Lipstick and Lies Page 12

  A second internal voice, the less conservative one I preferred, chided me. This man is no maniac like the one you went gaga over in Hollywood, it said melodiously, its tone sweet and caring. He’s an FBI agent, a good Catholic, a good son, a good big brother, a good neighbor.

  I faced Dante. Our lips touched and I felt a pleasant warmth spread through me. A telephone jangled in the kitchen. Sensing a sigh warm my neck, I was painfully aware that the feathery stream of air had not been intended to stimulate me.

  Dante said, “I have to get it.”

  Moments later, he was back. The caller had been Agent Connelly. Mrs. Blount, the wife of the murder victim, had been found. Alive.

  “We’ve had someone watching her place here in the city,” Dante explained, his voice both relieved and excited. “She’s been at her sister’s farm. Just returned home about an hour ago and Connelly went there. She hadn’t heard about her husband’s death, so it was up to him to tell her. She fell to pieces.”

  “She was at her sister’s place all this time? Isn’t that strange?”

  Dante was suddenly keeping a more professional distance. He rearranged himself on the spongy cushions. “Blount was murdered around six a.m. Earlier, around five, a woman telephoned, identifying herself as her sister’s neighbor. The sister wanted Mrs. Blount to know that their mother, who lives with the sister, had suffered a stroke. She was needed directly.

  “Mrs. Blount tried telephoning her sister to confirm the news, but couldn’t get through. So she hopped in the car and raced to the sister’s home in the country. To find that her mother was not ill after all. Greatly relieved, she tried to crack the mystery of the misleading call. She drove to the neighbors but they were clueless.”

  “Of course. It wasn’t a neighbor who called. It was someone involved in the spy ring.”

  “Possibly.”

  “It’s also possible Mrs. Blount fabricated the cry for help.”

  Dante lifted a shoulder in a half-shrug. “Not likely. She was en route to her sister’s at the time of the murder. It was long drive and with the fuel shortages, she decided to prolong the visit, stay all night. Our men are checking her alibi, of course, but it appears solid.”

  “You said she didn’t know her husband was dead. That’s a bit odd, isn’t it? Why didn’t she try calling him before rushing off?”

  “She did. But her husband was out on rounds.”

  “Then why not ring him again, from her sister’s? Especially after deciding to stay over?”

  “The phones were out, remember?” Dante wedged a finger inside his collar and scratched his neck. “Besides, she’d left him a note.”

  I shot him a skeptical glance.

  “It’s true. Connelly found it on the floor, under the stove. Our boys missed it earlier.” Dante read the disbelief on my face. “I know it seems incredible. And there’s no good excuse. But Mrs. Blount says she left a pen on top of the note. They have a cat. She thinks he may have batted at the pen, knocking it, and the note, to the floor.”

  I snorted. I couldn’t help it. Predictably, Dante smiled.

  Then he was serious again. “The theory’s as good as any we have so far. Paper had to have slipped beneath there, somehow.”

  “But why didn’t your men trace her to the sister’s place right away?”

  Dante shifted his weight. “Mrs. Blount’s sister is married, has a different last name. By the time we tracked her, Mrs. Blount was already driving back to town.”

  It was a little unsettling being privy to the inadequacies of the agency guarding our country’s internal security. I took a deep breath. “I see. Then what?”

  “Connelly brought Mrs. Blount to the morgue to ID the corpse and asked her to examine the, uh, item that had been in her husband’s hand. She recognized the monogram. Embroiders it on all of her undergarments, she said.”

  “And?”

  “They were hers. Fortunately the blood was not. It was animal blood.”

  I frowned. “What about the message, ‘bye baby’? What was that all about?”

  “We can’t be sure, of course, but our working theory is that someone planted the undergarment in his lunch box so he’d know his wife and unborn child were easy prey.”

  “That’s awful. Why would the killer do something like that when he was planning on stabbing him the next instant anyway? Unless…” I squirmed. “Unless the assassin wanted some kind of sick thrill.” I shivered, not wanting to believe that what I’d just said might actually be the case.

