Chapter Two
I gave Linda a synopsis of the mission from the moment we entered East Germany to the moment we left it. She took notes of her own as I offered my observations about changes in routes, two breaks in the chain of contacts, some buildings missing due to construction or renovation projects that interfered slightly with plans and that hadn't been mentioned in our briefings beforehand, and some ideas for substitutions and drops.
Linda questioned me on a few points, but they were the kind of questions that clarify meanings. She wasn't doubting my abilities or judgments. That would have been someone else's job, anyway. She was simply nailing down bits, pieces, and details.
I studied her face as we went over things. She wasn't a ravishing beauty and used very little makeup, but her face and demeanor radiated strength and competence and she was a truly attractive woman in every way. Her hair was pinned in a small, businesslike bun, something which can't be done unless the hair is at least shoulder-length. My imagination was beginning to kick in when she tapped my cup with her pen.
"Hey, there. Where are you?" asked Linda in a soft voice.
I realized that I hadn't said a word for several moments. I'd just sat looking at Linda. She rose with our coffee cups and strode over to the pot for refills. I watched her go and watched her return, as did every other man in the room. She met my eyes as she handed me my cup and sat down, saying, "Monika is asleep on the couch back there. You look damned tired yourself, Ed. I think I have enough notes for now."
"You don't have to furnish me excuses, Linda. I'm tired, but not that tired, and I don't usually distract so easily. For some reason you truly fascinate me. I was just looking at you with nothing else at all on my mind. When you tapped my cup I was daydreaming about how long your hair would have to be to make that bun."
Linda sat staring at me for a moment. "I don't know what to say, Ed. Thanks, I guess."
"You don't have to say anything," I laughed, "Just keep me on track until we finish. Once you're out of sight I should recover enough to function on my own again."
Linda blushed and said, "I really do have enough notes. But you're not going to be free of me right away, Ed. That's why I brought a suitcase. We're going to join the others at the hospital, and I'm to remain with your group until this incident is completely over."
"What incident? The guy who got shot isn't dead and wasn't part of our operation. We can just turn everybody over to the 'crats for processing into the West and we're done."
"He's not dead yet , Ed. You delivered potential witnesses to a murder. You and Will and Connie are also witnesses. IF that man lives, we can probably sweep the whole mess into a file folder and process him for potential asylum. Business as usual."
"What the hell...? Half the barracks here saw what happened. There are plenty of other witnesses available, Linda. They don't need us. We could just disappear."
"Will and Connie aided an escape, as far as the Easties are concerned. They're going to be considered participants, not witnesses. Pictures were taken at the guard post over there, so we couldn't substitute even if they were just witnesses. Word is that the guards who fired are being tried for acting without orders. It's all about politics, of course, and trying to create the appearance that they give a damn. You haven't heard the news, have you? The world is already watching. Everyone wants a useable piece of this political cake and they won't care who gets trampled in the process."
She took a sip of coffee and continued, "If it becomes a murder trial, the trial will be on the Eastern side of the wire, where the shooting happened, and things will be very well covered in the press and propaganda mills. We'll have to produce the witnesses and participants or explain how we lost them. The extractees will have to be granted immediate residency and asylum in either the U.S. or West Germany to avoid being arrested once they're discovered to be escapees themselves. This crew will have to be reassigned, and this incident could suspend the Dragonfly runs for a long time."
"Huh. Maybe I'm more tired than I thought. I just figured there were enough witnesses without us and that we'd disappear for a while as usual. I didn't think the Commies would give a rat's ass about shooting an escapee, whether he survived or not, and you're right, I haven't heard any news. The only radio I've heard is that thing."
I pointed to the walkie-talkie on the desk. After a moment, another thought occurred to me. "You're here to take more than notes, aren't you, Linda? You're here to take over command of the mission post-op."
Linda sat quite still, her eyes gazing steadily into mine for a moment as she gauged how I might respond to being displaced.
"Yes, I'm here to relieve you, Ed. You accomplished your mission. Now we need someone between you and the press, politicians, and police in just about that order."
"That's a nice way of saying that you've been ordered to take over and explaining why in the same breath, Linda. Someone at the office knows me pretty well. John sent you, and I'd bet a year's pay that choosing you wasn't any sort of accident, even though there are probably a couple of others who could handle merely being our social secretary."
Linda didn't answer immediately, but when she did, she said, "John knows what it's like to end a mission. We knew you'd all be dead tired, Ed, running on adrenaline and coffee, just as you are, and he also said you're an easy mark for tall, strong women. He used exactly those words, by the way. John told me you respect brains and competence and that all of those reasons added up to my being directly selected for this job. He was going to send someone out here anyway. Was he wrong to send me?"
