The Torch Betrayal

by Glenn Dyer

  “Are you kidding me? I’m far from lucky. Too far,” Thorn said while he spun his wedding band around his finger. When Thorn noticed that Heugle was staring at him, he dropped his hands and slid them into his pants pockets.

  “Don’t you get it? It’s London. With no more Blitz, it’s the gold ring of postings.”

  “And far from the front lines. At least here we can mix it up with the Gestapo.”

  “You’re so confused. Give it a day. It’ll all sink in.” He paused briefly. “Tell me something. Why do you still wear that thing?”

  Thorn shot him a hard look. “That . . . thing?” He shook his head in disgust. “I wear it . . . out of respect.” Even I don’t believe that. So what is the answer? he wondered.

  “Respect for . . . Ahh, forget it,” Heugle said, sliding off the fender, away from Thorn.

  “Yeah, good idea.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  1330 Hours, Saturday, October 3, 1942

  US Army Air Forces Film Lab, Camp Griffiss, London

  Elizabeth wished she had peed before they’d left for the film lab. But the commotion in the office after LCDR Butcher met with the general had distracted her, and before she realized it, she found herself in the backseat of the staff car. The first leg of the trip from Grosvenor Square to the US Army Air Forces Film Lab southwest of London was normally quick, gas rationing having culled the London streets of most civilian vehicular traffic. But once outside London, the narrow roads became choked with numerous types of military vehicles fighting for every inch alongside the brave, bicycle-riding English. Elizabeth customarily took the opportunity to rest her eyes and think of something other than the war. Staff Sergeant Billings, the driver, would take the hint and drive in silence.

  Today was different. Billings, a former New York City cab driver, navigated the traffic-clogged roads to the film lab with generous application of the horn accompanied with flashing headlights and an occasional shout of Move it, Mac! Butcher slumped in his seat beside Elizabeth, his right hand beating out a silent cadence against his knee.

  The satchel that she used to carry documents back and forth to the film lab was handcuffed to her wrist. It didn’t need to be, as it contained nothing. She knew that if Butcher asked why she’d brought it along, she would tell him, in no uncertain terms, it was so she could place the missing page inside when it was found. That’s how confident she was that this nightmare would soon be over. But as the olive-green Buick Roadmaster with bold, five-point, white stars emblazoned on the front doors darted in and out of traffic, the question did not come. Instead, Butcher sat quietly, staring out the window.

  “That lieutenant . . . did you call ahead to make sure that the lieutenant who handled the microfilming was still there?” The question from Butcher startled Elizabeth. It was only then that she realized that she was clutching the satchel so tightly her right arm was trembling.

  “Yes, Commander. I asked that he be detained should his shift end before we got there,” Elizabeth said, her voice shaky and feeble.

  “All right, that’s where we’ll begin. And tell me, what does he know?” Butcher asked in a low voice, pointing with his thumb to the front seat.

  “I have told him nothing,” she said.

  Butcher nodded and turned back to the window.

  Billings pulled off the two-lane road onto a narrow one covered in pale, crushed stone that gave up a cloud of dust as each vehicle passed over it. The staff car was waved past the main gate of the bustling camp by sentries who recognized Elizabeth and Billings. They pulled up to a nondescript, two-story, brick building set among a sea of Quonset huts spread out for at least a kilometer in either direction. Billings parked between a Jeep painted with the markings of a military police unit and another that displayed the markings of the US Army Air Forces and had a short trailer hitched to it loaded with several film magazines, of the type used by reconnaissance aircraft.

  Elizabeth was the first to jump out of the car as it stopped and the first at the building entrance, where she waited for the others to catch up. The rustling breeze carried the sound of falling leaves from a nearby grove of sycamore trees. Across the road, she saw two uniformed men burning trash, producing a pungent stream of smoke that spiraled into the October sky. At the entrance to the building, two burly guards stood with white helmets and armbands marked MP in bright-white letters. Butcher, buttoning his blue naval officer’s jacket, approached the guards.

  “What’s your name, Sergeant?”

