The Hunt aka 27 (52 page)

Twenty-seven was astonished when he heard her whisper the code phrase. Was she really his contact, this rich, tided Englishwoman whose father, the internationally famous journalist, had taken so many pot shots at
H
itler through the years? Taken completely unaware, he stood flabbergasted as Lady Penelope walked across the room and opened the door to her father’s suite.

“Daddy,” she said.

The tall, trim, impeccable Englishman strode into the room. He wore a red velvet smoking jacket and a blue ascot. He was a handsome man, his mustache trimmed and waxed, his fingers manicured, his silver hair perfectly trimmed, his posture military. There was about him a cool, tailored, untouchable air. So this was the author of the famous “Willow Report.” Looking at them together, Allenbee saw the family resemblance in the painfully correct posture, the classic features, the snobbish air.

Willoughby thrust his hand out.

“Well, well,” he said. “At last we meet. We’ve waited a long time for this moment.”

“Sir Colin,” Allenbee said cautiously. The Britisher leaned toward him and spoke a simple code phrase,
“Wilikommen Siebenundzwanzig, der Gespens
t
schauspieler.”

They shook hands.

“So..
.
time to make our contribution to the Third Reich, eh?” Willoughby said with a smile.

“How did you recognize me in the bank?” Allenbee asked Lady Penelope.

“Since you wouldn’t leave a picture, I watched who went to the safe deposit room. You picked up your credentials yesterday so I had a rough idea what you would look like as John Allenbee, although I must admit, the beard threw me. Actually, it was just luck. I was looking for a man I might feel comfortable engaged to.

“Engaged?”

“We’ll get to that,” Willoughby said. “You know, old man, you gave us a start when we saw the personal in the paper and knew you were on the run. What happened?”

“Somebody got on to
m
e.”

Willoughby turned ashen for a moment but quickly regained his composure.

“Who?” he asked, his eyebrows arching with the question.

“Someone at a government department called White House Security.”

Willoughby shrugged. “Probably something to do with the guards on the gates and halls
. .

“
I
don’t think so,” Allenbee said. “They knew my name, address, occupation. They asked for the sheriff first, then a park ranger to go with them to my place.”

“Where was this?”

“Aspen, Colorado.”

“What did you do?”

“I helped set up ski lodges there, Mapped out trails, set up base camps, ran avalanche patrols. It was a good job until these two showed up from Washington.”

“How did you get away?” Lady Penelope asked.

Allenbee stared at her for a moment, then smiled.

“With great difficulty.”

“What did they want, the two from Washington?” Lady Penelope asked.

“I have no idea. I didn’t wait to find out.”

“Well, never mind,” Willoughby said with a grin. “You made it. You are here. The time is now. Ready to go to work,
Herr
Swan?”

“Not Swan, Willoughby,” he said sternly. “My name is Allenbee. Erase Swan from your mind. He no longer exists. And can the German expressions. You’re English, I’m American.”

“Yes, yes, of course,” said a flustered Willoughby. “I’ll be more careful in the future.”

“See to it,” Allenbee said. “So
...
what
is
this plan that we’ve waited six years to implement?”

“Shall we go to my suite? Everything is there. Actually, the whole gambit is quite simple to explain.”

Allenbee followed them both into Sir Colin’s suite. Unlike Lady Penelope’s hotel decor, his living room had obviously been redecorated in oak paneling and leather furniture. One wall was dominated by an enormous Degas painting. Allenbee stared at it for several moments.

“Early Degas,” he said.

“You know your art, John,” Sir Colin said.

“It’s Ward. I prefer to be called Ward. John is too common.”

“Very good, Ward.”

“I once had a Degas,” Allenbee said. “That was years ago. Willie Vierhaus has it now.”

“Help me, would you, please?” Willoughby said, walking over to the painting. With Allenbee’s help, he took the painting down, turned it around and leaned it against the wall. Brown wrapping paper was stretched across the back. Willoughby took a sharp letter opener, scored the edges of the paper and tore it off. Beneath it, glued to the back of the painting, were two maps and a detailed blueprint. One of the maps was the eastern seacoast of the United States; the other was a blowup of a small section of the larger map, with an arrow pointing to a spot on the Georgia coast near the Florida border.

“This is where we are going,” Willoughby said, tracing his finger down the larger of the two maps to the town of Brunswick, Georgia. “About fifty miles north of the Florida line there is an island called Jekyll Island. This smaller map is a close-up of it. It’s just across the marsh from the mainland. Actually, a very short boat ride. The island just to the north of it is St. Simons Island. They are separated by a sound—probably a quarter of a mile wide.

“Jekyll has a somewhat checkered history. Among other things, the last slave ship to come to this country unloaded its unfortunate cargo on the island. I won’t bore you with history for the moment except to tell you it is now the richest, most exclusive private club in the world.
In 1885, a group of America’s richest men bought the island and established it as a private playground.
J. P. Morgan, Marshall Field, the Vanderbilts, George
Pullman,
James
Hill, Richard Crane, the Goodyears, the
Astors, the Rockefellers, Joseph Pulitzer
. .
you understand what I am saying? The
richest, most powerful
men in the United States. The list goes on and on.”

