The Alex Kovacs Series Box Set

by Richard Wake

  The last time I had heard from my father, it had been a telephone call to the bank where he asked me to give some of the money back. It was a long call, in three acts. In the first, he said a rebate from me was the "sporting" thing to do. In the second, he said it was the "gentlemanly" thing to do. And then, in the third and final act, the man who had always treated both his brother Otto and me as some peculiar species of irresponsible wastrels, insisted that I owed it, "as a matter of family honor." That's when I hung up.

  So, Merry Christmas. My spying activities had pretty much shut down for the holiday season, not because spies are particular fans of nativity scenes, except as places for a discreet brush pass of information or a quick conversation, but because the people I was spying on -- bankers, German ministers and the like -- all had families outside of their day jobs, and this was a family time. I was pretty much left with the newspapers, which speculated reasonably often about what might be next, but subtly. When it happened -- when Adolf's legions finally arrived -- it wouldn't be subtle, but for now, the talk was of unspecified "consultations in Berlin," and feature stories about the state-of-the-art technology contained within the Maginot Line, and friendly reaffirmations of Belgian neutrality, and the catch-all "awaiting events." Everybody was awaiting events.

  Gregory opened a bottle of champagne on Christmas Eve, and we sat around and told the old Vienna stories. Gregory got misty when he brought up his wife, who died of breast cancer in 1930. I got misty when I told my Christmas story about Uncle Otto, the one from soon after the war when he bought me a new suit and handed me a train ticket and a list of hotel reservations, officially giving me my first three clients, saying, "God, you were born to do this. Sometimes I think you really are my kid."

  And then Henry and Liesl locked arms and announced she was pregnant. Gregory wept for about five minutes and then sat stunned as if clobbered by an especially mighty right hand. As best as the doctor could figure, she was due in late May.

  Walking home, picturing in my head the whole way just how happy Henry and Liesl and Gregory were, I wondered if I was close to that. Or was I kidding myself? Was a life with Manon just some invention of my imagination, one that she never considered a possibility? And if she did think it as a real possibility, would I be able to commit when the moment arrived? Or was I always destined to be Otto's nephew, continually holding life at arm's length?

  Questions. And then, beneath my front door, someone had stuffed a flyer. It read, "Unite Against Nazi Aggression!" It was advertising a rally for the following Sunday, New Year's Eve, at the end of Bahnhofstrasse, right in front of Lake Zurich. The sponsors of the rally were not identified, which seemed odd, and I wondered if it was a request for a meeting from Groucho or another of the Czech spies. But I looked outside and saw the same flyer sticking out of from under a half-dozen doors. I snatched one and compared it to mine, just to make sure.

  As it turned out, they were identical. It was just a flyer. Next week, I knew, there would be another one, not for a pro-Hitler rally -- that would just be crass -- but for "a celebration of German culture and heritage" or some such thing. In a neutral country, divided by German influence in the north and east and French influence in the south and west, this tugging in both directions was a near-constant.

  I grabbed the bottle of schnapps from the sideboard. And by the time I was finished comparing the two flyers, and wondering about what morsel of news the morning papers might bring, and considering when it was time to start trolling the hotel bars again, I wasn't thinking about Manon or babies or what might be anymore.

  18

  January 4th was the first Thursday of 1940. Cafe Tessinerplatz was even more crowded than it was for the typical Thursday promotion. It was filled with men, almost exclusively, men who likely had seen enough of their families recently. Or, as Albert the waiter said as he seated me, "You can overdo it with the kith and kin, am I right, Herr Alex?"

  Marc Wegens, my army friend, was nowhere to be seen, though. I was two Manhattans deep, and he was still absent, which was unusual but not unheard of. Even during a phony war, as a major in a phony army, Marc likely was dealing with a lot of last-minute re-figuring of, well, everything an army figures. It was such a strange outfit, the Swiss military. They didn't have a general except when things started to get hot, and the legislature picked a guy to deal with the heat. The legislature just did that, and the papers said the guy's name was Guisan, and they called up a couple of hundred thousand people from the reserves. The whole thing sounded like a logistical nightmare. Hence, I figured, no Marc.

  I was about to call it a night when Herman Stressel, the German magazine editor, walked in with another man I had not met before. He caught my eye, and the two of them sat at my table.

  "Vlad Brodsky," the man said. He stuck out his hand and began talking before Herman had time to make the introductions. "And you are Alex Kovacs, who might or might not be doing a little undercover work for the Czechs. Am I right?"

  I looked at Herman. "Motherf--"

  "Calm yourself, my friend Alex," Brodsky said. He put his hand on my arm, as familiar as if we had known each other since kindergarten. "You must not blame Herman. I wheedled it out of him. I can be very persuasive."

  "He can help you," Herman said. He sat, half-smiled, half-shrugged. "I promise you, he can help."

  I didn't know what to say. They ordered drinks from Albert, and we sat in silence until they arrived. I don't know if it was the alcohol, but the rage I felt at the instant of hearing that Herman had blabbed to Brodsky ebbed almost instantly. Soon, I was calculating how this might help me, waiting for one of them to say something -- which Herman finally did.

