The Fighting Agents Part 35

OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE.

OSS LONDON STATION OSS WAs.h.i.+NGTON.

EYES ONLY COLONEL DONOVAN; CAPTAIN DOUGLa.s.sFOLLOWING FROM CANIDY RECEIVED 1110 LONDON TIME FORWARDED AUTHORITY DANCY CAPT WAC.BRUCE AND/OR STEVENS WILL HAVE MESSAGE IN HANDS NO LATER THAN 1230 LONDON TIME.QUOTE TOP SECRET OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE EYES ONLY BRUCE AND STEVENS1. ON SAFE ARRIVAL STATION VII INFORMED BY YACHTSMAN EXLAX AND TINCAN ONE IN HANDS OF CIVIL AUTHORITIES STATION V. TINCAN TWO SAFE WELL STATION VII.2. SURPRISE BOARDING BY BLACK GUARD AND RIVER POLICE YACHT STATION V RESULTED DISCOVERY EXLAX OPERATIONAL FUNDS. HUNGARIANS PRESUMABLY BELIEVE FUNDS INTENDED FOR PURCHASE BLACK MARKET FOOD. EXLAX AND TINCAN ONE ARRESTED AS BLACK MARKETEERS. SENTENCED NINE ZERO DAYS HARD LABOR COAL MINES STATION V.3. YACHTSMAN REPORTS DOc.u.mENTS NOT REPEAT NOT QUESTIONED.4. YACHTSMAN STATES SITUATION FAIRLY COMMON. ABSENCE PREPAYMENT GRAFT BLACK GUARD AND RIVER POLICE REGULARLY ARREST BLACK MARKETEERS CONFISCATE GOODS OR MONEY CONFINE LOCAL JAIL AT MINE HARD LABOR AS LESSON. YACHTSMAN BELIEVES THEY WILL BE RELEASED WITHOUT FURTHER DIFFICULTY PRIOR COMPLETION SENTENCE.5. HAVE TAKEN FOLLOWING ACTION.A. WILL REMAIN HERE PENDING DECISIONS ACTIONS ENUMERATED LATER HEREIN.B. TINCAN TWO FLOWN CAIRO FOR ICING THERE. RECEIPT THIS MESSAGE WILL CONFIRM SAFE ARRIVAL.C. YACHTSMAN ORDERED TO STATION V TO PERSONALLY CONFIRM LOCATION OF EXLAX AND TINCAN ONE AND TO EXPLORE POSSIBILITY ESCAPE OR RELEASE BY FORCE. EXPECTED TRAVEL TIME FOUR REPEAT FOUR DAYS. STATION V TO STATION VII COMMUNICATIONS SLOW AND UNRELIABLE REPEAT UNRELIABLE.6. REQUEST PERMISSION EFFECT RELEASE EXLAX AND TINCAN ONE BEST MEANS AT MY DISCRETION. IF SO REQUIRE IMMEDIATE DISPATCH VIA STATION VIII NEXT AVAILABLE HUNGARIAN SPEAKING TEAM. STANDARDTEAM EQUIPMENT SHOULD BE AUGMENTED WITH THIRTY POUNDS COMPOSITION C2 AND EQUIVALENT TWENTY THOUSAND US DOLLARS IN HUNGARIAN, GERMAN AND YUGOSLAVIAN CURRENCY. TEAM SHOULD HAVE HUNGARIAN AND OR YUGOSLAVIAN IDENTIFICATION DOc.u.mENTS.7. IN VIEW NECESSARY ABSENCE EXLAX CONTROLLER SUGGEST FINE AS TEMPORARY REPLACEMENT.

CANIDY.

END QUOTE.

TOP SECRET.

"Oh, s.h.i.+t! s.h.i.+t!" Chief Ellis said.

He picked up the telephone and dialed a number from memory.

Staley's familiar voice came on the line: "Capitol 3-1991."

"Is he up yet?" Ellis asked.

"I heard the c.r.a.pper flush," Staley reported.

"Well, don't say nothing unless he tells you to go anywhere but here," Ellis said. "If he does, say I called and said I think he should come here straight from there."

"What's up, Ellis?" Colonel Wild Bill Donovan's voice asked.

"There's something I think you ought to see as soon as you can, Sir."

"Will it wait until after breakfast, would you say?"

"Yes, Sir, it'll keep that long."

"We'll be there inside of forty-five minutes," Donovan said, and the line went dead.

Ellis tapped the cutoff b.u.t.ton on the telephone with his finger and dialed another number from memory.

"Capitol 3-2772," a male voice answered.

"Captain Dougla.s.s?" Ellis asked.

"Who's calling, please?" the man asked.

"Marmon, G.o.dd.a.m.n you, is that you?"

"You don't have to bite my a.s.s off, Chief," Marmon said righteously. "I thought I recognized your voice."

"Is the Captain there?"

"You want me to get him?"

"No. s.h.i.+t! I'm taking a census."

In a moment, Captain Dougla.s.s came on the line.

"Good morning, Chief," he said. "What's up?"

"I don't know what's going on where you're going, but if you can put it off, I think it would be a good idea if you came in."

"He ask for me?"

"No, Sir, but I think he probably will."

"I'll be there in half an hour," Captain Dougla.s.s said. "Thank you, Chief."

Ellis hung the telephone up.

"That important, huh?" Warrant Officer Vole asked.

Ellis looked at him.

"If you're fis.h.i.+ng for an explanation," Ellis said, "don't."

"I read the decrypt," Vole protested.

"That's only because we haven't figured out a way for you to decrypt stuff without reading it," Ellis said matter-of-factly.

