Jessica had heard rumors from her uncle that some GI’s in the supply units were pilfering large quantities of supplies and selling them on the black market. A little thievery was common enough when temptation presented itself and, as Tom had said, who counts paper clips and pencils? Still, stealing to provide one’s self with creature comforts was one thing, but this level of thievery was much more ambitious. Jessica was glad that the apartment was in her name and that she could prove where the money came from.
“Monique, I’m sorry.”
“So am I,” she said with a mocking pout. “Now it will take me weeks to find a replacement for him.”
Jim Byrnes’ career in the United States government had been varied, even spectacular, although he’d been denied his nation’s highest honor, the presidency. And, at age 65, he knew it would never happen. He’d been a congressman from his native state of South Carolina and then a justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. He had stepped down as a Justice in order to head the War Mobilization Board for his good friend, Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He’d also been born a Catholic, which offended many Protestants, and then converted to Episcopalian, which offended Catholics, thus making him unelectable to national office.
Still, the President trusted him and liked to use him for unofficial duties like the one he was pursuing today. Andrei Gromyko, the gloomy looking Soviet ambassador to the United States awaited him in a conference room in the uninspiring red stone castle that was the Smithsonian Institute. Gromyko was much younger than Byrnes and was considered a rising star, a Red Star, Byrnes thought whimsically.
Typically, Gromyko came right to the point. “Why do you wish to speak to me, Mr. Byrnes?”
And a bright good morning to you too, James F. Byrnes thought. “We would like to know what is happening to your army. It seems to have disappeared,” he said dryly.
“I don’t understand,” Gromyko said, either ignoring or not understanding the sarcasm. “We are fighting bravely and enduring casualties on your behalf.” Gromyko was known to be a stubborn negotiator.
“Ambassador, your vaunted Red Army does not appear to be moving. What has happened to your great advances and even greater victories?”
“The Red Army continues to fight. As you are aware, the Germans are now fighting far more intelligently than in the past. I believe your own forces are discovering this unpleasant fact in France. The Red Army’s senior commander, Marshal Zhukov, has informed our high command, the Stavka, that the army is exhausted. It requires far more in the way of supplies and manpower; thus, a period of relative rest is required. However, do not fear, the pace will increase once the situation improves.”
Byrnes continued in his soft Southern drawl. “In the meantime, the American army bears the brunt of fighting the Nazis. We are seeing German units in France that had been in Russia until recently.”
Ultra was providing disheartening information that numerous other German units were moving from the Soviet front to France. Aerial reconnaissance, along with captured enemy soldiers was confirming this.
Gromyko laughed unpleasantly. “Now you know what it is like to fight alone, even temporarily. From 1939 until now, Russia stood alone while your country dithered. My people bled. Our soldiers were killed and maimed, our cities ruined, our women raped, and all the while you Americans slept snug in your beds.”
Byrnes bristled. The accusation, however truthful, was unfair. The American people weren’t going to go to war against anybody until the Japanese had conveniently attacked Pearl Harbor and Germany subsequently and foolishly declared war on the United States. FDR had correctly identified Germany as the greater evil and had ordered the military focus to be against Hitler, even though there had been fierce opposition to that decision by those who felt that Japan should be defeated first. They both knew that an American focus on Japan would have meant defeat for Russia, and perhaps even Great Britain.
“It takes time to prepare an army,” Byrnes said, “and we were separated from the war in Europe by an ocean, whereas you had the Nazis by the throat. In Teheran, less than a year ago, we promised a cross channel invasion this spring and we have done it. We expected to be marching in lock step with you, and not have you giving the Germans a respite.”
Gromyko nearly sneered. “I concede that, however late, your army has arrived. But it is nowhere near the size of ours or that of the Germans confronting us. Your invasion of France is, for all intents and purposes, a sideshow.”
Byrnes nearly gasped at the insult. “Our army is large, getting larger, and will continue to grow, as will the amount of aid we are giving you. Our concern is that the Red Army isn’t fighting.”
Gromyko was clearly unimpressed. “I will relay your concerns. However, I will also remind you that General Winter was a Russian ally when the Hitlerites invaded, but is now a friend of the Germans. Winter in Poland might not be as severe as it is in Russia, but waging war in ice and snow and mud is still an extremely difficult enterprise.”
Byrnes reluctantly but silently concurred. “Then please add this. We are working hard and our people are in great danger in order to send supply convoys to the Soviet Union. Those supplies could just as well be used by our own soldiers as yours.”
Gromyko stood. His expression was one of controlled anger. “As I said, I will convey your concerns.”
CHAPTER 13
Colonel Ernst Varner thought he could hear Margarete’s cry of delight even before his Fieseler Storch landed in the dirt road by the farmhouse. He hopped out when it slowed and the pilot taxied towards some trees where the plane would be covered with a tarp and, hopefully, be out of sight of the damned Americans. He’d endured a couple of scares on the flight from Berlin to the farm.
Margarete jumped into his arm and hugged him while Magda approached a little more sedately. Her eyes, however, were warm with a promise of better things to come and he winked at her. Magda’s response was to grin and lick her lips provocatively.
As they walked to the house, Varner noted with distaste the presence of foreign workers. He felt that using prisoners and drafted foreign civilians as little more than slaves was almost as distasteful as what was going on in the concentration camps. Once more it brought home the necessity for Germany to win the war, or at least negotiate an honorable peace. If not, the world would doubtless wreak a terrible vengeance on the Third Reich, regardless of who was in charge at the end. Eric and Bertha doubtless thought having slave workers was their due as Nazis and conquerors. After all, weren’t the prisoners being well fed and cared for? What more could people who weren’t quite human want?
Despite the gathering dark clouds of disaster outside, dinner was jovial and the food plentiful. Ernst had been on rationed food and ate too much. So too with the drinks and he made sure that his pilot, an eighteen-year-old lieutenant who appeared both too young for his rank and to be flying a plane, was well taken care of. They would not be flying tonight, so let the boy have a good meal and a couple of glasses of wine. Normally, he would have eaten with the pilot, a pleasant young man named Hans Hart, who seemed spellbound by Margarete, but Hart was intelligent and discretely excused himself and gave Varner the privacy to be with his family.