  “We won’t know until we have the killer in custody.” Dante rubbed the side of his face. “If then.”

  “So what’s next?”

  “Renner’s spy gig at Willow Run has run its course. We’re going to reel him in, put him in the hot seat for a while. Hopefully, get him to talk.”

  “But what about getting a lead on his handler and any other rogue agents out there?”

  “We don’t really have a choice. Without Blount, we’ve lost our ability to predict what they might be plotting next. The message on the lingerie, Mrs. Blount being tricked into going to her sister’s—more and more, the signs suggest we’re dealing with a loose cannon. They’re also reminders that until we catch this bunch, innocent people are at risk. We need to make a move and you can help us.”

  “How?”

  “We’re organizing a surreptitious entry. We want to confirm Renner’s copy of the confidential plans for the new bombing device is still locked inside his safe.”

  I struggled to contain my excitement. “Oh?”

  “Let’s go into the kitchen. I’ll brief you in there.”

  I trailed him into the warm, brightly lit room. At the counter near the stove, he faced me. “I have to go back to the office. Connelly’s taken Mrs. Blount there and I need to question her before he escorts her home. How about taking some of this back to the Club?” He lifted the foil cover off the bubbling casserole.

  My stomach growled noisily, objecting to another delay. But my feelings were in worse shape. The call from Connelly had interrupted our intimacy, yet Dante did not seem the least bit bothered. I crossed my arms over my midriff, biting back a snarl. “Great.”

  I watched while he began transferring pasta tubes, oozing with cheese and sauce, to a smaller dish. Shoving thoughts of romance aside, I reminded him of the caper. “You were about to explain my role on the breakin team.”

  Dante smiled as though amused by the notion. “You won’t be taking part in the actual breakin. We need you to gather some intelligence on the layout of Renner’s office, especially the location of his safe.”

  “You don’t know where his safe is?”

  “It’s secret. Part of the overall plant protection system. But if we can pinpoint its location before we go in, it’ll save precious seconds once we’re inside.”

  I recalled what he’d said earlier about the company’s policy giving managers free rein in designing a security system for their private domain. “But someone knows where it is, how to open it, right?”

  “Sure. There’s a complex arrangement for emergencies, a coded formula that can bypass any of the combinations. But accessing it would require involving executives we’d rather not approach. At least not until we’ve identified the other insider. Or, insiders.”

  Basically, I would be doing a site-check in broad daylight during normal business hours. “So what’s my modus operandi?” I asked dully, not bothering to hide my disappointment over the powder puff assignment.

  “We’ve made an appointment for you to meet with Renner’s secretary, Mrs. Kovacizki. She’ll believe you’re a journalist there to lay the groundwork for a later interview with a draftswoman in their department.”

  “That’s it?”

  “It’s a long shot, but while you’re there maybe you can convince the secretary to give you the partial combination.”

  “What do you mean? How?”

  “All the executives have an arrangement that allows them to set a partial code which his
secretary can complete afterwards. That way, if he leaves some work for her to do in his absence, she’s able to access it.”

  A nasal sound meant to be a laugh escaped. “You must be joking. No secretary worth her salt would give that kind of confidential information to a complete stranger. A journalist at that!”

  Dante smiled. “Why not? Overcoming long odds is your specialty, right?”

  When he put it that way, I had to smile back. “And this is on for tomorrow?”

  Dante snapped a lid on the small container holding my takeout meal. He nodded. “We’ve got to move fast.”

  Dante reviewed additional matters important to my meeting with Renner’s secretary on the ride back to the Cosmos Club. I was pleased with his choice of interviewees within the tool design department. Her profile was a good match to my journalist cover; even in these times a draftswoman was a rare commodity. Also, my cover would allow me to use the fake press credentials and phony newspaper I’d be using when I interviewed the Countess as the second part of my assignment, later the same day.

