Louise's War

by Sarah Shaber

‘What?’ I said.

  ‘In your bag,’ he said. ‘What’s in it?’

  My tongue froze in my mouth.

  ‘You women and your knitting, and your magazines, and your lunches,’ he said. ‘You could supply a squadron with the stuff you carry to work every day.’

  He squinted at my badge and nodded me into the building. Once over the threshold I felt such relief I could have melted onto the floor. I leaned against the wall for support for a minute before I headed down the hall.

  Once in my office I set down my handbag on my desk. I was safe. Never even think of doing something like this again, I chided myself. Never. Ever.

  Betty and Ruth were already at work. A few minutes later a new girl, who introduced herself as Brenda Bonner, arrived, standing timidly at the door, a stack of paperwork in her arms. She looked about twelve. I explained to her the procedure for typing up index cards, and the office settled down into its usual routine. Ruth pushed her cart stacked with files into the hall while Betty forced multiple pages of typing paper and carbon paper behind the bail of her typewriter.

  I sat at my desk concealed behind the partition that separated me from the rest of the room and assembled a new and improved Bloch file. I included every document I had – the hydrology conference programs, the carbons Joan had given me, the reprints of Bloch’s journal articles, the photostat of the Vichy memo and the photograph of Metcalfe, Burns, and the Blochs in Edinburgh in 1936.

  I collected a few random files and left the office, radiating a businesslike sense of purpose. After filing all the other folders I knocked on Don’s door.

  ‘Look what I found,’ I said, without introduction, and shoved the Bloch file at Don. ‘Gerald Bloch’s file.’

  ‘Really,’ Don said, taking it from me.

  ‘It was in the “P” file room, on top of a file cabinet.’

  Don frowned.

  ‘I think that Mr Holman must have stuck it there, you know, confused because he was feeling ill, since it’s clearly marked to go to the Projects Committee.’

  I turned to leave, eager to escape. But Don gestured to me to wait, so I sat and watched him while he carefully read through the file. I knew he could read French. And he was a bright man, and would want to be credited with this. Please let him notice. It would be too suspicious for me to show it to him. I might have to explain everything I’d done, I’d be in pure trouble, and the Projects Committee might be less inclined to help Rachel.

  Don shook his head, minutely, and his brow furrowed. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘it might not be too late to help. We’ll see what the Projects Committee recommends.’

  He hadn’t noticed, damn it!

  ‘I skimmed the file myself, Don,’ I said. ‘I was curious, you know, it disappeared right out of Mr Holman’s office when he died. So odd.’

  ‘Like you said, Bob must have been feeling ill before his attack and left it in the main file room.’

  ‘Did you notice,’ I said, as evenly as I could manage, ‘that the titles of Bloch’s French articles on hydrology are the same as the titles of Charles’s articles he delivered at a conference here in 1939? When Gerald Bloch was in France?’

  ‘Really?’ Don was interested now, he reached for the file again and read it through.

  I watched as the creases in Don’s brow smoothed out, and he pushed his glasses up on his forehead and rubbed his eyes. He looked up at me with a grim set to his mouth and comprehension in his eyes.

  ‘Thank you, Mrs Pearlie. You were right. This is very important. I’ll take it upstairs immediately.’

  He’d finally put two and two together, just as I had.

  A G-man wearing a blue suit holding a fedora with a yellow feather stuck in the hatband was waiting for me in my office. He was the same agent I’d noticed at Bob Holman’s funeral.

  ‘Ma’am,’ he said to me, rising from a chair, ‘I’m Special Agent Gray Williams, Federal Bureau of Investigation. Is there somewhere we can talk in private?’

  Betty, Ruth and Brenda worked away, pretending to be oblivious.

  This was it. I’d been found out.

  ‘This way, Agent Williams,’ I said. I tried to appear calm as I led the G-man down the hall and into the conference room. We squeezed ourselves into two chairs at the scarred conference table.

  ‘Ma’am,’ he said, ‘I thought you should know, the Bureau has received complaints about you.’

  ‘Really,’ I said, trying to keep my voice steady.

  ‘You see,’ the agent said, averting his eyes and hesitating, as if he didn’t want to bring up such an unsavory subject, ‘a guest at the Wardham hotel let us know that, well, ma’am, you’d been seen behaving in a loose fashion, in the hotel bar, with a foreigner, a Frenchman.’

