“The applause was not exactly deafening,” Churchill mused, his voice tired.
“Thank God,” Thompson mumbled.
Churchill, thankfully, did not hear the comment.
“I have been told the newsreel camera broke down in the middle of the first iron curtain statement.”
“Attentive reporters will carry it, sir, despite it’s not being in the text.”
“Are there still attentive reporters? I wonder.”
Thompson knew the signs of a new wave of approaching depression.
“Better to have gotten the message across in your own way. This was a fine speech, sir, one of your best. Your view needed to be articulated.”
“And so it was,” Churchill snickered. “And an egg was laid.”
The cars moved forward and Churchill and Truman settled themselves in the backseat of theirs along with the college president.
Thompson held back deliberately, as the caravan moved on toward the president’s house. Now he was faced with the dilemma of body disposal and getting back to the train before it departed.
Standing in the lengthening shadows as darkness descended, Thompson watched as the ambulances and the medical personnel moved out of the locker room with their equipment. Although his course of action was clear, there were no guarantees he could accomplish it without incident. In such matters, many things could go wrong. If observed, the embarrassment to Churchill would be profound. Few, if any, would understand Thompson’s motives. The chances were that, if discovered, he would be detained and forced to reveal the facts of the attempted assassination.
It was of some small comfort to know that he did not kill this man. Of course, the evidence of the weapon and the vantage the man had chosen would prove his point that the man was bent on killing. But who? Truman? Unfortunately, the intended victim could never be validated. Only Thompson knew the truth. Churchill is a dead man. The words reverberated in his mind.
Would he be believed? He doubted it. Conspiracy theories would abound. If he was caught trying to dispose of this body, God knows what a Pandora’s Box would be opened. In his heart, he both detested and feared what he must do. The risk was enormous and his justification could easily brand him as a fool. Aside from the humiliation it would engender, what he was doing was clearly illegal and subject to punishment. Perhaps, too, he might be charged with murder. The thought was chilling, and he put it out of his mind. He knew what he had to do.
He moved quickly to the Chevrolet and drove adjacent to the locker room exit, then opened the trunk. Seeing the spade again, he saw its presence as an act of providence. The method of burial had been chosen for him.
The crowds were dispersing rapidly and he could see the line of lighted headlights as people headed away from the college. The police were no longer guarding the exits; apparently, they shifted their presence to the front of the gymnasium to supervise the departure of the crowds.
He moved through the exit door and found that it could be left open securely with a hook attachment and a metal eye drilled into the floor. The locker room was deserted now. He found the light switch and plunged the room into darkness. Moving inside, he looked into the gymnasium. People had begun folding and carting away the metal chairs. The cleanup work had begun in earnest. The photographers and reporters had moved out in buses.
Closing the door that led to the gymnasium, he quickly ducked behind the bank of lockers, pushed opened the door that led to the metal stairs, and dragged out the man’s body, setting it up at the edge of the lockers. Peeking out behind the bank of lockers, he noted that the area continued to be deserted.
Quickly he kneeled and, using the fireman’s technique, lifted the body and draped it over his shoulder, securing it by holding on to its wrist. His arm wound pained him and complicated the chore. He staggered with the effort for a moment but managed to raise himself upright. Suddenly, he was startled by the sound of metal crashing to the floor. It was a Luger pistol. He’d have to make another trip. Again he looked around the bank of lockers. Suddenly, the door to the gymnasium opened and a man looked inside.
“Somebody shut the lights,” the man said.
“Never mind,” another man said, and the door closed once again.
Carrying his burden, sweating profusely, Thompson moved through the exit door and threw his burden into the trunk and closed the lid. It took him a moment to catch his breath, and then he opened the car door on the driver’s side, abruptly closing it again when he remembered the Luger on the locker room floor and the assassin’s Mauser still in the stairwell.
Rushing back into the locker room, he picked up the Luger, put it in his belt, and then he entered the stairwell once again and moved up the stairs looking for the rifle. He found it quickly where it had fallen, removed the ammunition clip, and hunted around for the spent bullet and shell. He found the shell but could not find where the bullet that had grazed him had lodged. Finally, he gave up, calculating that even if it were found one day, people would not connect it to the event.
Then he remembered that he had dropped his Webley, which was also difficult to find. He had to move up the stairs to where he had been when he had dropped the weapon, and then moved down again. Still he could not find it.
He decided to remove the rifle first and come back again. The locker room was still in darkness, and he was able to get the rifle through the exit and into the backseat of the car. Then he returned to the stairwell to look for his Webley. As he moved from stair to stair, he heard movement in the locker room.
Although disconcerting, he continued to search for the weapon, finding it finally and returning it to his holster. When he came out the door to the stairwell, the locker room was a blaze of light and people were using it once again as a smoking lounge. With an air of nonchalance, he moved to the exit, which someone had closed.
“Speech was a little dry,” someone said, a man’s voice.
“Said a lot, though,” an older man answered. “Can’t trust those Ruskies? What do you think, bud?”
Thompson turned. The question was obviously addressed to him.
“Good show,” Thompson said, facing the men.
“He’s a Brit,” one of the men said.
“Figures.”
Thompson smiled and went out the exit door, got into the car, and began to drive out of the lot. His heart continued to pound, and sweat was pouring out of his body, dampening his clothes.
At the exit to the parking area, a policeman suddenly moved into view, waving a searchlight. Thompson braked the car, fearful that the policeman would ask for credentials to prove the ownership of the car.
“Where are you going, buddy?” the policeman asked politely.
Thompson flashed his identification as a member of the official party.
“I work for Mr. Churchill. Just had to pick up some material left by him inside the gymnasium.”
The policeman looked at the credentials and flashed the searchlight into Thompson’s face. If the man had been thorough, Thompson thought, using his policeman’s logic and training, he would have asked far more questions. Thankfully, he missed seeing the rifle that Thompson had thrown on the backseat.
Easy now, he admonished himself, realizing that the effort had tired him and he was beginning to make mistakes. It occurred to him suddenly that this mission required the incompetence of others to succeed.
The policeman waved him ahead.
He now had to work by instinct alone. He calculated that the reception at the president’s home would last no more than an hour, and the official party would make the twenty-mile drive to Jefferson City in about forty minutes. He estimated perhaps another half hour or so before the train left the station. This left him little time to dispose of the body. Thankfully, the gas tank was almost full. The assassin had obviously planned well on that score.