  At the Club, parked beneath the blue awning, Dante lightly brushed my cheek. “You be careful,” he said, his voice a little husky. “And sorry about tonight. Maybe you’ll let me make it up to you tomorrow?”

  His touch stirred something inside me. The apology may have had an effect as well.

  “Don’t worry about me,” I said with a wobbly grin. “And, yes, tomorrow sounds swell.”

  He turned to grab the door handle on his side of the car but I was on the sidewalk, waving goodbye before he could get out and do the gentlemanly thing.

  Chapter Ten

  I stood beneath the Cosmos Club’s canopy, pressing the buzzer. Eventually, a craggy-faced string bean in house uniform cracked the door and peered out with a rheumy eye.

  “Guest of the VanderKloots,” I said.

  “A moment,” said the doorman.

  A multi-tiered crystal chandelier loomed high above in the alcove behind him, casting his face in shadows and accentuating his deeply lined features. He consulted a roster he had carried with him to the door and the expression lines deepened. At last, I was invited in.

  He gawked at the container in my hands.

  “Dinner,” I explained, clutching the dish close, afraid he might confiscate it.

  The man had a slight frame and was about my height. He stood in the foyer, the gold-encrusted crest on his burgundy jacket glittering in the chandelier’s light. His thin, dark hair was interspersed with broad streaks of white. He turned with an exaggerated sniff, presenting an unkempt mat of streaky hair curling in random wisps in back. “Follow me.”

  I stalked his slow steps around an antique table graced by an enormous floral arrangement. His shuffling gait was so plodding that when I spied a loose thread dangling from his cuff, I imagined it might also be the remnant of a cobweb he’d untangled himself from before answering my buzz.

  The watchman glanced back over his shoulder. “You may not use the elevator. The operator is off-duty and while I am authorized to use it under certain conditions, the noise at this late hour, I fear, would create too great a stir.”

  I did not say so, but “a stir” was exactly what the place needed. It was like a morgue, the funereal quiet all the more oppressive after a stimulating evening spent at the lively Horseshoe Club, followed by an interlude of romantic music and the promise of seduction at Dante’s place.

  With a stiff stroke of a gloved hand, the doorman invited me to mount the stairs, letting me know with his silent gesture that the chore of ushering me to my room went beyond his realm of duties.

  A staggered display of gold-leaf framed portraits of the Club’s past presidents garnished the wall beside the stairs, elegantly attired women with identifying brass name plates beneath. Mrs. Horace Peabody, Mrs. Charles F. F. Campbell, Mrs. Archibald McKay, Mrs. Charles Horton. What would happen if Kiki reached her goal and became the Club’s newest president, I wondered. Her likeness would be added to the collection, but what about the splinter of brass? Mrs. Anastase Andreyevich Volodymyr Vivikovsky could never be squeezed onto it. What would they do? Get a bigger plaque? Etch with smaller lettering? Use her maiden name as Kiki preferred anyhow? I smiled. Each choice broke with the old order and “might cause a stir.”

  My amusement gave way as I thought of Kiki’s aims. For someone who once embraced controversial ideas and radical views and was a flapper who had liked her bathtub gin, becoming a player in the politics of a private women’s club seemed dull in comparison.

  On the second level, I mounted a narrow, less grand set of stairs, reversing my lofty position and reminding myself that no one had appointed me judge of what was, or was not, meaningful work. Kiki found satisfaction in being a club mucky muck. So what? Hadn’t the lieutenant at my OSS indoctrination claimed that socialites made the best women leaders? “Women from the upper strata are accustomed to managing large social gatherings and benefits,” he’d said, tagging on another bit of candor. “Women who don’t care about money are generally surer of themselves.”

  At the third floor, I turned left. My room was at the far end. The dish in my hand was still warm. Barely. I beat feet down the dimly lit hall.

  ***

  The simply furnished VanderKloot suite was a welcome oasis amid the ornate splendor of the Club’s vast public rooms. I flicked on the overhead light. Twin beds covered in white chenille spreads were separated by a small table supporting a reading lamp with dual fixtures. Opposite the beds, a writing desk and a tufted club chair with a matching footstool filled a small alcove. A massive armoire was positioned between two narrow windows.

