The official sign said something about an army gadget testing center, but Andros could make out the dim outline of a large country manor at the end of the long drive. So this was the OSS school for spies.
“The whole estate is about a hundred acres or so,” Prestwick explained as they started up the drive. “Belongs to a prominent industrialist from Pittsburgh. OSS is leasing it for the time being.”
At the entrance, a rotund woman whom Prestwick introduced as Gertrude greeted them and escorted them upstairs to spacious, comfortable bedrooms.
“A regular Waldorf you have here,” Andros observed, pressing down on the soft bed. “Is this how you toughen up your secret agents, Jason?”
Gertrude had warned them that they should use only their first names. Security precautions. Still, Andros detected an unnaturally chummy atmosphere here that confirmed his perception of spies as dilettantes, men of leisure who had little to offer their country-men like this Prestwick.
“Don’t you worry,” said Prestwick, who was standing by the window looking out. “We’ll get started in the morning with some of the more practical aspects of your survival behind enemy lines.”
Andros nodded and began to unpack his sack. He drew out a cigarette from his pack of Vargas and lit it with the gold lighter Aphrodite had given him.
Prestwick coughed from the smoke and turned away from the window. “A nasty habit for a West Pointer,” he observed. “My reports said nothing about you being a chain-smoker.”
Andros shrugged and propped up his picture of Aphrodite on the nightstand. He placed the gold lighter in front of it. “Maybe you shouldn’t put too much faith in those reports of yours.”
“And maybe you should keep your mind clear of distractions.” Prestwick was frowning at Aphrodite’s picture. “From now on you must focus only on your mission.”
“She is my mission.”
Prestwick ignored the remark. “There’s a bible in the top drawer of your nightstand. I suggest you begin with that tonight.”
Andros opened the drawer and found the OSS training syllabus. He scanned the table of contents: silent killing, firearms, ciphers, undercover operations, escape, explosives.
Prestwick said, “Those areas pertinent to your individual mission are highlighted. Study those sections thoroughly.”
Andros thumbed through the syllabus. “I’ll commit these passages to memory tonight.”
He tossed the syllabus on the bed and moved to the window where Prestwick had been standing. A peek behind the curtain revealed well-manicured lawns rolling on under the night and the shimmer of a swimming pool. Andros paused a moment and looked again. Swimming laps in the pool was a shapely woman. What kind of crazy outfit was this? At the sound of Prestwick’s rapping, Andros let the curtain fall and turned around.
“Your closet.” Prestwick opened the door to reveal clothing. “Your prewar Savile Row suits, custom-made Italian shoes, all the trappings of a playboy. Standard uniform for your cover.”
“Cover?” Andros asked suspiciously. “What cover?”
“That, you’ll find out tomorrow morning in the study, seven sharp. In the meantime, try to get some rest.” Prestwick stopped in the doorway and looked back with a self-satisfied smile. “Pleasant dreams.”
29
T he next morning Andros found Prestwick in the study with a stocky, gray-haired man of about sixty. They were looking over some papers and sipping coffee when he walked in.
“Chris Andros, this is General Bill Donovan, head of OSS,” Prestwick began, dispensing with the first-name rule. “He was kind enough to break away from his office to join us this morning.”
“Anything to meet the son of General Andros.” Donovan quickly extended a hand and looked at Andros with unusually bright blue eyes. “Met your father while touring the Balkans in ’forty-one, just before the Germans invaded Greece.”
“Really?” Andros was genuinely interested as they sat down around the coffee table, Donovan and Prestwick on the couch, he on a chair. Andros knew “Wild Bill” primarily as a millionaire Wall Street lawyer and former attorney general. But he was also aware that the Hoover Republican was a hero of the Great War and the only American to have won the Congressional Medal of Honor, the Distinguished Service Cross, and the Distinguished Service Medal-the nation’s three highest military decorations. As a result, he immediately commanded more respect from Andros than Prestwick had.
“A great leader, your father was,” Donovan continued. “Spoke fondly, if sadly, of you. But he’d be proud to see you now.”
“Would he?” asked Andros, self-conscious about his suit and the mention of his father.
“Hell, yes,” said Donovan, studying Andros’s physique. “If anything, you’ve become too fit since you’ve last worn those clothes. That won’t do. Prestwick, have a tailor alter them for young Andros here.”
Prestwick mumbled something as he scribbled a note to himself.
“We don’t want you looking too firm when the Germans consider your request,” Donovan explained, offering him some coffee and a Danish.
Andros declined. “What request is that, General?”
“Why, the request you’re about to present to the Germans, telling them you want to go back to Greece.”
“What? You want me to let the Germans know I’m coming?”
“Didn’t Prestwick tell you?”
Prestwick cleared his throat. “I’m afraid I haven’t gotten to that part yet, General.”
Andros stared at the two men incredulously. “I’m supposed to simply hand myself over to the Nazis? This is insane. I thought-”
“That we’d somehow sneak you into Greece by boat or parachute drop?” Donovan shook his head. “Normally, if we were simply dropping you off in the mountains to link up with the Greek partisans, that’s what we’d do. But you’re too well-known in Athens and could be spotted if we tried to slip you in covertly. Have you heard of a Major Tsigantes?”
Andros nodded. “A well-known republican in the Greek army.”
“Too well-known,” Donovan said. “Last September the Allied GHQ-Middle East slipped him into Athens on a secret mission. He was to contact political and military leaders in order to organize a non-Communist resistance movement. But he was betrayed by an informer and killed in a gunfight with Italian carabinieri in his hideout.”
“I see.”
“Besides,” Prestwick added, “such covert infiltration would defeat the purpose of the cover you’ve gone to such great lengths to establish with the girl. According to your letters and every other piece of information the Germans have on you, you’ve been attending Harvard all this time.”
Donovan nodded. “Perfect for when you approach the German Legation in Bern.”
“Switzerland now?” Andros leaned back in his chair, waiting to hear what was next.
“You’ll be going there on a humanitarian mission to secure the safe passage of Red Cross food and medical supplies to the suffering people of Greece,” Donovan explained. “The International Committee of the Red Cross, after all, is based in neutral Switzerland. And it remains an association of private citizens entrusted by governments with official missions.”
“What exactly is my official mission?”
“You simply want to approach the German Legation in Bern and request that the Germans lift their counterblockade so Andros ships can bring relief supplies into the port of Athens. Of course, in order to personally oversee their distribution, you’ll insist on being in Athens yourself as a neutral Red Cross observer.”
It sounded too simple to Andros. “What makes you think the Germans could possibly go for this?”
“They’ve done it before,” said Donovan. “The famine in Athens during the first winter of occupation was so desperate that the Greek government in exile in Cairo was able to persuade both the British and German authorities to lift their respective blockades and allow relief supplies to be shipped in via Turkey. Under the agreement, an International Red Cross administration was set up in Greece, staffed by Swiss and Swedes, which distributed Canadian and American wheat shipped into Greece with safe passage guaranteed by all belligerents.”