“Well,” the Chief said, “what’s so funny about it?”
“I didn’t say it sounded funny,” Jack Rhyce said. “I said I thought it sounded phony.”
“I wish you wouldn’t bother me about these details, Buster,” the Chief said. “The whole department is working on this cover for you. We’re giving it everything we’ve got, and then when we come up with something you merely say it’s phony.”
“I only mean,” Jack Rhyce said, “I sort of get the idea that this whole Friendship League setup sounds a little too good to be true.”
There was an appreciable pause, and it seemed to Jack that perhaps the Chief was reviewing the bidding. It was the Chief’s open mind that had finally put him where he was, in spite of competition.
“Have you read their literature yet?” the Chief asked.
“No, sir,” Jack Rhyce said.
“Well, read it,” the Chief said, “before you make any snap judgments. Of course it sounds like a front organization, but as far as we can see, this one is harmless, although Bill Gibson has not reported on it yet. Anyway, Chas. K. Harrington is harmless, and everyone else in his executive suite. They ought to be. They are drawing higher salaries than you or me, and they have expense accounts besides. Frankly, I never thought of this outfit to cover you until I saw that the Tremaine Foundation had set it up. Gus and I were in the war together. He’s a Texan. Do you like Texans?”
“Not always,” Jack Rhyce said.
“Well, I think maybe you ought to meet him,” the Chief said, and looked hard at Jack again and smiled in a frigid way.
“You see, Gus is like you, Buster. He just doesn’t believe that the world is full of people who want to do good by spending other peoples’ money. But you’re going to understand it. You’d better start learning, because we’re going to turn you into one of those people.”
“Maybe I’m not the right type, sir,” Jack Rhyce said.
“You’re going to be,” the Chief said. “You’re going to be a mother’s boy, and have a sweetheart. I think we’ll have her in the sociology department at Goucher College. You’ll only have about two weeks before you start, so throw yourself into it, Buster.”
Naturally, he was most anxious to throw himself into it. He had only been told until then that Gibson, in Tokyo, had requested help, and that he had been selected, but he still did not know what his mission was, and he had been careful not to ask. Now, however, as he sat in the Chief’s office, listening to the humming of the air-conditioner, and the sounds of the Washington traffic, he understood that the plans had solidified, and that his briefing was about to start.
“Do you know what I found out the other day?” the Chief asked him. “I discovered that the boys and girls in the office call me Dick Tracy. Why do you suppose they do that?”
“Well,” Jack answered, “I’d say it was mainly out of affection, and not because they think you’re a figure of fun, or a comic, or anything like that.”
The Chief turned on another of his icy smiles.
“Right,” he said, “comics aren’t comics any more. When I was a kid I was supposed to laugh at the Hall-Room Boys and Mutt and Jeff and the Katzenjammer Kids, but that’s all over now. Nothing is really funny anymore, not even a good pratfall, because it may have international significance. Right?”
“If you say so,” Jack Rhyce said, “but I don’t follow you.”
“Now don’t get fresh, Buster,” the Chief told him. “I admit that I am circuitous this morning. I’m sorry to harp on the remark you made about this Asia Friendship League letter. You said you thought it might be phony, but I’m afraid you think it’s funny too. Please don’t think it is, because I’d like to have you come back alive from Tokyo.”
He paused, and a silence fell between them.
“Let’s skip that last remark,” the Chief said. “All I’m trying to say is that these people like this Chas. K. Harrington aren’t funny. Often they’re not even stupid. Please don’t underrate them, Buster. Oh, sure, a lot of them are grotesque. Most of them are ignorant in many sectors, because they’re usually narrow and dogmatic—but don’t forget they can be dangerous. They do have a certain idealism, and a kind of selflessness. They have what Tennyson called ‘an all-increasing purpose,’ even if it’s fuzzy-minded. Never underestimate the do-gooders, Buster. As a class, they’ve made us a hell of a lot of trouble in the last thirty years. Please never think of them as being funny.”
When the Chief got started, he had an orator’s ability to begin in a slow, haphazard manner, and then with no appreciable effort to pull everything together.
