Amerikan Eagle

by Alan Glenn

  The three-story brick structure ahead looked like an elementary school. Twombly gestured to it with his burning cigarette. “That’s where it all happened back in 1905. Russians and Japanese did their thing here, with Teddy Roosevelt leading the negotiations. Building Eighty-six, the administration building. That’s how TR got his Nobel Peace Prize the next year, for ending that war. Lucky for him, there’s no process for revoking a peace prize. Seeing how the Russians and the Japs are both busily butchering thousands on a monthly basis.”

  In front of that building, Sam saw his first German flag on shipyard soil. Something inside of him chilled, seeing the swastika flapping in the breeze on an American military base.

  “That’s where they’ll be tomorrow afternoon,” Twombly continued. “Long and Hitler. See by the door? That’s a plaque, commemorating Roosevelt’s peace treaty. Think they’ll put up another plaque when those two clowns finish their bloody job?”

  Sam said, “No, not really.”

  “Yeah, that’s a vote of confidence if I ever heard one.”

  Two marines guarded the entrance. They looked ashamed to be standing underneath the flapping swastika.

  “Come with me,” Twombly said, leading Sam into another, taller, brick building. Twombly shut the sliding metal door, and the open-grill elevator made a rattling, hollow noise as it ascended four stories. At the darkened top floor, Twombly opened another door, and they went outside to a tar-covered roof.

  A squad of armed marines stood in one corner, dressed in dungarees and fatigues. Their squad leader looked over at Twombly, and Twombly waved a greeting, took Sam to the edge of the roof.

  From there, they had an expansive view of the shipyard, river, harbor, and Portsmouth itself. Off to the east, where the river widened, were the dark gray smudge of the Atlantic Ocean and the island community of New Castle. Before them were the cranes and docks and scaffolding, and Sam could make out the hulls of two submarines under construction. Nearby were the massive concrete and turrets of the Portsmouth Naval Prison, and there, across the river, rising above it all were the brick buildings of Portsmouth and the North Church spire.

  “That’s the way it is,” Twombly told him. “Marines on every roof, observing everything coming and going. More marines and shore patrol in the buildings and on the grounds. It’s the same over in Portsmouth. In a few hours, the day shift ends and the second shift is canceled. Only security and summit personnel will remain behind. Trust me, Inspector. Your brother may be somewhere around here. But he’s not in my Yard.”

  It was cool up on the roof, a strong salt-tinged breeze coming in from the ocean. Twombly said, “Hold on a sec. Going to borrow something from these leathernecks.”

  He walked over to the marines and returned carrying a pair of high-powered binoculars. He brought the binoculars up and, after a few seconds, said, “Ah, there you are, you little bastard. Here, take a look. Out by the horizon, to the north of the main harbor entrance buoy.”

  Sam took the binoculars. A passenger liner came into focus, at anchor by the shoals just outside of the harbor. From the stern, a large Nazi flag moved in the breeze. There were other ships out there, cruisers and battleships, off in the hazy distance.

  “There he is,” Twombly said. “Herr Hitler and his task force. The liner Europa and accompanying warships, including the Tirpitz and the Bismarck. Resting for the night … and tomorrow he and the President meet. See that dock down there with the bunting and the flags? That’s where the motor launch is going to bring Hitler in. Fact is, I just heard Long might be coming into Portsmouth within the hour. Hell of a thing, don’t you think? All this history happening in our fair little city and shipyard.”

  Sam kept the binoculars up to his eyes. From here, it seemed so peaceful, so innocuous. A passenger liner at rest just outside the harbor of his hometown. A passenger liner that held one of the most powerful and most hated men on the globe, a man Sam’s brother was here to kill. And to save his own family, he had to save Hitler.

  “Penny for your thoughts,” Twombly said.

  Sam lowered the binoculars. “Wish the goddamn ship would weigh anchor and head back to Germany. Tonight, if possible. Would make a lot of things easier for me.”

  “Nice thought,” Twombly said. “I wish you luck finding your brother. But I don’t think you’re going to find him here.”

