Zealot (6 page)

MacLeod could feel his voice catch in his throat. “I promise.”

“
Gut
,” said the rabbi, suddenly all business. “Now my coat, and we’ll be on our way to Shimon.” He fetched his coat and shrugged
it on, the dingy white armband with its blue Star of David prominent on one sleeve. Settling his hat on his head and picking
up the scroll of the Torah, he said “After you, Mr. MacLeod,” gesturing toward the door.

Suddenly, two sharp whistles pierced the predawn quiet. MacLeod quickly pushed the rabbi behind him and looked out the small
window embedded in the door. Rivka was gone. And coming around the corner where she once stood was a small convoy of German
vehicles.

Damn.

“
Vos
?” the rabbi asked. The squealing of wheels and the shouts of the soldiers answered his question before MacLeod could even
try. “
Tei’er Gott!
” The rabbi grew pale. Dear God. It was a sound he’d not heard in nearly four months, a sound he’d prayed every night he’d
never hear again. “The
Aktsia
—it has started again.”

MacLeod thought fast as he watched the Germans pile out of their trucks. Too many to try and fight. Too many to try and hide.
He turned from the window, setting the strongbox on the table and removing his jacket. “Take off your coat,” he ordered the
rabbi.

“What? Why?”

“Just do it. There’s no time to explain.” MacLeod took the Torah from the rabbi, placing it on the table, then helped him
off with his coat. Pressing the Torah and the strongbox into the old man’s arms, he guided him by the shoulders to the basement
door.

They could hear the Germans fanning out through the neighborhood, calling the Jews from their homes. “
Raus! Juden, Raus!
”

MacLeod lifted the hat from Rabbi Mendelsohn’s head and placed it on his own. “You can’t do this!” Rabbi Mendelsohn protested,
beginning to realize what MacLeod had in mind. “I won’t let you.”

“
Shvieg!
” Quiet! MacLeod commanded, “Stay here. I’ll be back for you.” He could hear soldiers banging on the door. “
Jude Mendelsohn! Raus!
”

“My life is not worth losing yours,” the rabbi whispered urgently, begging. ”Take the box and run! Please!”

MacLeod gave the old man a gentle push onto the basement stairs and swiftly locked the door behind him. “Wait for me. I
will
be back. I swear it.”

The pounding grew louder, more insistent. “Mendelsohn!” They were trying to break the door down.

“MacLeod!” he could hear the rabbi cry out as he began to put on the old man’s coat. “Do not do this! No one comes back!”

Quickly, he tugged on the coat. Even at his prime, the rabbi had been a smaller man than MacLeod, and the seams of the old
coat strained but held.

The same could not be said of the door, which finally broke under the force of the battering, and suddenly the room seemed
full of uniforms. Two of the soldiers grabbed him by the arms and forced him painfully to his knees.

“Mendelsohn, Zalman?” their leader barked in his face, and MacLeod nodded in mute acknowledgment. The soldier looked at him
suspiciously for a long moment—MacLeod held his breath—then signaled to his men to take him away. As they dragged him roughly
from the house to a truck waiting in the street, he overheard the leader tell another soldier he probably wasn’t Mendelsohn,
but they had a quota to fill and “one dead Jew’s as good as any other” as far as the final tally was concerned. MacLeod had
been counting on that.

The canvas-covered truck stank of stale urine and fear. Three guards, armed, rode the tailgate, completely ignoring their
defenseless cargo. There were about two dozen Jews packed tightly in the truck, mostly women, a few children, a few old men,
all terrified. As the truck pulled away, MacLeod maneuvered his way toward the tailgate, trying to calculate the best way
to escape and take the others with him. Or at least not get them all killed in his attempt. He had a pistol in his boot and
knew he could take out the guards before they could get off an answering round. Surprise was in his favor—they obviously weren’t
expecting any resistance.

His dilemma was the vehicle he could see out the back of the truck, an open car with six more Germans. Yes, he could take
out the guards, but at the first shot the chase car would be alerted, and then there would be nothing to prevent them from
opening fire on the truck.

