by Ed Ruggero
“I count it a small blessing that I was right-handed before,” she said. “It would have been a much tougher adjustment, otherwise.”
After a few seconds Harkins said, “I can’t even imagine.”
She finished pouring and gently pushed a cup and saucer toward him. “It’s all right to be curious,” she said. “It’s not like I haven’t noticed that my arm is missing.”
Harkins laughed, was relieved when she laughed, too.
“Did it happen in that raid you mentioned?”
“Yes. Tenth of September, 1940. Nothing heroic. I was running to a shelter and was hit by a piece of masonry. Knocked me down and crushed my arm.”
“Who pulled you out?” Harkins asked.
“An ambulance team got me out. First, they had to do the surgery right there, me facedown in the road. The arm wasn’t going anywhere.”
“I’m sorry,” Harkins said.
Beverly shrugged, sipped her tea. “A lot of people had worse things happen.”
Harkins drained his cup. “I was surprised to see you yesterday when I got back to headquarters. You always work that late?”
“When there’s a need, yes.”
“You said you were a librarian.”
“I am.”
“Well,” Harkins said. “I’ve only been assigned there since yesterday, but I’ve already figured out that people don’t talk much about their jobs. Can’t help but be curious, though.”
“A few of us who used to work in the British Library helped our intelligence crowd early in the war. We’ve been asked to do the same for your American team.”
“So, there’s a library?”
“Yes, though it’s not a room with books.”
“Years ago I worked at a university library,” Harkins said. “This was back in my short stint in college. Students were always coming up to the desk with their hair on fire, asking the most bizarre questions of the librarians.”
He widened his eyes in imitation of every panicky undergrad he’d seen.
“What’s the temperature on the surface of the moon? How deep is the Pacific? Was it raining when Keats died?”
Beverly laughed out loud, which made Harkins happy.
“I’ll bet there are some real head-scratchers at an OSS library,” he said.
“Head-scratchers?”
“You know,” Harkins said, putting on a puzzled look and scratching the top of his head. “Like this.”
“I imagine you are correct,” she said. “But it’s not just about information going out, of course.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, let’s suppose that you’re a German intelligence analyst. You’re getting ready to invade the United States and you’ve got a hundred, make it a thousand agents in that country feeding you information that will be helpful for your offensive. What do you want to know?”
“Well, you want to know all about the defending forces.”
“Sure. What else?”
“Oh, gosh,” Harkins said. “I guess road networks, conditions of bridges and how much weight they can hold. You’d want to know all about the railroads, where the rolling stock is. You’d want to know about food supplies and gasoline and coal. Which mines are the most productive. Which factories are where.”
“What about the people?”
“Well, you’ll want the names of all the police. Government workers, especially utilities people who can keep the lights on.”
“Let’s say you’re invading as a liberator,” Beverly said.
She was talking about France. Both of them knew it, though neither said it out loud.
“Then you’d probably want to know who can provide you reliable information. Who can spy on enemy movement? Who can guide friendly forces in unfamiliar terrain?”
“So you’ve got a great deal of information coming in,” she said. “Just pouring in, a veritable monsoon of disorganized data. You can’t just stick it all in a drawer and hope you’ll be able to retrieve what you need, right?”
“I get it,” Harkins said. “Librarians organize information, categorize it so it can be found easily. Probably cross-reference everything, too.”
“And if there’s no system of categorization—because no one has ever done this before, not on this scale—librarians have to come up with a system that works.”
“Wow,” Harkins said. “I see a knighthood in your future.”
“Silly, women can’t become knights. And no one will ever know about this,” Beverly said. “Maybe in fifty or sixty years they’ll let some historian see the records.”
“Doesn’t seem right. I got a little medal for qualifying as an expert with my pistol, but you’ll get no public recognition?”
“Women are used to working and not getting recognized,” she said.
Harkins thought about the army nurses he’d met in Sicily. The second lieutenants among them got half the pay of a male second lieutenant.
“So you may see me from time to time over on Grosvenor Street,” she said. “Probably best if we don’t let on that we know each other. That would just make people curious.”
“Did they send me here to board with you because of that connection? You and the OSS, I mean?”
“I doubt it. Just a coincidence, more likely.”
Harkins looked at his watch. It was time to go.
“Well, I’m happy for it,” he said.
“Me, too.”
“I’ve got a question—hypothetical—about classified documents.”
“Not my field, exactly, but I’ll try my best.”
“Suppose there’s a document that figures in an investigation. It might bear on the testimony, but is not going to appear at any trial because it’s classified.”
“That sounds plausible.”
“But the investigator thinks it was classified later for the express purpose of keeping it out of the trial, maybe because it will exonerate the accused.”
“So this hypothetical investigator wants to determine when the document was actually classified?”
Harkins nodded.
“Well, it’s easy enough to backdate a classification. There really is a big rubber stamp that says ‘Secret’ or ‘Top Secret,’ and the date is just written in with ink. Someone could just write in an earlier date.”
Harkins put his hands in his pockets.
“Is this germane to your investigation?”
“Maybe, maybe not. I might be grasping at straws.”
“Sorry I couldn’t help more.”
