Original Copy
The Case in Progress
Berlin lay in ruins. Thick, burnt air choked the streets; bodies rotting under tons of rubble.
Opposing forces marched in from the East and the West, filling the void left by the German defeat.
The brilliant were hunted. Cataloged. Coerced into service by the United States, or forcibly taken by the Soviets.
Uncounted others slipped the gallows’ noose. Compatriots negotiated with sympathetic governments outside of Europe for shelter. They offered the first fruits of a new world order and were given sanctuary. A place where they could peel humanity from bone.
A decade later, the brewing tempest found cracks in its containment. An evil weeping that refused to die.
CH 1 – Berlin’s Ghost
“Our experiment with races failed, but drastic measures must be taken to combat human excesses. Humans must make a decision on how to survive in modern times. Since eugenics has not succeeded in the short run, we must find another equally radical solution.”
—attributed to Andreas, the fictionalized alter ego of Josef Mengele,
The Sentimental Memoirs of the Angel of Death (unpublished manuscript, c. 1960s)
Los Angeles July 18,1954
The hurricane’s remains wrapped the city like a wet dog’s matted coat; steam curled from the storm drain beside the body. The detective flicked his cigarette stub into a puddle that shimmered with oily reflections of streetlights. The frayed edges of his trench coat brushed the cracked pavement as he crouched over the body.
He looked up at the young officer. “It’s good the dead don’t mind waiting.” The coroner was late. No surprise.
But this stiff was different.
A pale lifeless face, untouched by time or fatigue, like it was sculpted. No scars. No wrinkles. Not even a nick from a shaving mishap. Just smooth, flawless skin, stretched too tight.
He snapped his Zippo shut, blew smoke over the rookie’s head. “Third one of these this year.”
The rookie shuffled, flipping his note pad open without looking up. “No wallet, no papers of any kind,” his voice barely above a whisper.
Scanning the sidewalk, he nodded. “Nope. Just like the other two. No history. No family. A body that shouldn’t exist.”
He pulled back the stiff’s collar, revealing a small, almost invisible puncture at the base of the neck.
“You ever seen needle marks in a place like that?”
The rookie leaned in, squinting. “No, sir.”
“Didn’t think so. Notice anything else?”
The detective stood, observing the young officer.
“Yes, sir. Clothes are nearly dry, underneath is wet. He hasn’t been here long.”
“Kind of like…” Glancing up at the lit windows of the apartments above them, “… someone wanted us to find it sooner than later.”
As the stretcher crew rolled up, he motioned one of them over. “Straight to Larchmont’s table tonight, no detours. Make sure you leave it with him, no one else.”
The medic nodded. “You got it, Jack.”
He turned to the beat cops. “More rain’s coming. Search the alley. Don’t let any evidence wash into the sewer.”
“What are we looking for?”
His eyes sharp from years of scouring crime scenes.
“Anything that doesn’t belong.”
Thunder rumbled in the distance, echoing off the steel and concrete of the city’s bones. He watched as they loaded the body onto a stretcher—its limbs too rigid, too precise.
Except for being dead. Too perfect.
The ambulance doors slammed shut. Detective Jack Deckard pulled his brim down low and thumbed his collar up. His shoes scuffed the asphalt as he headed to his car. Tonight wasn’t just another night. Something old was wearing a new face. A ghost worse than all of the mobbed-up riff-raff between L.A. and New York. At least a mobster knew his place.
Three bodies too much alike.
This was more than flesh and blood.
Looking up into the dreary night as he slid behind the wheel, he muttered to himself, “No amount of rain is going to wash away this stain, not now, not ever.”
A figure crossed a distant streetlamp, its shadow knifing across Jack’s side mirror. His spine chilled. A vision of L.A. shattered into ruins. Berlin stalked him with its snapping jaws, reminding him. In the darkness, you have no friends.
He’d kept the memories of Berlin buried. He was there in ’45 when Soviets swarmed the city like locusts. He’d seen things then, things that didn’t make sense. Men with blank eyes and pale skin discarded like broken mannequins. No identification. Puncture marks at the base of their skulls. Easy enough to chalk it up to the horrors of war, one more unexplainable atrocity in a city drowning in them.
Now it was back. Those same wounds. That same lifeless perfection.
His knuckles tight on the wheel. There was only one man who’d been there with him, who’d seen what he’d seen: Donovan Earle, the spook with too many secrets and a drinking problem bad enough to drown the both of them. If anyone could have answers, it’d be him.
Jack twisted the wheel and slung a wet U-turn. He needed a phone. Needed Earle. Before the coroner carved up that body and turned it into just another footnote in L.A.’s endless ledger of the dead.
In the phone booth, the bell stabbed the night as each coin dropped. Jack cursed, fumbling for his notebook. Donovan Earle: notoriously hard to reach sober, impossible drunk. Last known abode, Chateau Marmont. The war cut Donovan deeper than most. The Marmont, it was his refuge, intact, like a piece of France preserved.
The savagery they’d seen while plotting their way from Lyon to Berlin broke many good men. Berlin nearly killed Earle—not just his body, but his mind as well.
Ring…
Ring…
A voice cackled through the receiver, could’ve been a hello, but Jack couldn’t be sure.
“Operator, connect me with Donovan Earle’s room, please.”
Ring…
Four more. Then the operator. “Mr. Earle isn’t answering.
Would you like to leave a message?”
He exhaled a plume of smoke. “No, no thank you.” He didn’t want Earle to rabbit out of there before he spoke to him.
Jack thumb punched more coins into the phone.
“Larchmont? Jack. Yeah… Who else? Do me a favor and keep tonight’s deposit on ice.”
“…No. That won’t be necessary. Just don’t slice him up. I need forty-eight hours. Thanks, I may actually owe you this time.”
Pulling his coat tight, he half-dashed to his car, ducking as if the mist could punch. He yanked the door open, sliding behind the wheel with Earle on his mind. He fired up the car and headed toward Chateau Marmont.
CH 2 – Donovan Earle
Jack eased off the accelerator as he turned off Sunset Boulevard, coasting smooth to a stop in the parking garage. Handing the keys to the valet, he took in the ivory edifice looming above him. Flanked by towering Mexican fan palms and slender Lombardy poplars, the Chateau Marmont stood as a beacon of bygone elegance—like a weary aged monarch.
It was easy to see why Earle had been drawn here. He was the moth; this was his flame. His refuge, where he could drink with his ghosts and pray the dark secrets they guarded would seep away by dawn. Up the hill from the Marmont proper, he sat in the dark of his cottage. Out the window, the city’s glow bounced soft off the clouded sky, lighting the courtyard. His drinking had worsened these last few weeks. New rumors of old brutalities grated his memories raw. They begged him to relive the past and robbed him of his appetite.
Jack picked his path up the walkway towards the cottages, damp enough to be miserable. Carla Reyes manned the night desk, a sharp-tongued raven-haired dame who owed him a solid for some pro-bono relocation of a rotten-to-the-core ex-husband. She gave up Earle’s room a little too eagerly. Pausing beneath the foliage, he listened for something, anything. Maybe Carla owed Earle more than she owed him, or maybe Earle finally had one drink too many. Either way, he waited.
Swirling the lone ice cube in his glass, Donovan watched the whiskey spin like water down a drain. He let the maelstrom settle, then, tilted the glass, felt the burn pass between his lips.
“How long have you known?” The whisper came through the window. Donovan jerked, looking towards the sound, sputtering a cough. In one motion, he let the glass fall, palming his revolver.
Earle barked a whisper, “Deckard!? Is that you?”
“Anyone else you know willing to help you waste your swill?”
Donovan yanked the door open and waved for Jack to come inside. “Get in here, Jack. Damn it—you’re a sight for sore eyes.” He shut and latched the door, “Three, maybe four months. How many have you come across?”
“Two confirmed. Third one tonight. Same story. Just like Berlin.”
Donovan shoved a glass into Jack’s hand, poured two heavy shots. “Cheers.”
“Not just L.A., Jack. Chicago and New York also. Could be worse than Berlin. We don’t know where those twisted German minds landed unless Uncle Sam made ‘em build rocket ships. The doctors, the real evil, are out there in the shadows.”
He held the bottle out for Jack. “Another?”
“Sure.”
“They could be here, maybe working in some Soviet lab. I’ve heard Brazil. No matter where, they’re doing the devil’s work.”
“Jack, I got a telegram from Cuthbert. She’s in France again, setting up networks across Europe for when the Soviets decide to infect Western Europe with their special brand of Red Mange.” Donovan leaned in close, “She’s got people around the globe, searching. She has everything we gathered from Berlin. She knows more than she will say, at least by telegram.”
Jack leaned back in his chair, remembering Virginia Hall. A smile eased his hard features as he remembered the one time they let their guards down over dinner. Her wooden leg had a name—Cuthbert. It was really only half of a leg, a necessity after she wounded herself in a hunting accident. She and that leg were one and the same to anyone that knew her. She was the most formidable of OSS agents, supporting untold operatives throughout France and building a network for downed Allied airmen. So many owed her, maybe they were paying her back from the deepest shadows across the globe.
“We need to know more. I need to know more. What are we looking for, a lab, university medical research? Are we looking at our own people? Too many unknowns. Can you get word back to her?”
Donovan exhaled the weight of the world, then sucked in the last drops of his drink. Momentarily peering at Jack through the bottom of the glass, he said, “It will take a day. You know her, she trusts only a few. There is…a Belgian I know. He can get her attention. Gather everything you have, I will send word. Book a room at the Roosevelt two nights from now. Use your old name. I will find you.”
Jack caught the weariness in his old friend’s face as he dragged his coat up across his back, wondering if he’d ever see him again, “Two days.”
The booze throbbed between his ears, hammering his soul as he slipped into the night.
CH 3 – Dead Dreams
The ragged edges of Jack’s memory wrestled with his fatigue, tossing him about the bed in a losing battle for sleep. His mind teemed with porcelain-faced dead, juggling their own heads reanimated, spinning and mocking with winks and sickly sweet kisses.
The ringing phone drilled into Jack’s dream, waking him with a wide-mouthed sucking gasp. Reaching through the blinding sunlight, he knocked the receiver off the hook, sending it clattering to the floor. It sprang erratically as Jack yanked the curly cord, bouncing by his head like a hammer on a loose spring, barely missing his face.
Jack recognized the tiny voice scratching its way out of the phone as he finished wrangling the bouncing receiver, “Jack, hello, Jack. What the heck, Hellooooo!!!”
“Silas, what gives with this obscenely early phone call?”
“It’s not early, Jack. Its 11 AM. I need you down here in one hour”
“I’ll be there in thirty.” Silas hadn’t even waited to hang up. Not unusual for the most direct person in all of LA County.
