Keeping Secrets (43 page)

Even that brief exchange didn't seem of any importance, except in terms of my growing curiosity about the whole group of people who lived at Beauregard and Washington. Otherwise, we still were gathering almost nothing in the way of information about Tetzel. His conversations with Cabot centered mostly around the difficult situation faced by all mine owners in Mexico at the time, wondering what Carranza would finally decide on as his policy for governing foreign investors, wondering what would become of the increasingly hot situation with Pancho Villa. He'd been terrorizing the countryside in all directions since the night he raided Columbus, New Mexico, bringing on the punitive expedition under General Pershing across the border. Villa was no man's friend now, with the exception of the Yaqui Indian and his ever-decreasing band of raiders. If it was Germany's intention to finance trouble below the border that would suck us into a hole, and keep us too occupied to bother them in their own war, you couldn't prove it by Tetzel. And the queer fact was that we were convinced he participated very actively in what was going on.

The slow pace gave me a chance to accept invitations from Keith, yet all he talked about was the work of the aeronauts in Mexico. Half our time together was spent around Fort Sam, watching the testing and dismantling of the planes that were destined for use on scouting missions down there. He would have given the clothes off his back to be among the eighty men of the first squadron sent below the border, although he predicted before they left that the planes weren't going to be strong enough in lift capacity to be useful in the mountainous terrain, and nodded in wisdom when returning aeroscouts reported they almost lost their necks. He was more approving of the planes sent later, but still itching to be down there himself.

“Can you imagine, Camille, they're the ones who found Villa being carried around on a litter. I tell you, one aeroscout can do the work of a hundred foot soldiers.”

“Yes; now if they could just guess whether he's alive or dead, we'd really have something.”

“I didn't say they were wizards. Boy, for two cents I'd quit school and join the reserves. As much as I've studied about flying, I know I'd be a natural up there.”

“No doubt about it,” I told him, in all seriousness.

Then he paused and became thoughtful. “I know you think I'm silly sometimes, Camille, but it's important for a guy to think about how he's going to make his mark in the world. I get so tired of just being the second Butler son who helps out at the grocery store. I want to be where the action is, and I want to see it from the air. That's where the real power is.”

“Doesn't seem to be much we can do from the ground,” I admitted.

17

At last, in early summer of 1916, results of our efforts began to come through. Edwin set up a meeting one Sunday afternoon at the Navarro Street bridge.

“Cabot's money is tied up in saloons down in the red-light district,” he said. “We know now he has been trying to sell out at a good price.”

“But failing.”

“That isn't all. He's dealing now with some real pros, an eastern syndicate. Those guys would as soon kill you as look at you—we've got an agent who knew something about them before the war—and it's a cinch Cabot is desperate. Tell you another thing. Those guys deal strictly in cash.”

“Hm … that would mean he could bypass paying income tax on the sale, wouldn't it?”

“Right.”

I thought that over for a few moments, then asked, “Is all this money he's trying to make going toward Barrista's rise to power?”

“We think a lot of it is. Financing Barrista, plus buying all the good properties he can get his hands on down there, must add up to a small fortune.”

“And if Barrista fails, his properties won't be worth any more than his saloons … maybe less.”

“I have some news about Tetzel, too. Now we know why he has suddenly become very idle. Since the border has become such a hot spot, with Pershing down there, the Germans have been getting arms into Mexico another way. They're pulling into coastal ports, aboard free-lance oil tankers.”

“Still going to Pancho Villa?”

“Yes. But from what we can learn, von Eckhardt, the German ambassador in Mexico City, is handling it. For the moment Tetzel is sitting tight. For a while we thought he was at work on sabotage of Russian arms, but—”

“Russian arms?”

“German money is helping finance the revolution in Russia. We've found out lately that munitions made in this country consigned to the Tsarist field forces are being switched out at the factory for scrap iron. Now and then a box of ammo is mislabeled, with the wrong caliber, so that when it arrives in the field, it doesn't fit the guns.”

