by James R Benn
“Some of those friends are questionable,” I said. “My guess is that MI5 got to Radecki, and bribed or blackmailed him into keeping Tadeusz quiet. Horak told me that at first Radecki was too hard on Tadeusz, which made him retreat into his shell. That was Radecki’s way of keeping him quiet, but he probably knew it wouldn’t last, not with Kaz helping the kid day and night.”
“So he started doping him.”
“Yeah,” I said, gripping the door as Big Mike veered out into traffic, laying on the horn, to pass a slow-moving staff car. “Horak mentioned that Radecki and Tad started getting along better a few weeks ago. I’d bet that was when Radecki began giving him the laudanum.”
“You think the bad leg is phony?”
“No, probably not. But he said he reinjured it, falling on the stairs. That could have been his excuse to get the drugs. And knowing the condition Tad was in, Radecki would’ve become his best friend real fast. There’s nothing like laudanum to help you forget, or at least not care if you remember. He must have told Tad to keep it a secret, or he wouldn’t give him any more. The state Tad was in, he’d be sure to comply at first, and then be unable to stop later.”
“You think Radecki was trying to kill him, or to keep him quiet?”
“Radecki must have been increasing the dose he gave him. Kaz told me that after Tad spoke to me, he never said another word. Maybe Radecki was caught off guard, and decided to hurry things up once I’d heard Tad’s story.”
“But it backfired on him,” Big Mike said, hitting the accelerator as we cleared the most congested part of the road. “They sent the kid off to a hospital, where he couldn’t get at him.”
“Right. So he goes off to this Station Number Eight, but I’d bet anything he’s making a side visit to St. Albans first.”
“To give Tadeusz a fatal fix. Eddie must’ve stumbled onto all this, and he was blackmailing Radecki.”
“Could be. Or maybe he was in on it with him. Picking up the drugs, watching Tad when Radecki wasn’t there. Maybe the money was his MI5 pay, not blackmail money.”
“War work,” Big Mike said, shaking his head in disgust. “With Tadeusz gone, Radecki didn’t need him anymore.”
“A loose end. Radecki had it all planned, having lunch with Kaz, making sure Kaz’s fingerprints ended up on his bayonet. He eliminates the one person who knows what’s going on, pins it on Kaz, and then takes care of Tad.”
“There’s one thing that doesn’t make sense, Billy,” Big Mike said, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel. I could see his forehead crease as he worked at adding things up. “Why were Brown and Wilson looking for him, if he was doing what they wanted?”
“Good question. Maybe Cosgrove or one of his bosses has a conscience.”
“They cover up a massacre of thousands, and you think maybe one of them has a crisis of conscience at the last minute?”
“This may be different for them. Eddie’s blood is on their hands. Tadeusz’s may be also, and this is happening here, in London, not in some distant, dark wood.”
“Maybe they prefer Polish blood on Russian hands,” Big Mike said. His finger tapping stopped, and his knuckles showed white as he gripped the wheel. We were in the country now, winter fields bordered by small trees and shrubs spread out over the gently sloping landscape. White, fluffy clouds decorated the horizon, and the sun shone brightly over our shoulders. It was beautiful, and I tried to imagine thousands of Englishmen from these villages and farms, gathered up, bound, and shot in the head, then buried in mass graves in the forests at the edge of the farmland. Or Americans, from the city of Boston or the dairy farms of western Massachusetts. How expedient would it be then, to sacrifice justice for the sake of the war effort? How simple to forgo revenge when the rotting corpses were your brothers, husbands, fathers, and friends? Or if their names were Robert, James, Peter, John, or Daniel, instead of Jerzy, Czeslaw, Stanislaw, Zygmunt, or Wincenty?
“Big Mike, how do you say Michael in Polish?”
“Mieczyslaw. Why?”
“Just curious,” I said as a sign for Bricket Wood came up. “We’re getting closer. Take this right.”
