The Fifth Column

by Andrew Gross

  “Besides that result being a very unfortunate turn of events for your daughter, you would tell them exactly what, Mr. Mossman?” Latimer stood up and said. “Exactly what would they find? If they looked into things. A rootless ex-con unable to hold a job, with a history of drunkenness and violence. Who, when his daughter was taken from him by his wife, had resumed his drinking again.”

  “That’s a lie.”

  “Is it…?” Latimer widened his eyes. “Is it, Herr Habenshaller?” He turned toward Karl. “You’ve waited on Herr Mossman and Fraulein Leperrier at the Old Heidelberg café several times, have you not?”

  “I have.” Karl nodded enthusiastically. “He always asks for me.”

  “And what have you seen? You’ve served Mr. Mossman drinks there?”

  “We had a champagne toast,” I said. “Once.” I looked at Noelle. “To celebrate our relationship. With someone who I thought cared for me.”

  “Not according to Herr Habenshaller, I’m afraid,” Warren Latimer interjected. “Karl, you’ve seen him many times at the bar there, have you not? Over the edge.”

  “Many times,” the heavyset German waiter with the ruddy cheeks replied. “Once, where he could simply not even walk out on his own. Another time, he almost got into a fight with another customer over his political views. Have you not seen the same…?” He turned to Noelle.

  Again, she merely clenched her jaw and nodded acceptingly. “I have.” Her face blanched again with shame.

  “How could you?” I glared at her.

  “How could she? You mistake her,” Willi Bauer said. “Miss Leperrier is bound to do her duty.”

  She averted her eyes.

  “And that transmitter? Would you like to check the closet, Charles?” Warren Latimer gestured there with his hand. “Clearly a figment of your own overactive zeal to find some kind of cause against them. And what was it you claim you saw on the beach the other night? A German submarine? Please. Your drunkenness clouded your senses once before in a very unfortunate way. And now, no doubt again, it’s sad to say. Try opening any of those barrels you claim to have seen rolled in and what would you find, Herr Bauer?”

  “Why, beer, of course.” Willi Bauer shrugged with a grin. “Good German beer. We have not fully disposed of all our inventory since we shut the brewery’s doors. Perhaps you would like a taste, Herr Mossman? I’m happy to show you, if you like? Bitte…?” He lifted up a mug from the table to me.

  “No, that won’t be necessary,” I said, seething with anger and frustration. I saw where all of this was leading.

  “And even the Bauers themselves…,” Latimer went on, gesturing toward Trudi and Willi. “Such nice, upstanding people. Who doesn’t have a kind word for them? And yet you questioned them right from the start. From the first day you got out of prison. Mrs. Shearer overheard you many times. In fact, I think your own wife would readily admit to that if pressed. No…? Bad-mouthing them. Following them when they went out. I think you even admitted such to the police. Looking into their affairs. Were you simply jealous of them, Mr. Mossman, having replaced you in your daughter’s affections while you were in the state penitentiary? Or maybe it’s just that you’ve built up this antipathy toward anything that even speaks of fascism. After your brother’s unfortunate death in Spain. For which apparently you carry a deep sense of responsibility and which you haven’t forgiven yourself for, isn’t that right, Mademoiselle Leperrier? I mean, Noelle?”

  “No, that’s not true,” I said, my temperature rising.

  “But it is. It is true. Didn’t he tell you all this, Mademoiselle Leperrier? Didn’t he unburden his soul to you?” Noelle was pale. It was almost like he was trying to rub it in to her as well.

  “Yes,” she said, swallowing and bowing her head.

  “What was that? I didn’t hear.”

  “Yes.” Noelle said again, nodding more firmly.

  “So you see, Mr. Mossman, you really have nowhere to go with any of this. Not if you truly value your daughter’s safety. You can’t harm us any more than Emma can. Because nothing you’ve seen or uncovered points to anyone but you, I’m afraid. To your own irrational contempt for those who have stolen your daughter’s affection. Finding plots under every rock simply because the Bauers’ accent is Germanic. The truth is, we don’t even need the pistol Herr Leitner is holding there. Please, Kurt, feel free to put it away. There is no need to keep our guest one minute longer than he likes. If he wants to make trouble, which I’m sure he will come to his senses and see for himself is the foolish path, he’ll regret it for the rest of his life.”

