The Accidental Agent

by Andrew Rosenheim

  ‘Haven’t you heard of rationing? And if I was being hoity-toity, Lilian, why would I come here?’

  She laughed. ‘That’s more like it. I’ll be back with your food in a jiff.’

  Stephenson was looking over Guttman’s shoulder again. ‘Okay so far,’ he said. Then he shifted his gaze to Guttman. ‘We’ve got a problem starting this conversation, Harry.’

  ‘How’s that?’

  ‘Both of us know more than we’re allowed to tell. But if we can’t level with each other, then we can’t help each other.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Guttman uneasily, rubbing his chin with his fist. Guttman wanted to keep his distance from Stephenson’s easy unaffected charm. ‘I have a feeling you’ve got more to tell me than I have for you.’

  Stephenson shrugged. ‘I’m not so sure about that. Unless you understand the science – and I sure don’t – then we’re not in any danger of violating security.’ He leaned forward, so there was no chance of being overheard. ‘The thing is, we have all been cooperating on what for lack of a better phrase I’ll call the Big Weapon. We know about the project and you can relax – we were allowed to know.

  ‘Now, we checked out the names you gave me as well as we could. Nothing popped up for you to worry about, though there was one name we couldn’t learn much about.’

  ‘Which one?’ asked Guttman, hoping the growing knot in his stomach was wrong.

  It wasn’t.

  ‘Kalvin,’ said Stephenson. ‘He’s a Polish Jew, but Poland’s not a place where our sources can discover much these days. It’s chaos, as you can imagine, and it’s likely to get worse as the Russians advance. Jews there have either been slaughtered or are about to be. Obviously some are in hiding. Kalvin was there until 1933 – we know that much. He worked in a research laboratory in Warsaw. Then he came over here in 1940.’

  ‘That sounds par for the course.’ Most of the refugee physicists’ careers followed this kind of peripatetic progress, especially the Jewish ones. ‘But how did he get out of Warsaw in 1940?’

  ‘He didn’t. He popped up in Paris in 1938, working in the Curie Radium Lab.’

  ‘So what’s the problem?’

  ‘We’ve got five missing years before then.’ He looked briefly again over Guttman’s shoulder, then said, ‘Look, there’s probably an innocent explanation. All our info is coming through Switzerland, and sometimes it’s second, even third hand. I can’t vouch for it as I could have done before the war.’ He added with an unexpected sharpness, ‘All I can say is I have people risking their lives to get it.’

  Guttman bit his lip. ‘I do know that, Bill. I’m very grateful.’

  ‘Sorry, Harry. I didn’t mean to get touchy.’ He looked embarrassed. ‘Relations on high are a little strained right now.’

  Guttman looked at him questioningly, and Stephenson explained: ‘This project’s been turned over to the military. Our friend Groves.’

  Guttman decided not to nod.

  Stephenson said, ‘He’s worried – rightly – about security. I figured that’s where your queries were coming from. But he also distrusts us Brits. He doesn’t think we can keep secrets from other interested parties.’

  ‘Is he right?’

  ‘Possibly,’ said Stephenson shortly. ‘Let’s come back to that, but first, can you tell me why you wanted this information?’

  Guttman had been dreading the question, since he wasn’t sure of the answer himself. Fortunately their food came, on vast oval-shaped plates. Stephenson looked at the mound of chopped liver on Guttman’s plate. ‘That’s a half-order?’

  ‘Welcome to my club. The decor’s not up to the Century Club, but the food’s okay.’

  ‘They certainly give you a lot of it.’

  They ate for a while in silence. ‘This is good,’ Stephenson at last acknowledged, between mouthfuls of turkey, while Guttman moved the bagel around the vast grey mound of chopped liver. He didn’t feel hungry after his knish. At last he said, ‘Do you remember Nessheim?’

  ‘How could I forget him? He deserves a medal. I hope he got one.’

  ‘He’s in Chicago, actually.’

  Stephenson stared at Guttman. ‘For the Bureau?’

  ‘Technically, he’s a student at the University of Chicago Law School.’ He figured if Stephenson didn’t know where the ‘project’ was, this wouldn’t mean much to him.

  Stephenson’s eyes widened. He said, ‘And the rest of the time, he’s at Stagg Field?’

