by Noel Hynd
He pulled out onto Connecticut Avenue, allowed a bus to pass him, then proceeded due north. It would be a long drive.
THIRTY-NINE
Laura was the first to see the man across the street in the shadows. She was upstairs with her bedroom light off. There were few leaves left on the trees this late in November and she had an improved view of the church entrance. It was 2 A.M.
She was sure this was a different man than the one she had seen before. He walked differently and wore different clothing. She felt her heart race. This was the man they expected downstairs.
She stepped back from the window and kept him in view. He disappeared into the church. For the first time she truly felt like a spy; but she was too frightened to savor the moment. She only gave the signal that Bill Cochrane had asked of her.
One sharp rap to the floor: the man had appeared. He was in the church.
Downstairs, four men had spoken from one station to the next in whispers. Now pulses raced. Nerves tightened like taut rubber bands and each man fell to a death of silence.
Hearn and Cianfrani took cover in the dining room and living room respectively, feeling like bloody fools or, worse, schoolboys at play. Hearn was under the tablecloth of the dining table, his Colt drawn, listening to his own pulse in the darkness. Cianfrani had found a suitable place between a couch and a wall in the Fowler living room. He too had his weapon drawn and ready in a darkened silent room.
He felt his own hands sweating against the weapon. The whole catechism came back from the National Police Academy.
Rounds, chambered, sir! . . .
Safety catch up, sir! . . .
Set to fire, sir! . . .
Between them they had covered the only access to Fowler's study. Back door chained. Windows locked. Cellar door bolted.
Front door open.
In the study burned the only light in the house. The light was from Reverend Fowler's desk lamp, the one with the green glass shade. At the sound of Laura's heel on the wooden floor, Peter Whiteside sprang to his feet and took his position within the stationery closet of the minister's study. Whiteside had fallen silent over the last hour, wondering what to expect, wondering just how to phrase his report to Whitehall, and inevitably—as does any spy when he has too much time to think in a foreign place—sorting out the loves, accomplishments, and failures of his own life. But then Laura's rap had come, and his weapon was ready. He was on his feet. He drew the closet door three quarters closed and if he could have held his breath for an hour he would have.
He held his pistol upraised. Easier to lower and aim than raise and aim. He saw his watch: 2:04 A.M. It seemed like 5 A.M. His eyes ached. His stomach was in open revolt with his nerves.
Bill Cochrane had found a black shirt, black jacket, and white collar belonging to Siegfried. He had donned all three. Better to set the final stage, all four men agreed. Then he had settled in at Fowler's desk and waited, his pistol across his lap, never more than a few beads of sweat away from his hand.
Over the course of the evening he had stared for several hours—interrupted only by occasional conversation with the moody Whiteside—at the curios on Reverend Fowler's desk: a silver framed color photograph of Fowler and Laura, presumably from their honeymoon, a handsome couple arm in arm before the Château Frontenac and the St. Lawrence in Quebec; a worn leather Bible, probably family, which made Cochrane reflect for hours if the Bible's value was that of an heirloom or a prop; an oval crystal paperweight and a brass scissors and letter-opener set.
Cochrane had studied these artifacts intensively, as if they were clues to some great puzzle. They yielded nothing. He tried, as he sat at Fowler's desk and coveted Fowler's wife, to move into the psyche of the man. What mad flywheel made Siegfried run? What furies besieged him? What demons possessed him?
He thought of the minister, calm and conciliatory even at the moment of his arrest. He thought of the helpless anonymous woman murdered in the woods behind the church and he pondered a sailor from landlocked Kansas slaughtered two miles from Red Bank. Nothing had connected by the time Cochrane heard Laura's foot on the ceiling above him.
The traitor—Fowler's guardian angel within the F.B.I.—was in the church. Then, upstairs, Laura saw the man emerge, clinging to the shadows cast by the streetlamp and the trees. He crossed the lane and Laura practically felt her heart explode.
The man opened the gate before her home and briskly approached the house via the flagstone path. As bold and as blatant as that! She almost forgot the second signal. Then her fear took over for her.
She rapped a second time. The man was on his way.
