Trinity Factor, page 15
“Yes, he is,” Gannt said, his eyes narrowing. “Anything unusual?”
“Plenty,” Kowalski said, eying Lovelace. “The sub was sabotaged.”
Something clutched at Lovelace’s gut. “Are you sure?” he said evenly.
“Damn right,” Kowalski said. “We pulled a couple of hundred pounds of TNT from behind the inner hull in the vicinity of the forward torpedo room. Noticed several of the inner plates cut out and then rewelded. Wires led back to some kind of a low-battery buss bar. From the looks of it I’d say the entire sub had been loaded with explosives.”
“Why didn’t the TNT you found explode?”
“Faulty connection just forward of the main buss.”
“Detonator?”
Again Kowalski glanced at Gannt, who nodded for him to continue, only now the man didn’t seem so certain, and he lowered his voice.
“I don’t know what you’re working on, captain, and I guess I don’t much care. But whatever your interest is in this submarine, I think you may have hit the jackpot.” He withdrew a narrow tubular device with wires sticking out both ends from his coverall pocket, and handed it to Lovelace.
It was light, not more than a couple of ounces, and it had a curious odor, almost like vinegar.
“What is it?” Lovelace asked.
“An acid fuse. It was wired into the battery buss bar. We traced the wires back to the officers’ quarters, where we found it installed behind the ship’s intercom.”
“Someone sabotaged the boat, and this was the fuse,” Lovelace said absently. He was thinking about Harvey Dansig and why he had been murdered.
“There’s something else,” Kowalski said, lowering his voice even more. He seemed troubled.
“Yes?” Lovelace said, handing back the fuse.
Kowalski took it. “Unless I’m completely wet—which has happened before—I’d say this fuse was Russian-made.”
Gannt went pale, and Lovelace suddenly felt light-headed, almost as if his mind was detached from his body.
“How sure are …” he started to ask, but Gannt cut him off.
“Hold it,” he snapped. “This is going no further until I get some authorization.”
Kowalski waved him off. “I’m only sure of death and taxes, captain, but I’d stake my reputation that this fuse is Russian-made.”
“That’s enough,” Gannt roared. “And that is an order, lieutenant.”
Kowalski looked at him and smiled tiredly. “Whatever you say, commander. How about my people?”
“Restricted to base until further notice,” Gannt snapped, and he turned to Lovelace. “And you are getting out of here, captain. But I’m warning you that what you’ve heard here this afternoon will be classified top secret, probably ‘eyes-only’ to the President. As of this moment it is a navy matter.”
“Sure,” Lovelace said, his brain spinning to a dozen different possibilities. He looked up. “Before I go I’d like to use the telephone in your office.”
18
SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO
The clacking wheels and rhythmic swaying of the moving train should have put Jada instantly to sleep. But she was wide awake. She lay on the top bunk of their compartment, aware of her heart beating against her ribs, and of her chest muscles expanding and contracting as she breathed.
It was at least three in the morning, which meant they would be in Santa Fe within four hours. It also meant that within twenty-four hours they could be finished with their assignment. If all went well.
In Chicago they had gotten close enough to General Groves in the depot to overhear him order two sets of round-trip tickets. One set from Chicago to Santa Fe and back, and the other originating in Santa Fe, on the overnight.
Alek had been convinced that the bomb laboratory where Oppenheimer worked was somewhere near Santa Fe. Groves was going down there to look things over, and was taking someone back with him on the overnight. Probably Oppenheimer, for a conference on the train.
“What if it’s not Oppenheimer?” she had asked him.
Alek had shrugged. “Then we’ll have to continue following Groves. Sooner or later he and Oppenheimer will be together.”
As she lay on the bunk she thought about their assignment. In some respects she hoped Groves was not picking up Oppenheimer, and therefore they would not have to kill just yet.
But another part of her mind held a strong desire for it to be ended. She wanted to return home. She was tired of the constant fear, constant worry of detection. And despite the fact she was living with Badim as his wife … almost as his wife … she was lonely.
Alek, she said his name softly to herself. Aleksandr. She liked that better. It was softer. Fit the tongue better.
He had said nothing to her about her terrible mistake, giving their contact their hotel and room number. And she had said nothing to him about killing the man.
It could not be helped. The man was a danger to the entire operation. He had to be eliminated. Yet every time she thought about it, she recoiled, seeing the almost totally blank expression on Alek’s face when he had killed.
Those thoughts also brought up the recurring picture of Harvey Dansig, which threatened to force her mind down into a deep, dark whirlpool.
She rolled over on her side so that she was facing the tiny bathroom door, and she held her breath, listening for sounds from the bunk below. She could faintly hear his breathing, and after awhile, he moved, then it was silent again.
“Aleksandr,” she said softly under her breath. There were several men in the NKVD section where she worked who were interested in her. One of them was a full colonel. But he was an old man who constantly smelled of vodka and cigarettes. His teeth were yellow, and he never seemed to be quite clean-shaven.
Her nightgown had hiked up to her hips, and she placed her right hand beneath her thighs, and clamped her legs tightly together, the warm feeling spreading from that place.
