He stood, dumped a mag a man high at the nearest parade of SS Panzergrenadiers, and shouted to his guys, “Go, go, go, go!”
Franc took the first hit. He just slumped, tried to get up, then sat, then lay down, then curled up.
“Go, go, go!” screamed Leets, dumping another mag. He had three left.
Of the two maquis, Leon, the youngster, made it closest to the treeline, but then a new flare popped and the German fire found him and put him in a beaten zone, and no man survives the beaten zone.
Jerome didn’t make it nearly as far, and Leets was unclear, for he ran himself through a sleet of light and splinter as the Germans tried to bring him down, but in the second before he was hit he saw Jerome jack vertically from his runner’s crouch and go down hard as gravity took hold of his remains.
The bullet struck Leets in the left buttock, blowing through his hip. Man, did he go down, full of spangles and fire flashes and lightning bugs and flies’ wings. His mind emptied; all visible movement ceased in the universe, and it went silent—I am dead, he thought—but he blinked himself alive again and saw SS coming up hard in the light of a new flare, holding their fire, for they wanted someone alive for the info before the execution, and he cursed himself for throwing out the strychnine tablet he’d been issued.
The pain was immense, and he tried to make it go away by rushing a mag change, lifting the ever-loyal, faultless best friend of the Thompson gun, and running another mag, seeming to drive them back or down or whatever.
He was twenty-four.
He didn’t want to die.
He tried to get through another mag change but dropped the heavy weapon. He got a Gammon bomb out but couldn’t get the cap unscrewed. He pulled out his .45, jacked the slide, held it up stupidly without aiming, blinked in the bright light of another flare just overhead and squeezed off a few pointless rounds.
The gun locked back. He saw two Panzergrenadiers quite close with their fancy new rifles and was amazed that at this ultimate moment his lifelong interest in firearms reasserted itself, and he thought for just a second how interesting it would be to ring one of those cool babies out at a range, then take it apart lovingly, taking notes, figuring out what made it go, running tests on the ammo. It would be so damned interesting.
Then the two Germans sat down, as if embarrassed.
A wave of explosions wiped out the reality that was but a few yards ahead of him.
“There, there, Beets, chum,” said Basil. “The fellows are here with a stretcher. I see a bit of bone, but any horse doctor can set that.”
“Basil, I, what, get out of here, oh, for—”
But Basil had turned and was busy running mags through his Sten, as around him, the other maquisards fired whatever weapons they had.
Somehow Leets was on a stretcher and being humped at speed the remaining few yards to the treeline.
“Basil, I—”
“There’s the good chap. Beets, these fellows will take good care of you. Get Leftenant Beets somewhere to medical aid. Get him out of here.”
“Basil, you come, too, come on, Basil, we got the bridge, we can—”
“Oh, someone has to stay to discourage these fellows. They seem so stubborn. But I’ll be along in a bit. We’ll have that chat. Good luck, Beets, and Godspeed.”
Basil turned and disappeared back into the forest. For Leets, it became an ordeal of not passing out as the maquis heaved his sorry ass along a dark path until he seemed to be being slid into some kind of vehicle, and then he did in fact pass out. Neither he nor any other of the man’s army of friends, lovers, and acquaintances ever saw Basil St. Florian again.
* * * *
On June 9th, 1944, Major Frank Tyne, U.S.A. attached to OSS, found a florist who would deliver, and he had a bouquet of mums and roses sent to Millie at 72 Grosvenor, Mayfair, office of Colonel David K. E. Bruce.
He got no response.
Finally, on the 11th, he got his nerve up, parked himself on her floor, and finally caught a glimpse of her rushing from one office to another.
“Millie!”
“Oh, Frank.”
“Millie, did you get my flowers?”
Millie seemed both nonplussed and busy. She was clearly anxious to flee but stayed and faced him with a somewhat tense, unpleasant face.
“Yes, Frank, I got them. They were very nice. Who knew there were florists in London in wartime?”
“Wasn’t easy to find one. Listen, Millie, I wanted to apologize about the other night. Really, I don’t know what came over me. I’m so glad I passed out before I did anything inappropriate. I’m just hoping you’ll see a way to forgive me. It would mean so much.”
“Frank,” she touched his hand. “It’s fine. Everyone had too much to drink. Please, don’t worry about it.”
“Thanks. Say, I was wondering if—”
“Frank, there’s so much going on now that we’re ashore. The colonel’s going to the front soon on instructions from General Donovan.”
“Yes, I know, I’ve heard—”
“So his scheduling is a nightmare.”
“Sure, Millie, maybe sometime.”
“Maybe. Say, what happened to Casey, if I may ask?”
“You didn’t hear?”
“Just rumors. Not happy ones.”
“No. They hit the bridge, did some damage, maybe cost elements of Das Reich a day or two, but they were wiped out, along with the French maquis group. Then Das Reich shot fifty hostages. So it was no good, really, a waste. OWI’s going to try to do something with Casey. Maybe a short little movie for the home folks, ‘The Heroes of the Bridge at Nantilles,’ something like that.”
