Peter again glanced at Julie, and he could see she was equally frustrated with the evasive answer they got from the general. But he knew that regardless of how much he pressed for answers, General Applegate was not going to budge.
“Well, as long as we’ll be brought up to speed in time . . .” Peter said, drifting off in disappointment.
“If there is nothing else?” Applegate said as he again stood up to leave.
Peter sat for a moment before standing himself. He waited for most everyone to exit. As Applegate was about to leave, Peter said, “General? A word please?”
When they were alone, Peter moved to close the door, and turned to the general.
“I am not sure what is going on here, but why are you holding back information? You’ve admitted as much and if you want this mission to be a success, you need to be more forthcoming with us. You picked Julie and me for a reason. We can handle it.”
“Peter, what I said in front of the team is true. We are feeding you information slowly to promote thorough absorption. Could we be providing you the full mission specs? Yes. Yes, we could. But let’s not forget what happened with you, Benny, and Stella just a few short weeks ago.”
“I told you General. Nothing happened. I didn’t say a word,” Peter lied.
“I know what you said Peter, but in the event you get a little too inebriated again, we would feel more comfortable with limiting the information prior to departure. Peter, you will have to trust me. I am doing this for your own good.”
Peter stared into the general’s eyes. They were not the friendly eyes that had greeted him prior to learning of or accepting the mission. He felt deceived.
“I can tell you this. Once back in 1942, you will have a week to review the complete mission briefing prior to your departure to France. We built extra time into the schedule specifically for that purpose. We want you all to arrive and remain concealed while you get acclimated to the new timeline. We will not need to rush the mission once you leave the present.”
Peter remained stoic and upon hearing that nugget of information his frustration abated, slightly. “OK, General. I’ll play along. It’s just that I feel like I could be planning more effectively if I knew what was supposed to be accomplished. That’s all.”
“I completely understand. That is one of your strengths, Peter. You are always thinking two steps ahead. Why do you think you are on this mission in the first place? We want to utilize that skill to its fullest potential. However, since you have plenty of time to acclimate in 1942, we are limiting any potential damage that could occur in the present.” Applegate slapped him on the back as he walked to the door and left.
Peter paused a moment before following him out of the room. Heading to the training area to meet up with Julie, Peter began to reflect on what wasn’t said during that conversation. He had to find out what Benny remembered from Herb’s. The success of both missions could very well depend on it.
CHAPTER 4
Twelve days to Linear Shift
After dinner, the kids retreated to their rooms. Peter finished cleaning up the kitchen and decided it was time to head to Herb’s to touch base with Benny. Peter had tried to call Benny several times over the last few days. He needed to know just what Benny remembered from their discussion and warn him about the general and his cronies. But Benny’s answering machine always picked up on the first ring. The man seriously needed to move into the twenty-first century and subscribe to voicemail.
He knew he would have to be careful to circumvent Trevor, so now was a good time to practice the tradecraft instilled in him over the last couple weeks. He changed into dark clothing and stepped out the back door.
The evening was cool and a light mist was hanging in the air. The moon remained hidden behind the clouds, giving Peter’s covert expedition a beneficial head start. Carrying a half-full trash bag to toss into the alley dumpster, he crossed through his backyard to the gate at the alley. Without hesitation, he slipped into the alley and tossed the trash into the large green bin. The thud caused a few barks from neighboring dogs but nothing more. Peter paused in front of the dumpster, glancing up and down the alley. He sensed no movement in either direction. He noticed a burgundy sedan with tinted windows under the street lamp at the north entrance to the alley. He began to move down the alley, staying out of the sedan’s sight line and in the shadows as much as possible.
After a half dozen houses, he reached the end and ducked behind a parked car, waiting. He listened intently but heard nothing except the occasional chirping of crickets. Satisfied, Peter crossed the alley and swiftly jumped the three-foot-tall fence, praying that the yard he was invading had no dogs. He ran toward the rear of the house and slipped along its side, ducking below the windows as he crept by. The occupants were home, and as he slid by the nearest front window, he could hear the nine o’clock news being broadcast.
Having made his way to the front of the yard, he discreetly lifted the gate latch and walked out onto the sidewalk. He resisted closing the gate, not wanting to make any more noise than necessary.
Peter could feel his heart pounding from the excitement of his stealthy prowess. He loved the feeling of adrenalin pumping through his veins, and he reveled in this new adventure. The previous year of complete inactivity paled in comparison, and he was grateful for having been guided into his new profession.
Without incident, Peter repeated the ‘duck and weave’ through the next five blocks before he was sure he was not being followed. He casually strolled the last few blocks to Herb’s in plain sight, still checking for a tail as they had taught him in training. He was not followed, and he felt great.
Standing in front of Herb’s, Peter suddenly realized he had not had a drop to drink since accepting the mission. It was a conscious decision because he wanted to have complete focus for the mission training. He contemplated whether to have a drink or not before went in. He had hoped that Benny wouldn’t entice him into a rowdy night of debauchery and mayhem. Deciding not to heed his own concerns, Peter swung the door open and walked inside.
