Mrs. Roosevelt's Confidante (24 page)

“This is serious, Franklin,” she said, her voice pitched higher than usual. When she withdrew her hand, Fala woofed in protest.

“All right, then,” the President said, taking off his reading glasses. “Shoot!”

“I know you've been informed that a young woman who was in my employ for a short while, Miss Blanche Balfour, was found dead.”

“Yes.” The President's smile dimmed by a few watts. He nodded. “I was informed.”

“It's come to my attention that she didn't commit suicide, as we'd originally believed—she was murdered.”

Franklin gave his wife a sharp look. “How do you know that?”

“Never mind how I know that, Franklin, I just do. I think what is more important is that a young woman is dead. Murdered! A woman who worked in
our
White House!”

The President sneezed, then pulled out a handkerchief and blew his nose. “It's tragic, Babs. I'm so sorry.”

The First Lady drew a deep breath. “There was a letter.” Her thin fingers worried at the edge of her dressing gown. “A letter…about me. About me…and her.”

A cloud passed over the President's face. “No. There wasn't.”

“But there
was,
Franklin. There was a letter at Blanche's apartment—one that mysteriously vanished. And now, I've just found out, there's yet
another
letter, one that Miss Balfour had given to her fiancé, Byrd Prentiss, ‘in case anything happened to her.' ”

“So Prentiss says he has another letter, hmm?” The President absently stroked Fala as he watched red-and-blue flames dart in the fireplace. Then he looked at his wife. “I'll handle it, Eleanor.”

“Maggie Hope says she destroyed the letter. I want you to know, there's not one shred of truth—”

“I said, I'll handle it, Eleanor!” At his side, Fala whined. The President reached down to comfort him.

“Franklin, I need to know, did you—did we—do anything that…I should know about?” The unspoken words hung in the air.

“No, Babs, I swear to you. And it will all be fine in the end.”

“And Maggie Hope—Mr. Churchill's secretary—do you know anything about her being attacked after our going to Andrea Martin's talk at Metropolitan?”

“No!” His response was so loud that Fala gave a sharp bark. “Shhhh,” he said, stroking the dog's fur. “No, of course not,” he insisted. “And I'll look into extra security for her if you think she's in danger.” The President turned his smile back on. “Now, you go to bed and get some sleep, Babs. It's going to be a busy day with Henri Giraud tomorrow.”

“But, Franklin—”

“Go to bed now, Eleanor,” ordered the President.

“Yes, dear.”

When she had closed the door behind her, Roosevelt picked up the telephone receiver. “Tell Frank Cole I need to see him tomorrow.” He pinched the bridge of his nose, squeezing his eyes closed. “Yes, tomorrow. He'll know when and where,” he said and hung up.

John returned, his nose sunburned, to the Walt Disney Studios the next morning.

This time, however, he was surrounded by other men in uniforms. U.S. uniforms. “The Army's moved hundreds of troops into the studio,” Cora explained as she ushered John through. “The soldiers are part of the antiaircraft force that's stationed here, because of the aircraft factories. We're home to Lockheed Air, you know. And then we have troops training on the soundstages because they can close them up and the soldiers can do their war exercises in blackout conditions.”

“How very…Hollywood,” John murmured.

Cora beamed. “You made the gossip column, you know.”

He sighed. “I know.” He shuddered, remembering. He'd been brought up to believe a person's name should appear in the newspaper only three times—birth, marriage, and death.

“Your visit also merited a gushing mention in Hedda Hopper's column today.”

“Who is Miss Hopper?”

“She's our resident snoop. Writes gossip for the
Los Angeles Times.
Everyone reads it.”

“And what did this Miss Hopper have to say about me?” John braced himself for the indignity.

“She said you and a brunette soon-to-be-divorcée were looking
awfully
cozy by the pool at the Beverly Hills Hotel yesterday.”

“I was merely being polite.”

She smiled. “Of course.”

They took a wide corridor to a conference room. It was a large, modern, high-ceilinged space with a gleaming wooden floor. An upright piano stood against one freshly painted wall. Bright sunshine streamed in through the open windows, while birdsong filled the air.

The walls were lined with bulletin boards, pinned with drawings of Gremlins. Cap under his arm, John went down the line, looking intently at each one.

“Perfect. Excellent,” he said with a widening smile. Disney's artists had detailed his story of a Gremlin named Gus, who spots an RAF plane in the sky and wants to leave Gremlinland and see the world.

When the plane is shot down, he knows he has to help.

And so he and his trusted friends leave Gremlinland to try to find the RAF pilots. There they meet James—a tall, brooding pilot—who'd been shot down and injured and couldn't fly anymore. They give James new hope and swear to help him fly again and win the war against the Nazis.

“So, are we winning yet?” Walt Disney asked, joining them. “What do you think, Stalky? Did we do your Gremlins justice? You're the expert, after all.”