She had never known a man. No one had ever touched her there, not even a doctor. No one, that is, except for herself.
She thought about Aleksandr lying on the bunk beneath her, and wondered what he looked like with his clothes off. He was tall. He was handsome. And he was strong.
But she also wondered about the women he had known. Had he made love to German women? He must have. He had spent nine years in Germany, and she was certain he had not lived like a monk.
If everything worked out here in Santa Fe, they would be on their way back home this time tomorrow morning. When they got back to Moscow he would undoubtedly be given a new assignment, and she would return to the language section, and the colonel who wanted her.
She shifted her legs and an almost electric thrill coursed through her body. She was wet and she could feel a flush creeping up her neck into her cheeks.
“Aleksandr,” she said softly.
She wanted a husband. Children. A home in the country, possibly by the sea. But that image was mixed up in her mind with Brighton and the beach. She was a little girl, and her father was there to protect her.
But those things were irrevocably lost to her, and so would Aleksandr be lost to her once this assignment was completed.
Something woke Badim, and he opened his eyes. The train was still moving through the night, and in the dim light filtering through the window he could make out the edge of the overhead bunk, and across the tiny compartment the bathroom door, which was ajar. A thin silver of light shone under the passageway door, but nothing was wrong. Everything was as it should be.
Jada shifted in the bunk overhead, and he thought he heard a muffled sob. He was about to call her name, but then she was quiet, and he said nothing.
The luminous dials on his wrist read three-thirty, leaving them three and a half hours of sleep before they arrived in Santa Fe. The overnight back to Chicago probably left at seven or eight in the evening, which gave them a full twelve hours or more in town.
He had thought about following Groves from the train depot and somehow trailing him to the laboratory, but had dismissed it as an unnecessary risk.
If Oppenheimer did not come back to the depot with Groves there would be another time to make plans for finding and approaching the installation, which was probably not too far from Santa Fe itself.
For now, however, he would content himself with taking the overnight back to Chicago. If Oppenheimer was with Groves, he would be able to take them both out and get away.
The first step would be getting to New York City, where he had a telephone number for transportation. From there it would be across the Canadian border to Halifax, Nova Scotia, then on the Russian convoy to Murmansk.
Those thoughts brought a kaleidoscope of others—about his childhood, about the orphanage, and about his nine years in Germany.
Besides his training in Moscow before he became Valkyrie, there had been little else for him other than the State. He had been a friendless child who had only the vaguest memories of his father, a stern, authoritarian figure, and none whatsoever of his mother.
In fact, he mused now, he had never even seen a photograph of his mother. Although there were times when he found himself thinking about her, wondering what she was like, he had never developed even a fantasy picture of her in his mind. And that very fact itself was sometimes a cause for disturbance in him.
Jada shifted again in her bunk, and he called softly to her. “Are you awake?”
There was a silence above for a long moment, but then she answered timidly. “Yes, I am. Did I wake you?”
“No,” he lied. “But try to go to sleep. We’ll be in Santa Fe in a few hours.”
She was silent for a long time, and Badim thought about her. Over the months of their training outside Moscow, the thirteen days in the submarine, and now the week they had spent in this country, he had had a chance to closely observe her. She was a lovely young woman; her naivete was her only real fault.
On several occasions he had seen her clothed in nothing more than a bra and panties, and her image swam into his mind’s eye now, but he shut off his erotic imaginings even before they began. They were here to do a job; there would be time later for the other thing.
“I’m sorry,” she said softly.
“I told you that you didn’t wake me, Jada. Now go back to sleep.”
“No, I mean about leading our contact back to our hotel.”
It had been inexcusable. And he found himself thinking that if she had been anyone else, he would have killed her then and there. It had been a mistake that could have cost them their lives.
Why hadn’t he killed her?
She shifted on the bunk again, and he looked up as her bare legs came over the edge. Her feet were small and her ankles were narrow. He almost reached up and touched her.
“Go back to bed,” he snapped. “We’ll need our rest.”
“Aleksandr … I …”
“Go back to bed,” he said harshly.
“Listen to me,” she pleaded. “I think … I think I want you to make love to me.”
Badim groaned inwardly, but before he could say anything she had jumped down from her bunk, her nightgown sliding up, giving him a momentary glimpse of the backs of her legs, and her buttocks. And then she was standing there in front of him, her eyes wide.
He pushed himself up on one elbow. “When we’re finished with this assignment, and back home, there will be time.”
She shook her head, then gathered the hem of her nightgown in both hands and pulled it over her head, tossing it aside.
Her legs were straight and perfectly formed, the hair on her pubis was only a tuft of light brown, her belly flat, almost boyish, and her breast were small but well-rounded, the nipples erect.
He looked at her in the dim light for a long time, feeling his heart accelerate, and his breath quicken.
“You have a lovely body, Jada,” he said finally, and he flipped back the covers and moved over, giving her room to lie beside him.
She came to him, and they were in each other’s arms. He kissed her lips, and then her chin and tiny neck, and she responded by arching her back, pressing her breasts against his chest, a soft moan escaping from her lips.
