A Despicable Profession (28 page)

Trees and bushes in the median made it difficult to get a clear glim of the entry gate. I drove past and banged a U at the intersection with
Krautstraße.
That was the name of the tiny street, I swear.
Krautstraße.

I drove north, thinking this fortress was going to be one tough nut to crack. I slowed the delivery truck, crawled past the sentry booth and took a mental snapshot. Guard sleeping it off in the booth, big windows to the north inside the quad, upstairs. Shadowy figures stirring behind the glass, reveille at first light.

A one-story windowless bunker to the east.

Barred windows on the interior south side of the quad, upstairs.

A door to the immediate right of the sentry booth, set back from the courtyard. A sheltered entry point.

I drove around for a while after that, looking for a garbage truck making the rounds. I didn't see one. I circled back to
Blummenstraße
and parked the delivery truck down the block from the Armory, in a spot where I could watch the comings and goings from my side view mirror.

I did that for a good thirty seconds before I fell asleep.

A knocking on the truck window roused me. I sat up and waved at the Soviet MP who was tapping his nightstick on the glass and shaking his head. No sleeping behind the wheel in the Soviet Sector. I smiled and nodded till he drove off with his partner in a Lend-Lease jeep. Dumb place for a catnap, Schroeder.

I coaxed the delivery truck to life. There was one more stop I needed to make. The home address that Norwood gave for his Case Officer, NKVD Colonel Petrov Voynivich. I knew where the street was, had seen it when Ambrose and I first ventured into the Soviet Sector.

I found the address in short order. An imposing villa set back from the street, two miles from the Armory. The rest of the block was in bad shape but the brick turrets and ribbon windows of this turn of the century beauty were intact, as if the Red Army had spared it on purpose.

I drove by slowly, an eye peeled for sentries. When I was squared up with the villa I geared into neutral, depressed the accelerator halfway for a few seconds, then punched it to the floor as I threw the truck in first and jammed the brakes down hard.

It worked. The lurching and bucking and explosion of black smoke from the tailpipe brought a Red Army soldier out the front door and down the steps.

I got the truck rolling again and headed home. It looked like Col. Norwood had told the truth.

-----

I took the three flights of stairs to my apartment one step at a time, bag of contraband in hand. I was beat down to the ankles,
looking forward to a couple hours of shuteye before my big meeting with General Donovan. I had my key out when the door stopped me.

It didn't look right. The door was a warped old board that needed a shoulder from inside to get the latch bolt and strike plate lined up. The door wasn't open, but I could tell it wasn't latched.

I hoisted my Walther and checked the magazine. My sharpshooting display at Col. Norwood's had left me with only three rounds. I got my breathing slowed down and reminded myself that the CO had a key to the place. It wouldn't do to storm in and lay waste to Victor Jacobson and General William Donovan.

But that was stupid. The CO wouldn't bring Donovan to my crummy digs. And he wouldn't come himself with Donovan due in. There was someone else inside my apartment.

I listened at the door jamb, heard a familiar sound and knew instantly who that someone was. I pushed the door open and saw Sean and Patrick Mooney, both sporting scraggly beards.

Sean looked up from the book he was reading and said, “You can put up the gun.”

Patrick continued his signature snore on the musty couch, two quick snorts followed by a long ragged inhale, like a chainsaw biting through a knothole. I put up my gun.

“Well now, where have I seen this happy scene before?” I said, referring to the time the Mooney Brothers lock-picked their way into my room at Mrs. Brennan's rooming house.

“Where's Ambrose?” said Sean, tartly.

His brother awoke with a snort, hearing his cue. They were a regular Abbott and Costello, these two. I turned away, put my shoulder to the door and latched it, then turned back to face the music.

“Our mum had her fiftieth birthday last week,” said Sean. He was the middle brother, compact, dark-haired.

“Ambey didn't send a card or a telegram,” yawned Patrick, the baby brother, freckled and gangly.

“He wouldn't do that,” said Sean.

“Not at tall,” said Patrick.

“Which is why we're here.”

“'Tis.”

