Authors: Margit Liesche
Tags: #Fiction / Mystery & Detective / General
I took my position at the table we planned to use for the sorting process while Dante began examining the inside of the safe. He handed over several legal-sized manila envelopes and I arranged them on the table.
At the safe, Fingers gave a low whistle. Curious, I edged up behind Dante. He had discovered a false bottom. He opened the trap door and was reaching for a long tin box inside when Fingers signaled Dante to freeze. A barely visible string had been placed in a zigzag pattern across the top. Inspecting the container more closely, Fingers also called our attention to a fine white dust coating the lid.
A few quiet seconds passed while Fingers sketched the pattern of the string’s layout so that he would be able to reaffix it in precisely the same manner. Next, using the beam of a small flashlight and a hand-held implement resembling a dental tool with a tiny mirror, he checked the safe’s interior for other booby traps. Finally, the box was cleared for removal and Dante slid it out, positioning it between the piles of manila envelopes on the table.
The elongated lid lifted easily. He flipped it backwards, resting it on the table. The box contained a large envelope. As Dante carefully extracted it, something long, thin, and weighty slipped to the side.
Fingers pointed to some reddish-brown streaks on the envelope’s exterior. “Blood?” he whispered.
“Could be,” said Dante. He unfastened the flap’s wing-clasp and looked in. “Eureka.”
Carefully, using only the tips of his gloved fingers, he withdrew the prize. A push dagger. I knew the weapon from training. Made by the Brits, the specialty dagger combined a round, ice pick-like blade with a three-fingered grip that added power to the thrust. Designed to be used in close combat, it was particularly effective in a surprise attack when approaching a victim from behind. The blade readily penetrated clothing, flesh, and tissue, and was favored by female agents because of the extra supportive grip.
A flaky, rust-colored matter clung to the tip and to parts of the weapon’s spiked gray metal blade. Looping a finger through the grip, Dante dangled the dagger, rotating it, giving us all a chance to examine the weapon, before he returned it to the envelope.
“Hold on. What’s this?” He removed a newspaper clipping that had also been inside. It was yellow with age and we stared over his shoulder, trying to read it.
“Is it German?” I asked.
“Uh-huh,” he replied, absorbed in the article.
“What’s it say?” Fingers whispered.
“Something about a merchant seaman. Age twenty-three…Named Wilhelm Oskar Mehnert…Jumped ship in Galveston, Texas. Uh, was on shore leave, got into a scrape, broke an ankle. A doctor…
someone
treated him. Wasn’t there when the ship set sail, next morning. The desertion raised a lot of questions…Mehnert had been a corporal in the Kaiser’s Army during the last war…. Served in a machine gun outfit, earned several medals…It surmises the young seaman didn’t want to return to Germany because of post-war economic conditions.” Dante flipped the paper over. “Ah, dated September 12, 1922. It fits. There was a terrible depression in Germany then.”
He placed the clipping beside the envelope. “Eyes, be sure to get a shot of this. I’ll want to study it more thoroughly later.”
Numerous other manila packets awaited our inspection. He shoved the metal box aside and, following a prearranged system for sorting, spread the papers out on the table, culling out any suspicious documents, handing them over to me. While the two of us evaluated papers, Fingers went to Renner’s desk and examined ledgers and reports, occasionally showing Dante an item of potential interest.
Within minutes, a small stack of material had accumulated, including a roster of names and addresses that looked interesting, as well as carbon copies of instructions describing how to use invisible ink and how to apply various make-ups for disguise. Once he had enough to get started, Eyes left the room.
His search of the desk completed, Fingers turned to the adjacent three-drawer file cabinet and flipped through folders. Meanwhile, the portable dark lamp was getting plenty of use. I ran it over every document Dante turned over to me, testing for hidden messages. He had also given me two sealed envelopes. I opened them using my special razor device. One envelope contained a business letter inscribed with an awkward personal note near the end.
“Mother arriving Billy Boy’s seventh,” Dante said, reading the line out loud when I showed it to him. He frowned. “Hmm, ‘Mother’ might be code for a convoy. What do you think?”
I shrugged. “It’s possible. And Billie Boy…?”