“Incidentally,” he said, “I wonder if you have ever read Heaven’s My Destination by Thornton Wilder. I don’t suppose so, because it was written when you were in short pants, except that of course they weren’t wearing them when you were a boy, were they? I wish you would read it before you go to sleep tonight, because his central character is a do-gooder. Some people thought he was funny, but he wasn’t. You’re giving me your full attention, aren’t you? You see, your cover is a do-gooder and you’ve got to understand the species.”
He stopped and gazed at Jack Rhyce, but of course Jack was giving him his full attention.
“The thing to keep clearly in mind is that this individual you’re going to represent, whom I call a do-gooder for want of a better word, is a distinctly modern type. There was nothing like him in the days of the Roman Empire, and he can only survive today in a country rich enough to afford him. There have been plenty of philanthropists before, and socialists and revolutionists—Tom Paines, and John Donnes, and Karl Marxes, and Arnold von Winkelrieds, and Wilhelm Tell, and Spartacus, and lots of other active characters whose hearts have bled for the common man, but not the same way our modern hearts bleed. Do-goodism in its purest form is new in the world. Maybe it’s our greatest hope, but it’s also our biggest danger—seriously.”
“You mean certain people and ideologies take advantage of it?” Jack asked.
“You’re smart today, Buster,” the Chief said. “The trouble is, we’re an incorrigibly romantic nation who believe, like Little Orphan Annie, that Daddy Warbucks will always be just around the corner. Do-gooders are unrealistic and their older models weren’t, basically. The older models thought things through, but we don’t think. We feel. The same used to be true of you, but I trust you’re getting over it.”
“How do you mean—it used to be true with me?” Jack asked.
“Do you remember,” the Chief asked, “that damn-fool remark you made to Molotov just before we yanked you out of the paratroopers, about all men being brothers? That’s what I mean—it was do-goodism. I damn near sent you back to the army after that.”
Jack Rhyce was startled. The truth was you never could tell what the Chief would remember.
“I agree with you, sir,” he answered. “I hope I’m better now.”
“But I don’t want you to be better now,” the Chief said. “I want you to be a do-gooder. I want you to throw yourself into it. Now you’ve shown me your letter. Here’s another for you, Buster, and after you read it maybe you won’t feel that Chas. K. Harrington’s Asia Friendship one is so phony. Don’t hurry with it. Take your time.”
He opened the top drawer of his desk and pulled out a photostat of a letter dated a week before from Amarillo, Texas.
DEAR MR. HARRINGTON (he read):
Due to my business commitments here and there I’ve been kind of out of touch with your project, the Asia Friendship League, but I’ve heard a lot about the fine things you’re doing out there, and I feel right gratified, to use a Texas phrase.
Now just in order to keep myself up to date, I am commissioning a young friend of mine, for whom I can vouch in every way, because we’ve rode the range together, and eaten brains at the same barbecue, to make a survey for me of everything you’re doing, so I can have the whole picture straight, right here at El Rancho Chico.
The name is Jack Rhyce—a good real American, by the way, t
hough I’m not anti-foreign or anti-anything, partner. Take him right in and shoot the works to him, and send him around the world to all those places which I hope to see myself someday, where they ride in sampans and leave their shirttails out.
You’re going to like Jack, so just feel free to tell him anything, because, honestly, he’s a prince. And here are a few facts. Jack graduated from Oberlin College in 1941. He has a fine religious background, but is at the same time a real he-man. For example, he played right tackle for Oberlin on the team that almost got to the Sugar Bowl or someplace, and also commenced interesting himself in civic and welfare projects. For instance, during summer vacations, he was counselor for the Y.M.C.A. boy’s camp at Lincoln, Nebraska; and helped out in various recreational projects, including the organization of the Tiny Tim Football League, which proved very popular.
