He managed to follow the signs that pointed in the direction of Jefferson City. As he drove into increasingly rural areas, he searched for some side roads that might lead him into some deserted spot that could give him the cover he needed to accomplish his purpose.
After twenty minutes of driving, he took a chance and moved into a dirt road that ran parallel to a creek. He braked the car at a place that looked deserted enough for his purposes, took out the spade, and began testing the soil for the softest spot he could find. Then he began to dig. The pain in his arm was intense and his back was beginning to hurt. Using all the strength and endurance he could muster, he managed to dig a hole deep enough to serve as the final resting place for the body in the trunk.
He stripped the body, put it into the hole, and filled it up, patting it down carefully. The whole aspect of what he was doing disgusted him. As if to assuage these feelings, he said a prayer over the body, a catechism he remembered from boyhood, ending with “Forgive me, Father.” For some reason, he also remembered the last words of Sydney Carton from A Tale of Two Cities and recited them aloud.
“It is a far, far better thing that I do than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known.”
Not to know the true identity of the body struck him as un-Christian. With a heavy heart, he got into the car, drove another few miles, found another deserted spot, and again dug a hole in which he threw the weapons, the clothing he had stripped from the assassin, and other items he had found in the car, including what looked like a packet filled with U.S. dollars. Blood money, he thought as he threw the packet in with the rest and covered everything up.
By the time he was finished, he was exhausted. His arm was killing him, and his back pain had gotten worse. For the first time in years, he started to sob.
Had he done the right thing? Would the body remain hidden for years? In his early police training, he had been told that the earth held many secrets and bodies were often discovered during construction projects, many of them impossible to identify. He wondered if forensic science in the future would improve the process and make it possible for identification in all circumstances. He tried to wish it from his mind but knew he would have to develop some mental strategy to cope with the memory. His own death would take care of that, he thought bitterly.
Checking the time, he knew he was cutting it close. According to his calculations, the train would be leaving in less than a half hour. Reaching Jefferson City, he found an open pharmacy, bought bandages and antiseptic, and received directions to the station. It was impossible now to abandon the car anyplace but close to the station. At this point, he was too exhausted to speculate what would happen when the stray car was discovered. He parked the car within a short walk from the station, removed the spade and put it in a nearby garbage bin, and then walked to the station.
Thankfully, the train was still there, but he could tell by the steam rising from the engine that it would embark shortly. He nodded to the Secret Service men posted at the entrance to the car that contained Churchill’s suite and his adjoining compartment. He stripped, attended to his wound, which although painful did not look serious. Then he showered, slipped into clean slacks, shirt, and sweater, and knocked on Churchill’s compartment door just as the train began to clang forward out of the station.
He found Churchill had changed into his blue siren suit, preparing to leave.
“Thompson,” Churchill remarked, taking a lit cigar out of his mouth. “I thought you had been hijacked.”
“I was in one of the last cars in the caravan, sir. I was certain you were secure. The Secret Service has provided excellent security.”
Churchill inspected him but showed no sign of exceptional curiosity, for which he was thankful.
“I’m off for an informal supper and another round of poker with Truman and the boys,” he said. “I am geared for revenge, although I believe Truman and his minions will not be so merciful this time around.”
“I gather their reaction was less than enthusiastic.”
“I’m afraid so, Thompson. I expect brutality to reign. The press has been hounding Truman for his comments. So far he has been tight-lipped, but he did remark to me that he would try to make it right with Uncle Joe, a futile exercise I’m afraid. But then, I had no illusions that I would come out of this unscathed.”
Churchill smiled and took a deep puff on his cigar.
“But you have, sir,” Thompson said.
Despite his exhaustion, he enjoyed the irony.
“Not quite, Thompson,” Churchill said, moving toward the door. “The poker gallows await.”
Chapter 27
Maclean chuckled as he read the story Benson had written in the Washington Star. Hardly a scoop, it hadn’t even made it into the larger story above the fold. But then, as news stories went, it was already three days after the event — meaning, old news.
He read it over again and then aloud to himself:
It has been rumored that the Russians had somehow obtained a copy of Churchill’s speech in advance. This came as a surprise to most reporters following the story, who had not received the speech until a short time before Mr. Churchill delivered it. Officials at the British embassy, where Mr. Churchill had been staying prior to leaving for Fulton, were somewhat surprised.
The incident did prompt First Secretary Donald Maclean to take the matter seriously and call together senior staff to find ways to tighten security procedures, indicating that the relationship between Russia, Britain, and America had taken on a new dimension.
‘This is Washington, a city of busybodies,’ a British embassy source commented. ‘But considering that the speech was being delivered by the eloquent former Prime Minister, the Russians were wise to find a way to secure it in advance and prepare themselves for the consequences, if any.’
The aftermath was now in play, and from Maclean’s perspective, it was delicious. He looked at the mimeographed sheet, which he had had the information people at the embassy prepare. It contained many of the choice comments in the press, almost all negative.
Among the postings were what Maclean considered “juicy little facts,” which he had encouraged to be included. Items such as the information that sometime after the speech, Truman had telegraphed Premier Stalin and invited him to come to America and deliver his side of the story to the same forum at Westminster College.
Truman had even offered the battleship Missouri to bring him to America. Maclean and Boris had had a good laugh over that one. Of course, Stalin had refused, and he was quoted in Pravda as saying “the speech was a pack of lies.”
In New York, the widow of President Franklin Roosevelt denounced Churchill as a “warmonger” and in the nation’s capital, three senators, including Claude Pepper, termed the Fulton address “shocking.”
The New York Times had questioned Churchill’s “dangerous lack of judgment.” In Britain, the London Times criticized Churchill’s harsh description of the Communist governments, saying “the Western democracies have much to learn from Communism in the working of political institutions and the establishment of individual rights and in the development of economic and social planning.”
Pearl Buck, one of America’s most important writers and a Nobel laureate, told an audience that the world was “nearer war tonight than we were last night.”