The Folks at Fifty-Eight (7 page)

“Of course not, sir. Would you like some coffee?”

Strecker was a bland, forty-something career soldier, who disliked his job and resented his current orders, disliked the need for political expediency and resented being away from his wife and family. Carlisle knew all this. He also knew that Strecker disliked and resented him. The dislike was mutual. Carlisle viewed Strecker as a sycophant and puritanical hypocrite, and tweaked his resentment at every opportunity. But Howard Strecker also had his uses.

“Coffee won’t cut through the bad taste I’ve got in my mouth.”

Strecker moved to the stationery cupboard, where he kept the essential booze.

“Scotch or schnapps? Or I could rustle up some bourbon? You want something to eat?”

He shook his head and pointed to the scotch. Strecker poured out two measures.

“So what did he have to say for himself?” he asked.

At that moment, Carlisle had a more pressing matter to address.

“Before we get into that, I need to know if you’ve heard from Hammond.”

Strecker handed over the glass and shrugged his ignorance.

“Hammond? I don’t quite. . .”

“Hammond, Gerald Hammond. The man we sent after the girl.”

“Ah yes, him. My mind was on other things for some reason.”

Carlisle wasn’t in the mood for sarcasm, especially not from Strecker.

“Well, get it off other things and concentrate on this. This is important.”

The smirk on Strecker’s face faded. Now he looked confused.

“I don’t understand. What do you mean, important? Carpenter didn’t stress any special importance. He just said she was a good-looking young woman and we were rescuing her from Beria’s clutches. He said it was a favour to someone. Beria being Beria, I assumed it was to save her from the obvious fate.”

Alan Carlisle knew the public persona of Lavrenti Beria, as the head of Soviet state security: a sadist, rapist, and mass murderer, who terrified the Soviet Union from his third-floor office in the Lubyanka. But, unlike the rest of the world, Carlisle also knew Beria as a spymaster without equal, an espionage genius, who was taking maximum advantage of America’s unpreparedness for the rapidly-approaching cold war.

He up-ended his glass, and passed it to Strecker for a refill. The phone rang. He picked it up. Melody had the number he’d asked for. He thanked her and waited, and then said,

“Hello?”

A youthful male voice crackled out from the receiver.

“Yes, what is it?”

“Mathew? It’s your father. What are you doing home? You should be at college.”

“I got bored.”

“Bored? You’re studying at one of the finest universities in the world, or you should be.”

“I told you, I don’t like politics and I can’t stand economics.”

“You’re not there to like them. You’re there to secure a future for yourself.” A lengthy silence followed before he spoke again. “Is your mother there?”

“No.”

“So where is she?”

“Out, thank God.”

“Whad’yer mean, out? It’s only just gone seven a.m. in Washington. Out where?”

“How the hell should I know? Drank too much at one of her boring charity dinners, I expect. Why would you give a damn? Look, I have to go. There’s someone at the door.”

The line went dead. He replaced the handset and tried not to show the anger as he spoke.

“Kids, huh! Who’d have them?”

Strecker looked embarrassed. He moved to top up Carlisle’s glass. Carlisle persevered.

“You got any kids?”

Strecker poured his own freshener, then returned to his chair and nodded happily.

“I’ve got two, one of each. Jane’s twelve, gonna be a stunner. Peter’s up at Yale.”

Carlisle stared moodily into his glass as he considered the limited merits of his only son.

“I’ve just got the one. Mathew. He’s up at Princeton, or he should be. Pulled some serious strings and got him into PIA. For some inane reason, I always figured PIA stood for Public and International Affairs; didn’t realize it stood for piss it away.”

He took another drink, and changed the subject to a more interesting one.

“Girl on the switchboard. Melody, is it? Sounds like she could be fun. Not black, is she? Name sounds black?” Then, in response to the answering frown, he said, “Don’t get me wrong. No finer sight than a well-rounded pair of glistening ebony buttocks thrusting back at you.”

Alan Carlisle knew that his comments would outrage the puritanical Howard Strecker. That was precisely why he made them. He stifled a smile as he watched and listened to Strecker, clearly struggling to keep any hint of censure from his answer.

