Louise's Gamble (14 page)

‘Murder is unlikely,’ Don said. ‘An FBI agent was on the scene with the police, but he concluded Alessa’s death was a suicide and left the case to the police to wrap up.’

‘How could he be so sure?’

‘Louise,’ he said gently, ‘laudanum tastes vile in an amount large enough to kill. She wouldn’t have swallowed anything that tasted of it by accident. And if she’d been forced, there would have been evidence of it on her body or at the scene. The FBI concluded she took the laudanum willingly and went to bed as she usually did.’

‘There’s nothing OSS can do?’

‘We have no authority to conduct a domestic murder investigation,’ Corso interrupted. ‘And we can’t allow the police to know that Alessa was involved in an OSS operation. Police headquarters leaks like a sieve, and crime reporters would crawl all over it. If we tell the police that Alessa was involved with OSS, we might as well broadcast it on the radio. We have no choice but to turn over the file to the Office of Naval Intelligence. The Port of New York is their territory. Without Alessa OSS has no dog in this hunt.’

Melinsky nodded to the other two men and they left the room, leaving me with my handler – if he was still my handler.

‘I know you had a personal relationship with Alessa Oneto,’ Melinsky said.

‘I did. We were friends before all this.’

‘You do understand that OSS involvement must stop now?’

‘Yes, I see that.’

Melinsky leaned back in his chair and pulled out his cigarette case.

‘I would like one of those,’ I said. ‘I don’t usually smoke, but . . .’

‘Of course,’ he said, handing me a Sobranie, and then lighting it for me.

I inhaled. The cigarette had more depth than a Lucky Strike; the smoke carried exotic flavors. I could see why people who could afford it splurged on them.

‘But,’ Melinsky continued, ‘we need to wrap up a couple of loose ends.’

So Alessa’s death was a loose end.

‘You will need to go on to your knitting circle tonight,’ he said. ‘How you’ll behave will depend on whether the news of Alessa’s death makes the afternoon papers. We will meet here before you leave work today. If her death is in the papers, with a picture, you will of course discuss it this evening. If not, you will simply wonder where she is.’

I wished acting were included in my training at ‘The Farm’. This was going to be challenging, to say the least.

‘“Anne” will be at the knitting circle, too.’

‘My babysitter?’ I said. ‘Why?’

‘Because we don’t know for sure what happened to Alessa. We don’t know if an enemy agent might be watching you, or if you’ve been tailed. For the same reason, Jack will pick you up at the designated rendezvous as usual. Instead of bringing you to me, though, he’ll drive around a bit to make sure no one is following you, and then drop you near your boarding house.’

‘OK,’ I said.

Melinsky rested his elbows on the desk and leaned forward. ‘Louise,’ he said, ‘be careful for a few days. Watchful. When you’re not at work stay at home. Until we see the final police report on Alessa’s death. If you need to talk to me, tell Don and he’ll arrange a meeting.’

‘Certainly,’ I said.

My foray into espionage was over. And I’d never see Alessa again.

I made it to the ladies restroom, thankfully empty, before my bowels turned to water and I permitted tears to form and fall. Afterwards I sat on the toilet seat, coiled into a tight ball with my feet resting on the edge of the toilet bowl, my arms around my knees and my head down. I needed a few minutes to pull myself together.

I was presentable, I thought, when I returned to the office. My girls thought otherwise.

‘Are you OK?’ Ruth asked. ‘You look so pale.’

‘I’m fine,’ I said.

‘Don’t get whatever illness Betty had,’ Brenda said.

Betty stiffened and tears came into her eyes, but she lowered her head over her typewriter and the other two girls didn’t notice.

I went to my desk and sorted index cards with a vengeance. Hours would pass until I spoke to Melinsky again, and more hours until I went to my knitting circle to play my part. I desperately wanted this day to end.

I was sure Alessa hadn’t committed suicide. It made no sense at all to me. I’d never noticed any despondency in her, or fear, which would have led to such a despairing act. She’d been murdered, I knew it, because of the information she’d brought back from New York. I doubted if Melinsky would even tell me what the police concluded after their investigation. Why would he? I was a cut-out. The less I knew, the better.

Melinsky and I met over a weak cup of coffee in the OSS cafeteria after most of the staff had gone home for the day.

‘It’s in the papers,’ Melinsky said, handing me copies of the
Herald
and the
News
. ‘There’s a photograph of her, and she’s identified as Countess Oneto.’

