by Frank Deford
I didn’t reply right away. I was thinking. #l: yes, I did have to give him some more information, but, I figured, so long as I didn’t give him Horst’s name, there was no real risk. Horst was gone. Besides, once they got Goldstein, he was probably going to blow the whistle on Horst, anyway. And #2: I’d been pretty innocent to think the FBI would just accept the information w/o dying to find out who I was. Now how was I going to get the heck out of here?
“All right,” I said at last. “I see your point.”
“Thank you.”
I took a breath. “So I learned this from the Nazi agent who was sent over to shoot the president.”
“Sent over from Germany?”
“That’s right.”
“So, you, up there in Hagerstown, you got it from the horse’s mouth, direct from Berlin?”
“Yes, I did.”
“And how exactly did he get here . . . from Germany?”
“I can tell you that—exactly.”
“I’m all ears.”
“Four days ago, he arrived on U-Boat 5l8.” I pointed to his pad. “5-l8,” I said. He wrote that down. Curtly, like I was delivering expert testimony, I went on: “The submarine surfaced off Bar Harbor, Me., in Frenchman’s Cove, & he was rowed ashore there at Hancock Pt. You can look it up.”
“Just ’cause it’s there, doesn’t mean the U-Boat came there.”
“No. But it did. You wanted to know how he got into the country. I’ve seen the watch towers they built down at the beach, down by Ocean City. So, we’re on the lookout. Right?” He nodded. “Well, that’s how he got here. I guess they don’t have anybody looking out for U-boats up around Bar Harbor.”
“And what’s his name?”
“That’s what I won’t tell you.”
He leaned forward on his desk, right into my face. “Excuse me, you say you know a Nazi spy, in this country, out to shoot the president, but you won’t tell me?”
“Yes, that’s right. Because he’s not a Nazi spy anymore. Don’t you understand, Mr. Anderson? He’s the one who gave me this.” I pointed to the papers on his desk. “He’s the one who told me about Goldstein. Because he hates the Nazis. He’s a hero, Mr. Anderson. Don’t you understand?” I reached into my purse & took out a handkerchief, as if I was going to tear up.
“OK, OK. So why did this Nazi . . . excuse me, Nazi traitor—”
“That’s right.”
“Why did he tell you all this?”
“Because he loves me.”
“Oh, I see. And you love him?”
“I did. Once. I’m married now. To somebody else. An American.”
“Okay, so where did you meet him—the German?”
“I don’t want to get into that.”
That made him slump back down & put on a great show of exasperation. He took another drag on his cigarette. “All right, just a second.” He picked up his phone and dialed 3 #s—obviously, an extension.
I was thinking fast. There was no more I could tell him. The ball was in his court now. So I reached back into my pocketbook &, very carefully, pulled out my driver’s license & the little purse that held my money. I put them in my lap. Then I tried to think: was there anything else in that pocketbook that could identify me?
“Hey, Bobby,” Mr. Anderson said on the phone. He whirled his chair around, to get the full blast of the fan, so that now he was pretty much facing away from me. “Ralph Anderson. Could you check out a name for me? Thanks.” And then he read him Goldstein’s name & address & phone #.
Then I remembered. I still had the 2nd half of my roundtrip bus ticket to Annapolis in the pocketbook. And, of course: my keys. Mr. Anderson was still more or less looking away, reveling in the breeze from the fan, as he talked to whoever Bobby was. I reached back into my purse & started fishing around. I grabbed the keys, & put them on my lap, too. They jangled a little, but Mr. Anderson was still talking so he didn’t pay any attention. “Just find out if we have anything at all on this fellow.” And he chatted a little more about how awful the Wash. Senators baseball team was.
My fingers came across the bus ticket. Gingerly, I pulled it out, & when I was sure Mr. Anderson wasn’t looking at me, I stuffed it down my front. I put the pocketbook right back on his desk & waited for him to get off the phone. After a few seconds more, he hung up & whirled back toward me. “Okay, you heard that,” he said. “We’ll just see if there’s anything in our files on this Goldstein character.”
“I don’t think there will be,” I said. “I think he lives a very respectable life.”
“Double life?”
“Yes. There’s a Mrs. Goldstein, too.”
“She’s also a spy?”