A sense of déjà vu came over him. He walked up to the bar and had a seat. He glanced around, hoping to see Benny in his usual booth, but no such luck. The crowd was thin, but then again it was a work night. Joe noticed him and sauntered over.
“Hi there, Pete,” he said, leaning on the edge of the wood rail. “What brings you in on a Wednesday?”
Acting casual, Peter said, “Nothing too crazy. Just want to clear my head a bit. How ‘bout a beer?”
“What, no scotch tonight?” asked Joe as he reached back for a pint glass.
“Nah, trying to lay off the heavy sauce for a while. Actually, make it a light beer. I’m trying to lose this gut.” He patted the much-less-ample belly. An additional benefit of military training.
“Whatever you say, Boss.”
A moment later, Joe slid a pint of some nondescript, wheat-colored lager toward Peter. He turned to retreat across the bar, but Peter called after him.
“Hey, Joe. Seen Benny around lately?”
“Nope. Haven’t seen hide nor hair of him,” Joe replied, glancing up to the ceiling in contemplation. “Now that you mention it, Benny hasn’t been around since that night you two closed this place down. I figured he and Stella finally hooked up, ‘cause she’s not been in since that night neither.”
Peter was shocked at the news, but he kept his poker face. “Heh, yeah. Benny is just crazy enough to actually take Stella out for a spin,” he chuckled. He picked up his beer and downed a few swallows as he thought through this new dilemma. Hesitant to raise suspicion, but wanting more information, he pressed on “How ‘bout that pretty brunette and the goon that were in here that night? Have they been back?”
Needing to attend to other customers, Joe replied shortly, “Nope. Not seen them neither since that night.”
Joe moved to the other side of the bar, and Peter nursed the remainder of his beer over the next fifteen minutes. While he sat, he wondered wha
t might have happened to Benny and Stella. He knew it was not Benny’s style to just disappear like that. He knew even more so that Stella would not miss her regular watering session. Herb’s was her home away from home, if there ever was one. He was certain of one thing. Ever since General Applegate came into his life, it seemed that the present had already shifted.
Peter finished his beer, tossed a five near the empty glass, and silently exited the bar.
As he walked through the gloom back to his house, forgone was the stealth training approach because his mind was lost in thought. What the hell happened to Benny and Stella? Subconsciously he knew, but he was afraid to admit it to himself. He wanted to give the general the benefit of the doubt, but deep-down he knew it was a wasted effort.
His walk home from Herb’s was much quicker than his trip there. When he neared his front yard, he noticed the familiar burgundy sedan parked across the street. Just then, both the driver and passenger side doors opened. Trevor and Mark stepped out. “Shit,” exclaimed Peter under his breath. He slowed his pace and met them at the sidewalk leading to his front door.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” Peter said.
“Where’ve you been, Mr. Cooper?” asked Trevor.
“Oh, just out for a stroll on this beautiful night,” stated Peter. The night wasn’t particularly beautiful; it could have started raining at any moment.
“Cut the crap, Peter!” exclaimed Mark. “We know you were up at Herb’s.”
Dumbfounded, Peter recalled his clandestine trip to the bar, and was absolutely confident he was not followed. How did they know?
“Come on guys. I just needed to get out. You know, clear my head? We’ve been training pretty hard lately. Can’t you guys lighten up a bit?” Peter said, more as a statement than a question.
“Sorry, Mr. Cooper. We can’t do that. You know how critical your discretion is. General Applegate will need to hear about this,” said Trevor matter-of-factly.
“Yeah, sure. Fine,” Peter barked. “Whatever you two need to do. I’m going inside now.” He proceeded to the front door.
Once inside, he locked the door and peeked out the side window to see if his babysitters had returned to their car. They both were still standing on his sidewalk, and Mark was on his cell phone. Peter was certain he was tattling to General Applegate. He didn’t care. He was reaching his threshold for tolerance with all this distrust. He decided that to make this worth his effort, he would make certain Operation Abraham succeeded. After everything he had learned that night, it reinforced that he needed to look out for himself.
CHAPTER 5
Ten days to Linear Shift
The next few days of schlepping back and forth to the warehouse were uneventful at best. Peter was certain that Mark had talked to the general about his late night escapade at Herb’s, but strangely enough, Applegate hadn’t said a word about it.
With the arrival of the weekend, Peter was looking forward to a little R&R —and some time away from the general and the warehouse. Most importantly though, he had two full days to spend with his kids, which was something that he hadn’t done a whole lot of since taking the mission. He knew his time with them was limited, so he wanted to make the best of what little time was left. The only problem was that Tori had screwed up family time by having a sleepover at a friend’s house. At first Peter was upset at her self-centered attitude. But in the end, he couldn’t be too angry; she was a teenage girl living in a house with two guys and no mother figure. She got a pass.
Peter hoped Brett was ok with it as well, because it gave them some guy time.
“Well, bub. Looks like it’s just you and me this weekend. Anything you want to do?”
Peter and Brett sat at the kitchen table finishing up breakfast. Brett had just swallowed an enormous bite of syrup-laden pancakes. He shrugged. “I don’t know. I was kind of hoping to rearrange my room.”