Dante studied the letter again. “A secret landing spot, maybe. Bilbao’s a port in the north of Spain, near France.” He handed the document back, asking me to try ultraviolet light, then reagent, if necessary.
Eyes reappeared with the sheaf of papers he’d finished documenting. He left with a new collection, and Dante and Fingers returned to their individual searches while I examined the letter under the purple glow of my lamp.
Certain secret inks do not show up under black light, but sometimes the same stubborn ink will respond when swabbed with reagent. When no writing appeared, I dipped a swab in a small jar of the chemical included in my kit. I “stripped” the paper by running the swab diagonally across the page. My neck was tense. I rubbed it and scrutinized the damp lines. Reagents were both good and bad. If the letter contained a secret ink message, the special compound would cause it to develop and appear as brown ink and we would have something incriminating against Renner. But then the bad part. The developed ink would remain visible and we would not be able to return the stained letter to the box. Bad or not, I wished for something tangible to appear. To no avail.
I dipped another swab, executing a second pattern, and studied the fresh application. I sighed. “No hidden message,” I reported. I placed the paper beside the proper envelope to dry.
“Put it in that final stack for Eyes,” Dante said. “Headquarters will want to know about anything even vaguely referencing Bilbao.”
I pushed out of my chair. “Want me to check the drawers?”
Doc had already turned to another document. He looked up. “Huh?”
“The drawers built into the wall,” I said. “Shall I check them?”
He glimpsed his watch. “Yeah, sure.” He turned to Fingers, who was closing a cabinet drawer. “Nearly finished?”
Fingers’ shoulders heaved. “Looks like it.”
“Good. We need to vamoose. Take what’s left to Eyes. Once he’s snapped them, help him pack up.”
Fingers left the room with the small pile of documents. I hesitated, my hand on the upper drawer’s pull. “We haven’t come across the plans for the secret night-bombing device Renner supposedly copied and stashed in here. You don’t seem concerned.”
Dante was assembling documents, arranging them in a prescribed order. He frowned. “Maybe with the hubbub surrounding the murder, he decided to move them or stash them at home. We’ll know tomorrow after we interrogate him.” He lifted an envelope, preparing to place a batch of papers inside. “Besides, Eyes has shot a booty of stuff we can use.”
“Enough evidence for probable cause, maybe. But now with Blount dead, without an outright confession, you don’t have the solid link I thought you needed before going up against Renner…”
“Pucci, he has a dagger in his safe.”
“But is it the actual dagger used to kill Blount? If it is, I’ll bet it’s been wiped clean of prints.” Dante’s eyes narrowed and I knew he didn’t appreciate the direction I was taking. But I couldn’t stop. “Possession of a knife doesn’t prove he’s been pilfering Ford’s secrets for the
Abwehr
. Or that he’s the assassin. Plus, if he is the assassin, why would he save the dagger?”
Dante shrugged. “Panic. Nervous about passing it through security. Fear of where to stash it, or dump it, so it wouldn’t be found.”
“Still, it doesn’t make sense. He’d only be inviting trouble keeping it. What if Mrs. K saw it…”
Dante returned to shuffling papers. “Lewis, our mission is accomplished. We came here to mine enough material so that Renner knows that
we
know what he’s up to. We’ve done that. In fact, once we let on we’ve found the dagger he’ll be champing at the bit, wanting to help us. Now we’ve got to skedaddle.”
I nodded. He was right. I opened the drawer. About four inches deep and three feet wide, it was indeed designed to hold flat files. But it was empty. I shoved it closed and pulled out the drawer below. I paused. Inside, directly behind the pull, stuck in a crack, was an orange card that looked like a badge. Maneuvering the card with my finger and my letter opener, I removed it. I felt a fluttering in my chest. It was a factory badge and it wasn’t Renner’s!
“Someone could have planted the dagger, though, right?” I asked, excitedly.
Dante’s head was bent over a document. He knitted his dark eyebrows together and looked up. “Sure. And if that’s the case, Renner would be equally anxious to squeal on whoever he suspected put it there.” His gaze flicked to the orange card in my hand. “Why do you ask?”