“Oh, that's really dirty … but Tetzel isn't involved in that, is he?”

“No. We think that Tetzel is working directly with the German Foreign Office on something highly secret. It doesn't appear anyone else is in on it, and that explains why the memos to Francke in New York have stopped. He's probably wiring information back and forth, probably coded.”

“But I thought the British cut the cables at the beginning of the war.”

“They did, but not through Holland. He could wire messages from here through the Dutch cable, and if they were carefully coded they'd go right past and into Germany.

“Our electrical wizard could be brought down to tap a telephone wire into Tetzel's office, but just now he's busy on other projects.”

“Sometimes I feel as though we're the orphans of the BNA.”

“Between the Bohemian National Alliance and the Slovak League, we have around three hundred and twenty thousand people. Do you know how that compares to the German espionage system? They have around three million sympathizers.”

“Golly … I guess we're spread pretty thin.”

“You get the picture.”

“Well … how about one person—a spy in the telegraph office here?”

“We've already tried that. It's tighter than a cork on a bottle of vintage wine.”

“Anything turned up on Aegina Barrista?”

“Not yet. Have you got anything more on Electra Cabot?”

“No. I really don't think she's into anything, do you?”

“It's possible, because we haven't been able to trace anything on her in Colorado. For all we know she could have come out of any crack. I think the Dexter name was a fake. Why don't you try to get with her again, find out a maiden name if you can?”

“All right,” I said petulantly. I wished we could leave her and Cabot and Nathan Hope alone. Whatever their personal motives, it was my guess they were being used by Tetzel. Shortly after, however, I was in for a number of surprises.

One day in July while I was out on a banking errand, I glanced toward the post office to see Electra hurrying out the door, gripping a letter which she soon began tearing to shreds as she descended the stairs, obviously in a huff. I stared at her in wonder as she reached the bottom stair, looked both ways, and drove a fistful of paper fragments down into her handbag. Next she turned in the direction of her home and it was then I got a good view of her face. I had never seen her look so distressed. Even her normal gait had changed from one of grace to a quick, animal stalk. I stood there for a while, wishing there were some way I could have a look at the letter she picked up. I felt it would tell us an awful lot.

When I reported the incident to Edwin, he could make nothing of it, but encouraged me to keep watching her. Later in the month I managed to chat with her when by coincidence we met at the train station. She may have been a little nervous, but otherwise seemed her normal self. She'd come with a group to meet the influx of soldiers being moved to Fort Sam and Camp Wilson and offer them refreshment. I was there awaiting Mother's arrival for a short visit. During a temporary lull I sidled over and began with lines designed to lead her into a trap. We spoke of Lyla Stuttgart, who sat in a corner looking ill. “Funny name, Stuttgart, some German city, isn't it? Wonder what her name was before.”

“I don't know,” said Electra.

“Mother and I get into conversations sometimes about the fact a woman gives up her name when she marries, often to something far less pleasant. Seems unfair, don't you think? I sort of like my name now … I hope I marry a man with an equally distinguished name.”

She laughed, and shook her head. Oh, how easy it was to play the game of silly young maiden girl to my advantage. “Well, you can laugh,” I said. “Look what you wound up with. Cabot. That's a strong, powerful name.”

“Well it certainly beats Weems,” she said, then closed her mouth abruptly. Now almost an expert at diverting conversations, I was speaking of something across the station even as I noted her sudden silence. I wanted her to believe I hadn't really been paying attention to her last remark, and I am fairly certain she did. Since we had never disproven she was once married to a man named Dexter, I assumed Weems was her maiden name. However, I realized as she walked away the name might be spelled any number of ways.…

I stood around for a while, keeping an eye out for Mother and now and then glancing toward Electra's group, still busy serving the soldiers. How simple life used to be, I thought. It seemed as though now we all existed in layers. Before I got mixed up with the BNA, I was always candid and forthright, living on the first layer and assuming everyone I knew lived the same, at least to a reasonable degree.

