Curtain of Death
Page 18
Well, she’s right about that.
“Interesting point,” Wallace said.
“So, Harry, he told me what he’d rather not see in my story and why. And, since what he told me made sense, I wrote it that way.”
“Am I supposed to say, ‘Thank you’?”
“That would be nice. You’re welcome. Anyway, Harry, at some point in our conversation, Odessa came up. I told Jim that was a story I’d really like to write and was going to write whether he liked it or not, but maybe we could scratch each other’s back. Or rub each other’s back, whichever he might prefer. So we made a deal.”
“As I understand that, what he contributes is telling you things you have no right to know. So what are you contributing to this mutual back rubbing?”
“For openers,” Cronley answered, “she’s going to arrange for us to get a guy into the Stars and Stripes plant in Pfungstadt.”
“How?”
“She’s got a jeep. From USFET Public Relations—”
“The USFET Press Office,” she corrected him.
“No driver,” Cronley said. “So we give her a driver, one of Tiny’s guys, and they drive this jeep to Pfungstadt. She leaves Tiny’s guy there to see what he can find out about Odessa using the Stripes trucks—”
“She’s not going to stay there?”
“No. Just the driver. I’ll go pick her up in an L-4, or send Winters, and bring her back here. If our guy is going to find anything out, he should be able to do it in three or four days. Then she calls Pfungstadt and tells them to send her driver down here with the jeep.”
That just might work. I’ll be damned.
“Miss Johansen . . .”
“You can call me Janice, Harry.”
“Only if you call me Harold, Janice.”
“Does that mean you’ve accepted me as a fellow warrior in the holy war against the Red Menace?”
Yeah, I guess it does.
“I don’t have much choice, do I?”
“Well, in that case, Harold, I’ll call you Harold.”
“I was about to say I hope you really understand my uneasiness about—”
“Me hearing things I shouldn’t be hearing?”
“Yeah.”
“Not to worry, Harold. As there are very few Army officers who can actually find their own rear ends with one hand, there are a very few journalists who can be trusted. I’m one of them. I’m not going to blow what you guys are doing for the sake of a byline. Okay? Do we understand each other, Harold?”
“I really hope so,” Wallace said. “So when are you going to drive to Pfungstadt?”
“Just as soon as Jim and I get back from the monastery.”
My God, he’s not going to take her out there!
“What’s your interest in Kloster Grünau?”
“I want to have a look at the guy Colbert popped—the one who was dead on arrival at the 98th Hospital. Resurrection is always a good story.”
“Jesus Christ!”
“Even if I can’t write it right now. What are the Brits always saying, Harold? ‘In for a penny, in for a pound’?”
After a perceptible pause, Wallace said, “That’s what they’re always saying.”
Two waiters appeared carrying their breakfasts.
[ TWO ]
Suite 507
Hotel Vier Jahreszeiten
Maximilianstrasse 178
Munich, American Zone of Occupation,
Germany
1025 26 January 1946
Captain Chauncey L. Dunwiddie, Miss Claudette Colbert, Mr. Friedrich Hessinger, Mr. August Ziegler, and Mr. John D. Hammersmith were in the office when Major Harold Wallace, Captain James D. Cronley, and Miss Janice Johansen walked in.
“Surprise, surprise,” Wallace greeted them. “The enemy is at the gates.”
“You can close your mouth now, Captain Dunwiddie,” Cronley said.
“Good morning,” Janice said.
“Change in the Order of Battle,” Wallace said. “Johansen, Janice, from Enemy to Ally.”
“Thank you, Harold,” Janice said.
“Don’t make me regret it,” Wallace said.
“Perish the thought,” she said.
“I have jumped to the conclusion that everyone has read this morning’s Stars and Stripes,” Wallace said, making it a question.
Everyone nodded.