  “Wright, sir. With a W,” said the sergeant as he stabbed the stenciled name patch on his chest with his forefinger after snapping off a sharp salute.

  Elizabeth noticed that Butcher didn’t return the salute. Not the first time. She appreciated that Butcher was more corporate than military.

  “OK, Sergeant Wright with a W, what’s the status here?”

  “Per your orders, the lab has been secured. No one in or out for the last hour.”

  “Good. Right.” Butcher headed inside, following Elizabeth and Billings. Butcher, head down, proceeded up a staircase on the right side of the building’s foyer.

  “Commander. This way,” Elizabeth said from the top of a staircase leading into the building’s basement. Above her head, on the gray wall, was a stenciled sign that read “USAAF Film Lab” with a hand pointing down the staircase. Bits of flaking paint lay scattered on the steps below. She again went first.

  The stairway dropped into a narrow hallway lit by exposed, ceiling-mounted light bulbs every ten feet. The unseasonably warm day and the basement’s dampness produced air heavy with humidity. The double doors to the film lab—each door with a twelve-by-twelve piece of glass reinforced with wire—were located halfway down the hall. On either side of the doors, film mags were piled up, waiting to be moved into the lab for processing.

  “Why no guard, Sergeant?”

  “Sir, I don’t have enough personnel to properly man this entrance and the front and back entrances to the building. But I did lock the doors, so no one could get in or out,” the sergeant said as he reached for one of the door handles and rattled the doors.

  “You mean they’re locked inside?” Butcher asked, alarmed.

  Elizabeth realized that the more time she spent working for the commander, the clearer it became that he was far from being comfortable with the power of his rank and assignment. She watched as LCDR Butcher’s face betrayed a look of honest astonishment that his order to secure the film lab had required incarcerating the lab’s inhabitants, who—Elizabeth could see though the scratched glass window—were none too happy.

  #

  Butcher strode purposefully into the film lab. A lieutenant who appeared to be in charge, a staff sergeant, and two privates stood on the other side of a narrow counter that ran the length of the room as if impersonating statues, all staring at him. Butcher debated whether to tell them they weren’t going anywhere until this nightmare was over or not. The lieutenant, with rounded shoulders and hands pushed deep into his pockets, did not look pleased with his circumstances. The enlisted men appeared only slightly more tolerant at being locked up with no explanation from the military police.

  Sergeant Wright, who stood at ease with his hands clasped behind his back, cleared his throat, shattering the silence. Butcher suddenly realized that they were waiting for him to address the group. “Lieutenant, my name is Butcher, aide to General Eisenhower. Sorry for this inconvenience, but under the circumstances, there was nothing else we could do.”

  “Just what are those circumstances, sir?” the lieutenant asked in a melodic, slow drawl as he patted a cowlick on the back of his head. “I must tell you that we are pretty confused, not to mention we’re falling far behind in our work.” The lieutenant, perhaps thinking he had defeated the stubborn cowlick, returned his hand to his pocket.

  “And you are?”

  “First Lieutenant Johannson, sir.”

  “Well, Lieutenant Johannson, let me cut to it because time is something we don’t have a lo
t of,” Butcher said, stepping to the counter and heaving his weathered briefcase onto the counter, nearly sending a magnifying glass the size of a dinner plate to the floor. “You, Lieutenant and, I assume, some of your staff are familiar with the type of work that Miss Weddington brings to the lab on a regular basis. Simply put, some of that material has come up missing, and we need to recover it.” He paused, the men’s gazes still locked firmly on him. “We are going to recover that material,” Butcher said with a raised voice that served to emphasize his own determination. “The film lab is where the material in question was last seen. So this is where we begin our search. At this point, that’s all you need to know.”

  Butcher peeled off his snug-fitting brass-buttoned officer’s coat and threw it on top of his briefcase, this time succeeding in knocking the magnifying glass off the countertop. The lieutenant, who stood two feet away, sprang forward with impressive agility and snatched the magnifying glass by its brass handle, almost cracking his head on the sharp edge of the counter.