Silas Larchmont had been cutting up bodies so long that he sometimes forgot the living can talk.
The bags under Jack’s eyes were softer than he felt. After washing his head in the bathroom sink and running his fingers through his hair like a fat comb, he hurriedly dressed in the cleanest clothes he could find, drank a cold cup of leftover coffee and left.
The morning sun had beat down on his car turning it into a four-door broiler. Hot plastic seats and a ring of fire for a steering wheel. He was sure his hands suffered second-degree burns before he could reach the speed limit.
CH 4 – Sliced and Diced
Jack found his way down to the basement morgue of LA County General and spotted Dr. Silas Larchmont pacing in the hallway outside his office.
Silas looked up. “I said an hour.”
“I said thirty. If you hadn’t hung up like a housewife slamming the phone on her husband, you might’ve caught that. What’s your hurry? Someone wake up on the wrong side of the table?”
“No, nothing like that. I said I would wait to do this autopsy. Can’t do it Jack. I’m getting pressured from above, and they’re getting pressured by someone else. They weren’t thrilled that the first two bodies were transferred.”
Jack followed him into his office and leaned against the doorjamb, “What’s the big deal about that? I thought the unclaimed went to Boot Hill or cutting practice at some low-rent university?”
“This is LA County, Jack. Bodies go to the highest bidder.”
“Highest bidder? Who’s had the top dollar this time?”
Silas rifled through stacks of notes, “Second body, I don’t know. When I got back from vacation, it was gone. First one? Autopsy was February 13. I sent the heart to the National Heart Institute. They didn’t ask for it—I just figured, hell, it was so pristine I made it my Valentine’s gift to them. Not even a ‘Thank You’ card, I guess they won’t be on my Christmas list this year.
“Were you born this twisted Silas, or did an endless line of stiffs finally punch a hole through your sense of decency?”
Flipping through the stained manila file on one of the endless piles, Silas muttered through a half-smile: “Just as God made me, Jack. Just as God made me.”
“Anyway, the rest of that body... here we go. Standridge Research Institute, Chicago. February invoice. I remember the call. A weird one for sure. Said they were looking for ‘peculiar anomalies.’ Wouldn’t define what that meant. I think they rang me back in January. They sent three fellows in suits to take possession of the body. One did all the talking, the other two, neck-down types.”
“Neck down?”
“Yeah, you know, not much gray matter upstairs. Brains off, follows-orders sort. At least that’s how they struck me. But what do I know? They weren’t dead, never got to pop the hood.”
“Remind me never to nap around you.”
“Noted.” Silas leaned in, “You got secrets upstairs you don’t want out?”
“You ever get a date to stay for desert?”
Silas snorted a sharp laugh. “Smartass.”
“Anyway. Why wouldn’t they want you to pack it in ice and stick it on a train or a plane for Chicago?”
“Normally I would send it to a funeral home for embalming. They’d box it up and put it on a train. Maybe Standridge just wanted to save a buck and decided to skip the embalming. Like I said. Weird.”
Jack wanted to laugh. If Silas thought it was strange, it had to be the kind of oddity that would curl the toes of average Joes.
“Did you get a look at the car?”
Silas’s frustration boiled over. “What is this, twenty questions? I called you because I’m getting pressured. The feds are gonna pick the body up at 5PM, if we are gonna get some information, I got to start now, I had all day, but now, I don’t have enough time to get it all done. I hope you’re ready, any more delays and there will be more questions than I have answers.” Pushing through the doors to the morgue, Silas’s voice reverberated against the block walls. “There’s a lab coat in the closet and some goggles. And No! I didn’t see the car, didn’t have time for that, two murders the night before kept me busy”
Deckard donned the lab coat and goggles from the cabinet. He eased through the doors as if the dead could be woken. The antiseptic smell burned his nose. Too clean. On the center cadaver table, naked but for a toe tag, the body lay under the harsh surgical light, serene, unnaturally symmetrical. Perfect. As if dumped from a mold.
Holding the microphone close, Silas pressed a button spinning the twin reels on the Dictaphone.“Coroner’s Office, Los Angeles County. Case file John Doe number six, July 19th, 1954 11:45 AM. Subject: unidentified male, approximately thirty-five years of age. No apparent cause of death.”
Silas hung the microphone on a hook hanging from the exam light, “Victim is five feet eight inches, weighing 163 pounds, and has blue eyes. Skin is pristine, without freckles or blemishes, not so much as a callous on any digit. No facial hair. Of note, a small puncture wound at the base of the skull, looks to be in the range of a 22 gauge hypodermic needle.” Returning John Doe #6 onto his back, from his rolling cart, he grabbed a syringe and drew nearly a pint of blood, “Jack, we need to do some tests on this body, it just doesn’t look right.”
He took his reverent time, the knife slicing silent from the collarbone to the breastbone—first the left, then the right—completing the Y incision from the breastbone to his belly button, exhaling as he pulled the knife from the body. It took him many years to come to terms with the organized mutilating nature of his work. The moment before the first cut, to the final indignity. He saw no point in rushing through any of it.
“The skin cuts normal but has a resilient feel to the surface similar to John Doe #1 & #4. Skin seems to be from a much younger person than the age required to grow to this size body.” Silas scribbled something on a pad pulled from his coat pocket. Stuffing the pad back into a pocket.
“Jack, be a doll and hand me that little circular saw, and plug it in please. This is where it gets a little messy. You may want to stand back”
Silas plunged the saw into John Doe’s sternum, churning up fine pieces of cartilage and bone into mist, the high speed whine lowering in pitch, then speeding up as it broke through each bit of hardness in the chest. Removing the front of the rib cage, Silas freed the lungs and heart, weighed each and set them aside on a tray. He emptied the contents of the stomach into a large beaker, weighed and noted the recognizable contents.
“I wish I had some onions Jack, this liver looks perfect”
“Just stop it, you’re more twisted than a mountain road. What’s so good about that liver?”
“That’s just it—perfect. Go to that cold storage unit and bring me box marked JD#2”
“You mean the refrigerator?” Jack strode to the fridge, opened it and found the box next to a lunch. Jack looked over his shoulder and then back at the box and the lunch, shook his head and grabbed the box.
“Hand me the bag that says ‘JD#2 LIVER’.”
Jack retrieved the liver and put it on the scale.
“See that! Within two ounces of the one I just removed, and look, damn near identical.”
“What do you make of that? Nearly identical isn’t actually identical.”
“Livers aren’t like fingerprints, but no two are ever this close — unless they were from twins raised on oatmeal and Holy Water. I can safely say these two people, never smoked, never consumed alcohol even in moderation. You want to know what’s worse? I’ll tell you. Overreaching feds grabbing the body before I can finish. Cutting up a body is only half the fun; I get paid to make sense of it, and this advanced timeline isn’t conducive to business as usual. Yesterday I got ready for this possibility. There is another box of innards in the cold storage unit, behind my lunch. Grab that, we are taking all of the organs we can get out of Johnny here and put these in from a automobile wreck last week. Heart attack at the wheel, tragic, just not criminal. Similar sized individuals. Once the Feds get this body, it will never be seen again. Oh they will claim they are going to do a ‘full set of advanced diagnostic tests’, whatever the heck that means. We will get a poorly fabricated report stating unequivocally, “death by natural causes.” Hiding the truth, Jack, that’s not their game, they’re gonna bury it, with the help of LA County’s finest coroner, six feet deep with the wrong heart.”
“Aren’t you the only coroner in this town?”
“You noticed? Help me roll him over, I’ve got to get a skin sample from around the puncture, if any of the poison seeped around the needle, the lab can test it. I’m going to get the kidneys also. Blood type match that will take an hour or so, if the sample is good, even from a corpse, the antigens don’t lie, unless, of course, the body has been cooking too long in the sun”
Silas pulled out a second scalpel and extracted the skin around the puncture wound. He measured the penetration depth beneath the skin. Holding the rough square of skin under the magnifier looking for anything that might hint of a substance. Sliding the sample under the microscope, he hunched over the eye piece and began to focus.
Jack glanced at the clock, 3 PM, “We don’t have much time left, this is burning through the afternoon…”
“Shit…… !”
Jack’s head jerked back to Silas hunched over a microscope.
“Would you come look at this, it’s unbelievable.”
Silas moved to the side of the scope making room for Jack. “See the faint black line feathering away from the hole— I think he was electrocuted. This radial feathering, its a hallmark of human lightning strikes. I don’t have enough time to confirm electrocution, and I am not sure its possible. We are way beyond the average murder. This medical science isn’t in any textbook. If there is a fourth body, and we can get to it early enough, maybe it will prove to be a common method. Jack, this is some weird shit, I don’t have any idea what you need to kill someone like this. Electric chairs use 2000 volts. But this, this is elegant, precise, diabolical. Look at it close, no trauma outside the hole, a bare strand of something at the innermost layer of the dermis. Looks like metallic filament, could be a wire, a damn small wire. Nothing like this was visible in the other victims. Maybe what ever it was, misfired with less intensity or duration. This is out there Jack, someone’s in the warning track and doesn’t care if they hit the wall. Death must have been near instantaneous, a small jolt. This is clean, not just effective. It’s sterile.”
“We don’t have much more time Silas. The Feds are never late, you got to sew this stiff back up and hide the organs, but I need something first. I need all the autopsy files for these. I can’t say right now who, but I know someone who knows something, and we got to give him what you have. “
“Right. I will say that one of them Federal Agent fellows with greased hair and a dark suit came by and took those already”
Silas rifled through his records, found all the pertinent John Doe files, then stuffed them in a manila envelope.
“Jack, don’t go out the way you came. Go left out of this office, then down the corridor, third or fourth right, there’s a sign. The loading dock is that direction. Bodies leave the morgue the other direction, that will be the way those G-men slink in. Here, take these and go now! I got to sew Johnny up. Don’t come back or call, I will leave a message for you when the dust settles. Good Luck Jack Deckard!”
Jack turned abruptly, leaving…
“And Jack—“
He paused with his hand on the door, “yeah”
“Don’t get yourself shot! I only work on the dead—and I don’t want to find you on my table.
The door swung shut, leaving Silas in the dead silence.
CH 5 – Toad in the Hole
Jack lurked his way through the corridors to the loading dock and out into the afternoon. The detour to avoid the feds left him with a long walk around the hospital campus to his car.
After grabbing some clothes and supplies from his apartment, he drove to his dad’s ranger cabin in the San Gabriel Mountains. No phone, no intrusions. A kerosene lamp, wood stove, and water from the cistern. An hour of twisty gravel roads, and he’d be out of reach of everyone.