“Aleksandr,” she said heavily. “Oh, god … Alek …”
He stroked her breasts with his fingertips, then bent down and kissed her nipples.
Again she moaned. “Alek … make love to me … please … now.” She rolled over on her back, her eyes closed, her lips half parted. “Please, Alek,” she said. “Please.”
He was wearing only pajama bottoms, and he took them off. Then he was on top of her, entering her, and she was incredibly tight. She cried out sharply once, but then her hips were gyrating wildly, and he was pounding inside of her, deep inside, and his memories and thoughts about everything, including their assignment, were gone, replaced by the moment.
She came almost at once, her entire body convulsing, and a moment later he released, the pleasure going on and on, and she held on to him tightly with her arms and legs, as if she never wanted to let him go, as if she wanted him inside of her even deeper.
For a long time afterward he lay on top of her, his heart slowing down, his ragged breathing quietening.
Aside from the fact that she was young and very tight, she had been a virgin, and it had not been very good. In technique, the whores he had known in Berlin had been much better. But this wasn’t the same. Despite the lack of technique, which could be learned, this had been better in a different way.
He tried to withdraw, but she wouldn’t let him.
“No,” she said, opening her eyes and looking up at him. “Don’t leave just yet. I like you … in me.” She giggled.
“We need our sleep,” he said softly.
“We have three hours or more before we get to Santa Fe,” she said. “I’d like to do it again. Slower this time.”
Badim had to laugh despite himself. “You’re going to have to give me a little time to recuperate.”
A sudden look of alarm crossed her features. “Are you hurt?”
He laughed out loud, and shook his head, then bent down and kissed her nose. “No,” he said. “With men it’s a little different than with women. It takes us a little longer to get ready for a second time.”
“It takes you a while to get another hard-on?”
He wondered how he could have thought about killing her. “In polite society it’s called an erection, if it’s mentioned at all.”
She sighed deeply. “I want to mention it, and I don’t want to be polite. Not now.”
19
WASHINGTON, D.C.
Lovelace had a splitting headache, his mouth was foul from too many cigarettes, and his eyes burned in their sockets.
Blearily he looked at his watch again; it read 11:50 A.M. Ten minutes before noon Washington time, which meant it was close to ten in Santa Fe. Groves should have been at Los Alamos by now. He should have gotten Lovelace’s frantic message. And yet he had not called.
“Sonofabitch.”
He sat at his desk in his office, where he had been sitting since eight this morning waiting for the general’s call.
He had tried everything, but Colonel Pearson refused to cooperate, Colonel Lansdale was somewhere en route to Berkeley, California, Secretary of War Stimson was not in, and President Roosevelt was on his way up to Quebec, Canada, for a meeting with Churchill.
Two police artist sketches were laid out on the desk in front of him, and he looked down at them again. One was of a handsome man—narrow nose, square chin, and aristocratic eyes. The other was of a woman—much younger, tiny nose, high cheekbones, and lovely, full lips.
The police chief in Santa Fe had thought he was crazy when Lovelace called this morning, but had agreed to keep his people on the lookout for a man and a woman matching the descriptions he had relayed.
“Can’t guarantee much, though, captain,” the police chief had said with a thick Texas drawl. “We’ve been gettin’ a whole shitload of people coming through here as of late, if you get my meaning.”
“Anything you can do will help,” Lovelace had said patiently.
“Can you tell me what you want them for? I mean, are they deserters or something?”
“Murderers,” Lovelace said.
“Hotdamn,” the chief said with obvious relish. “I’ll sure do what I can for you. Have a good day now, hear?”
The phone rang, jangling Lovelace out of his thoughts. With a shaking hand he picked it up. “Lovelace.”
“This is Groves. What the hell is going on up there, Lovelace?”
A flood of relief washed over him. “Where are you at this moment, general?”
“Site Y, and I want to know what’s going on up there with you. I’ve just been on the phone with Hoover … . He wants you thrown in jail!”
“General, listen to me carefully,” Lovelace snapped, putting as much force into his voice as he could. “I want you to stay where you are. Don’t move until I get there.”
“You’re not going anywhere!” Groves roared. “You’re staying right in Washington. You’re going to see no one, talk to no one, or do a thing. And that’s an order!”
“Goddammit, Groves, listen to me! Your life is in danger. There’s a very good possibility you will be assassinated if you leave Y!”
There was a dead silence on the line for a long time, and Lovelace ran the fingers of his right hand through his hair.
When the general came back on the line, his voice was deadly calm. “As soon as I finish talking with you, Lovelace, I’m going to telephone my secretary and tell her to start proceedings against you. As of this moment you are fired. You may consider yourself under house arrest. If you run, we’ll find you.”
Lovelace closed his eyes and sighed deeply. “General Groves, why won’t you let me help you?” he asked tiredly. “I’m doing nothing more than the job you hired me for.”
“You’ve gone too far this time,” Groves snapped.
“There are compelling reasons for me to suspect that a man and a woman are here to assassinate you.”