  So he did know. Good, thought Guttman; he was happiest coming clean with Stephenson. ‘I’ll tell you about it,’ he said, leaving the chopped liver alone.

  So as Stephenson continued to eat his turkey breast sandwich, Guttman explained how he had first been drawn in, leaving Frankfurter’s name out of it, but making it clear that he had been privately consulted – and that the rest of the Bureau (he meant Hoover) was unaware of the project. He described how he had cajoled Nessheim to help out. And finally, sensing its thinness, he related what Nessheim had unearthed so far, though Guttman didn’t mention Arthur Perkins. ‘The thing is, if Kalvin’s a Jew, I can’t believe he’d be helping the Nazis.’

  ‘Stranger things have happened. He may have family back in Poland who the Nazis have threatened – we had a Jewish refugee interned who was being blackmailed by the Gestapo. But it doesn’t seem very likely. Is there any evidence the Nazis have infiltrated the project?’

  Guttman sat back in the booth and sighed. ‘That’s the thing. There isn’t any at all that I can see.’ He thought of Kalvin’s mysterious meeting with the man who’d then gone downtown in Chicago to the building that housed the FBI Field Office. It was impossible to see a Nazi connection there. He said resignedly, ‘My orders came from on high.’ He looked meaningfully at Stephenson. ‘The highest high we have, lacking a monarch.’

  Stephenson laughed; there was something refreshing about the delight which could spontaneously appear on his face, since otherwise he cut such a prim professional figure. ‘The President himself, huh? But I tell you, I think he’s got the wrong end of the stick. We’re confident that the Nazis aren’t working on building … on a project like this. They’ve decided it’s not practical. There’s a physicist named Heisenberg – he’s been in charge of German efforts to build a Super Weapon. He confided in one of ours.’ Stephenson paused briefly. ‘Have you heard the name Bohr? B-o-h-r.’

  He’d been on one of the lists – Guttman was sure of that. He couldn’t pronounce names, he didn’t recognise them when they were spoken, but he remembered what they looked like on a printed page. His memory was not photographic, but it was close. ‘I’ve seen it. Where is he now?’

  ‘In England. But before that, in Denmark. Heisenberg went to a conference there and saw Bohr. He could not have been clearer that the Germans don’t believe a bomb is possible within the probable time limits of this war.’

  What were they? Three years? Five years? Some days Guttman thought it might be ten. He said, ‘Denmark? You said you’d have news from Norway.’

  Stephenson smiled. ‘Norway’s our guarantee. Just in case Heisenberg wasn’t telling the truth (though we’re sure he was). The Germans have a factory – it makes something called heavy water.’

  From his visit to Oppenheimer six months before, Guttman knew what it was. ‘What about it?’ he asked.

  ‘We’re going to blow it up. It may take more than one go. But we’ll get there. And that won’t leave the Nazis with any alternatives, even if they suddenly change their mind. They can’t get the graphite for one thing.’ He looked at Guttman to see if he was following.

  He was. Pure graphite lay at the heart of the project in Chicago at Stagg Field; Groves had said so, in a throwaway line when he thought Guttman wasn’t paying attention. ‘So there’s nothing the Nazis would gain by having an agent in Chicago?’

  ‘Nothing. It’s almost inconceivable. You know better than the rest of us how inept the Nazi espionage attempts have been in this country. But you also know their tar
gets have always made sense – blow up a naval yard, disrupt communications, wreak havoc among civilians. It’s the people they’ve chosen who’ve been their downfall.’

  This was true. The few fifth column sympathisers had been easy enough to find, and the actual Germans who’d landed had almost rounded themselves up, so incompetent had they proved.

  Guttman said, ‘Maybe so, but there’s something that troubles me. Nessheim had an anonymous note, saying, “We know where you are.” It wouldn’t mean much of anything – Nessheim used to run informants in the Chicago area, and he’s got any agent’s normal quota of enemies. But the note was addressed to “Rossbach”. And that was Nessheim’s undercover name when he infiltrated the Bund.’

  ‘I remember. Who else would know that?’

  ‘Nazi sympathisers, maybe the Nazis themselves.’

  ‘Yes, of course, but who else?’