The familiar gravel drive opened its arms to him as the golden hour stretched the shadows and burnished the hills. His father had been gone seven years. He hadn’t spent time here since the funeral. Not much had changed. The memories of his father’s final year were too painful. Imagining this place without him was a dead weight Jack couldn’t carry. Since then, his uncle had come around a few times a year to check on the place.
Scrabbling around these hills during the summer weekends of his youth had grounded him. Unlike the city kids who never left the concrete, Jack knew there were places where beauty could trap you, grip you, and let you be consumed. The city was cruel, banal, rude, and flat. Out here, you could trip, you could fall, you could die painfully at the bottom of a cliff or with the fangs of a rattlesnake driven into the flesh between your toes. You didn’t need crime or corruption to be your undoing. Self-awareness wasn’t optional.
All of those lessons had served him well in France. That place reminded him of this one. Serene, except for the punctuation of artillery and gunfire.
Jack dragged his memories, luggage, and dossier up the steps to the cabin. The door creaked its welcome. The room held the faint aroma of kerosene. He lit the lamp low and away from the window, then returned to the porch to sit on the steps.
He looked west, watching the sun begin its final descent as the silence consumed him. For a moment, he gazed across the great expanse with the wonder of his lost innocence.
The night folded in, the lights of civilization splattered across the valley like a field of fireflies. Coyotes howled below, their overlapping yips bouncing off the hills, making it sound like he was surrounded. If he stayed out, he might get to see one pass in the moonlight. If he didn’t have a nagging murder filling his thoughts, he might’ve walked off into the trees and never looked back.
Rising, he put his childhood to bed.
Inside the cabin, he found his food and his flask. He dumped the files on the table and chewed through his sandwich as he turned up the lantern.
He laid the photos from each autopsy side by side. The matching organs had the same texture and color. The scale appeared identical. The recorded weights of each were near exact, just as Silas said.
Cause of death: Acute organ failure. Cause unknown.
The blood type notation from the second autopsy caught his eye.
Blood Type: O-
Silas had circled it.
Uncommon. Retested. Confirmed. Two unidentified bodies with that type? Not probable.
Jack stared at the words until his cigarette burned to its last ember, scorching his fingers. Cursing, he flicked his hand, sending the butt skittering to the floor. Wishing for some ice, he rubbed the sting from his fingers and muttered, “What is it with the blood type? Why didn’t he say anything?” He made a mental note to press Silas on why the blood mattered.
With a slow exhale, he shoved the reports back into the envelope. His back ached for the cot across the room. After one final gulp from his flask, he trudged over and dropped onto it.
Wrapped beneath the layers of quilts, Jack rested with his hands behind his head. The fading lamp’s light seemed to cue the coyotes. A repeat chorus welcoming the night, trailing off as they began their nocturnal hunt. The stillness that followed emptied Jack’s mind and lured his body into a soul-scrubbing slumber.
CH 6 - Mountain Air
The soft light of the San Gabriels’ western slope quietly intruded through the windows, spilling across the floor, reclaiming the dark cabin.
Stretching like a cat after sleep had sung its last purring chorus, Jack emerged from his cocoon. Sitting upright, rubbing his face, dragging his fingers through his hair, he inhaled the mountain air. It was brisk, not cold. The downdraft from higher elevations had leached the warmth from the cabin overnight. He welcomed it.
Coffee pot in hand, he stepped out the back door toward the familiar rock cistern, already looking forward to the cold splash of water on his face. Somewhere above, there was a spring, a constant flow except for the driest of years. His dad had spent one summer busting the rocks to channel the water to the cabin. In the dim light, he could see his reflection. If it weren’t for visible scars, he’d be looking at his dad. If not for the invisible ones, he wouldn’t be here.
“Dad, what have I gotten into now?”
Plunging the pot below the water, he broke the reflection. Filling it, he set it aside, submerged both hands in the cold water, and splashed the sleep from his face. Turning his back to the cistern, he said, “No more time for reminiscing.”
Sitting close to the wood stove, Jack tried to enjoy his coffee and a hard-boiled egg. The autopsy notes still dominated his thoughts. The warmth did nothing to ease his anxiety.
He lingered at the cabin until he could no longer justify remaining.
CH 7 - The Oracle in the Lift
The drive down from the mountains re-centered his focus on the details. He flipped through them in his head like an endless game of solitaire with zero chance of clearing the board. As if there were no jacks in his deck. The same two plays no matter how he dealt the facts. Three dead bodies and an ocean of trepidation leading back to Berlin. Too many years out of that game, too many years of average crime with predictable motives. After nearly a decade of involuntary dulling, he would have to hone himself quickly. It was too late lament what he could have been doing.
All too soon, the hotel was before him. An opportunity awaited. Maybe another piece of the puzzle would be found. Hopefully, it wasn’t the one piece he couldn’t flip face-up, or one of those middle pieces that looked like every other piece.
“If Donovan can just give me the finished edges.”
The lobby of the Roosevelt would have been a welcome respite from the heat, if the lobby had been cool. Jack landed here after the war, wanting to ground himself before heading home. It was more elegant then, a striking contrast to the all-too-comfortably chaotic crucible that had tempered him. Now, the walls reminded him of sea foam, that creamy green whispering of sirens who lured Greeks to their doom. Except here, you woke up beside a chain smoking B-movie mermaid, shellacking her hair with Aqua Net as she rifled through your wallet.
“Good afternoon, sir! Will you be checking in?”
Jack let his eyes get their fill of the clerk as he locked onto her name tag. “Yes, Sylvia, indeed I will. Please. A single room.”
“Name please?”
“Sol d’Artémis.”
With the smack of her gum, she said “Sol Dart and Miss?”
Jack sighed. “No, just Sol, the name is Sol d’Artémis. Here.” He pulled the pen from her fingers as he spun the register around, “Let me save us both some aggravation.”
“Oh, of course, my mistake Mr. Artemis. How many nights?”
“Two, and could you ring a wake-up call at 5 am?”
“Of course, Mr. Artemis. Here is your key, room 617. The elevator is ahead to the left. Do you need assistance with your luggage?”
“No, thank you, Sylvia.”
“You’re welcome, have a pleasant stay, sir!”
Picking up his suitcase and his coat, Jack followed Sylvia’s directions. Sitting attentive in the open elevator as Jack entered the cab, the operator greeted him, “Good afternoon sir! Which floor?”
“Six,” Jack said, sliding the operator a sawbuck, “how about an express ride?”
“Yes, sir! Direct flight to six, no stopovers.” Pulling the outer and inner doors closed, he sat and rotated the control for smooth liftoff. “Were you in the war, sir? You have that look about you, my son was there. He and civilized company never got along after he came home. Some folks could never put it away. He never got all the way back home. Not upstairs, anyways, I do miss him, the boy that left us. The man that came home, well—I wish he hadn’t had to go.”
Jack listened in silence as the elevator eased noisy to stop. “I know what you mean. My dad said as much. I guess I made it as well as anybody could.”
“Sixth floor, right on time.”
Jack hesitated at the open door.
“Good luck to you. I ain’t sure the world don’t still need saving. Don’t you let them fool you, and don’t you let your guard down. The peace you paid for was never meant to be permanent.”
Turning slightly as he exited the elevator cab, “They never spoke the truth before. I don’t expect them to start now? I’ll be alright, Pops and maybe extract some payment for your son while I’m at it.”
His jaw tightened as he approached his room. He had known Donovan a long time; he never cut corners. If something needed doing, he made sure the right people were in the mix. Still, Jack wished for clarity. The elevator operator’s words could have been his dad’s. That generation came from a different world. The war to end all wars had lied to them. They carried a rightful grudge. They gave up their own flesh and blood to stop what should never have started.
The key turned sloppy in the lock, like something handled too many times by too many people. Whoever signed off on the new sea foam green lobby had obviously been willing to let the decay of low priorities take care of everything else. Only God knows how many jealous lovers had jimmied this door after a booze-fueled spat.
Tossing his luggage on the bed, Jack found his flask and thumbed the power knob on the radio. Looking out onto the street, the whiskey, the music, and the droning rhythm of the traffic made a passable distraction. The automotive chrome shone brilliant in the afternoon sun lending the heat an intensity that made Jack glad he wasn’t stuck cooking inside his own car down in the traffic melee. Soon, he figured, the heat would ease into a decadent night full of future starlets and barely legal boys chasing their skirts.
The monotony of the big band tunes was cut short by three sharp knocks delivered by a hand used to breaking things.
Jack crossed the room and put his eye to the peep hole, Donovan Earle’s unblinking eye stared back at him.
Opening the door, Donovan entered, Jack checked the corridor before shutting and locking the door, turning around in time to see Donovan toss the briefcase onto the bed, bouncing like it had weight.
Donovan spun the chair around, seating himself with his arms folded on the back. “What do you know, Jack?”
Jack handed over the envelope. “More questions than answers. Blood type is rare. Don’t know how that fits. Cause of death looks like electrocution delivered to the base of the skull. It sounds insane, and you won’t find that in the notes. Until the third body, it looked like they were all killed by an injection of some sort, at that spot. Coroner found it by fluke, a small remnant of wire beneath the skin and microscopic trails similar to lightning strikes. It can’t be anywhere near that much power, the skin damage is minimal.”
“Yeah, Jack, this goes along with what I received from Cuthbert yesterday. No one knows why LA has more bodies than every other city. Someone got word to her of a matching body recovered in the French sector of West Berlin. You know how she is, there are no secrets from her.”
“I know well her capacity to gather information. What did she think, are we onto something that stretches back to ’45?”
“She hasn’t said, and she wants to talk to you in person.”
“You’re not singing my song Donovan.”
“A new tune’s been called Jack, and she is leading the band. I’ve got two tickets for France. Here’s yours. LA-Chicago-New York-London-Paris. You leave day after tomorrow 8 am.”
Jack took the envelope but didn’t open it. “Am I bait or the tip of the spear?”
“Is there really a difference? You better than anyone knows the answer. A driver will meet you, one of the Jedburgh operatives, one you’ll recognize. You should be able to trust him, but don’t blab like high school girls at pajama parties. He will drive you to a villa near Obernai, La Maison des Trois Renards. One stop at Saint-Dizier—a small café. If he tries to take you anywhere else, wait until you get out of town, and deal with him.”
“Deal with him how?”
“Don’t leave him breathing and thumbing a ride back to Paris. We can’t afford a leaky faucet.”
“Sounds like my options are few.”
“Pack appropriately, you’ll be on your own until you see Cuthbert.”
“You sure this villa isn’t haunted by some black-jackets with lightning bolt insignias and long memories?”