John was inexplicably happy. For the first time in he couldn't remember how long, he felt joy. The visions he'd seen in his head, the visions that had gotten him through his time in Berlin and the escape, were now real, tangible. Others would see them, be entertained and perhaps inspired. “Yes, yes you did, Mr.—er, Walt.”

“Come with me, Stalky,” Disney ordered. They walked the wide corridors back to his office. “I want to acquire the rights to this story right away. I'm assuming we'll have to run that by the British Air Ministry.”

John nodded. “And I'll have to talk to Mr. Churchill, as well.”

“Of course, young man,” Disney said, clapping him on the back. “Talk to Winnie, then get back to me. By the way, we'd like you to stay out here for a while. Enjoy our California sunshine, what do you say?”

“Awhile? What's ‘awhile'?”

Disney gave his most inscrutable smile. “Who knows? You've got talent—I can see that! And you've got battle experience, too. We could use someone like you on permanent staff.”

Maggie was working in the map room, opening and organizing mail for the Prime Minister that had been forwarded to the British Embassy and then sent in bags to the White House. Even though he was away, she could still smell the smoke from Churchill's Romeo y Julieta cigars. She wanted to get back to trying to break the code, but with the Boss and David on their way to Ottawa and John in Los Angeles, there was a lot to do. She typed up a summary of the P.M.'s mail to read to David over the telephone when he called in.

There was a sharp rap on the open door. “Miss Hope?” rang the First Lady's warbling tone.

“Yes, Mrs. Roosevelt?”

“When you have a moment, please come to my office.”

In the First Lady's sitting room, a wireless radio played Aaron Copland's
John Henry
as raindrops pattered at the windows.

“Close the door and then turn that down a bit, would you please, Miss Hope?” Mrs. Roosevelt requested when Maggie had entered.

She did as she was asked, then moved stacks of newspapers to take a seat on the fringe-trimmed brocade sofa piled high with colorful needlepoint pillows. She tucked one ankle behind the other.

“May I offer you a cup of tea, Miss Hope? I'm going to ask for one. And perhaps some cookies? Mrs. Nesbitt's made honeydrops.”

“That would be lovely, ma'am. A cup of tea and a biscuit—er, cookie—would be perfect right now, thank you.”

The First Lady pulled twice on a thick silk cord, then came to sit on a club chair beside Maggie. “Did you find anything?” she asked in a low voice, referring to Franklin's office. She was pale.

“I did,” Maggie answered. “I found an appointment book in a concealed compartment. But it's in code.”

The First Lady pursed her lips. After a moment, she asked, “Can you break it?”

“I was only able to copy down a bit, which makes it harder to crack. I'm working on it, though.”

“Oh, I find mathematics impossible!” Mrs. Roosevelt said, throwing up her hands in frustration. “I fear we women aren't made to think that way.”

“Not made to think that way? Or not
encouraged
to think that way?”

The First Lady shrugged. “I don't know. I was terrible at math in school, though—loathed it.”

Maggie knew enough about the First Lady to venture, “But you didn't like public speaking at first, and look at you now!”

Mrs. Roosevelt gave Maggie a long, thoughtful look. “Yes, I see your point, Miss Hope. Practice, hard work, and tenacity are the keys to most things in life, aren't they? I'm sure math is no exception.”

Maggie pulled a piece of paper from her skirt pocket. “Here,” she said, handing it to the First Lady. “I copied this. It's the entry for December twenty-second—the day Blanche Balfour was murdered—”

R S F G H V N R Q U Q R X X M N V F

The First Lady looked at it, shook her head, then handed it back to Maggie.

“Now, it's all letters—no numbers or symbols,” Maggie explained, accepting it. “So it's what's known as a ‘substitution code.' I made one of these for my diary when I was a teenager at Boston Latin. It looks unbreakable, but it's not. To crack it, one can use a number of techniques—tricks, if you will.”

Mrs. Roosevelt nodded, placing her chin on her hand.

“We can use what's called frequency analysis.”

The First Lady winced as though she had a headache. “Oh, dear.”

“No, no. It's just the way it sounds—there are letters of the alphabet, such as ‘e,' that are used more frequently than others in English. So if a particular letter is used a lot, it's quite possible it's an ‘e.' However, in this sample, the most frequently used letter is, alas, not ‘e.' The sample size is just too small.”

Mrs. Roosevelt attempted to look game. “All right, so then what?”

“So then we can look at repeated letters. There are only a few letters that repeat in the English language—‘e,' ‘t,' and ‘d,' for example.”

The older woman nodded.

“There's also a way people create code by using a word or a name that's important to them or easy to remember. I've tried to break this particular one by using the names Eleanor, Fala, all of your children's names, grandchildren's names, previous Presidents…”

“He told me a long time ago that he changes it every once in a while.” A thought occurred to her. “Try Lucy,” the First Lady said, her mouth twisting with uncharacteristic bitterness. “Lucy Mercer.”