  “Probably not, but thanks anyway, Nate.”

  “Sure,” Twombly said. He took the binoculars back and raised them again. Sam wasn’t sure, but it seemed as if the security chief sighed. “I do hope you find Tony. And that it all works out. Ever hear about my brother Carl?”

  “No, can’t say that I have.”

  “Carl was a couple of years younger than me. With youth comes ignorance, and with youth also comes passion. So when Germany invaded France and the Low Countries back in 1940, Carl went up to Canada and enlisted. Thought it was important to help England stand up against the Nazis. Lots of people thought like he did, but others, like me, thought we should stay out of it. Why was it our fight? Right?”

  “Yeah, I know.” Sam’s wrist with the tattoo itched. He left it alone.

  “Carl was with the RAF. Flew a Hawker Hurricane fighter plane against the bombers burning London to the ground. Nabbed a Heinkel bomber during one of his missions. And during the first landings, he was shot out of the air. A couple of Messerschmitts blew him up. Exploded in midair. No parachute. No chance of survival. So my little brother turned into burnt chunks of meat over the English Channel.”

  Now the binoculars came down; his voice turned bleak. “You said you wished the Europa would weigh anchor and go back to Germany. You know what I wish, Sam? I wish one of our submarines down there would go out tonight for sea trials and fire four torpedoes into the Europa’s belly and send all those miserable bastards to hell. That’s what I wish.”

  Sam kept silent, and Twombly shook his head and smiled ruefully. “That’s what I wish—and what’s my job? To make sure the Kraut bastard out on that boat gets here and leaves here safely and in comfort. Hell of a thing, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah, a hell of a thing,” Sam agreed.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  Back in Portsmouth, Sam parked his car at the police station and started walking downtown. Block after block, building after building, he looked at the doorway to each structure, seeing National Guardsmen or Portsmouth police officers or even state police officers standing guard. Tony. Where would he be?

  One of these buildings? Doubtful, with all the security. And the shipyard was out.

  He smelled coal smoke. He was approaching the Portsmouth rail station. More people were about him, a mix of residents and police and Guardsmen and reporters and military from both the United States and Germany, some Long’s Legionnaires scattered through. He could hear a brass band playing a tune.

  The President was arriving.

  He let the crowd move him forward to the train station. At a lamppost he stopped, arm wrapped around the metal to prevent him from going farther. Before him was the station, and to the left, a parking lot had been cleared. A new wooden platform, set with bunting and flags, had been raised there. At least there were no Nazi banners. A band was playing a Sousa march, and from his vantage point, he could make out the khaki uniforms of National Guardsmen and upheld rifles with bayonets attached. An honor guard, though he didn’t see any honor out there.

  Up on the platform, men were starting to appear, including a line of the Kingfish’s good ol’ Legionnaires. He hoped a couple of them still had bruises from the whomping he had given them the other night. Even at this distance, he could make out his father-in-law, fresh from his furniture store, and it was good the bastard was up there. How to explain to him what had happened to his daughter and grandson? The thought made him physically ill.

  There was the deep whistle of a train. The whistle sounded twice more, and then, coming down the tracks, belching smoke and steam, rumbled the Ferdinand Magellan, the official train of the President o
f the United States. The train ground to a halt in a storm of steam, and another Sousa march started up. There were cheers and shouts and waves, and he looked around at his fellow citizens and thought, Don’t you see it? Don’t you see what has come to us? There was no difference between this man here and that man out on his ocean liner. Both crushed and imprisoned their opponents, both had bloody hands, both did what they wanted. Both had Jews behind barbed-wire fences.

  Didn’t these people see that?

  There. Men filed off the train, and there was the familiar roly-poly figure with its florid face and shock of hair. President Huey P. Long, the mightiest Kingfish in the world. When he raised both arms in greeting, the crowd roared.

  No, Sam thought. What they see is what they desire most. Jobs, safety, and a way of keeping the bloody fields of death out there on the opposite side of the oceans. Just end this damn Depression, get people back to work, stay out of war, and right now, President Long was promising that.

