The Rhinemann Exchange (35 page)

Grudgingly, David began to understand the subtle clarity of Brigadier General Swanson’s manipulation. Swanson had maneuvered him into a clean position. The killing of Erich Rhinemann—whether he did it himself or whether he bought the assassin—would be totally unexpected. Swanson wasn’t by any means the “stupid bastard” Kendall thought he was. Or that David had considered.

Swanson was nervous. A neophyte. But he was pretty damned good.

“All right. My apologies,” said Spaulding, indicating a sincerity he didn’t feel. “Perhaps the New York thing was
exaggerated. I made enemies in Portugal, I can’t deny that.… I got out under cover, you know.”

“What?”

“There’s no way the people in New York could know I left the city.”

“You’re sure?”

“As sure as you are that no one’s trying to stop your negotiations.”

“Yeah.… O.K. Well, everything’s set. I got a schedule.”

“You’ve seen Rhinemann?”

“Yesterday. All day.”

“What about Lyons?” asked David.

“Swanson’s packing him off at the end of the week. With his nursemaids. Rhinemann figures the designs will be arriving Sunday or Monday.”

“In steps or all together?”

“Probably two sets of prints. He’s not sure. It doesn’t make any difference; they’ll be here in full by Tuesday. He guaranteed.”

“Then we’ve moved up. You estimated three weeks.” David felt a pain in his stomach. He knew it wasn’t related to Walter Kendall or Eugene Lyons or designs for high-altitude gyroscopes. It was Jean Cameron and the simple fact that he’d have only one week with her.

It disturbed him greatly and he speculated—briefly—on the meaning of this disturbance.

And then he knew he could not allow himself the indulgence; the two entities had to remain separate, the worlds separate.

“Rhinemann’s got good control,” said Kendall, more than a hint of respect showing in his voice. “I’m impressed with his methods. Very precise.”

“If you think that, you don’t need me.” David was buying a few seconds to steer their conversation to another area. His statement was rhetorical.

“We don’t; that’s what I said. But there’s a lot of money involved and since the War Department—one way or another—is picking up a large share of the tab, Swanson wants his accounts covered. I don’t sweat him on that. It’s business.”

Spaulding recognized his moment. “Then let’s get to the
codes. I haven’t wasted the three days down here. I’ve struck up a friendship of sorts with the embassy cryp.”

“The what?”

“The head cryptographer. He’ll send out the codes to Washington; the payment authorization.”

“Oh.… Yeah, that.” Kendall was squeezing a cigarette, prepared to insert it in his mouth. He was only half-concerned with codes and cryptographers, thought David. They were the wrap-up, the necessary details relegated to others. Or was it an act? wondered Spaulding.

He’d know in a moment or two.

“As you pointed out, it’s a great deal of money. So we’ve decided to use a scrambler with code switches every twelve hours. We’ll prepare the cryp schedule tonight and send it out by patrol courier to Washington tomorrow. The master plate will allow for fifteen letters.… Naturally, the prime word will be ‘Tortugas.’ ”

Spaulding watched the disheveled accountant.

There was no reaction whatsoever.

“O.K.… Yeah, O.K.” Kendall sat down in an easy chair. His mind seemed somewhere else.

“That meets with your approval, doesn’t it?”

“Sure. Why not? Play any games you like. All I give a shit about is that Geneva radios the confirmation and you fly out of here.”

“Yes, but I thought the reference had to include the … code factor.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“ ‘Tortugas.’ Hasn’t it got to be ‘Tortugas’?”

“Why? What’s ‘Tortugas’?”

The man wasn’t acting. David was sure of that. “Perhaps I misunderstood. I thought ‘Tortugas’ was part of the authorization code.”

“Christ! You and Swanson! All of you. Military geniuses!
Jesus!
If it doesn’t sound like Dan Dunn, Secret Agent, it’s not the real McCoy, huh?… Look. When Lyons tells you everything’s in order, just say so. Then drive out to the airport … it’s a small field called Mendarro … and Rhinemann’s men will tell you when you can leave. O.K.? You got that?”

