The Rules in Rome (5 page)

“What are you wearing under that dress?” Ley asked.

“That’s none of your business.”

Ley exhaled deeply. “Actually, since we’re working together, everything about you, including each item of your clothing, is my business. If you’d rather not continue this inspection, feel free to withdraw from the mission.” He strode to the chest of drawers, brushed her to the side, and handed her an old bra and a pair of panties. “Change into these. I’ll be back in five minutes.”

Gracie had never wanted to hit someone so badly before, but she refrained from a physical assault. That was beneath her dignity, and Ley was well over six feet tall and looked like he was made of solid muscle. She tried a verbal onslaught instead. “Captain Ley, you are the rudest, most insufferable man I’ve ever met. No wonder your former fiancée chose Captain Vaughn-Harris instead of you.”

She’d hoped her words would sting, but Captain Ley laughed. “Allotment Annie? She had a goal to be married by winter. Vaughn-Harris is just upset that I was her first target and that I was relieved instead of jealous when he told me they’d married a few weeks after I left for Europe. Five minutes, Miss Begni.”

When Ley shut the door behind him, Gracie threw the underwear after him in frustration. Dressing like a pauper would be infinitely easier than pretending she was in love with
him
.

As the train began its
ascent through the Gotthard Pass, Bastien left the compartment he shared with three other German officers and walked to the dining car. Gracie wasn’t there, so he checked the other cars. They’d both purchased tickets and boarded the train at the same station but at different times. As was expected of a German officer, Bastien had purchased a first-class ticket. After giving her a final opportunity to withdraw from the mission, he’d suggested she purchase a coach fare. It wasn’t very chivalrous, and Colonel Ambrose had no doubt given her enough cash for a more
expensive ticket, but Gracie needed to play her role, and an Italian civilian in well-worn clothing would blend in best while sitting in third-class.

He hoped she’d backed out before boarding, but he continued his search and finally found her in the last compartment before the luggage car. She met his eyes for an instant before turning toward the blacked-out window. They weren’t supposed to have met yet, so she was acting appropriately, but he wondered if it was playacting or her anger that had prompted her to look away.

Bastien continued to the rear of the train before going back to his sleeper. By the time he passed her again, she had pulled the collar of her jacket up so it covered more of her neck, and her arms were wrapped tightly around her body. OSS had outfitted her for Rome, not for the Alps during winter. The compartment was heated but not very thoroughly. He
felt guilty walking to his superior accommodations while she shivered the night away sitting on an old bench crowded with strangers.

It’s her decision
, he reminded himself. He’d done his best to make her say no. He’d tried to shock her with a kiss, scare her with stories of the Gestapo, irritate her with endless target practice, and infuriate her with his wardrobe check. He felt he’d succeeded in drawing out each desired response, but none had been enough to make her quit.

Bastien lay on his bed, hoping the movement of the train would lull him to sleep as it left Switzerland for Italy. He felt a hint of regret as Gracie crossed his mind again. He hadn’t meant to kiss her that thoroughly, but something about her and her lips had created a momentary lapse in his judgment. The confusion and vulnerability he’d seen in her face just after stung his conscience. He’d tried to provoke several emotions, but he hadn’t meant to toy with her heart.

* * *

Bastien and Gracie switched trains inside the Italian border early the next morning. Bastien walked around the platform, pretending to stretch his legs as he made sure Gracie was in the right place.

Winter weather had slowed traffic on the Brenner Pass between Italy and Austria, making the Gotthard Pass through Switzerland busier than usual. Axis trains sent through Switzerland were supposed to contain no weapons and generally brought coal south and slaves north. With the heavy traffic on the rail system, less important trains were often forced to side tracks to make way for trains with more vital supplies. Bastien passed one such sidetracked train, its cars locked and guarded by members of the SS, and recognized its human cargo.

