One Touch of Espionage:
The 1st Touchstone Action-Mystery
(c) 2011
by David M. Delo
Smashwords Edition
ISBN
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Table of Contents
Chapter 1: May 31, Washington, D.C.
Chapter 2: May 31, Near the Black Sea
Chapter 4: June 1. Intelligence HQ, Versailles
Chapter 5: June 2, Reuil Malmaison
Chapter 8: June 2, Reuil Malmaison
Chapter 9: June 3, Washington, D.C.
Chapter 13: June 3, Outskirts of Versailles
Chapter 14: June 4, Washington, D. C.
Chapter 15: June 4, Grindelwald
Chapter 16: June 4. Grindelwald
Chapter 17: June 4, Grindelwald
Chapter 19: June 5, Intelligence HQ, Versailles
Chapter 20: June 5, Grindelwald
Chapter 21: June 6, St. Goddard's Pass
Chapter 22: June 7, Lake Garda
Chapter 24: June 8, Washington, D.C.
Chapter 25: June 8, The Orient Express
Chapter 26: June 8. The Outskirts of Paris
Chapter 35: June 11, Bay of Venice
Chapter 36: June 12, Bay of Venice
Prologue: May 30. Paris, France
The night air on the drive from Reuil Malmaison to Paris was exhilarating because it had rained earlier that evening, a short but powerful shower without as much as a thunderclap. The low shroud of clouds had left the night as black as they came, which made the lights of Paris all the more brilliant. And there was only one Paris.
The downpour had amused the French who watched life on the streets from the shelter of their favorite bistros that lined the wide sidewalks of the Champs Elyseés. It infuriated the rest, caught in the open without a shade tree or a parapluie, umbrella, to open over them.
Nick and I had taken his TRY-4, as usual, into Paris for one of our midweek bar tours. Once each week we reviewed the mug shots of a number of known Eastern Bloc intelligence agents thought to be operating out of Paris. Then, for that thirty minute investment, we were paid for the opportunity of cruising Parisian bars and watering holes once or twice a week. Most of the time we roamed the streets of the city on Friday and Saturday. Since the tours were on the Unites States Army, we were quite willing to sacrifice our personal time.
Tonight was a bit different. It was Thursday, but we’d both been a bit ancy lately and decided to tool into town for dinner. The humidity stayed uncomfortably high after the shower, and I could see little puddles of water trapped between the worn cobblestones which surfaced the boulevard surrounding the Arch de Triomphe. At the last traffic light on the Champs Elyseés before the long, straight stretch toward the Rond Point, a Frenchman in a new Simca pulled alongside. He revved his engine and smiled disdainfully at the two of us in our little black British car.
“What do you think?”asked Nick as he tapped the ash of his cigarette into the overflowing ashtray.
“Might be interesting,” I said with a grin, always open to a little excitement.
As the light turned green, the two machines spun wheels and leaped forward. No one paid any attention to our petite impromptu race. The Champs Elyseés had always been an unofficial speedway; the French delighted in turning their grand boulevard into a playground for their little, squealy, yellow-eyed bugs.
Side by side, the Simca and TRY-4 sped over shiny cobblestone. The Elyseés was eight lanes wide and it ran true until it intersected La Place de la Concorde. As you approached that oval, a central fountain proffered its artistic delights.
The Champs Elyseés-Concorde intersection was not T-shaped, and traffic from the Elyseés entered not at the center of the fountain but near one end of the inner plaza. Traffic simply curved around the end of the fountain. Just before the racers entered the oval, the Frenchman downshifted and lost traction. The slight slither lost him just enough ground so that as the two vehicles reached the intersection, Nick's TRY-4 led by a half a length. Since Nick was on the right of the Simca, French law said that he had priorité a droite, the absolute right of way, a right that included cutting in front of anyone on his left.
Oh, yeah! The Frenchman could see what was coming. Nick minimized his arc around the circle by cutting close to the fountain. Since he was cutting across traffic lanes from right to left, the law was with him. As he cropped his turn, he put the squeeze on the Simca.
The Frenchman had three options: hit the American and be responsible for an accident; collide with the magnificent fountain and be responsible for damaging a national treasure; or, brake, admit defeat, and wait for another day.
An accident was unthinkable to everyone, and to crash into the fountain would create a national incident. Parisians adored their sculptures, and this one featured a charming bronze lady who wore nothing but a sly, contented smile. She peered out at us, brazen and gorgeous in her altogether as she cradled a fish that spouted water into a thin-lipped basin.
The driver of the Simca pumped his brake. Unfortunately, he had waited until the last minute so he had to brake rather hard. The back end of his car lost traction on the slick cobblestones, the driver overcorrected, and the Simca did an uncontrolled three hundred sixty degree spin. Luckily, the oval was empty. No harm done except a nasty bruise to a Frenchman's pride.
Nick tooted the horn twice, and I waved “ta-ta” to our fuming continental challenger. Then Nick slowed to the pace of traffic and we paralleled the Seine River. A mile or so later, we cut north through thinning traffic and entered a neighborhood of old apartments. The widely spaced street lights left most of the arrondisement, district, in shadow, a drab ambiance encouraged by the uniformly gray facades of the buildings from centuries of soot. Nor had this voisinage, neighborhood, seen a new brick since the end of World War II.
Nick slowed, did a U-turn in the street, nosed into an opening between two cars parked on the sidewalk, and killed the motor. Sidewalk parking is encouraged. It reduces the number of fender benders.
Still chuckling at the shaking fist of the French driver, I got out of the TRY-4, checked to make sure I had my wallet and cigarettes, then slipped on my brown suede jacket. Nick unfolded his six-foot, four-inch frame, crossed the street, lit a Winston, and waited. I checked the details of my appearance in the car door mirror, then said, as I strolled across the street, “Wasn't that a nice three-sixty?”