  His father-in-law, Lawrence, came up to a microphone and said a number of words, most of them drowned by feedback and overamplification, and then he shook the hand of Long, and the President came to the microphone as though chatting with an old pal.

  “My friends, my very dear friends,” he said in his rich gumbo-flavored voice, “I’m so very happy to receive this warm reception, even if you are a bunch of Yankees.”

  There was laughter and more applause. The President started talking in his seductive voice, but the words had a sour sound. More blather about the Rockefellers, the Mellons, the Carnegies, the moneyed interests he had fought ever since Winn Parish in Louisiana, and how the rich parasites had tried to sabotage him in all his years, in all he wanted to do, merely to serve the people.

  More blather. Sam forced his way back out of the crowd.

  * * *

  He made his way back to the center of the city, the sidewalks emptying as he got away from the train station. He was there as the President went by.

  First were the sirens, and then a brace of New Hampshire State Police motorcycles came roaring up, followed by three convertible black Ford sedans, the tops rolled back. It looked like staff or newsmen were in the lead and following cars, for President Long was in the center car, waving to the few people on the sidewalk, and Secret Service agents were on the running boards, two of them holding submachine guns. Taking up the rear were two more state police motorcycles. The sound quickly rolled on, dust and newspaper scraps spun up by the speeding vehicles.

  Sam reached the police station, looked up at the old building, and realized there was nothing there for him. He went to his Packard, started it, and went back to the Rockingham Hotel.

  * * *

  LaCouture looked as though he were being held together by coffee and cigarettes. His usual dapper style had left him; his clothes were rumpled and stained. Even Groebke looked exhausted. There was none of the manly banter or ballbusting or usual bullshit. LaCouture just looked up from his eternal paperwork and said, “Well?”

  “Nothing,” Sam answered. “This place is so tightly sealed, I can’t see him gaining access anywhere to make a shot. I even went over to the Navy Yard. If anything, it’s tighter over there.”

  “Friends? Acquaintances?”

  “None. Tony pretty much kept to himself. And the Yard security chief said Tony’s not popular with most of the workforce. I just don’t know—”

  Groebke said, “You wouldn’t be protecting him, eh, so that he could shoot our chancellor?”

  “No, not a chance,” Sam said, his voice biting. “Getting him gets my family free, and if that’s what it takes, that’s what’s going to happen.”

  Groebke’s pale eyes stayed on him. “Still, I know how you hate my country, hate my leader. I believe you would not mind seeing the Führer get shot tomorrow, even if it means your wife and son remain in prison. Perhaps such an exchange, a trade, would be worth it. Eh?”

  “You’re right,” Sam said, keeping his voice under control with difficulty. “I wouldn’t mind seeing your Führer shot tomorrow. Or stabbed. Or drowned. But I’m a cop, a cop assigned to you characters, and I’ll do my job. Protecting Hitler, finding my brother, and getting my family free.”

  LaCouture yawned, waved a hand. “Go on. Go home or go out on the streets again, but get out of here.”

  “That’s fine,” Sam said. “What about tomorrow?”

  “Come back at eight. We’ll figure something out then.”

  Sam stood there, tired and soiled, and he said, “My wife and boy. I want to talk to them. Now.”

  LaCouture shook his head. “Can’t do it.”

  “Why the hell not?”

  “Because I don’t want to, all right? Because it doesn’t suit me. Because I’ve got dozens of things to do before I get to bed tonight, and worrying about your family is not on that fucking list. What’s top on that list is finding your criminal brother, so I suggest you get your ass out of here and find him if you want your wife and son out of that camp. Bad enough what can happen to a woman in one of those camps. I’ve heard stories about young boys and—”

  Only Groebke leaping up and grabbing his arms prevented Sam, in a white-hot fury, from leaping onto the FBI agent. LaCouture kicked back his chair and stood up, nostrils flaring, and said, “That’s right, son, you hit me and that might feel right, but your family will still be in that camp. I got the fucking lock that keeps ’em there, and your brother is the key. So find that key. Don’t come beatin’ up on me; that won’t serve you none.”