  “Johansson, the first thing I need you to do is to pull together a list of names of everyone who has been in or out of the lab since Thursday, including your lab technicians. While that is being done, Miss Weddington and Staff Sergeant Billings will, with the help of your staff, retrace their steps from earlier this morning. After which, they will go through every trash can, file cabinet, and drawer in this lab.” Butcher spun around to face Sergeant Wright. “Sergeant, wait outside for officers from G2, and get them down here as soon as they arrive.” Turning back to the lab staff, Butcher said loudly, “All right then. If there are no questions, let’s get to it.”

  “Sir? If I may? I have one question,” Johannson said, raising one hand to reengage in the skirmish with his recalcitrant cowlick.

  “What is it, Johannson?”

  “Well, sir, just what exactly are you looking for?”

  Butcher paused for several seconds before he responded. “Lieutenant, let’s just say that we’re looking for a missing page from Gen—from a report to General Eisenhower from the Combined Chiefs that was to be microfilmed.”

  Johannson scratched his head. “It must be pretty important to bring you down here. Sir.”

  “You could say that, Lieutenant.”

  #

  Butcher was pacing along the length of the counter when Johannson approached him timidly. “Commander, here’s that list you wanted. Besides my lab staff, there are only four other names on it, so it was easy to pull together. We have a log of everything that comes in and goes out of the lab and who brought it in or took it out.”

  Butcher started to speak when Sergeant Wright rushed through the lab’s double doors with two officers following close behind him.

  “Commander, this is Captain Valetta and First Lieutenant Evans from Army Intelligence.”

  Butcher, who was naval reserve, not career military, opted to shake hands rather than return the salutes of the officers. “Thanks for your help, gentlemen. Captain, follow me,” Butcher said as he headed for Lieutenant Johannson’s office.

  Butcher closed the door to the closet-sized office and sat behind a metal desk that looked as if it was a holdover from the last war. Captain Valetta took a seat in an armless wooden chair in front of a battered, three-drawer file cabinet. A ceiling fan overhead wobbled, causing the pull chain to clink as it danced from side to side.

  “Can you please give me a rundown, sir?”

  Butcher was pleased to hear eagerness in Valetta’s voice. “Bottom line, Captain, we’re looking for a missing document. Top secret. And we need to find it—fast.”

  Valetta hesitated as if he was expecting more. “So . . . I take it you searched the place?”

  “My staff is in the process. I need you or your lieutenant to question the lab technicians, and I also need you to track down the people on this list,” Butcher said, leaning over the desk to hand the list off.

  Valetta slid his index finger down the list.

  “It’s everyone who has been in or out of the lab since Thursday. We need to get them in here for questioning. My theory is that the document is either still here in the lab or someone walked out with it by mistake.”

  “Seems simple enough. Just who are these names on the list?”

  “I’ll get Lieutenant Johannson in here. He runs the lab, so he can tell us. While I do that, can you get your lieutenant to start questioning the lab’s enlisted personnel?”

  “I can do that, but what do I tell them we’re looking for?”

  Butcher sat back in his chair and looked up at the swaying ceiling fan. That was the problem with all the extra eyes looking for the diary page. Secrets became less secret. “It’s a document numbered 117 in the upper-right corner.”

  Valetta looked at Butcher for several seconds before nodding. “I get it, Commander,” he said, rising from his seat and calling for Lieutenant Evans as he exited.

  A few minutes later, Butcher was standing behind the desk and Lieutenant Johannson was in the chair when Valetta came back. Johannson stood up.

  “Stay put, Lieutenant,” Valetta said, motioning Johannson to sit back down.

  “Lieutenant, run down this list for us. Just who are these four people?” asked Butcher, handing the list to the Johannson, whose legs swayed back and forth like Butcher’s six-year-old son when he needed to pee.

  “You OK, Johannson?” Butcher asked.

  “Oh, I’m fine, sir. Never better—except for this mess, of course.”

  “All right, so about the list,” Butcher said, knowing that Johannson had no idea how much of a mess this was.