“Yes, I’ve got it,” said Spaulding. But he wasn’t sure.

Outside, David walked aimlessly down the Buenos Aires streets. He reached the huge park of the Plaza San Martín, with its fountains, its rows of white gravel paths, its calm disorder.

He sat down on a slatted bench and tried to define the elusive pieces of the increasingly complex puzzle.

Walter Kendall hadn’t lied. “Tortugas” meant nothing to him.

Yet a man in an elevator in New York City had risked his life to learn about “Tortugas.”

Ira Barden in Fairfax had told him there was only a single word opposite his name in the DW transfer in Ed Pace’s vaults: “Tortugas.”

There was an obvious answer, perhaps. Ed Pace’s death prohibited any real knowledge, but the probability was genuine.

Berlin had gotten word of the Peenemünde negotiation—too late to prevent the theft of the designs—and was now committed to stopping the sale. Not only stopping it, but if possible tracing the involvement of everyone concerned. Trapping the entire Rhinemann network.

If this was the explanation—and what other plausible one existed?—Pace’s code name, “Tortugas,” had been leaked to Berlin by Fairfax infiltration. That there was a serious breach of security at Fairfax was clear; Pace’s murder was proof.

His own role could be easily assessed by Berlin, thought David. The man in Lisbon suddenly transferred to Buenos Aires. The expert whose skill was proven in hundreds of espionage transactions, whose own network was the most ruthlessly efficient in southern Europe, did not walk out of his own creation unless his expertise was considered vital someplace else. He’d long ago accepted the fact that Berlin more than suspected him. In a way it was his protection; he’d by no means won every roll of the dice. If the enemy killed him, someone else would take his place. The enemy would have to start all over again. He was a known commodity … accept an existing devil.

Spaulding considered carefully, minutely, what he might do were he the enemy. What steps would he take at this specific juncture?

Barring panic or error, the enemy would not kill him.
Not now. Because he could
not
by himself inhibit the delivery of the designs. He could, however, lead his counterparts to the moment and place of delivery.

What is the location of Tortugas!?

The desperate … hysterical man in the Montgomery elevator had screamed the question, preferring to die rather than reveal those whose orders he followed. The Nazis reveled in such fanaticism. And so did others, for other reasons.

He—Spaulding—would therefore be placed under
äusserste Überwachung
—foolproof surveillance, three- to four-man teams, twenty-four hours a day. That would account for the recruitment of the extraterritorial personnel on the Berlin payroll. Agents who operated outside the borders of Germany,
had
operated—for profit—for years. The languages and dialects would vary; deep-cover operatives who could move with impunity in neutral capitals because they had no Gestapo or Gehlen or Nachrichtendienst histories.

The Balkans and the Middle East countries had such personnel for hire. They were expensive; they were among the best. Their only loyality was to the pound sterling and the American dollar.

Along with this round-the-clock surveillance, Berlin would take extraordinary measures to prevent him from developing his own network in Buenos Aires. That would mean infiltrating the American embassy. Berlin would not overlook that possibility. A great deal of money would be offered.

Who at the embassy could be bought?

To attempt corrupting an individual too highly placed could backfire; give him, Spaulding, dangerous information.… Someone not too far up on the roster; someone who could gain access to doors and locks and desk-drawer vaults. And codes.… A middle-level attaché. A man who’d probably never make it to the Court of St. James’s anyway; who’d settle for another kind of security. Negotiable at a very high price.

Someone at the embassy would be Spaulding’s enemy.

Finally, Berlin would order him killed. Along with numerous others, of course. Killed at the moment of delivery; killed after the äusserste Überwachung had extracted everything it could.

David got up from the slatted green bench and stretched, observing the beauty that was the Plaza San Martín park. He wandered beyond the path onto the grass, to the edge of a pond whose dark waters reflected the surrounding trees like a black mirror. Two white swans paddled by in alabaster obliviousness. A little girl was kneeling by a rock on the tiny embankment, separating the petals from a yellow flower.

He was satisfied that he had adequately analyzed the immediate options of his counterparts. Options and probable courses of action. His gut feeling was positive—not in the sense of being enthusiastic, merely not negative.

