Crossword

by Alan Bricklin

  A knock on the door and Bill, his aide, opened it sufficiently to pop his head in and announce, "Mrs. Bancroft is here, sir."

  "Send her in."

  Mary strode into the office, all business, still wearing her coat, unbuttoned, scarf hanging around her neck, and walked up to his desk, settling herself in one of the chairs that faced it. "What do you have?" It was not yet time for her routine weekly meeting so she assumed that her summons to come see him was related to her observations on the encounter she had had last time outside her hotel.

  "Let's go over to the table," he said, placing his pipe in the large ashtray and scooping up the pictures that were piled in front of him. Mary stood up, laying her coat and scarf across the chair she had just vacated, and followed him to the large conference table where he spread out the photographs in a neat row. "These are all the German officers that have been in Switzerland recently or might have been without us knowing about it, and who come anywhere near fitting the description you gave me. I did take some liberties, though, with your observations, broadening the search a little to include basically any Nazi officer."

  Mary smiled. That's so like you, Allen.

  "Take a look and see if any of these look like your man."

  Bending over she examined each photo, side stepping from one to the other down the line, passing by Schroeder's picture without even a glimmer of recognition. "It's one of those two," indicating two sets of pictures that she had pushed back from the orderly alignment in which they had been set down. "I want to look at them again."

  "Sit. Let me get rid of the others." Dulles removed all but the two Mary wanted to examine further, then laid those in front of where she was sitting at the end of the table, along with the files on each of the officers.

  She carefully examined each picture, including a few in the folders that Dulles had not shown to her originally, angling some to the light for a better view of the mostly hastily shot images. Before she had finished looking at the second folder she said with determination, "This one," tapping her forefinger on the large picture that he had included in the original lineup. She read from the file cover, "Gerhard Waldman, General, SS."

  Allen came alongside, looking over her shoulder at the image of a dapper looking, dark complexioned man, who had just turned to his left to look at something when his picture had been taken surreptitiously, apparently in Berlin. He was walking with a small group of generals several paces behind Hitler and Himmler, and Dulles, sitting down beside Mary, picked up the picture and held it before him, focusing intently on the General as if, by sheer concentration, he could glean more information than was conveyed on this print by the array of silver molecules on photographic paper. Having worked closely with Bancroft he felt no need to ask if she was sure. "Well, now we know who he was, but not what he was doing in Bern."

  "Do you think he might have been meeting with the English, or maybe even the Swiss in some sort of unofficial manner?"

  "I can check with the English, but as far as the Swiss go, we're a diplomatic mission and would have no business inquiring about some German general in civilian clothes on 'holiday' in Switzerland." He put down the picture, retrieved the one other file and returned to his desk where he placed the folders in a neat pile to be re-filed by his clerk.

  Mary Bancroft sat at the conference table, a look of concentration on her face as she stared into space, rhythmically tapping her finger on Waldman's picture.

  "Could you bring me his file, please? It's time I learn what I can about this fellow."

  She slipped the picture back into the folder and brought it to Dulles, gathering up her coat and scarf after depositing the items on his desk, since she could tell by his tone that she was being dismissed. It was his game from here on. The great game.