  While jotting my name into her appointment book, Liberty had nonchalantly asked, “And how’s the lighting in your room?”

  I had gawked at her, wondering what she was talking about, then realized she was signaling me to check my suite’s ceiling fixture. Hiding messages there was a technique we’d learned in training.

  At the room’s center, a flat piece of frosted glass, shaped like a seashell, covered four bulbs. I craned my neck, squinting into the pool of light, at last spotting a small gray area in one of the flutes. Dragging a chair over, I climbed onto the seat and reached inside. Gently, I probed the flute, at last grasping a folded piece of paper. It was a note from Liberty. I’ll be in the library at eleven p.m., the message said. Meet me there, if you can.

  Excitement flooded me. If I can? Apart from those clumsy moments in the beauty parlor this afternoon, I hadn’t seen my friend for nearly a month. I climbed down and checked the bedside clock. Relieved to discover I had time to eat something before I would have to leave, I returned to the desk where I had left my meal and pulled the fork Dante had thoughtfully lent me from my pocket. I took a bite. I wasn’t sure if it was Mrs. Sarvello’s superior talent or my ravenous hunger, but I thought I had never tasted anything so heavenly. Forkful after forkful of ricotta-filled pasta went down while I thought about the friendship Liberty and I had developed during training. It was strange to think that when we first met, I would never have believed we would be so close.

  In the days before that first encounter, just eight weeks ago, I had been fully engaged in my normal duty, ferrying P38s from left coast to right. Then, August 5th, the unexpected cable: Report to the OSS Wash.—George C. Marshall, Chief of Staff.

  My spirits had soared, then plummeted. OSS agents gather intelligence and carry out irregular warfare. Nice work if you can get it, but the work goes on behind enemy lines. My duty bound me to the home front. Had someone somewhere missed the obvious, I’d wondered? Still, I had my orders.

  Arriving in Washington, I reported to Q building, a rambling, haphazardly designed temporary office complex, headquarters for OSS personnel. In Room 2205, I was met by a shiny-faced lieutenant with big spectacles and pale, plastered-down hair. He handed me a ream of registration forms, grinning as I winced.

  I flipped the pages. It was official! I was being elevated to another level of service. I filled in th
e particulars, checked customary boxes, handed the documents back.

  “Congratulations. Glad to have you with us, Lewis,” the lieutenant mumbled, giving the paperwork a perfunctory look. “Wondering why you’re here?”

  I’d been too nervous to ask. “Yes, sir.”

  “We need a variety of operatives, male and female, at the ready, in different places, at all times. This is where we prepare them. The bulk of our trainees are men, but a small percentage is women. Most of our gals will be sent overseas. Others, like you, will remain here.” He described the selection process, including their early reliance on the Social Register as a recruiting source, adding, “The work requires knowledge of a European language and familiarity with the terrain in France where many of them once vacationed.”

  I squirmed in my seat. “And my qualifications, sir?”

  The lieutenant’s smile turned benevolent. “Don’t worry, Lewis, you have the stuff. You’re a WASP. You’ve got the kind of mobility needed for covering fast-breaking situations, all across the continent. And you understand danger. There’s danger in flying planes. There’s a different sort of danger attached to this.”

  “This?”

  “You’ve been identified as a candidate for certain operations, yet to be determined. You’re here for an intensive three weeks of training. Normally, we’d keep you for several months. But you have an obligation to the WASP. It’s a unique situation and we don’t want to pigeonhole you too tightly. So, while you’re here, suffice it to say, you’ll be part of MO.”

  “MO?”

  “Morale Operations. Black psychological warfare, the art of influencing enemy thinking by means of subtle propaganda. The deliberate use of rumor, lies, and deception to generate confusion and defeatism among the enemy. You know…” The lieutenant let his sentence drift, suggesting he had dished up enough clues already.