A wave of exhaustion washed over me, exhaustion so complete that Sean and Patrick seemed to blur around the edges. But I couldn't very well excuse myself and hit the hay, anymore than I could explain to the Mooney boys what had happened to their big brother. Not yet anyway. I needed a minute.

“You hungry? Thirsty? Want to wash up?”

“We'll take a drink of whiskey,” said young Patrick amiably.

“And an explanation,” said Sean, less so.

“I don't have any whiskey,” I said while removing the bottle that I had filched from Col. Norwood. “But I do have a jug of vintage Port. It's thick as blood.”

“We're wantin' a drink,” said Patrick.

“Not Holy Communion,” said Sean.

I went to the kitchen and uncorked the bottle anyway, grabbed three glasses. The sudden appearance of the Mooney boys was perfect. I would have a backup and a lookout going in. We could get right to work on a plan to rescue Ambrose. Everything was jake. Just as soon as I told the boys that their beloved brother had been snatched by the Soviet secret police and imprisoned in a reinforced concrete dungeon.

I returned with the bottle of Port and three plastic juice glasses, set them down on the low lacquered coffee table and made a joke which the young hooligans found amusing.

“How did you get in?”

I poured myself a full glass and crooked an eyebrow. Patrick looked to Sean, who nodded. I poured two more. “How'd you know where to find me?”

“You and Ambrose, you mean,” said Sean.

“Ambrose sent us a letter,” said Patrick.

I offered a toast. “Welcome to Berlin. Your timing is impeccable.”

We drank, kept silent and drank some more.

Then I told them all that had happened. I told them where their brother was being held and didn't mince words about how tough it would be to bust him loose. They took it stoically, bless ‘em.

“The good news is we've got some help. General William Donovan arrives today.”

“Himself? The Fightin' Harp?” said Patrick, eyes wide.

I nodded.

“Bloody hell,” said Sean.

Wild Bill was a Hibernian legend from way back. He won the Medal of Honor commanding New York's heavily-Irish 69
^th
Regiment in World War I.

I didn't mention that I might be on the legend's shit list after he learned about Col. Norwood, or that Ambrose Mooney would be last on Donovan's list of concerns if he made the list at all. I couldn't give them the big picture. But I did tell them I would free Ambrose or die trying.

“With your help.”

They drained their glasses of red wine and made the sign of the cross. I smiled at their youthful courage. And thought about their mother.

I had spoken to her once in Cleveland, when I telephoned for Ambrose. She hadn't been pleased to hear from me. And now here I was again, about to kill off her own three sons. I had to do what I had to do but I didn't need both Sean and Patrick to do it. I needed a lookout, but a backup was...well, it would be nice to have as I prowled the corridors of the Armory but I was a seasoned espionage agent with eyes in the back of my head.

I could spare one of them, Sean or Patrick. I could do Mrs. Mooney that small miserable favor.

The boys wouldn't part easily, and calling to mind their sainted mother praying for their safe return would only tick ‘em off. So I tried another approach.

“We'll need to get some more L pills before we mount this operation. I've only got one.”

“What's that?” said Sean.

“An L pill?” said Patrick.

“Cyanide. L for lethal. We spies keep them handy in case we're captured. And tortured. The Russians have a guy named Beria who's pretty good at it.”

I poured more wine and waited to see how this went over.

“An operation is it?” said Sean.

“Bloody impressive,” said Patrick.

“And I don't see where any L pills are necessary,” said Sean. “If Patrick's captured I'll shoot him dead.”

“And if Sean's caught I'll do the same.”

I said a silent apology to Mrs. Mooney. There would be no separating Sean and Patrick. I shoved onto the couch next to Patrick, planted my feet on the lacquered table, put my chin to my chest and dozed.

I woke up a minute later. Beards. Sean and Patrick had scruffy beards that made them look like anarchists.

“If you gentlemen expect an audience with Wild Bill Donovan you will have to go to the sink and make yourselves presentable.”

Sean sat up with some alarm. “You mean shave?”

“I do.”

Sean and Patrick groaned as one.