“Part African, part Cajun, I believe; beautiful girl, lovely smile, hour-glass figure. But, I should warn you, she’s happily married. One of my former lieutenants took one look at her and was instantly smitten. That was less than six months ago. Sorry to disappoint you.”

Strecker didn’t look sorry. He looked disgusted. Carlisle shrugged and feigned indifference, but the interrogator in him had heard something interesting, and he wasn’t about to let an opportunity like this pass him by.

“I’ll live with it.” And then, when he saw Strecker’s look of disgust turn to one of relief, he said, “Did you say, one of your former lieutenants? Am I to assume he’s no longer here on the base?”

Strecker’s face suddenly fell.

“Uh, no. Transferred him to VA last month. We’re winding Europe down, consolidating our experienced teams over at Fort Hunt. But then, I have to presume you already knew that?”

Carlisle ignored the question and feigned concern. He was thoroughly enjoying this.

“And she didn’t go with him? What a shame. Poor girl must be so upset. . . and lonely.”

Strecker hurriedly rustled through his in-tray.

“Young Melody requested an immediate transfer, of course. Couldn’t approve it, because of staff shortages, but I’ve told her, I’ll sanction it just as soon as we get some replacements.”

Strecker finally found the document. He waved it in the air, like a trophy. Carlisle held out his hand.

“May I see?”

He took the form, studied the information and grinned.

“Only twenty-two, huh? All seems so unfair. Look, why don’t I see if I can pull some strings when I get back to the department? Send you someone and get her stateside.”

“Sorry, sir, but I can’t let you do that. Regulations, I’m afraid.”

Carlisle wasn’t about to let him get away with that. He waved away the objection.

“Not a problem, Colonel. I’ll deal with it. Least I can do. Unless, of course, you’re determined to make an issue of this?”

If it came to a conflict between the two men, there could only be one winner. He knew it, and he knew that Strecker knew it. He watched him squirm, and heard him say,

“They’re all someone’s daughter, you know, and they all have feelings.”

“You just concentrate on the sons and leave me to worry about the daughters. Now, what do you suggest we do with our fat little Kriminaldirektor in interview room two?”

Strecker’s failure to protect the vulnerable Melody Strand had hurt; it showed.

“If it were up to me I’d ship him straight down to Nuremberg, let them deal with him. The more I see of these murdering bastards, the more they make my skin crawl.” Carlisle frowned, and then stifled another smile as Strecker hurriedly back-pedalled. “No disrespect intended, sir, but strictly speaking, these people are war criminals. They are on the list.”

“That all depends on whose list you use, Colonel, and your precise interpretation of Article Six. But no, that can’t happen. Kube’s too important to throw to the wolves.” He thought about his own level of political exposure and decided that escalation was the safest option. “I’ll call Marcus Allum, see what he wants to do. That is what they pay him for.”

He picked up the phone. She answered immediately. “Get me Marcus Allum at the State Department, would you, Melody? Oh, and I may have some news about your transfer. I’m tied up this afternoon. Perhaps you could drop round to my hotel this evening, around seven. We’ll discuss it then.”

“Uh, uh, yes, sir.”

Alan Carlisle gave a self-satisfied smirk as he replaced the receiver. Then he saw the look of disgust and dismay on Howard Strecker’s face and roared with laughter.

They had been lucky in their leaps from the moving train, landing on soft ground and suffering little more than minor cuts and bruising. Then, in a frantic effort to escape the early search radius, they had run until tired legs could run no more. They found a wooded area and rested for ten minutes, knowing the train would soon arrive in Leipzig and their head start limited. After that they walked quickly for the rest of that day and all through the night, staying out of sight, or close to cover, until they neared their primary objective.

Hammond had purposely chosen to head for the safe-house in Dessau. He reasoned the Soviets would expect them to make a run for the western-alliance sectors, and concentrate most of their search effort to the south and west. He obviously couldn’t take her south and east, because that way lay Leipzig and a large contingent of the occupying Red Army. North was the only sensible option, and north meant the safe-house in Dessau.

