by Matt Eaton
“Not long,” Havermeyer said. “A couple of months.”
“I see you’re wearing a wedding band,” said Kaplan.
Havermeyer sighed. “I keep meaning to take that off. Old habits.” He explained how a year earlier his wife had run off with the husband of a close friend. Divorce papers were pending. He’d known Barber for several years and for most of that time only considered her a colleague and a friend. Romance had blossomed after Barber offered to take him out one night to cheer him up, knowing what his wife had done.
All details that were both plausible and easy enough to double check, Kaplan figured. “You said before it made no sense. What did you mean by that?”
“I don’t believe Helen was suicidal,” Havermeyer said. “And whisky? Forget about it. She barely drank at all and she particularly hated whisky. That was her father’s poison, and she hated the man. The other thing is, she didn’t own a gun.”
“You sure about that? Isn’t it possible she had a pistol and never told you about it?
Havermeyer shook his head emphatically. Explained how Barber had laid bare her family’s sordid history. Her father had drunk himself to death — Helen had somewhat shamefully admitted to being glad of it. The man had terrorized his family for years. “Helen was scared of guns. Her father had a revolver. Her mother would hide the bullets.”
An interesting story. And convenient. “How exactly did this come up in conversation?” Kaplan wondered casually.
“I’d offered to buy her a pistol for her own protection,” said Havermeyer. “She wouldn’t hear of it. I asked her why, and she told me.”
“What sort of pistol would you have bought her?” Kaplan asked.
“A Beretta,” he said. “They’re lightweight, easy to conceal. Not particularly accurate over long distances but fine for...” Havermeyer stopped and a look of panic crossed his face. “Is that what she used? A Beretta?”
Kaplan kept him sweating. “I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to divulge that information.”
It had been a thirty-eight special. More powerful than a Beretta and far more damaging to the human skull at point-blank range.
“Lieutenant Havermeyer, when was the last time you saw Helen?”
“Wednesday night. I remember because she was angry.”
Kaplan raised an eyebrow. “Go on.”
“She’d had coffee that day with a woman. I forget her name, but she used to be a reporter for the Times-Herald. Now works as a senatorial researcher.”
“Which senator?”
“Ives,” Havermeyer remembered. “Irving Ives. Helen and this woman had history.”
Kaplan knew a woman who used to be a Times-Herald reporter. “What sort of history?”
Havermeyer grimaced and shook his head to indicate he wasn’t sure. “Helen said it was better I didn’t know. I’m trying to remember the woman’s name. Something to do with ducks.”
“Do you mean Drake, by any chance?”
“Yeah — Drake, that’s it. First name started with an E — maybe Emily or Edie...”
“Edna,” said Kaplan.
Havermeyer nodded. “Yeah. Edna Drake. That’s her name.”
THIRTY
Saturday August 22, 1953
Donald Menzel showed up at Edna’s door with a look on his face like the harbinger of doom. She ushered him quickly inside her room. He wasted no time in telling her about Helen Barber’s death. The news came as a terrible blow — she immediately felt responsible. But shock quickly turned to anger. “Mind telling me why you’re the one breaking this news to me?” she asked.
Menzel looked like he’d been expecting the question. “The police are looking for you. They know you met with her on Wednesday, and that Miss Barber came away from the meeting angry. Edna, I want to help you, but I really need to know what’s going on here.”
She almost laughed. “I’d have thought your man told you all about it after dropping me home.”
Menzel stared at her blankly. “What are you talking about?”
“Oh, come on, don’t go coy on me, Donald. You were having me tailed. I spotted your man and confronted him.” Menzel just stared at her and she could almost see the wheels turning in his head. She walked to the window and stared out at the street. “Was it you? Did you have her killed?”
“For God’s sake,” he cried, “you think me capable of that?”
“I didn’t tell her anything, although I admit I wanted to. But she didn’t want to hear it.”
“Jesus Christ, Edna. Do you really think I’m that cold blooded?”
She turned to face him. “I do. I think you’d do it to show me what can happen if I don’t toe the line.”
“You need to leave town,” he said. “Today. I’m here to make that happen. Under no circumstances are you to talk to the police, do you hear me?”
“Why not?”
“Because I know how your mind works. More to the point, you’re not a very convincing liar. If this Detective Kaplan asks you why you were meeting Helen, he’ll know if you don’t tell him the truth.”
“Kaplan? I know him.”
“Even more reason to avoid him,” said Menzel.
“To cover your tracks.”
“I told you, I didn’t do this,” he said.
“No. Of course not. I believe you.”
“Like I said, you’re not a convincing liar.”
“I’d like you to leave, Donald.”
“I’ve booked you a plane ticket to Los Angeles.” He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the ticket. “It’s under the name Daisy Compton. Your flight leaves in three hours.” He held it out. She made no move to take it from him, so he placed it on her bed.
“How much does Kaplan know?” Edna asked.
“He has your name. He knows you work for Senator Ives. Thankfully they stuck to protocol and gave him the address of your former apartment on M Street. That’s a dead end.”
“Yes, but it’s also right next door to the café where Helen and I met the other day. This just gets better and better. Are you trying to make me look guilty?”