He heard the other passengers whisper nervously among themselves. They were nearly to the
Umschlagplatz
, the railway station that led to Treblinka. Pressed against one canvas wall of the truck, a toddler in his mother’s arms
began to wail, as if hearing the name of the bogeyman. His mother hurried to shush him, clutching his face tightly to her
bosom, but the wailing grew louder.

“
Stille!
” a soldier on the tailgate commanded, annoyed by the sound. The young mother did what she could to quiet the little boy,
putting her hand over his mouth, cooing words of comfort in his ear, but the boy was inconsolable. The others in the truck
looked at each other with helpless dread. The wail became a scream as the toddler fought to get away from his mother’s suffocating
grasp.

“
STILLE!
“

A single shot rang out. The scream was silenced. The young Jewish mother slumped where she stood, killed by the same bullet
that had passed through her child, but her body could not fall, held in place by the crush of the other prisoners. Behind
her, the splatter of her blood leached into the fabric of the wall.

One of the old men near her, his hair, his clothes, his face all gray, rocked back and forth, eyes closed, lips moving in
silent prayer.

MacLeod reached down and cautiously pulled the pistol from his boot. At the train station would be more soldiers, and more
innocent victims. He knew he didn’t dare make his stand there. He felt trapped. He had made a solemn promise to Shimon, and
then to Shimon’s father, but how many lives was he willing to sacrifice to keep that promise? He watched the gray man praying.
They both would need a miracle.

Then, before MacLeod’s eyes, someone’s prayers were answered. The chase car erupted in flames!

Not stopping to thank God for this unexpected blessing, MacLeod acted on it. As the three guards registered what had just
happened behind them, he fired three shots in rapid succession. Just as rapidly, three stains of blood blossomed on three
brown shirts. One guard fell from the tailgate to the rapidly moving pavement below. MacLeod pushed the other two from the
truck as the other prisoners looked on in astonishment.

The sound of gunfire was all around now, and another explosion rocked the truck. “Get down!” MacLeod ordered the stunned passengers.
“
Vart doh!
” He pushed the gray man to his knees for emphasis and the other passengers followed.

As the truck lurched to a halt, MacLeod vaulted over the tailgate, landing on the street in a crouch, then rolled under the
truck. From there he surveyed the situation. He could see they were about a block from the train station. All around, hundreds
of people wearing the white armband were fleeing, taking cover, or dropping to the ground where they stood, covering their
heads. In the midst of them, a fire fight—a handful of Jews, maybe twenty in all, young men and women, practically children,
were taking on the Germans with nothing more than some pistols and a few grenades. And, incredibly, the Germans were retreating
to cover under the barrage!

Another grenade impacted nearby and rocked the truck. MacLeod could hear the occupants still above him in the truck scream.
He crawled along the underbelly of the truck until he reached the cab. Reaching up from below, he threw the driver’s side
door open. When the driver leaned out, MacLeod grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him from the cab to the ground.

“
Guten Morgen!
” MacLeod said cheerfully to the surprised German, then punched him hard in the face, knocking him out against the pavement.

Climbing into the cab, he saw that the copilot had already bailed out. He threw the truck into gear and started to drive.

As he did, he sensed the presence of another Immortal nearby.

Shit
, he thought,
not now
. He drove on for several blocks, taking the truck far from the line of fire, but still he couldn’t shake the sensation. Once
sure that his passengers were safe for the moment, he stopped the truck and knocked against the back of the cab, yelling “Go!
Hutry!
Gai a’vek!
” The rocking of the truck assured him his charges were taking his advice and getting the hell out.

Just as MacLeod turned to get out of the truck and face the other Immortal, the other Immortal came to him. The passenger
door opened and a young man of slight build jumped in. His skin was smoky dark, very different from that of either the Poles
or the Jews who inhabited the area. He had black, almost bottomless eyes and a boyish face that could have been considered
friendly under other circumstances—circumstances where he wasn’t holding a pistol to MacLeod’s head. MacLeod slowly raised
his hands.