He tells me he thinks he would have gone into settlement work if it had not been for the war, but he was just as quick as a Texan to heed his country’s call, serving in the paratroopers until wounded. After this he did desk work for various services in Washington, and since then has stayed in Government, not wearing striped pants, but traveling the world for projects like Point Four and things like that. Jack’s got a lot of swell ideas, and you two are going to have a lot in common. He’s at loose ends now, and I don’t know anyone who will understand and appreciate what you’re up to better than Jack.
Why is he at loose ends? Well, frankly, because I’ve been lucky enough to shanghai him out of Washington with the eventual plan of having him as a sort of legman for me out here at Amarillo. How was I able to shanghai him? Well, frankly, don’t kid Jack about it, but Cupid has entered into the picture in the shape of a very lovely little trick who is working in the department of sociology at Goucher College, whose name is Helena Jacoby. What with his lovely mother, whom he’s never let down since he was five, and this Cupid deal, Jack needs a little more dough. Well, that’s the story, Harrington. You’ll hear from him, and give him the red carpet treatment all the way to everywhere, and so hasta mañana.
GUS TREMAINE
The strength of the letter was that its main facts were provable by investigation. He had been to Oberlin. He had played right tackle. He had been a Y.M.C.A. camp director, and his parents did entertain strong religious convictions. He had been a paratrooper until the Chief had run into him at Walter Reed Hospital. Since the war he had served in Washington.
“How do you like it?” the Chief asked. “It ought to be good, because I spent two nights over it, personally.”
Jack Rhyce handed back the copy. It was amazing how intricately the Chief’s mind could work.
“It looks pretty good, sir,” he said, “but it might help if you were to tell me just why you’ve selected me for this spot, and what I’m supposed to do when I get there—in Japan.”
For a moment the Chief looked annoyed, but finally he nodded.
“Maybe you’ve got a point there, Buster,” he said. “You know I never play fun and games with anyone intentionally, don’t you? I think it’s early to give you the breakdown, but maybe you’ve got a point.”
He paused and tapped his desk with his pencil.
“All right,” he said. “Question Number One: You’re going out to the East because you’re not known there. Europeans, and especially Americans, stand out like sore thumbs in the East. Everybody knows your income and your girl friend in the Orient. Even the rickshaw pullers know whether you are a spy or not. Orientals are experts about people, as you’ll find out, and that’s why we are working so hard on your cover, but it won’t help indefinitely. They find out everything eventually.”
“What about Sorge?” Jack Rhyce asked. “He lasted quite a while.”
He was speaking of one of the greatest men in the profession—the German Sorge who, in the guise of a newspaper correspondent, ran the Russian spy ring, and for years had given Moscow accurate intelligence regarding all Japanese intentions. He had been a foreigner, alone in a highly suspicious country, who had been watched by a highly organized secret police, and yet it had been a long while before the Japanese caught up with him.
“Sorge,” the Chief said. “Exactly. Sorge had a good cover. But the Japs got him in the end, and made him sing. He must have forgotten his pillbox. I want you to keep yours handy, Buster.”
They were both silent for a few seconds. They were professionals, and there was no need to underline anything.
“All right,” the Chief said. “Question Number Two: You’re going out to assist Gibson. You’ll be under his orders.” And then he lowered his voice. “Gibson’s got the wind up, and he doesn’t scare easy. He thinks the Commies are planning a political assassination, and anti-American demonstrations in Tokyo. This is serious when you consider the total political picture.” The Chief pushed back his desk chair and stood up. You never realized how tall he was until he was on his feet. He selected another chair and drew it close to Jack.
“Gibson’s vague. But you know as well as I do that he’s damned intuitive. He says a new personality is running things.” The Chief’s voice dropped to a still lower note. “An American personality, Gibson thinks. He asked for you, particularly.”
“Did he say what the personality is doing?” Jack Rhyce asked.
It was never a good idea to ask the Chief direct questions, and he was not surprised that the Chief was annoyed.
“Damn it,” the Chief said, “Gibson was necessarily vague. That’s the trouble with this cold war. It’s all vague. It isn’t a question of stealing the secret plans. It’s organization and propaganda and sudden ugly incidents; and our side hasn’t learned yet to organize or to understand what people want. All we know is what they ought to want, but maybe we’re learning slowly.”