“Bill Donovan is a military man, first and foremost,” I said to the Mooney boys the following morning after we were all showered and shorn and dressed to kill.

I was surprised to see that they came equipped with brass buttoned Navy blue blazers and silk ties till I remembered that they were wealthy young gentlemen now, courtesy of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland. Well turned out they were, save for the plugs of toilet paper pasted to their shaving cuts. I understood why they had grown the chin spinach. Without it they looked fourteen years old.

“Military bearing in his presence at all times. Shoulders back, chin down.”

I demonstrated. The Mooney boys mirrored me.

“Do not speak unless spoken to, and always use sir. Got it?”

“Yes sir!”

-----

We drove south to Dahlem, the traffic light, the weather mild, almost warm. Sean and Patrick were keyed up, chattering like schoolgirls. I was glad to have them on board. My free lancing days were over. I would have to tell General Donovan of my hare-brained scheme to rescue Ambrose from the Armory, somehow convince him to give his blessing. Having two proud sons of the Old Sod arrayed behind me couldn't hurt.

When we arrived at the white brick mansion in Dahlem the redheaded receptionist told me General Donovan had issued ‘a change of plans.' The meet was now taking place twenty kilometers south in the town of Babelsberg, just east of Potsdam. She gave me a bright smile and typewritten directions.

“Is this a snub?” I asked. “To the CO?”

She answered by way of gazing at the elderly bartender and the
frau
in a peasant blouse standing around the parlor with no one to serve. The boys and I washed down some finger sandwiches with a glass of champagne and returned to the delivery truck.

I drove southwest as instructed, wondering how I was going to brief the CO about Col. Norwood while in the presence of Bill Donovan.

Victor Jacobson would be on thin ice. He had presided over the brutal destruction of our White Russian network at the hand of his trusted new hire, Leonid Vitinov. I owed Jacobson the courtesy of a private heads up so he could determine what to tell Donovan about Norwood, and when.

We jounced southwest to Babelsberg on cratered roads. The countryside was thickly wooded and lushly green. I turned due west at
Grossbeerenstraße,
Big Berry Road. We passed an enormous bomb-damaged complex of buildings big as airplane hangars, though no airstrip was visible. The road swung north.

I turned right at the park as instructed, drove quiet streets lined with Hansel and Gretel cottages until I found what I was looking for. An 18
^th
Century peak-roofed stucco villa with a circular drive and a four-pillared portico that looked out on a very wide river or a very narrow lake. An MP wearing button-up white leggings stood guard on the front steps.

Sean and Patrick fell silent as I pulled up the drive and parked the truck at the base of the stone steps. The MP saluted. We were expected.

I was anyway. The MP got jinky when he saw the Mooney boys spill out of the truck. He checked his clipboard. They weren't on it. I told the MP that the gentlemen were with me.

Didn't matter. They weren't on his list. “Back in the truck, gentlemen,” I said, climbing the steps. “I'll be back in no time.”

Sean and Patrick climbed back in the truck like kids sent to their rooms on Christmas morn. I crossed under the pillared
portico and pushed the doorbell. It chimed a dolorous tune, I felt a chill. There was something creepy about this old place. I saw a dark shadow behind the opaque glass panels of the double doors. Who was this now, Boris Karloff?

Just a stooped housekeeper with a toucan beak and angry black eyes. She bustled off before I could say a word.

I stepped inside, saw a very formal living room directly off the entry hall, and a big dining room to the right. To the left, a long wide carpeted corridor that ran along the outer wall of the house. All the rooms off the corridor faced the back of the property. Security precaution maybe.

I found the CO down that corridor, sitting outside the door to an office, lost in thought. The door to the office was closed. I told him the Mooney brothers had arrived unexpectedly.

“What do they want?”

“Their brother.”

“Shit.”

“It's okay sir. They're capable, they'll do as they're told.”

“You're sure?”

“One hundred percent.”

I told him they were awaiting permission to enter the premises. We went outside. I introduced Sean and Patrick. Jacobson shook their hands. “Welcome to The Little White House.”