All at once, and unfolding in all its complexities within the breadth of a second, an appalling notion was upon Bill Cochrane. It was so neat and clear that Cochrane could not understand why it had never come to him before:
Tiny Mr. Hay was the demon within the F.B.I.! Toupéed, scheming, malevolent Mr. Hay:
I know everything, Cochrane. . . .
Pull my whiskers again and there'll be bloodshed, I swear it to you. . . .
If there's a fire, I figure I can be assistant director. . . .
The little imp was probably assembling matches and kerosene already!
In Bill Cochrane's tired mind, allegiances blew apart, swirled into a vortex of confusion, and then reassembled in queer, bright ominous new formations. Before Bill Cochrane was a panoply of deceit.
Mr. Hay sat astride a network that involved both Dick Wheeler and Frank Lerrick, at least as subalterns. Hoover was kept in the dark, which wasn't difficult, and the entire floor of Bluebirds in Section Seven were legmen for the cabal on the second floor.
Hope See Ming, Lanny Slotkin, and, yes, even Mary Ryan had deciphered Siegfried's code long ago. But they weren't telling. The Germans—Roddy Schwarzkopf and Liz Pfeiffer—were doubles, quite obviously now, and Bobby Charles Martin was a crypto-Nazi from the Rhineland of Ohio. At 2 A.M. it all made perfect sense. Cochrane had been the fall guy for the entire operation, the one to whom Hoover had turned for an answer and who had not been able to supply one. Hoover was thus destroyed at the White House and Cochrane was ruined as a public servant. And, most important in this scenario, America's fledgling intelligence networks would be washed away. A reorganization would be forced going into an election year, 1940, and then everything would again be wiped clean by a new President.
Then the whole conspiracy flew apart, spiraled, and reformed. Peter Whiteside and Laura Fowler were Gestapo. So was Otto Mauer. So was Stephen Fowler, who had been hauled away not by M.I.6 agents but by co-conspirators. The transmitter at the top of the church tower was dead and the man now lured to Liberty Circle was not an F.B.I. traitor but an executioner who would in a few moments treat Cochrane to a bullet between the eyes. The only betrayal within the F.B.I., Cochrane reasoned, was Cochrane himself, who, against all entreaties of rational, professional men like Dick Wheeler, had thrown in his lot with the opposition.
"I'm going crazy," Bill Cochrane said softly. His hand was on his pistol, which was across his lap. Then there was a sound. It was the front door of the house opening and then softly shutting. Peter Whiteside stood in the doorway of the stationery closet with a .38 drawn and upraised. Even in the dim light cast from Fowler's green desk lamp. Cochrane could find his eyes.
"No shooting unless absolutely necessary," Cochrane said again, his voice no stronger than a whisper. But no one could hear and that had been decided a day ago, anyway.
The footsteps moved closer.
No shooting, Cochrane reasoned. Why then was his own hand soaking wet upon the pistol? Why was there a cramp in his wrist and vein pounding in his neck? Why was the sweat on his face unbearable?
Why was he taking a final glance at the sturdiness of the wooden desk to see what parts of it might stop a bullet?
The footsteps had found the sliver of light cast by the partly open door to the minister's study. They drew closer now, careful footfalls on a carpet, then upon a bare floor.
Cochrane swiveled i
n his chair to place his back to the door and he prayed that the intruder would speak before shooting.
A large man or a small man? Cochrane wondered. Then, to his abiding horror as he heard the door push open, he realized that if the man started shooting, size made little final difference at all.
The door was open. One footfall, then a second into Fowler's study. And Cochrane was thinking, Dear God, let me see who it is before I'm shot! Dear God, this one last wish!
"Reverend Fowler?" asked the visitor.
Cochrane knew the voice from a thousand other times that he had heard it. But it was only when he swiveled quickly in his chair to face the intruder that the reality was upon him.
Cochrane stared as Peter Whiteside pushed his closet door open and faced Dick Wheeler with a drawn pistol. Wheeler jumped in astonishment when he saw the movement, then gave an involuntary quake a second time when Hearn and Cianfrani appeared quietly behind him, weapons drawn.