He got up and walked to the safe and worked the combination. From a two-foot-high stack of folders piled precariously in the bottom, he pulled a thick one with a TOP SECRET cover sheet and EXLAX written on it with a thick pointed pen.

He carried it to the desk and started going through it. There was no more of a question in his mind that the Colonel would want the paperwork in front of him than there was that he would want to talk Canidy's Eyes Only Operational Immediate over with Captain Dougla.s.s. By the time either of them walked into the office, the paperwork would be ready for them.

Ellis's eye fell on the overnight traffic. He should get that out of the way before he laid this stuff out.

Then he had another thought. He opened a drawer and took out a lined pad and a pencil and wrote quickly on it.

"You want to make yourself useful," he said to Vole. "Get this encoded and out right away. And then stick around. I think there will be a reply to the Eyes Onlys."

Vole took the sheet of lined paper from Ellis and read it.

Urgent via K S F for W Y Z B For Hq US Forces in Philippines Attention Brigadier General Fertig Keep your s.h.i.+rt on stop J. R. Ellis Chief USN Stop End "You really want me to send this?" Vole asked.

"Just that way," Chief Ellis said.

4.

OFFICE OF THE STATION CHIEF OSS LONDON STATION BERKELEY SQUARE, LONDON 1600 HOURS 17 FEBRUARY 1943.

"Is something wrong, David?" Lt. Colonel Edmund T. Stevens asked.

Bruce looked at him with his eyebrows raised.

"I would say so, wouldn't you?" he replied dryly.

"I mean, right now, here," Stevens said. "You were frowning. "

"Oh," Bruce said, and then managed a faint smile. He gestured vaguely around his office. "Actually, I was thinking, paraphrasing Churchill, that 'never have so few been commanded by so many.' "

The three visitors' chairs in the office were occupied by Colonel Stevens, Capt. Helene Dancy, and Lt. Charity Hoche. Capt. Stanley S. Fine was leaning against the wall.

"I don't see that it could be avoided," Stevens said.

"No," Bruce agreed, then: "I presume this is one of those things in which Miss Hoche has a special interest?"

Stevens nodded.

"Well, let's get on with it, then," Bruce said. "You first, Charity, please."

She didn't seem surprised, but neither did she say anything.

"The way we do this, Charity," Bruce explained, "is 'in the military manner.' That is to say, the junior member of this panel is asked for his . . . her . . . opinion first, so that it will not be influenced by that of more senior members. "

Charity nodded.

"I don't see that we have any choice but to give d.i.c.k Canidy what he's asked for," she said, and then quickly added, "at least until we hear to the contrary from Was.h.i.+ngton. "

"That doesn't address the question of authorizing him to try to get Fulmar and Professor Dyer out of the jail in Pecs," Bruce said.

"I think we'll be told what to do about that," Charity said. Bruce looked at Stevens, who just perceptibly nodded his head in agreement.

"What he's asked for, specifically, is the next available Hungarian-speaking team, thirty pounds of C-2, and twenty thousand dollars in mixed currency," Bruce said. "That's what you mean?"

Charity nodded. "That, and Captain Fine to step in as control."

"We'll start with that, then," Bruce said. "Unless I hear an objection, I will ask Fine if there is some reason he cannot, or thinks he should not, take over as control."

He looked at Stevens, then at Helene Dancy, and finally at Fine.

"No, Sir," Fine said.

"So ordered," Bruce said.

"One thing, Stanley," Stevens said. "Charity is cleared for this. All the way."

"Yes, Sir," Fine said.

"I want to clarify that, Stan," Bruce said. "Charity is to be brought into anything connected with this that Colonel Stevens and myself are."

"Yes, Sir," Fine repeated.

"Well, why don't you sit here," Bruce said, "and take over this meeting?"

"I don't mind standing, Sir," Fine said.

"I'd rather walk around," Bruce said, and gestured for Fine to sit down.

Fine sat down at Bruce's desk, put a lined pad on the green blotter in front of him, and took a pencil from a dozen sitting, point up, in a gray pottery orange-marmalade jar.

"Helene," he said. "You'll take care of the money? Is that going to pose any problem?"

"We don't have that much," Capt. Dancy said. "But I can have it by, say, nine in the morning."

"And the C-2?"

"I'm sure there's at least that much at Whitbey House," Colonel Stevens said.

"There should be," Helene Dancy agreed. "But I'll check."

"That, then, brings us to the team," Fine said.

"First," Charity Hoche said. "To the question of their doc.u.ments. Canidy said Hungarian and/or Yugoslavian. If we can, I think we should give them both."

Fine's face was expressionless, but Colonel Stevens thought he saw in his eyes a hint of surprise, even annoyance.

"Helene?" Fine asked.

"Doc.u.ments Section can handle that," Capt. Dancy said. "They'll need four hours."

"Why so long?" Charity asked.

"They don't have very much of the proper paper for the photographs," Dancy explained. "We have to use their paper; it produces a characteristic grain and image flatness. The Hungarian is different from the Yugoslavian. And the only place we can get it is on the local black markets. It is also lousy paper, and it takes that much time to be sure. In case they have to print the photographs twice, or even three times."

"But they will be able to come up with what we need?" David Bruce asked.

"Probably in forty-five minutes," Helene Dancy said. "I'm using the worst possible scenario."

"Have we got a team to photograph?" Fine asked.

"They have all been photographed, Stanley," Helene Dancy said. "Several times, in work clothes, suits, even in Black Guard uniforms. Printing Printing is the problem." is the problem."

"That's not what I really meant," Fine said. "I'll rephrase. Is a team available? If there is more than one available, which is the better of them?"

"I was out there when this came up, Stanley," Colonel Stevens said. "There are two teams finished with training, one in the last week."