During a frigid mid-November week Betty went away on an unexplained trip. Stewart collected the daily portions of the Blajoviak report. He smiled at Francie too much, and made clumsy, obvious passes which she pretended not to notice. Betty left on a Tuesday. She was back Friday night. Saturday morning Osborne talked to Francie alone in Tom Blajoviak’s tiny plywood office. Osborne was having difficulty concealing his jubilation behind a poker face.
“What have you found out?” Francie demanded, her voice rising.
“Nothing about Bob,” he said quickly.
She sagged back into the chair and closed her eyes for a moment.
He went on, “But we’ve gone places in another direction. Can’t tell you too much, of course. But I thought you’d like to know. Evidently, they’ve been under orders to keep contacts at a minimum. I believe that Mrs. Jackson acted as courier for everything accumulated up to date. She has good technical training for the job, but I don’t think she has the feel for it. We put enough people on her so that even if she could push a button and make herself invisible, we’d still stay with her. Her contact is from one of the control groups we’ve been watching. She met him on a subway platform and went through a tired old transfer routine. He gave the stuff to a deluded young lady who works in Washington, taking a one-day vacation in New York. She took an inspirational walk when she got back to Washington. Visited national shrines by night and was picked up by the traditional black diplomatic sedan. By now those no-good reports have cleared Gander, chained to the wrist of a courier from one of the Iron Curtain countries.”
“Why are you telling me all this, Mr. Osborne?”
“It’s time to get impatient. We know all we have to know. It has been a month since the first letter. How has it been going?”
“All right, I think. I don’t think I’ve overworked those three things you told me to say. But it seems so pointless. I’ve been friendly. I help her with those lures they make, enameling them. And we talk a lot.”
“Start tonight. No letter, no more reports. My guess is that they’ll tell you one is on the way.”
“One probably is.”
“Please, Mrs. Aintrell, keep planning on the worst. Then, if I’m wrong, it will be a pleasant surprise. How much weight have you lost this month?”
Francie shrugged. “I don’t know. A few pounds. Four or five.”
“Or twelve.”
She glared at him. “Now tell me about the lines around my eyes. It helps my morale.”
He smiled. “Young lady, you are doing fine, but, remember, give them a bad time tonight.”
Fat, wet flakes of the first November snow were coming down as she walked down the trail toward the Jackson camp. She walked slowly, rehearsing her lines.
She went up on their porch, knocked, and opened the door.
Betty put her knitting aside. “Well, hi!” she said. “Off early today.”
Stew was near the fire, reading. He put his book aside and said, “An afternoon nip to cut the ice?”
Francie stripped off her mittens, shoved them in her pocket. She unbuttoned the red coat, looking at them somberly. She saw the quick look Betty and Stew exchanged.
“I came over to tell you that I didn’t bring you anything today. And I’m not going to bring you anything from now on.”
Stewart Jackson took his time lighting a cigarette. “That’s a pretty flat statement, Francie. What’s behind it?”
“We made a bargain. And I kept my end of it. A month is more than up. As far as I know, Bob may have died in that military prison. When I get the letter you promised me, the letter saying that he’s better, then you get more data.”
“Hon, we can understand your being impatient,” Betty said, in an older-sister tone, “but don’t go off half-cocked.”
“This isn’t just an impulse,” Francie said. “I’ve thought it over. Now I’m doing the bargaining. You must be reporting to somebody. They’re probably pleased with what you’ve done. Well, until I get my letter they can stop being pleased, because you’re going to have to explain to them why there aren’t any more reports.”
“Sit down, Francie,” Stew said. “Let’s be civilized about this.”
Francie shook her head. “I have been civilized long enough. No letter, no reports. I can’t make it any clearer.”
Stewart smiled warmly. “Okay; there’s no need of hiding this from you, Francie. We just didn’t want you to get too excited. A letter is already on the way. I’m surprised we haven’t gotten it already. Now do you see how foolish your attitude is?”
It startled Francie to learn how accurate Osborne’s guess had been. And the rightness of his guess strengthened her determination. She turned from them, took a few steps toward the fire. “No letter, no reports.”
Stewart’s smile grew a bit stiff. “You are being paid for those reports.”
“I thought you’d bring that up. But it doesn’t matter. I don’t care what might happen to me. Here is step two in my ultimatum: Either I get my letter within a week, or I consider it proof that Bob is dead. Then I’m going to go to Dr. Cudahy and tell him about you and what I’ve been doing.”
She took pleasure in Stewart’s look of concern in Betty’s muffled gasp.
“You wouldn’t dare,” Betty said. “You’re bluffing,” Stewart said. “Sit down and we can talk this out.”
Francie pulled her mittens on and turned toward the door.
Stewart barked, “I insist that you act more reasonably, Francie!”
“Look me up when you’ve got mail for me,” Francie said crisply. She slammed the door behind her and walked along the lakeside trail. She felt neither strength nor weakness — just a gray, calm emptiness. When she got home the fire she had lit was blazing nicely. She sat on the floor in front of it, looking for Bob’s face in the flames...
On Monday, after listening to her report, Osborne said, “Now, understand this: You’ll get a letter. If the letter proves, by content, to be a fake, it will be up to my superiors to make a policy decision. Either we take them into custody or we flush them and see which way they run. If the letter doesn’t prove anything, one way or another, then we go on as we are and wait for the report through Formosa. That may take until Christmas. If — and I am recognizing this possibility — the letter shows beyond any doubt that your husband is still alive, we’ll continue to play along and use every resource to try to get him back for you. Just remember one thing: No matter what the letter shows, you are to act as though you have no doubt. Can you do that?”
“I can try.”
“We’ve asked a great deal of you, Francie. Just this little bit more.”...
The Jacksons came over to the cabin on Wednesday, minutes after her arrival from the lab. They stamped the snow off their feet, came in smiling.
“So you doubted me, eh?” Stew said cheerfully. “It came this morning.”
As he fumbled for his pocket, Francie knew that Osborne’s doubts had shaken her more than she knew. She was afraid of the letter. Afraid to read it.
It seemed to take Stewart an impossibly long time to undo myriad buttons to get at the pocket which held the letter. Francie stood, looking beyond him, hand half outstretched, and through the windows she saw the shale of new ice that reached tentatively out from the shore line into the lake. She heard Betty prodding the fire.
“Here you go!” Stewart said, holding out another folded sheet of the familiar cheap-fibered paper. She took it, her finger tips alive to the texture of it. Betty knelt in front of the fire, bulky in her ski suit, head turned, smiling, flame light caught in the silky blond hair. Stew stood in his shaggy winter clothes, beaming at her.
“Well, go on!” Betty said. “You going to just stand and hold it?”