“I’m trying to keep you out of jail.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“Would you rather I had them send him over here?” She shook her head. “Look, all we’ve done is buy you some time. Kaplan’s a good cop, he’s going to find you eventually if you stay here.” He let that sink in for a moment. “As for prison, for all I know you’ve already broken your security oath by talking to this woman. That’s a life sentence. Maybe it’s lucky for you she’s dead.”
“Lucky?” she said in disgust. “I told her nothing. Mamma Rey will back me on that. Our meeting was over in a few minutes. Not a lot of time to divulge our secrets. They need some explaining.”
“I’ll send someone to talk to Kaplan and feed him a version of the truth, but I need time to work out what that is and how to make it sound convincing.”
He had shame written all over him. She was scared now and needed to get as far away from him as possible. “All right, fine,” she said. “I’ll go to California. But only for a few days.”
Menzel looked relieved. “Good. I’m glad. I’ll go down now and pay your hotel bill. You should leave as quickly as you can.” He touched her on the arm in an effort to be empathetic. “It’s the right move, Edna, believe me.”
He made her flesh crawl. She didn’t believe him for a second. “Tell me this, Donald: if you didn’t kill her, who did?”
“No idea,” he said. “I’ve got Clarence and MJ-12 working on that as we speak.”
THIRTY ONE
Saturday August 22, 1953
She threw the dead bolt across her door the moment Menzel left, then opened a window and stuck her head out, making sure she was clearly visible from the street. Another warm day ahead. She watched as Menzel left the hotel, then pulled her head back inside and began packing her bags. She was in the hotel foyer less than 15 minutes later.
She was relieved to discover he had
already paid the bill, although she had no intention of taking up his offer on the plane ticket. Whatever was going on here, she wasn’t about to place her life in his hands. If he did mean her harm, sending her to Los Angeles was a great way to get the job done. That city was a den of vice and corruption. She only had one place left to go. Two places actually, but one final destination.
In Washington’s best hotels, there were many things money could buy. One of them was having errands run no questions asked. She left her suitcase at the front desk, slipped the concierge $5 and asked him to wait half an hour before taking the bag to Union Station and depositing it in a locker. She said she’d be back to pick up the locker key. He nodded and smiled like the request was nothing out of the ordinary. She thanked him, then walked to a pay phone and asked the operator to put her through to Detective Vincent Kaplan at city homicide. It was a Saturday, but she knew he’d be at work.
“You’re playing hard to get, Edna,” he told her.
“I didn’t know you were looking for me until about half an hour ago.”
“But you know why.”
“That was news to me too, detective. I honestly don’t know what to say. I feel...”
“Responsible?” he suggested.
“Yes,” she said, “though probably not in the way you think.”
“You were one of the last people to see her alive. You and her boyfriend. But I don’t think he’s got a clue what’s going on.”
“I had no reason to want her dead. But I think she was killed because someone knew about our meeting and didn’t like it.”
“What did you tell her?”
“Nothing.”
“Yet here we are. Why would she be killed just for talking to you?”
“I’m not at liberty to say,” Edna told him.
“Where are you? Are you in trouble?”
“It’s looking likely, yes.”
“Let me come pick you up.”
“No. Listen, Vincent,” she said, lowering her voice, “I work for an intelligence organization. I can’t believe I’m hearing myself say that, but it’s true. Somebody thought I was feeding secrets to Helen Barber. I didn’t. Maybe I wanted to, but I didn’t. These secrets — they’re a big deal.”
“I can get a subpoena to order Senator Ives to talk to us.”
“Ives has nothing to do with it. My work for him is just a cover for what I’m really doing.”
“You’re not helping either of us here.”
“I don’t know who killed Helen. Not for certain.” Though she certainly had her suspicions. “But I mean to find out. When I do, you’ll be the first to know.”
Kaplan didn’t like that idea one little bit. “If I don’t see you by first thing Monday morning and I have to come looking, I’m going to charge you with obstruction of justice and being an accessory after the fact.”
“Two days it is,” she said, hanging up the phone.
She caught a taxi to Chinatown, walked around for a while, jumping in and out of shops, then caught another taxi to Union Station. She was headed for the ticket queue when a man tapped her on the arm. “You want a taxi miss?” He didn’t look like a taxi driver.
“Sure,” she said, following him out to a parking bay at the northern end of the station. He took her to one of three identical cars parked alongside one another. There were drivers in two of them. He opened the back door to the third and ushered her in, then all three cars headed south along First Street at the same time, turned sharply into G Street then south again on North Capitol Street before splitting three ways at Massachusetts Avenue. Her driver went straight ahead for two blocks, turned right into E Street then quickly right again into McCollough Court, where a gang of workmen stepped onto the road as they passed, placing a road-closure barrier that prevented any more traffic from following. Her driver pulled into the rear parking lot of a restaurant, from where they were no longer visible to the street.
“The rear entrance is just across the way,” he told her, pointing. “Here, put these on.” He handed her a black scarf and a pair of sunglasses. She wrapped the scarf around her head and put on the glasses. “She is waiting in room 603,” he said.
