Buried Caesars

Buried Caesars

Stuart M. Kaminsky

A
MysteriousPress.com

Open Road Integrated Media Ebook

To Natasha Melisa Perll Kaminsky

The President of the United States ordered me to break through the Japanese lines … for the purpose, as I understand it, of organizing the American offensive against Japan, a primary object of which is the relief of the Philippines. I came through and I shall return.

                  General Douglas MacArthur

                  Friday, March 20, 1942,

                  in Adelaide, Australia

T
here was no point in trying to talk to Major Castle.

We were sitting in the back of a big, 1940 custom-built Packard Darrin Victoria One-Twenty watching the coast go by and the sun go down. The driver was a tall, dry bolt of a man whose name I didn’t know but found out later. Castle hadn’t given it to me when he picked me up in front of my office on Hoover Street in Los Angeles.

Castle hadn’t told me much on the phone when he had called. He said he was on a mission for General Douglas A. MacArthur. The mission involved me. He asked if I would meet him but the request sounded more like an order. It was the kind of request I might consider turning down if I had a few bucks in the bank and he hadn’t suggested that the outcome of World War II was about to be laid on my battered desk.

It was September 1942, a clear Tuesday during which I had done some shopping—three pairs of socks and a new shirt from Hy’s for Him on Melrose. That left me with enough for a bag of tacos from Manny’s and gas to get my bleached Crosley through the next week.

Major Castle had come when I clearly needed a client.

I had shaved in the morning, gone shopping and waited to change into a pair of new socks and the fresh shirt until I got to the office I shared with Sheldon Minck, D.D.S. Sheldon was off that day on a mission of his own, the nature of which he did not share with me.

I had suggested to Castle that I meet him in front of the Farraday Building. The alternative would have been for him to pass through the dark pit of tooth decay that was Shelly’s dental office, past the spit sink, into the Cabinet of Dr. Caligari I used for an office. It wasn’t impressive enough for army brass.

Just before four, when I was scheduled to meet Castle, I had checked my face in Shelly’s mirror. Flat nose, graying hair, lopsided smile. The body was a slightly bulky 165 pounds on my five-nine frame, but that didn’t hurt when your business was looking like a mug and occasionally acting like one. A half century of abuse had molded my body for the job. The bad back didn’t show and the scars were covered by clothing.

I thought I was ready for Castle. The Packard was waiting in front of the building, windows closed in spite of the eighty-three degree heat. The driver was standing next to the car, not leaning on it, his hands at his sides, his crisp tan suit and tie in contrast to my almost matching baggy trousers and jacket. My tie was loose. I’d gotten a deal from Hy on the shirt but the collar was a half size too small.

“Mr. Peters?” the driver asked softly over the rumble of traffic and the laughter of a woman shopper and her dour companion, who blitzkrieged past me on the sidewalk.

“Peters,” I agreed.

The driver nodded toward the Packard and got in the driver’s seat. I opened the front door and a voice from the back said, “Back seat.”

I closed the front door, opened the back one, and slid in next to a man who looked as if he had been dipped in cement the day before. The man was gaunt and gray. His hair, cut close, his face, his hands, his eyes and even his suit were gray. He turned those gray eyes on me and I didn’t like what I saw in them. Shelly’s office wouldn’t have bothered Major Castle. He had seen far worse.

“Major Oren Castle,” he said, holding out his right hand as the car pulled into traffic.

I took his hand. In spite of the heat in the closed car, the hand was dry and cool.

“Toby Peters,” I said. “Where we going?”

“Not far,” he said.

“You mind telling me what this is about?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said and looked forward.

That was all anyone said in the car for the next hour and a half as we drove over to Daly Street and headed north. Every few minutes I’d take a look at Castle to see if I could catch him blinking. I never did.

I watched the landscape which was fine but I’d seen hills before. Boredom set in after three minutes and then I wanted the flash of the city, the noise of a downtown L.A. street or restaurant, the blare of a movie. Nature and I got along okay, but we weren’t exactly pals.

