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Back The Radio Operator Save as PDF
Chapters (43)
  1. Cover
  2. 1
  3. 2
  4. 3
  5. 4
  6. 5
  7. 6
  8. 7
  9. 8
  10. 9
  11. 10
  12. 11
  13. 12
  14. 13
  15. 14
  16. 15
  17. 16
  18. 17
  19. 18
  20. 19
  21. 20
  22. 21
  23. 22
  24. 23
  25. 24
  26. 25
  27. 26
  28. 27
  29. 28
  30. 29
  31. 30
  32. 31
  33. 32
  34. 33
  35. 34
  36. 35
  37. 36
  38. 37
  39. Acknowledgments
  40. Bibliography
  41. A Note from the Translator
  42. About the Author
  43. About the Publisher

Now when he left the house with the dog he didn’t look at the river or the sky anymore but rather at something inside himself: his fear. Sometimes the fear made his throat tighten. Sometimes it filled his chest with what felt like liquid ice. Sometimes it sat in his stomach. He became aware of how, depending on what form it took that day, the fear could exercise total control over his thoughts.

Then he had an idea. A radio that fit inside a suitcase would make them mobile, much less easy to track down—and he would finally get the two of them out of his apartment. The delivery truck was perfect for it.

He saw various places in his mind. Brighton Beach, the street right by the boardwalk, good for transmitting, no obstacles. No. Coney Island was too busy. The parking lot in the Bronx outside the nationalists’ headquarters. Red Hook in Brooklyn. These thoughts reassured him, blotted out the fear for a time.

Treason. Electric chair. He had read an article in the newspaper about the victims’ eyes bursting, about them wearing diapers because they would shit themselves when the thousand volts were sent surging through their bodies.

18

New York, May 1939

IT WAS THE FIRST DAY WHEN THE AIR OUTSIDE WAS WARMER than the air inside. When he opened the door to leave his building, he felt summer pouring over him and winter at his back. He took the subway downtown, got out a stop early, walked down 96th Street to the East River and then south along the Rhinelander Reef to Carl Schurz Park. He had a date with Lauren.

Lauren had called him. “I figured you would have to be back in New York by now, and look at that, I was right. You answered the phone. I’m talking to you.”

Confident laughter.

He joined in, laughing quietly. He had never been gone. He had been living in a state of numbness for two months. Over time he had gotten used to it.

Carl Schurz Park stretched from the entrance at East 86th Street over a hill and down to the shore promenade. The evening was bright. A warm, salty wind blew in from the East River and played in the clothes of the dog walkers, sailors, and couples.

Yorkville had been Lauren’s idea. Maybe to prove that his German origins didn’t bother her. Not wanting to argue, he had said yes to Lauren on the phone in an almost drunkenly overexuberant tone of voice: “Yes, my dear. Yes. Yorkville. If you wish to see some krauts, yes.”