It was hard for Louis to be certain what he was seeing. The man standing in the doorway seemed to be a Nazi. Not a Neo Nazi. Not some scary looking guy you see on the subway and happen to glance a prison-made swastika tattoo creeping out from under a sleeve. No, this seemed to be a Nazi Non-Commissioned Officer in the grey Hugo Boss designed uniform, black collar and shoulder boards, skull and crossbones pin on his officer's cap. Louis was suddenly caught by a vague memory that Hugo Boss had been fined and had lost the right to vote after the war, because he had been a Nazi sympathizer. That must have seemed like a slap in the face when, for the previous eight years, everyone in Germany had been a Nazi sympathizer for all Boss could likely tell. The rise of the National Socialists and his party affiliation and their obsession with military affectation had saved the clothing designer and manufacturer from going under. He had been bankrupt in 1930. By 1940 he had been the style maker to The Thousand Year Reich and his designs marched in lock step right into his bank account. By 1948 he was disgraced, stripped of citizenship in his own country, and finally, dead. And now, here he was, high and tight, crisply creased, and draped over the man holding open the door to Louis.
In an act of universe-destroying paradox, the man in the doorway smiled brightly and said, with a slightly Minnesota accent, "Hi, can I help you?"
Louis had made his way to 209 Houston and found himself standing in front of The Film Forum. He had spent the train ride down with his mind unable to shake Zed's final expression. The look of disbelief, that moment when something irrevocable has happened, that moment when all you can think is "No, wait." He had such gleeful menace only the second before. In Louis's mind, every commuter on the train wore that expression. As he talked to the ticket girl, her face flickered in and out of that expression. Only to him. She had been bored. Irritated at having her texting interrupted. When he asked her about the "Smithsonian" she had sent him around to a side entrance and then gone back to her phone before he had even walked away.
Next thing he knew, he was standing in front of the door with a Nazi who was polite to the point of eager.
"I'm, uh, looking for the Smithsonian," Louis said.
No, Wait flashed across the man's image. Quickly replaced by a big real world grin. Louis grinds his jaw. Now. Fully back to the now. Louis focuses.
"Oh, sure! Come on in."
Louis is brought into a room of Nazi officers. Men and women standing around with drinks in their hands, all Grey and Black and precisely tailored, adorned with arrays of medals and black lightning and silver skulls. Aside from everyone being dressed like the greatest evil mankind has ever known, it seemed like any other cocktail party of Manhattan professionals. Post grad school twenty-somethings in their pre-stroller hey days regaling one another with their wit and insight.
Apparently, Louis's face betrays his confusion. His host comments. "Oh, ha ha, don't worry, we're just ironic Nazis. You know, we're not really Nazis. Except of course we are."
This gets a round of laughs from some black clad SS officers nearby. Louis is blank-faced. His reaction is always going to be whatever they want it to be. They know he's so shocked and they're so daring and they will project the reaction that satisfies onto any blank slate that comes their way.
All Louis sees, when the laughter dies down, is No, Wait.
Louis shakes it off. "Is this…Is this related to the Smithsonian?"
The Grey Shirt gets this somewhat amused, somewhat disbelieving look…
No, Wait
… like Louis is either nuts or naïve or gauche or all three.
"Um, well, heh.... You know what, why don't you wait here and I will see if he is around."
The Grey Shirt walks away into the crowd. Louis has had enough. These people are idiots. Worse. Rich, educated idiots and they have no idea, could have no idea what is at stake for someone like Louis who can't get the final flicker of mortality from the dying thug who was only moments before going to hack him to pieces, that final expression could have been warn by him, but instead it was up to Louis to remember, to record it, to see it forever, to be the custodian of the final moment of the man who wanted him cut to ribbons and these first year lawyers think this is fucking shocking?
"Would you like a drink sir?"
The waiter is wearing black and gray striped pajamas.
Louis is nauseated. He turns and leans on a small table. Puts his hand to his side. That's when he feels the broken Luger. Remembers it. He'll leave it and go. He'll just put the broken gun on this table and walk out of this, find his sister. Not going to find her here. This is a dead end.
He puts the Luger down and spins around towards the door. He turns too fast, unaware of the black clad SS Reichsführer who is standing behind him. One of Louis's elbows catches a tumbler in the man's hand. The glass goes flying and smashes against the base board of the wall. Louis looks after it. Embarrassment on top of everything else is not an emotion Louis could even begin to communicate right now.
It doesn't seem to matter, The man seems to regard the broken glass and lost drink like someone passing on the street that he half remembers but not enough to stop for. He turns back to Louis. He has his jet black hair slicked back and a prominent brow and nose that shadow already dark eyes. Those eyes are no level at Louis.
"If you are here, then I would suppose that Zed is dead." He looks away, casually taking a new drink off the passing tray of a survivor, "It is an unfortunate fact of our world that sometimes one can feel happy about another man's well deserved end."
Louis would point out the irony of that sentiment coming from a man in an SS Uniform, but what's the point. The man takes Louis's hand.
"My name is Joe. Come with me. We'll talk in private."
Louis follows. He's not even sure why anymore. He passes a waiter, No, Wait, and takes a drink off of his tray.