“Probably. But I don’t know. I mean, she lives with him.” I reached into my lap, then, & w/ one hand I palmed the purse & driver’s license & w/ the other, the keys.
“Okay,” he went on. “So, let me get this straight—”
Suddenly I put a pained expression on my face. “Mr. Anderson,” I said, “excuse me, just a second. I, uh—”
“Yes? You all right?”
“Well, yes, but, well, I’m pregnant.”
“Oh, I see.”
“And, I’m sorry, but I just HAVE to go to the ladies’ room.”
He looked distressed. Men don’t know what it’s like to be pregnant, so it’s a wild card you can always play. I stood up, grimacing, holding the keys & the purse tightly. I made no effort to reach for my pocketbook. It sat smack on his desk, waiting for me to return. “Please, you understand.”
He was solicitous. “Of course, Mrs. Gunther,” he said. “It’s that way, right down the hall.”
“Thank you,” I said, acting all the more uncomfortable. “I’ll be right back.”
“Take your time,” he said, & he lit up another Chesterfield.
I smiled a thank you at him, then left his office, heading down the hall. When I got to the door of the ladies’ room, I glanced back, just to see if he might be watching. He wasn’t.
So I kept walking a few more steps, then turned down the stairs, hurrying now. In the lobby I resumed a casual pace. Going past the check-in desk, I smiled sweetly at Charlie & whispered a big thank you, as if he’d been a tremendous help. But I never slowed. I simply kept walking, trying to appear normal. Outside, I turned up 10th St. It was hardly a minute or 2 since I’d left Mr. Anderson’s office, & my heart was still racing. Up the st., there was a Rexall drugstore on the corner, so I turned in to catch my breath.
In those days, if you’ll remember, drugstores had fountains. I sat down & ordered a vanilla phosphate.
Another minute or so & Mr. Anderson was going to start to get curious. But my pocketbook was on his desk. He’d wait longer. Women DON’T leave their pocketbooks. But finally he’d have to get some secretary to go into the ladies’ room. Then he’d check my pocketbook, but all he’d find, besides my lipstick, compact, etc., would be the letter I’d addressed to J. Edgar Hoover himself, which included the invitation to Goebbels’ party. That was the piece de resistance, I knew. That was surely going to make him sit up & take notice. It was better than a foreign word—it was an authentic foreign artifact. Then he was going to call downstairs to the desk to find out if anybody had seen me leave. All that was going to take a few more minutes, so I sat there at the counter, sipping my vanilla phosphate, plotting the rest of my escape.
OK, I thought, just retrace your steps: grab a cab back to the Greyhound station, take the bus to Annapolis, pick up my car, drive to the ferry & go home. Safe. But then I thought: I’d told Mr. Anderson I’d come in from Hagerstown on the bus. Wouldn’t the bus to Hagerstown & the bus to Annapolis leave from the same station? Probably. Wouldn’t that be the obvious place for them to look for me? Probably.
Time was passing. I’d drained the phosphate. Maybe by now the secretary had gone into the ladies’ room & discovered I’d gone. I really cogitated. Then I got up, went outside & hailed a taxi. “Union Station,” I told the cabbie. That’s the train stat
ion.
I bought a ticket to Baltimore, & when I got off there, I took a cab to the Balt. bus station & took the bus to Annapolis. Then: into my car, the ferry across the bay, home. Safe & sound.
I can only describe myself as excited. I felt like a master spy—master spyess? I’d accomplished exactly what I’d set out to do, outwitting the mighty FBI in the process. Surely, they’d send the pages over to be de-coded now, & they’d go right after Goldstein, & even if he’d gotten scared & taken off, they’d find him. And Horst was not only safe and sound somewhere, but his mission was accomplished. When he called, I’d tell him what I’d done. He’d be so proud that his efforts had been successful.
I only kept thinking: was there anything in that pocketbook I’d forgotten that might reveal who I was? You know the stuff every woman sticks in her pocketbook. Then you forget. But try as I might, I couldn’t think of anything that’d be incriminating. Still . . . ?