  ‘What do you mean? Outside the Bureau, nobody else would know it.’

  ‘Outside the Bureau?’ Stephenson gave him a look that said come on.

  Then he glanced over Guttman’s shoulder again, and this time his eyes stayed there. ‘Harry, there’s a guy who’s passed by the front window twice. Heavyset, tall, with the collar of his overcoat turned up. No hat. I’m just wondering.’

  ‘If he comes by a third time you’ll know. Twice is questionable – three times is bad news.’

  ‘That’s what I was thinking. Before we go, I need to tell you about that one other name you asked me to check. The one that wasn’t foreign.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Guttman slowly, still digesting the import of their exchange about Stagg Field.

  ‘We can’t figure out where the man lives.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘We’ve followed him, Harry. Not every day – I just don’t have the manpower now. But enough to know that he doesn’t go home, or at least not “home” as you and I know it. He keeps going to motels. They’re all in D.C., but not in what I’d call the most salubrious neighbourhoods.’

  ‘Weird. I mean, I can see maybe he’d stay in a motel for a while, but even then you’d want to make a long-term deal. You know, get a room cheap if you stay a month. That would still be odd – he’s not a new employee any more.’

  ‘I know. And we’re checking him out on the West Coast. But until then we’ve focused on his life in D.C. – and the motels. My chaps have the strong impression that he’s not always alone.’

  ‘Shacked up with someone?

  ‘It’s more like visitation rights. And from more than one visitor. We couldn’t get a photograph – it was too dark. But we’ll keep trying.’ Stephenson started to reach into his coat for his wallet.

  ‘It’s on me,’ said Guttman, reaching a hand out to keep Stephenson from proffering money.

  ‘Let me contribute. It was delicious,’ he said with a smile which suddenly froze.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘Our friend just walked by a third time. Are you armed, Harry?’

  Guttman shook his head. Strictly speaking, he wasn’t on official business. ‘I didn’t think I’d need a gun today.’

  ‘You never know. Anyway, I am. For two cents I’d take care of this guy but this is your turf and I’d hate to end my war in Sing Sing. Especially if he’s not working for the enemy. Did that occur to you?’

  ‘It did, Bill. It did.’

  ‘I’d better leave first, Harry. I don’t think he’s spotted you yet.’ He stood up, buttoning his overcoat. ‘I’ll be in D.C. the day after tomorrow. I’ll call you if I’ve got any news about your young roving friend. Same number?’

  ‘Yeah, or at the office if you get through to Marie.’

  ‘Good.’ Stephenson pointed to the bill. ‘I think I will let you get the tab after all, Harry. I’m just sorry you’ve got two problems. It could be they both stem from the same place.’

  Guttman waited ten minutes, then paid the bill and left Lilian Rabinowitz four bits. Outside, he stood and looked around. It didn’t take long; within a couple of minutes the heavyset guy was coming up Houston and when he spotted Guttman standing there, he turned and signalled to a car way down the block. It was the Ford again. Guttman walked slowly and the car passed him, then went right down Essex Street. Turning round, Guttman blessed his luck, for a cab stopped almost as soon as he raised his arm.

  ‘Foley Square, and step on it,’ he barked, showing the driver his badge. By the time the Ford had circled around the block he would be long gone. Looking back through the rear window he saw the heavyset guy standing alone on the far corner, waiting forlornly for his colleagues in the dark car.

  In Foley Square, a Red Cross station had set up shop for blood donations, though the persistent drizzle was keeping volunteer numbers down. Guttman walked up the steps of the Courthouse, a monumental, classical Greek temple with Corinthian columns and granite-faced exterior walls. Adjoining it at the rear was a tall tower, thirty storeys high, which held government offices, including the Field Office headquarters of the FBI.

  Going through the Courthouse halls, he passed lawyers, clients and cops mingling outside the courtrooms, waiting for the afternoon sessions to begin. There had been a time when Guttman had hoped to spend his career in just such a setting: defending the innocent (this was when he was still an innocent); prosecuting the guilty (as he grew more worldly wise); or testifying as an honest cop, tough but just – like Keane, the Irish policeman. Those aspirations seemed in the distant past, and he would not have wanted to say which role he was playing now.