“I’m only sure as she is. This is bigger than three stiffs in the LA county morgue. She wants you in the mix, she needs her right hand again. There is no denying that you two worked together like the gears of a clockwork.”
“I don’t guess ‘no’ is an option.”
“Not one you should consider. Disappointing Virginia Hall is low on everybody’s list of priorities. I will meet you there.” Dealing out the contents of his briefcase Donovan continued, “Read this carefully and burn it before you leave. An American on vacation in France looking like you do, isn’t going to satisfy any cursory interrogation. Your cover story is in there.” Rising from his chair, “Here is your passport Mr. d’Artemis. I will meet you in France.”
“—Copy that.”
No good-luck slaps on the back between them, no ‘remember when we gave them hell’, just the unspoken commitment to see this through. Donovan left and sucked the optimism out of Jack. Donovan was good at that, Cuthbert’s lone realist to parry Jack’s hopeful skepticism.
An umbrella might be prudent. The work could get wet.
Giving Donovan sufficient time to leave the hotel, Jack took to the stairs to avoid any inquisitive conversations with persons unknown.
Jack’s nose led him to the coffee shop. The sweet smell of all-day breakfasts and fried goodness gave its location away. At first glance, an open seat seemed improbable and avoiding the congested tables impossible. Unperturbed, he prowled his way through the crowd, and eyed a booth at the end of the row opposite the kitchen.
The waitress was weaving through her tables toward him as he slid into the booth.
“Something to drink? Need a menu?”
“Yes on both. Cup of coffee, black, and a glass of water, no ice please.”
“Yes sir. Here’s your menu and I will be back with your drinks momentarily.”
The rhythm of her walk was that of someone always auditioning. A way up and out of the grind of roaming hands and amorous stares that would burn her clothes off if they could. She has a shelf life. Stained polyester uniforms and swollen ankles would sap her youth in fewer years than she realized, first her optimism, then her vigor. Jack didn’t feel sorry for her. It’s the way the world worked. The beautiful people are always young.
After giving himself an internal five-count, he looked about the diner and considered the menu. Donovan’s words made him wonder if others were watching him. Definitely nothing undercover here, just a bunch of glad-handing with everyone looking to impress everyone else with promises of large sums of cash. As he perused the menu, he satisfied himself that he was the only one out of place—the one that those kind of promises could not tempt.
“Here are your drinks, sir. Are you ready to order?”
“Sure, Delmonico steak, baked potato, just butter, salad, and could you toss in some green beans, and if you got cherry pie, I’ll have a slice for dessert.”
“Delmonico, buttered baked potato, side of green beans, and green salad. House dressing?”
“Yes”
“Excellent choice, your order will be out shortly”
Jack pulled out the French map Donovan had marked up. The route wasn’t unfamiliar; their original Jedburgh mission had criss-crossed the region. At least this time the Wehrmacht wouldn’t be hot on his heels.
“Planning a trip, sir?”
Jack was surprised he had spent so much time reviewing the map, “No, just found a map in an old box of mine, was reminiscing about days long gone”
Jack leaned back as the waitress placed his food on the table. “Looks like a vacation might do you good. Sometimes it’s nice to visit the old stomping grounds. None of us are getting any younger.”
“Maybe you’re right about a vacation, and it’s time to take a break from saving my corner of the world.”
“Enjoy. Let me know if you need anything else, I will refill your drinks my next time around”
“Thank you.”
His appetite urged him to eat like an unrefined teenager with a hollow leg, but Jack resisted. He opted for a slower, more deliberate consumption of his meal. It was all good, reminding him that he should eat more regularly. The boiled eggs at breakfast didn’t carry him like they used to.
A vision crossed his mind: a heavier version of himself, sinking hard into his detective’s chair, his belt complaining and his shirt stretched tight from too many second and third helpings of home cooking and comforts of a steady gal who was unafraid of his past.
Chastising himself as he set his coffee down, he muttered, “I should just eat more eggs at breakfast.”
He left payment on the table with as healthy of a tip as he could justify with his meager salary, maybe it would extend her shelf life a little longer.
Punching the elevator call button, unable to stand still, Jack’s own impatience annoyed him. No sounds emitted from the elevator.
As he approached the front desk from the elevator, the clerk anticipated his question. “No operator.”
“What happened to the old guy in the gray coat, rode me up earlier today? The one there in the photo.” Jack pointed to a black-and-white photo behind the desk. “Him. Same coat, same smile, same hat.”
The clerk turned, nodded. “That’s George. George Mantle. He walked out earlier today Didn’t say a word.”
“Sorry for the inconvenience. The stairs are just past the elevator on the right.”
Jack turned toward the stairs without another word—feeling the hollow elevator as he passed.
CH 8 - Flyboy
Jack was awake and out of his room well before the wake-up call could interrupt the mostly silent room. He was rested. Sleep had come quickly, and for once, stayed. He stopped by his apartment and packed for France. In his briefcase: the Welrod wrapped in leather, the 1911 beneath the map and passport. Another silent friend tucked into his boot. There was a time for each tool, but he wished he wouldn’t need any of them. He read, reread and then burned the dossier. The flames charred any hope that his mission would not be messy.
The heat wave cooking the Northeast had made the news. Stepping off the plane at New York’s Idlewild airport made the headlines seem tame. The humidity and the heat reflected off the tarmac stole Jack’s breath. Twelve hours cramped in a smoke-filled tube did little for his disposition, or his back. The thrumming propellers made sure sleep was shallow. The kind of rest where you hear everything, feel everything, held on edge, never plunging into the deeper darkness.
The walk between terminals worked some life back into his legs. With two hours to burn, the urge to be early felt like a curse.
Time slowed.
Tick…
Tock…
An unwound clock. Fading to stop.
“No point in waiting any longer.” He opened the door. The red-eye terminal was dim and sparse with travelers. The seating looked less comfortable than what he’d just been freed from. A couple from his last flight mingled in a corner like newlyweds do, forgetting they weren’t invisible.
A newspaper from the rack would have to be his entertainment.
“EISENHOWER RELUCTANTLY ACCEPTS INDOCHINA BUT WARNS REDS…”
Jack read the article with travel-weary detachment. The real story lurked somewhere between the lines of copy.
He folded deeper into the newspaper searching for something lighter.
“Everything sets the stage for something else. If everybody in Indochina agreed to stop shooting at each other, it meant they’d found a common target.”
“Last call for boarding, Sol d’Artemis. Direct flight to six, no stopovers.” Jack woke blinking. The words still echoed in his ears. Trying to look nonplussed, he scanned the terminal for the source of George’s voice.
Then—
“Pan American, Flight 91, service to London, now boarding at Gate 2. This is the final boarding call”
Shrugging off his haunted nap, Jack grabbed his luggage and newspaper and made his way to the gate. Handing over his ticket, the agent directed him to the tarmac where the plane awaited.
Looking up the stairs, he took a breath and steeled himself for a night of discomfort. Even if this plane was nicer, with more leg room, more attractive stewardesses, and a better menu, it put him one day closer to Cuthbert. One day closer to the unknown.
Donovan had built in a one-day layover in London for Jack’s itinerary. Just enough time for him to uncoil his body after being packed away for two days like smoked sardines basted in sweat. He needed the space to get his head back in the game.
The drizzle, the fog, the lack of sunshine lived up to every dreary novel set in London. It almost made Jack regret convincing his boss to let him go. Lt. Vernon J. Tate had sat behind his desk, a desk built as solid as Tate himself, while Jack leaned on every bit of leverage he’d banked over the years.
“In ten days I want you back in Los Angeles.”
He was glad he’d turned down the offer to run the London Station. Passing through was bad enough. California was better on all counts, even if he had to answer to the LAPD.
CH 9 - Release the Hound
Jack wrapped his jacket tight against the brisk Paris air as he crossed the tarmac. The weather had been a yo-yo. Every stop brought a headline-worthy extreme.
Getting into the terminal was the easy part. Getting out according to plan was something else. The bureaucracy at customs was always an unknown. One rookie who missed the morning briefing, everything goes sideways—everything.
There’s no secrets with international travel. Someone always knows you’re coming and they might not be your friend.
“Enjoy your stay in France, Monsieur.”
Jack pocketed his passport. “Merci.”
From inside he spotted the promised two-tone burgundy Citroen idling at the curb.
Letting the rest of the manifest shuffle past him, he stepped out of view and opened his case. Slipping the map into his coat pocket, he arranged the remaining contents for a worst-case scenario. He worked the latches a couple of times. Smooth and quick. Satisfied, he moved toward his ride.
Jack recognized Armand Berger behind the wheel. Virginia Hall called him Petit Armand, not because he was small, but because the other Armand was a freak of nature at six-foot-three.“
“Bonjour, Monsieur d’Artemis.” Armand greeted Jack as he shoved his suitcase across the back seat and slid in behind the driver.
“Hello Armand, you’re looking…well.”
“Oui. Many years of peace has been good. No? No more running and hiding.”
“Peace has been good.”
“We have a long drive, I have cheese, bread and some wine.”
“Only allowed one stop permitted. Saint-Dizier. Any deviations will be bad.”
“D’accord.”
Jack watched as the scars of the invasion roll past the window.
The retreating Germans turned their humiliation into cruelty.
Villages destroyed.
Families murdered.
No one to remember.
No one to rebuild.
There never would be enough justice.
“What did you do after the war, Armand? I guess it’s been at least eight years since we saw each other. Did you get married, have some kids? Is this what you dreamed of doing? Still tinkering with radios? You never let us down with the hardware.”
“Oui.” Armand gave a crooked smile. “Always. Radios made a good living for us. I found ma femme a year after the armistice. Her parents didn’t survive. They’d seen the writing on the wall before the invasion began and sent her to relatives in England. They helped the resistance and paid the price. They loved this country.”
“Many did Armand.”
“Oui! C’est vrai. She didn’t want to bring children in to this world and have them lose their family because some people wanted our land. The Soviets, they beat their chests—America is so far away, you never feel the pressure. You never forget either monsieur, no?”
Jack’s hand brushed the dagger in his boot. Armand never talked so much before.
“No, I haven’t.”
“France dies without new blood, Armand. You two should have children. No matter what we do.”Their eyes locked in the rearview mirror. “No one lives forever.”
The words hung between them. Armand’s forearms rippled with a tighter grip on the wheel. His knuckles whiter. His eyes slipped from Jack’s steel gaze, slow and uncertain, wishing he could watch both the road and his passenger.
The engine hum, the wind rushing through the open windows, the rhythm of the road—all tempted Jack into sleep. He resisted.
“How much longer to Saint-Dizier? The gauge is looking thirsty.”
