He wondered if any of the guards or any of the soldiers he could see might be talked into surrendering or letting in a commando force in return for a free pass to the United States for them and their families. He congratulated himself on an excellent idea that he would discuss with Dulles as he pedaled back to his quarters at the warehouse. On arrival he found there was a message for him saying that Winnie would meet him at a boat dock at eight o’clock the next morning. He was to wear casual clothes and bring a swimsuit.
Oh joy, he thought. He had always disliked chubby women in bathing suits. Winnie was attractive enough from her shoulders up, but her body left a lot to be desired, including a bath. Ah well, the things he would do for his country.
* * *
Winnie was already on the cabin cruiser when he arrived. As before she was unfashionably dressed in a long baggy dress that did not flatter her in the slightest. “I’m glad to see that you didn’t wear leather shoes,” she said tersely. “Other than damaging the deck, leather shoes are slippery and you might fall overboard. Even though the lake is a lovely shade of blue, it is very cold and extremely deep. I would hate to lose you so quickly.”
“Winnie, I have actually been on a boat before. And whose boat is this anyway?”
“Sorry,” she said sounding not the slightest bit sorry. “It belongs to a small corporation owned by Mr. Valenti and thus is the property of the American taxpayer. As taxpayers, I guess this is our boat. Shall we enjoy it?”
They cast off the lines and Winnie skillfully took the boat well out onto the lake. She ran parallel to the German coast, staying at least a mile off shore. Ernie had read that there were disagreements between the Swiss and the Germans as to where borders on the water began. Winnie said they would not do anything to attract attention from either nation. Although they had been warned that boats on the lake could be in danger, they did not think a small outboard cabin cruiser would be construed as a threat by the Germans. Nor were they alone on the lake. A small number of boats were also out on the dark blue water, either fishing or cruising for pleasure. None were very close. They had privacy if they needed it.
Winnie had brought a hamper filled with cheeses, bread, ham, butter, and a couple of bottles of a very popular local Pinot Noir and a fruity white wine called a Chasselas. Ernie generally drank beer, but what the hell? he thought. When in Switzerland, do as the Swiss do-or something like that.
“Do you fish?” she asked.
“I can hook a worm, but that’s about it.”
“Well, you’re ahead of me. We’ll cut the engines and pretend.” She opened a chest and took out a couple of fishing poles and laid them over the stern of the boat. “If we were serious we could try to catch trout or whitefish. Instead, why don’t you go into the cabin and change into your swimsuit. We’ll look very natural that way.”
Ernie did as told and emerged a few moments later. “Do I pass?” he asked.
Winnie smiled. She really did have a nice smile, he realized. “I was hoping for better, but you’ll do.”
While she changed, Ernie took binoculars and checked around. He kept in the shade of the cabin to make it difficult for someone to see him. There were no boats that appeared to be official and none were headed their way. He checked the German coastline and again saw nothing in the way of unusual activity. Maybe he was being paranoid, but constructive paranoia was a good way of staying alive.
“Can you see Hitler or Goebbels from here?”
“Not quite,” he said and turned. He almost gasped. “What have you done with pudgy little Winnie Tyler?”
The Winnie Tyler now before him was slender and athletic looking. She was wearing a blue one-piece bathing suit that hugged her figure like a glove. “It’s an incredible diet, Ernie. It’s called how to lose fifty pounds in five minutes. First you wear a lot of padding under an ugly dress that’s way too large. Then you have your hair cut very short so you can wear a number of wigs and don’t forget thick glasses with clear glass to make you look strange, and then add balls of cotton stuffed in the cheeks. And don’t forget to rub garlic and other stuff on your face and hands so you stink to high heaven. We could have met and discussed matters elsewhere but this was a great opportunity to dress and behave like myself and not have to put on an act with the ugly suit. Unless you decide to behave like an animal, today is a holiday for me.”
“And for me too?” he said happily. “And I am a gentleman and not an animal. Well, usually.”
“You are very nice, but just to keep things straight, I am not going to sleep with you or even kiss you. Today is recreational. I simply need a day off. I don’t want to get involved with anyone until this war is over. I owe too much to my brother.” Her lips began to twitch as she finished, and a tear ran down her cheek.
“Tell me,” Ernie asked softly.
“He’s in Honolulu. He’s somewhere in the rusting hull of the battleship Arizona where he’s been since December 7, 1941, and I have a very hard time even thinking about it and him. He was three years older than me and he was my hero. He still is. I joined the OSS in order to strike back at the Japs. Unfortunately, I later found that General Douglas MacArthur has no use for the OSS and there wasn’t much intelligence work for a woman in other areas of the Pacific, so I decided to strike at the Japs by hurting the Nazis. Does that make sense?”
“As much as anything else I’ve heard lately. I think it’s time to open the wine. May I raise a toast to your brother?”
She smiled warmly. “I’d like that very much.”
* * *
Shock and dismay tore through the 105’s division headquarters at the sudden news. Franklin Delano Roosevelt, thirty-second President of the United States, was dead in some strange place called Warm Springs, Georgia. A heart attack or a stroke the news said, not that it mattered. He was dead and that was all that counted. The entire army and navy were stunned. Grown men cried at the thought of a familiar father figure passing away.
“I didn’t even know he was sick,” Tanner said to Cullen, quickly realizing what a banal statement it was. Who would have told him?
“I guess we should have known in hindsight that he wasn’t well. His most recent pictures made him look old and isn’t it true that he finally admitted that he couldn’t walk? Jesus, we had a crippled sick man in the White House and never knew it. I wonder how I would have voted if I’d known.”
Tanner shook his head. “That’s probably why they didn’t announce it. Besides, what did his being stuck in a wheelchair have anything to do with his ability to deal with the Depression and fight this damned war?”
“Nothing I can think of,” admitted Cullen.
The news was shocking. FDR had been president for twelve years. Many had begun to think of him as immortal. Hell, he was only in his early sixties, which was quite old, but most of them had at least one relative who was older. There were people who had never heard of Herbert Hoover or any other prior president.
General Evans looked distraught and Tanner could hear the sounds of sobbing. Soldiers weren’t supposed to cry, he told himself as he fought back his own tears. It wasn’t as if he was in love with Roosevelt. He had seriously considered voting for Dewey on the basis that three terms was more than enough. But then he’d asked himself if it was time to change captains on the ship of state and reluctantly decided that it wasn’t. Like most Americans, he’d voted for Roosevelt in 1940. FDR had dragged the country from the depths of the Depression and had led the fight against Hitler and Japan. The world had lost a giant and many people felt that they had lost a member of their family. His fireside chats broadcast on radio had calmed and encouraged them, while his eloquent fury had sent the U.S. off to war after Pearl Harbor.