I unfolded the
Herald
.
Alessa’s ‘suicide’ was reported below the fold on the front page. This would be all we’d talk about at the knitting circle tonight.

‘Memorize what’s in these articles,’ Melinsky said. ‘You should know nothing other than what’s in the newspapers. And what all the other knitters knew about Alessa from the evenings you spent together.’ Like how Alessa had disguised herself as a poor refugee. I knew that would come up in the conversation tonight.

I committed the brief paragraphs to memory and gave the papers back to Melinsky.

‘Play it by ear,’ Melinsky said. ‘You’re as shocked as anyone and as surprised that Alessa was a countess as the rest of them.’

‘Of course,’ I said.

Melinsky reached his hand over the table, and I took it. I barely felt his grip; I was still numb with shock.

‘It was good to know you,’ he said. ‘Perhaps we will cross paths again.’

Melinsky left, giving me a quick smile before he went out the door. I was alone except for a grizzled colored man mopping the floor. I wanted to throw my coffee cup at the wall and pound the scarred wooden table with both fists, but instead I rubbed my aching temples.

‘Bad day, miss?’ the colored man said as he came near with his mop.

‘Awful,’ I said. ‘Awful.’

He paused, then put a wiry hand on my shoulder. ‘Remember, miss,’ he said. ‘The Good Lord won’t send you nothin’ you can’t handle. You be stronger than you know.’

‘Thanks,’ I said. He patted my shoulder and moved away.

I was only being respectful to him. In less than a year I’d moved so far from my Southern Baptist roots that I well knew He could send me plenty of trouble I couldn’t handle. Look at what horrors went on in this world already! Depression, world war, millions of innocent people dead and displaced. Innocent dreams shattered forever. If God planned to intervene, He was taking his time about it. No, it was up to us humans to cope with this Armageddon all by ourselves. And it wasn’t clear yet that the good guys would win.

Alessa’s death was a tiny pebble cast into a maelstrom of horror, but it was enough to overwhelm me.

‘Dearie,’ Phoebe said, ‘are you all right? You look ill.’ She and Dellaphine had
The Boston Cooking School Cookbook
out, poring over recipes at the kitchen table, planning menus for the week ahead. Including Thanksgiving.

I’d learned at OSS to tell as close to the truth as possible when lying was necessary. The fewer falsehoods to get caught in, the better.

‘I’m terribly upset,’ I said. ‘A friend of mine has died, and the police are saying it’s suicide. I can’t believe it.’

‘A good friend? Someone we know?’ asked Dellaphine.

‘No,’ I said. ‘A woman from my knitting group.’

‘I’m so sorry, Louise,’ Phoebe said. ‘Let me fix you some tea.’ I would have liked a shot of Mr Holcombe’s bourbon, but figured it would be unwise to ask for it.

‘That would be lovely,’ I said.

The kettle came to a full head of steam quickly. Phoebe poured hot water into her china teapot – no newfangled tea bags for her – and let it steep. Soon I was sipping strong Earl Grey with honey and milk while watching Phoebe and Dellaphine sort through recipes. I felt calmer now that I was home.

Funny how I’d lived here at ‘Two Trees’ for less than a year, but I already thought of it as home.

We were a solemn group that gathered in the women’s club room of the Union Methodist Church that evening. The sexton had stoked the coal fire in the pot-bellied stove for us, so at least our bodies were warm, if not our spirits.

Our group was small, too. Me; Laura; Pearl of the gorgeous mink coat; another regular, Miriam, an older woman who rarely said much; and Anne, my babysitter.

‘Hi, everyone,’ she said. ‘I’m Anne. I heard about this group from my landlady. I hope you don’t mind if I join you tonight?’

‘Of course not,’ Laura said. ‘The more the merrier.’ Then she checked herself. ‘Though I’m afraid we’re not very merry tonight.’

‘Oh, why not?’ Anne said as she pulled her project out of a deep carpet-bag, a heavy khaki sweater and a tangle of knitting needles and yarn. There’d be a standard issue .45 caliber Colt revolver in the bottom of that bag, too. It would be much more effective than my knife, which I still carried in my pocketbook. So silly for me to have made so much of my time at ‘The Farm’. My assumption of the title ‘agent’ embarrassed me now. I’d accomplished nothing and wouldn’t have the chance again.

‘One of our regulars died,’ Pearl said.

‘Oh no!’ Anne said. ‘How?’

‘It was in all the afternoon papers,’ Laura said. She was working on a pair of the fingerless gloves from the pattern she’d given us last week. ‘She killed herself!’