There was little said, considering the moment. Cochrane spoke first, and his own voice sounded distant in what was otherwise total silence.
"Please remain calm, Dick," he said, still stunned, "and keep your hands in full view. You're under arrest."
A bewildered Wheeler looked at the Englishman. Simultaneously, Cianfrani held a cocked pistol to Wheeler's ribs while his hand darted professionally under Wheeler's coat to remove the service revolver.
From the desk, Cochrane saw Laura appear. Then his attention went back to all the guns that were drawn and he prayed that nothing would happen accidentally. The evening had already been blackened enough.
Then another mood swept Cochrane and his overwhelming emotion was that of disappointment. He could barely bring himself to look Wheeler in the eye. "Give him a thorough frisk," Cochrane said in a subdued, sullen voice. "He's probably carrying more than one."
He was: a two-shot derringer was at the elbow in the left coat sleeve.
To which Dick Wheeler feigned confusion. "Bill, what the devil is all this about? Some sort of joke? Not funny, brother, if it is."
For several seconds Cochrane could not answer. He merely held Wheeler—who was moved to the wall and frisked by Cianfrani as Hearn stood guard—in a chilly assessing eye while several images flashed before him:
Kurkevics, the dead F.B.I. contact in Berlin, Theresia bloody and dead in her home, Mauer worried to the point of homicide and hysteria over the plight of his family, and then Cochrane's own long days of exile with the flatulent dwarf in the archives.
Disappointment gave way to anger and anger to confusion. Dick Wheeler, the ascendant star of the Bureau; the F.B.I. emissary and diplomatic courier to the House and Senate; Dick Wheeler, who stood to inherit the leadership of the whole department if any President ever had the temerity to send J. Edgar packing.
Wheeler had betrayed all this and betrayed every human being he knew within the Bureau. Why? For what in return? Bill Cochrane sat in the quiet room and watched Cianfrani and Hearn complete an all but routine arrest and search. But Bill Cochrane did not understand.
"No joke at all, Dick," was all Cochrane could say. "And you're right. It's not funny."
Whiteside withdrew slightly, lowered his pistol, but kept it drawn and pointed toward the floor. He knew better than to involve himself further in what was now a preponderantly American operation. Cochrane stood from the desk.
There was something about Fowler's clothing that now rested uneasily upon Cochrane. The white celluloid collar was unbearably tight all of a sudden and he wanted to be rid of it. He unfastened it.
Laura stepped through the doorway. "There isn't anyone else," she said. "I kept watch."
She moved to Peter Whiteside, who took her under his arm. Cochrane later remembered thinking how tired she looked. And Agent Hearn, looking back and forth from Cochrane to the prisoner, finally spoke in confusion, addressing Cochrane.
"Hey, what's going on?" he asked. "You know this guy?"
"Somewhat," answered Cochrane. "But it's a long dismal story."
Cochrane insisted that they leave for Washington immediately, drive through the night, and render their prisoner to a federal installation as soon as possible. Cianfrani suggested that a nice new cement and iron edifice in Newark was ready, spiffy, and waiting. But Cochrane made the further point that this would only make another transfer inevitable.
"And we don't even know entirely what we're dealing with," Cochrane said, with an eye to security and a larger conspiracy.
It fell to Laura to make coffee for the drive, an irony which was not lost upon her. A strange parochial little scene transpired as the coffee brewed and they sat around waiting, all of them chitchatting except for Wheeler, who had fallen silent, and Hearn, who sat with his pistol across his lap and stared at his shackled, manacled prisoner.
Then the whole crew was off to Washington in three cars. Hearn and Cianfrani drove the lead, transporting Wheeler in an enclosed rear seat designed for just such purposes: a leg chain linked him to the body of the car, an iron mesh divider separated him from the occupants of the front seat, and the rear doors locked from the outside.
Cochrane drove with Laura in the second car, his Hudson, and Whiteside drove the follow-up, staying a precautionary hundred yards behind the other two.
It was 7 A.M. when they reached Washington. The three cars remained together all the way to the Federal House of Detention. Everyone's eyelids were heavy, even Wheeler's. The prisoner had little to say. But he said all of it when Cochrane helped him out of the rear of the F.B.I. car.