The Chief described a circle in the air with his right hand.
“All we can do is to sketch this character,” he said. “He’s an organizer, a new mind in the apparatus. There’s been a sudden marked change in Japan, according to Gibson’s estimate. The neutralist intelligentsia are getting more neutralist. There’s more anti-Americanism, more pro-Communism. The Communist choral groups are getting better. There’s more and better Red literature in the bookshops. There are new ideas. For instance, there’s a new labor union that sells clothes at 40 per cent below the retail price. It’s the bread and circus idea, but somehow it’s done on subtler lines. It’s Gibson’s notion that all this is only the prelude to large-scale disturbances. You’ll have to see him to get it straight, or maybe you’ll even have to see the character.”
This piece of exposition impressed Jack Rhyce because it lacked the Chief’s usual balance.
“Maybe I haven’t quite followed you,” Jack Rhyce said. “It seems to me everything you say sounds like the usual Moscow technique.”
Certainly he and everyone else had seen enough of it. The undeviating quality of the Moscow manufactured procedure was its greatest strength, because there came a saturation point when simple-minded men accepted boredom. The Chief nodded slowly.
“I’m sorry if I gave you that impression,” he said. “Actually yours was my own initial reaction, until I examined the orders to organizers and all that sort of thing. It’s all gayer. It doesn’t taste so much like castor oil. You’ll find you almost enjoy it. When was the last time you were in Tokyo?”
“Eight years ago,” Jack said, “and only for two days. Tokyo looked pretty well bombed out then.”
“Well,” the Chief said, “I was there six months ago, and really you wouldn’t know the place now. The Japs have that resilience, or national will to live, or whatever you may call it. The whole town’s built up and it’s bigger, better, busier. And any fool can observe that its atmosphere is predominantly American. It used to be Germany before the war, but now in Japan the fashion is the U.S.A. Even the shop signs are in English in districts no American ever visits. Maybe they think America is good because we won the war. I wouldn’t know. I wouldn’t care. Of course Japanese culture never will be Amer
ican, but oh, boy, they have the superficialities! You hardly see a kimono in Tokyo any more. You don’t hear the sound of a geta on the sidewalk. Go to a ball game—and you might think you were back at home from the sounds the crowd makes. The girls all wear American dresses and the men are in business suits. Do you think I’m getting away from my point?”
“I know you couldn’t do that, sir,” Jack Rhyce said, and he was quite right, because in the next few words the Chief pulled everything together.
“They like everything American. That’s the point,” the Chief said. “They don’t fall for anything Russian. And this new propaganda has an American touch. It has jazz and neon lights in it. It’s damn clever. And I think Gibson’s right—it’s dangerous. Communist-made Americanism always is, because it can form the background of serious disturbances. Frankly, I wouldn’t say that Japan is very firmly in the camp of the freedom-loving nations. Why should it be? Well, we lost China, and God help us if Japan goes Communist. We’ll be in the grinders then; and frankly, Gibson thinks there’s a hell of a better chance of its happening than there was six months ago. Something new has been added from America and things are accelerating.”
Jack Rhyce knew that the Chief had not given all the details yet. Certainly the Bureau’s organization in Japan was not so ineffective that it had not turned up a few concrete facts.
“I hope you’re going to tell me what’s been dug up,” Jack Rhyce said. “After all, I have personal reasons for being curious.”
“Oh, yes,” the Chief said, and he sat down behind the desk again. “I’ve made a few mental notes. Of course we have our contacts in the left-wing organizations, but as far as we can make out, none of our people has seen this individual. However, there is reason to believe that he has been to Japan several times. We think we know his cover name. It’s Ben Bushman. There’s a lot of talk about a Ben in all the recent intercepts. The man who is really masterminding things out there is a Russian named Skirov who comes over to Tokyo to meet Ben. Gibson thinks there’s a meeting due pretty soon. I don’t need to ask you if you know about this Skirov, do I?”
Mr. Moto Omnibus Page 57