  "The reason I could tell Vlad was because, well, Vlad is in the same business," he said.

  "Sort of," Vlad said.

  "Let me put it this way," Herman said. "Vlad is in a couple of businesses. Do you understand what I am saying?"

  I had no earthly idea what he was saying, which I told him, substituting the word "fucking" for the word "earthly." Vlad snorted his approval.

  "You are so careful, my dear Herman," he said. "It is the German in you, always walking on the eggshells -- that is the expression, yes? Hitler has you spooked. You're in a free, neutral country but you act as if the Gestapo is listening over your shoulder."

  "For all I know, they are," Herman said, pointing at Albert.

  "I don't think so," I said.

  "You know nothing," Herman said. "You are so naive."

  "Listen -- I once tried to kill a Gestapo officer in Cologne. I had spent time stripped naked in a cell of a Gestapo prison. I'm not fucking naive."

  "Now this is interesting," Brodsky said, rubbing his hands together in delight. "You will tell me that story another time. But in the here and now, let me spell out what our friend Herman has been attempting to explain in his riddles. When he says that I am in a couple of businesses, what he means is that, under my cover as a journalist -- I'm a correspondent for a newspaper in Helsinki -- I am working as an intelligence officer for some important people in Moscow."

  I looked at Herman, my eyes as serious as I could make them. "But, in case you haven't been reading the papers, that makes you Herr Hitler's partner at the bridge table," I said. "Are you doing his bidding."

  "This is where my businesses get interesting," Brodsky said. "I have sources here and there, in Germany and elsewhere, including our friend here," he said, waving at Herman. "When I get a piece of information, I send it in one of three directions. If it is bullshit analysis or gossip, I send it to Helsinki to put in the newspaper. If it is military information that I believe will benefit the Soviet Union for the day when Hitler turns on us, as we all know he will -- even Comrade Stalin does, I believe -- I send it to Moscow. But for information that I believe might benefit the French or the British or the Belgians or the Dutch, my inclination is to send it in their direction."

  "Those are his businesses," Herman said.

  "And this is where you come in," B
rodsky said. "I have begun to receive information that I would like to send westward, and I would like to do it through you."

  With that, Brodsky began to tell his story. From a source just outside the German high command -- "but he's very close, and not a damn janitor, although they can be quite lucrative sources" -- Brodsky had obtained the bare bones of the Wehrmacht's western invasion plans. Their name was "Case Yellow."

  "Terrible name," I said.

  "Terrible people," Herman said.

  "Shhhh," Brodsky said. He went on to explain that he knew only two things: that the plan involved the invasion of Holland and Belgium first, and that it was likely to occur before the end of January.

  "Sounds like the last time," I said. "Why do they think it's going to work this time after what happened the last time?"

  "Come now, you read the papers," Herman said. "You've heard Hitler's speeches. You know why they think they lost, right? It wasn't because of a bad plan or any military failure. It was because of the Communists hiding in the government. It was because of the Jews most of all. German territory was intact, the army was entirely in France, and it got stabbed in the back, right when it was on the verge of victory."

  "With the country starving and millions of men already killed and wounded," I said. "That the Jews' fault, too."

  "Of course it is," Herman said. "Where have you been?"

  "But it's more than that," Brodsky said. "If you look at the map, there really aren't a lot of ways in, especially if the Maginot Line is all that it's cracked up to be. If the Germans come in a little stronger and a little faster this time, they could do it. They came damn close at the beginning last time. They were this close to taking Paris."

  We debated back and forth about our understanding of the Battle of the Marne, and the soldiers ferried to the front in taxicabs to join the fight, and how much was truth and how much was propaganda. In the end, though, I needed to get the message to London, and quickly.

  "So we can work together?" Brodsky said.

  I nodded.

  "And if you come across any crumbs that might benefit me?"

  I nodded again.

  We agreed on a signaling method if either of us needed a meeting. On the path around the perimeter of Lake Zurich, used by families taking a stroll on pleasant days and solitary men smoking cigarettes and walking their dogs in the evening, there was a marble fountain with some fish and other assorted designs displayed as part of a tiny-tiled mosaic. At the top of the fountain, it said "MCMIX."

  "If either of us needs a meeting," Brodsky said, "we will just leave a mark with yellow chalk on the side of the fountain's basin. You'll need to check it at least every other day, and definitely on Thursday." He then said the meeting place would be at the Barley House, a bar on Escher-Wyssplatz.

  "Way out there?" I said.

  "It's right on the tram line -- the stop is right out front. And nobody will ever think anything of it. It's full of people pretty much all day -- the brewery down the street is running three shifts these days."

  That settled, we decided to have one more. I had so many thoughts running through my head that I almost forgot. I looked at Herman, and it was as if we remembered at the same time.

  "The gold," I said.

  "I know, I know," Herman said. "I do have a little something -- not much, but maybe it can get you started. I still don't have any details about the mechanics of the transaction. I can't even prove it's happening, not definitively. But there is somebody at the national bank -- Herr Jan Tanner. Somebody who I trust told me that if this is happening, he is the person making it happen."