I tried to sleep, but even tho I was tired, I was still so keyed up. I just wanted Horst to call me. I knew it’d take him a couple days to get settled, but I could hardly wait to tell him all about my adventure. I lay there in bed, thinking about him. I thought about Jimmy, too. No, I didn’t. I didn’t think about Jimmy. I only wondered about Jimmy, & that is different, & that made me wonder about myself & what sort of a woman I was. What sort of a wife.
IV.
I went back to the office the next day. It rained all morning, which was good, because we needed that on the Shore, even if most of the crops were in. But what w/ Labor Day & then missing work yesterday, I had a lot to catch up on, so I threw myself into it, barely stopping to eat the sandwich I’d brought for lunch.
My mother called long distance from Atlantic City. It turned out that the Miss America contest was on that weekend, so she and Elliott were going to extend their vacation a couple days & watch the finals at Convention Hall, which was one of the largest auditoriums around at that time—quite the marvel to see. Otherwise, the day proceeded apace. The rain finally stopped, & it was steamy. My clothes clung to me, so I wanted to go home & get out of them & go swimming.
At 1/4 past 3, Gentry Trappe called. That was very unusual, so right off the bat I asked him if everything was all right. No, indeed, he said, everything was fine, but he just wanted to tell me that Western Union had come by w/ a telegram & that he’d signed for it.
My heart leapt. Obviously, it was Horst, contacting me from wherever he’d gone to. It was all I could do not to leave the office right away.
Now, this was still only ’42, the start of the war, & I didn’t know yet that the government sent out telegrams to next of kin. And so, when I did get home & picked up the telegram where Mr. Trappe had left it & rushed out onto the porch & sat down there & ripped it open, I had no preparation whatsoever. I was just certain that it was from Horst. Who else would be sending me a telegram?
But there it was. It isn’t hard to remember. It was pithy & to the point: THE SECRETARY OF WAR DESIRES TO EXPRESS HIS DEEPEST REGRET THAT YOUR HUSBAND, CORPORAL JAMES L. BRANCH, WAS KILLED IN ACTION ON AUGUST SEVENTH ON THE ISLAND OF TULAGI.
That’s all it said.
I let the telegram drop into my lap. I didn’t cry right away. I was too shocked, I guess. I just sat there. Finally, I got up. I started taking my clothes off as soon as I got into the house. I was so clammy. They were sticking to me. I took everything off, letting them lay, one by one, wherever they fell as I climbed up the stairs. By the time I got to the top of the stairs I didn’t have a stitch on, & I just walked into the shower. I stayed there forever, letting the water run on & on, all over me. Then I came out, still dripping wet, & I stood in front of the full-length mirror in my bedroom, stood sideways, staring at myself. You couldn’t really see the little swelling in my belly when I had any clothes on, but it was obvious now when I was naked.
All I could think was: there’s Jimmy’s baby, & he’s gone forever & he didn’t even know he was going to be a father. I didn’t see my face or my legs or my arms or my hair or my breasts or anything. I just saw that little swelling. This is what I thought: that’s all in this world that’s left of Jimmy Branch. A little bump.
And that’s when I started to cry—not just cry, but those great wracking sobs, so much so that I just sank to my knees & held my head & said Jimmy’s name over & over till I finally could get up & get dressed. I walked down by the river. I thought I would cry some more, but there were no more tears left w/in me.
I had to stop reading—just imagining the agony that my poor mother had gone through. God, think of it—being mistakenly informed that her husband had been killed. That must’ve been the cruelest experience. No wonder neither she nor Daddy had ever wanted to talk about Guadalcanal. I pondered this for a few moments more before I went back to Mother’s story, turning one more onion-skin page.
But at that moment I heard a noise, and when I looked up, Mom was coming out of her room. She’d put on her bed jacket, but had, I suppose, simply forgotten to put her wig back on. I’d never seen her this way before, with just a frizzy bald head. In the dim light on that side of the room, in her nightgown and her light pink jacket, she seemed like a wraith, some pale apparition. But she was a friendly ghost, and she smiled at me as she stepped closer. “Aw, curiosity killed the cat,” she said.
“Hey, come on, Mom, did you really think I couldn’t read this as soon as I got it?”
She shrugged. “Well, where have you gotten to?”
“Incredible. They’ve just sent you the telegram that Daddy was killed. I simply can’t fathom how the government could make a mistake like that.”