  The receptionist was startled when Guttman showed his Assistant Director’s credentials. It was encouraging that she hadn’t been expecting him, though he knew it didn’t mean much. She phoned through to Powderman’s secretary, and Guttman could envisage the resulting panic – especially since it turned out that Powderman was not in his office, but roaming the floor. After a few minutes a flustered woman in a pink blouse came and collected Guttman, apologising for the delay as she took him to see the new Special Agent in Charge.

  Powderman had moved into the SAC’s comfortable office overlooking Foley Square, though his desk faced the door so that he sat with his back to the window. Little American flags sat on each of his desk’s front corners, and a poster on the wall showed two factory workers gabbing, while a sinister foreign-looking man with a moustache eavesdropped in the background. The caption read, ‘Keep it to yourself!’

  Powderman seemed genuinely surprised to see him. ‘You should have said you were coming.’

  ‘So you could lay out the red carpet?’

  Powderman laughed, a little nervously. ‘At least I’d have made sure I was in my office.’ Guttman relaxed a bit, more confident now that Powderman hadn’t known he was in town. It seemed the Ford hadn’t been a Bureau car after all.

  Powderman asked, ‘What brings you to the city?’

  ‘My mom’s not well.’

  ‘Sorry to hear that.’ Powderman looked too young to have a dying mother; Guttman figured he was just shy of forty, and fresh-faced. A Nebraska native, who now that he’d been promoted to SAC wore a spiffier kind of suit, though he still spoke with the mild twang of the Midwest. The SAC’s job here usually came with the title of Assistant Director, but either because it was wartime or because Powderman was unproven in the role, he was still just called the Special Agent in Charge. This gave Guttman a slight but perceptible advantage.

  ‘I thought while I was here I’d stop by. Nothing new on the Dasch front, I take it?’

  Powderman considered this, careful now that the small talk was over. ‘No. We followed up the leads you guys provided. Nothing more’s come up.’

  Guttman nodded as if he expected this. ‘I had three more names. Since I’m here maybe you could run them through the local files.’ It was not an unusual request, for not everything held in the field offices would be duplicated in the files at HQ on Connecticut Avenue. Field offices would commonly hold unsubmitted lists of subversives, or more accurately, suspected subv
ersives. Everyone knew the lists could be both grotesquely inclusive and wildly inaccurate – as if someone throwing darts counted even those that missed the board. These stabs in the dark could be the results of a neighbour’s vindictive whisper, a suspect’s meeting with a known ‘agitator’, an undivulged grudge on a Special Agent’s part, or simply from the field office’s need to show results.

  ‘Sure,’ said Powderman, reaching for the internal phone on his desk. He spoke into the receiver. ‘Bonnie, check a few names in the internal subs files, will you?’ Guttman could hear a high-pitched voice respond. Powderman said, ‘Yes, right away. I’ve got someone from D.C. here and he’s waiting.’

  Powderman looked at him questioningly and Guttman said, ‘The first name’s Kalvin – with a “K”. A refugee currently living in Chicago, but it was suggested he used to live in New York.’ It hadn’t been, but Guttman wanted to give three names to lessen the attention paid to the one he was actually interested in.

  Powderman spelled out ‘Kalvin’, then raised his eyebrows at Guttman.

  ‘Schneider. Ernst Schneider. Lives in Yorkville.’ Guttman was making it up on the fly.

  Reciting Schneider’s name into the phone, Powderman then looked at Guttman again. ‘The last one is Perkins – Arthur Perkins of Riverside Drive.’ He didn’t say that Arthur Perkins was dead.

  Powderman relayed this last name, then put the phone down. ‘It won’t be long – Bonnie’s quick.’

  While they waited, they shot the breeze for a bit, talking sports mainly – Powderman bemoaning the decimation of Major League rosters by the wartime call-up. ‘Ted Williams,’ Powderman announced. ‘He’s going to lose a couple of years of home runs.’

  A couple of years? Again, Guttman wondered. He was confident of the Allies’ eventual victory, yet equally certain of the Germans’ ability to resist a premature invasion of Europe.

  When they had exhausted the last season’s batting averages and Guttman was wondering when Bonnie would show up, Powderman said suddenly, ‘You know, I think maybe I owe you an apology.’