“OK, Boleslaw,” Big Mike said, giving me a quick glance as he downshifted and took the narrow road. “Don’t ask me why, but that’s Polish for William.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
St. Albans Rest Home sat on a hill east of the village bearing the same name. It was hidden from view, nothing but a small white sign, the paint blistered and peeling, to point the way down a narrow country lane. We were stopped at a gatehouse manned by two fellows from the Home Guard. One of them looked about sixteen, and I wondered why he wasn’t in school. The other had wisps of gray hair sticking out from under his helmet and a bulbous red nose that meant his other duty station was in the local pub. Still, they were armed and all business, checking our identification papers and asking whom we were visiting. The boy went inside the gatehouse while the old fellow watched us for signs of trouble. Through the open door I could see the kid showing our papers to a guy in a gray suit, who glanced at us. He was no local Home Guard; even in the dim interior of the gatehouse, I could make out the steely glint in his eyes as he assessed us. He nodded to the kid, and picked up the telephone.
We drove on a wood-lined gravel driveway, passing two Home Guard soldiers patrolling the grounds. One of them gave us a cheery wave. As we neared the house, a civilian cradling a shotgun in one arm, and holding two dogs on a short leash by the other hand, crossed in front of us.
“Are they trying to keep people in or out of this place?” Big Mike said.
“Both. Probably a lot of secrets locked up in the heads of patients here. Wouldn’t do to have any of them wander off and start yakking with the locals.” Around a corner the woods thinned out and a great, green lawn opened up, with a four-story, ivy-encrusted granite building set on the far side. Patients wrapped in blankets sat in chairs on the lawn, facing the sun. Nurses pushed some in wheelchairs, or held onto the elbows of others as they took slow, hesitant steps. Some were dull eyed, their vacant stares focused on some distant vision. Others moved in abrupt spurts of energy, their eyes searching us for signs of recognition, salvation, or threat.
“Who are these people?” Big Mike said as he parked the car, the scrunch of gravel beneath the tires harsh and sudden.
“People who fight in darkness,” I said. Commandos, secret agents, assassins, and the innocent who had seen the unthinkable. Would Diana know any of them? Perhaps an SOE agent she’d trained with, who had escaped the Continent in body but not in spirit. I caught the eye of a young woman as she walked past the jeep, her nurse’s arm wrapped around her waist. She stared straight through me. “Let’s go,” I said. I had a vision of Diana shuffling along, dead eyes wide open, as a shiver passed through me
We checked in with a nurse at a desk strategically placed opposite the main entrance. An orderly, dressed in white, unlocked the door behind her and pointed up the main staircase. “Third floor, first door on your left.” This being England, that meant a climb up four floors, since the Brits start with the ground floor, and then begin counting.
At the top of the stairs we stopped and huffed and puffed for a second, catching our breath. Muffled voices came from the room to the left. I put my finger to my lips and we moved closer. I saw Big Mike put his hand in his pocket, where he kept his revolver, and I found my hand resting on the butt of my pistol in its shoulder holster, as we each took one side of the door. Leave it to a couple of cops to assume gunfire to come through a door in a quiet hospital in England.
“No.” That was Kaz’s voice, for certain.
“ On potrzebuje tego,” the other voice said.
“ Prosze, pozwalal mnie,” someone else said, in a small, weak voice.
“He’s asking for something,” Big Mike whispered as he put his hand on the doorknob. I took my hand off my revolver and nodded. He opened the door and I went in, stepping to the side to make room for Big Mike. We were both breathing heavily
, from the rapid stair climbing and the expectation of something wrong, something that needed cunning and cold steel. What we found was unexpectedly calm.
Tadeusz sat in an armchair, dressed in the same white pajamas and bathrobe as all the other patients. His face looked hollow and paler than the last time I’d seen him, his eyes bloodshot and rimmed with tears. Seated next to him was Valerian Radecki, in the midst of a discussion with Kaz, who leaned against the empty bed. The room was well furnished, with drapes pulled back from tall windows on one wall, and framed paintings adorning another. The rug was thick, and only the faintest trace of disinfectant lingered in the air. Otherwise, it could have been a guest room at a country estate. A very well guarded estate.
“What are you doing here?” Kaz said, his eyebrows arching in surprise.