Mom sighed, and her eyes seemed to go vacant. Then she shook her head, ever so sadly, at me. “Oh, Teddy, it was no mistake.”
“But, Mom—”
“Come on, it’s not that hard. You can figure it out now.” I closed my eyes.
Oh my God. Of course, there was only one answer. It really was so simple after all.
“Can’t you?” she asked.
“Yes. I see.” And, in fact, it was at once so suddenly obvious and so incredibly shocking that I barely reacted outwardly. The news simply infiltrated me, and I slumped there, stunned, staring at Mom, unable to say anything else.
She sat down next to me and hugged me. “You all right, Teddy?”
I managed to mumble that I was.
“Well, I hope so, ’cause that’s what you had to know.”
“Yes. Thank you.”
She rose and started to turn back to her room. “So, now that that’s settled, I’ll let you finish the rest alone.”
At last, then, I began to regain some semblance of lucidity. I couldn’t let her leave me now. “No, Mom, wait. I’ll read it all later. You’re still awake. Please. You can’t just let it go like that. You gotta tell me the rest. Tell me it all. I wanna hear you tell it.”
She paused only for a moment, for I believe she’d been hoping that I’d ask her that. “Well, all right, Teddy. But do me a favor. If I’m going back there in time again, there’s a bottle of Old Crow in the liquor cabinet. Everybody used to drink Maryland rye when I was growing up. Oh my, did Carter Kincaid and I get so awfully tight on that one night when we were kids and her parents were out and we got into her father’s bar. It was called Pikesville. I can’t forget that poison. Pikesville Maryland rye. Oh my. That almost did me in for drinking for a lifetime.”
“But it didn’t.”
“No, a lifetime is too long for most things. Now, of course, they stopped making Maryland rye years ago, but bourbon tastes the closest to it, so I have some for old time’s sake every now and then. And I think this would be one of those nows and thens.”
“Okay,” I said, rising.
“But just a finger now, Teddy. Or a thumb since you’ve got skinny fingers.”
“I’ll make one for myself too, Mom.”
“Well, that’s fine. Lots of water: sippin’ whiskey we called it.”
“And, Mom?”
“Yes?”
“Don’t you want to put your wig on?”
Her hand shot up to her head and she felt it. “Oh my, I was still half-asleep. I’m sorry you have to see me such a fright.” I started to protest. “No, no, don’t try and be polite, Teddy. But it squares the circle, I think. I came into this world as bald as a bowling ball, so I might as well go out the same way.”
“Yes, ma’am,” I said, and by the time I’d fixed us both a thumb of Old Crow, she was back, with her wig firmly in place, and even a little lipstick on for good measure. She made a point of going across the room and picking up the vase with the flowers in it that she’d brought in memory of Daddy. Carefully, she set it on the table, right in front of her. I had the tape recorder out, so I put a new tape in and turned it on. When Mom was sure it was spinning, she took a sip of her bourbon, and began again.
So, Teddy, the long and short of it is precisely what that telegram said, that Jimmy Branch, your dear father, was killed on August the 7th, 1942, on Tulagi, in the Solomon Islands.
She let that sink in again. I took a sip of my drink and tipped my glass to the father I never knew. Mom offered a little salute at my gesture.
He was one fine man, your father, Teddy. I’m so sorry you never got to know him. And I’m sorry he never got to know you. He would’ve been proud of his son. I should’ve told him I was having a baby, Teddy. At least he could’ve taken that to his grave. Poor, poor Jimmy.
“Mom, excuse me: where’s Tulagi? I thought it was Guadalcanal.”
Yes, Guadalcanal was the main target. The Japs had built an airfield there, and we wanted to take it from ’em. But Tulagi was a smaller island, just across the channel, so we had to take that, too. There were three battalions assigned to the task, under a colonel named Merritt Edson. They called him Red Mike.
“Red Mike?”
That’s what they called him. They had better nicknames back then. They were descriptive. I knew two or three boys named Red myself. Well, one was Reds. And another boy we called Freckles. I knew a Fats and a boy we just called Noggin because he had a huge head. That would be “politically incorrect” now, I suppose. But back then, you were what you were, and it was Red Mike who led the Marines onto Tulagi.