I handed over the card, turning it so he could see the picture on the back. It was Chaplin. The dwarf.
“Bingo! Looks like we’ve nailed the unidentified insider.” He set the badge on the table. “I should say
you
nailed him. Good work. We’ll get Eyes to snap a shot of it.”
I pulled the drawer open wider. Dante checked the time. “Two minutes.”
Three plastic sleeves inhabited the drawer. Two were empty, but one of them held a large parchment envelope. Its flap was sealed. I flicked on my pen light. Holding the envelope aloft, I ran the fluorescent beam over the contents and recognized the dark lines of a drawing.
Fingers and Eyes reentered the room. “Eyes,” I said, setting the envelope on the drafting table and using my fine-bladed opener to unseal it. “Get a camera.”
“Pucci,” Dante interjected, “there’s no time.”
I probed the flap, lifting it gently. “We make time, or this goes with me.”
He turned to Eyes. “Your gear all packed?” Eyes’ valise was at his side. He nodded.
“Take out the bare minimum. Get a few shots of what she’s got, but make it quick. We need to document that card, too.” He gestured to Chaplin’s badge then turned to Fingers. “Fingers, reactivate Renner’s listening device while I finish returning these documents. You’ll need to replace the string and re-dust the box when I’m through. Lips, start packing up your gear. By the way, what’s going on in the lot?”
While Dante was giving directions, I began unfolding the large, transparent sheet of tracing paper I’d removed from the parchment envelope. I smoothed the delicate paper, flattening it against the table. Next to me, Eyes held a small, sophisticated camera.
“Zowee,” he said, clicking away at an illustration that was actually a hand-drawn map.
A three-page, typewritten document was also part of the discovery. On the outside chance the pictures did not turn out, I skimmed the pages, attempting to memorize every possible detail. The hurried perusal was doubly challenging as I had to leave the pages on the drawing table so that Eyes could photograph them, and I had to prevent myself from yelping over what I was reading.
The final minutes were devoted to cleanup. Once everything had been carefully replaced and the dial on the safe reset to its original reading, Dante doused the lights and opened the blinds.
Fingers took out a small whisk broom. The last of the group to leave, he walked backwards, sweeping our footprints from the carpet as if we had never been inside.
Our gear had been reloaded, the men were in the back, and Dante and I were once more settled inside the cab. Outdoors, the temperature had tumbled and air rising from the fan on the dash had fogged the windshield. It would take a few moments to clear, but we weren’t leaving right away anyway. The Kid had ordered us to stay put while he gave the section of the building we’d sprayed an all clear. Fortunately, anticipating this sort of scrutiny, we had squirted the baseboards with faux extermination chemicals, actually a harmless deodorizer.
Dante looked over. “I caught a glimpse of the map. Looked like an air raid plan. What about the attachment? Did it explain?”
I nodded. “I read it quickly, but the gist is that some nut wants to send a string of German bombers from Norway over the Great Circle Route to Canada. The map, hand drawn by the way, identifies the bombers’ eventual targets with yellow flames. All major Midwestern cities, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Milwaukee, Chicago, Cleveland, have one.”
Dante raked his fingers through his hair and sighed. “We’ve known the
Abwehr
has a master strategy for launching sabotage plots stateside in the U.S. Looks like we, no
you,
stumbled onto one of them. What else?”
Turning slightly in my seat to face him, I shared my hurried take on the rest of the document. The author wanted Hermann Goering, commander of the
Luftwaffe
, Hitler’s national Air Force, to send a fleet of transports with a crew of engineers and enough men and supplies to build a bomber base in an uninhabited section of Canadian wilderness called the Keewatin District.
The memorandum claimed that a landing field could be cleared within a few days. After the base was established another fleet, this time Heinkel bombers, would arrive. The bombers would be tuned up, refueled, and loaded with destruction ordnance before taking off for their targets along the Great Lakes, all of them sitting just over the horizon, like ducks on big ponds.
“Detroit is the scheme’s initial target,” I told him.
Dante’s expression was grave. “So it’s true. Someone is gunning to finish off what Operation Pastorius started.” He was referring to the Nazi saboteurs, dropped off by U-boats along the Atlantic seaboard, just over a year ago.