  Johannson nodded and pointed to the paper. “The first two names, Betts and Thompson—they’re both attached to the Eighth Air Force. They’re regulars, and they’ve been rotating ever since the Eighth started their daytime bombing in August. Good guys.”

  Butcher was pleased to see Valetta taking notes, the red tip of his cigarette glowing as he stood in a corner of the office, leaning against the file cabinet. The air in the small office, despite the efforts of the ceiling fan, was becoming rank with cigarette smoke and perspiration. “So if they walked out with something by mistake, they would let you know?”

  “Oh yeah, Captain. Like I said—good guys.”

  “Go on,” Butcher urged.

  “Well . . . there’s the guy from that Free French intelligence unit. Name is Toulouse, Captain Toulouse. Tall guy. Never seen arms as long as his. Slicked-back hair, like some old-time actor. He’s a nasty type, likes to throw his weight around, is quick to remind us he’s a nephew of General de Gaulle.”

  Butcher and Valetta both looked at each other.

  “So an ally, but not a friend?” asked Butcher.

  “I don’t know, Commander. If I’m honest, I’d say neither. He’s become touchier lately, since the Eighth’s been hittin’ French targets pretty hard, especially Rouen. Likes to complain about the Eighth’s accuracy. Guess he’s got family around there.”

  “Anything else?” asked Butcher.

  “Just that when he came in on Friday for his set of recon photos of the Rouen raids, we didn’t have them ready, so he left without anything. Of course, he let us know General de Gaulle wouldn’t be happy,” Johannson replied.

  “So that would rule him out, I suspect,” Butcher said, more to himself than anyone else.

  “And the last name?” Valetta asked, coming out of the corner to put out his cigarette.

  “That would be RAF Warrant Officer Montgomery. His outfit is the RAF Coastal Command. Been coming in for a few weeks. Seems that the Brits have a few processors down at the RAF base at Mount Farm, lookin’ for some spare parts, so’s I hear. The RAF has been hittin’ the German naval ammo depot at Mariensiel hard.”

  “What else do you know about him?” Butcher asked, loosening his tie as he silently cursed the fan’s inability to cool the room.

  “Hardly anything. Doesn’t say much. Nervous type. Real jittery.”

  “OK, Lieutenant. Captain, any other q
uestions?”

  “No. Not at this time.”

  “Thanks, Lieutenant. You’re excused.”

  Johannson rose slowly and shut the door.

  Butcher looked at his watch. They had been in the basement lab for hours. No one had had anything to eat or drink. He shook his head and attempted to stretch out the kinks in his lower back.

  Weddington and Billings had searched every inch of the lab, in every file. If anything pleased Butcher, it was the thoroughness with which his staff and the lab staff searched. But it was now clear that the missing document was not in the lab. He could confidently report that nauseating news to General Eisenhower.

  Butcher went out into the lab to locate Weddington. The fumes from the film processors had given him a pounding headache and successfully torpedoed his appetite. He found Weddington in the back file room, her hair a stringy mess.

  “Still at it?” he asked.

  “I have been through these file boxes three times now. Nothing.”

  “Where is Billings?”

  Before Weddington could answer, Butcher heard his name being shouted.

  “Back here!” he replied above the hum of the processors.

  Captain Valetta rounded the corner with a head of steam and almost sent Butcher crashing to the floor. “Let me show you something. Follow me.” Butcher and Weddington followed Valetta, who led them to a door in the back of the lab.

  “See this?” He pointed to a smashed six-by-eight-inch pane of security glass in the door; it was the pane closest to the doorknob. At least a dozen strands of the wire mesh embedded in the glass were cut. Dried blood was smeared on the door panel below the doorknob and on the deadbolt, though it was clear someone had made an attempt to wipe it clean.

  It only took an instant for Butcher’s reaction to morph from so what to we’ve got a major problem here. Up until that moment, Butcher had worked overtime to convince himself that they were just looking for a misplaced document. But the sight of the smashed pane of glass and the dried blood changed all of that. Weddington covered her mouth with both hands and cowered against the wall. She too understood that the situation had just become bleaker.