The Rat Race by Jay Franklin (book club books txt) 📕

Gad! this country's been asleep. Here M.I.D.'s been hunting Von Bieberstein for the last ten years and what do we find? We find that he's lived in this country all his life and holds a reserve commission in the United States Navy! No wonder we had Pearl Harbor! This time, Grant, we're sure of our facts and we're going to take them to the White House."

"You may be sure of your facts, General," I agreed, "but do you happen to know a man named Axel Roscommon?"

Wakely nodded. "Of course, a thorough gentleman. See him every week or so at the Army-Navy Club. Well-informed, too."

"Did he ever tell you that he's head of Nazi intelligence in this country?"

"Rubbish!" The head of G-2 detonated impressively. "He's nothing of the kind. That's nothing but a smear put out against him by the F.B.I."

"Well, General," I admitted, "I'm wasting your time. I have some reports—"

"Just a minute, Grant. I'm not done with you. We're going to finish this Z-2 business right now." He pushed a button and uttered into his desk-phone: "Sergeant! Bring those women in here."

A moment later the door opened and Dorothy, Germaine and Virginia appeared, each looking as bedraggled as any woman who has been awakened too early.

"Winnie!" Germaine's face lighted up like a traffic go-sign. She crossed the room and kissed me. "I thought—"

General Wakely coughed, severely.

"Mrs. Tompkins," he announced, "I'm Major-General Wakely. This is G-2. The C.I.C. has rounded up your husband's chief associates for this interview. We're about to close in on the most dangerous Nazi spy-ring in existence. You know Mrs. Rutherford, of course, and this other woman goes under the name of Mrs. Jacklin."

"My name is Mrs. Jacklin," Dorothy replied with feeling, "and the O.S.S. will want to know by what authority—"

Wakely waved her and the O.S.S. aside. "Very clever, Mrs. Jacklin, or should I say Mrs. Von Bieberstein?" He turned back to Germaine. "Thanks in part to your husband, Mrs. Tompkins," he continued, "we have at last got on the track of Hitler's ace operative in the Western Hemisphere, Kurt Von Bieberstein, or should I say Frank Jacklin? We almost had him cornered five years ago but he took advantage of the confusion after Pearl—after the Navy let us—after the declaration of war, and went into hiding as a naval officer. It was only by accident, when Mr. Tompkins accidentally supplied the missing link, that we found the trail again."

"That's handsome of you, General," I said, "but I think that Counter-Intelligence deserves full credit."

He beamed at me.

"And what am I doing here, General Wakely?" Virginia cooed at the specimen of military manhood.

Wakely smiled before he remembered that he was a pattern of military efficiency. "You are known to Counter-Intelligence, Mrs. Rutherford, as one of the best agents in Z-2."

"But what is Z-2?" Virginia was frankly bemused. "Of course, I've heard of Intelligence. Isn't that something that belongs to the Army?"

The General oozed approval. "Gad! Tompkins, you train your agents well. She'd never admit a syllable without your permission. No, Mrs. Rutherford, Z-2 is to be liquidated and we're here to find this fellow Von Bieberstein."

Dorothy stood up. "I've heard all the drivel I propose to stand for," she announced. "Frank is a decent, loyal American and it's not his fault that we couldn't get along together. I've never heard of Von Bieberstein in my life. Mr. Tompkins," she added, turning to me, "if you had anything to do with this high-handed foolishness—you say you knew Frank—"

"Mrs. Jacklin," I told her. "I don't think that your husband, and I knew him well, was disloyal for one moment of his life. In any case, military intelligence can't lay a finger on your husband."

"And why not?" Wakely demanded.

"Because he's dead, General," I said.

"Suicide, eh?"

"No, sir. He went down with—"

"Winnie!" Jimmie interrupted me as though descending from a fiery cloud. "Now I see why you've been acting so strangely. You're in intelligence. Of course you couldn't tell anybody. Darling!"

Even the General looked embarrassed.

Dorothy did not relax. "I am going to leave this room and this building," she announced. "And if anybody interferes with me, you are all witnesses that I am being detained illegally. Just call the O.S.S. and tell them that Army agents under General Wakely's orders broke into my bedroom at six this morning and kidnapped me."

She turned and left the room. Nobody stopped her. Wakely pressed the buzzer again. "Sergeant!" he commanded, "see that Mrs. Jacklin is escorted out of the building and that our people keep an eye on her."

"Now, Tompkins," the General resumed, "what's this word about Von Bieberstein being dead?"

"If you'll have the ladies leave the room, General," I told him, "I'll give you my report."

Jimmie and Virginia withdrew, with visible reluctance.

"Jacklin is dead," I told him. "I think that your agents are mistaken in linking him to Von Bieberstein. In fact, I know it, because I think I know who Von Bieberstein really is. But I can't tell you without direct verbal authority from the President. I can tell you how Jacklin died."

Major-General Wakely became once more the man of action. "Good, let's have it!"

"The Navy Department," I began, "has been trying to beat the Army with the development of an atomic bomb—"

"The dastards!" Wakely all but screamed. "The dirty, treacherous, sneaking dastards! You can't trust the Navy as far as you could throw a battleship. By Gad! Tompkins, this is going straight to the White House."

"They had a man named Chalmis who did something with thorium, General," I continued. "I'm not a scientist so I can't tell you about the process. It was simpler and less expensive than what General Groves is trying to do with uranium."

"Groves!" Wakely spoke with soldierly pride. "Now there's a West Pointer for you! Four years and two billion dollars and he hasn't got it yet, but by Gad! the old West Point spirit never accepts defeat. He'll get a bomb if it takes fifty years and a hundred billion dollars. The Navy can't match that kind of guts, Tompkins. They're all yellow, the Annapolis crowd!"