The fan had begun blowing warm air. He cranked up the defroster. The windshield cleared and we saw The Kid leave the factory and hop on his scooter. Dante shifted into first, the engine whining with the strain of its load as we took off after our escort.
I chuckled softly. “Some scheme. An air raid over Detroit. Can’t wait to hear what Renner tells you about the dimwit who dreamed it up.”
Dante’s eyebrow arched. “Hey, don’t knock it. The idea’s actually brilliant.”
“Brilliant? Har har,” I said, mockingly. “You’re joking.”
I looked at Dante. He wasn’t.
“It’s ludicrous!” I huffed. “A Nazi bomber could never get near Detroit. He’d have to get through a wall of spotters, Canadian fighter planes, American interceptors, and anti-aircraft guns. Not to mention all the logistical problems. How can you say it’s brilliant? It’s impossible!”
He might think the plot was brilliant, but he was none too happy about it. His face was grim as he peeled his gaze from the road and met mine. “It’s not impossible. Berlin’s probably the most heavily guarded city in the world right now, yet with all its defenses, the Germans can’t keep the R.A.F. from bombing it regularly. And think of Pearl Harbor. A raid like the one you just described would have the similar supreme advantage of surprise.”
He faced the windshield again. “Hitler knows an attack on Detroit that destroys a few military and industrial targets won’t bring us to our knees. But he also knows it would crush American spirit and boost German morale. Think of Doolittle’s raid over Tokyo. The attack did only minimal damage to military and industrial sites, but it brought the war home to the Japanese for the first time. It was a daring low-level daylight raid, it forced the enemy to take costly defensive measures. It was great for our country’s morale after the blow of Pearl Harbor. The invasion described in the memo could have the same impact.”
A heavy feeling shrouded me as I grasped his logic. “Point taken.”
We had left the factory. The country road we were following was dark and deserted. He eased the truck onto the shoulder and killed the engine. “I promised Connelly we’d radio in once we were clear of the factory. I can ask him to collar Chaplin. I’m also expecting an update from Jarvis. His team’s been scouring records and he was planning on interviewing Liberty’s parents a second time. Maybe there’s been word.”
He cracked the sliding window and instructed Ears to remove the two-way radio from its hiding place, then slipped outdoors to join the men in back. He left the trap door slightly ajar and I was able to catch muffled bits of conversation as he conversed on the radio.
We were on the road again a short while later. Dante announced he would be returning to headquarters immediately after dropping me off. My teammates would go with him and deliver the push dagger to the lab for testing, plus take the film to the photo lab for developing. Meanwhile, Connelly had assigned a team to Chaplin.
“What about Merriman?” I asked.
“Your instincts about someone being in disguise were right.”
Connelly had been to the Club. After questioning Merriman and the staff, he had searched the room next to mine. A uniform, identical to Merriman’s, was hidden in the closet. In a wastebasket, he found an empty bottle of shoe white, a nearly empty bottle of shoe black, and the stub of a Max Factor No. 6 blue-gray liner.
I tugged my ear, listening intently. I’d been taught to use the exact items as part of the tricks we were taught for appearing older. The blue-gray pencil was effective for accentuating facial lines and deepening eye-sockets or coloring in dark circles beneath the eyes; shoe-white, grayed down with a bit of shoeblack and applied to the hair, added years to a person’s looks.
I recalled meeting Merriman for the first time. His features were so deeply lined they’d seemed unnatural. His streaky, flyaway hair was also unusual, and I remembered thinking at one point he might be wearing a wig. Had I even been observing the real Merriman? I frowned as something in my memory bank rippled to the surface, then submerged again before I could grasp it. Finally, I shook my head slowly. “So there are two Merrimans, one of them in disguise. And if the real Merriman is not part of Renner’s ring, the other one is. Whoever he is,” I added, “there were any number of other less chancy ways he could have tried scaring me off than entering my room. Which leads me to believe he was at the Club for another purpose.”
