Alice knows exactly where she is. The white walls, the white sheets, the white metal bed frame. She’s been here before, more times than any human should have to endure. A hospital.
“Welcome back,” a voice says.
Alice startles, wincing in pain. She should’ve expected someone would be waiting for her to wake. She never would have guessed who, though: Colonel Linden. She croaks out his name, clears her throat, then adds, “What are you doing here?”
Alice follows the question with a surveillance of herself. An IV is secured in her lower arm. The rest of her arm, her torso, and her second arm are in a hard bandage. She couldn’t move if she wanted to. But should she be worried about him? Can she trust Linden?
“I’m here to check up on you,” he says. “I came to your rescue but was too late.”
She tries to sit up. A poor decision. She can’t, and it only causes a surge of electric pain throughout her body.
“Easy now,” Linden says, inching closer, then settling into a bedside chair.
She eyes him warily, then decides to just come out and say it. “Jones was a double agent. Are you?”
“I am not.” He shakes his head solemnly. “But you are right about Jones. I’ve gone through it a million times in my head. I worked with the man for more than two years and never suspected him of working with the Russians.”
“The Russians,” she parrots.
He sighs. “Everything changed last week. Jones insisted you were taking too long and demanded a transport to Geneva to move things along. After he left, I worried he’d push you into something you weren’t ready for, so I got on the next plane. I was going to scrap the mission and pull you out if I had to. But I was too late. I had men watching the roads from the château. They saw you leave, Jones go after you, then the standoff between you two. We believe he was trying to intercept the film to give it to the Russians. My men killed him and his partner, but not before Jones took a shot at you.”
“Where?” Alice asks, looking down at her bandaged body. It all happened so fast and the searing pain had felt like it engulfed the entirety of her.
“In your back.”
Alice took a quick, excruciating intake of breath. “My back? Am I going to—”
“Your shoulder, more specifically. I don’t know all the details, only that the bullet didn’t hit your spine or any organs. It all makes me very squeamish, in fact.”
“You, Colonel Linden?”
“We all have our weaknesses. What matters is the doctor worked his magic and says you’ll heal completely. He has you fully outfitted in a body cast. But you’ll be feeling like yourself in no time.”
Unbelievable.
“I’m sorry, Alice,” Linden goes on, using her name for the first time ever. “I knew this assignment could be dangerous, but I never imagined you’d end up here, Jones would be dead, and we’d have nothing to show for it.”
“You didn’t recover the camera? I had it in my robe. Jones took it.”
Linden’s jaw tightens. “Last thing he did before he was shot was open the camera to expose the film. If they couldn’t have it, neither could we, I suppose. Jones always was an aggressive man. We were hoping the film would be salvageable, but the headlights were enough to destroy the negatives.”
Alice closes her eyes, exhausted, disappointed, remorseful. She failed. She did not meet expectations. She did not prove herself capable of completing her mission. She struck out, three for three. And for what? She poses the question aloud: “So it was all for nothing?”
She sees Hans’s face as she ran from him. She recalls the pages of names of the Nazis who’ll get away with their loot. She can vividly see the numbered box and the Star of David emblem.
Her eyes shoot open. “I can still help you.”
“Miss Marble, you’ve done enough. Now you need to rest—”
“No,” she says. “Get me a pen and paper.”
Linden’s face tells her he clearly needs more of an explanation.
“I can see every page I photographed. Remember my eidetic memory?”
He stands. “I’ll get a stenographer in here right away.”
When he arrives, Alice provides page after page of Nazi names that were listed in Hans’s ledger.
Hans.
“What will happen to him?” she asks Linden after her work is done and her hospital room on the US Army base is calm once more.
“Honestly? Probably nothing. But we expected that. Best-case scenario for us is that he’ll cooperate and hand over the holdings of his vault. Best case for him, and I imagine he’s a clever man, is that he’ll find a way to protect himself. The list of Nazi names you provided is only a starting place. Mr. Steinmetz will likely deny doing any business with them without any hard proof.”
“Do you think he’ll assume it’s me who gave you the names?”
Linden pats her hand. “Like I said, he’s a clever man. And unless another ex-lover fled his house last night . . .”
“Was that a joke, Colonel Linden?”
“My very best. Now, rest up. As soon as we can get you out of here, we’ll get you back to the States. We’ll have someone keep an eye on you for a bit, but I believe you’ll be safe on our home turf.” Colonel Linden smiles. “You and I, our paths won’t cross again, but I’m grateful—and I know our country is grateful—for your service.”
Alice’s brow creases. “That’s it, then?”
“That’s it. In fact, none of this ever happened. You came to Geneva for the exhibition, which the Swiss believe ended early because of an emergency back home. The journalists will print nothing. Miss Tennant has been informed you’ll be extending your visit because of an inflamed cyst that needs to be removed from your back. Someone from the Tennis Lawn Association is taking care of her . . . I mean, that situation, for you. In the meantime, the servicemen and -women here at the hospital are sworn to secrecy.”
Alice lets his words sink in. He offers her a final smile and turns to leave, but she stops him with a question. “Can I write him? If I’m careful with my words, can I try to . . .” What would she try to do? Apologize? Assure him she loved him?
“I’m sorry, Alice. And if he tries to contact you, you cannot respond.”
“He won’t,” she says, knowing it in her heart. “He can’t trust me anymore.”
“It’s for the best.”
Alice puffs out her cheeks, annoyed with the wave of melancholy that washes over her. She chose her assignment over him. It was forty-love and, in that pivotal moment, she went for broke, fighting for something bigger than herself, for someone other than herself.
Alice believes it’s the first time she’s ever done that.
She likes how it feels, the warmth that washes over her.
Alice resolves to do more of it.