  ‘Oh, dear,’ I said, trying to appear embarrassed, ‘I’d met Mr Barbier at a party, he seemed so nice.’

  ‘You were seen again at the Shoreham on Saturday evening with the same man, and made quite a spectacle of yourself.’

  ‘Oh, no,’ I said, feigning surprise. ‘I drank way too much champagne.’

  ‘We investigated and you’ll be glad to know that we saw no reason to suspect you of anything. On the contrary, your record appears to be exemplary.’

  ‘Thank goodness,’ I said. ‘I assure you. . . .’

  Agent Williams waved off my assurances.

  ‘You must understand that it is in the best interest of a government girl to maintain high social standards. Being seen out in public with foreign nationals is not acceptable.’

  Condescending bastard.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I said.

  ‘The Bureau,’ he continued, ‘felt it would be helpful for you to know about this incident. For your own sake, you understand. As your record has been outstanding until now.’

  ‘Thank you so much,’ I said. ‘I appreciate your concern, and I promise to be more circumspect in choosing my friends.’

  ‘An excellent plan, ma’am,’ Agent Williams said, settling his fedora on his head. ‘I know my way out.’

  From the doorway of the file room I watched him leave the building.

  That was a close call.

  I didn’t intend to see or speak to Lionel Barbier again, which was why I was so irritated to find him at the drug store on the corner where I went for lunch. He rose from a booth from the counter and beckoned me over.

  ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ I asked.

  ‘I know you lunch here often, and I needed to see you again. How fortunate that you chose to come here today.’

  ‘I can’t believe that you’d dare try to speak to me after what happened Saturday night.’

  ‘Sit down, my dear,’ he said, ‘and don’t look so fierce. It’s not becoming.’

  Angry as I was with the man, I was curious. Who was the FBI to tell me what to do, anyway? I slid into the booth.

  ‘You’re a snake,’ I said. ‘An FBI agent just cautioned me about you.’

  ‘Really,’ he said, stroking his chin. ‘Interesting. Perhaps I should lie low for a time.’

  ‘You couldn’t get much lower than you already are.’

  ‘Chérie, I know where there are the deepest of holes to crawl into. And remember, you did get that item you desired so much.’

  The waitress appeared at the booth with her pad.

  Once I realized the FBI wasn’t going to arrest me, my stomach had unknotted. ‘I want a grilled cheese and tomato sandwich, French fries and a Coke,’ I said. Lionel wrinkled his nose. I figured he wouldn’t eat lunch-counter food unless he was starving.

  ‘Coffee only,’ Lionel said. The waitress nodded and moved away.

  ‘What luck to find you here,’ Lionel said again. ‘I was hoping you would come here for lunch today. I didn’t want to risk calling you on the telephone.’

  ‘Make it quick. After today I never want to see you again.’

  ‘That is not in the cards, my dear. We must not see each other for a time, and we will never speak of your Monsieur Bloch again, but
in a few months, we will meet at the Wardham again for another drink.’

  ‘Surely you don’t think I . . .’

  ‘Calm down. Tell me, did you find what you needed in the file?’

  I hated to admit it. ‘Yes, I did.’

  ‘Some good will come of it?’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘Everything has its price. I did not collect the night we stole that file at my embassy. I risked much, you remember, to help you.’

  ‘I know.’ In other words I owed him a favor.

  ‘I would be most interested,’ he said, glancing around the room and lowering his voice, ‘in knowing who your, ah, employer recommends to lead the Free French.’

  So you can decide which side you’re on, I thought.

  So he knew, or guessed, I worked for OSS. Why was I not surprised?

  I didn’t answer him, and he didn’t press me. I let him think I intended to do as he asked, instead of slapping him across the kisser like I wanted to.

  The waitress brought our order. After cooling his coffee with cream Lionel gulped it down.

  ‘Goodbye, my dear Louise,’ he said, rising from the booth. ‘In French we say au revoir, “until we see each other again”.’ I choked back the expletive I wanted to answer him with, but I thought to myself that it would be a cold day in hell before Lionel Barber saw me again.