Peter remembered how in his teenage years he had also liked to change his layout every few months, just to keep the monotony to a minimum. “All right. How’s about I give you a hand and later we can go see a matinee or something?”
Brett’s eyes lit up at the thought of going to the movies. “Could we see that new alien abduction one in 3-D?”
“Sure thing, sport. Let’s finish breakfast and get cleaned up. Why don’t you clear the table and I’ll go check the movie times? Meet in your room in 10 minutes?” Brett was already starting to stack the dishes before Peter’s words were out of his mouth.
After forty-five minutes of moving practically every piece of Brett’s furniture to a different spot in his room at least three times, Brett conceded that where everything had begun made the most sense. As they finished moving everything back to its original locale, Peter noticed a book on Brett’s shelf titled The Expert’s Guide to Collecting & Investing in Rare Coins. He pulled the book out and began to flip through the pages.
“That’s the book you bought me last year for my birthday,” Brett offered when he noticed his dad looking at it.
“Any good information in here?” Peter asked.
“Eh, not really. I mean it has a ton of information, but it was all kind of basic to me. I like the Red Book or the Blue Book better for values.”
“Um, what? You lost me. What’s the Red Book and the Blue Book?”
“They’re books on US coins that come out every year, and they are way better at identifying and rating coins in your collection.” Brett reached up and pulled the 2012 version of the Red Book. “See, it shows values of coins by their year.” Brett flipped through a number of pages to show his dad.
Intrigued, Peter returned the book he was holding back onto the shelf before taking Brett’s Red Book from him. He flipped to 1942.
“What do you know about coins from World War II?” he asked his son.
“Not much. I think there is something about a mercury dime . . .” Brett answered, but Peter was already scanning the values of all the coins from 1942. The mercury dime was in fact valued the highest of all, but not as high as he had hoped.
“If you want to see a high-priced coin, Dad, look at the 1943 bronze penny.”
“Bronze? Was that new in 1943?”
Brett chuckled at his dad’s ignorance. “Uh, no. The penny is actually not copper, dad. They’re made of bronze, which does include copper, but not 100%.”
Peter, feeling foolish that his thirteen year old son was schooling him on what a penny was actually made of could only say, “Oh.”
“Actually, in 1943 the US Mint ordered all pennies to be made of steel, in order to save copper for the war efforts.” Brett paused, as he flipped the Red Book to the appendix. “See, the bronze pennies that actually made it into circulation were made from planchets that were not removed from the presses from the 1942 run.”
“What exactly is a planchet?”
“It’s the metal disc before they do the imprinting.”
“Right.”
Peter skimmed the appendix while Brett continued on “It’s unknown just how many made it into circulation, but there was at least one from each of the three US mints. The rarest of all came from the San Francisco Mint—”
“What’s that? The San Francisco Mint?” Peter asked, now ignoring the book.
“Yeah, the one and only 1943 penny from San Francisco known to exist sold a few years ago for a million dollars.”
Peter felt chills run through his body. “A million dollars? For a penny?”
“I know, right?”
“What year was it again?”
“1943,” Brett replied, deflating the optimism he’d just built. Peter’s mission wasn’t going back to 1943; he’d be a year early.
Peter flipped back to the section for 1942 and again scanned the coin values for that year.
Looking over his dad’s shoulder, Brett asked, “What’s so important about 1942?”
“Nothing particular. Just a conversation on World War II coins Benny and I were having. And you’re right. The mercury dime looks t
o be the best.” He began to flip back through the book year by year, looking at various values within ten years of his mission target. Nothing was jumping out at him.
Feeling defeated, he wondered what else of value he could use. It had to be cheap and compact to fit his plan. Something that, at the time, would not be missed and that could increase in value over seventy-odd years.
His mind returned to the 1943 penny, and he cursed the unlucky timing of his mission. “If that 1943 penny were only made in 1942 . . .” He mumbled allowed.
“Well, actually, it was. But we can’t afford it, so it doesn’t matter anyway,” Brett explained.
“Huh? What did you just say?”
“We can’t afford it. Besides, it’s in some permanent collection now. I don’t even think it’s for sale.”
“No, not that. What about it being made in ‘42?”
“Oh. Yeah, I think it was actually made in the latter part of 1942, to be released in 1943. I’m not exactly sure though.”
His enthusiasm reignited, Peter asked, “What about the other pennies from that year? You said something about having at least one copper penny from each mint.”
“You mean bronze . . .”
“Yeah, I meant bronze. Are they equally valuable?”
“Not even close. The other mints also let out bronze pennies, but their values are much, much lower because of the number of them circulated.”
“How much lower?” Peter asked quickly.
“Something like $60,000 or so. It’s such a price difference because there are ten or more from the other mints known to exist.”
Peter whistled in amazement. “Sixty grand is still pretty nice.”
The two sat there for a few moments in silence as Peter continued to turn the pages of Brett’s Red Book. Peter’s mind was now racing, trying to figure out how he could get a hold of a few of those 1943 pennies while on the mission. If he could just get three or four of them and stash them away, when he returned from his mission, he could recover the hidden coins and sell them to a collector in the shifted present.
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