He now had to evolve his own counterstrategy. He had to bring into play the lessons he had learned over the years in Lisbon. But there was so little time allowed him. And because of this fact, he understood that a misstep could be fatal here.

Nonchalantly—but with no feelings of nonchalance—he looked around at the scores of strollers on the paths, on the grass; the rowers and the passengers in the small boats on the small dark lake. Which of them were the enemy?

Who were the ones watching him, trying to think what he was thinking?

He would have to find them—one or two of them anyway—before the next few days were over.

That was the genesis of his counterstrategy.

Isolate and break.

David lit a cigarette and walked over the miniature bridge. He was primed. The hunter and the hunted were now one. There was the slightest straining throughout his entire body; the hands, the arms, the legs: there was a muscular tension, an awareness. He recognized it. He was back in the north country.

And he was good in that jungle. He was the best there was. It was here that he built his architectural monuments, his massive structures of concrete and steel. In his mind.

It was all he had sometimes.

He looked at his watch. It was five thirty; Jean had said she’d be at his apartment around six. He had walked for nearly two hours and now found himself at the corner of Viamonte, several blocks from his apartment. He crossed the street and walked to a newsstand under a storefront awning, where he bought a paper.

He glanced at the front pages, amused to see that the war news—what there was of it—was relegated to the bottom, surrounded by accounts of the Grupo de Oficiales’ latest benefits to Argentina. He noted that the name of a particular colonel, one Juan Perón, was mentioned in three separate subheadlines.

He folded the paper under his arm and, because he realized he had been absently musing, looked once again at his watch.

It was not a deliberate move on David’s part. That is to say, he did not calculate the abruptness of his turn; he simply turned because the angle of the sun caused a reflection on his wristwatch and he unconsciously shifted his body to the right, his left hand extended, covered by his own shadow.

But his attention was instantly diverted from his watch. Out of the corner of his eye he could discern a sudden, sharp break in the sidewalk’s human traffic. Thirty feet away across the street two men had swiftly turned around, colliding with oncoming pedestrians, apologizing, stepping into the flow on the curbside.

The man on the left had not been quick enough; or he was too careless—too inexperienced, perhaps—to angle his shoulders, or hunch them imperceptibly so as to melt into the crowd.

He stood out and David recognized him.

He was one of the men from the roof of the Córdoba apartment. His companion David couldn’t be sure of, but he
was
sure of that man. There was even the hint of a limp in his gait; David remembered the battering he’d given him.

He was being followed, then, and that was good.

His point of departure wasn’t as remote as he’d thought.

He walked another ten yards, into a fairly large group approaching the corner of Córdoba. He sidestepped his way between arms and legs and packages, and entered a small jewelry store whose wares were gaudy, inexpensive. Inside, several office girls were trying to select a gift for a departing secretary. Spaulding smiled at the annoyed proprietor, indicating that he could wait, he was in no hurry. The proprietor made a gesture of helplessness.

Spaulding stood by the front window, his body concealed from outside by the frame of the door.

Before a minute was up he saw the two men again. They were still across the street; David had to follow their progress through the intermittent gaps in the crowd. The two men were talking heatedly, the second man annoyed with his limping companion. Both were trying to glance above the heads of the surrounding bodies, raising themselves up on their toes, looking foolish, amateur.

David figured they would turn right at the corner and walk east on Córdoba, toward his apartment. They did so and, as the owner of the jewelry store protested, Spaulding walked swiftly out into the crowds and ran across the Avenida Callao, dodging cars and angry drivers. He had to reach the other side, staying out of the sightlines of the two men. He could not use the crosswalks or the curbs. It would be too easy, too logical, for the men to look backward as men did when trying to spot someone they had lost in surveillance.

David knew his objective now. He had to separate the men and take the one with a limp. Take him and force answers.

If they had any experience, he considered, they would reach his apartment and divide, one man cautiously going inside to listen through the door, ascertaining the subject’s presence, the other remaining outside, far enough from the entrance to be unobserved. And common sense would dictate
that the man unknown to David would be the one to enter the apartment.