“Janice has told us (a) that her splendid story will already have made its way on the AP wire to all the world’s newspapers, including the Washington Star, which both the admiral and El Jefe read over their morning coffee, and (b) that the Washington Star will almost certainly run a story of great international significance, such as a WAC non-com blowing away four evil men intent on stealing her virtue with a .38 she carries around in her underwear.
“To that end, Freddy, get on the horn to the ASA in Fulda to make sure I have an encrypted voice line to El Jefe at noon. That will be 0700 in Washington, and with a little bit of luck, I’ll be able to talk to El Jefe before he or the admiral reads Miss Johansen’s article. I suspect both the admiral and his executive assistant will wish to chat with me about it. I would prefer to have that chat before they are enraged by it.”
“Yes, sir,” Hessinger said. “I’ll arrange the line.”
“I am now going to my room, where I will try to figure out what to say. Captain Cronley will bring you up to speed on this disaster. If Colonel Mattingly calls, tell him I’m skiing in the Alps.”
“Is Colonel Mattingly somehow involved in this?” Claudette asked.
Wallace hesitated before replying.
Finally he said, “Dette, would you be surprised to hear that once again Captain Cronley has grossly annoyed Colonel Mattingly and that as we speak the colonel is probably telling General Seidel why he is displeased?”
“No, sir.”
“That’s something else I fear I will have to discuss with our naval superiors. How am I going to talk them out of keelhauling our chief?”
“I see the problem,” Hessinger said.
“Good,” Wallace said, and walked out of the office.
Everybody looked at Cronley.
“While Freddy is talking to Fulda,” he said, “what I need from you, Tiny, is one of your troopers, a German speaker, to drive Miss Johansen to Pfungstadt, where he will spend several days becoming chummy with the Stars and Stripes delivery truck drivers.”
“Good idea!” Hammersmith said.
“I want him ready to go the minute Miss Johansen and I get back from Kloster Grünau.”
“What’s that about?” Hessinger asked.
“Miss Johansen is interested to see the man we reported as dead.”
“Resurrection always makes a good story,” Janice furnished.
“I won’t even get into that,” Claudette said. “But before you go out there, I think you’d better have a look at this.”
Cronley read the SIGABA printout she handed him:
Priority
Top Secret Lindbergh
Duplication Forbidden
From Polo
via Vint Hill Tango Net
2210 Greenwich 25 January 1946
To Altarboy
Pilot of SAA flight 777 eta Rhine main 1700 local 26 Jan has photos you requested of daddy showing wife and kiddies buenos aires cultural attractions.
Polo
End
Top Secret Lindbergh
Cronley handed it to Janice.
“What am I looking at?” she asked.
“This changes our schedule,” he said. “I think we should have these pictures before we go see Lazarus.”
“Who the hell is Lazarus?” Augie asked.
“You should have paid attention in Bible class, Augie,” Cronley replied. “If you had
, you would know that Lazarus is the guy Christ raised from the dead. Religiously speaking . . .”
“Or blasphemously,” Tiny said.
“. . . the guy Dette popped and we reported as dead has probably decided he’s in purgatory, which, Augie, my heathen pal, is the place between heaven and hell. He expects that he will soon be on his way to hell, with his mortal remains buried in an unmarked grave in Kloster Grünau. I will show him his other option by showing him photographs of former NKGB Polkóvnik Sergei Likharev and his wife and children in heaven. In other words, Buenos Aires. I wouldn’t be at all surprised if ol’ Sergei and his family are shown saying ‘cheese’ before the Colón Opera House. Which Lazarus, the Russians being big on opera, will recognize. He then has the choice between going to heaven or to the unmarked grave I mentioned.”
Both Ziegler and Hammersmith wondered: Is he actually thinking of shooting this guy?
“So the first thing we have to do is get Janice and her driver to Pfungstadt.”
“That driver is going to be a problem,” Tiny said. “You said you want a German speaker. Unless schlafzimmer Deutsche counts, my guys don’t.”
“We need somebody who speaks German and knows what to listen for,” Cronley said.