“Oui monsieur. Seventy-five kilometers at the last sign”
“Good, pass me some bread and cheese, I could use a bite.”
“Wine Jack?”
“No—bread and cheese. I hope you found something good. Back home, we don’t get the real fromage.”
“Oh no!, très désolé”
“No need to be sad, we have our own cheeses, just not French”
Armand handed over the sack. Jack set the wine aside, preferring not to drink it.
“Enjoy, mon frère”
Jack used his pocket knife to pry off some cheese, ripped himself a chunk of the baguette while considering Armand’s last phrase, ‘my brother’.
“Fine cheese, Armand. You did good. Ought to hold me for a bit.”
Smaller working farms became more frequent as they drew closer to Saint-Dizier. Between vineyard expanses, cattle and sheep stood out against green pastures. A few months from now, migrant laborers would swarm the slopes for the grape harvest. The war robbed the region of young men who would have continued the work of their fathers and grandfathers. No one cared where the hands came from, as long as they were in sufficient numbers. With no shortage of work to be done, some managed to stay. As long as they kept their noses clean, nobody asked questions.
The car slowed.
Jack looked out the window. A rusted Shell-Berre sign above two gas pumps stood like sentries in front of the faded station.
He slid his hand into his boot.
“Not here, Armand.”
“Non? We need fuel.”
“Do I need to repeat myself?—”
“I hope not. And don’t speed off like it’s a race.”
Armand glanced back in the rearview mirror, and began to understand how closely he had brushed the edge. He eased on the accelerator smoothly hoping he hadn’t pushed too far.
“On the east side of town,” Jack said, “Relais Auberge de La Marne. About two kilometers from here. That’s our stop.”
He hoped the stop at the auberge would go as expected. He wanted no more hiccups. He’d been naive to think the ride to Obernai would be clean. Armand could have been nervous, out of the game too long, unsure of his passenger, or answering to someone unseen. Someone that no one should trust.
While the car was refueled, Jack grabbed his briefcase and made his way to the restroom. Locked in, he put on his shoulder holster, checked the 1911 and holstered it.
Armand’s attempted deviation hadn’t been an accident.
For a moment, his father’s gaze measured him from the mirror. “Jack, you were nearly an idiot.”
He found Armand at a table and joined him.
“I can’t afford any mistakes, Armand. I hope I have made myself clear. The rest of the way will be much more predictable.”
“Oui, pas de problème”
Lunch came and went. Good steady road food. No poor choices. Unless you counted the waitress and her shoes.
Armand waited by the Citroen while the bill was paid. Jack checked the back seat before sliding in diagonally across from Armand. Hand near his weapon, Jack would make sure the rest of the ride stuck to the plan. Sitting clearly in Armand’s peripheral vision ensured that if things went sideways, it would be no mystery who was delivering the bad news.
The last leg to Obernai was uneventful, shy of four hours of less than smooth roadways. Armand regained his composure and seemed calmer. More farmland and cattle: rows of grapes, barley and the columns of hops. Jack couldn’t relax, anxious for the journey to end. The scenery’s distractions were more nuisance than comfort, never seeming to end.
Jack pulled out the map with La Maison des Trois Renards marked. When he leaned over the seat Armand flinched.
Pointing to the map “Do you know this place?”
Looking quickly, “Oui, the Three Foxes.”
“Know how to get there?”
“Oui.”
“How much further?”
“Maybe 10 kilometers?”
Jack caught Armand’s eyes in the mirror. “Remember. This still isn’t a race.”
CH 10 - La Maison des Tres Renards
Armand locked the brakes harder than necessary. Lurching against the sudden stop, Jack braced himself as the car slid to a halt. Their eyes met in the rearview. Jack knew it wasn’t an accident.
An armed man met the car, spoke fast and low. Too quiet for Jack to catch. Armand handed over the keys and the two of them walked off to an outbuilding.
Before Jack could fully exit the car, Donovan met him.
“Well, well, well, Jaaack! Looks like you made it just fine.” Donovan slapped him on the back, punctuating his feigned surprise. “She’s waiting for you. Anxious, even. Here, let me get your suitcase, I’ll show you the way”
“Sure thing. And take me by a washroom first, I feel like I have walked here.”
Virginia Hall sat behind a sparsely covered desk reviewing files in the library of the two-hundred-year-old house. The high beamed ceilings gave the illusion that her desk was a small insignificant piece of furniture. Page after page, she worked through a dossier: reviewing diagrams, scratching out sections, making corrections. She enjoyed none of it.
Jack lingered at her open door, watching until Donovan’s footsteps faded down the hall. He waited for the right moment to interrupt. The missions came racing back. Every success had hinged on this one person, the one who never missed a detail.
“You gonna come in, Jack Deckard, or stare at me like a schoolboy ogling his crush?”
“How’s the leg?”
“Like a Louisville Slugger. Ready to send the next pitch into the cheap seats. How you been, Jack?”
She rose and made her way over, her gait carrying that familiar half-beat pause, then wrapped him in a warm embrace.
“God, it’s good to see you—and all in one piece.”
“I like being in one piece.”
“Come, sit! Coffee?”
“Sure.”
“Marcel!”
Appearing at the door, “Oui madame.”
“Apporte-nous du café, s’il te plaît.”
“Bien sûr, madame.”
Jack lit a cigarette, took a healthy drag, then exhaled straight up and watched the smoke drift to the ceiling like a prayer he didn’t want answered.
“Virginia, we have a problem,” he said, his face more stern. “Somethings not right with Armand. He doesn’t look any older than when I left eight years ago. And, he talks too much.”
“Could be nerves. You aren’t exactly known to be personable.”
Marcel entered with the coffee.
“Merci Marcel… Dis à Donovan de venir ici.”
Turning sharply Marcel left in search of Donovan.
The hot, dark brew was perfect. Jack savored it like a man who had been tortured with an untold number of cups of instant.
“I don’t think it’s that. He should have known the route better.”
Donovan appeared at the door. “Take a couple of the men and shadow Armand,” Virginia instructed. “Jack here is having some reservations about his—dependability. Arrange relief for tomorrow morning. Let’s keep an eye on him for a few days.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“I need to get you up to speed Jack, there are things I couldn’t send to you, things unsure. Intel arrives weekly, sometimes daily. It’s a complicated puzzle I’m trying to assemble, more like one of those model airplane kits, only my kit is missing the engine.”
“Madame Hall…”
“Yes Marcel”
“Dinner will be served in one hour”
“Merci, un moment Marcel.”
“Jack, you do look like you walked the long way around to get here. Marcel will show you to your room. Get yourself cleaned up—there’s some clothes up there that will keep you from sticking out like a Yankee in King Arthur’s court. We have much to discuss this evening—you’ll want a full stomach and a clear head.”
“I do feel like an unwashed heathen.”
“Find a mirror and you’ll know why you feel that way!”
Jack snorted a laugh as he stood.
“This way monsieur.”
“Lead the way, sir.”
Jack closed the door, leaving Virginia searching for her missing engine.
CH 11- La Maison des Tres Renards
The table was set in a way that could only come from Virginia. Usually efficient, with an economy of thought and movement that kept her feminine side veiled, tonight she let go of practicality. The linens crisp, silverware polished. A single brilliant blood-red Coquelicot placed in a tall slender vase almost centered between the two place settings.
The sight of her made Jack glad that he’d cleaned up. She was regal. Seated at the head of the table like the matriarch of France.
“Sit down here closer Jack, you’re not the prey in a cheap double-naught spy thriller.”
“I think I can manage that.”
“Wine?”
“Of course.”
She filled two crystal flutes, “It was a gift from The Alsatian vineyard. Homecoming of sorts, I suppose.” The bubbles rose in perfection in the almost pale yellow liquid. Jack followed her lead as she stood.
She tilted her glass, “À ceux qui ne sont plus.”
Jack returned the gesture, “To them.”
Marcel orchestrated the kitchen staff with precision, reading the room unobtrusively, timing each dish without visible cues from the host.
A wedge of Chaource before them, Virginia spread the cheese on a thin round baguette slice and savored the flavor as the wine cut through the richness.
Giving herself a moment, “How’s the life of a copper treating you? I thought you’d stay in the game—we all thought that.”
“It seemed to be the one thing I was good at that kept me in my own bed.”
“You sold yourself short.”
“Maybe. I dunno. I won’t lie, the chase has been—exhilarating. A few more wedges of this cheese, and maybe I stay. How’s that fellow you were sweet on? I never had the pleasure to work with him—can’t recall his name.”
“Paul. Yes, still sweet on him. The work doesn’t let us stay together as much as we want. He keeps talking about marriage, and I keep…not talking about marriage.”
“I can’t help you with that. I am not much of a Casanova.”
“Oh please.” She rolled her eyes with affection. “If you would have ever looked up, you could have had anyone of a dozen French maidens follow you home or anywhere else you wanted to go. You were gossip fodder.”
“You could have clued me in a bit.”
“You’re the spy, I just handed you maps, and made sure your shoes were tied before you went out,” she said, smiling and leaning in close—“You’re supposed to be the observant one, working on the edge and all. Didn’t the OSS teach you any better?”
“Better enough to know that dinner is about to come through that door.”
The aroma hit him first. Braised chicken, thyme, garlic, mushrooms just before the Coq au Vin was in sight.
Marcel entered the room circling the table and placing the dishes with quiet pride.
“You must have been in the kitchen all day. I haven’t had such dining since, well, I don’t think I can remember when it was.”
“Hopefully it wasn’t the last time I cooked for you.”
“Maybe not that long ago.” Jack’s hunger overtook the conversation for a moment, each bite cooked to perfection.
As the light faded behind the window, Virginia set her silverware down and grew quiet.
“You know Armand was with us—he was one of us.”
Jack let his thoughts linger, “I know, I remember.”
“I especially remember both of the Armands getting drunk and deciding to disguise a sticky bomb with cow manure.”
Virginia laughed, nearly choking on her wine.
“Those two stunk for days, God—we were lucky they were mostly unsuccessful.”
“Agreed, that wasn’t the only time we had a close call of our own making.”
“You’re right…. What was his name, for goodness sake—it was just on the tip of my tongue. You know—the one who said he had been in the circus.”
Jack grinned. “Pierre. Pierre Le Grand Feu d’artifice.”
“That’s IT! He swore he was a human cannonball.
Turns out though—he didn’t have an act. He just helped with the tents, hawked tickets and shoveled elephant shit.”
“If the Armands had just enlisted someone with relevant experience…”
Their unrestrained laughter, hard and belly-aching, stole their breath and burst the dam, flooding the room with memories. Slowly, the laughter ebbed, crushed with the tears that followed—quiet, unspoken, and long overdue.