“Not at all,” Harkins said. “Listen, maybe if I’m back at a decent hour, we could grab a bite to eat together.”
“I’d like that,” Beverly said. “Now, off you go. Be careful traveling today.”
Harkins pulled his cap from his pocket. “How did you know I was traveling?”
“Just a guess,” she said, giving him a mischievous smile. “Either that, or I’m a super spy. But you’ll never get anything out of me, Yank. Not until you buy me dinner.”
* * *
“So, no Captain Wickman again today,” Pamela Lowell said to Harkins as they drove south toward the channel coast. “You did tell him we were headed out, didn’t you?”
“Why, Private Lowell, I’m surprised you think I could be so devious as to abandon my partner.”
It had been Wickman’s idea to let Harkins go to the coast alone to interview Batcheller’s friend, Lieutenant Payne. The captain said he was working on something that would help them.
“So why are we driving and not taking the train?” Harkins asked.
“All the trains have been requisitioned,” Lowell answered. “The clerk told me she couldn’t find a single seat on anything going toward the coast.”
“Is that right?” Harkins asked, looking sideways at Lowell, who kept her hands at ten and two on the wheel.
“What do you mean?”
“Well it just seems odd, with gasoline—excuse me, petrol—so tightly rationed, that we’re motoring down to Southam
pton,” Harkins said. “You didn’t pull this little stunt so you could stay involved in the investigation, did you?”
“It’s not a little stunt, sir,” Lowell said, glancing at him quickly. “But I am glad to be out of the rotation at the motor pool. I would like very much to be useful, but I’m also happy to be away from Corporal Moore.”
“Is that your squad leader?”
“Team leader, yes, sir. If she gets wind of a good assignment, she often pulls the girl off the job and takes it herself.”
“Do you think I’d like her better?” Harkins asked, smiling. “Should I trade up?”
“Well, she’s quite pretty, but I’m sure you’re better off with me.”
“If you say so.”
They drove south and west, the land unfolding around them in dozens of shades of green, low hills and ancient hedges close to the road. Since the highway signs had been removed, Lowell named the towns, a strange-sounding litany: Chertsey, Woking, Farnborough, Basingstoke, Sutton Scotney, Kings Worthy. The closer they got to the coast, the more military hardware they saw parked in fields and along roadsides, much of it under camouflage netting. They passed one great pile of crates—Harkins thought it was ammunition—with a footprint half as big as a football field, the wooden boxes stacked eight or ten high, all of it tucked below a giant overhang of corrugated metal. He counted six gleaming new locomotives parked on a railroad siding visible from the highway.
“Why did you become a police officer?” Lowell asked Harkins when they got past the jam.
“A girl told me that the blue uniform went well with my eyes.”
Harkins turned to Lowell, certain that she’d look to confirm he had blue eyes, but she stared straight ahead.
“Okay,” he said. “That’s not true, but I did take typing in high school because there were lots of girls in the class.”
Lowell didn’t crack a smile at this tidbit, either. After a pause, she said, “So?”
Harkins looked out the windshield as they passed a horse-drawn cart hauling milk cans. An old man sitting on the bench seat lifted a hand when Harkins waved.
“I was in college for a year,” Harkins said. “Catholic school called Villanova, near Philadelphia.”
When he didn’t go further, Lowell asked, “Then the war came long?”
“No. I was asked to take my talents elsewhere. There was this big guy on the rowing team, and he kept pushing around some other guy, a smaller guy who wore glasses. I asked the rower to lay off.”
Harkins looked off to the right, and when the hedges parted he saw a man standing in a muddy field, examining a horse’s hoof.
“So, what? The big guy didn’t stop?”
“No, he stopped,” Harkins said.
That part was true; the bully got the message, but only after Harkins had smacked him around in front of his teammates at the boat house. Harkins got expelled for fighting, but he suspected it was because he beat up a rich kid.
Lowell downshifted and braked, giving way to a shepherd moving thirty or so sheep across the road in front of them.
Harkins doubted he’d told a half-dozen GIs that he’d had a year of college, in part because he didn’t want to get stuck with the nickname “college boy,” which was not a compliment in the army, and in part because he was embarrassed at getting kicked out of school.
“But why a cop?” Lowell asked. “Why not something else?”
Patrick, his priest brother, had asked him the same question before he joined the force. Harkins had said something about law and order, about helping people, protecting the weak, and all that was true. But there was also some truth to the comparison Harkins’ father made, that Eddie Harkins was like his uncle Jimmy, the brawler. He liked to mix it up. Sometimes Harkins was afraid it was darker than that.
“I told you,” he said. “I look good in blue.”
* * *
They passed through three different security stations before reaching Southampton, which sat on a triangle of land where the River Itchen met the River Test, thirty miles upriver from the English Channel. The address they’d been given took them to a cluster of temporary buildings set up in what had been, pre-war, a city park. All lawns had been turned to mud by tire tracks, and there was a latrine dug in one of the garden beds. A small sign beside the security gate said ROYAL NAVY LOGISTICS, SOUTHAMPTON.
“Is Payne a Brit, sir?” Lowell asked.