“I got a guy,” Ziegler said.
Cronley motioned for him to continue.
“He speaks Pennsylvania Dutch, which is really Hessian German.”
“Another Pennsylvania Dutchman?” Hessinger asked.
Ziegler nodded. “He’s an MP PFC. Seventeen years old.”
“Wonderful!” Cronley said.
“I was in the PX snack bar when I heard someone cussing in Dutch. He had spilled his Coke and hot dog in his lap. So I talked to him. He’s from Kunsterville in Bucks County. He finished high school in June, joined the Army to get the GI Bill. They ran him through six weeks of basic training and sent him over here. The 403rd MPs had him working as a translator.”
“You said you had a guy,” Cronley said.
“I decided I needed a translator more than the 403rd did.”
“And he was a fellow Dutchman,” Cronley said. “You’re not seriously proposing we send this kid to snoop around Odessa?”
“His ambition in life is to be a CID agent. And he’s smart.”
Cronley sighed audibly.
“Jim,” Hammersmith said, “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but why not? Ziegler says he’s smart, he speaks the language, and who’s going to suspect a seventeen-year-old PFC of being anything but a seventeen-year-old PFC? All he’s going to have to do is hang around the Stars and Stripes motor pool and keep his eyes and ears open.”
“Oh, shit,” Cronley said. “Well, let’s get him over here and have a look at him.”
—
PFC Karl-Christoph Wagner appeared fifteen minutes later, in full MP regalia. He was not what Cronley expected. Wagner had the innocent face of a seventeen-year-old, but he was six feet two and obviously weighed more than two hundred pounds.
“Karl, this is Captain Cronley,” Augie said.
Wagner saluted crisply.
Speaking in German, Cronley said, “Mr. Ziegler has been telling us you want to be a CID agent. Why?”
“I want to better myself, sir.”
Well, he speaks German.
“Just for the sake of conversation, Wagner, would you be interested in taking on an assignment under Mr. Ziegler that would involve a certain element of risk to yourself? To your life?”
“Yes, sir.”
Cronley had a mental image of PFC Wagner in a Boy Scout uniform solemnly reciting the Boy Scout oath—On my honor, I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country . . . —on the occasion of his promotion from Tenderfoot to Second Class rank while his mother and father watched proudly.
What this kid is doing is thinking, “I am now going to have the opportunity to go out and slay dragons!”
“Karl,” Augie said, “we have reason to believe that the drivers, the German drivers, of the trucks who distribute the Stars and Stripes every day, are carrying contraband.”
“You mean black market stuff, sir?”
“That, too, probably, but what we’re looking for is people.”
“Nazis, you mean, sir?”
“Yes, Nazis,” Augie said. “Here’s the deal, Karl. Miss Johansen here . . .”
“I thought that might be who you are. I saw your story in the Stripes this morning about Miss Colbert, Miss Johansen.”
“What we’re thinking of having you do, Karl,” Augie said, “is drive Miss Johansen in her jeep to the Stars and Stripes printing plant in Pfungstadt, which is twenty miles south of Frankfurt. She will then leave for a couple of days, leaving you there to just hang around the motor pool and see what you can learn. For example, does one of the drivers seem to be the guy running things? Or look like he’s into moving PX goodies? Just get his name. Don’t even think of arresting anybody even if you catch him with fifty cartons of Chesterfields and fifty pounds of coffee he stole from the PX. You understand?”
“Got it, sir.”
“You think you could handle that, Karl?” Augie asked.
“Yes, sir. I’m a dumb PFC just hanging around.”
“Is there a PX in Pfungstadt?” Hammersmith asked.
“Yes. And a QM clothing store,” Janice said.
“What I’m thinking is that Wagner could go to the PX and stock up on cigarettes, Hershey bars, et cetera. And maybe to the QM store. I understand jockey shorts and T-shirts are a hot item on the black market. Maybe one of the drivers might make him an offer.”