  "Spell the name," I said, and Herman complied, and I repeated it back.

  19

  The next night, Gregory and I sent the information that Brodsky had given me to London. It was the longest message we had sent and by far the most important. We still weren't exactly sure what risks we were running, although the picture of Michael Landers with his eye shot out was never far from my consciousness when Gregory was tapping away on his radio key. But whatever the risks, this was worth it. As he finished up, Gregory looked at me and said, with a kind of solemn excitement, if that was possible, "If this were to make a difference, I would be proud to die right now. Maybe for the first time in my life."

  "You don't mean that," I said.

  "I think I do. I was proud of my marriage. I am proud of Henry. But I have never been proud of anything I ever worked on. I made money. I did it within the rules of my profession. I wasn't a thief. The punishments I inflicted, or had inflicted on others, were always within the understood boundaries. But I never fought in a war for my country. I never did much charity work, other than within the context of the business."

  "That isn't true. I rememb--"

  "It is true," Gregory said. He was disconnecting the Morse key, placing it in the drawer of the table along with the copy of the Bible, not so much to conceal them as to keep things tidy, even amid the stacks of crates and crap in the spare bedroom of his flat. We were still waiting for the acknowledgment from Groucho, though. If it didn't come, Gregory would just have to pull out everything from the drawer and start again.

  "My life was about money and power but mostly money," he said. "What could I tell God when he asked for my accomplishments? That I never stole from people, even as others did? That I never had anyone beaten up just to make an example of them? Alex, there has to be more than that."

  We sat for a few seconds in silence. I didn't know what to say, even as I knew what Gregory was feeling. The more I thought about it, the more I recognized the parallels in our lives. I wasn't a mobster, but until Groucho had recruited me in 1937, my life had been strictly about money and comfort and avoiding personal entanglements.

  "I think you understand what I'm saying," Gregory said. He stared me down, locking eyes until I nodded. The moment was broken by the acknowledgment code from London, dash-dash-dot, the letter G.

  "You sent the whole thing?" I said.

  "Of course."

  "The last part, too, about how we are awaiting further instructions?"

  "Yes, yes, all of it," he said. "This was pretty big news. They might need a few minutes to digest it."

  We had a drink and distracted ourselves with talk about the baby. But it was a temporary thing -- I barely slept, seeing every hour on my bedside clock, worrying about the impending German invasion and how the French and British would react to our message, wondering how they might use me from here. The truth was, I was excited.

  I remembered something Leon told me, about the first time he covered a murder for Der Bild in Vienna. He said, "So it's this horrible fucking scene, the guy's head was half hacked off of his body. The cop let me have a peek, and any normal human being would have thrown up on the spot. But I started taking notes from the scene: the cut of the dead guy's hair, the color of his jacket, the blood dripping over the curbstone in a tiny stream and falling into the gutter. Recording the details was like an instinct for me. That's when I knew for sure that I was in the right business."

  And this night, and what I was feeling every time I woke up and looked at the clock, that's when I knew.

  But there really wasn't anything I could do until Groucho sent some instructions. Gregory would turn on the radio every night at midnight for five minutes, in case there was a message. There had not been one in the weeks since we had started, but he listened every night.

  In the meantime, I had Herr Jan Tanner to investigate. In a bookcase behind where Anders spent his day, we had copies of the yearly directories published by the national bank. The next morning, I went and grabbed the 1939 edition -- the heft of the book, with its brown leather cover, buckled my wrist for a second, until I adjusted. I felt Anders staring through my back as I reached up to take it. I could make small talk with anybody, but I had given up trying with that guy, and I usually just saw his blank expression for what it was -- blank. Lately, though, and especially since the murder, his look had seemed more menacing. Or maybe it was just
my imagination, which admittedly had undergone a few recent jolts.

  The book told me that Tanner's official title was director of currency and physical assets. I assumed that physical assets were gold bars and bullion and coins. He had held the position since 1935. His main offices were in the bank's building in Bern, but the book also listed another office in Zurich. I guessed that he had to spend at least a third of his time here or they wouldn't have bothered to give him the second office. So that is where I would concentrate.

  As I considered, Marta barged through the door with my diary open before her. "We need to do this," she said, accusing me of ducking her attempts at organizing my schedule for weeks. The truth was, I had only been ducking her for days.

  She sat in the chair next to my desk -- Marta was the only one who ever sat in it -- and, from a separate notepad, began firing off questions and answers. A dozen lunches, dinners, coffees, cocktails, and conferences were decided upon, with Marta doing most of the deciding. She wrote the appointments in the diary in ink -- always in ink, despite the inevitable changes that would occur.

  Her handiwork complete, she paged through. She got to the last week in January and stopped. This was suddenly having the potential to be a pretty big week in my life, in all of our lives, after what Brodsky had said, but that wasn't why she stopped. Instead, it was because of a longstanding appointment that had been winking at me for weeks, ever since it was first entered.