Rising Sun (17 page)

Love and aloha,

Amanda

Tim put down the letter. His hands shook and he felt emotions he hadn’t felt since he was a kid. He felt his eyes start to moisten. Amanda was safe.

Merchant stepped by and looked down. “What’s the problem, Tim?”

He took a deep breath and regained control. He remembered a rule that said “thou shalt not cry in front of a senior officer.” “No problem, sir, far from it. Remember the young lady I told you about? The one I met in Honolulu? Well, she somehow made it to San Francisco.”

Merchant laughed and slapped him on the back. “Fantastic. You’ve been moping like a lost dog since you got here what with your worrying about her.”

“Was it that obvious?”

“Worse. Now, fill me in.”

Tim did, at least as much as he knew. “She’s going to be coming here and it’s such a big location, I don’t know how we’ll find each other when she does.”

“You’re an intelligence officer, right? Well, just use your damn intelligence, and figure it out. Or, hell, if she could make it across the Pacific, I’m reasonably certain she could find you in San Diego.”

* * *

Wilhelm Braun was frustrated and angry. He had made a mistake. In fact, he had made several of them and he was not used to that. It did not behoove a field-grade officer in the SS to make so many errors. At least, he thought ruefully, there was no one senior to him around to notice.

First, he had underestimated the complexity of the situation confronting him. The American buildup around San Diego was truly massive and security was surprisingly tight the closer to the more tempting targets. It rapidly became evident that he was not going to be able to blow up ammunition depots, fuel storage facilities, or ships. Nor would he be allowed to get close to senior military and civilian personnel in the area without committing suicide, and that still was not on his agenda. He was willing to die for the Reich, but not in a futile gesture.

He laughed harshly. Let their little Jap allies do that.

Doing it all alone was also no longer practicable, if it ever had been. He would need help. He sent a signal to Gunther Krause, the embassy aide he’d thought could come north and meet him should the need arise. Krause was a senior sergeant who’d been masquerading as a low-level clerk in the embassy, and would be an invaluable help. He would also provide muscle and was more than willing to kill for the Reich. Braun was as well, but two men with guns were much better than one.

When Krause arrived at the bus station in San Diego after crossing without incident from Tijuana, he was dressed in a combination of clothes that made him look like a refugee. At least his hair was long enough to not look military. Even to Braun it was clear that Krause would need help in becoming inconspicuous.

“My dear Sergeant, I am delighted to see you,” Braun said as they drove away, “but there are a number of changes that we will have to make.”

“I understand, sir.”

Braun wondered if he did. Braun knew that Krause wasn’t well educated formally, but he was surprisingly intelligent and, somehow, had become fluent in English along with Spanish. Apparently the man had a feel for languages.

“First, Sergeant, we will get you some American clothes. You stand out in what you are wearing. All of your clothing, including underwear and socks, will be of American make.”

Krause nodded. It made good sense.

“Second, you and I will speak only English, and that includes when the two of us believe we are alone. Anyone speaking a foreign tongue will attract attention, and that is something we don’t need. I’m sure we’ll both make slips and people will surely notice your accent, but we must fight against them. The accent can be explained because your identification says that you are Swedish, which practically nobody speaks, while German is a fairly common language.

“Further, you and I will not speak loudly as that, obviously, will attract unwanted attention. Nor will we whisper as that will make people lean forward to try and eavesdrop. Human nature, I’m afraid.”

Krause laughed. “People are nosy and gossipy, sir. May I ask how you will explain me?”

“Good question. Quite simply, you are my assistant in my engineering business. May I assume you know nothing about engineering?”

“I know how to blow up a bridge, but not build one. Does that count?”

“Actually, it does. However, if anyone asks, and I doubt that they will, you are my wife’s nephew and I had to take you despite your shortcomings. You are my clerk and assistant and you are definitely not an engineer. I’m not either, but I believe I can fool people for long enough to get out of trouble.”

“Understood, Colonel. Is that it? I would like to go shopping and get out of these rags.”

“Not quite. I want you to never refer to me as sir or colonel again and I will never call you sergeant. We are civilians in the United States, and we must act and speak like they do, however uncomfortable that might make us at first. Therefore, you will refer to me as Bill, and not sir or colonel, and I will call you Gunther. I used the name of Brown when I crossed the border, which turned out to be unnecessary, but now I’m using Swenson as my last name. Americans are far less formal than we are, and civilians almost uniformly, and despite differences in their hierarchy, refer to each other by their first names. It would be especially so for two people working together. Such social intimacies would be normal.”

“I understand, sir.”

“What?”

Krause laughed. “I understand, Bill.”