  Sam broke free from Groebke’s grasp. “You better pray they’re okay. You got that, Jack?”

  “I stopped prayin’ to God above the day I got into the FBI, ’cause my savior then was the Kingfish, who got me there. Get out, Sam. I don’t have time for you bullshit.”

  * * *

  Outside, Sam was still shaking with anger. He strode over to the Packard and got in and slammed the door. He lowered his head, thinking about Sarah, frightened, imprisoned … And poor Toby. Sam’s heart ached so hard he was dizzy, thinking about his boy there, away from his home, his bedroom, his radio, his models.

  He stared blankly out through the dirty windshield. All the models broken, shattered, by those thugs of Long’s, breaking into his home without worry or legal warrant. The bastards.

  He knew he should keep on looking for his brother, but for Christ’s sake it was dark, and what could he do? Just flail around from one well-guarded building to another, going through checkpoints, hopefully not get shot by some trigger-happy National Guardsmen. And going home to that violated place, no, that wasn’t an option. He put the Packard into drive and edged himself out on the streets, drowning in his troubles.

  And then it came to him.

  Where did he and Tony always go when they got into trouble?

  That little island in the harbor. Pierce Island.

  * * *

  He was surprised to see two cars parked at the far side of the island’s dirt parking lot. It looked like more people than he thought had those prized windshield passes. He got out and took his flashlight, played it around the interiors of both cars. One was empty. In the other was a man and woman in the backseat, so busy that they didn’t even notice Sam’s presence.

  He scanned the lot. Called out, “Tony? You out here?”

  He moved down the path, the flashlight beam slicing a wide area ahead of him, and then—

  A noise. He whipped to his left, let his light play out.

  A man stood there, trying to move away.

  “Freeze! Portsmouth police! Don’t move!”

  He drew his revolver, held the flashlight out, saw a man standing there, his back to him.

  Another man scrambled to his feet before the first man, holding a hand up to his face to block the light. He wore the dress blues of a sailor. “Hey, pal, get the light outta my face, will ya?” came the sheepish voice, with a thick New York accent.

  Sam saw the other man adjust his pants and shook his head at what he had ju
st interrupted. He lowered the light. “All right, sailor, beat it.”

  “Uh …” The sailor backed away, “Not sure how to get back. This fella gave me a ride.”

  “Oh, Christ, the both of you just beat it. You, turn around.”

  Now something was familiar, something was wrong, for he knew this man, knew him very well.

  The mayor of Portsmouth, his father-in-law, the honorable Lawrence Young. With his pants around his knees.

  “Sam.” His head was tilted so he wasn’t looking at the man who had married his daughter.

  “Pull your pants up, all right?”

  Lawrence bent over, yanked up his trousers, drew the zipper up, and fastened the belt. “Look, this isn’t what you—”

  “Larry, you never gave a damn what I’ve thought, so why start now?”

  “It’s just the pressure, you know? The summit and the President coming and—Just a onetime thing, that’s all. Something to take the pressure off.”

  Sam edged the flashlight beam back up to his father-in-law’s face, knowing he couldn’t tell the bastard anything about Sarah and his grandson, for LaCouture had made it clear: Only by getting Tony would they get out of Camp Carpenter. Bringing in Lawrence … Christ, who knew how that could complicate things? But there was something else that had to be said.

  “Larry, you ever hear of a street over in Kittery called Admiral’s Way?”

  “Perhaps … I’m not sure … Why?”

  “Cut the crap. Some months ago I went along with some Maine state troopers and Kittery cops on a raid at a whorehouse on Admiral Way. Nice, quiet Victorian house. I was just observing, but you know what? Something I observed was you coming out in handcuffs. How the hell did you think you got freed that night? Because of your voting record? No, I asked a favor from one of the Kittery cops. So he went over and uncuffed you.”

  Lawrence’s face was ghostly white, and he was trembling. Sam added, “Oh, and another thing I observed was the staff of that particular whorehouse. Young boys dressed as girls.” His father-in-law rubbed a hand across his face as if hiding his eyes. “So don’t tell me lies, okay?” Sam said.