“It’s so sad,” she said. “Sometimes there’s no justice in this world.”
* * * *
Stephen Hunter would like to thank Helge Fykse, LA6NCA, of Norway, for information on German radio technology.
<
* * * *
MAX IS CALLING
Gayle Lynds
Vienna was cold that spring, and dreary. The sixteenth- and seventeenth-century buildings of the Innere Stadt stood like sentinels against time, cloaked in a chilly mist. Dressed in rain gear, businesspeople and students, hausfrauen and doktoren hurried through pools of yellow lamplight, umbrellas bobbing. Only the cafés and pubs could be counted upon for gaiety. The last refuge, they were bustling of course. The rich aromas of coffee and beer scented the gray air.
Watching carefully all around, two men in dark trench coats moved quickly past St. Stephens Cathedral, its Romanesque entrance alight. The old city of Strauss and Mahler, Freud and Klimt felt like a dream, an exciting dream to one of the pair— Bayard Stockton. But then he was with Jacob “Cowboy” Crandell, a Langley undercover legend, in a city storied for its espionage.
As Bay had learned, the Viennese were a melancholy lot, relentlessly self-absorbed with their glorious past of the Hapsburg empire. Flamboyant fatalism, some called it. But then they had survived the Nazis and the Cold War to become the political ground zero of east and west, north and south. Some seventeen thousand diplomats operated in the city, a full one percent of the population—and about half had links to intelligence services.
They worked at embassies and global agencies such as OPEC, the IAEA, and the UN. From business to government, Langley wanted to know what they were thinking, who was on the take, who was in line to get the next contract, and the peccadilloes, peculiarities, and vulnerabilities of all players and potentials. Naturally, Vienna was awash with foreign agents. The freewheeling ones occasionally murdered in broad daylight, while the authorities, who often knew them, looked the other way. As it had historically, Vienna handled everything diplomatically, especially when a political connection existed.
Bay loved it. Fresh from Langley’s grueling training courses, he had been there two exhilarating months. He was young for the business, only twenty-five, a wiry man not quite six feet tall. His collar was up against the frigid damp, and a black beret covered his head,
wavy red hair showing beneath. There was nothing unusual about his smooth face, his blue eyes, or his shaved chin, which was just the way he liked it. In his pocket was an unmarked envelope containing 5,000 euros—about $6,250— which made anonymity even more important tonight.
“Stop walking like an athlete,” Cowboy rumbled under his breath. “Dammit, boy, you should’ve learned that in CIA 101. Rolling off your feet shows the strength of your muscles and your training. The Viennese are always looking around, which means they’re going to check you out. Don’t give them a reason to remember you. What were you—a runner? The one hundred?”
Bay blinked. In his enthusiasm for being with Cowboy and his mission tonight he had forgotten himself. “Yeah, the hundred.” And free weights, of course. But he did not mention that. He flattened his feet, tightened his joints.
Cowboy’s cool blue eyes appraised him. Then he dipped his big head in a short nod. He seldom gave compliments, so Bay was pleased with the nod.
“Hell, this is a beautiful antique burg.” Cowboy was peering around at the buildings, grande dames decked out in soaring pediments, ornate rococo, and regal porticoes. Hands dug into his coat pockets, he was fifty-two years old, a tall, rangy man with a neutral expression. His brown hair, broad face, and rimless eyeglasses were wet, but he seemed immune to what would annoy the rest of humanity, which Bay admired. From the wilds of Wyoming, Cowboy wore Tony Lama snakeskin cowboy boots. They were incidental to his nickname. The real reason was his shoot-from-the-hip boldness, which occasionally got him into trouble but more often resulted in success. Close-mouthed and adaptable, he knew the city like the veins in his hands and was the most productive of the station’s case officers, handling an impressive twenty assets.
As they walked, his boots clicked on the cobblestones. To Bay, they sounded like exotic music in this very correct city.
“Operating here is like being inside a museum, punctuated by boredom, of course,” Cowboy instructed. “The lull before the storm. I used to believe I could die happy in my Jaguar. Now I know Vienna’s the place. What do you think?”
“It’s terrific.” Bay shot him a grin.
When a new officer arrived at his first station, he was customarily given a desk job for several weeks to read and analyze reports, recorded conversations, and streams of satellite data. Once he was familiar with that, he was assigned to shadow experienced officers for hands-on training. Bay had worked with two good ones and been pretty successful so far. Then Herb Rutkowski, the head of station, had called him into his office this afternoon to give him special instructions and the good news his next assignment was with Cowboy Crandell.
“Tell me about Max, sir.”
