maintain friendly, even cordial, relations, even cheering American victories when they were announced. We’re all in this war together, aren’t we?
Like any neighborhood or cluster of businesses, there was a pattern to life and any deviation from that pattern attracted attention.
Thus, the presence of the two unmarked cars with two men in each was immediately noted by the two Germans. One car was in front and down the street and the other in the rear of the building and down a ways. The occupants of both vehicles appeared to be interested in Swenson Engineering, and were quickly identified by the two Germans as a menace.
Instead of driving onto their property, Braun and Krause drove past and around, parked a little distance away, and observed. They were quietly thankful that the Ford didn’t have the Swenson Engineering sign attached at the moment. After a while, the two men in one of the cars were spelled by two more men in another car. It confirmed to the two Germans that they’d been discovered.
Braun sighed. “They are not very good at their jobs. They are either FBI or local police and it doesn’t matter. We’ve been betrayed and now we have to run.”
“Where to?” asked Krause.
“Wherever you want,” Braun said. “As we previously discussed, we are going to split up and go our own ways. Our part in this war is over. We have no way of notifying the people in Mexico who will doubtless soon be arrested if it hasn’t happened already. We have phony identification that should enable each of us to fashion a life. When Germany is victorious, we can each, separately, find our way back to the Reich for whatever is due us. Since we failed, I doubt it will be much of a reward,” he added bitterly, thinking that their reward could be years in a prison camp as the Reich didn’t tolerate failures.
Krause was silent. He’d been listening to the radio and reading the newspapers and if they were only half correct, the Third Reich was in grave danger. The offensives in Russia had stalled and a second Russian winter was upon the German army. Also, the Americans were in North Africa helping the British and there was a massive buildup of American forces that the German navy was unable to stop. No, German victory in his opinion was far from a foregone conclusion, and Braun’s dreams of returning to Germany might never come true. Defeat seemed far more likely. He also felt that Japan would sooner or later feel the wrath of the Americans.
Nor did Krause think it would be all that easy to disappear, even in the vastness of the United States. If the American government had their names, they likely had their pictures, and he’d seen photos of wanted men on the walls of post offices and in the newspapers. He could envision some small child telling his mommy that the man in line to buy stamps looked just like the man glowering from the wanted poster, the man accused of espionage. Oh, that would be wonderful, he thought.
“We will need money,” Krause said.
“Fortunately, we have some. There’s almost seven thousand dollars in the safe deposit box at the bank. Since it’s in another name, I doubt that the police are watching it yet. I suggest we get the money, split it up, and disappear. You will leave first, as I have a job to do.”
Krause nodded slowly. He knew he was being cheated. He’d counted the money when Braun wasn’t looking and knew there was more than twelve thousand dollars, not seven. He didn’t like the thought of Braun screwing him and leaving him on the run for the rest of his life. Krause thought he understood what job Braun was going to do. But what could he do about it and how could it work to his benefit?
“All is quiet on the Pacific Front,” joked Captain Merchant. “And I like it that way.”
Dane couldn’t complain either. Work, if you could call it that, was falling into a routine. He now had a staff of two and they did much of the initial work, leaving him to analyze what they had written down. One of his staff was Nancy Sullivan, the half-Japanese daughter of the store owner in Bridger. She’d been raised by a Japanese mother, and both spoke and read the language far better than he. She could also write it, which he couldn’t at all. Going to work for the navy had transformed what Dane thought was a shy young girl into a bright and cheerful young woman who exuded considerable confidence. This further confounded those who thought all Japanese women were shy and submissive.
Getting Nancy onto the base had taken a little help from Merchant and Spruance, but she had proven invaluable, even if she did draw some strange glances from others. She puzzled them. Was she Japanese or not? As long as they left her alone, she was content and safe, while her mother prudently remained in hiding somewhere near Bridger.
The second staffer was a different story. He was a recently commissioned ensign who had majored in Japanese and Asian studies at Harvard and, in Dane’s opinion, might be able to write poetry in Japanese but couldn’t order food in a Japanese restaurant. The ensign was clearly frustrated that a young college student was so much more knowledgeable than he. It also meant he was relegated to routine clerical tasks, which thoroughly annoyed him.
Nor was Amanda all that busy either. There had been no major fighting in some months, and that meant empty beds in the hospital, while those that were occupied contained patients who were either mending or were stabilized. As a result, they had plenty of time to be together, but no opportunity to be intimate. Their time at the beach had not occurred again. Amanda had hinted that she might be willing to go away with him for a few days, but where? Only Merchant had his own place off base and Grace now spent a lot of time there. He and Amanda joked that they did not want to share the place, even if Merchant would agree to it. They supposed they could go farther away, perhaps to Arizona, but both were essentially on call and neither wanted to take the chance of being absent if something important occurred.
Dane was staring at a wall when the phone rang. He answered and a deep voice responded. “Commander Dane?”
“Speaking.”
“I wish to make a bargain with you.”
“Do I know you?”
“In a way. My name is Gunther Krause and my companion is Wilhelm Braun.”
The information took Tim’s breath away. “How did you get this number?”
Krause chuckled. “It was easy. I asked the base information for the name of the navy person who was working with the FBI. I didn’t know you by name, but I assumed there had to be someone working as liaison with them. They gave me your name and number right away. You really ought to be more careful with your secrets. After all, there is a war on.”
“What do you want, Mr. Krause?”
“I wish to go free. In return for information of tremendous value to you, you will have me pardoned of all crimes I might have committed, and you will permit me to live the rest of my life in the United States.”
“I don’t think I can do that.”
“Of course you can’t. However, you can send the request to your government and they can do it. In return for that and as a good-faith down payment, I will now tell you what Herr Braun is planning to do.”
Wilhelm Braun parked his car in front of the building that housed Zuckerman’s offices. He got out, looked around, and saw nothing out of the ordinary, nothing to arouse his primal instincts. He was focused on the idea of killing Zuckerman the Jew. He knew his hatred was making him careless, but it didn’t bother him. He wanted to kill and Zuckerman the Jew would be an easy target. He looked forward to seeing the look of horror on Zuckerman’s face. Perhaps he would rape his secretary while the Jew watched before putting both of them out of their misery.
The Jew was the only one who knew he was here, and therefore, it must have been Zuckerman who turned him in to the police. He did wonder if it had been the supposedly highly vaunted FBI who’d been watching his building, since whoever it had been was so obvious. Perhaps the FBI had had to farm out the task to local police who were far less skilled than Hoover’s Bureau. It seemed likely but right now it was terribly irrelevant. He would be on his way out of San Diego in a very few minutes.
He shifted so the pistol in his belt was within easy reach. Once he’d sworn his life to his Fuehrer and, later in Mexico, had wondered if he had the courage to die for the Reich. Now he knew. He did have that strength. But he would not die alone and hopefully not today. Zuckerman and his whore of a secretary would die today and burn in the hell that all Jews deserved.
