The Sandler Inquiry Part 40

And he ordered his counterfeiters to keep working. Right up till the end " Did they?"

"Yes" he said with a pained smile.

"And beyond. When the Bolsheviks got to Berlin, the counterfeiters packed it in. TheySandler, Andorpher, and whatever help they had-tried to escape with all the equipment, heading south toward Austria. They travelled by truck. That essentially is how we know what they were up to. The main truck, bearing most of the equipment plus crates and crates of freshly printed pound notes, broke down on the escape route. They couldn't bury it, it was too big. And they couldn't abandon it, it was too valuable. So they tried to hide it. Sandler released the brake on the top of a hill. They let it roll down until it splashed into a lake. And there it sank."

"Forgotten?" asked Thomas with obvious sarcasm.

"For a few weeks. Then the crates broke open. Millions of pounds worth of notes came floating to the surface. Fives, tens, twenties, and fifties. Need I say, the locals had a fine time. Wringing out the money and hanging it in trees to dry. It was the first time Allied intelligence heard of it. Wasn't exactly the type of thing that could be kept quiet. It was the first time any outsider had any inkling about Bernhard." Whiteside's brow was furrowed.

"There'd been suspicion for a long time, mind you. There were simply too' many pounds circulating. But now we knew. Our sacred pound sterling, and our friends the Sausage Makers had been printing it "And Sandler?" asked Thomas, sensing the next chapter.

"And Andorpher?"

Whiteside made a gesture with his mouth. It was half wince, half pained smile.

"This is where it gets sketchy," he said.

"But some basics are known. Andorpher, for example."

"Captured?"

"In a sense. He was found dead, seventy-five miles east. Not west, mind you, but east. He was lying in a ditch Whiteside delivered the next sentence as casually as ve might give a cricket score or a weather report.

"Andorpher was lying in a ditch with his throat Cut.

Ear to ear. That left our friend Sandler."

"Alone?"

"Almost. When the trucks were pulled out of the lake we learned that he'd taken along some items for good luck. The plates. The engraved counterfeiting plates."

"Of course," said Thomas, almost inaudibly.

Whiteside looked at the younger man as if to judge him. Whiteside's eyebrows were slanting downward in a nervous frown; his teeth were clenched in concentration.

"Now," Whiteside continued, 'let's see if Thomas Daniels is a man or a boy. Let's see if he can spot the fox in the thicket."

"Go ahead."

"You're obviously a clever young man, Mr. Daniels. Otherwise you would never have gotten this far. And if you're as sly as I give you credit for being, you'll have spotted something very wrong.

There must have been something in the story I told you that struck you as odd."

"A certain detail or turn?" asked Thomas.

"Yes. What was it?" he asked challengingly.

Thomas didn't have to think.

"East made no sense' he said simply.

"In light of everything about Arthur Sandler, east makes no sense at all."

"Exactly!" snapped Whiteside with enthusiasm, bringing a fist down hard on his desk. He allowed a moment or two to regather his poise.

"For twenty-two years, Mr. Daniels, east has made no sense.

And now we'll discuss why."

Chapter 15 "No b.l.o.o.d.y sense at all' continued Whiteside.

"None! Here's a top American agent, a man who spent the war slipping back and forth across enemy lines, a man who moved around Austria and Germany with obscene ease, a man who knew the inner mechanisms of German intelligence for five years, and what does he do when the war is over? He moved one hundred eighty degrees in the wrong direction.

Instead of returning to the Americans, he jumps into the Russians'laps'

"Whiteside shrugged disgustedly.

"We know he was in Moscow for a month at least' "There are possible explanations" said Thomas thoughtfully.

"Of course there are," buffed Whiteside.

"Countless explanations.

Want to know the best one, the one most popular at the Foreign Office?

Here it is: The Yanks recruited a closet Bolshevik in 1941.

Sandler, the theory goes, was working three ways from the middle, with his highest allegiance being given to Moscow."

"I don't follow," said Thomas.

Whiteside buffed slightly, as if mildly exasperated at having to explain.

"A triple game, Mr. Daniels he elaborated.

"You Americans thought Sandler was your own spy acting as a double agent against the Germans. In a sense he was, but he was also a triple, selling out Was.h.i.+ngton to Moscow whenever he had the opportunity. That would have explained why he went east instead of west."

"Intriguing," said Thomas reflectively.

"Intriguing, yes:' retorted Whiteside.

"And possible. But it doesn't wash. Not all the way. We tried several theories on Sandler.

We had to. Can you guess why?"

"It's obvious, isn't it? He had those plates. He kept using them"

"Brilliant' remarked Whiteside quietly from behind white teeth that were most clenched in annoyance.

"He kept printing our money."

Thomas suppressed a sudden smile as the incredible Sandler fortune, the one which had magically materialized after the war, flashed into his mind. Of course, he thought to himself. Of course, of course, of course!