Some things had gone well. The two-story rental property he’d arranged through the shell company provided a shop and a place to store the truck, while the second floor above the shop included a comfortable apartment that would house both men. It amused Braun that his landlord was an annoying Jew lawyer named Zuckerman. When the time came, perhaps he would kill Zuckerman the Jew just for pleasure.

The freshly painted sign on the front of the building proclaimed it as the home of Swenson Engineering, which matched the Swedish passport he would use for identification if anybody asked. So far, nobody had, which also amused him. Once again, he concluded that Americans were gullible fools. Gunther Krause had become Gunther Swenson.

In Germany, Gestapo informants would be watching his every move and reporting everything he did. But not here. Apparently the Americans thought that nobody would use false identification or that Germany would be even slightly interested in America’s war against Japan.

The staff he’d left behind in Mexico had also given him some marvelously created fictitious contracts between the United States government and Swenson Engineering, including phony purchase orders, which enabled him to get rationed food and gasoline. Since his papers said he was a defense contractor for the government, he was eligible for more gasoline then he’d ever use.

The truck he’d driven across the border was a ruin, and he’d decided to drive it only in an emergency. Instead, he bought a 1937 Ford station wagon from a lady whose husband was in the service. It had wood paneling on the side and was commonly referred to as a “woody.” He made a removable sign identifying it as belonging to Swenson Engineering, along with several other business signs which he kept out of sight. This evening, however, there were no signs on the Ford.

It was getting dark by the time he and Krause had driven the station wagon out toward the small town of Lakeside, north and east of San Diego. A rail line ran through it and it was time for the two of them to earn their pay. He’d planned to do it alone, but it would be so much easier with Krause’s help. Braun thought a couple of sticks of dynamite and an impact detonator would do the job and Krause concurred.

Braun parked the Ford among some trees a few hundred yards away from the railroad track and walked slowly toward it with Krause a few paces behind. He found a place where the rail bed was built up and crawled onto it, after first looking around to see if anyone was in view. The dynamite went under the rails and the detonator, built to act like a land mine, went on top. When the train’s wheels ran over it, a spark should be created which would cause the dynamite to explode. The track would be shattered and the train would be sent hurtling down the embankment.

It was easy, almost too easy. The tracks were normally deserted. He’d checked it out before and seen no signs of activity, not even kids or bums or patrols checking for sabotage. Well, he said with a laugh, all that might change after tonight.

They looked around. There were people who spent a lot of time doing nothing more than train watching. However, he did not think he’d run into them as the late afternoon sky darkened. If the trains in California ran on anything resembling a schedule, the freight train they were waiting for should be along within an hour.

Even though it was dangerous, Braun felt compelled to stay and see the results of their handiwork. They drove to a spot where they could look down on the tracks and still remain out of sight. The place where he’d placed the dynamite was a good mile away and he hoped an innocuous Ford station wagon would go unnoticed.

He pulled out a cheese sandwich and ate slowly. He offered half to Krause, who said he wasn’t hungry. After what seemed an eternity, they heard a train whistle in the distance. Braun tried to will it to come closer, sooner, but when it finally appeared, it was a very long one and moving slowly. Braun was delighted.

Two steam engines sending clouds of white smoke into the sky were locked in an almost sexual embrace and pulling a line of freight cars and flatcars that stretched to the horizon. It was the type of train that blocked roads and drove drivers to distraction. Braun thought that blocked roads would be the least of people’s worries in a little while.

Braun smiled as he saw that the flatcars carried a number of M3 Stuart light tanks. They were the best the Americans had at this time, but were pieces of shit in comparison with German armor. He was confident the German Panzer III and the new Panzer IV would destroy them with ease. What disconcerted him was the fact that the tanks would be replaced by the Americans who turned them out like Ford used to make cars.

He wondered what the dirty little Japs had in the way of tanks and decided he really didn’t care. He just wanted this train to crash.

The whistle sounded again, loud and strident. Here I come, it seemed to proclaim. Not for long, Braun laughed, and Krause sighed.

He held his breath as the first locomotive passed over where he’d placed the charge. It drove on and, for a second, Braun thought he’d failed and set the detonator improperly. Then a white flash suddenly appeared underneath the second engine and was followed by an explosion. The train shuddered like a drunk trying to keep his balance. But it couldn’t. The rails had been destroyed. The train lurched and stumbled, and slowly turned to its left and began to careen off the tracks and down the embankment. The sound of metal crashing and tearing ripped through the sky. Car after car played the game of follow the leader and ran down onto the field to their destruction.

The sound of metal and wood colliding and ripping became deafening. Some train cars fell on their sides while others stayed upright and a few actually turned turtle. The despised Stuart tanks ripped free of their shackles and fell onto the field. In a couple of cases, the turrets came loose and rolled around. Braun was mildly disappointed that their crews hadn’t been traveling with them.