Thirty seconds later, she was back inside the foyer of the Commodore Hotel. This time, she took the elevator.
Involving the Russians was a risk, but it was the quickest way to lose the Americans on her tail. Now she only had one tail to worry about. And given the resources employed to bring her here, it was abundantly clear that Polina had been lying when she said she was acting alone.
The Russian agent answered the door smiling. “Come in.” The room was identical to the one Edna had stayed in several floors below. She wondered how long Polina had been here and why she’d stayed after Edna moved to the Carlton. They had clearly known where she was all along — opening the window of her suite and popping her head was a pre-arranged signal telling them she wanted to meet.
“I shouldn’t be here,” Edna decided.
“Nonsense,” said Polina. “No such thing as shouldn’t. We drink, we talk. You say what you want, I respond.”
“The police are after me. A friend of mine was killed. I think it was because she met with me.”
The Russian nodded. “I know,” she said. “Everybody knows this.” Polina opened a bottle of vodka and poured two shots.
“Killing doesn’t bother you much, does it?” Edna asked her.
“You really need to ask?” She downed her shot in one go. Edna followed suit. It burnt, but it felt good. She pulled out a cigarette and lit it.
“Careful,” Polina warned, “vodka and cigarette can be lethal combination.” She smiled. Gallows humor.
Maybe it was her imagination, but Edna couldn’t help feeling the Russian agent’s accent was becoming more obvious. The Long Island lockjaw was long gone. Was she letting her guard down? Edna sat down on the lounge chair beside the bed and Polina poured them both another drink.
“Stalin had millions of Russians killed,” Polina said. “He had a system. Sometimes there were quotas we had to meet. We killed for no reason other than to control. He was worse than Hitler in the treatment of his own people. He was irrational. Insane. Hated criticism of any sort. He terrified even his closest comrades because he played them off against one another. Yet today all across Russia he is beloved. Hailed as our greatest leader of all time. Why is that, I wonder?” She downed another shot and poured again, holding out her hand for Edna’s glass.
“Because people prefer the legend,” said Edna.
“Yes. Also, because he got away with it,” said Polina. “You Americans did nothing. Britain did nothing. You let it happen. In our world of secrets, death is always by your side. You must not let it stop you doing your work.”
There was something broken in this woman. It kept Edna on her guard. They talked some more about cold war politics. Polina said her country might have its faults, but did at least treat men and women as equals. “Your men do not treat you well,” Polina concluded.
Feeling this was a path in the conversation best avoided, Edna changed the subject. “What does Russia know about UFOs?”
“We know the Roswell crash was real, that you have saucer wreckage and the bodies. We know, of course, you still have the saucer stolen from Lebanon by Bill Donovan and your lover.
“You mean they stole it before you could.”
“Exactly,” Polina said, offering a semi-soporific grin.
“Have you retrieved any craft of your own?” Edna asked.
“Come work with us and you’ll see.”
“You mean like Kim Philby works for you?”
The name appeared to catch Polina off guard for a moment. “British intelligence found Philby innocent of this.”
“Yes, but what do you say about it?” Edna persisted.
Polina looked away. “If I was running MI6, I’d put a bullet in his head.” Her eyes were cold as ice. “You can never be too careful.”
A confirmation of sorts. “I don’
t think I’m ready to put myself in that position,” said Edna.
“Don’t take too long to decide. You came to me, remember?” Polina pulled open the curtains to reveal the top of the Capitol Building dome in the distance, and stood staring out the window. “You and I know the real world is not what we see out this window. Communist, capitalist — none of this matters.”
“Try saying that to your boss and see how far it gets you,” said Edna. Polina turned around and almost lost her balance. If this was an act, it was a bad one. “Did you tail Helen Barber after we met for coffee?” Edna asked.
Polina nodded.
“What did you see?”
“It was an American who killed her. A contract killer.”
Edna stared at her in horror. “Who would do that?”
“CIA. Verus. Take your pick,” said Polina.
“Are you sure?”
“They saw you talking. They send you message. No more talk.”
“Why should I believe you?”
The Russian sat down roughly on her bed. “I want you to trust me, Edna. I help you, one day you help me. Look into my eyes.” They were bloodshot, pupils dilated. It was hard to get a good read on her. “I am telling the truth. In our business, you must know truth when you see it.”
But Polina was so drunk the only truth Edna could see was self-loathing. Edna poured two more drinks and handed one to her. “Drink up,” she urged, holding the glass to her lips. When the Russian was distracted, Edna emptied her shot glass on the carpet.
“Why did you come to me today?” Polina demanded.
“Because I needed your help to get away,” said Edna truthfully.
“Is not enough,” the Russian agent told her. “We go to much trouble to bring you here. This is not how friendship works. You must give me more.” The booze was a truth serum. It was undermining Polina’s cool demeanor.
Edna poured one more time. She thrust the glass at the Russian, then threw back her own shot theatrically before staggering toward the bathroom. She closed the door, spat the vodka in the sink and waited a while. When she emerged two minutes later Polina was still sitting on the bed, looking very much under the weather.