  I clenched my fists. He was right on one thing: I would have liked to have leaped on him and buried him with blows. But I did see it. Plainly now. The taste in my mouth was so bitter I could barely wet my lips. I’d been set up. From the start. And they were right, I was trapped. Trapped by my own foolishness and stupidity to think I was more cunning than them. To want to believe I could be loved again. Trapped even more completely than when I was in my own cell. In Auburn. The only thing that mattered now was to get Emma back, and Latimer was right, if I blew that, if something happened, I’d live with it for the rest of my life. And I could see they were prepared to do what they had to do to get their plans accomplished. The rest … The rest, my own safety, as Latimer said, would sort itself out in the end.

  “First, I need to know that Emma is okay. She must be terrified,” I said.

  “I assure you, Emma is perfectly fine,” Willi Bauer attested. “She is being well taken care of. Just look at it as if she was spending a day at camp.”

  Camp. I scoffed.

  “But if there is not a call from us every day, at a particular time…” Willi shrugged. “Then I’m afraid she will not feel that way at all. You understand me plainly, don’t you?”

  “I understand.” I took in a breath and seethed, looking at their blank faces staring back at me. “So tell me, how do I know I can trust you?” I said to Latimer. “You tell me you’re prepared to kill my daughter. If I do what you need me to do, how do I guarantee we will get her back?”

  “Please, we are not savages, Charlie.” He sniffed with some pride. “No matter what you think of us, no one here wants to hurt an innocent child.”

  “Emma is like a granddaughter to Willi and I.” Trudi put her teacup on the table. “Never in a million years would we choose to hurt her unnecessarily.”

  Unnecessarily …

  My chest was tight. Futility and helplessness swirled in me. Mixed with rage. I’d never had the urge to actually kill someone before, but now … “So when…?” I looked at Latimer. “This beer party of yours. When does it take place?”

  “Thursday,” Willi Bauer said. He looked to Latimer and Curtis. Kurt.

  Thursday. Thursday was two days.

  Two days till I became a traitor against my country. Two days to get my daughter back in Liz’s arms.

  I looked back, defeated, accepting. I let my gaze fall from Trudi to Willi and then to Latimer, and ultimately to Noelle, where it remained until she looked away herself.

  “All right.” I nodded and took in a breath. “What is it you need me to do?”

  33

  Deflated and spent, I left Liz’s brownstone and started to walk down Lexington Avenue, my mind in a daze. I was trapped. They had laid out what they wanted me to do. Participate in poisoning the water supply of New York. They said they needed a fall guy who could talk his way out of trouble. But more like someone they could pin the whole thing on. And I was the perfect candidate for that. My life had already crumbled to where no one would doubt I could do anything. Anything stupid and irrational. Even turn on my country.

  Something called liquified sarin gas. I didn’t know how many might die from something like this.

  But however many it was, now I’d be complicit.

  And if I didn’t agree, they’d made it clear Liz and I would never see Emma again. And that was a possibility I couldn’t face. I had no idea where they had her kept. If
we don’t make a call once a day at a particular time … Maybe Mrs. Shearer could be traced somehow. Maybe their calls could be traced. I heard they could do that now. But Make no mistake, Latimer had made it clear, if you choose to go to the police, I’ll know. I have my own contacts high up at the FBI, which is precisely where they’ll go. You get any foolish ideas, Mr. Mossman, I’ll know.

  Emma’s fate is entirely in your hands.

  They didn’t even try to follow me when they let me out. I had no choice but to comply.

  So what were my options? I tried to reason them through. Help them in their plans, I’d be a traitor. In shame for the rest of my days. If I even survived the night. Maybe Liz would get our daughter back again. Turn them in, as Latimer laid out, I still may not be able to prove a thing. I didn’t even have the photographs I’d taken. They’d preyed on every weakness I had. And I was still reeling from the thought that the person I thought I was falling in love with just a few hours ago had duped me from the first moment we met.