The new silence between them was heavy with absence. Not only the missing voices of their friends, but all those who should still be here, laughing, living, getting old and ornery with their wives. The good and brave who gave everything to be free. There was no way to measure this loss.
Their desserts sat untouched. An undeserved pleasure they no longer felt they had earned.
Virginia rose with quiet purpose. “Come, Jack, our long-gone friends need us to finish the work they paid for.”
CH 12- Unnatural Selection
Jack followed Virginia as she led him through the labyrinth of hallways and grand rooms, recounting stories she had been told. Two hundred years of history, right at her fingertips. They finally reached the library she had turned into her office.
Jack paused, looked around the room in awe at the number of books, and slowly trailed his fingers down the leather spines of the ancient tomes. He wished he were more fluent in French.
At the sideboard, Virginia poured two doubles from the modest selection of spirits. She turned with two glasses in hand. “Bourbon still your preferred poison?”
“Absolutely.”
“I wish we could get that reliably here. Scotch whisky do?”
“In a pinch.”
She held out his glass. “We’re in a pinch.”
“Then, it’ll do.”
Jack took a glass from her. Lifting it, he took in the sweet, woody notes and let the whisky warm his lips.
Seating himself, he began to wonder about Petit Armand and how he could have been compromised.
Lost in thought, Virginia’s voice snapped his attention back in order.
“I didn’t just give you a double because I like you. What I am about to show you may require it—plus a refill.”
Pulling a manila envelope from her desk, she opened and laid out a two-page document.
Virginia’s tone shifted—sharper. Clipped. Precise. Her finger pressing down on the dossier.
“This is why you are here. I couldn’t risk sending any of it to you. No method could guarantee that only your eyes would see it. This came with other files, through a channel I wasn’t expecting. We vetted the paper and the typeface—both are consistent with official SS issue typewriters and paper stock. It’s impossible to prove whether this is a draft or a final version that he ran out of time to post.”
“Best thing is to let me read it.”
“You’re right, but—I have warned you.”
My Führer,
In continuation of my previous correspondence, I must clarify the nature of our setbacks. The failure of eugenics lies not in principle, but in its premature application. Breeding alone cannot ensure the permanence of desirable traits without a robust regenerative biological infrastructure.
Our early trials using artificially sustained wombs have extended our capacity to manufacture viable donors. This approach has accelerated greatly since the first organ-manufacturing successes, proofs of concept established during the previous studies in 1933. Experiments have demonstrated that O negative blood, though genetically recessive, holds unmatched transfusion compatibility across all types. Conversely, the AB type, rare but stable, exhibits unparalleled receptivity. It is the natural culmination of superior design: able to receive sustenance from all, yet none can receive.
This duality defines the future of Aryan persistence. The inferior classes, though genetically expendable, retain a certain utility as living reservoirs. We need more than expendable, natural born reservoirs. We must manufacture them from existing stock at an accelerated rate. The work is arduous and successes have come at a cost that I am sure you understand. The cost of progress only appears extreme to those who do not comprehend the magnitude of the work.
The scale of this work now requires secrecy beyond my control. A new facility is being prepared, its location withheld even from me for reasons of security.
My Führer, this is not failure. It is evolution, painful, complex, but necessary. Time is no longer our ally, the Red Horde closes in with relentless resolve.
Heil Hitler,
Dr. Joseph Mengele
Jack read the letter slowly, at first sipping his whisky, then pausing altogether. He stiffened on the second read through, the glass motionless in his hand.
Setting his glass on her desk, he stood and paced the room with a third reading.
Looking out into the darkness of the night, he said, “This makes sense of some things.”
“Jack—”
“Yeah?”
“He’s not dead.”
Jack soft-hammered the edge of his fist against the window frame.
“Shit, shit, shit! You’ve confirmed this? I knew he had seemed to vaporize. No body, no immediate family left behind, absolutely no trace of him in the obvious places. Are you sure?”
“As sure as I can be without having him in custody. We know where he has been, we don’t know where he is now. There is a lot of noise about South America. It’s all speculation right now, it could be a ruse—he may have never left Europe.”
Jack looked Virginia square in the eyes. “Do you have a plan?”
“It’s being worked on by some brilliant young agents, but as of now—no. I do not have a plan. Day after tomorrow the relevant players will be here. I want you with me. Some of these company men have a hard time dealing with a woman on top.”
“Fools.” Jack found his glass and drained the last drops of whisky.
“Another?” She asked.
Knock, knock… knock
Facing the door, Virginia called out, “Come.”
A stern-faced Marcel opened the door, “C’est monsieur Earl, il y a un problème”
“Excuse me, Jack. I will be right back.”
Marcel led Virginia to the hallway. Jack could hear a distressed conversation, unable to make out the words, his French still unrecovered from years of disuse. He could hear Marcel’s urgent footsteps retreating.
“Jack, you have to go with Marcel. Something has happened to Donovan.”
“How bad?”
“Marcel doesn’t know much detail—only that Donovan’s still alive. He followed Armand into a hôtel de passe—in this case, a brothel disguised as a nightclub. His backup was slow getting in or got lost among the crowd. Marcel knows the place—he’ll drive. He’s swinging by the armory. Meet him at the green stake-bed truck—looks like we sell tomatoes out of it. It’s parked along the south side of the house.”
“Will do.”
Jack turned on his heel and, with a purposeful stride, stopped by his room, grabbed his things, and headed for the front door.
Marcel revved the truck, passenger door waiting open. Jack hopped in, slamming the door as Marcel gunned the motor, spitting gravel and sliding sideways with the sudden acceleration.
CH 13- The Wired Broad
Marcel treated the accelerator like it was a cockroach under his foot; the road rattled the truck like rocks in a tin can.
“How far away is this place?”
“Twenty-five or thirty kilometers. Le Coq de Minuit.”
“The midnight rooster?”
Marcel shouted over the engine noise, “Oui, Jaque.”
“Only open after dark, I suppose.”
“Ha ha ha—You almost get it, Jaque.”
“Oui, Marcel. Oui”
Thankfully, Marcel slowed as he approached town. If Jack had any loose teeth, they would’ve been in the floorboard or out the window halfway back. The rough country road gave way to the less-rough cobblestone streets. Driving more sanely now, Marcel eased through Obernai’s back streets.
A block ahead, Marcel pointed up to a neon sign. ‘Le Minuit’ blinked slow in blue beside a big neon-red outline of a rooster’s head, as if the words themselves were being crowed into the night.
Marcel killed the headlights, cut the engine and coasted the truck to a stop. The neon rooster buzzed each time it blinked. Checking their weapons, they stepped out and made their way toward Le Minuit.
They braced themselves before forcing the door. The door gave way easily, causing them to stumble. The place was nearly vacant. Two of Virginia’s men had detained Armand and an unknown woman. Donovan lay on a small couch against the wall, a medic hovering over him. Jack recognized him from the house as one of Donovan’s chosen men.
Jack made straight for Donovan.
The medic extended his hand. “Albert. I’ve heard about you from the boys.” He rechecked Donovan’s erratic pulse. “Damn cruel work.”
“Here. I found this clenched in his fist.”
Jack took the D-cell flashlight-sized object from Albert.
It was dull gray metal, twelve inches long, with a one-inch stainless orb extending from the business end. A quarter of the way down, a raised ring encircled a knurled button that sat proud of the surface; below it, a rubberized grip.
“Shit.”
“Seen one before?”
“No. But I have an idea what it does—this is not good. Some bodies turned up in LA. The coroner couldn’t prove the cause of death. Microscopic skin marks typical of being struck by lightning.”
Looking down at the barely breathing Donovan, Jack asked, “Can we move him back to the house?”
“He’s slowly coming around. He said a few words and tried to point. I was beside him within seconds after he was attacked. Armand didn’t try to get away, but we didn’t take a chance on him sneaking off. Her, on the other hand. She’s guilty of something besides being this evening’s temptress.”
“Has she said anything?”
“There was some wailing, some tears. The kind of stuff some women say when they want you to think they’re the victim, when factually, they pulled the trigger.”
“We’ll take her back. Cuthbert will have the questions that sting. Armand seems to be in the middle of the whole mess. We need to get out of this place in case someone talks. Folks might show up with either a badge, a grudge or a handful of friends who might not appreciate their proximity to the edge.”
“As soon as possible: Donovan needs to be in a safe place, Armand in a secure place—and the girl in Virginia’s crosshairs.”
“Marcel, pull the truck up to the door, I’ll find a mattress we can put in the back for Donovan. Time is short.”
“Oui.”
Marcel’s deliberate care to keep both Donovan stable on the mattress, and Albert in the bed of the truck, made the trip seem interminable. Jack considered the device in his hands, desirous to push the button.
Virginia and several of her men were waiting as they pulled up to the house. Armand and the girl, not having any choices, rode in the other car and arrived sooner.
There was a litter ready for Donovan, mostly delirious and unable to fully support his weight, he was carried to the makeshift infirmary. Albert spoke briefly to Virginia and then followed.
Marcel moved the truck out of sight.
Device in hand, Jack walked to Virginia. “I think this is what did it. We can’t be sure until one of the canaries sings for us.”
“The girl is being held in the music room next to the library. Armand is in the tack shed, hopefully ruing this day. I am confident that she will talk, without anything distressing happening to her.”
“Here. You might need this.” Jack handed the device to Virginia, “I’m going to go sit with Donovan, wait until he can speak, and probably find a bottle on the way.”
“Keep your wits about you Jack. Don’t let this be more personal than it already is.”
“I won’t.”
Jack wandered through the house towards Donovan, in no hurry to see his friend suffering.
Catching sight of Albert, Jack cornered him. “How is he doing?”
“I think there is some sense left in him, he mumbled your name once or twice.” Albert continued, “He could move his legs.”
Albert’s face hardened, and moved closer to Jack. “Just before Donovan fell, I heard a static radio crackling sound, like a short circuit or an arc welder. I couldn’t push through the crowd fast enough. I’m sorry Jack, I just couldn’t get there any quicker.”
“You didn’t pull the trigger, this isn’t your doing. Donovan knows the risks. We all do.”
“It was crazy in there, Jack, there must have been thirty or forty men in there trying to pry themselves a little bit of flesh out of ten girls. You saw the place, it’s not very big.”
“No it wasn’t.”
Jack looked down with his lips twisted in frustration. “Think Armand was the intended victim?”
“I don’t know.”
“Thanks for the update on Don, I’m gonna stay with him most of tonight, probably should see that Armand is fed. If I’m wrong about him, it would be bad for us if he starved to death.”
“C’est vrai!”
