon as you’re dressed, get to the village. I’ll take it from here.”
“But—”
“Don’t argue. It’s the only way to keep you safe, and you wouldn’t want me to break a promise by not protecting you, would you?” He began to dress the body in Natalia’s clothes. The Russian was slightly bigger than the young woman, but the clothes she had borrowed from her friends in the village were loose fitting enough that it did not matter.
He was halfway done when he felt a hand on his shoulder. “Eddie? I … I am ready to go.”
Chase turned to see that Natalia was now dressed—and that despite her words, she did not want to leave. He stood and faced her. “Are you all right?”
“No,” she admitted. “I am frightened. And not just for me. These people, when they find you, they will—”
“Hey, hey. It’s okay.” He put his hands on the young woman’s shoulders and kissed her on the forehead. “I’ll be fine. It’s the only way to keep you safe. Although,” he added as an idea came to him, “sorry about this.”
“Sorry about what—Ah!” She gasped as he twiddled a skein of her blond hair around his forefinger and tugged hard, strands snapping. “That hurt! Why did you do that?”
He tucked the hairs into a pocket. “Her hair’s darker than yours. If I make sure they find these, it’ll be more convincing. Now go on, get moving.”
Chase straightened, gently but firmly pushing her away. Natalia got the message and, with an expression of deep regret, set off into the jungle to the east. Then she paused, looking back. “Eddie. Thank you.”
He nodded. “Can you make me a promise?”
“Of course. What is it?”
“That you’ll make the most of the life you’ve got.”
Tears shone in her eyes. “I will. If you do the same.”
“Always do.” He gestured for her to go. Reluctantly she turned away and headed into the trees. Before long she was lost to sight amid the undergrowth.
Chase watched until he was sure she had gone, then looked back at the dead woman. “Okay,” he said with a sigh, “sorry about this, but I’m going to have to kill you again.” He finished dressing the corpse, then raised it over one shoulder in a fireman’s lift. “Now, where’s the best place to start a fire?” He got his bearings, and headed back into the jungle …
“So that’s what happened,” finished Eddie. He and Nina were seated with Natalia on the same makeshift bench on which the young woman had told the Yorkshireman her story eight years earlier. “Lock and Hoyt bought it, and so did Kagan and the Russians. They actually believed I’d executed Natalia. As if!”
“Yeah, and I believed you too,” said Nina, still reeling from the revelation. “You jerk! You lied to me!” She punched him, only semi-playfully, on the arm. Natalia looked on with a mixture of amusement and concern, unsure exactly how angry she was.
“No I didn’t!” he protested. “And by the way: ow.”
“You did, you said you killed her!”
“No, I said I did what she asked me to do. Which was to make sure nobody used her DNA to re-create the eitr. Lock and the Russians both thought she was dead, so they stopped looking for her. Problem solved!”
“I did not agree with him at the time,” said Natalia. “But now I am very glad that he did what he did. It has not been easy, but the friends I have made here, the help I have been able to give to the children—I would not give that up for anything.”
Eddie’s expression became more serious. “So how are you?” he asked her. “Have there been any more … symptoms?”
She gave him a sad look, then discreetly rolled up the hem of her thin cotton shirt. Several lumps, ranging in size from the width of her little finger’s tip to slightly smaller than a golf ball, ran in a ragged line up from her waist. “The first one appeared last year,” she said, indicating the largest. “The others came soon after. They are only growing slowly … but they are growing all the same.”
The sight of the tumors filled Nina with a sickening chill. Was this a glimpse of her own future? She had to clear her throat before speaking, mouth suddenly dry. “Have you seen a doctor?”
Natalia shook her head. “I did not want to risk anyone learning that I was still alive. I was afraid that the Russians or Americans would come after me again.” She lowered her shirt.
“They won’t,” said Eddie. “I promised you eight years ago, the only way you’d ever see me again was if I was one hundred percent sure that wasn’t going to happen.” He spread his hands wide. “And here I am!”
“You are completely sure?” she asked, hesitant.
“The second eitr pit has been destroyed,” Nina told her. “The Russians developed a substance to neutralize the eitr, and as far as we know, it worked. And I heard Lock say there’s nothing anyone could learn about the eitr from your DNA. So if you want to see a doctor …”
“I do not think they will be able to help me,” the German said with a sigh. “You did not say that the Americans or Russians had developed a cure.”
“Afraid nobody’s found anything. Yet,” Eddie added for Nina’s benefit. “But if you want or need anything, we can arrange it.” He nudged his wife. “See if Seretse canceled your IHA credit card yet, eh?”
Natalia shook her head again, but this time in gratitude. “There is nothing I need.”
“Really?” Nina said.
“I have everything I want here already. I have lived my life the way I promised Eddie.” Seeing that he was unsure what she meant, she continued: “That I would make the most of everything I had.” She smiled. “It was very good advice.”
“Maybe I should write a book about it. I might get a six-figure advance too,” he said, grinning at Nina.
“But if you could get medicines and toys for the children, that would be wonderful,” Natalia went on. “Anything you can give them will help.”
“I’ll see to it,” Nina assured her.
The three of them continued to talk for some time, curious villagers occasionally joining them with questions for the visitors. Even the boy with the missing leg, now in his teens and keen to show off his agility on his prosthetic limb, made an appearance. Eventually, however, the conversation came around to what Eddie had b
een doing since his last visit, which in turn led to the events in the eitr pit. “You … were infected?” Natalia asked Nina in a quiet voice.
Nina touched the little mark on her cheek. “Yes,” she said, sighing. “Just a drop, but that was all it took. I don’t know how long I’ve got left.”
“I am so sorry.” She looked down at the ground. “This is all my grandfather’s fault. He was an evil man. I wish he had never been—”
“It’s not your fault, though,” Eddie cut in firmly. “And Nina, I didn’t just bring us here to tell Natalia that she was safe. I wanted to see if she was still okay—and to show you that it’s not all over. You can’t just give up and accept it. You might have years, bloody decades even, before any symptoms show. That’s plenty of time for someone to find a cure. You just don’t know. Christ, look at everything we’ve survived up till now. We should be dead fifty times over, but we’re still here! So I’m not going to give up on you, ever, and I won’t let you give up either. Like Mac always told me: Fight to the end.”
Nina tried to take solace from his words, but struggled to overcome the gloom in her heart. “I wish I had your confidence.”
“No, Eddie is right,” Natalia insisted. “Because of him, I have had eight more years of life. Sometimes they have been hard, but they have always been worth it.” She smiled at the American. “And you are very lucky. You have a wonderful man to share your life with. He will look after you and protect you—I know this, because he did the same for me.”
Eddie put his arm around Nina. “She’s right. I’ll always be here for you, love. You know that.”
Nina’s gloom evaporated as she turned to look at her husband’s smiling face. He was not handsome in any conventional sense, yet she couldn’t imagine anyone else she would rather see each morning for the rest of her life. “Yeah, I know. I love you.”
“I love you too.” They kissed, making Natalia smile and blush.