“Horatio,” said Nick, shaking his head as though feeling sad, “you take longer to get ready than the Colonel takes to finish a sentence. How are we going to earn our keep if you're so friggin' slow?”
Yes, my given name is Horatio, Horatio Delmer Touchstone. Nick, like everyone, usually calls me Touch; most of the time anyway. At an early age I decided I was not Horatio, and Delmer sounded like something made of plastic, so I became Touch.
Without changing pace, I flipped Pirelli the bird. “Et ta mère, mon gar. And your mother, old friend. This barhopping is a total waste and you know it. The last time a real spook stuck his head inside a body shop around here, Colonel Pocket was still in Berlin exchanging food tickets for a quick blow job.”
Nick's chuckle turned into a cough. Smoke, curling from his nostrils and angular mouth, turned him into a friendly dragon. “So what?” he replied. “It would spoil his fantasies if we told him we were only eyeballing quail. He'd cut off our funds. And that, you know, would spell the end of these weekly tours de force. We can't afford these places on what we make.”
“Amen,” I said.
I shuffled down a short flight of steps into an unmarked lounge. Once inside, I stopped to let my eyes adjust to the dim, yellow light. The decor and ambiance of the jazz bar, Le Fou Monde, The Crowd, was comfortably different from American bars. It had an immediate French stamp.
The room was a simple rectangle whose walls were raw brick. A long black bar, an old sofa, and a few over-sized lounging pillows occupied the far wall. A jazz trio, led by a blues harmonica, played softly in a distant corner. Closely-spaced wrought iron tables and chairs were scattered haphazardly across the room. Black, wrought iron lamps, projecting from the wall above the tables, emitted a yellow glow.
Like most Parisian nightspots of the mid-1960s, the low-light ambiance was further softened by a thin haze of smoke that gathered about a foot below the ceiling. Le Fou Monde was packed.
I eased my way towards the bar. Nearly everyone was talking, yet the mood remained hushed. Several couples, as intertwined as mating snakes, carried on at their tables as though they were the only twosome in the room. I loved the French method of coping with intimacy in public. I admit it. An amorous pair could gain total privacy by simply ignoring the existence of everyone who was not an immediate part of their aura. It was this invisible shield that created the image of the sensual, inwardly-focused French lovers at large. Ah, l’amour.
Nick slid between two berets and tried to catch the bartender's eye. The man he was looking for was futzing with the tubes of a hissing espresso machine. I saw the bartender serve several customers in Nick's immediate vicinity as Nick waffled a hundred franc note. The bartender was a short, paunchy, partially bald man with a white apron wrapped high around his stomach. He looked like someone had molded him by pressing him into a stout jar. He had no neck, but his baggy jowls replicated the curve of a distended stomach. The skin of his face cast a yellow-gray hue, as though jaundiced. His chipmunk cheeks pushed down the corners of his lower lip, providing the man a permanent pout, the perfect expression to complement the curvature of his ponderous black mustache.
Every minute or so, without altering his dour expression or disrupting his routine, the Frenchman pursed his lips two or three times. This muscular exercise endowed his sad sack face with a modicum of life and cleared his drooping Gitane cigarette of its growing ash. Otherwise, the man registered little emotion and less energy.
I knew the bartender was aware of Nick. So did Nick, but there was nothing to do except wait. The Frenchman wiped another draft beer glass on the loose end of his apron. He was in no hurry to favor a one-time visitor, a tourist, sans doubt, without doubt, and American to boot. Indeed, in the dust-colored crowd of Frenchmen, Nick and I stood out like bleached mannequins at a redneck bar.
I leaned against the cool, brick wall and scanned the crowd knowing that Nick would eventually prevail. I was in no hurry. A few pair of French eyes glanced at me. In those eyes I saw the same, monotonous message: Yankee, Go Home. After my first week in Paris, nearly a year ago, now, I told Nick about the negative messages I kept receiving from the locals. He told me not to take it personally. Now I know what he meant. Paris had its priorities. The city belonged first to les mademoiselles, secondly to les artistes, and to the clochards, the bums who lived beneath the bridges. After that, the city was the private turf of resident Parisians. Ask any resident of the city. They were the put-upon, forced to suffer the presence of outsiders, who, by their very presence, adulterated the sterling quality of la grande ville, the big city.
In truth, Parisian tolerance depended on the nature of the invading race. Visiting French from Marseilles, Nancy, and Brest were but familial annoyances. The Swiss, Canadians, and Italians for the most part, were ignored. But for Americans and Germans, the locals went out of their way to be rude.
Neither Nick nor I wanted to go home. We liked Paris. We liked the food, the museums, and the ambiance. And, of course, we lusted after its women with their slender figures, delicate bones, and maddening expressions of total indifference. We agreed that French women dressed to the nines, and that when they sat with their legs crossed, their high heels pulling willowy calf muscles into smooth, tight lines, and they looked sensuous enough to make one's mouth go dry.
In the cafes and bistros, in contrast to their aloof demeanor, they lavished attention on their male companions. If the men in general had a feigned indifference of their own, it was expressed by the slovenly manner in which they dressed. For the life of me, I could not figure out how to mimic their style.
Nick handed me a drink, then we strolled past several conversations to the far corner of the room, opposite the jazz trio. “I'll say this about French women,” I said quietly to my friend. “They sure know how to turn a guy on.”
Nick exhaled a thick plume of smoke. “Women, again? Touch, you're not here to get turned on. Pay attention to business.”
“Yeah, yeah. I know. Too bad.”
I was in Paris, and a man in Paris should not be alone. N'est ce pas? Right? But in my celibate mood, it was fun to let my imagination do my work. So I dipped into my wine while my mind slid smoothly into fantasy.
The crowd parted as I strolled into the room. The maitre d' immediately waved to his staff, issuing instructions with urgent hand signals. Two waiters cleared a place for three on the center sofa. I acknowledged the preparations, nodded nonchalantly to several acquaintances, and dropped my fur coat on the couch. My slender, blonde companions slithered out of their wraps.