I chuckled. It surprised her. "Let's see," I said, "You're tall and have magnificent legs, so you commandeered my attention immediately. Add grace, beauty, brains, competence and orders from the home office to take over because I don't handle political terrains well. I'll even add my own reference, Linda. You have great management abilities, too. I've hardly felt a thing, and you've been in charge since you boarded that chopper."
She continued her steady gaze as she asked, "You mean that? No hard feelings, Ed?"
"I'm not paid to have feelings, Linda, hard or otherwise. I'm paid to find ways to haul people out of places, not to deal with the press and politicians. I'm glad to leave that crap to someone else. And you shouldn't be too worried about my feelings or anyone else's if you're going to have to order troops around. They tend to take advantage of your good intentions. Besides, John's right. He's seen me deal with politicians before."
Linda laughed softly and said, "He told me about a nosy new Senator's visit last year. Did you really push him into the canal?"
"The official story is that I tripped and fell against him during his third visit, Linda. He thought he could conduct some grand little inquisition and came at us like an officious, spook-hating fop. I suggested a tour after lunch, so he and his dozen or so "assistants" accompanied me to a restaurant and afterward we walked back on the path by the canal. He was too out of shape to save himself from rolling and sliding down thirty feet of grassy slope, screaming for help all the way, so he got very wet in front of all his sycophants. Strangely enough, the press somehow got pictures. He didn't visit us a fourth time. John is afraid I'll catch another case of the clumsies in the middle of all this."
Linda laughed again, whether at the mental image of the Senator rolling downhill or only because it seemed expected of her I couldn't tell and didn't guess. John had sent her, so she had all the qualities advertised. He didn't make personnel choices casually.
With that in mind, the whole mission takeover I'd experienced could easily have been something such a woman could have executed without difficulty, not that I really gave a damn about that. My job was finished, as we'd both said. All I had to do was stay clear of the press and pols while the boss found me something else to do somewhere else.
"Linda, there's something else you should know about me. I hate deceitfulness from anyone working with me. I'm discovering that I like you for a lot more than your legs, so if this friendliness is an act to make your takeover easier, let's drop it and get down to business. No hard feelings if we do it now."
I sipped my coffee and said, "My trust in John's judgment in choosing the right people for a job is based on my own experience. In three years he's never made a bad field choice of which I'm aware, and in our business mistakes of that nature can lead to people getting imprisoned or shot. You're here because you're well above simply being competent, Linda, and I completely understand that. An entire segment of our agency's reason for existing could be shut down over this incident, and you were John's choice."
Linda just stared silently at me for a time. She put her notes and the recorder in her briefcase and closed it, then drank some coffee and continued to stare at me for a while longer before speaking. "Well, that was pretty direct. Did you mean it?" she asked.
"I meant it. No hard feelings if we drop all pretenses right now."
Linda made an exasperated expression and said, "No, not that part. The part where you said you were beginning to like me for more than my legs." She grinned.
It was my turn to stare at her. I grinned back. "Yes, I very definitely meant that, too."
Linda laughed nervously. "What were you trying to do, talk me out of this? First you make me sound like Wonder Woman , then you tell me how bad things will go if I fail."
"Both items appear to be true. Ah paints what Ah sees."
"Well, thank you anyway, but all this flattery is going to give me a nosebleed, Ed."
"Flattery? You know better than that, Linda. If I ever even once handed you flattery you'd trash it instantly and never trust me about anything else. Have you considered any other reasons for putting you in charge of something that is potentially momentous?"
"We're all expendable in one way or other," she said, "If I slip, I can be reassigned..."
I held up a hand. "John retires in less than two years, Linda. We've talked about it, and I was wondering if I'd even stay with the agency if John couldn't pick his replacement."
The shock on her face told me she'd thought this was just another assignment. The fingers that covered her lips were trembling. "But...me ? Are you serious , Ed?"
"I'd refuse that crown and haven't been asked anyway. My next choice for boss is retiring for medical reasons next year. I know the rest of the possibles in the office and I'd leave before I'd let any of them design or conduct one of my missions. You were the wild card, Linda. I remember when John spent six months stealing you from the Navy two years ago. I almost wished I had a desk job when you showed up in the office, miLady. The Navy had you running some SEAL ops, and you handled all facets as needed, but you weren't being ticketed for a command slot. Why?"
I held up a hand again and answered my own question. "You were too damned good for your own good, Linda. You made the brass look too good, too. John said the 'old boy' network was going to keep you there 'till you were old and gray. He didn't steal anyone else that year, but he yanked some strings hard and the pretty Navy Lieutenant was attached to us for a year. You must've walked across a swimming pool somewhere along the line, because John busted his ass to keep you when your TDY tour was up. Your decision to leave the Navy and join us was largely based on pay grades and benefits that John arranged to have sprinkled in your path. He didn't want you to get away, Linda."