We hit the valley and turned east south of Glendale, where my brother Phil and I had grown up. The sun was half red and half reflection on the horizon behind us. The driver turned right when we hit Hill Avenue in Pasadena. After ten or twelve minutes of twists and turns we pulled into an iron-gated driveway just beyond the Huntington estate, and drove along between thick trees which blocked the view of the house until we were almost in front of it. The main house was a big adobe with barred windows and turrets. It was supposed to look like old money and old Mexico. It looked like someone with a lot of money trying for the effect and coming pretty damned close.

The driver parked in front of the front entrance and he and Major Castle got out without a word. I got out and closed the door. I didn’t say anything either. The driver was standing at the top of three red stone steps, right hand clasping his left wrist as he looked down at me. Castle stood next to him looking at me over his shoulder, waiting. I moved toward the steps and Castle went to the door and knocked.

I joined him just as one of the thick wooden doors opened on a well-groomed woman in a tan dress. Her dark hair, swept up in the latest style, framed her long neck; her jeweled earrings caught the last light of the day. She backed up with a small smile and we stepped in.

Inside I could see that the woman was older than she had appeared at first glance; older but still worth looking at.

“He’s waiting,” she said.

Castle nodded and moved past her.

“Good to meet you,” I said to the woman as Castle’s shoes clicked on the inlaid tiles.

She smiled. Nice mouth. Good teeth. Clear skin.

We moved, Castle leading the way. The walls were draped with colorful rugs and the rooms were tastefully furnished with solid, old-looking wooden furniture. Castle stopped in front of an inlaid oak door and knocked. He looked directly at me and I thought I detected something in his face that might pass for life.

“Come in,” came a deep voice and in we went, Castle letting me step past him.

It was an office, a big overheated office; desk, bookcases, photos on the walls, plenty of big-leaved plants. Next to the desk, his hand on the back of a leather chair, stood General Douglas MacArthur. Even in civilian clothes there was no mistaking him. His face was on buttons, posters, front pages, ads. There had been days named in his honor, parks dedicated to him. He was the only hope California had of keeping the Japs from landing tomorrow afternoon. He was, as one citizen had said, the greatest general the United States had known since Sergeant York.

The General examined me and then turned his eyes toward Castle, who stepped out of the room and closed the door. I knew MacArthur was sixty-one or sixty-two, but he looked younger. His shoulders were broad and he looked a little thin. He was slightly stooped. His hand went to his thin dark hair, which he had combed back to unsuccessfully cover a bald spot. He was dressed in a white suit with broad pleated pants and he stood still for about ten or fifteen seconds as if he were posing for a portrait. I’d already begun to sweat in the small, hot room, but MacArthur looked cool and clean, without a stain.

“Mr. Peters,” he said. “Sit.”

It was a command. I sat in a heavy wooden chair in the center of the room in front of the desk. MacArthur examined me, puckered his lips, nodded in what might have been acceptance and reached for a cigar which was smoldering in an ashtray on the desk. He took a puff, played with his finely manicured fingers and began to slowly pace the room. MacArthur was giving me a minute to get used to being in his presence. As he got absorbed in what he was saying, he began to pace more quickly.

“General Douglas MacArthur is not here,” he said, starting to pace.

“I can see that,” I said.

He either ignored me or didn’t hear. The General went on pacing.

“It is vital that no one know I am here,” he said. “Communiqués are being issued in my name from my headquarters in Australia. I am in radio contact by the hour. Within three, possibly four days I will return to the Pacific, but it is imperative that my presence in the United States not be revealed.”

“You’re not here,” I said.

“I’m not concerned, Mr. Peters, about the possibility of your revealing my presence to the press,” the General said, snaking his head and pointing his cigar in my direction. “You do not have sufficient stature to make such a revelation credible.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“My people would simply deny it,” he said. “And I assure you that I will not be in this house for more than three hours. The Japanese would give a great deal to know my whereabouts, and I doubt that my passage back to Australia would be without incident if they were to find out. It was only through perseverance and good fortune that my family and I managed to get through the Japanese blockade of Corregidor earlier this year.”

“I know,” I said. “General, whatever you want …”

“Please do not interrupt,” he said with a tone that made it clear he was not accustomed to interruption. “Your very obscurity is an asset in the situation that and your reliability. My people tell me that you are tenacious and loyal. Both attributes I value. Your intellectual capacity and lack of flexibility may not qualify you for a field commission, but given the present circumstances … your full attention is required here, Mr. Peters.”