I patted the cushions next to me. One blonde dipped gracefully to my side and folded her legs beneath her. The second settled on the floor between large cushions and draped an arm over my knee. Heads turned; local conversations died. The syncopated backbeat of the jazz quintet filled the club.
The club owner approached with drinks. He knew what I drank. “Bon soir, Touch,” he whispered. “Ou es-ce que tu les découvrir, mon comarade? Tu m'étonne, toujours. Where do you find them? You continue to astonish me.” The man eyed my companions lasciviously.
“It's a marvelous town, Henri,” I replied in idiomatic French. The women are thick and free, like the pigeons. All you need to do is pay them a little attention.” I handed him a hundred franc note, returned a smile, and nod of recognition to the harmonica player, and stroked Charlene's leg. Life was good.”
Nick nudged me with an elbow. “You're drifting. I can tell because your eyes are glazed. You're supposed to be examining the crowd, making note of any and all nefarious characters.”
“I am. I am! Like the legs at the third table to the left. That's what I call nefarious.”
Nick shook his head. “You'll never make it to Berlin that way my friend. Have you managed to take note of a few faces for future reference?”
“Of course, but the jazz and the legs are more interesting.” Ten minutes later I downed the remaining drops of wine. “See you outside,” I said, and walked away. Nick didn't move.
Outside the club, I crossed the street, leaned against a building front, and looked around casually for about ten seconds. Satisfied that no one was in sight, I slipped into a shadow where I could keep an eye on the club entrance. The air was dark and still. The street light at the end of the block hardly reached us. I waited.
A few minutes later, Nick emerged. He stamped on his cigarette; crossed to the black TRY-4, got in, and started the motor.
I waited a full minute before I joined him. If someone had followed me out of the club, Nick would have been alerted. Had someone had taken an interest in Nick, I would have been in a position to note who it was. Sometimes I carried a small camera with high speed film. In six months, not a thing had happened.
“Where to?” asked Nick. We were through with business for this evening.
“The last restaurant guide I discovered recommended a place close to the Etoile. You know, one of those one-pan joints with a drab facade, snooty waiters, limited entrees, and superb sauces.”
The pencil beams of the sports car disrupted the night. I listened to the Triumph growl while I watched Nick in my peripheral vision ran through the gears. Nick's stick frame and long arms reminded me of a Praying Mantis. At five foot, ten, he made me feel like a midget. We were the same age, but that's where the similarity ended.
Nick was half leg; I was built like a fullback. Nick had lost half of his hair; I had a head full, dark brown and wavy. Nick's high forehead accented the long line of his jaw; I had dimples and a Kirk Douglas chin. The guys in the unit had nicknamed us Mutt and Jeff after some comic strip characters from the 1950’s.
I stuck my arm straight out of the window to feel the cool night air. I was relaxed and free this evening, and with good reason: I was one of a handful of Americans living in Europe's most exciting city, and I was one of a very few who had a license to play while Uncle Sam picked up the tab. Of course, when I was totally honest with myself, I admitted to being a soldier with camouflage, like a private eye without portfolio, limited to routine security assignments.
In Washington, D.C., my name was on a long list of US Army Counter Intelligence agents in Europe with a shallow cover. I was allowed to wear civilian clothes and live in an apartment, but I was still a sergeant in the United States Army. I went to the office every day, typed my own reports, and said “sir” to all the officers. Everyone used his real name, trench coats were the exception, and the closest I had ever been to a dagger was my dull letter opener.
Why dote on the tedious aspects of life when you can savor the romance? I preferred to see the world as a sprawling Casablanca. Every other army sergeant wore fatigues or dress greens and stood inspection at six in the morning. I wore tailored suits, white shirts, and conservative ties. Other sergeants ate in mess halls and applied for a pass every weekend. I shared a pad in Reuil Malmaison, and tooled in and out of Paris at will; and I was free to go where I wanted at night and every weekend, except, of course, Berlin and Eastern Europe.
Tonight, my mind was full of visions of faraway places. Saturday, I would launch my first European vacation. I was going to see places I'd never even dreamed of: Switzerland, the Alps, and northern Italy! From the leather cushioned seat in the TRY-4, I watched the Parisian parade of well lighted historical monuments. No sir, there could be no finer way to finish my tour of duty than to play away the days and nights in gaie Paris!
The TRY squirted around a tight corner onto the Quai du Louvre. Suddenly, bright lights cut into our lane from the opposite side and blinded us. A late model Citroen had lost patience with the leisurely pace and pulled out of line. It rocketed towards us as though the boulevard was a one-way street.
Nick maintained speed. The distance between our Triumph and the Citroen shrank rapidly. “Hold on,” he said, “we've got another French Andretti.” Nick twitched his high beam flasher twice, the standard method of dropping the gauntlet.
I watched the lights of the approaching automobile blot out more and more of the scene in front of me and tried not to forget that Paris was not known for its fender benders. Because Parisian drivers were into serious bluff, collisions were often fatal. I inadvertently tightened my grip on the seat as I calculated how many seconds we had before impact. A half second before a head-on, our antagonist darted left, between two cars.
As the Citroen zipped past, I saw the driver's obscene hand gesture, the French semaphore for “Screw you, Mac!” Nick whistled and did a thumbs up. I puffed out my cheeks with a sigh of relief and lit another cigarette. Ah yes, I thought as my blood pressure return to normal, when in Paris never giving way means to win.
***
I poured the last drop of Beaujolais from the flask. “Not too shoddy,” I said.
“Hey, you sot, what do I have to do to get another glass of wine?” asked Nick.
“Sorry about that. You're driving, and tomorrow morning is Friday, which means we check back in to the Palace for another day of N.A.T.O. fun and games. Remember?”
Nick shrugged. “Your loss. I was considering the purchase of a round of Calvados.”