Cronley had an epiphany.
“Time out,” he said. “Are we really seriously considering sending this kid—no offense, Wagner, but you’re seventeen—to do something like this? These are not nice people. We don’t even know for sure that it was the NKGB that tried to grab Dette and Florence. Lazarus might be Odessa. Or connected with it.”
“I can do this, sir,” Wagner said.
“On the other hand,” Hammersmith said, “he is seventeen, and we agreed that the NKGB or Odessa is unlikely to think a seventeen-year-old is a DCI agent.”
“Tiny?” Cronley asked.
“I’m glad, frankly, that I don’t have to make the call,” Dunwiddie said.
Cronley looked at Wagner.
“You sure you want to do this, son? That you know what you’re volunteering for?”
“Yes, sir. I understand.”
“Yes, sir, I really want to help the old lady cross the street. To do my duty to God and my country!
“And slay dragons!”
“How long’s it going to take you to go to your kaserne and pack an overnight bag?” Cronley asked.
Why do I think I’m going to regret this decision?
“I won’t have to do that, sir. If there’s a PX and a clothing store at Pfungstadt, I can get whatever I need there.”
Cronley considered that for a moment.
“Okay, here’s the schedule: Wagner drives Miss Johansen to Pfungstadt. If they leave now—it’s about a hundred and sixty miles, all autobahn, so that’s about four hours—they’ll get there about 1500. That’ll give Miss Johansen time to tell the Stripes people that she’s going to leave Wagner there for a couple of days. And for them to go to the PX and the clothing store. And while that’s happening, I’ll go to the PX here and get the goodies Sergeant Finney is going to take to Strasbourg. Then I’ll get in a Storch and fly to Eschborn, pick up one of the Ford staff cars we’ve got stashed there, and go to Rhine-Main to meet the SAA flight arriving at 1700 and get the tourist pictures of the Likharevs seeing the sights in Buenos Aires. It’s a short haul from Rhine-Main to Pfungstadt, so I should get there by 1800. That makes it too late to get back here today, but we can take off at first light and be at Kloster Grünau by, say, ten tomorrow morning.”
“I hadn’t thought about that,” Cronley admitted.
“I’m surprised,” Claudette said.
Cronley sensed something in her tone of voice and looked at her.
What is that, the Green-Eyed Monster?
He saw in her eyes that it was.
“Eschborn is right down the road from the senior officers’ hotel, Schlosshotel Kronberg,” Janice said. “What about that?”
“That’d work,” Cronley said.
“I’m sure it will,” Claudette said, with a knowing smile.
Is Augie picking up on this? Or anybody else?
“Well, let’s get the show on the road. Get out of that MP gear, Wagner,” Cronley ordered.
“Yes, sir,” Wagner said, and began to divest himself of the white MP Sam Browne belt and holster, the MP brassard on his arm, and the white leggings.
“I’ll hang on to that stuff for you, Wagner,” Ziegler said.
“Thank you, sir.”
“Dette, give him fifty—no, a hundred—dollars from the safe,” Cronley ordered.
“Yes, sir,” she said.
Ziegler saw Wagner take the .45 Colt semiautomatic pistol from his holster.
“Karl, you can leave the .45 in its holster,” Ziegler said. “I’ll take care of it.”
Wagner ejected the magazine, racked the action, checked to see that it was unloaded, and then reinserted the magazine.
“I thought I’d take it with me,” Wagner said, holding the pistol in his large hand.
“I’m not sure that would be a good idea, Wagner,” Cronley said. “People would wonder what a Press Office jeep driver was doing with a pistol.”
“I’m not going to wave it around, sir,” Wagner replied. “No one would know I have it.”
He pulled up the hem of his Ike jacket, jammed the pistol inside the waistband of his trousers, and then pulled the Ike jacket down over it. There was no indication that the jacket now concealed a weapon.
“See, sir? Who would know I had it?”