“I’m Duncan MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod,” he said, “and we don’t need guns.”

“I am Avram ben Mordecai of…” he thought for a moment, trying to match MacLeod, “the House of Judah. And I don’t have time
for this Immortal bullshit right now. Get out of the truck.”

MacLeod got down from the truck and Avram slid across the seat to exit behind him, gun still trained on the back of MacLeod’s
head.

“Why are you here?” Avram demanded.

“I came to help.”

“Funny, you don’t look Jewish.” A threat.

MacLeod turned to face him. “I didn’t realize that was a prerequisite for compassion.”

“These days, it is.” Avram studied him closely, taking in the too-small coat, the Star of David. “You know,
goy
, I could shoot you right now and take your head.”

“You could,” MacLeod acknowledged. “But I think you have more important things to do. And I have a promise to keep to Zalman
Mendelsohn.”

“The
Rebbe
?” Then he realized, “You wear his coat!” He pressed the gun closer to MacLeod’s face. “What have you done to the
Rebbe
, you bastard?”

“Tzaddik, don’t!” a young voice cried out. Keeping his pistol to MacLeod’s face, Avram turned his head to see Rivka racing
down the block toward them.

MacLeod called to her in alarm, “Rivka, stay back!” but she kept running.

“Tzaddik, don’t hurt him. Shimon sent him—all the way from Paris!” Reaching them, Rivka threw her arms around MacLeod protectively.
“We’re going to get the
Rebbe
out of the Ghetto!”

“Shimon? You’ve seen Shimon?”

MacLeod nodded. “He made it to Paris. He’s with the Resistance.” Avram stepped back from him, regarding him intently but not
dropping his gun. The two men sized each other up. MacLeod thought he could sense that Avram was much like himself, a man
of honor. From blocks away, they could still hear the sound of sporadic gunfire. “Listen to your heart, Avram,” MacLeod appealed
to him urgently. “Believe me. Trust me. I’m not here to hurt anyone. I just want to help Shimon’s father. And your people
need you back there.” Avram’s expression didn’t change. “If you don’t believe me, then send the child away and we’ll settle
this honorably.”

“Tzaddik, please …” Rivka begged.

In the distance, another explosion sounded. Avram was torn. This was the moment he and the surviving youth of the Ghetto had
worked and drilled endlessly for—when the Germans would return in force to eradicate the last remaining Jews in Warsaw and
the Jews would finally rise up with weapons and face their murderers in battle. His people needed him. But, this Immortal,
this Gentile, this
goy
MacLeod…he could prove a danger to his people as well…He looked from Rivka’s eager eyes to MacLeod. “Well,” he said after
a long moment, praying he was making the right decision, “if Shimon and Rivka vouch for you…” Sometimes he could only go with
his gut feeling. He reached into a pouch at his waist and pulled out a grenade, handing it to MacLeod. “Here, you’ll probably
need this. Now go, you and Rivka keep your promise. Give Shimon my regards. Tell him he still owes me two tickets to the pictures.”
He turned and climbed into the cargo truck.

“Avram!” MacLeod called after him, and Avram hung out the window. “I’ll be back to help when the rabbi’s safe.”

“Sure you will,
goy
,” Avram called back, unconvinced. He threw the truck into gear and drove off.

Paris: The Present

MacLeod pulled his Citroën close in behind the truck stopped in front of the Hôtel Lutétia, tossing his keys to a uniformed
doorman as he got out. As he adjusted his gray turtleneck sweater and buttoned the single button of his blue sports coat over
it, he thought he could almost detect the vaguest shiver of nervousness in his stomach.

Some things never changed, not even after four hundred years. Certainly first dates hadn’t changed—all the possibilities,
all the uncertainties. At least he wouldn’t have to meet Maral’s parents. The thought brought a rueful smile to his lips.
Fighting the most despicable Kern or Kalas on the planet had always been easier than facing a girl’s parents for the first
time. With a deep relaxation breath he entered the great revolving doors and passed into the grand lobby of the hotel.