He paused for effect. Allenbee leaned closer, studying its location among a string of other islands that dotted the southern coast.

“Through the years, they have built a rather splendid clubhouse, two apartment buildings and several what we jokingly call ‘cottages.’ The first ones were relatively modest. But as time went on and their egos began to clash, these so-called cottages got more and more lavish.

“Since the early thirties, a group of regulars consisting of twenty-seven families have been going every year for Thanksgiving and returning just before Easter. Penny and I first started going down as a guest of the Vanderbilts. We’ve been going on this jaunt off and on since then. The first trip, the very first time, it occurred to me that it would be a relatively simple thing to lift one or two of them. Then I thought more about it, Why not get them
all?
I took the idea to Vierhaus and he took it to the Führer who was fascinated with the idea.”

He turned to Allenbee.

“These men are the fatted pigs of American industry and society,” he said, his eyes aglow with excitement. “Think of it, Ward
. . .
the captains of America’s ships of state, some of the richest and most influential families in America with billions in foreign banks
. . .
all together at one time in one place, isolated from the mainland, literally unprotected. As the Yankees say, sitting ducks.

“Oil, steel, coal, transportation, the press, shipping, arms, munitions, automobiles, banking. The stock market! The heads of two of the biggest brokerage firms in America. My God, these are the men, Allenbee, who will create America’s arsenal if it goes to war with us. In fact, they are already providing England with the tools to fight us.”

Allenbee lit a small cigar with his gold lighter. He stared at the map without speaking, his face an unemotional mask.

“The plan is simple,” Willoughby continued. “We have been invited down for the first three weeks of the season. A U-boat is at this moment sequestered on Grand Bahama Island, approximately two hundred miles to the south. She will come up the coast on the night of November 23rd

“Thanksgiving?” Allenbee asked.

“Precisely. The U-boat will dock at the yacht pier and we will then take twenty-seven of the richest men in this country hostage, remove them from the island and take them back to Grand Bahama. We will negotiate with Roosevelt. If the U.S. remains completely neutral, when the war is over they will be released.”

“How do we get them off this island?”

“Another U-boat will meet us in Andros. The hostages will be split into two groups, to reduce crowding on the submarines. They will be transported to a mother ship in the mid-Atlantic and from there a clipper can take them to Spain. We can have them on our soil in
. . .
seven days.”

“And this was
your
idea?” he said finally.

Willoughby nodded, waiting for his reaction. None came. The man who was now Allenbee stood up and walked to the desk, studying the papers and documents and then the map on the wall.

“The U-boa
t
is already in place,” said Willoughby. “The coded message you will send to the U-boat is in this envelope. It is in the
Dre
i
cipher. Not even I know what it is.”

He handed the envelope to Allenbee who tapped it against his cheek for a moment or two.

“And when do we do this?”

“The private train leaves in ten days. The trip down takes five. The timing is perfect. Poland is ours. France is in turmoil. The British have four divisions in France along the western lines. If America is neutralized, France and England will have to sue for peace.”

“That’s an oversimplification.”

“Not at all. The
Wehr
m
acht
will be on the coast, ready to invade. And jolly old England will be sitting out there all alone with her bloody pants down
. .

“And,” Allenbee said, interrupting him again, “we’ll have the industrial and financial power of America in our hands.”

“Exactly.”

“What made such a good Nazi out of a stuffy old British bastard like you, Willoughby?” Allenbee said in a monotone, his expression still hiding his reaction to the scheme.

Willoughby chuckled. He sat down behind his desk and leaned back in his chair.

“1 interviewed the Führer for the first time in 1927,” he said. “He was nothing then—but I could
feel his power. Then I became a disciple of
Mein Kampf
I’ve worked for
Jews for years, been exploited by them for years. The Empire is finished, Allenbee. That faggot, Edward, running off with the American bitch. Canada gone. India will be gone. Just a matter of time. A great empire dead of dry rot and run by gutless ninnies. Need I go on?”

Allenbee slowly shook his head. “And you, Lady Penelope?”

“What has England ever done for me?” she said coldly.

He lit another cigar. “What’s my cover?”

“Why, you and Penelope are betrothed, old boy,” Willoughby said with an almost mischievous grin. “We’ll announce it here at a cocktail party two nights before we leave, that way there won’t be time for anyone to check on your background, if they so desire, which I doubt. We’ll be going down in Andrew Gahagan’s private car. There w11 be twelve private cars on the train. I’ll write the first story about the coming nuptials—parental pride and all that. If someone in the press begins to look too carefully into your background, it will be too late. We’ll be off to Georgia.”

“And what’s our story?” he asked Lady Penelope.

“I met you on our last trip to the Orient,” she said. “We fell in love in Hong Kong and you followed me back. All very romantic.”

“They’ll welcome you with open arms,” said Willoughby. “I’ve always written lovely stories about the place so they coddle me. You’ll find that the very rich are just as vain as anyone else, perhaps more so.”

