“… bombing raids upon Berlin by a number of long-range Ilyushin bombers took place tonight. Officials reported that no military targets were struck but that a number of homes and hospitals were destroyed and scores of civilians were killed.
“On the Russian front, house-to-house fighting continued in the city of Stalingrad, while Russian armored units have reportedly engaged German panzer groups on the outskirts of Kharkov.
“In London, Prime Minister Mosley met again with German Foreign Minister von Ribbentrop. The talks were conducted to review terms of the armistice agreement signed between Great Britain and Germany two years ago. One of the main areas of disagreement, according to Washington diplomatic sources, is the number of German troops that are allowed to be based in Great Britain and some of her overseas possessions.
“In Montreal, a surprise visit from a trade delegation from the Soviet Union raised suggestions in some quarters that the government of Canada may be seeking closer ties to its neighbor to the west.
“Closer to home, President Huey Long signed a bill today ensuring that all Americans receiving federal assistance of any type sign a loyalty oath to the government, guaranteeing, as the President said, that patriotism will continue to thrive during his second term. The bill, called the Patriot Enhancement Act, will be enacted into law immediately. A violation of the loyalty oath will mean an automatic prison term.
“On Capitol Hill, Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau, fresh from his attendance at a meeting of the World Jewish Congress, was unsuccessful in his attempts to convince Congress to increase the number of Jewish refugees allowed into the United States this year.
“Also from Washington, unemployment figures released from the Department of Labor indicate that more Americans are working today than at any time before and that—”
Sam reached out and switched off the radio. News of the world. Mostly lies, half-truths, and exaggerations. Everyone knew that the unemployment numbers were cooked. Every month more and more Americans were supposedly working over a decade after the stock market crash. But he saw with his own eyes what was true, from the hobo encampments by the railroad tracks, to the rush of unemployed men at the shipyard gates when a rumor spread that five pipefitters had been killed in an accident, to the overcrowded tenements in town.
That was the truth. That desperate numbers of people were still without jobs, without relief, without hope. And nothing over the radio would change what he knew. He rolled over, tried to relax, but two thoughts kept him awake.
The thought of three stones piled up on his rear porch.
A series of blurry numerals, tattooed into a dead man’s wrist.
Both mysteries. Despite his job, he hated mysteries.
INTERLUDE II
Now he was back in the shadowy streets of old Portsmouth, where there were lots of homes from the 1700s, with narrow clapboards, tiny windows, and sagging roofs. He kept to the alleyways and crooked lanes, ducking into a doorway each time he saw an approaching headlight. When he got where he had to be, he crouched beneath a rhododendron bush, waited some more. He thought about these old homes, about the extraordinary men who had come from this place, had gone out to the world and made a difference. Did they feel then what he felt now? The history books claimed they were full of courage and revolutionary spirit. But he didn’t feel particularly full of anything; he was just cold and jumpy, knowing that behind every headlight could be a car full of Interior Department men or Long’s Legionnaires.
Across the street, the door of an old house opened and a man stepped out, silhouetted by the light. The man looked around, bent over, put two empty milk bottles on the stoop, then went back inside.
In the darkness beneath the bush, he smiled. All clear. One bottle or three, and he would have left. But two was the sign. He crossed the street, through an open gate to a picket fence, then to a cellar door. He opened the door and went down the wooden steps. The cellar was small, with a dirt floor, an exposed rock foundation, and three wooden chairs set about a wooden table. There were two men in the chairs, only one of whom he recognized, and that was a problem.
The man on the left had a thick mustache and swollen hands, scarred with old burn tissue. The owner of the house, Curt Monroe. He looked to him and said, “Curt.”
“Boy, I’m glad to see you, pal,” the scarred man said.
He said, “You tell me who this other guy is, Curt, or I’m out of here.”
The other man had thinning hair and a prominent Adam’s apple. Curt said, “This is Vince. He’s all right.”
He thought about that. Then he took the spare chair and sat down. “How’s he all right?”
Vince said, “Look, I’m—”
He stared at the second man. “I don’t remember asking you a goddamn thing.”
Vince shut up. Curt tapped his fingers on the table. “I used to date Vince’s sister back when I was working, before my hands got burnt. I know him, he’s okay, and he can get what we need.”
Now he looked to Vince. “Where?”
“Huh?”
He had to struggle to keep his temper under control. “We need something particular. Something that’s hard to get nowadays, with the latest confiscation laws for firearms. So. Where the hell are you getting it from?”
“A guy up the street from my sister. He’s got a ready supply. I already paid him with Curt’s money. You just tell me where you want it.”
He thought about that and said, “I want it delivered to Curt.”
Vince was confused. “I… that wasn’t the deal. The deal was, I get paid half for making the buy and the other half for delivering it where you want it.”
“Fine. And I want it delivered here, to Curt.”
“But—”
He stared right at him. “Bud, last time I’m going to say this. I know Curt. I worked with him back when we were both employed. I was one of the first guys to get to him when his hands got burnt. So me and him, we got a history. You, I don’t know shit about you. Curt’s vouched for you, but I’m a suspicious bastard, you know? Last time I trusted somebody I didn’t personally vouch for, I got my ass arrested. So the deal’s changed. All right? You deliver it here. You get paid. And then you forget this all happened. Got it?”
Vince looked to Curt, and Curt shrugged, and then Vince got up and left, going up the wooden steps, his feet thumping hard. Curt said, “Pal, you’re even a bigger prick since you’ve gotten out.”
“All that government attention will do it to you,” he said. “Be back in a sec. Don’t leave.”
“What?” Curt asked, but by then he was at the cellar door, swinging it open. There was movement out on the street, and he followed Vince in the shadows as he strode away, hands deep in his pockets, shoulders hunched forward, moving fast. Idiot, he thought, trailing him with no difficulty at all. Damn fool isn’t even checking who might be behind him.
Vince walked four blocks, then stopped at a corner. This part of town was more commercial, with two bars and a corner grocery and an abandoned bank building, the former Portsmouth Savings & Trust, one of many abandoned banks across the country. He stood in a doorway, watching. Vince took a cigarette out, stuck it between his lips. It took three tries to light it up. Nervous twit, he thought, and then a sedan came down the street and stopped.
Vince tossed the cigarette into the gutter and got into the rear of the sedan. The vehicle quickly drove off. It was too dark to see the license plate or who was inside the car, a model he didn’t recognize, knowing only it was a pricey set of wheels.