Amerikan Eagle

Small wooden door, half hidden by a black curtain.

He ran across the choir loft, tore at the curtain, grabbed the door handle.

Locked.

Christ almighty!

He looked around.

A metal fire extinguisher hanging on the wall.

He pulled it off, tearing fingernails in the process, brought it to the door, raised it high, and brought it down.

The doorknob flew off and rattled across the floor. He dropped the fire extinguisher and pried the door open.

Worn wooden stairs, narrow and high, in a spiral. He started running up, his shoulders brushing against the plaster walls. There were voices in here too, from above. His .38 Smith & Wesson Police Special was in his hand and he went higher and higher, yelling out his brother’s name.

To the top, just above the clock gears and machinery.

A man turned. The room was small and cluttered with boxes and rusting metal parts. A hole had been cut from the steeple in the direction of the harbor. The room smelled of dust and pigeon shit.

The man looked to him, holding a scoped rifle. “Hey Sam,” the man said. He was wearing one of Sam’s old black suits, the elbows and knees shiny from age, a suit Sarah had wanted to throw out.

Sam stood, legs shaking, arms at his side. “Put the rifle down. Come over here.”

More voices. A battery-operated radio broadcasting a commentator with an excited voice, describing the approach of Hitler’s boat. That’s how it would work. The assassin would know when exactly to raise his rifle and pull the trigger.

Tony said, “Not going to happen, Sam.”

“Tony. Get the fuck away from there and drop the rifle. Now!”

Tony had the impatient look of an older brother. “Sorry. Worked too long, too hard, sacrificed too much to get here.”

Sam raised his revolver. “Drop the rifle, Tony. I don’t care what you did at the Yard, don’t care what they did to Dad. Look—Sarah and Toby have been arrested. They’re in a labor camp. They get out if I bring you in! Do you hear me? I bring you in and they’re free!”

Tony seemed to shudder, as though something had struck hit him deep and hard. “I wish you hadn’t told me that, Sam.” A pause, as if he were trying to regain his strength. “And you might be lying, for all I know.”

“You numb shit, I would never lie about my family.”

Tony said, “Sam, I love ’em both, more than you know, but they’re soldiers, just like everyone else. Drafted but still part of the fight. And what I’m doing here, it’s more important than them, you, or me.”

“Tony!” he yelled, hearing loud voices in the steeple.

“Leave me alone, Sam. I’m going to take care of that monster down there. Somebody should have killed the bastard years ago. He’s long overdue.”

Sam stepped forward. “Tony, he’s a bastard, but just one bastard. You kill him, and so what? Another bastard will take his place. He’s just one man. That’s all.”

Tony glanced out the opening. “No, that’s not all. He holds it all together. Get rid of him and the whole rotten system collapses. One man can turn this world to hell. And one man can make it right. And that’s gonna be me.”

The voice on the radio squawked, “Now! Now the boat has docked, and I can make out Chancellor Hitler as he starts to step out…”

Tony raised the rifle and Sam said, “Don’t!”

His brother didn’t turn. “Or what? You’re going to shoot me? Why? Because it’s your job? Your duty?”

Another step closer. “Yeah, it’s my job and duty. And saving that bastard will get Sarah and Toby free. Now drop the rifle!”

Tony murmured, “We all got roles to play, and I’m sorry, mine is the more important. You can piss around the edges, host an Underground Railroad station, but when it counts, I’m going to make it all right.”

The rifle came up to his brother’s shoulder and the radio commentator said, “… the dock. Hitler is now on American soil for the first time, walking briskly to the Navy Yard commander—”

Tony’s head lowered to the scope.

The sound of the shot was deafening, pounding at Sam’s ears.

The revolver recoiled in his hand.

The rifle clattered to the floor, and Tony slumped over.

Sam ran to his brother and knelt as Tony looked up, disbelieving, his face white with shock. “You—”

“Tony, damn you,” Sam said, his face wet. Sam fumbled at his brother’s coat and shirt, and the radio was blabbering, and there were footsteps, racing up the stairs. Tony grasped Sam’s wrist hard.

“You did it… I can’t believe it… you actually had the balls to do it…”

Sam ripped the shirt open, buttons flying. “I aimed for your shoulder, Tony. You’ll be okay. It’s just a shoulder wound.”

Tony grimaced, lips trembled. “Hurts like hell… shit, doing your duty. How true blue can you be?” Footsteps grew louder. He coughed and said, “Hope the hell you know what you did… one man… hope you know what you did…”

Sam said frantically, “I do. Look, you’ll be okay, you’ll see a doctor, and Sarah and Toby, you’re gonna free them. You’ll see.”