Father Night by Eric van Lustbader

Author:Eric van Lustbader
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

FOURTEEN

ANNIKA, HAVING piloted the Antonov An-2 across the border into Finland, guided them to a safe landing at Lappeenranta Airport. Jack’s jet was waiting for them on the tarmac, having flown in from Tallinn.

They climbed down from the biplane, Jack helping Gourdjiev, while ground personnel jammed the wheels with chocks to keep the biplane from moving. The pilot from Jack’s plane greeted him and then went off to inform the immigration people of the trio’s diplomatic status.

As Jack turned back, he said, “We should board my plane as soon as possible. The fewer people who know we were here, the better.”

The lowering sun was in Annika’s eyes, turning their carnelian color luminous. “I can’t go with you.”

“Alli needs us,” Jack said.

Annika smiled sadly. “She needs you. My grandfather needs me.”

Jack looked around the airfield. The winter-shortened afternoon was clear, with a high blue sky that was almost purple at its apex. Even with little or no wind it was very cold.

“I don’t like the idea of us splitting up. Not now, not after all that’s happened.”

“I wouldn’t have it this way, either,” she said. “But neither of us has a choice.”

“Of course you have a choice.” These were the first words Dyadya Gourdjiev had uttered since the Antonov had lifted away from the smoking pyre in which Katya had died. “You always have a choice.”

Annika kissed him tenderly on both cheeks. “You of all people, Dyadya, so Russian, so stalwart, you know that duty obliterates choice. My heart may be with Jack, but my duty is clear.”

The old man nodded. He knew better than to argue. He turned to Jack. “You’ve done me a great service, young man. A service I won’t forget.”

“You asked me to help you get out of Russia. But Katya—”

“Which you have done, most ably.” Gourdjiev squeezed Jack’s shoulder. “The rest is up to me.”

They saw Jack’s pilot returning across the tarmac. He gave a thumbs-up before climbing up into the jet.

“Almost time for you to go,” the old man said. “Take these last moments together.”

Jack watched him walk away, as precisely as any foot soldier, as confident as any commander. For a time, there was an uncomfortable silence.

At last, Jack said, “Why must it always be beginning and ending for us, nothing in between?”

“It is our fate,” Annika said. “And our choice.”

“Our choice? Really?”

She slid her hand along his chest. “We both carry pasts that make our present difficult.”

“Is there to be no hope for us, then?”

Tears glittered in her eyes. “We are always together, Jack.”

“Even when we’re apart?”

“Especially then.” Pressing herself against him, she whispered in his ear, “Think of Emma.”

“Emma is dead.” He tried to pull away, but she held him fiercely to her.

Her lips brushed his ear. “To some, perhaps. But not to you.”

An inarticulate noise was all the sound he could make.

“We carry those we love inside us, always.”

“And those we hate.”

“I have let my father go.”

“And everything he did to you?”

“A scar is a scar, Jack.” She pushed him back now, so that their eyes locked.

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