  While Mary Bancroft and Allen Dulles were meeting in his office at number 23 Herrengasse, Julian Templeton was strolling through old town Bern, oblivious to the charm of this area of the city and unconcerned with the upscale shops selling what little there were of luxury items to be had in a country surrounded by a world at war. Down the Marktgasse and along the Kramgasse, his direction purposeless, but his thoughts focused and clear. However, so much was still unknown that definitive conclusions were few and of little operational value. When he reached the Nydegg bridge spanning the river Aare, which held old Bern nestled in its curves, he paused and sat on one of the benches that lined the pedestrian walkways, deciding that the time for information gathering was rapidly nearing an end and he must put into play at least one or more plans of action. At the time of his last meeting with Waldman, the field agent had not reached Munich; the general's tell had been subtle, but Julian was sure it was there. If the operative had been killed or captured en route, the game was over and could not be replayed; may as well all go home. Although that was a possibility, it had to be ignored since it was a null prospect requiring no action on his part except a small bit of "cover your ass." Therefore, he was forced to assume that Gerhard, by now, either possessed the plutonium himself or had it under his control, and held the trump card. Templeton considered several scenarios, the first of which, that Waldman had the plutonium, a buyer and a safe exit strategy, he dismissed out of hand, for if that was the case, Julian was pretty much fucked, with nothing to do except perhaps vengeance and that would serve only to incriminate himself. No point in developing contingencies for something over which any of the plans he could devise would have no effect. The other options were all variations of Gerhard being able to accomplish some, but not all, of what needed to be done to abscond with the prize, sell it for a shit load of money and escape to South America or the Middle East. All of these possibilities begged the question of why any of them would be better than the deal he had offered him, and the only answer was more money or, less likely, more safety. If this were the case, and he was trying to cut out Julian, Waldman's goal would be to deliver the plutonium to the buyer or his agents, and this would entail moving it across the border. A sale to someone in Germany was extremely unlikely and was another null prospect engendering no action on Julian's part. Too much over which he had no control.

  He took a breath and focused his eyes on the scenery around him, the quaint quarter of the old town and the pleasant looking wooded slopes that surrounded it helping to mitigate the uncomfortable feeling with which he started the day, although the greatest portion of solace came from the analysis just completed, because now he knew where to direct his energy. Gerhard and the plutonium had to get out of Germany, and if he was trying to bypass Julian it was likely that he would not let it out of his site. Bringing it into Switzerland would not be too difficult, but keeping it a secret from agents of the Allies would be near impossible. To the west, American and French forces controlled the countryside, and to the east, the Russians were rapidly advancing. That left Italy to the south as the only feasible exit route, which meant that Gerhard would have to transport the material pretty much due south from Munich, through the area around Innsbruck and the Tyrol. Julian had contacts in northern Italy who had no love for the Germans and, more importantly, were always interested in lining their pockets with American dollars or British pounds, no questions asked. He stood up, all thoughts of the beauty of the local scenery gone from his head, and walked off to begin his plans, although he kept in mind that still the most likely eventuality was that the original strategy worked out by the two of them would eventually be played out to its conclusion. But, he thought, it never hurts to be prepared.

  * *

  Fifty miles north of London, in Buckinghamshire, lay Bletchley Park, a lovely Victorian manor house built in 1882 in the small town of Bletchley. Since 1938 it had been the home of the Government Code and Cipher School and was the location where the ultra secret German Enigma code had been broken through the efforts of a group of brilliant, dedicated men and women, including the mathematician Alan Turing, one of the fathers of the modern computer. As the war effort grew and more branches of the intelligence community found a home at Bl
etchley, numerous out buildings or "huts" as they were called, sprang up on the grounds, and at its height, upwards of 10,000 people were employed, their frenetic activity in stark contrast to the bucolic setting.

  Hulbart was unaware of any of this, or even his exact whereabouts for that matter, as he was escorted from his quarters to one of the nearby Quonset huts to meet with the interrogators who would debrief him. Walking along the path, he found the setting peaceful, although not as spectacular as Norway, and if he made any comparisons during the short stroll, Bletchley Park was not found wanting, the ambience of the English countryside being what his soul required at this time after the many months of stress and uncertainty at Norsk Hydroelectric. On arriving at his destination, a small, nondescript metal hut still dripping the morning dew from its corrugated roof, he was ushered into a room that seemed to occupy approximately half of the building, an extravagant utilization of space, he thought, especially during wartime. In actuality, most of the workers, both civilian and military, had been dismissed or reassigned, their primary task having been accomplished, and there was ample room to allow a bit of indulgence.