  He handed me his chit and walked out of the restaurant, leaving me to settle his account.

  I arrived back at work in time to revel in the outcome of my venture into espionage. As I turned the corner I saw a crowd of OSS staffers standing on the front steps watching a couple of FBI agents, including Agent Williams, and two GIs lead Charles Burns away in handcuffs. I quickly ducked behind a tree and watched as they pushed him into a car and drove away. No one in the crowd on the steps said a word. I noticed Joan in the front row, eyes wide, a hand clapped over her mouth. Guy and Roger stood side by side, Guy with his arms crossed over his chest, Roger smoking a cigarette. I didn’t see Don. He’d acted quickly, I had to give him that.

  It was over, thank God. I’d realized why the Bloch file had been stolen, and who stole it, when I went through the stolen documents yesterday. The answer was right there, staring me in the face, evident even before I’d broken into the Vichy embassy. Charles Burns plagiarized one of Gerald Bloch’s journal articles and presented it as his own at a professional conference in 1939 without even bothering to change the title other than translate it into English. I suppose he assumed that Bloch, a Jew trapped in France, would never have the chance to know what he had done. Burns must have noticed the file in Holman’s office, realized what Bloch’s freedom might mean to his career, and taken advantage of Holman’s heart attack to remove it. The theft had nothing to do with the war or politics at all.

  So my quest to help Rachel evolved into a trap for Charles Burns. I led Don to notice what I’d seen in the documents I gave him. Fortunately he did. I wondered what would happen to Charles, but I pushed him out of my mind, and thought of Rachel and her family. If the OSS thought Gerald could assist the Allies in North Africa they might still help his family escape.

  Time was short. The Gestapo arrived in Marseille tomorrow.

  The office was quiet as a tomb all afternoon. None of us dared talk about what happened. Don’s office door remained closed. Guy and Roger sat together, talking easily, during coffee break. Guy even offered Roger a cigarette. I sipped my java with the other clerks, and we chatted about our Fourth of July adventures. I elaborated, with gusto, on my fictional afternoon at the Wardham Hotel swimming pool, to the point where I almost believed it myself.

  As we left to go back to our respective offices Joan pulled me aside.

  ‘Let me give you a lift home today,’ she said. Her face was pale and her eyes sunk deep in her face. I figured she wanted to talk about Charles.

  ‘Sure,’ I said.

  The inside of Joan’s car steamed like a coal boiler. We rolled down both windows and Joan pushed open the convertible top. I tied a scarf around my head to keep the hot wind from blowing my hair into a bird’s nest. We didn’t speak until we were blocks away.

  ‘Do you know why Charles was arrested?’ Joan finally said.

  ‘Yes,’ I answered. ‘He stole the Bloch file, to save himself from a plagiarism charge. I wonder what will happen to him. What do you think they’ll charge him with?’

  ‘Murder.’

  ‘What! Who was murdered?’

  ‘Bob Holman.’

  ‘But he had a heart attack!’

  ‘General Donovan told me the whole story this afternoon. Don’t breathe a word of this, Louise, but I have to tell someone. Charles murdered Bob Holman. When he delivered a map Mr Holman had requested that afternoon, he noticed the Bloch file on Holman’s desk. Charles was terrified that if Bloch escaped from Marseille he would some day find out that Charles had stolen his work. Charles panicked and stabbed Holman with a letter opener so he could steal the file and prevent OSS from rescuing Bloch. OSS security and the FBI hushed up the murder while they investigated. Didn’t want to warn off the killer.’

  Killer. All this time I’d been pursuing a murderer and had no idea. It wasn’t surprising, though. A man who was evil enough to condemn an innocent man and his family to a Nazi labor camp because of a few boring scientific articles would be capable of murder.

  ‘The queer thing is, Charles told the FBI that he’d destroyed Bloch’s file, but of course he didn’t, because you found it.’

  We’d stopped at a traffic light.

  ‘When you returned the file and Don examined the documents he realized that Charles had killed Holman. He found Bloch’s articles and evidence that Charles had used them as his own work. Don’s some kind of hero for figuring all this out.’

  I was angry that Don hadn’t mentioned my contributions, but it was probably wise for me to let Don take all the credit. I didn’t want anyone to question me about my role in all this. I’d broken way too many rules. Good thing I knew how to keep my mouth shut.