If not for that day Michael Stobalt knocked on Mother's door, I would have an important job as the secretary to a bank owner named Adolph Tetzel, not knowing he was anything other than what he appeared to be on the outside—a hardworking, prosperous businessman, inclined to be generous toward me in return for my capabilities, my sincere eagerness to serve him, and my loyalty.

I would probably be acquainted with both Electra and Emory Cabot somewhat by now, believing them to be nothing more than an extraordinary couple with money, good looks, a place in society—all things normally to be admired if not envied. I might even have chanced to be courted once or twice by their quiet and modest employee Nathan Hope.

I would know nothing of the layer just beneath the surface of the lives of all these people that was built of betrayal, secrecy, hidden motives.… And I'd be awaiting my mother today, believing that the life I'd made for myself in this city would go on until I decided to change it, for some normal, everyday reason. Watching Electra smile and hand out cups of beverage like any young matron anxious to aid a good cause, I could almost imagine that if I wished hard enough and shut my eyes, there might be but one layer after all, and everything underneath that would be the product of a bad dream from which I would soon awaken.

When Mother got off her train, I found the sight of her cheery face unusually refreshing. She'd been in Missouri for a meeting, and was curtailing all other activity until September, when she had to be in Atlantic City. In between, she'd manage a visit with each of us kids. We went directly to my apartment, and sat down to talk.

Right away she observed me carefully and concluded, “You look a little tired, and definitely thinner.”

“You're looking a little tired yourself.”

“But not any thinner. I go to too many luncheons,” she said with a laugh, then paused before continuing. “Something's bothering you very much, isn't it? I can always tell. You're less bubbly.”

“It's only that … well … I went into this thing believing people were either all bad or all good. I'm beginning to see it isn't quite so simple.”

“That's a good lesson to learn, my dear, though sometimes a hard one.”

“We keep digging away. Some of the people we're working on are not going to prove to be involved in anything wrong—at least too wrong, anyway, I don't think—and somehow it makes me feel bad. Dirty, underhanded. Yet I have to admit that when I'm sniffing someone out, my curiosity is pitiless. Sometimes I despise myself.…”

“I wonder if I didn't do you a terrible injustice by introducing you to that group,” she said.

“I've been giving some thought to that myself. Remember, I was going to prove Tetzel was a knight in shining armor.”

“Instead you keep finding more tarnish.”

“Yes. But you know, I still find I can't dislike him, or even fear him. I've never admitted that to my contact here, but it's the truth. Funny, isn't it.”

She smoothed the hair back from my forehead and said, “You're growing up, honey,” then she took me in her arms and we held each other for a long time. I wonder if she could ever imagine what those moments between us meant to me, how much support I felt in her embrace. Certainly it was a gesture that helped to bolster me through the next few crucial months.

One afternoon in mid-August I returned from an errand to hear Cabot's voice in Tetzel's office. I rushed to the storeroom, turned on the machine just in case, and put my ear to the wall. Cabot was incensed. Barrista had backed out altogether.

“He's got no more sense than that fool Madero,” he told Tetzel, who listened silently. “He thinks Carranza will be reasonable enough that in time he can get a cabinet seat, then when his turn comes around, he can run for President. He wants to drop the Plan de Pacifica Reforma altogether.”

“Perhaps you push too hard; give him time.”

“He's had too much time. He has been listening to his brothers—especially Carlos—who never wanted into this thing anyway. I've been marooned up here with no control over what was going on.

“It looks like we're finished. I'll have to pay you back the notes as best I can.”

“Slow down a bit. If you aren't one of the most impetuous men I have ever known. Don't we both know how hungry Carranza is for power? He did not hang on this long with any idea of letting go easily. Let me see what I can do about bringing about the truth a little early. Leave it to me, eh?”