“I doubt you could taste it,” I retorted half seriously. Nick was a chain smoker, and I had decided it was my role to get him to cut back. Other than that, Nick was an easygoing, career-oriented, Army bachelor who served as our unit's photographer. A few weeks after my arrival at the unit, Nick had showed me his darkroom. When I asked what kind of work he did, he showed me two eight inch by ten inch prints.
The first print was a photograph of the base of the Eiffel Tower, taken from the steps of the Trocadero with a standard lens. A portion of a crowd that gathered near the bridge one hundred yards away had a red circle drawn around part of it.
The second eight by ten print was considerably grainier but still incredibly clear. It showed two men having a conversation. The man on the left wore a striped tie and had a ring on the fourth finger of his upraised hand. The man he talked to had an aquiline nose, narrow face, and long pointed collars that tagged his shirt as French made.
Nick handed me a magnifying glass. The same two men were also in the first print. They were on the bridge that crossed the Seine. Both prints had been made from the same negative.
The TRY-4 vibrated over rough cobblestones. Two blocks before the Bois de Boulogne, I tapped Nick on the shoulder. “Pull over or pay the consequences.” Nick glanced at the sidewalk urinal, braked, and double-parked. I got out and disappeared behind the metal shield.
I unzipped my pants, wrinkled my nose, and sighed while I blessed the practicality of all French. I heard Nick a few feet away.
“God, these places stink,” I said aloud. “Only the French could get away with using the outside panels of a piss sink to advertise perfume.”
Silence.
“But it's this or the woods, and at this time of night we stand a good chance of getting V.D. before we get it back in our pants.”
“The word at the P.X. is that the price for a quickie is down to ten francs,” said Nick.
“Yeah, so I heard. And you don't even have to get out of the car.”
“Zip it up and let's go home,” said Nick. “I still have work to do.”
The trip through the Bois de Boulogne to St. Cloud, then through side streets to the apartment, took twenty minutes. Home was an unassuming neighborhood of plain, four-story, affordable apartments, but the location gave us quick access to the major highways into Paris.
Our flat was eighty-two steps up. No elevator.
“Coffee?” asked I as I walked into the kitchen.
“Maybe later.”
I plopped on the sofa and looked at my watch. I had enough time for a letter home. I owed one to my sister, Annie. She was always pestering me for details of Parisian life. Tonight I could tell her about my vacation plans for Switzerland and Italy. She would stop writing for two weeks, then send me hate letters for a month.
Too bad I couldn't tell her anything about my job. Not that anything I did was classified; au contraire, on the contrary, there was little to tell. Routine was routine, and boring was boring, but that was to be expected for a peacetime soldier, even a counter intelligence agent. Unfortunately, even that news was off-limits to sisters.
I'm left-handed, so writing longhand is a hassle. I would have typed my letter tonight, but Nick had requisitioned our only typewriter. I freshened my coffee and took the cup into the kitchen. As I passed Nick's door, I noticed he'd shut it. Unusual; something heavy, I decided.
Back in the living room, I made a few smoke rings, watched them self-destruct, and wondered once again what Nick was working on. Like everyone at the unit, Nick was pretty closed mouth about his work. Curiosity had gotten the better of me several times in the past, but expressions that said, “You should know better than to ask,” quickly set me straight.
With slow, circular motions, I made sure my ballpoint was working, then wrote, “Dear Sis.” I could hear the typewriter clicked softly in Nick's room. Maybe he was typing a letter to his folks. More than likely, he was writing a letter that had do with money or something legal.
It intrigued be only because I'd never known Nick to type in his room. He always pecked it out in the living room on two fingers with a cigarette hanging from his lip, and asked me every other minute how to spell a word. I lit another cigarette and pictured Nick hunched over the typewriter, encircled by a wreath of smoke. There was always a butt smoldering in Nick's vicinity. The apartment smelled like an ashtray. I know; I couldn’t talk. I grunted, blew a final smoke ring, and tended to sibling affairs.
***
In his room, Nick Pirelli took another drag on his Winston and read the half completed page without removing it from the carriage. The first word on the form was preprinted in red on the form so no one would miss it.
Secret
To: Major Jim Anderson, Operations Control
Joint Services I.A.C.C.B., Washington, D.C.
From: Euro Control
Update: Project Holiday
Major: Project Holiday will be activated when Subject leaves for Switzerland day after tomorrow. Everything to this point has been approved. As per instructions, all operatives are in place. I will issue final instructions after Subject departs. I anticipate that he will reach our first objective no later than—
Nick leaned forward and opened his door part way. “Hey, Touch?”
“Yeah.”
“When did you say you'd get to Neuchatel?”
Nick heard Touch get up and walk his way. With a cigarette in his left hand Touch learned against the door frame, then pushed Nick’s door open a bit more. “Anything in particular?” he asked casually.
“Not really. I'm writing this guy I know in Washington, D. C. I mentioned your vacation, and that made me think about your schedule. I couldn't remember.”
“Noon,” he said. “Saturday, about midday.” He waffled his hand to show the approximation.
Nick nodded and dropped his eyes to the carriage of the typewriter, but he waited until Touch sauntered back to the living room before he continued.
Saturday, early afternoon. All communication channels have been verified. Am still missing a backup plan. Consider this element mandatory, as I do not consider Subject expendable. Please confirm.
Nick reread the last sentence several times but left it as it was. Even a major needed a reminder now and then. He typed a final paragraph, made two corrections, then decided to retype the whole thing.
A half hour later, he marked it Copy #1 of 1 and signed above the title block which read: Euro Control, Project Holiday. The document fit into an envelope which already carried a diplomatic pouch stamp on its lower left-hand corner. Nick sealed it, pushed back from the typewriter, and dragged on his cigarette. It had burned down to where it tasted hot and bitter.