After watching Albert walk away, Jack entered the room, moved a chair to the bed and sat himself beside Donovan. Some optimist had left two glasses and a bottle on the bedside table. Jack poured one and sipped it slow as he watched his friend breathe.
The music room shared a door with the library-turned-office. Virginia Hall stepped inside from her office. The woman from the brothel—by her looks, more like a sixteen-year-old girl—fidgeted in the chair.
Virginia eyed the young woman, unsure if there was more to the girl than met her eye. Her clothing was nondescript—what she expected for a brothel. Maybe she didn’t know there were better ways to earn a living. Or maybe the wrong man came along at the right time and the downward spiral of abuse, retribution, false apologies, and make-up sex, warped her mind until she decided that if she skipped to the sex part, she wouldn’t have to deal with all the other garbage.
“Parles-tu anglais?”
“Oui madame.”
“Good. Let’s start with introductions. My name is Virginia Hall, you are my guest. Do you need something to eat?”
Unable to maintain eye contact with Virginia, she looked at the floor. “They call me, Fleur du Soir at Le Minuit.”
“Please—I am also thirsty.”
Virginia studied the girl for a moment, “Fleur du Soir?”
“Oui, madame.”
Virginia opened the door and spoke to the guard.
“Then Mademoiselle Soir, once you have eaten, you will be shown to your room. You may clean up and get some rest. If you need anything, knock—someone will attend to your immediate needs.”
The guard opened the door and brought in a small table, a cold sandwich on a plate, and a glass of water.
“I apologize that the meal isn’t hot. The hour is late and the kitchen staff have retired for the evening.”
“Pas de problème”
Virginia made her way to the door. “I know it will be difficult, but do try to get some rest this evening mademoiselle.”
The door shut and the flower of the evening was left to her meal. Alone.
Jack looked at the contents of the shelves in Donovan’s room. Old books, files, war memorabilia. An unexpected machine caught his attention. Moving quietly so as not to disturb Donovan, he looked closer. A portable wire recorder with a headset. A box next to it was labeled KL Natzweiler; inside—a wire reel for the recorder.
Jack poured a second glass of whisky, plugged the machine in, and loaded the reel. The SS had not decided to be more humane at Natzweiler than anywhere else. It was the only concentration camp on French soil. It was one too many.
Expecting to hear a recording of the liberation of the camp—someone asking every prisoner’s name—Jack settled himself into the chair and pushed the play button.
“31. August 1944. Leutnant Hans Brinkmann, Adjutant des Kommandanten, KL Natzweiler. Die Grube ist vorbereitet. Die Häftlinge werden aus den Baracken geführt.”
The high-pitched voice of a child cut through the German commentary.
Jack turned white and had to stifle a cry.
“Maman ! Maman ! Non, je veux pas ! Laisse-moi ! Maman, s’il te plaît !”
“Mon bébé ! Rendez-moi mon enfant ! Non ! Non ! Vous n’avez pas le droit ! Mon Dieu, pitié !”
BANG……BANG……
Jack doubled over and retched into the trash can, his gut clenched like he had been punched by Joe Louis.
BANG!
Wiping his mouth and looking at Donovan’s limp form, he dropped the headphones.
Jack shoved the chair into the corner next to Donovan.
The recording had tainted the whisky he belted back, like poison leaking into a mountain spring. Inescapable in every shot.
He woke rubbing his neck, trying to ease the crick from the contorted position, hoping the daylight creeping into the dim room would mute the desire for revenge still working through his system.
Donovan’s arm flailed feebly, trying to reach Jack’s leg.
“Jaaack! … Jaaack!”
“Don! You awake?”
“Of course not.” Donovan tried rubbing the sleep from his eyes but was only marginally successful.
Jack found a wash cloth at the basin, soaked it in the cool water, and wiped the crust from Donovan’s eyes.
“Better now?” As he cared for him, Jack felt the weight pressing down on his anger ease— like a pressure cooker relief valve hissing open.
“She was going to use that thing on Armand. Couldn’t let her. Knew it—”
Donovan sagged back into the bed.
“—What you were looking for.”
“What were you thinking?”
“Wasn’t thinking, was just doing…Armand wasn’t always rotten…she had to know…”
“Had to know what?”
Jack leaned in, fingers at Donovan’s throat, counting.
Unconscious. His nervous system still misfiring from the attack.
Erratic, then steady.
Donovan’s breathing found a solid rhythm.
Jack put the recorder back like he found it, the reel tucked back into its box. A fleeting thought bumped his raw memory. He thought he should destroy it—but knew that the future would not believe the atrocities that this select group had committed without evidence.
They may not believe it, even with evidence.
Prying himself from Donovan’s side, Jack followed his nose to the kitchen. An oversized coffee cup successfully tempted him into filling it. The dark roast arranged his senses straight. After the wire’s onslaught, coffee proved to be the cure.
With a second cup and a lit cigarette, he roamed the house in a half-hearted attempt to find Virginia.
Marcel found him first.
“Jaque!”
Jack turned to see Marcel hurrying to catch up.
“Madame Hall is with the girl in the music room—she asked not to be disturbed.
“I hope the girl talks. Donovan babbled something about her knowing something.”
“Oui. If she knows anything, she will talk, madame has her ways.”
“That she does.” Jack nodded and excused himself, wandering back to Donovan.
CH 14- The Interlocutions
Virginia arranged two chairs and a table in the music room. Casual enough to give the appearance of social gathering instead of an interrogation. The device that had injured Donovan was conspicuously placed on a shelf—impossible to ignore.
Settling in with a book for distraction, Virginia made herself comfortable and waited.
Marcel knocked, opened the door, and escorted the girl in.
On their heels, one of the cooks brought in breakfast: Tartines with cherry jam, fresh raspberries, a small dish of fromage blanc, two coffee bowls, and a filled enameled coffee pot.
Rising to greet the young girl, Virginia welcomed her warmly, “Good morning, mademoiselle. I trust you were undisturbed in the night. Please—sit. Have something to eat.”
“Merci, madame.”
The girl eyed the food with the wary hunger of the perpetually underfed.
Each addition to her plate came with a pause, a faint tremble of her hand. She held her breath and waited—as if hunger had taught her to expect punishment.
Virginia poured the bowls full of coffee and sat across from the girl, elbow on the table and chin in her hand.
Another time, another place, they could have worked together. She didn’t judge the women who worked as she had; she had relied on many just like them—ones that resisted the invading horror. As much as this girl resembled those she knew, the ones that were valiant against the Reich—Mademoiselle Fleur was not the same. She was born of the entrenched apologists, raised on rationalized guilt. How many generations would that war keep dividing this country.
Virginia rose from the table and walked to the window. Looking out, she took a moment to measure herself.
“You know why you are here, no?”
“No, madame. Not really.”
“Really? Not even the slightest notion?”
“No.”
“That hardly seems believable.”
Virginia turned and leaned against the window arms crossed, her chin lifting toward the shelf.
“Do you know what that is?”
Fleur glanced downward and away.
“C’est un jouet!”
Her eyes fixt on Fleur.
“Un jouet,” Virginia replied flatly. “A toy.”
“Oui—Pour le boudoir.”
“For the bedroom? This toy scrambled the brains of a man trained to survive anything short of a panzer shell.”
“You saw what it did to him.”
Fleur paled before her next heartbeat.
“You’ve never used it before?”
“Non, madame.”
“I need to know who gave it to you.”
Fleur’s lips trembled, the truth straining against her fear. “Le patron—the boss. He told me to try it on Armand—to see if he liked it.”
Virginia let the words hang in the space between them.
Like smoke from a suffocated flame.
She cut the silence with the one question she knew she must ask—the ember smoldering from the night before—and the one she dreaded to hear answered,
“You’ve been with Armand before?”
“Yes. Many times.”
The weapon repulsed Virginia as she turned it in her hands. She desperately wanted to push the button—if only to see how much the mademoiselle would enjoy it.
Opening the door she gave it to Marcel. “Give this to Jack, I’d rather not test my restraint.”
Morning simmered til noon, The improvement in Donovan might as well be none.
Unchecked by silence, Jack grabbed the recorder, the recording, and the weapon.
“Time for answers my friend.”
The tack shed was, like the rest of the house and barn, built of stone, with the look of it being an addition to the barn.
A lone guard stood at the door.
As expected Jack found Armand tied to a chair. A single lamp hung above his head, close enough that its heat made him sweat.
Placing two cases and a pair of leather welding gloves on the table, Jack looked down at Armand, his jaw tight.
Jack gripped Armand’s jaw, forcing him to meet his eyes— to feel Jack’s heat.
“I know the kind of people you work for. I don’t think you want them showing up with a rubber hose and a syringe full of sodium Pentothal, asking what songs you’ve been singing…”
Jack let go of Armand’s chin hard, snapping his head sideways.
Circling the table, Jack opened the smaller case. He pulled out the device that had been used on Donovan, held it upright in the light. Its stainless steel orb-tipped end pointed skyward. His thumb brushed the textured ring around the single button.
He clicked it.
The static crackle split the room. A sharp metallic scent filled the space. Ozone and electricity.
In full view of Armand, Jack pushed the button a second time dividing the room again.
Power from fear.
Before and after.
Armand’s breath caught audibly.
”I don’t know how this works, but I know, and more importantly, you know the end result if I should get too close with it.”
He waited a torturous five count.
“What will it be?”
Armand’s body recoiled, face heavy with sweat. His face twisted trying to mouth words.
“This isn’t difficult Armand. Tell me what you know, how you know it, and where the vermin who handle you hide. You have got to know that the girl was trying to kill you last night. You must have disappointed some very short fused people.”
Jack heard a faint metallic scrape and a deliberate step in the gravel outside the shed door. Easing toward the door, he pulled the bolt, locking them in.
Gunfire erupted outside the shed, “Arretez! Arretez!”
Jack dove to the floor as bullets tore through the walls. Crawling to Armand, he knocked him over and out of the line of fire.
Short bursts of small machine gun fire splintered the walls from two directions. Reacting to the sound of a body trying to break through the door, Jack pulled his pistol and moved so to have a clean shot if the door was breached.
Two more shots, and then distinct slumping and sliding of bodies on the outside of the walls.
“Lâche ça” cut through the chaos, followed the sound of a weapon hitting ground. Several pairs of feet could be heard scuffling near the door, Jack scuttled to the window and peered over the sill in time to see that Cuthbert’s team had neutralized all but one of the intruders and were now dragging him away.
He holstered his weapon and picked up the uncooperative prisoner, restoring him to an upright and seated position.
“I hope those aren’t all your friends Armand, you might be down to only one.”
Armand had some grit, spat toward Jack and remained silent. Jack respected that in most men, in this case, it only would make things harder, needing to stretch his edges further. Push his own sentimentalities into discomfort.