  Heading downtown, deep in my own thoughts, I saw those pages fly all over again.

  My dissertation …

  On Sixty-seventh Street, I saw a police car turn down the street and realized I was a block from the station.

  I could go in and ask to speak with Monahan again. Lay it all out for him. I didn’t have the photos or the Darwin book or anything, but I could try to convince him that I wasn’t some kind of lunatic who once came in about Nazis down the hall and secret codes and now had graduated to German subs unloading weapons on American beaches and rogue State Department traitors. Would he believe a word that I was saying?

  Certainly when Willi and Trudi, Latimer, Noelle, or even Karl the waiter pointed the finger at me, no one would.

  Latimer had warned, If you go to the police or the FBI, we’ll know.…

  I looked behind me. I didn’t see anybody following. A couple, arm in arm, went past. A man on the other side of the street ducked into a doorway as if avoiding being seen, but then I saw him go into the building and a light go on in the hallway.

  It was all clear. They didn’t even think it necessary to put someone on my tail.

  I turned, huddled into my jacket, and went down the block to the station. I didn’t know what was the right or wrong thing to do, only that Emma’s life hung on whatever decision I made and I was scared to make it alone. I stopped in front. Two uniformed officers stepped out, nodded my way, and continued past me. Go on in, I exhorted myself. It was my only way out of this mess. Let the professionals handle it. I was just a pawn in this. Set up. Latimer couldn’t have his tentacles everywhere. They’d see it. Liz could confirm Emma and Mrs. Shearer were missing. I could name names. People. Places. But, of course, accusations like this would have to be looked into. And investigations would take time. And time was something I didn’t have now. And there was no guarantee, even if I did what they wanted, that Emma would ever be returned safely. I’d be risking her life, doing their bidding—all the while with no assurance of ever getting her back.

  All these things were careening through my mind.

  I asked my inner voice what to do, the one who always gave me the right advice, but he pulled himself out of the discussion fast, going, “I can’t help you this time, pal.”

  I took a last look around, pretty certain that no one was watching me, then said, “Hell,” and flung the station door open. My heart raced; I prayed I was doing the right thing. I took a breath and stepped up to the elevated front desk. A duty officer was sitting behind it, different from the one who had been there the last time I’d been inside.

  “Help you, buddy?” he looked down and said. He glanced up from whatever he was reading.

  My heart started to pound.

  All I’d have to do was blurt out, “They’ve taken my daughter!” That’s all I had to do. But my tongue was paralyzed.

  “Sir, can we help you…?” the duty officer asked again, peering down over his glasses.

  “Yes. I need to—” I felt a swell of panic come over me. Monahan already thought I was a flake. The story I had to tell now would be even harder to accept.

  “Buddy, are you all right…?” The cop peered over, seeing me break out in a sweat.

  I wasn’t even close to all right. I wasn’t sure if this was the right thing to be doing. Finally, it all made me feel like I was going to burst. “Sorry,” I exhaled, and turned and ran back outside. My chest was tight and exploding and I needed air. As soon as I got out of the doors, I gulped the crisp night air into my lungs and my heart went rat-tat-tat against my ribs.

  All I could conjure up was the image of the police knocking on the Bauers’ door, and then what would happen? Or the FBI sitting me down in an interrogation room, trying to pick apart the truth from what appeared to be ramblings. German subs. Latimer.

  All it would take was one call from Trudi and Willi and then what? About Emma.

  I just couldn’t take the risk.

  Slowly I regained myself and felt the sweats start to recede. I blew a blast of air out my cheeks.

  I had a day to figure something else out.

  Something that didn’t involve the police.

  Something so I wasn’t a traitor.

  Emma, I’ll find another way.

  34

  I headed down Lex to Forty-seventh and York to Liz’s sister’s apartment. The doorman rang me up.

  “What?” Liz met me at the door with worry in her eyes, searching my face for an answer. “Charlie, tell me.”