After a few moments of startled silence, Linda said, "I thought you're supposed to be a local hire, Ed. How in the hell do you know so much about all this? And about me?"
"About you? Just how you came to be in our outfit. No personal stuff."
"Well, that's really comforting, Ed, but I'm asking why John confides in you at all. You've only been there three years, yourself, and you work in the field, not the office. You're listed as a circumstantially-necessary 1970 local hire with no explanation as to why you're still on the payroll. I only scanned your jacket lightly."
"Consider that you even saw my jacket or anyone else's. You aren't in personnel. Logic, Linda. Logic. You know John well enough to know that I'm still on the payroll because I'm good at what I do. Do you know how I came to be with the agency?"
She shook her head. It mildly irritated her to be lectured by someone under her command, but she sat for the rest of it without interrupting, so I continued.
"It isn't a secret around the office. John's only son Rick was in Vietnam in 1968. I'm the medic who pulled him out of a muddy, bloody hole and dragged him to cover. He was hit bad, and I thought he'd be a KIA when I got a good look at him. He had chunks blown out of his leg and shoulder and he was already a couple of pints down."
Linda gave me an odd, sideways look and said, "That sort of thing wasn't unusual there, was it? I mean, John didn't think he owed you a government job here, did he..?"
"Doubt it. Anyway, I couldn't stop the bleeding in his leg without cutting circulation, so I used a piece of jeep radiator drain tubing to splice the vein. Tied the ends of the vein around the hose with dental floss. One of the other guys died and he was a "type-O", so I pushed his body up the paddy dike and rigged an IV tube to drain some of his blood into Rick before he spoiled. The zone was so hot it took an hour to get a medevac bird to us. About two weeks later they pulled me out of the field and sent me to Tan Son Nhut airbase without a reason. That's usually a bad sort of thing. In this case it was some guy who wanted to take me to dinner, and that's not usually a good thing, either."
I grinned at Linda. She chuckled softly. I continued, "The civilian said his name was John and that I was assigned to him until he chose to let me go, which was just a plain damned weird thing as far as I knew. Then he got me a room at the Bachelor Officer's Quarters, even though I was only a sergeant, and told me to report back to Brigade HQ at six o'clock. By this time I didn't know what the hell was going on, but I thought he was CIA or like that, about to try to get me to volunteer for some strange-assed mission, so I called Brigade from the BOQ and got nowhere with questions. I was again told firmly to be wherever I was told to be. When I arrived at HQ, he was waiting with two women, introduced as Sylvia and Darlene. Nurses, he said. Darlene was a friend of his and Sylvia was a friend of hers as well as my blind date. Both looked at me as if I'd just arrived from Mars. Hell, I thought it was because I was enlisted instead of an officer."
Again Linda laughed softly as I drank some coffee. "Go on," she said.
"Well, he took us to dinner in the restaurant at the U.S. embassy in Saigon and fed us steaks and booze. After dinner, he circulated a picture of his son and told us that I had saved his life. I said thanks, but that I barely recognized the son from among all the other guys I'd patched up. John said he'd expected that, so the dinner and weekend away from the war was as much for all of the guys I'd ever saved and tried to save. Sylvia said John had told Darlene what I'd done and that Darlene had told her and that she had actually volunteered for this "dinner mission" just to meet the guy who installed auto parts in people."
Linda smiled a little smile. "So how did the weekend go?"
"Classified," I said, smiling back, "But Sylvia seemed to like me enough. Monday it was back to work. When I married back into the Army two years later and we came to Germany I took a job at Landstuhl Hospital. One day John showed up and recruited me."
"And the rest is history, as they say," said Linda, "How and why did he know you were at Landstuhl? Do you think John was keeping an eye on you all that time?"
"Hardly that. I was just a team medic in the war. My name probably popped up when my wife got very drunk, nasty, and arrested during a tour of East Berlin. She had to have special permissions to travel in or near East-bloc zones due to her job and all of those permissions are tracked. We were put on the next plane to Frankfurt. Back at Landstuhl she was told she was being transferred to the States. I'd had enough of living with an alcoholic, so I cut a deal with her. We send each other forms to sign and we still have all the bennies of being married in the military. She gets COLA and supplemented off-post housing near Washington while I get to keep my green car tags, PX privileges, and the NATO/SOFA stamp in my other passport. She has her world and I have mine."
"I was wondering about that... The wife nobody ever sees. Any regrets?"
"Have you ever lived day-to-day with an alcoholic? Hell, no. No regrets."
The company clerk came over and said the helicopter would be leaving in about half an hour. We decided to have a look at Will's car before leaving and cleared it with the Major. Linda produced a camera and devoted a roll of film to the car, then we boarded the chopper with Monika for the trip to the hospital.
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