“Looking for both of you,” I said, giving Radecki the once-over, checking for a bulge in his jacket. He didn’t reach for a weapon, didn’t protest his innocence. “A few steps ahead of MI5 and Scotland Yard.”
“Please wait outside,” Radecki said, oblivious to the implications of what I’d said. “We are discussing a matter internal to the Polish government.”
“That’s the point,” Kaz said, ignoring us and jumping back into the argument. “Tadeusz has information that is vital to the Polish government, and to the Polish nation. To our future.”
“But can’t you see that means nothing if he completely falls apart? He needs this simply to keep from going mad,” Radecki said.
“What you say is madness,” Kaz spat back. “Who will believe a drug addict? His word will be useless if the Russians find out. Or the press, for that matter.”
“I am not an addict,” Tadeusz said, but neither Kaz nor Radecki responded. Big Mike gave me a questioning glance, and I returned it with a quick, silent mouthed no. Neither was responding in the way I thought they would, and Radecki certainly wasn’t acting like a guilty killer.
“I am glad you came to visit, both of you, but it would be best if you left us for the moment,” Kaz said. “This is a decision we must make alone.”
“Whether or not to keep Tad drugged up?”
“Please, Lieutenant Boyle,” Radecki said. “It is none of your concern.”
“Really? Is this what you’ve been giving Tad, the same stuff you use?” I picked up a bottle of pills from a side table next to Radecki, where it sat next to a tin of biscuits. The bottle was the same as the one I’d found in his desk. How easy would it be to add poison, or simply overdose Tad?
“It’s the only thing that helps. Please,” Tadeusz said as he reached out a trembling hand. Radecki took the hand in his and patted it.
“Not yet, my friend. Lieutenant Kazimierz must first agree. It is only right.”
“I thought you two didn’t get along,” I said, trying to take in what was playing out here. Radecki wasn’t acting like a guy who’d knifed Eddie this morning and then come here with MI5-inspired murder on his mind. And Kaz damn well had no clue Scotland Yard was looking for him either.
“We didn’t,” Radecki said, giving Tadeusz’s hand a squeeze before letting it go. “But not because I disliked this brave young man. Rather, because I thought it best for him, and the government, if he would make a public declaration of what he saw at Katyn. But I was wrong. I saw how these terrible memories affected him, and I came to understand he had been wounded as terribly as a soldier struck by machine-gun fire. He needed rest, in a safe place, before he could face any scrutiny. So I withdrew, and Lieutenant Kazimierz took over.”
“I’m afraid I had little success,” Kaz said.
“You both helped me,” Tadeusz said, “as much as you could. I’m sorry I haven’t… I cannot…” Tears flowed from his eyes, but his face was calm, with no sign of anguish.
“You started giving him your laudanum,” I said.
“Yes,” said Radecki. “Our plan had been to coax Tadeusz along until he could speak for himself in front of strangers. Major Horak insisted it be done without drugs, so there would be no question of his stability, or willingness to speak the truth.”
“But you thought otherwise.”
“Yes, and I acted alone. Lieutenant Kazimierz didn’t find out until he arrived here, an hour before I did.”
“I’m sorry,” Tadeusz said. “They won’t give me anything here to let me sleep, orders from Major Horak. I can’t close my eyes, because the dreams come again and again. And I can’t leave them open, either. I stare at the wall, and I see all those men, their faces, staring back at me. Why didn’t they kill me with them? I wish I were with them; anything would be better than this.”
“Did you have an overdose,” I said, “after I met you? Kaz told me you didn’t speak at all after that.”
“No, it was nothing like that. Valerian gave me a dose every night, to help me sleep. He did that night, and it worked as usual. I could drift to sleep, and hardly remember anything, or care. But the next day, Major Horak said he wanted me to speak to your General Eisenhower, if it could be arranged. It frightened me, it still does. I found I couldn’t answer him, couldn’t speak to anybody, couldn’t communicate in any way.”
“I believe his mind found a way out,” Radecki said.
“Perhaps,” Tadeusz said. “This morning, though, I could speak.”
“I’m sorry,” Kaz said to him. “But we must talk about that again. General Eisenhower will be in London soon, and we need to influence him. There are many Poles in America, and if he reports what you tell him, they will have to demand the truth!”