  “She’s all right,” I said upfront, trying to calm her. “I promise.” We went inside and sat down on the couch. Her sister Sophie poured some coffee. “But you are going to have to trust me on some things, Liz. Things that may be hard to believe at first. First, she’s being held. By Willi and Trudi. Just as I told you. And by some others too.”

  “Held?” Panic lit her eyes. “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve come upon some things, Liz. You’re not going to like them.”

  “What things, Charlie?” She gasped and put her hand to her mouth. “What do you mean by that?”

  “What I mean is I was right. About what I’ve been trying to tell you all along. The Bauers … they’re German agents, Liz. I know that’s hard for you to believe, but it’s true. Worse than agents, in fact. They’re about to take some steps against the country now that we’re at war.” I took her through the entire series of events that I’d been a part of over the past week. From the truck ride out to Bridgehampton and seeing the German sub in the water and the launch coming ashore. To Warren Latimer. And how I met him. And who he was. To Curtis and Mrs. Shearer. All the people in her life. German spies.

  She looked at me with the detached, slack-jawed gaze of a doctor trying to ascertain the mental health of a raving patient. “Charlie, you don’t actually expect me to believe all this, do you…?”

  “Liz, look at me,” I said. “This isn’t fantasy. This is real. You know it is. They have Emma. We’re at war. They have her in order to entrap me into helping them in some way.”

  “Helping them do what?” she asked.

  “I can’t tell you, Liz. You’re just going to have to trust me on this. The less you know the better. I know you’ve been skeptical of all this. I know you thought I was making stuff up or was even out of my mind. But I also know you know I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize Emma. And that’s what’s at stake here. And why I need you to trust me on all this. I’ll get her back.”

  “How? How will you get her back? What do they want you to do? You say they’re spies, Charlie. Even if I believe you on this, then we have to go to the police. Now. Right this minute. What else is there?”

  “No.” I held her by the shoulders. “Part of trusting me is accepting that I just don’t think that’s the best way right now.”

  “What’s not the best way, Charlie?” Panic flamed in her eyes, along with distrust. Distrust of me. “What’s not the best way?”

  “Getting the police involved. There
are people in this who are already more well connected than the police. We might alert them if we go…”

  “We might? Trust you? What are you jabbering about, Charlie? You’re telling me our daughter’s been taken. By this group of people we trusted who are now spies … That my own nanny is somehow involved. You say they’re plotting something. They’re holding our daughter for ransom. And that we can’t even take it to the police? What about the FBI then?”

  “No.”

  Her pupils were wide as dark moons, terrified. And I was doing my best not to be just as terrified. And to try to make sense to her, as much as I could. I described the meeting I’d just had with them. I even told her about Noelle. How the person I thought I was falling in love with had betrayed me.

  She looked to her sister and her brother-in-law, Les, a lawyer, for support.

  “How do we even know they’ll keep their word?” Les muttered after I fully mapped it out, making me trust I had at least convinced them I wasn’t raving mad.

  “We don’t.” I shrugged kind of futile-like and helplessly shook my head. “But I think you’re right on one thing, Liz. Trudi and Willi do have feelings toward her. I don’t think they’d want to see her harmed. They’d have no reason to, except to punish me, if we don’t comply. I’m banking on that.”

  “Comply with what, Charlie…?” Liz finally asked, looking pale and terrified.

  “If I do what they say. They have her hidden somewhere. I don’t think they’ll hurt her if I comply. But if I don’t, if they feel threatened in any way, I also have no doubt they’ll do what they say they’ll do.”

  “Do what, Charlie? What do they want you to do?” she asked again.

  It was best she didn’t know. Didn’t know what depths I had to sink to to try and save Emma. “They just need me to help them in something.” I exhaled. “For Emma’s sake, I’d rather not say.”

  Liz leaned back. Her red eyes raw and glazed. Trying to make sense of it. Of anything that was happening. “Willi and Trudi…,” she muttered, shaking her head. “I can’t believe this … I can’t … And Mrs. Shearer … I just can’t.”