  ‘Oh, and Dora Bertrand’s back,’ Joan said, ‘she was a suspect, apparently, but the FBI reinstated her security clearance. General Donovan insisted.’

  ‘The FBI suspected her of the murder? Why?’

  ‘Well, Bob Holman was opposed to a second front in Europe, and Dora championed one. And because she’s not the Ladies’ Home Journal ideal American girl, I guess.’

  ‘What crossed your mind when you heard Charles was arrested?’ I asked.

  ‘That I always seem to pick the wrong fellows to get crushes on,’ Joan said, ‘but this one was a doozy.’

  ‘Let’s go get a Martini. My treat.’

  ‘Can’t. Believe it or not, I have a date. A real date. He asked me.’

  Joan let me out at my doorstep. I wished I’d had that Martini. I’d come to close to disaster, and I didn’t mean getting caught breaking into the Vichy French embassy.

  Knowing Charles killed Holman completely altered my perspective on his behavior. I’d been so naive to think he was romantically interested in me! When he’d asked me to dinner after our Monopoly game at Joan’s, it was because I was so curious about Holman’s death and the state of his office and he wanted to find out how much I knew, not because he was infatuated with me. Then when I’d visited him in his office with questions about the 1936 conference, he became truly worried about my interest in Gerald Bloch. At dinner with Joan one night all he’d done was ask her questions about me. She thought he wanted to ask me out, but actually I was just too interested in the Bloch file for him to ignore.

  So when Charles had picked me up outside Union Station the day I met Barbara, when he tried to ‘take me to lunch’ against my wishes, driven with me into quiet and empty Brentwood Park, I now suspected that he’d intended not to force himself on me, but to kill me.

  I knew that I’d been playing a dangerous game, trying to help Rachel, but I’d had no idea my own life was at stake. Despite the heat I rested on the front stoop for a whi
le, until I stopped shaking.

  Phoebe and Joe were in the lounge listening to the radio.

  ‘My dear,’ Phoebe said. ‘Are you all right? You look so tired.’

  I leaned up against the doorjamb.

  ‘I suppose I am,’ I said. ‘I didn’t get much sleep last night.’

  ‘Big day at work?’ Joe asked. Was I being self-conscious, or did his voice carry a hint of deeper meaning in those words? Phoebe didn’t act as if she detected anything in his tone of voice. I stared at him. He seemed completely absorbed in the radio and the newspaper on his lap. I must have been wrong. I badly wanted Joe to be one of the good guys, but I had no real proof that he was. Best to keep my distance in the future, I thought, after we went to that movie this weekend. I was considering This Gun For Hire.

  ‘Have you seen Ada?’ I asked.

  ‘I believe she’s in her room,’ Phoebe said.

  ‘So you see,’ I said, gripping both of Ada’s hands in mine, ‘the FBI was watching me that morning, not you.’

  ‘Oh, thank God,’ Ada said. Tears streamed down her face, filling the creases in her skin with powder and mascara. I let her cry. I’d been scared when Agent Williams visited me, and I couldn’t imagine how frightened she must have been. Instead it was me who had a file at the FBI, me and Eleanor Roosevelt.

  ‘You will never tell anyone, will you?’ she asked. ‘About, you know.’

  ‘Of course not,’ I said. ‘I know how to keep my mouth shut.’

  She wiped her face with her handkerchief. It came away coated with make-up. ‘I must look horrible,’ she said.

  ‘Go on and fix your face,’ I said. ‘Supper will be ready soon.’

  Ada wasn’t the only person in the house who got good news that evening. Madeleine, wearing the khaki suit with pink rickrack trim Ada gave her, floated into the kitchen right after dinner, full of the news she’d landed a job with the Social Security Administration punching out Social Security cards on a special typewriter.

  ‘The whole room was full of colored girls,’ she told us in the kitchen, ‘all high-school graduates like me. I’ll be making twenty-one dollars a week!’

  ‘What are you going to do when you get old, girl,’ Dellaphine said, ‘that’s what I want to know. When you can’t work that job no more, you be out in the street. I’ll always have a home here in this house. The Knox boys will see to that.’