He slipped the envelope into his briefcase, put out the smoldering butt, and thought about what he had done. He could smell his feelings of guilt. Touch was a good friend, perhaps his best friend, but orders were orders. In this case, he had no option.
He lit another cigarette, and idly regarded the exhaled smoke. Well, he thought; the next two weeks were going to be very interesting.
Chapter 1: May 31, Washington, D.C.
Briefcase in hand, Major Jim Anderson hurried toward the elevator at the rear of the underground car garage. His steps cut crisp echoes in the cavernous room. As he pushed the elevator button, he made a mental note that he was on Level Four Red. When the elevator door opened, the military operator snapped to attention and punched Level Twelve Black without hesitation. The Corporal had recognized the major, and he always kept a list of the day's classified conferences.
Anderson kept glancing at his watch, as if frequent glimpses might make it slow down. At the end of the windowless hall, he flashed his badge at the security guard to whom he muttered, “Lo, Bill,” then he entered a small, plush conference room, grimly prepared to buck a different kind of traffic from that which had made him ten minutes late.
Normally, Major Anderson inhabited the recesses of the old red brick building on “Kay” Street which the War Department had salvaged for its Central and South America Counterespionage activities. The Mediterranean was Anderson's specialty. He'd been making steady gains with a technique that his disapproving counterparts referred to as “off-the-wall” tactics.
But it was precisely because of his successes, and because he'd received his original training in Europe, that a brigadier general in Washington decided that Anderson was the best man to oversee a short-term, high priority project about to take place in Europe. The meeting he was late for today was related to that assignment.
The project had been snidely labeled Project Holiday by his staff, and Anderson had been given the questionable title of Project Control. Anderson wished he had control. If he had, what he referred to as these “damn meetings” with the Counterespionage Policy Guidance Council would not be necessary. His unintentional, but still insulting, tardiness hardly balanced the injury his ego sustained every time he was forced to listen to council members nitpick the operational methodology he had set in place to run the project.
Less than an hour after the Major sat down, he knew that his best shot at saving Project Holiday as he had structured it was in jeopardy. He tried to concentrate on the logic behind the speaker's choice of words and repress the gut feeling that the meeting was a total waste of time.
General White looked directly at Major Anderson while he concluded his comments. “I don't have any faith in untested field control procedures, Major, so I can't support the conclusions you’ve drawn in your report.” He spoke slowly, and emphasized a few words to demonstrate his disdain while he waved his copy of the document Anderson had handed out at the conclusion of the last meeting. The document was a blueprint of Anderson's proposal.
“In addition, I was unable to find anything that resembled a contingency plan, yet if I read the situation correctly I'm told that we have much at stake in this project; maybe too much. You say, major, that you don’t want to alert the opposition, but you do not address what follows if we lose our man in the field. By lose, I mean by accident, by an act of god, or because the opposition somehow gets wind of our plans and takes steps to remove our operative.”
The general looked around the room for support. “It doesn't make any difference how it happens, does it? No one plans it, but it happens—all the damn time. So I don't understand the absence of a contingency. Do we just sit back and say, ‘Too bad’?” General White looked the length of the table once again, then fixed his eyes on Major Anderson.
“I do agree with your initial statement, major; we do not get an opportunity like this more than once a decade.” General White sighed. “Unfortunately, I was not asked to recommend alternative plans; I was asked only for my reaction. Very well—I can't support this.” He gestured to the classified document outlining Anderson’s control plan.
The procedure at the meeting was not adjustable: everyone was permitted to speak his mind, after which a round robin discussion followed, then the council head summed things up and made decisions. The democratic dissection of Anderson's preferences violated every tenet of project management and military command he had ever known. It might not have been so bad had he not been a product of the D-5 School of Project Control: Devise, Develop, Decoy at a Distance, then Dismantle. The approach he had set in place, and which was not being picked apart, was based on a controversial concept known as Loose Field Controls. Those who had no faith in it called it the “Baffle” technique because they claimed that the logic behind it baffled everyone but the opposition.
But the D-5 and Loose Field Controls suited Anderson's personality. He had used both tools with more success than anyone, and the techniques had prevented exposure of America involvement in two recent, touchy, diplomatic cases involving high-ranking Caribbean personnel.
Anderson doodled while General White recommended what he said he was not going to recommend—an alternative approach. The committee chair interrupted White, asking that he submit his ideas in writing rather than take up the Council's time.
In the silence that followed, Anderson looked at the gray-haired man on General White's right, Brigadier General Cross. Cross, like White, was another retired officer who thought he had “blocked ‘em, rocked ‘em, and socked ‘em all.” He certainly was not bashful about his self perceived qualifications for the still open slot of Chief of Foreign Intelligence Operations. Anderson had read his file and thought that the man was probably missing a few genes.
Cross remained seated but cleared his throat. “Gentlemen, I’ve concluded that the machinery Major Anderson has designed for this project is unstable and vulnerable. Since communication is channeled through one man to only one man, we lose the works if anything happens to either individual. It's unprecedented and I believe, unnecessarily foolhardy.”
His eyes stopped at Major Anderson, and then he frowned and shook his head. “It would appear that you have something special in mind, Major. Whatever it is, it's beyond me. The different points at which our man is exposed spread clear across Western Europe, yet you appear content to employ this one individual who you believe will, by his own unguided actions, serve as a catalyst to expose the identity of the individual behind the very well conceived espionage operation we’re trying to snuff out. That is, if it really exists!
“What is more incredible to me is that this ‘super agent’ is supposed to accomplish his mission without knowing that he has been handed the lead role.” Cross smiled at the Major with a deep puzzlement. “You do anticipate some organized reaction from those in the network we are threatening—don’t you, major? You must!”
Anderson did not respond. General Cross was silent for a moment, then summarized his thoughts by looking at the leader of the council at the end of the table. “To me, it's like asking someone to walk down a corridor and open a series of doors, one by one, without telling him that behind one or more there may someone intent on preventing him from reaching the end of the hall. I feel sorry for the poor bastard.”