“Lucy Mercer?” The name meant nothing to Maggie.

Mrs. Roosevelt shook her head. “Never mind—it's nothing.
She's
nothing.”

If she's not important, why did you mention her?
But Maggie resumed. “But, even if we don't know the key word, the code isn't unbreakable—we just have to keep trying different things.” She took a deep breath. “And even if I crack the code, of course it doesn't necessarily mean we'll find anything incriminating.”

“No,” Mrs. Roosevelt agreed. “No, of course not.” She rubbed her chin. “Code breaking is rather like life, isn't it? You just have to keep trying and trying, until you get it right.”

Maggie beamed. “It is!”

There was a soft rap at the door, and a maid entered, carrying a tray with a silver tea set, two cups and saucers, and a plate piled high with golden-brown cookies.

After the maid had left, Mrs. Roosevelt rose and walked to her desk. She picked up a manila file. “I want to show you something. I've only just received it.”

As Mrs. Roosevelt checked the pot to make sure the tea was properly steeped, then began to pour into the delicate cups, Maggie opened the file folder and paged through. “Blanche's telephone records—” She breathed. She looked up at the First Lady. “Is this legal?”

Mrs. Roosevelt nodded, lifting her gold-rimmed teacup. “It is now, thanks to Congressman Sam Hobbs of Alabama. And with the country at war, Franklin's all in favor of legalizing wiretapping.” She took a sip. “Ironically, the Southerners all favored wiretapping and making telephone records available to law enforcement. Attorney General Jackson said
‘the only offense under the present law is to intercept any communication and divulge or publish the same. Any person, with no risk of penalty, may tap telephone wires and act upon what he hears or make any use of it that does not involve divulging or publication
.
' 
”

Maggie stirred milk into her tea. “Why ironic?”

“Because one of the calls made from Blanche's phone that evening was to the Virginia Governor's mansion.” The First Lady's hand went to the triple strand of creamy pearls around her neck. “I feel terrible doing this—with all that Benjamin Franklin said about how those who would give up freedom for safety deserve neither….”

“So we can infer Blanche—or someone—was calling the Governor's mansion, the same Governor who isn't about to pardon Wendell Cotton—” Maggie said, too excited to taste her tea. “What number is this?” she asked, pointing to one dialed late that afternoon.

“That's to the Washington Office of the Governor of Virginia,” the First Lady said. “It's where Byrd Prentiss works.”

“Prentiss was her fiancé—it isn't odd at all that she would have called him. But is it possible to obtain
his
telephone records? I mean, as long as we're at it?”

Mrs. Roosevelt nodded. “I do believe we can manage that, Miss Hope.”

Maggie went back to the file. “A call was made from Blanche Balfour's apartment, just before we arrived.”

“A call to the Governor's mansion.”

Maggie bit her lip. “There was a call to the Virginia Governor's mansion at around the time of Blanche's death. And there was another call made, well after that. A call to the White House.”

“Let me see,” the First Lady said, taking back the file. She peered at the small black print. “That number is for the White House's switchboard. But there's no way to tell who Blanche—or whoever—was calling.”

“The call was made only twenty minutes before we arrived,” Maggie said, putting the time line together.

“She was still alive then?” The First Lady looked horrified.

“No.” Maggie shook her head. “According to the coroner's report, she'd been dead for hours. There must have been another person in the apartment that night,” she said, her hands trembling. “Someone who had a reason to phone the White House.”

After luncheon and several meetings—but before Children's Hour—President Roosevelt performed his water exercises in the White House's private indoor pool. It had been built especially for him in 1933, funded by the New York
Daily News
and the private donations of American citizens. The pool had been constructed inside the West Gallery, between the White House and the West Wing, in place of the old laundry rooms, which had been moved to the basement of the mansion. As Roosevelt swam, propelled by the powerful muscles of his arms and torso, gray light filtered in through the fan windows at the ceiling. The air was thick with steam and the smell of chlorine.

Frank Cole entered, the click of the heels of his black oxfords echoing off the arched ceiling. He stood on the blue tiles, clearing his throat when the President finished a lap and pulled himself to the pool's marble edge. Cole asked, “You wanted to see me, Mr. President?”

His eyes red from the water, Roosevelt looked up at the man. “Last night, Mrs. Roosevelt informed me that Blanche Balfour was murdered.”

Cole spoke carefully. “I'm sorry to hear that, sir.”

The President blinked. “Aren't you going to ask how it happened?”

“No, sir,” Cole rejoined. “I have a number of other things on my plate right now.”

“A young woman is dead!” the President snapped, his voice echoing off the tiles.

“Yes, sir,” Cole said. “And I'm sorry. But you know as well as I do who's also dead—the 2,403 Americans at Pearl Harbor—not to mention 1,178 wounded. Then we also have the brave lost sailors of the USS
Reuben James.
That's not even taking into account the Poles, the British, all those killed in France and the Netherlands, and now the Russians….”