  Having opened the door for him, the corporal who had fetched him from his small room withdrew, presumably, Hulbart thought, to remain at guard. Two men were seated inside, one at a plain wooden desk and the other in a comfortable looking upholstered chair, one that looked like it belonged in someone's sitting room, with a smallish end table next to it. Its surface was completely covered with a pile of notebooks and maps, all of which seemed in imminent danger of sliding off and cascading onto the floor. The occupant of the chair, a man of middle age with abundant wavy hair streaked with gray, and dressed in civilian clothes, looked up from the pad on which he was jotting down something, motioned for Hulbart to wait, then returned to his writing, occasionally pausing with the capped end of the pen at his lips, apparently pondering some point, before resuming his notes. After several minutes, during which Hulbart glanced around the room in a state of mild discomfiture, the man capped his pen and returned it to his shirt pocket, then laid the pad on top of the pile on the table top, the penultimate piece in a precariously growing pyramid, and finally placed his glasses at the summit before standing and walking to Hulbart, whose eyes remained focused on the assemblage next to the chair, expecting it to collapse any second.

  "Hulbart Gerlach, welcome to England." He extended his arm, a smile on his face as he gripped the scientist's hand in a firm handshake, nodding his head as if to say that yes, you are finally out of Nazi Germany and everything will be alright now. "Call me Franklin."

  "Like the American president."

  "Exactly. This is Captain Wesley," indicating the other person in the room.

  Wesley stood and acknowledged Hulbart with a perfunctory nod before returning to his seat behind what Hulbart could now see was actually a table rather than a desk; some sort of work table, he thought, its surface bearing nicks, scratches and other signs of long years of use. A typewriter, one edge propped up with folded paper against the uneven topography of the surface, occupied a position directly in front of where the young looking Captain sat. He wore khaki fatigues, and although he had been introduced as a Captain, no sign of rank was visible. In addition to the typewriter, there were several notebooks, maps and writing implements, all arranged neatly on the surface, and Hulbart had to suppress a smile at the contrast between the two men.

  "Pull up a chair. As you can see we've plenty of them." He swept his arm around the expanse of the room, which contained at least a dozen chairs of all types as well as one plush looking sofa and various other pieces. Looking around, Hulbart realized he must be in what was once some sort of store room, the repository of odd bits of furniture, the central portion having now been cleared out to make room for interrogations, while the periphery held the remnants of its former function. He chose one that looked comfortably padded—— no telling how long he might be here —— but was located close enough to be easily moved in place before the two Englishmen. "I trust someone gave you breakfast. Would you like something to drink?"

  "No, I'm fine. And they brought me breakfast. Thank you for asking," he said in quite passable English.

  "Good, then let's begin." Franklin returned to his easy chair, making himself comfortable as he fixed his glasses in place and picked up the note pad on which he had been writing, thumbing through a few pages before continuing. "So, you went to Norway to work at the Norsk Hydroelectric plant in Vermork?"

  "Yes, except that it's not correct to say that I went there when I was really ordered to go there. I had no choice."

  "Exactly how were you ordered? Did someone come to your house and drag you away?" And so the long tedious business of interrogation and debriefing began, the continual digging for details, the same questions repeated in different ways looking for inconsistencies or outright lies.

  Cheese, bread, some sliced meat and a beer for each of them were brought in for lunch, the questions continuing while they ate and even during a short break when Hulbart was allowed to stretch his legs in front of the hut for a few minutes. It was mid afternoon when the following exchange took place. "So, you were working as a chemical engineer at Norsk, where they made plutonium for the atomic bomb."

  "Not exactly," Hulbart replied.

  "What do you mean 'not exactly'?"

  And Hulbart Gerlach explained what he meant. And the explanation and the questions it engendered went on for three hours. And the Captain's eyes grew wider, and Franklin found himself stopping often to moisten his dry mouth. Finally he said, "We'll continue tomorrow. The corporal will show you back to your quarters."

  When he had left the hut, they turned to each other and the captain spoke first. "I've got to tell the C.O."

  "I'll go with you. We need to get a message to London."

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  As they rounded a bend in the road, Larry noticed a vehicle in the distance, a truck of some sort judging by its size, but other than that he could tell very little except that it must be traveling slower than he was since he was coming up on it and would soon overtake it. Although they had been lucky since leaving the barn in not meeting up with any of the citizenry or, even more fortunately, any of the military, it was a situation that Larry knew could not last. He eased off the accelerator while he thought about how to proceed.

