Boys from Brazil

Liebermann said, “Don’t you know where they came from? Originally, I mean?”

“The boys? From Brazil.” Frieda Maloney looked away. “The people who brought them were Brazilian,” she said, holding out her hand, “and the stewardesses were from the Brazilian airline, Varig.” She took the carafe from Fassler, brought it to her glass, poured water. Fassler went around the table and sat down.

“From Brazil…” Liebermann said.

Frieda Maloney drank, putting the carafe on the tray. She drank, lowered the glass, licked her lips. “Almost always everything went like clockwork,” she said. “One time the couple didn’t show up. I called and they said they changed their mind. So I took the baby home with me and arranged for the next couple to come. Also new papers. I told my husband there was a mix-up at Rush-Gaddis and nobody else had room for the baby. He didn’t know anything about anything. To this day he doesn’t know. And that’s it. Altogether there must have been about twenty babies; a few close together at the beginning, and after that, one every two or three months.” She raised the glass and sipped.

“Twelve of,” Fassler said, looking at his watch. He smiled at Liebermann. “You see? You have seventeen minutes left.”

Liebermann looked at Frieda Maloney. “How did the babies look?” he asked her.

“Beautiful,” she said. “Blue eyes, dark hair. They were all alike, even more alike than babies usually are. They looked European, not Brazilian; they had light skin, and the blue eyes.”

“Were you told they were from Brazil or did you base that just on…?”

“I wasn’t told anything about them. Only what night they would be brought to the motel, and what time.”

“Whose babies did you think they were?”

“Her opinion,” Fassler said, “certainly doesn’t have any bearing on anything.”

Frieda Maloney waved a hand. “What difference does it make?” she asked, and said to Liebermann, “I thought they were the children of Germans in South America. The illegitimate children, maybe, of German girls and South American boys. As to why the Organization was putting them into North America, and choosing the families so carefully—that I couldn’t figure out at all.”

“You didn’t ask?”

“At the very beginning,” she said, “when Alois first told me what kind of applications to look for, I asked him what it was all about. He told me not to ask questions, just to do what I was told. For the Fatherland.”

“And I’m sure you were aware,” Fassler reminded her, “that if you didn’t cooperate, he could have exposed you to the kind of harassment that finally came years later.”

“Yes, of course,” Frieda Maloney said. “I was aware of that. Naturally.”

Liebermann said, “The twenty couples you gave the babies to—”

“About twenty,” Frieda Maloney said. “Maybe a few less. No more than twenty.”

“They were all American?”

“Do you mean from the United States? No, some were Canadian. Five or six. The rest were from the States.”

“No Europeans.”

“No.”

Liebermann sat silently, rubbing his earlobe.

Fassler glanced at his watch.

Liebermann said, “Do you remember their names?”

Frieda Maloney smiled. “It was thirteen, fourteen years ago,” she said. “I remember one, Wheelock, because they gave me my dog and I called them for advice sometimes. They raised them, Dobermans. The Henry Wheelocks, in New Providence, Pennsylvania. I mentioned we were thinking of getting one, so they brought Sally, just ten weeks old then, when they came for the baby. A beautiful dog. We still have her. My husband still has her.”

Liebermann said, “Guthrie?”

Frieda Maloney looked at him, and nodded. “Yes,” she said. “The first one was Guthrie; that’s right.”

“From Tucson.”

“No. In Ohio. No, Iowa. Yes, Ames, Iowa.”

“They moved to Tucson,” Liebermann said. “He died in an accident this past October.”

“Ohh…” Frieda Maloney bit her lip regretfully.

“Who was next, after the Guthries?”

She shook her head. “This is when there were a few close together, only two weeks apart.”

“Curry?”

She looked at Liebermann. “Yes,” she said. “From Massachusetts. But not right after the Guthries. Wait a minute now. The Guthries were at the end of February; and then another couple, from someplace in the South—Macon, I think; and then the Currys. And then the Wheelocks.”

“Two weeks after the Currys?”

“No, two or three months. After the first three they were spread out.”

Liebermann asked Fassler, “Would it kill you if I wrote this down? It’s not going to hurt her, in America so long ago.”

Fassler scowled and sighed. “All right,” he said.

“Why is it important?” Frieda Maloney asked.

Liebermann got out his pen and found a piece of paper in his pocket. “How is ‘Wheelock’ spelled?” he asked.

She spelled it for him.

“New Providence, Pennsylvania?”

“Yes.”

“Try to remember: exactly how long after the Currys did they get their baby?”

“I can’t remember exactly. Two or three months; it wasn’t a regular schedule.”

“Was it closer to two months or to three?”

“She can’t remember,” Fassler said.

“All right,” Liebermann said. “Who came after the Wheelocks?”

Frieda Maloney sighed. “I can’t remember who came when,” she said. “There were twenty, over two and a half years. There was a Truman, not related to Truman the President. I think they were one of the Canadian couples. And there was…‘Corwin’ or ‘Corbin,’ something like that. Corbett.”

She remembered three more names, and six cities. Liebermann wrote them down.

“Time,” Fassler said. “Would you mind waiting for me outside?”

Liebermann put his pen and paper away. He looked at Frieda Maloney, nodded.

She nodded back.

He got up and went to the coatrack; put his coat over his arm and took his hat and briefcase from the shelf. He went to the door, and stopped and stood motionless; turned. “I’d like to ask one more question,” he said.

They looked at him. Fassler nodded.

He looked at Frieda Maloney and said, “When is your dog’s birthday?”

She looked blankly at him.

“Do you know?” he asked her.

“Yes,” she said. “April twenty-sixth.”

“Thank you,” he said; and to Fassler: “Please don’t be too long; I want to get this over with.” He turned and opened the door and went out into the corridor.

He sat on a bench doing some figuring with his pen and a pocket calendar. The matron, sitting on the other side of his folded coat, said, “Do you think you’ll get her off?”