The prisoners’ hands were jammed into the cracks between the doors and thrust through the mesh covering the small windows. Bastien could hear their pleas in haunting Italian, begging for water. The Nazis frequently rounded up Jews, Gypsies, and Communists and sent them to camps. They gathered up other civilians too, sometimes bribing them with the promise of work or cigarettes, other times simply taking them. The car looked like a forty-and-eight boxcar—meant to transport forty humans or eight
horses. Usually, far more than forty people were shoved inside, leaving the passengers with insufficient room to even sit down.

The SS guards ignored the requests. The Nazis often locked people in trains for days with no food or water; they did it to POWs, to civilians, and to undesirables. Bastien had long ago concluded that the best thing he could do for Italian civilians was help the Allies break out of Anzio and kick the Nazis back into Germany, so even though he wanted to help the unfortunates on the train, he fully intended to walk past and do nothing.

An elderly Italian woman, her gray hair showing under the black scarf she wore on her head, approached the train. She had a bag slung over her shoulder, and she reminded Bastien of his grandmother, the one his family had lived with when his father had gone away to war. Bastien had no memories of his father prior to his sixth birthday. His grandmother had been the one who had taught him to tie his shoes, spell his name, weed the garden, and do a hundred other things.

The woman opened her bag and handed potatoes to the Italians trapped inside the locked train.

“Stop! What are you doing?” One of the SS guards brandished his pistol and rushed over to the woman.

As the guard ripped away her sack and raised his hand in preparation for a strike, Bastien interrupted. “What seems to be the problem?”

The SS man was only a guard, not even an NCO, so Bastien, acting as Hauptmann Adalard Dietrich, clearly outranked him. The man lowered
his hand and turned to face Bastien, anger written on his face.

Bastien glared back. Acting like a conceited officer was one of the few perks of his current assignment. “Put your pistol away. This cargo is to do work for the Reich, no? Well-fed slaves are better workers.”

“Italian scum. Plenty more where they came from. If a few die on the journey, it’s an insignificant loss.”

Bastien glanced at the sack lying on the ground, still half full of potatoes. “You will go draw water for them,
sturmmann
.” Bastien stressed the last word, emphasizing the soldier’s low rank.

The SS man’s face twisted with defiance.

“Now, sturmmann. You may do it yourself or release a few of the prisoners and have them do it.”

The guard marched off, though Bastien didn’t think he’d really fetch water for the prisoners. Bastien handed the bag back to the woman. “Quickly, Signora. I think it best if you leave before he returns.”

The woman was just finishing her mission of mercy when the SS guard came back, his officer by his side. It was an obersturmführer, so Bastien was still the ranking man, but the officer would be more difficult to deal with. Bastien shooed the old woman away.

The officer stopped a few feet from Bastien and tilted his chin up. “Hauptmann, it appears we have a misunderstanding.”

“Oh? And what would that be, Obersturmführer?”

He gestured toward the train with his hand. “I am escorting these criminals to Germany. I will allow no interference.”

“And what are their crimes?”

The obersturmführer seemed surprised by the question. “Too numerous to enumerate.”

“Hmm. I’d wager most of them committed the simple crime of being
born in the wrong place.” Bastien glanced behind him, making sure the
Italian woman had disappeared into the crowd. “I have finished my so-called-
interference. I assume this cargo will be transported through Switzerland?”

“Yes.”

“Then feed them and give them water. We wouldn’t want the Red Cross
to notice anything amiss, would we?”

The obersturmführer snorted. “The Swiss don’t care what we transport as long as we continue to line their bank vaults.”

“For your sake, I hope you’re right, Obersturmführer. Good day.” Bastien turned to leave, hoping he’d successfully bluffed his way out of a volatile situation.

He shouldn’t have done it. Of the six boxcars full of Italian civilians, the woman had fed less than one. For all he knew, the men inside were strangling each other for a bite of potato. Her gift could have easily made their journey more, not less deadly. And Bastien had his cover to maintain. At all costs, he had to maintain his cover, even if it meant one old woman was beaten by an SS guard.

“Just a moment, Hauptmann.”

Bastien turned to meet the man’s arrogant blue eyes. “Yes, Obersturmführer?”

“Your name, please.”