  "Why are you slowing?"

  "There's a small truck ahead, not moving very fast. Could be military, a commercial transport or just some local farm vehicle. Before we catch up to it I want to decide what I'm going to do in each of the situations." The latter two possibilities were of no real concern to him, mainly because he was in a SS staff car and wearing a military tunic. Any civilian farmer would show the utmost deference and would actually prefer no interaction at all; but a military vehicle, although not necessarily a great danger, presented the risk of someone wanting to make contact, if only in a social context, and that could be trouble. The longer they were on the road, in plain sight, the more they would be vulnerable to the vagaries of chance, a fear that was well founded.

  "What if we pull off the road and wait until the truck is out of sight?"

  "We'd be too exposed. Too many chances for someone to start asking questions or to see if perhaps we might need help. I'm going to get closer and see what it is. If it's military, we can just speed by with what I hope is a not unexpected, arrogant indifference. Climb in the back and try to look important. Oh, and hand me the cap on the seat, please."

  Maria hiked up her skirt so she could move her legs enough to make the necessary contortions to accomplish the change of position, and as she maneuvered herself into the rear of the car Larry glanced her way and was rewarded by a glimpse of shapely legs and an agile body.

  Adjusting the hat on his head, Larry saw Maria in the rear view mirror hastily applying makeup to her face, and, a moment later, sitting erect with a realistically haughty expression on her face, looking every bit the woman of a high ranking officer being driven o
n some errand or outing of great importance to her. They would make a perfect tableau as they sped by and passed whatever lay ahead on the road. He increased the speed, the distance from the vehicle ahead rapidly closing, and in less than a minute he could see that it was a military convoy truck, its canvas top enclosing a dozen or so troops, and he could also see the reason for its snail like pace. In front of it was an oversized farm wagon filled to overflowing with hay and carrying several farmhands, seemingly children from the quick look Larry had as he pulled the car slightly to the left. There was no place for the wagon to pull off the road, drainage ditches paralleling both sides of the road also preventing the truck from passing it. However, he judged that there was just enough space for his car to pass if he was careful. He would have to drive more slowly than he wanted, but it seemed to be the only way. He prepared to hit the accelerator to get quickly into position, when the soldiers sitting at the rear of the truck started pointing in his direction. His stomach knotted, and indecision welled up in his mind before he realized that although they were pointing in his general direction, the angle of their arms was upward, towards the sky, and at the same time he heard the noise. There is nothing like the high pitched whine of a fighter aircraft diving out of the heavens to instill fear, to make one feel like a small field mouse who hears, high above, the flapping wings of a raptor, a sound that it instinctively knows, without having to look, is a harbinger of death. Icy fingers wrapped around his heart.

  Maria, too, heard the shrill scream of the straining engine, and she frantically threw herself from one window to the other trying to see into the sky above. "Lorenz, what is it? I can't see anything!"

  Before he could answer, a new sound assaulted them —— the staccato discharge of fifty caliber machine guns as a track of impacts swept by the car taking out the right front tire in a shower of metal and sparks before continuing up the road and tearing through the cover of the infantry transport. The driver of the truck, apparently not experienced at the art of dodging attacks from planes, sped up while the soldiers realized their best chance was to bail and scatter rather than remain in a concentrated target, a course now rendered difficult by the increasing speed of the truck. Maria and Larry were thrown forward as their car came grinding to a stop and pivoted a quarter turn clockwise, Larry banging his head first on the windshield then on the window. With smoke swirling around the car, he looked to the left and saw the transport almost on top of the farm wagon, and at the same time heard the Doppler shift of the plane's engine as it roared by, only to be replaced by the whistle of the incoming bomb released with deadly accuracy by the pilot. The fact that their wheel had been shot out, causing the car to stop so suddenly, saved their lives as the distance between them and the speeding truck increased rapidly.