“Tell me more about the plan. I don’t need lectures on human nature.”

“Quite. The island’s contained, only two miles wide at its broadest and about five miles long. The cottages are all in a nice, tight little cluster around the clubhouse less than a hundred yards from the docking facilities for their yachts—plenty deep enough to bring our sub in and take thirty people aboard.”

“1 thought you said twenty-seven.”

“Well, there’s you and me and Penny, we’ll have to leave. I will act as the negotiator.”

“Okay.” He stared at the smaller map for a while. “So there will be twenty-seven millionaires, their wives and guests, is that it?”

“Actually thirty-two. When we conceived this plot, twenty- seven regulars and their guests went down to the island every year. Since then the players have changed a bit.”

“And we take twenty-seven of them?”

“The list is right here,” Willoughby said. “We can take our pick. But it is my understanding that thirty is the limit.”

Twenty-seven picked up the list and perused it.

“How spread out is this compound?”

“Perhaps three city blocks square. But
everyone
will be in the dining room at precisely eighteen-thirty hours for dinner that evening. It’s the big meal of the year and by club rule everyone must eat dinner in the clubhouse.”

“How many total at dinner?”

Willoughby rustled through the papers in a file folder and separated one sheet from the rest.

“Here is the roster of all the members and their guests. Thirty-two members; their wives, children, nannies and secretaries total one hundred and twelve. In addition, there will be a total of thirty-three guests. That comes to a hundred and forty-five people eating dinner.”

“At eighteen tables?”

“No. Nannies, secretaries and the smaller children eat in the staff dining room. It’s adjacent to the main room right here.” Willoughby pointed to the smaller room on the plans. “Actually the dining room has twelve tables seating eight.”

“So now we have two dining rooms to worry about.”

“But connected.”

“How about security?”

“Just walkabout guards at night, to prevent anyone from coming ashore and stealing from them.”

“How many?”

“Three.”

“Staff?”

Willoughby opened a file folder and sorted through a half dozen sheets of paper, lifting one out.

“Kitchen staff, seven; waiters, twenty
. .

“Twenty!”

“One for every two tables.”

“Exorbitant, aren’t they.”

“Quite. These men are used to getting things their own way.”

“That too will change,” Allenbee said with a smile.

Wil
l
oughby went on. “Kitchen and waiters, twenty-seven; security guards, three; two radio operators, a switchboard operator and the resident engineer. The teaching staff, maids, caddies, clean-up people, all leave on a six o’clock boat to the mainland.”

“That’s thirty-four, not counting the rich boys.”

“That sounds right.”

“145 and 34, that’s 179 people.”

“Yes, but all you have to do is radio the submarine if everything is clear and keep order until it gets there.”

Allenbee laughed. “That’s naïve thinking.”

“Naïve?” Willoughby was insulted.

“There are radios and telephones on this island. They have to be taken out. There are three security men. They have to be taken out. There will be a hundred and fifty people or so in the dining room, not counting anybody who might be sick and staying home that night. We’ll have to cover a hundred and fifty people until the U-boat patrol arrives to help us.”

“I, uh.
. .
am not too good at.

“I’ll
tell you what to do,” Allenbee snapped. “This is my operation, we will do it my way. You two will do exactly as I tell you. is that clear?”

“That’s why you were picked for the job, Swan. You
. .

“It’s Allenbee, damn it! My name is
Allenbee.
Swan does not exist!”

“Of course, of course,” Willoughby stammered. “It was a silly error. I won’t make the mistake again.”

“See that you don’t. I don’t want this whole thing to go down the drain because of some stupid blunder like that.”

“I said I’m sorry. It will not happen again.”

“So,” Allenbee said, stepping back from the map and staring at it with his hands across his chest. “We must single-handedly lay siege to an entire island and hold almost one hundred and fifty people hostage until the U-boat arrives.”

“We can’t take a chance on bringing anyone else into the plan,” Penelope said. “Since the beginning our biggest fear has been a possible breach of security. At this moment only six people know about this. The three of us, Vierhaus, Adolf Hitler and by now, the boat commander. If we bring in more people, the chances for failure will increase.”

“Failure?” Allenbee said brusquely. “It’s not going to fail! I’ve been waiting six years for this mission. I will kill anyone who jeopardizes it, anyone who gets in my way—and that includes you two. Is that clear?”

“Perfectly,” she said.

“I will remind you, sir,” Willoughby said, “that this was
my
scheme. If it were not for me, you wouldn’t be invited to the island in the first place
.

“And I’ll remind you, sir, that if I must I will get on the island and carry out this operation without you and your damned invitation.”

Allenbee continued to stare at the material on the table and the map on the wall.

“There will be two changes in the plan. In
your
plan. First, we will kill one of our millionaires before we leave
.

“What!”

“We’ll select one of them, important but not crucial, and kill him. That way they will know we mean business. Second, ultimately we will divide these men into twos and put them on our U-boats. We will then advise Mr. Roosevelt that every time the British sink a German submarine, they could be killing two American millionaires. And every time two die, we will inform them.
That’s
the way to play this game, Sir Colin.”