“No. Looks like he might be a liaison officer.”
Harkins and Lowell got out of the car and approached a group of three American naval officers coming out of a large building. Harkins wasn’t sure how to read naval rank, but there was a double handful of gold stripes among the men, so he threw up a hasty salute. Lowell followed suit, and Harkins heard her heels click together. He’d have to ask her to lighten up on the spit-and-polish so he didn’t look so bad by comparison.
“Excuse me, gentlemen,” he said. “I’m looking for a Lieutenant Frank Payne.”
“Right over there,” one of the men said, pointing back over his shoulder. “But you’d better hurry. He spends most of his time on the road between here and Bournemouth.”
“What’s at Bournemouth?” Harkins asked.
“Buddy, if you don’t already know, I sure ain’t gonna tell you.”
When the three walked away, Lowell said, “I guess we’re smack in the middle of the staging area for the you-know-what.”
Harkins and Lowell went inside the building, and a clerk pointed out Lieutenant Frank Payne, who stood at a table covered with charts. He had a telephone in each hand and seemed to be yelling into them both at the same time.
“Yeah, well, that’s not going to happen anytime soon,” he shouted into the right handset. “So you better make do with what you got.”
He jammed that phone onto its cradle and turned his attention to the other.
“Hello?” he said into the left handset. Then, louder, “Hello?”
Apparently there was no answer, so he dropped that one into its cradle and looked up at Harkins.
“He hung up on me,” he said. “He called me for help and he hung up on me. Can you believe that?”
Payne was shorter than Harkins, maybe five eight, with a bald, bullet-shaped head that was, at the moment, shiny with sweat.
“Lieutenant Payne?” Harkins asked.
Payne looked at Harkins without saying anything, then at Lowell. His anger seemed to leak out of him.
“Annie called me,” he said. “Told me you might be coming.”
“I’m Lieutenant Eddie Harkins. Is there someplace we can speak privately?”
Payne took a deep breath. “I’m not sure I can help you. I’m really quite busy.” He looked at his watch. “I’ve got to be somewhere in an hour. Less than an hour.”
“This shouldn’t take long,” Harkins said.
“And it’s a thirty-minute drive is what I’m saying,” Payne said.
“Look, Frank,” Harkins said. “May I call you Frank?”
“Sure.”
“We can give you a ride, if that helps.”
“I don’t know,” Payne said. “Like I said…”
“I know; you’re not sure you can help,” Harkins said. “I hear that a lot.”
Harkins lowered his voice, leaned over the table a little so that he was closer to Payne. They were in an open space, all kinds of people in U.S. and Royal Navy uniforms bustling about carrying file folders and papers stuck to clipboards.
“So, you know this is a murder investigation, right? I’m the investigating officer, and I can detain people if I see the need, but I don’t want to do that.”
Harkins stood straight, tried a smile. “I hear there’s a war on,” he said. “So let’s not waste any more time, okay?”
Payne picked up his hat and a canvas satchel. “Okay, let’s go,” he said.
Outside, Lowell opened the rear door to the staff car; the two officers got in the back.
“Where to, sir?” Lowell said when she was behind the
wheel.
“Left out of the gate,” Payne said. “Then keep left at the fork on the main road.”
“Annie Stowe told me you and Helen dated,” Harkins said, pivoting on the rear seat to face Payne.
Payne wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. Harkins had thought he was starting with an easy question. When Payne didn’t answer, Harkins asked, “Is that true?”
“Yes,” Payne said. “We were friends. I mean, we went around together, but we were mostly friends.”
Payne was anxious, which made Harkins more curious.
“You married?” he asked.
“What?” Payne said, turning to Harkins. The question had hit a nerve of some sort. “No. Why do you ask?”
“Lots of married people, overseas for a couple of years, have other lives,” Harkins said. “I’m not judging; you just seem nervous talking about Batcheller.”
“No, I’m not married. Helen was great company.”
“Okay,” Harkins said. He sat back, looked out the windshield. “How long have you been here?”
“I got transferred last month, maybe five weeks ago,” Payne said.
“Have you been back to London since then?” Harkins asked. He had not thought about Payne as a suspect, but the guy was clearly on edge.
“No.”
“Did you request the transfer?”
Payne looked at Harkins. “I did.”
Harkins wanted to ask him if he and Batcheller had a falling-out, but he needed to turn down the heat a little to get Payne talking, so he took another tack.
“More interesting work down here?”
“Well,” Payne said. “Yes. I’m a supply officer, and this is the biggest buildup of supplies, maybe anywhere, anytime.”
The road led north alongside the River Test and its giant docks stacked with everything from oil drums to jeeps. Lowell slowed to let a formation of marching men cross the road in front of them, two bagpipers in the lead.
“I love that music,” Lowell said.
“Sounds like somebody’s strangling a cat,” Harkins said.
Every road and side street was jammed with military vehicles or men in uniform and on foot.
“I’m sure it’s a puzzle, sorting out where all this stuff has to go,” Harkins said, trying to draw Payne out. Lowell caught Harkins’ attention in the rearview, lifted her eyebrows as if to say, Tough one.