He looked at his briefing sheet. “This Sergeant Touchstone. I might even suggest that it's homicide on our part to put him in harm’s way.”
Major Anderson felt the eyes of the chairman on him, but he was damned if he was going to get into an argument. He had to remember that he had not chosen this assignment. If the department was not going to give him the authority he needed commensurate with the responsibility he had, there was little he could do. So far, he had a dearth of the former and a surfeit of the latter.
He repressed his urge to explain, because he knew it would do no good. He’d been forbidden to inform the council that when he’d been slapped with the assignment, he’d been told that he would have to work blind: no names, no dates, no traceable events, and no documents. He was told only that vital information inside N.A.T.O. was being received behind the Iron Curtain. He knew virtually nothing of the methodology the opposition was using to transmit the information, yet he was told to design a counterespionage project to nullify the “alleged network” which had “most likely” burrowed into the bowels of N.A.T.O's Tactical Nuclear Warfare Planning Department.
His nightmare was compounded because he'd been pulled away from two long-range projects that were about to bear fruit and told to forget them until Project Holiday was a success. Anderson knew that he would be within his rights to appeal his new assignment. He had the connections, and logic was on his side. But he had accepted the job because he agreed that the source of the information about the leak of classified information was impossible to ignore. A high-ranking Eastern Bloc intelligence officer, referred to only as Nicki, had told his western counterpart that he wanted to defect. In the absence of personal guarantees Nicki had been willing to show good faith by describing some of the information which had been collected. The implications of what he showed Western Intelligence eyes had shattered nerves, destroyed all sense of N.A.T.O. security, and caused major bowel cramping up and down the ranks of intelligence officers.
Nicki had effectively sketched the operations of a nematode comfortably ensconced in N.A.T.O. headquarters, a mole whose successes had totally nullified whatever tactical nuclear edge N.A.T.O. might have once had over the Eastern European Bloc. He added that the Eastern Bloc’s Intelligence Apparatus knew all of N.A.T.O.'s options and priorities. Using a hockey game as an analogy to tactical nuclear warfare, someone said that the information had just given the East a free “penalty shot.”
How much was true? Major Jim Anderson had proceeded like a man crossing a mine field. If a mole existed in N.A.T.O.’s nuclear planning division, then any move Anderson made might make was already too late. If the information was intentionally false, it might be disinformation to distract them from a more clever intrusion elsewhere into N.A.T.O. Departmental analysis of N.A.T.O. security weaknesses, of changes to the Eastern European military posture, and data from select intelligence personnel denoted that if a network was in place, it might well have been functional for close to a year.
Major Anderson welcomed tough discussions and remained open to valid alternatives, but it rankled when deadwood like generals White and Cross threw obsolete concerns into the proceedings. The intelligence methods they coveted were like dusty case histories confined to text books.
Nonetheless, Anderson was well aware that few of the officers present approved of or appreciated his proposed control measures. On the one hand, he granted that their reasoning, if unexciting, was valid. He also knew that if he had any chance at all of pulling off Project Holiday, he would have to employ the most oblique controls possible. The situation was one of the very few which called not only for loose field controls, but was also ideal for a blind operative. And the travel plans of agent Touch Touchstone were perfect for his purposes. Yes, he was poking a sleeping rattler, but he hoped that before the strike came, he would be able to identify not only the type of rattler, but his name, rank, and serial number.
General White had called his planned operative, Sergeant Touchstone, a “poor bastard.” The common intelligence term was “goose.” Well, that's the way Major Anderson was going to have it, with a “goose.” The project control measures would have to remain as he had structured them. He was sufficiently clear about this that he was prepared to advise his superiors that Project Holiday be abandoned in toto if his plans were blocked.
“Jim,” toned the council moderator, “do you have anything you would like to say?”
While his ego told him there were a lot of things he would like to say, Major Anderson nonetheless stood and tried to appear concerned, yet impartial. It was the expected posture. When he spoke, his voice was deep and smooth, and it exuded a measure of command that he knew was not his, at least not in this room.
“The project structure and control approach I have selected have been subjected to severe criticism because it is unorthodox.” He nodded. “I understand. Had I not personally participated in a number of live situations in which identical controls were in place, and had seen how effective they are under the right circumstances—which is what I believe we have here—I would be as alarmed as generals White and Cross. I do agree with one observation: our control man in Europe is the key. If anything happens to him, we’re in serious trouble.”
Jim Anderson leaned forward and placed his hands on the table top. “In this case, however, Euro Control is in the perfect position to guide, control, if you like, our blind operative, our goose. His influence is critical to our objectives, but Euro Control is perfectly safe as long as he stays where he is.
“From my examination of Sergeant Nick Pirelli's file, from additional discreet inquiry, and from a face-to-face discussion with this man, I have every reason to place implicit trust in him. He’s intelligent, dedicated, and trustworthy. I can only hope that you gentlemen will place equal faith in my ability to direct this project using tools and techniques I know best, the effectiveness of which has been demonstrated in the past.”
General White interrupted. “Norm, I recommend we scrap Project Holiday. As it's currently structured, it's a liability and an embarrassment.”
White was fed up with playing devil's advocate, but he'd chosen the role because he believed someone had to do it and no one else appeared to want the part. He also did it well. Today, however, he had no need to role play. In his mind, he believed that Anderson's game theories were fine for incidental forays and third world intrigues of tertiary value. In fact, White was willing to acknowledge that within a narrow specialty, Anderson had shown steaks of brilliance. When left alone to his own devices, the man had achieved his goals with much less fuss and in less time than most.