‘How awful,’ Anne said.

‘She was a refugee from somewhere in Italy,’ Pearl said, pulling off her wide gold bracelet with the diamond clasp so she could knit without impediment and dropping it carelessly into her pocketbook.

‘You knew her the best,’ Laura said, turning to me. ‘You lunched together a few times, didn’t you?’

‘Yes,’ I answered. ‘She was a very sweet woman. I’m shocked that she’d do such a thing.’

‘Perhaps she couldn’t bear being away from home any more,’ Anne said.

‘You know the really crazy part?’ Laura said.

Here it comes, I thought.

‘She was a countess! And rich! She and her husband lived in a suite at the Mayflower. The picture in the paper showed her wearing a ball gown and a tiara!’

‘She pretended to be poor when she was with us,’ Pearl said. ‘She must have bought the clothes she wore at some thrift shop. Why do you think she did that, Louise?’

‘I have no idea,’ I said. ‘But I can guess. So she could be herself, not get special attention?’

‘It was a disguise,’ Miriam said.

My heart began to pound. Surely this mousy woman had no idea of Alessa’s plan.

‘A disguise?’ Pearl asked. ‘What do you mean a disguise?’

‘She didn’t want to be herself,’ Miriam said. ‘She was ashamed.’

‘What on earth of?’ Laura asked.

‘Of being a wealthy foreigner, with nothing to do but live in a fancy hotel safe and sound, while our boys are fighting for her country. It would shame me, I can tell you.’

I exhaled slowly in relief.

‘It’s a sad story,’ Anne said. ‘I’m sorry for her.’

‘And I just dropped a stitch,’ I said. The silence that followed told me we were all remembering how Alessa always repaired my mistakes.

‘Hand it over,’ Anne said. ‘I can fix it.’

After two hours of a lot less conversation than usual, we began to pack up our work bags.

Anne turned to me. ‘I heard there is a late night market around here,’ she said. ‘Do you know where it is?’

‘I do,’ I answered. ‘You need to go up to I Street, turn left on Twenty-First, cross Pennsylvania Avenue, and the Western Market is a block down on the right. I’ll walk with you.’

‘I don’t want to trouble you,’ Anne said.

‘It’s no trouble. I’d like to get some air.’

The two of us walked together to the market. Anne showed no signs of being a trained secret agent, but then she wouldn’t have been a very good one if she had, would she?

Once inside Anne guided me down the canned food aisle, which was sparsely stocked to say the least. People must be stocking up for Thanksgiving, less than a week away now. Without a word Anne shoved open the back door for me. Jack waited in an idling car, one I hadn’t seen him drive before, and I climbed in next to him. Anne shut the door. Once back inside she’d do some shopping as cover, then leave with a bag of groceries and her knitting bag. I wouldn’t see her again.

‘I’m to drive you around a bit, then take you home,’ Jack said.

‘Could you go down Johnson Street, please?’

‘I suppose so,’ Jack said.

‘Here,’ I said. ‘Stop here.’

‘Ma’am, I’m not supposed to stop . . .’

‘Damn it, Jack! Stop!’

Hearing me swear must have impressed him, because Jack pulled into a parking spot right in front of a late-night liquor store lit up by a gold neon Martini glass, complete with a green olive and a red swizzle stick.

‘I’ll be right back,’ I said.

Inside, the man behind the counter looked shocked to see a woman alone. I couldn’t have cared less.

‘Give me a pint of Gordon water and a pint of vermouth, please,’ I said and handed him a five-dollar bill.

He filled my order in disapproving silence. I put both the bottles, wrapped in newspaper, into my knitting bag.

Jack didn’t say a word when I got back into the car, and I wasn’t in the mood to chat.

A few minutes later he dropped me a few doors down from ‘Two Trees’ and tipped his hat to me. ‘Good evening, ma’am,’ he said.

I doubted I’d see Jack again, and he’d been perfectly nice to me, so I found my manners. ‘Thank you, Jack,’ I said. ‘For everything.’

Thank God no one was downstairs. I wasn’t in any mood to make pleasant conversation. I slipped up to my bedroom and changed into a new pair of flannel pajamas, the ones with the thin blue and purple stripes. Then I poured what I estimated was a jigger of gin into my tooth glass and sprinkled some vermouth on it. I hid the bottles in my dresser, climbed into my bed, and sipped on my Martini. I was a grown woman and this was my home, and I was going to have a drink if I wanted one!