Dessau, and more precisely its Junkers aircraft factory, had been the objective of heavy allied bombing during the war. As a result, the proud capital of the former Principality of Anhalt had suffered badly. However, it was not to the rubble-strewn centre that Gerald Hammond and his young charge were headed, but to one of the few undamaged buildings on the town’s northern outskirts.

Hammond scanned the road and countryside again, just to make sure, then called and beckoned for her to join him. She crept forward, and he heard her ask,

“Are you married?”

The question took him by surprise. Of all the questions he might have anticipated her asking, about who he was, why he had rescued her, or if it was safe, she had asked that. It was only when he saw the admiring look in her eyes that he suddenly realized.

He was her saviour, her gallant rescuer. It was a natural and understandable reaction, particularly for one so young, but it was a reaction that, nonetheless, needed careful handling.

“Yes.”

He wasn’t good at that sort of thing. She looked disappointed. He smiled benevolently and gently teased her.

“Sorry about that. Would you like me to take you back to the train?”

She smiled back at him.

“We’ve probably missed it by now. We could wait for the next one.”

She had a sense of humour. That was good. He smiled again and returned his attention to the road below.

“Tell me about your wife,’ she asked. ‘What’s she like? Is she beautiful?”

“Yes.”

“Do you live in New York?”

“No.”

“One day I’d like to go to New York. I want to climb right to the top of the Empire State Building. They say it’s over a hundred stories high and you can see all over the city.”

As he listened to the lilting voice, speaking English with the merest hint of an accent, he found it enchanting. Her constant chattering was obviously an unconscious release of nervous tension, and that was good too. Victims of brutal interrogation sometimes found it difficult to conduct even the most basic conversation. She had obviously suffered no such trauma. Hammond knew something of Soviet interrogation techniques. She had been lucky.

She continued chattering. He happily indulged it.

“And I want to go to Los Angeles. I want to see Hollywood and all those famous film stars. I want to see Ray Milland and Clark Gable and William Holden. Oh, and especially Cary Grant; he’s lovely.” She paused for a well-earned breath, and then began again. “Oh yes, I want to go to Chicago, too. I want to see where all those gangsters live. Do you live in Chicago?”

“No.”

“So, where do you live?”

“Washington.”

“State or D.C.?”

“D.C.”

“Have you ever met the President?”

“No.”

“I met the Führer once, when I was a little girl. We were invited to Berchtesgaden. Everybody there was very important. He came across to us and asked my name, and then he gave me a kiss and said I was very pretty. Everybody was looking at me and smiling. I’ll always remember that. Have you ever met anyone really famous?”

“No.”

“You don’t say much, do you?”

He smiled a smile of warmth, and gently chided her youthful garrulity.

“I think you say enough for both of us. C’mon, let’s move.”

They left the copse, climbed over a wire fence and scrambled down to the road. He crouched by a drainage ditch at the roadside. She crouched alongside and continued firing questions.

“Back there on the train, when you said ‘they’ sent you, did you mean the Americans?”

“Yes.”

“So why did they. . . ?”

“Be quiet.”

Hammond had just seen a convoy. It was still some way in the distance, but travelling quickly and heading straight for them.

He shoved her into the ditch, and followed immediately after, then pulled her against the roadside bank and crouched beside her in the stagnant water. When she tried to peep over the top, he pulled her down and held her close, then clamped a hand over her mouth and hissed a second instruction for her to be quiet.

He peered out from behind a convenient tuft of grass as the convoy neared and then rumbled on by. There were four Opel Blitzes, commandeered from a defeated German army. Stragglers, he guessed, from the larger convoy that had passed by a few minutes earlier. Each was straining to make up time, and each was packed with Russian troops.

He again scanned the road to Jessnitz, or he hoped it was the road to Jessnitz. It was a tactically poor position, but they’d had little choice. They had to get to Dessau before dark. That meant leaving cover and negotiating a large expanse of open farmland.

Hammond cast his gaze over the road and across the farmland to the safety of the woods on the far side. He calculated they could make it in eight or ten minutes, but that meant eight or ten minutes of exposure to prying eyes.