“Very well.”
Jack opened the wire recorder and loaded the wire reel.
Pacing around the room as if he were looking for a line on the floor that showed where ‘no turning back’ was demarcated. If this was war, that zone would be marked by rules and regulations, out here, now, he was just a detective five-thousand miles out of his jurisdiction with no one to slow him down. His mind raced thinking of Donovan never recovering, or worse, living like in a state of wavering consciousness, moments of lucidity tempting his friends with optimism just to crush it minutes later.
“Armand, you should tell me everything. There is a veil between good and evil. It’s here between us. If it should rip…”
Jack pushed play.
“31. August 1944. Leutnant Hans Brinkmann, Adjutant des Kommandanten, KL Natzweiler. Die Grube ist vorbereitet. Die Häftlinge werden aus den Baracken geführt.”
Armand’s eyes grew large, and his face went pale. He knew the camp.
“Maman ! Maman ! Non, je veux pas ! Laisse-moi ! Maman, s’il te plaît !”
Jack stopped the wire.
“Was that your little niece calling her mother, Armand? Was it her?”
He pushed play again.
“Mon bébé ! Rendez-moi mon enfant ! Non ! Non ! Vous n’avez pas le droit ! Mon Dieu, pitié !”
Armand’s face began to reflect the horror he was hearing.
Jack stopped the wire, rewound, and pushed play.
“Maman ! Maman ! Non…..”
Jack pushed play again.
“Mon bébé !….”
Jack stopped the wire, cutting off the pleading mother.
He rewound it again.
“I can do this all day.”
He pushed play.
“…Die Häftlinge werden aus den Baracken geführt.”
“Maman ! Maman ! Non, je veux pas ! Laisse-moi ! Maman, s’il te plaît !”
“Mon bébé ! Rendez-moi mon enfant ! Non ! Non ! Vous n’avez pas le droit ! Mon Dieu, pitié !”
Jack stopped the playback and counted to ten to in his head…”
Once more, the machine began to play.
BANG……BANG……
“NOOOOOOOOO!!” Armand’s voice cracked as he wailed at the top of his lungs.
Then—
BANG.
“MON DIEU, NON!! Je vais parler, s’il te plaît… plus ça…”
Armand began to uncontrollably shake and sob against the ropes.
Jack had pushed harder than he’d ever pushed anyone without physical force. Armand hadn’t cracked from this. Not today. Not yesterday. Not the day before that. He was living with a fracture years in the making. The wire was just a pry bar to open him wide.
“Please, Jack…” His head hung. “Please…no…more…”
“Tell me everything.”
“There’s a… a hidden entrance. A secret place, side of a hill…underneath the camp.”
“And?”
“You need to…see it.”
“Under Natzweiler?”
“Oui.”
“Can you take us there?”
“Yes.”
Slumping into the chair across the table, Jack stared into Armand’s eyes, hoping to find a reason to believe there were easier choices for both of them. There were always more choices. Just not always ones that would keep you sane.
Reluctance was supposed to be the moral check valve. The thing to prevent your conscience from being pulverized and scattered by the wind.
Jack opened the door and spoke to the guard. While packing away the recorder, two men entered and began to untie Armand.
“Let him get cleaned up and feed him. Keep an eye on him, but I don’t think he is going anywhere. We have a date tomorrow. We’re going places.”
CH 15- The Bunker
The overgrown two-track road wound through the valley floor. Almost invisible unless like Armand, you knew it. Marcel had appropriated a couple of surplus jeeps for the trip. Loaded with supplies, they made the slow trek better than walking. barely
Armand hadn’t looked anyone in the eye since they left the house. A hollowness hadn’t been there before—now an uneasy truce. He gave directions, Jack followed. Simple and empty. Jack couldn’t tell if he had reopened an old wound or carved a new one.
Alsace was a beautiful region with farm- and vineyard-covered hills dispersed amongst the wild forests. Pristine, remote areas like this could trick any stranger into thinking nothing bad had ever happened in all of France.
To the north, the quarry still bore the stain of the blood and sweat of the camp laborers. Even after a decade, no company would mine it. To the south, the camp.
Armand’s confession stung. Every resistance fighter had faced the same choice: die for France or live in the shackles of the Reich. Lured by thin, enthusiastic promises to keep your loved ones alive. If you would…Just. Sign. Here.
Many chose shackles.
The game was well in hand when they broke Armand. He became one of them.
Coerced into agreeing to remove the last evidence from the bunker, he worked slowly, with discretion. Over time, Armand’s disposition spiraled into darkness. Promises had been made—and marginally kept. His sister might have been better off dead. He’d never know. They had spoken twice by phone since, and the letter from the Christmas before last were her final words to him.
His regret became his hell. Sometimes, love does not conquer all.
The road ended dead at a large, rusting culvert mouth in the side of a hill. Cutting their engines and stepping out with boots crunching gravel. Noisy footsteps violating the hushed wind whispering through the firs.
Marcel and his man secured the perimeter. There was no way for anyone to approach without being seen.
Armand led Jack into the tunnel. Twenty feet in, they came to a watertight bulkhead door. A lantern hung from the ceiling to one side. Jack lit the lantern as the door was opening. The grinding squeak of the unlubricated hand wheel was sharp in Jack’s jaw.
“Lead the way Armand, this is your show.”
“Allons-y!”
Dust kicked up as they walked the corridor. The air was stale, smelling like an auto garage unopened for months. Armand led him to an insulated room with a generator. Ventilation shafts gaped open in the ceiling above it.
He opened the fuel valve, switched on the battery, and pushed the starter button. The engine fired with a cough. As he worked the choke like a trombone, the engine began to run smooth.
He shoved the wall-mounted knife switch upward. Sparks flashed through the surrounding cobwebs, the generator bogging down as the lights glowed to life.
As the shadows flickering steadied, Armand shut the door, muttering, “They didn’t have time to take this out. Too heavy, I suppose.”
Jack kept the lantern with him, the flame burning low.
Many long-dead, burned-out lights hung from the tall ceiling; a few still glowed incandescent.
The farther inside, the more disorganized everything seemed.
Documents were strewn about, a clipboard with handwritten notes hung on the wall. Jack flipped through the pages of observations with date and time stamps. Results were plotted on an X-Y axis at the bottom of each page. His German comprehension skills were nearly nil, times and dates were the only things he recognized.
One room; sample jars resting haphazard across the floor, some lined up along the walls. Jack shivered looking down at the dated jars of pickled hearts, livers, eyes, brains, and fetuses. In the corners, skulls had been cast aside without ceremony. Some, he imagined kicked as part of a game to see which one stayed on top.
Another room was organized, curated with purpose. File cabinets, books, and specimen jars, each exactly where it belonged. Jack rifled through the cabinets. Nothing after July 1943.
Turning to the dated jars. Each extended forward in time. The older specimens looked corrupted, incomplete somehow. The last two of each, nearly identical to Jack’s eye.
“Thought you were supposed to get rid of all this?”
“I couldn’t do it any longer, Decided to take care of it instead. I took some things out, just enough in case someone ever came back to check on it.”
In time, Armand had turned this bunker into a monument to his pact with the devil.
Jack wandered further into the complex, Armand close behind.
To the left, a meeting room. Inside a long table filled the space. Large enough to seat ten or twelve. A time-shredded film projection screen dangled from the ceiling at one end of the room.
On the long wall opposite the door hung a four-foot-tall by eight-foot-wide map of the world. Jack turned up the lantern and stepped closer.
Red lines radiated across the map, crooked and deliberate: Berlin, Cologne, Strasbourg, Oberursel, London, Buenos Aires, Kiev, Peking,
New York,
Chicago,
Los Angeles,
…Here.
The letter choked out all of Jack’s thoughts as it replayed in his head.
“Our early trials using artificially sustained wombs have extended our capacity to manufacture viable donors.”
If the letter was true, compared to this, B-movie scientists building the worst monsters imaginable were like children playing with paper dolls.
Jack chewed the words, “Those twisted bastards are growing human bodies to harvest their organs. To sustain themselves. Not humanity. Themselves.”
He traced the map line homeward with a finger.
“Why kill them?”
A new version of the final solution?
Human but not human?
Or something becoming too human to control.
He turned out of the room.
The blow came from behind him, solid and fast, head rebounding off the wall.
Blackness.
Armand listened to the grunt that oozed from Jack’s throat as his body slumped down the wall.
Motionless. Out cold.
“I’m sorry Jack, you wouldn’t play the game like you were supposed to. You shouldn’t have tried to salvage me.”
Armand threw down the chunk of wood and kicked the lantern down the corridor; glass chimney shattering, fuel leaking like a serpent on the floor. Catching fire as it spread.
He headed for the entrance, steeled himself as he stepped out into the tunnel. No sign of Marcel. He stalked his way to the edge of the tunnel—no sign of anyone.
Picking a line down the road that offered him some cover, he checked himself. Squatting down like a runner, he took several deep breaths.
He dipped his head. One last inhale.
“Arretez!”, echoed off the hills.
A single gunshot kicked up gravel near Armand’s running feet. Then he was off the road and out of sight.
His throbbing pulse hammered Jack awake. Light burst through as his vision faded into focus. The fumes of the burning white gas filled his mouth as he gasped back to consciousness.
Hovering over Jack, Marcel’s face filled his vision, as he gave Jack’s cheek a smack, “Jaque…Jaque.”
Marcel kicked out the flames and dragged Jack away frm the smoke.
Rolling over and pushing himself up to a kneeling position, reaching out to the wall to steady himself. His shoulder stretched up by a hand under in his armpit helping him stand before he knew that he was off the floor.
“Wh-what… h-happened?”
“Armand s’est barré!”
“Wh-at? Ran away? Doesn’t make sense.”
“C’est vrai.”
“Shit!—Ow! What the hell did he hit me with? A tree?”
“Oui, ce bout de bois,” Marcel said, pointing to a piece of lumber next to where Jack had fallen.
Jack fingered the side of his head, finding the dent Armand had gifted him.
“At least there’s no blood.”
“Oui, c’est très bon”
Moaning through the pain, his breath ragged and unsure, “We packed a camera, didn’t we?”
“Oui.”
“Could you bring it. There’s some stuff here that we need to document, and…I want to bring that map with us.”
Jack looked around.
People forget the consequences of the old saying—if these walls could talk. The walls listened first. And because they listened, they could’ve saved the world a lot of grief if they’d just caved in on the rats who built this corner of hell. We would all be home in our pajamas sipping our poison of choice, listening to Willie Mays power the Giants through this season on the radio.”
This way to the next chapter. Through the door on the left and into the darkness.