“I can’t do all that. I can’t.”
“It will be just as you spoke with Billy. Not a lot of people.”
“I don’t think I’m able. Will you let Captain Radecki give me the laudanum?”
“Wait,” I said. “There is a part of this that is my business.”
“What part?” Radecki said.
“The part about Eddie Miller being murdered early this morning. With your bayonet through his heart.”
“Eddie?” Tadeusz said. “Who would kill Eddie? He was so kind to me.”
“He was an informer for the Russians.”
“Oh no,” Tadeusz said, thrusting his head back, as if to get away from the thought. “Oh no.”
“We just found out,” Kaz said, trying to calm him. “We were using him to send bad information to the Soviets. There was never any danger.”
“Not from the Soviets. But what about MI5?” I said.
“You can’t be serious,” Radecki said.
“I’m not saying they killed Eddie. But Scotland Yard thinks Kaz did. That’s one reason we’re here, to warn you.”
“What’s the other?” Kaz asked.
“To find out if Captain Radecki did, and if he intends to harm Tad.” As I spoke, Big Mike edged toward the door, blocking any route out.
“How dare you!” Radecki said, rising from his chair and advancing on me. “You accuse me? Are you an idiot? We were using Miller, he was valuable to us.”
“Maybe he outlived his usefulness. To you.”
“What do you mean, Billy?” Kaz said as Tadeusz looked at me and back to Radecki, as if trying to figure out whom he could trust.
“You were the ones who told me about the British government preventing the truth about Katyn coming out. Think about it. What agency would carry out that mission? MI5. How would they do it? Get someone on the inside. Bribe them, or hire them, to get the job done. For Allied unity. Get rid of the evidence. Get rid of Tadeusz.”
“Absurd,” Radecki said.
“No, it isn’t. You thought you had time to kill him, with an accidental overdose, probably. But you hadn’t counted on his being transferred out here, so you had to act fast. You killed your accomplice to keep him quiet, and tried to pin it on Kaz, to get him out of the way. He’s the only other person Tad trusts, and who might have noticed anything. Two birds with one stone, pretty smart.”
“My accomplice? That pathetic waiter?”
“Sure. He knew all about
the drugs. He made the pickup for you at your doctor’s office on Horseferry Road. That way no one would notice how often you went there.”
“You fool!” Radecki said, his fist raised in anger. “Miller never went to get the laudanum. Sheila Carlson did. I couldn’t take the time, and the walk only made my leg ache like the devil, so I paid her to go. I called the damn doctor to let him know, he’ll confirm it.”
“Sheila?” I felt a horrible sensation in my stomach, the dropping away of everything I had thought was true. What did it mean? “Sheila?”
“She was very nice to me,” Tadeusz said. “She always stopped by to chat. A very pretty girl. Did she do something wrong?”
“She lied,” I said. “About something she had no reason to lie about, unless she was covering something up.”
“Or laying the blame on a dead man,” Big Mike said from his post at the door.
“Why did you and Kaz have lunch together yesterday?” I said to Radecki, trying to keep the threads of my theory from unraveling. “And how did you get him to handle your bayonet? His fingerprints are probably all over it.”
“I invited him in order to find out if and when he would visit Tadeusz, so I could get here first. But my train was delayed at Radlett, and as you can see, I was late. As for the bayonet, it was Lieutenant Kazimierz who asked about it.”
“It’s true, Billy,” Kaz said. “I sensed he was interested in when I would visit, but I didn’t know why. To change the subject, I asked him about the bayonet he kept on his shelf. I picked it up out of mere curiosity.”
“No one was blackmailing you?” I asked Radecki.
“Of course not. Over what?”
“Drugging Tad, I had thought. Did Sheila know you’d been giving him your laudanum?”
“Not that I know of, no. Although I do remember her knocking on Tadeusz’s door one day, just as I was bringing him some. It’s possible she overheard.”
“Did she ask about Tadeusz recently?”
“Why, yes, she did,” Radecki said. “Yesterday. I told her I planned to visit him today, if I could get away.”