But General White had no intention of remaining silent while Major Anderson draped his “loose field controls” like a mantle over the shoulders of a matter of international security. If the information that had caused the National Security Council to direct the Guidance Council to oversee Project Holiday was valid, N.A.T.O.'s value as a deterrent to international mayhem was going to hell in a hurry. White believed it was his job to ensure that the council took every step necessary to reverse the situation. In the end, however, he also knew it was up to the chair of their council, Norman Dupree.
In the white pages of United States Government Employees Directory, Norm Dupree was listed as the State Department's Director of the Bureau of Internal Security. This advisory body was allegedly responsible to ensure that important matters didn't fall between the cracks created by the plethora of overlapping intelligence agencies. Of course his position was a bit more complex than the phone book hinted. Dupree was paid by the Department of Intelligence, but responsible for his actions and decisions to the President via joint intelligence sessions which included the head of the C.I.A. and the National Security Advisor. On the one hand, White pitied Dupree; on the other hand, he admired the man. He thought that anyone who could juggle those political apples and accomplish anything must be a first class prestidigitator.
“Let's start at Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, S.H.A.P.E. Headquarters,” said White, continuing. “Employ electronics for a month or so. It may help us narrow the field.” He'd almost said “identify the enemy” but thought it would brand him as old school. “As though we were exploring a booby trapped house; you know; one room at a time.”
“Well, if we're going to terminate the project,” said Mark Spencer, interrupting the general, “we should do it in a manner that makes the tactic itself appear as a red herring.”
Mark Spencer was a recent acquisition from Naval Intelligence. Anderson had urged Norm Dupree to assign Spencer to the council because Anderson had known Mark for years. He believed Spencer had the sharpest mind in the group. He was tough but liberal and not afraid to try something new. It was also characteristic of Mark to break in on a conversation. It was a penchant that had eventually cost him his marriage, but Spencer's peers never took umbrage at his surprise utterances, because his comments were always to the point and made without bias.
“Chances are fifty-fifty that Eastern Intelligence field officers controlling this network—if it exists—already know of our little Project Holiday. If so, it's safe to assume they also know our general approach. They may have even identified our goose. Overt termination, if combined with hard-to-detect electronic backup, might catch their N.A.T.O.-based operative off balance.” Spencer cleared his throat and wet his lower lip with his tongue, a sign he was about to launch into a minor soliloquy on technical considerations.
“Excuse me, Mark,” interjected Norman Dupree, “but there has been no decision to terminate Project Holiday, so let’s table discussion of closing options.”
“Thank God,” thought Anderson; “Dupree has made his decision.”
“Barring unforeseen emergency sessions, we'll meet here again in two weeks. Until then, Project Holiday will continue as structured under the direction of Major Anderson. Our goose, this Sergeant Touchstone, appears to respond well to Euro Control's suggestions.” He paused, then looked at every man at the table. “And we don't have the luxury of going back to the drawing board for new concepts at this late date. We’ll make the best possible or what we have or,” he paused and breathed out, “we’ll pull the plug.”
For nearly thirty seconds, the room was void of sound or movement. The phrase Dupree had uttered was well known to every man in the room, but one that no one had ever heard voiced at an intelligence meeting. Pull the plug. The image of everything going down the drain was very appropriate, for “pull the plug” meant shredding all current plans and rebuilding N.A.T.O.'s nuclear posture from scratch. Tactically, it meant that N.A.T.O. would immediately go to Condition Red and remain there for a minimum of three months. Surveillance planes would be doubled. Nuclear subs would be assigned maximum range patterns. Silos with every conceivable type of nuclear device would be armed and made to stand in condition Yellow. At the same time, every man in the top hierarchy of every line department at N.A.T.O. would be rotated and replaced in controlled sequence. Plans and programs would be dumped, as though every plug into N.A.T.O. mainframe computers were being pulled. The implications were so frightening, that generals White and Cross both turned pale.
“Gentlemen, I appreciate your input and will continue to count on your incisive remarks as the project progresses,” said Dupree. “If you plan to leave town during the ensuring four week period, please contact me first. I think the next two weeks will be very interesting.”
Chapter 2: May 31, Somewhere near the Black Sea
Colonel Uri Petrovich Urbanski searched for the right word. The only one he could find was скучный, “drab.” It fit his mood and the absence of color. From where he stood, he saw slate roofs, fog laden hills covered with barren, gnarled olive trees, and wandering, poorly maintained stone fences. They were all textural variations of the same opaque gray that prevented him from seeing the distant mountains. It had been like this all morning, yet he was told that it was one of the best views of the country.
Colonel Urbanski, known to his closest friends as Peter, shifted his weight once again to his toes. He'd been staring out the single window of his new office for nearly twenty minutes, his mood as grim as the weather and as depressing as the gray in the scene.
He rubbed his hands together as though the cold, damp weather had penetrated the room, then turned and reached for the phone on the desk. Bureau was expecting an answer. He dared postpone no longer. When the operator answered, Urbanski spoke in a rough Slavic dialect. A voice asked him to wait. It was a long one. Finally, he spoke again, hung up, and returned to observing the country.
Two more minutes passed before the phone rang. For the second time, Uri Urbanski reached across his desk for the phone. This time he realized that he was nervous, because he wasn't certain what he was going to say. None of the scenarios he had rehearsed in front of the window seemed appropriate. He would have to play it by ear. No one would make specific reference to the subject over the line, but there was only one topic to discuss, the one referred to by the dog-eared document that lay on the pitted desk before him.
The size and cover of the document identified the content as field issue, but once it had been reviewed at Bureau, someone had slapped a red cover over the black one and added Class One lettering, the first Uri had seen in four years. The top line of the cover, printed in the rarely used bold type, identified the source, topic of contents, and classification of the material. In this case: United States, Counterespionage; Project Holiday; Top Secret.