Bastien unfastened the top buttons of his overcoat, exposing Dietrich’s Iron Cross. “Hauptmann Adalard Dietrich. And your name?”

At the sight of the award hanging from Bastien’s neck, the obersturmführer lost some of his confidence, and his lips trembled slightly as he spoke. “Obersturmführer Fritz Meyer.”

“Carry on, then, Meyer.” Bastien strode from the boxcar, hoping Dietrich’s decoration would deter Meyer from filing a report.

And if it doesn’t?
Bastien shivered in the early morning chill. He was supposed to have gone to the Ruhr for an imaginary aunt’s funeral. If questioned, he could perhaps claim he’d acted under the influence of her compassionate nature. Travel through Lombardy was reasonable, especially with the transportation disruptions air raids, sabotage, and winter weather caused, but drawing attention to himself had been a mistake.

“Stop!”

It took Bastien a few moments to recognize the feminine voice.

“Stop! Thief!” At least Gracie had remembered to shout in Italian, but now neither of them was blending in like they should.

Bastien found Gracie in the
crowd, chasing a young man who was running off with her suitcase—the one with the radio. He hesitated. Stepping in would only draw more attention to himself. Bastien still had Smitty’s radio, so Gracie could use that if she lost hers, but if the thief reported the radio to the Gestapo, Gracie would be in trouble. And while Bastien might not be eager to work with her, he didn’t want her to get caught.

Bastien moved to cut the man off at the edge of the platform, but someone else intervened first. A shot sounded, the young man fell, and Obersturmführer Meyer, his pistol still drawn, approached the thief and kicked him in the ribs.

Bastien pushed his way through the crowd forming a circle around Meyer and the thief. The man on the ground wasn’t dead yet, but his wound looked fatal. Bastien considered asking if there were any doctors in the crowd, but although death was a severe punishment for stealing a suitcase, interrogation by the Gestapo, followed by death was even more severe. And there was the radio to worry about.

Bastien reached for the dropped luggage, but Meyer beat him to it. Bastien swallowed. Suitcases packed with radio parts were heavier than they looked.

Meyer hefted it by the handle, scrunching his eyebrows together and staring at the piece in surprise. “Weighs more than I expected.”

Bastien reached for it. Meyer pretended not to notice. “I’ll take that, Meyer.”

Meyer reluctantly handed it over.

“Thank you, Obersturmführer. I assume you can deal with this.” Bastien gestured toward the dying man.

“I think it best that we take every precaution, don’t you? We should question him and search the suitcase, see if the man or the woman has partisan connections.”

“He looks young for a partisan.” That wasn’t true—the wounded thief looked about Roberto’s age, a teenager, and Bastien had seen other partisans far younger than any of Marcello’s men. “He’s probably just a pickpocket
trying to move on to larger items.”

Bastien met Gracie’s gaze and walked toward her. She was breathing hard, and despite the chill, a few dark hairs were matted across her forehead with perspiration. Her face was pale, and she looked ill. Bastien wasn’t sure if that was the result of the theft or of what had happened to the thief, but in either case, she didn’t look up to an interrogation by Obersturmführer Meyer. “I’ll investigate the suitcase and its owner,” he told the SS man.
Turning back to Gracie, he lifted the suitcase and switched from German to Italian. “Is this yours, Signorina?”

Gracie nodded.

“Do you have any other luggage?”

She looked around as if she’d completely forgotten her other suitcase. “Yes.”

“Well, let’s find it before someone runs off with it.”

Gracie retraced her steps, and Bastien stayed nearby, carrying the radio for her. Her other suitcase still sat on the platform.

“I’ll need to search your things,” Bastien said. Meyer would be suspicious if he didn’t, but Bastien wasn’t sure where he could perform the search
without everyone seeing what was inside. He spotted the ticket office and, taking Gracie’s other suitcase, led the way.

The small building was closed to the public, but he was a German officer, and neither of the railroad employees objected when he stepped inside, Gracie right behind him. He turned the suitcases so no one but he and Gracie could see the contents and glanced at her. The incident had left her shaken.
So now that there’s no turning back, she finally realizes what she’s gotten herself into.
Bastien pretended to examine the contents of her luggage, and this time, she didn’t protest.