As they turned the corner, they passed the Mozart statue, and Cowboy said, “It was four months ago, Christmas season on the Kärntner Strasse. The stores were busy, a lot of people coming and going. I felt a tug on my pocket and grabbed. The hand was gone, but a torn piece of paper was left inside. Of course, that was the first contact—a list of four names. All were Chechen informants, just as the note claimed. There was also a phone number, which the station traced. It belonged to a disposable cell; the owner was unidentifiable. So I figured what the hell ... I dialed the number, and the man who answered told me to call him Max, and he’d give me more intel for a price. All his contacts with me have been through disposable cells. Wily bugger, but his intel’s been good.”
“Is Max a Chechen?”
“Damn right he is. Never seen his face, and don’t have a clue who he really is.”
“Is that unusual?”
“Not here. Most of my assets are unknowns, but these Chechens are the best at it. Austria’s got one of the most liberal refugee programs in the EU, so about twelve thousand are living in the city. Mostly they’re from the two wars against Russia. A lot aren’t legal. They were guerrilla fighters and soldiers and don’t have a war or any good way to earn a living, so they’ve invaded the criminal underworld. Made it a hell of a lot more dangerous in the process. Besides the usual thievery and break-ins, they act as bodyguards, smugglers, strong-arm tacticians, and assassins. Not a postcard picture of Vienna. It drives the authorities nuts, especially when one country hires them to screw another country.”
“How will my blind date work?”
As they strode along, a frown crossed Cowboy’s face. Instantly it was gone. “Max gives me a location and the time to arrive. Then he phones to tell me exactly where to meet. You’ll go in with the five grand. He’ll give you a piece of paper folded down to nothing, which is his latest report. You’ll give him the dough. It’s always dark, and he doesn’t like to talk. Herb says you speak Russian, but good luck trying to have a conversation with him.”
“I understand, sir.”
“I hope you do.”
Pedestrians pushed past them. The edge of an umbrella nearly spiked Bay’s head. He glanced over his shoulder to make certain it was unintentional. When he turned back, a tall woman dressed in a short red skirt, flesh-colored tights, very high heels, and a formfitting black jacket was sauntering down a building’s steps, smiling widely. Her red lips were so shiny they seemed to reflect light. Although she held a small collapsible umbrella overhead, her long golden hair hung limp from the mist.
“Cowboy,” she purred in German, “it has been a long time. Who is this nice young gentleman with you?” She sidled up to Bay and ran her free hand down over his trench coat and inside to pat his shirt. Her breath smelled of peppermint toothpaste.
Bay grinned.
“Having a slow evening, Estelle?” There was a devilish light in Cowboy’s eyes as he answered in German. “This is my new friend, Bay. You have any info, feel free to pass it to him. He won’t mind.”
“Oh?” She stared into Bay’s eyes, her hand pressing against his heart.
He could feel it pound.
“I would like to give him ‘information,’” she decided.
“I’ll just bet you would,” Cowboy said. “We’ve got to be going, Estelle. Behave yourself.”
Estelle gave a pretty nod and backed off. “Have a nice evening.”
But as they walked away, Cowboy said to Bay, “Give me five euros.”
Bay reached inside his trench coat. And spun on his heel. He ran back to Estelle, who was trotting up her steps.
He grabbed her arm and felt big, hard muscle. “Nice trick. Hand over my wallet.”
Estelle turned and pouted. “I don’t know—”
Bay’s voice turned steely as he saw the prominent Adam’s apple. “Don t fuck with me. You know what I can do to you. Give it to me. Now.”
Her long black lashes lowered and raised. “You’re so mean. Oh, all right.” She took the wallet from her jacket pocket.
He snatched it and jogged off. Ahead, Cowboy was striding along without a look over his shoulder.
When he caught up, Bay said, “Okay, I get it. Estelle’s a guy.”
Cowboy laughed loudly. “You’re lucky you found out the easy way.” Then as they rounded the corner, he looked sharply at him. “Herb says you’re a hotshot. Ivy League, top of your class at the Farm, six languages. Grew up in Europe. What I see is eagerness and idealism, not that that’s the end of the world. I’m just warning you this is no glamour gig. It’s exhausting, nerve-numbing, and frustrating. The days are over of putting on your tux for an embassy party every night to try to get buddy-buddy with some East Bloc official so you can convince him his ideology sucks and he should play on our team. Now you’ve got to infiltrate the tenements, the mud huts, the terrorist cells. Vienna’s as close to the old Cold War days as you’ll get, and it’s not very.”
“Then why are you so successful?”
Cowboy chuckled. “Charm.” His expression grew serious as he continued, “The word is out I pay, and I keep my mouth shut. Chechen informants won’t take a piss unless they’re sure they can do it in secret.”
“With so many assets, you must handle a lot of money. Do you ever have trouble getting it for them?
”
“As long as they deliver, Langley will. Tonight’s money is for Max’s last piece of intel. In it he claimed the Lebanese were paying the French tens of millions of dollars in contracts in exchange for nuclear technology, starting with a seventy-megawatt commercial atomic reactor and a smaller research reactor. Apparently they’re already building both.”
Agents of Treachery Page 25