"You're making a hell of a mistake, Bill," he said, hulking out of the rear seat into an upright position. "I don't know what you think you're doing."
"Uh-huh," Cochrane answered.
"I'm just assuming that you've lost your mind completely and can't be legally held responsible for any of this."
"Cianfrani and Hearn will handle the booking," Cochrane answered.
Dick Wheeler looked at him sourly. Then Cianfrani and Hearn took Wheeler's arms and pulled him respectfully in the proper direction. Cochrane waited until the three figures disappeared into the federal jail.
Laura and Peter Whiteside moved to a spot a few feet behind Cochrane and were there when he turned.
"I'll take Laura over to the Shoreham," Whiteside said. "I'll check her in there, then I'll need some sleep myself. Been a bloody long stretch."
Cochrane nodded. "What about Fowler?"
"He'll be safe with my men in Baltimore for another day," Whiteside said. "Then I'll have him brought here. Acceptable?"
Cochrane did not care for the delay. But he needed the sleep himself. He acquiesced to Whiteside's plan. His attention turned to Laura.
"I think you should stay away from your home until your husband is safely locked up," he said. And then for some reason, perhaps due to the fatigue that afflicted all of them, he added. "I'm sorry."
She nodded. Words were failing Laura at that hour, too. Something caught in both of their eyes and she reached to Cochrane and he embraced her. He gave her a comforting hug and slowly released her.
She pulled slowly from his arms. "Thank you," she said. "Come say hello tomorrow."
Cochrane promised that he would.
FORTY
"What you have to remember about the Germans," said Reverend Fowler, entrancing his two guards, "is that in the age of the Barbarians, we're talking about the 400’s and 500’s A.D. here, the first German converts to Christianity denied the divinity of Christ."
Fowler's eyes twinkled. He was at the card table with Fussel and McPherson. His feet were chained together and linked to a tall armoire. His wrists were cuffed. For the past hour, he had regaled his captors with historical and religious anecdotes ranging from the death of Catherine the Great to Cardinal Richelieu supporting Catholicism in France and Protestantism in the rest of Europe.
"That made the first German converts," Fowler concluded, "the first Christians to be both true believers and heretics at the same time."
McPherson was fascinated as Fussel listened warily. Reverend Fowler took aim on McPherson and began talking of what he called "Scotland's legitimate national feelings," to which Fussel moaned and turned a deaf ear.
There was some smoked meat on the table with a large serving fork. Both guards sat with their weapons on the opposite side from Fowler.
"Mind if I eat something?" Fowler asked in passing.
"Help yourself," McPherson said. Fussel dealt the cards and McPherson moved the serving knife from the plate.
Fowler picked up a salt shaker and shook it briskly over a slice of beef. He ate. He looked around. "What's the matter?" McPherson asked.
"Overdid it with the salt," said Fowler. He eyed McPherson's beer.
"Nothing doing!" Fussel interjected. "He doesn't get any alcohol. Whiteside's orders."
"Then get him some water," McPherson said. "You're closer than I am."
Fussel shot his partner a hostile stare. "Want to know something?" Fussel said. "I'll be happy when we can turn the bloody parson here back over to the Americans. If he's dangerous, we shouldn't have him. If he's not, we shouldn't have him, either."
"Just get him some water, huh?" McPherson said. Fowler turned politely to Fussel. "Thank you," he said.
Fowler watched Fussel leave the room for the kitchen, one room away. With his cuffed wrists, he reached to Fussel's five-card poker hand. Fowler peeked. He looked back to McPherson.
"Two aces, a king, and two sevens," he whispered. "Is that good?"
McPherson's bushy brow furrowed. He looked downward at his own hand. Then everything was too fast for comprehension. The minister's shackled wrists flew toward the serving fork, grabbed it in both fists, and brought it upward into McPherson's throat.
McPherson howled, but at the same moment, Reverend Fowler was lunging across his body, pulling the pistol from the holster and withdrawing backward once he had it. Fussel dropped what he was doing in the kitchen and raced back when he heard the commotion. He was fumbling for his own gun.