"Of course this thing wasn't anything like so good as the Army's bomb, General," I assured him. "It was something whipped up in eighteen months and cost less than fifty millions."

"Pikers!"

"Well, the Navy rushed through this sneak-bomb of theirs and sent Chalmis with it on a surprise raid against the Kuriles, on the latest light carrier, the Alaska."

Wakely took a few portentous notes on a memo pad.

"Jacklin was assigned to the Alaska and our information is that he was with Chalmis in the ship's magazine when the bomb—er—accidentally—er—went off. The ship was a total loss and everyone aboard died in the explosion."

Wakely got to his feet and stood rigid for a moment.

"He was a brave man, Tompkins," he observed with soldierly emotion, "a damned brave man. By Gad, I'm almost sorry we're going to liquidate Z-2. We'd like to take you all over into M.I.D. but red tape won't let us, eh? Have to be in uniform, under West Pointers or it isn't regular. So Jacklin was one of your men and he died for the Army. He sank the Alaska and killed himself and the inventor of the thorium bomb, rather than let the Navy get away with this outrage. By Gad, Tompkins, General Groves will have a laugh over that one. I'll go and apologize to Mrs. Jacklin in person for our mistake. Von Bieberstein would never have done that job. As you know, it's the Nazis who are backing the Navy against the Army. If it wasn't for the Japs backing us against the Navy we'd have a rough time of it in this man's war. Now Tompkins, this thing is too big for us to handle. It's got to go up to the highest echelons."

I raised my eyebrows.

He nodded. "Yes, this has got to be laid before President Truman himself. By Gad, Tompkins, I'll see that you get to report to the President tomorrow morning if I have to take you there myself."

"As to Von Bieberstein, General," I said, "he can wait until tomorrow. When you know who he is and where he is placed—with the President's permission—you will probably decide to go away. After all, even you would hesitate to arrest on a treason charge the—" I stopped.

Wakely leaned across his desk. "Tompkins," he assured me, "I'll get Von Bieberstein if it's the last thing I ever do. By Gad! If you help me, I'll see that you get the Order of Merit, a Presidential citation and the Orange Heart."

"Don't you mean the Purple Heart?" I asked.

Wakely snorted. "That's merely for combat duty. The Orange Heart is a confidential decoration given to those who serve intelligence well on the home front, even including civilians. It's like the Army E-Award but is personal and worn on the inside of the coat-lapel. It is conferred on the recommendation of the Deputy Chief of Staff, G-2."

He buzzed again. "Sergeant!" he barked. "Get me the office of the Military Aide, the White House, and if they don't answer, wake up Harry Vaughan at Blair House, even if he's still in bed, which he probably is—the lucky stiff! Tell him this is top-priority."

I sighed. The water was already far over my head, but it was too late to draw back. I had to swim for the farther shore.

CHAPTER 19

"The President will see you now, Mr. Tompkins," said the White House usher, as he beckoned me to follow him.

A pleasant, rangy, mild-mannered man rose from behind the great desk and shook my hand.

"Glad to see you, Mr. Tompkins," he said. "General Vaughan has been telling me great things about your work. What can I do for you?"

As I looked at the guileless, friendly face, my heart sank. Here was one man who should not be deceived. It would be as easy as stuffing a ballot box.

"Mr. President," I told him, "when I left the Pentagon Building yesterday, I had an elaborate report to submit to you. But I decided that the President of the United States was entitled to the simple truth."

"That's right!" snapped the Chief Executive.

"So if you'll listen to me for five minutes," I continued, "I'll tell you the strangest story you ever heard."

President Truman coughed. "General Vaughan has told me of the fine work you've been doing for Z-2," he observed. "As you can imagine, I'm terribly busy taking on this job."

"Mr. President," I began, "to begin with, there's no such organization as Z-2. If you'll listen for a few minutes I'll tell you the whole story."

I did.

At the end of it, he smiled at me.

"Mr. Tompkins," he said, "you're a married man, aren't you?"

"Yes, Mr. President."

"Then you tell Mrs. Tompkins for me that I want her to take you home and take good care of you for the next few weeks. You've been overdoing it. This Z-2 work has taken it out of you. You need a rest. Now don't you worry about Z-2," he continued. "What you need to do is to take things easy. The work will go right ahead. I'm putting Z-2 under General Wakely. This country needs better intelligence services and they ought to be concentrated under one responsible head, if you ask me."

"But I tell you, Mr. President," I insisted, "there never was such an organization as Z-2. I invented it in order to clear myself with the F.B.I."

He flashed a boyish grin at me. "But there's no doubt that the Alaska went down like a stone?"

"She went up like a sky-rocket, sir."

"Then this thorium bomb doesn't sound as though it was practical, sinking one of our ships like that."

"Mr. President," I argued, "any bomb will explode if it is deliberately detonated. This bomb was deliberately touched off by Professor Chalmis. He wanted to prevent its use in warfare."

The President nodded. "Yes, yes, Mr. Tompkins. You explained that to me before. Now you be sure to tell your wife to take good care of you. When you're rested up, you come on down and see me again and we'll talk some more about this Z-2 work of yours. We can use men like you in the State Department. I'm sorry I don't know more about it, but all of President Roosevelt's papers have been removed from the White House and I don't even know what he told Stalin at Yalta. Perhaps you'd better talk to the State Department before you take that rest. That's what they're for. Thank you for seeing me."

Two beefy Secret Service men appeared in the doorway.

"Is there any particular man I should see at the Department, sir?" I asked. "I want to get this whole business cleared up."

The President stood up and shook my hand in dismissal. "Just go across the street and tell them I sent you," he said. "Good day to you, sir."

The two body-guards closed