He closed both suitcases with a snap. “All seems to be in order, Signorina.” He spoke loudly so the rail workers could hear. “I’ll help you to your train.”

Bastien planned to escort her all the way to her seat, but he ran into Meyer
again outside the train. He handed the suitcases to Gracie and watched her board.

“Anything suspicious?” Meyer asked.

“No.”

“What was in the small suitcase?”

“Sewing machine parts.” Bastien glanced around the platform. The crowd had dispersed, and the thief was gone. Bastien saw two SS men carrying away
something wrapped in a blanket. It was the right size to be a body. “And our thief?”

“He died before I could ask him any questions.”

Bastien glanced once more at the covered bundle. “Probably a random robbery. Good day, Meyer.”

Meyer saluted, then followed his men.

Bastien turned toward the Rome train and briefly met the eyes of a stocky, middle-aged man. Before boarding the train, Bastien looked back again. The man was still watching him, and according to his uniform, he was SD.

* * *

Gracie was exhausted when the train finally pulled into Rome’s Termini
Station a day and a half after leaving Switzerland. In good times, a passenger
train could cross the border into Italy and make it to Rome the same day, but her route had taken much longer. She’d had to switch trains twice, and her last train had stopped for several hours somewhere between Milan and Bologna to fix a problem with the engine.

Because the train arrived during curfew, the passengers weren’t allowed off until nearly dawn. Gracie hadn’t slept since boarding the first train, but she couldn’t sleep now. She was too cold. At first it had been the winter chill, but after her radio was stolen, it was fear that left her shivering. Her cover had almost been blown, so easily, even though she hadn’t made any mistakes. She’d never seen someone shot before, and the memory was horrible. She wouldn’t have said anything, preferring to let the thief get away with her radio, if she’d known what would happen to him. And she was worried. Had it been a random theft, or had something about her or her suitcase made it a target?

When light from the still-hidden sun illuminated the station, she saw Captain Ley through the window. They’d planned no contact until the next day, and she supposed the robbery wouldn’t change that. He strode away, composed, confident, perfect for his assignment.

As Gracie left the train not long after, she dreaded what might happen next, what bad luck or her own inadequacy might bring. She’d been so eager to work behind enemy lines, but unlike Ley, she wasn’t perfect for this assignment. She had pictured herself calmly meeting with informants, then competently transmitting vital intelligence, doing something that would really make a difference for the army. She hadn’t even been able to handle the thief without help. She whispered a prayer, pleading for divine protection. She had a feeling she was going to need it.

Colonel Ambrose and Captain Ley had given her the names of several buildings where she could seek lodging, all of them a long walk from Termini Station. She grabbed her luggage and began her trek. At least the scenery was pleasant. Rome was an open city, so although it had been bombed a few times, most of its structures were still intact, and the buildings, piazzas, and statues she passed were beautiful, even behind piles of sandbags. She’d been to Rome a few times when she was younger, and
despite the years, things were mostly the same. Except for the occupying army. German soldiers were everywhere.

The first two places she approached had no spare rooms. The third, by far the dingiest of her options, gave her the choice of two apartments after she’d shown the landlord her forged paperwork.

“Would you like the room on the second floor or the one on the fifth?” he asked.

“The fifth, please.” Gracie hoped she’d have more warning from that floor if she needed to hide the radio. The room was small, furnished only with a bed and a chest of three drawers topped with a porcelain pitcher and bowl. The bathroom was at the end of the hall, to be shared with the residents of the other five apartments on that floor.

According to her papers, Gracie was Concetta Gallo, a student. Her supposed studies would give her an excuse to come and go at irregular intervals, but she thought she should collect a few books so her room looked the part.