Uri wondered how they had obtained it. An “A” and a “Z” in small black letters in the lower left-hand corner further annotated the contents of the document. They told Urbanski that the source of the information was highly reliable but that the information itself was unverified. That was Urbanski's job, to evaluate and pass judgment on the contents. It was not an impossible job, but it could not be done without some personal risk. An error in judgment might jeopardize the party's penetration of N.A.T.O.'s Military Headquarters, S.H.A.P.E. An error might also jeopardize his position inside the bureaucracy, a priority that Uri had wrestled with until recently.
He fitted the phone to his ear. “Urbanski here.
“Yes, General, I have,” he said.
“The information appears accurate, as far as it goes.” He hesitated. “It's unlikely that US intelligence put it together on its own.” He was guessing and hoped that he was right
“Yes, I think we should assume someone close to our operation has—yes, sir, a leak or defection.”
Uri winced at the increase in the increased volume coming through the phone. “At the present, I have no idea, sir. Perhaps we could—.”
The squawking continued at a loud pitch. “What? No sir, I do not agree. The network we have in place is still quite valuable. We've never been this close to obtaining such a complete picture of N.A.T.O.'s tactical nuclear capability and plans. To shut everything down now would b—. Excuse me, sir?
“Everything is a risk, General, and everything has a price. The value of the information we've received to date has been worth the risk. In case of a reversal, our losses can be minimized.” He paused to clear his throat. “Personally, sir, I recommend we use our man in Paris to determine the validity of this document.”
“We refer to him as Anchor, sir.”
“Who, sir? Touchstone. No, I've never heard that name.”
“No sir, we have no file on him, but that doesn't mean anything. He could have been pulled in from South America or Hawaii. Anywhere.
“Of course I'll check. That procedure is automatic, but it doesn’t lessen the possibility that we're dealing with a red herring.
“Red herring, sir. It's an American expression, General; it means a false trail.
“Well, I think there is good reason to believe it may be, but it's best to play it safe. Let's see what Anchor has to say.” Uri listened intently for a reaction.
“Yes. I agree. It does reflect Major Anderson's atypical tactics, but—. Yes, sir, he was the one who damaged our opportunity in Panama in sixty-four and in Cuba more recently. I was saying, sir, the way this alleged project is laid out, it has serious flaws and I doubt it would pass the American Project Operations Control Council.
“The Council? Eh, it’s a deliberative body. It monitors and occasionally overrules policy on select operations. A stupid and interfering group, very unmilitary, but very American.
“Mmm. But then again, general, as an alternative, I suggest we use Anchor. He designed the network, and he's very secure in his position in Paris. He should be able to monitor events and advise.
“Yes, sir. I agree. I'll take care of it.
“Same to you, sir. Goodbye.”
Uri wished that he smoked; he needed something for his nerves. Maybe Gregori would be interested in a game of handball later. Urbanski returned to his window and once again scanned the landscape. Now it was raining. The officer made a face and wondered whether his analysis had been accepted. He also wondered how much pressure he could place on Anchor.
Then the officer permitted himself a small smile. Maybe he would use that rabid little fellow with the long, black hair to harass Anchor. He searched his mind and found his code name: Lapin, rabbit. Urbanski had never liked Anchor, and it suited his sense of punishment to use a dragon like Lapin as insurance. Who knows, it might even speed up the process.
It began to rain harder. The officer tried to imagine what the weather might be like in Paris. He had been there, once. Then his focus changed and he caught reflection of the document's dark red cover hovering before his eyes. The image broke Urbanski’s reverie. He sighed and acknowledged that the next two weeks were going to be very interesting.
Chapter 3: May 31, Versailles, France
That same evening, a heavyset man wearing civilian clothes but military shoes stood at the counter of a local bar and chatted casually with several patrons in colloquial French. Since it was a weekday and the hour was late, the bar was almost empty. Suddenly the man glanced up into the mirror behind the bar and glimpsed a slender individual with long black hair walking toward him.
When the newcomer saw that he had been observed, he continued walking casually to the rear, found an empty booth, and sat down. The man in military shoes first pressed his lips together in quiet fury, but then, with a shrug and forced smile, he terminated his conversation, ordered “deux verres rouges,” two glasses of red wine, then walked to where the newcomer waited. The man with the wine stared at the newcomer, a much younger fellow than he, a man with intense eyes, hollow cheeks, and pale skin.
“You're an arrogant bastard to come here,” said the man in military shoes quietly in French. “You trying to ruin my cover or just invade my personal time?”
“Sit down or you'll cause a scene. Have you read the instructions I sent you?”
“That's another thing. I don't take orders from you. I have my own contacts and my own chain of command.” He sat, nonetheless. “You can tell your boss that I am not going to risk everything I have worked for just because some bogus report shows up and makes everyone nervous.”
The black-haired man's voice remained unruffled. “You have no options. The message was quite specific. You are to keep tabs on Touchstone and verify whether this project is real.”
“If that's all you want, I can tell you now, there is no such project. Not in the office, not in the unit, not in N.A.T.O.!” he hissed. “Don't you think I would know?”
“Bureau thinks otherwise.”
“Bureau is not in Paris, nor at my office. I know everything that goes on.” He leaned forward, threateningly. “There is no such project.”
The black-haired man said nothing. His wine remained on the table, untouched.
The heavyset man in military shoes breathed deeply, then continued. “Look, if Bureau is so paranoiac let them put a tail on Touchstone. He's a callow, middle-class nothing. No one in his right mind would assign—.”
“Maybe that's what he wants you to think,” said the long-haired man with an edge to his voice. “He's been here nearly a year. Have you checked his background?”
“You read too many spy novels,” retorted the older man. He tipped his glass of wine hastily. Two drops reached his chin before he felt them. “I will do what I can, but it's dangerous for me as well as a waste of my time. Now, drink your wine and get out of here and don't come back. This is my turf. It's off limits to people like you.”
The thin man with black hair pushed the wine glass away from him. “You can't lead two lives, Anchor; perhaps you have forgotten that you made your choice long ago.” One side of his mouth curled upward slightly as he saw that his remark hit home.
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