“This Merriman-clone, whoever he is, cavalierly tossed the tools of his trade into a trash can where anyone could find them. As though he’s sending a message: he has no fear of getting caught. Conceit,” Dante added a moment later, “let’s hope it continues. We’ll nab ’em that much sooner.”
“You haven’t said anything about Liberty,” I ventured. “Any news?”
“There’s a paper trail leading clear back to Switzerland. Which means that part of the investigation will take more time. But Mrs. Leach has developed her own theory of what’s happened to her daughter.”
“Really? What?”
“Her sister in Switzerland heard through the grapevine that Liberty’s boyfriend was sent to serve in Italy. Mrs. Leach thinks Liberty found a way to join him.” His tone was cynical.
“Liberty had a boyfriend?” I was amazed.
Dante looked equally surprised. “You didn’t know?” He shook his head. “No, you couldn’t have known. You would have recognized the name, Tazio Abbado. She met him in boarding school.”
The world as I knew it had taken another 180-degree turn. I sat in stunned silence. Abbado. An enemy operative with a direct connection to the Countess and who, it would appear, was the inspiration behind Liberty’s goal to be assigned to MO in Rome.
“Mrs. Leach’s theory might sound weak,” I began slowly, “but she may be right.”
I disclosed my discovery of the secret message inside the copy of
Personality Unlimited
. I also provided a rundown of my stop at LaVue Rouge, including my shock at seeing Irina there. I sent Dante a significant glance but did not press him to explain. It could wait until later. By the time I got to my parting conversation with V-V, I had a sinking feeling in my stomach.
“Whatever Liberty is up to…” I began haltingly, “wherever she is, V-V is tangled up with her.”
His eyes flashed with something. Shock? Fear? Anger? “What are you saying?”
Reluctantly, I revealed Liberty’s plea that I continue to delay telling anyone about our meeting, about her mission, about her leaving the country. “V-V said that he’d been asked to convey the message and that the very security of Detroit, the Midwest, possibly the entire nation, rested on my keeping the secret.”
Dante’s expression was locked up, rock hard. We turned onto Michigan Avenue. Only minutes remained before we would be back at the Orange Lantern.
He might not want to talk, but I did. “We’ve assumed Tazio is an enemy agent because his name was on a picture in the Countess’ possession. Besides, pegging him as a bad guy fits with your agency’s assumption, based on her parents’ information, that he was a liberal radical of some sort. But the Countess claims she never made contact with him. And Liberty has never tried to hide the fact that she has friends in the Italian Underground. What if he’s part of a faction assisting the Allies?”
Dante didn’t scoff, but he didn’t look convinced either. “Hmm, interesting. But if she was planning on leaving the country, why was she at the Club undercover as a manicurist?”
I shrugged. “It’s what we’ve got to find out. Besides, finding a way to sneak off to be with her lover in Italy is the only bright scenario I can possibly envision right now for what might have happened to her.”
Dante smiled sympathetically. The smile faded. “Look, Pucci, right now I can’t say for sure what’s going on. But I plan on getting to the bottom of things soon as I’m back at headquarters.”
We had arrived at the tavern. He turned in to the front lot. It was late, but a smattering of cars still occupied the lot, and from the porch the orange globe above the door glowed softly. We entered the darkened area in back. Pulling up beside my Ford, Dante left the engine running.
He looked over at me. “I want you to promise me you’ll go directly back to the Club, lock your door, get some sleep. Stop fretting about your friend, about V-V, about what might be going on at that estate. We have the murder weapon, our boys are watching Renner. Trust me—everything is covered.”
I smiled. “Okay, fine.”
His smile was guarded. “In the morning, after you’ve questioned Clara, bring that book with the phantom ink message to headquarters. If what you found is a part of the puzzle, by the time you arrive we should have most of the picture laid out.”
“Can’t wait to see where it fits,” I said, climbing out. “But don’t forget I’m meeting with the Countess tomorrow, too. Won’t take long though, I expect, given I have no leverage to work with.” I pulled a face. Dante did not smile as I expected.
“Lewis, even this late in the game, whatever dirt she might have on the sisters could still make a huge difference. And remember, keep your guard up with that woman. She’s a certified pathological schemer.”