She unpacked her clothes and the other items she’d brought, then checked the radio. The lightbulb that indicated signal strength as she transmitted was cracked. She replaced it with a spare and hoped the spare would last. If it broke, she’d have to ask Ley for his, and she didn’t want to ask him for any more help. Her radio’s transmitter, receiver, and power source were each about the size of a skinny shoebox. They’d be easy to carry in the suitcase, or she could wrap them to look like packages or hide them in a bag of groceries. For now, she wrapped them in cloths and hid them in the bottom drawer behind some clothes before she slid her empty secondhand suitcases under the bed.

She picked up her silk handkerchief printed with two hundred sets of transposition keys and slipped it into her bra. No one would feel it in a pat-down, and she wanted to keep the radio and the silk separate. She slipped a second handkerchief and a sheet of instructions for its use into her pocket so she could leave them at a dead drop for one of her contacts. The last things she checked were her pistols, both Italian Berettas so they couldn’t immediately be tied to US forces. She hoped she would never have to use either of them. She wasn’t even sure how often she’d carry one because civilians weren’t allowed to own firearms.

The bed had only a single, threadbare blanket, but at least the sheets looked clean. Gracie sat on the thin mattress and then lay down, telling herself she’d just rest for a few minutes.

She woke to the sound of someone in the stairwell and glanced out the window. The sun was sinking toward the western horizon, and she had work to do before the five o’clock curfew. She took a sheet of paper and a pen and wrote what looked like a love note.
Amore mio, it’s been so long. I’ve missed you. Please let us return to how things were last summer.
Then she grabbed her lightweight coat, slipped the note and a piece of chalk into her pocket, and left, locking the door behind her.

Whomever she’d heard in the stairwell must have found their floor because the building was now quiet. She descended the rickety metal staircase quickly at first, then slowed, trying to make her passage less noisy. She didn’t want half the building’s occupants to hear her every time she came or went in her clunky black loafers.

Maybe a different pair of shoes would be better?
Gracie almost laughed at herself. She was posing as a poor Italian student; she was no longer the daughter of a fashion-conscious, upper-middle-class mother, and she would have to get by with one or two pairs of shoes rather than one or two dozen. She quieted her footsteps and left the complex, heading north and passing a bakery. Her room had no kitchen, so she’d have to purchase most of her meals in nearby shops. She slowed her pace outside the bakery, inhaling the aroma of fresh-baked bread. The line was long, so she couldn’t stop now, but maybe she’d have time to buy something later.

The fountain she’d been told to find was in an open plaza, and one of her contacts passed it every evening. Gracie hoped she wasn’t too late, that the agent would see her mark tonight. A chalk triangle drawn on the west end of the fountain was a signal to meet the next morning at a nearby waterline. Bombing had damaged the water ducts, so most civilians had to wait in line for their water. If everything went according to plan, Gracie would find the agent in line the next day and recognize her contact by the red patch sewn on his or her left sleeve near the elbow.

She waited until a pair of Italian Fascist policemen left the area, then drew her triangle. The fountain was dry, which was a pity. She thought it would have been lovely otherwise. The marble figures looked almost real but too pale and perhaps too perfect. She circled the fountain once, admiring it, then moved on toward the other agent’s address. She slipped her note under the door to alert her contact that she was in Rome, able to pick up any information left at a specified dead drop. She was tempted to leave the silk transposition keys and instructions under the door too, but her contact had been out of touch with OSS headquarters in Caserta for several weeks. It would be better to follow procedure and use the dead drop.

She was back on the street and had walked nearly a block when she glanced behind her and took in about a dozen faces. A few blocks later, she checked again, recognizing one face from her previous glimpse, a handsome Italian civilian. Gracie turned left at the next intersection and increased her
pace. Two blocks and two turns later she glanced back, and the man was still there, roughly the same distance behind her despite her rush.

Stay calm
, she told herself.
He’s Italian; it’s not like the Gestapo’s on your tail.
Her training had covered what to do if she was followed. She could confront him or try to elude him. She turned into a more crowded street in the hopes
of losing him and rushed along, trying to put more people between them.

She’d just passed an alley when someone grabbed her arm from behind and yanked her off the road. A hand slapped over her mouth before she
could scream, and within seconds, she’d been dragged into the deserted foyer of a dark building.