The Worm in Every Heart Read Online Free PDF Page A

them cracks further, issuing five or so Germans in a spew of blackened bricks and melted mortar: Blinking, coughing, bloody like afterbirth. The straggly remains of some back-up platoon caught in the
Taifun-gerat
‘s indiscriminate sweep, clutching their weapons so close you’d think they were substitutes for the crucifixes Hitler’s already outlawed; a strange faith, but their own. And easier by far to pull the trigger than pray, Kotzeleh supposes, considering the usual outcome of either action—
    Suddenly, she’s locking eyes with Lev’s gun-barrel rather than him, its sight drawing a careful bead on her forehead. “Down in the mud, Polack whore,” Lev tells her, utterly matter-of-fact, as she gapes—then adds, to them: “You think I won’t shoot, if I have to? Though I do hate to waste a hostage, especially one this juicy . . . ”
    Hidden behind a fresh fall of masonry, Fat Chavah kneels lower still, blinking her seared eyes furiously, hunting ‘round for something—anything—to use as a weapon. While Kotzeleh simply stands there doing her level best to look the kidnapped Christian, shivering shoulders hunched to hide where her hand is bound for, giving them the tearful blue eye through the dirty gilt fall of her hair. Thinking, all the while:
    Oh, Rabbi, you idiot. Like the Mayor of Chelm, you’re God’s own fool.
    What does he think this is, anyway—a mitzvah, some selfless act that’ll get him back in the legendary G-d’s good books? Sacrifice himself for Kotzeleh, to cover Chavah, so that when the Nazis kill him it’ll provide enough distraction for them both to bring his murderers down in turn?
    So slow: Seconds passing like centuries, as Kotzeleh’s fingers find the knife, hilt-first. She quirks her mouth at Lev, signalling
It’s all right, no more, you can stop now, NOW. Now, damn you. I said—
    (
stop
)
    She can see his lips moving even from here, though, as the Germans shift, thumbing their safeties; that familiar invocation of last resort, clear as the prominent nose on his too-Hebraic face.
Hear, o Yisroel, the Lord our God, the Lord our God is one . . .
    And:
Not MY God, Rabbi,
Kotzeleh thinks, grimly.
Not by a long shot.
    A flash of the future now, its resonance echoing back over years, sharp as a turned thumb in a still-green wound. Because this is when she might have saved him, that’s what she’ll always let herself believe—right here, this very moment, had things only gone differently. But it’s not like any of them will ever know, after all . . .
    (Is it?)
    One single moment: Here, then gone. Then Chavah slides her seeking palm across a hidden catch cunningly worked into the snaky tangle of demons crushed beneath St. Christopher’s feet and jolts back, hearing it click; kicks up a dirty wave as she does so, making the Germans jump in turn. And
something
comes ripping through the wall to meet her, five leprous-white fingers catching her fast by the scalp, pulling her back through the too-small hole it’s made—a scraping pop followed by a wrench, a crunch, by Chavah’s body slumping headless into the murk, as the Germans open fire.
    Lev falls, instantly pierced at the wrist, the knee, with one eye shot out and his hair full of blood, so cheerfully bright red it seems dyed; Kotzeleh lunges to slit the nearest German’s throat as he does, some boy barely her own age wearing a uniform one size too small, then pivots to use his gun on the rest—white muzzle-fire blast and glare, hot whine of ricocheting bullets. Then dives deep, letting the shell-casings fall where they may, swimming through garbage to emerge at last, panting and dripping, by the chamber’s door. Spits liquid waste and stands there for a moment, trying not to see where Lev’s blood has already begun to surface . . .
    Germans dead and dying, face-up or face-down; Kotzeleh watches