"I will. And thanks, Doctor. You saved his life."
"Actually, you did, Boyle. If you hadn't brought him in he'd have lasted only a few hours."
I mumbled something and took off down the hall. I didn't want to confess that Kaz was in this fix because of me in the first place. I was glad to hear the good news, but I was still worried. Kaz was a little guy in lousy health, and that was before he took a slug and then got gangrene waiting for yours truly.
I needn't have worried. I found Kaz sitting up in bed, a huge white bandage wrapped around his arm, with a pretty redheaded nurse feeding him soup.
"Really?" she was saying as I walked in, "a real baron? I never met royalty before." She stuck a spoonful of soup into Kaz's mouth as he noticed me in the doorway. He smiled weakly as he swallowed and gave a little apologetic shrug.
"There," the nurse said, dabbing the corner of Kaz's mouth with a napkin, "I'll leave you to your visitor, Baron, and come back to check on you later."
"Thank you, Rita," Kaz said. "But I am fine."
"It's no problem at all," she said, keeping her eyes on Kaz. She walked by me like I was a piece of furniture. Kaz looked away from me, and raised his good hand to wipe away a tear, then covered up by making a show of adjusting his glasses.
"It's okay if a pretty girl makes a fuss over you, Kaz," I said in a low voice as I took the chair Rita had just vacated. "You don't have to give her the cold shoulder."
"Why would my shoulder be cold? We are practically in the desert here."
"Don't change the subject," I said. Kaz loved American slang and he and Daphne used to go to gangster movies just to pick up new phrases. I thought he might know this one already but wanted to divert my attention.
Kaz turned away to stare at nothing.
"Sorry," I said. "I just hate seeing you all torn up."
"She is very pretty, and kind," Kaz said in a tired, low voice. "But all she can do is to remind me of what Daphne and I once had. I would rather she was plain and heartless. I have no room for kindness."
I couldn't think of anything to say, or do. Someone dropped something out in the hallway and the clatter and cursing echoed off the tiles. I was glad of the distraction.
"You look better, Kaz. Last night was pretty bad."
"Thank you for taking care of me, Billy. They say I would have died if you hadn't brought me here."
"Yeah, well, you wouldn't have gotten shot if you hadn't rescued me, and your arm wouldn't have gotten so bad if you hadn't waited for me last night, so we're even. Forget about it. How are you feeling?"
"Much better. I woke up a while ago and was actually surprised to feel so well, even though my arm hurts. They had to clean out the wound and re-stitch it. Rita told me about the penicillin they gave me. It's a miracle drug. Do you know about it?"
"More than I want to. I've got a lot to tell you-"
"Tell both of us, Boyle." The deep voice of Major Sam Harding boomed out from the doorway where he stood; the expression on his face said he was not pleased. Gloria Morgan stood right in back of him. Her face told a different story. She looked very happy to be in the major's company. She gave me a little raise of her eyebrow and a coy smile, then vanished as Harding shut the door behind him, but not before he'd given her a smile and a nod. I had a feeling they'd be doing some catching up later.
"How are you, Lieutenant Kazimierz?" Harding asked as he took off his helmet and sat next to Kaz's bed on the chair I had occupied before his arrival.
"Fine, sir. My arm hurts a bit, but they said that would pass. I am very lucky Billy got me here in time."
"Good. Now tell me what the hell is going on," Harding said, his eyes drilling me. "This morning I got your message that you'd brought I Lieutenant Kazimierz here, but I assumed it was just to check his wound. Then I get a phone call from Gloria… Captain Morgan… informing me that it was gangrene and that oh, by the way, the CO here wants you to investigate a murder!"
"Bet it was a real surprise hearing from her, Major." I said.
His look said the topic was off limits. The room went totally silent.
Kaz glanced between us. "Do you know Captain Morgan, Major?" he asked, tentatively. A couple of seconds passed very slowly as Harding turned his gaze toward Kaz, who obviously was unaware of their history. Some of the grimness left Harding's face, mostly because he wasn't looking at me anymore. It made me wonder about what had happened between him and Gloria. And what might happen next.
"Yes. We served together for a while back in the States. She's career Army Medical Corps."
More silence. That was going to be it. I looked at Kaz. He looked at Harding. Harding looked at me. Right back where we started.
"Start at the beginning, Boyle," Harding said as he shook a cigarrette out of a pack of Lucky Strikes and lit up with his Zippo. That reminded me of Willoughby's Chesterfields.
"Just one quick question, first," I said, "sir." Always helps to remember to call 'em sir when they're in a bad mood. "Those little four-packs of Chesterfields, do they only come in K-Rations?"
"Yes," answered Harding. "Why?"
"And K-Rations are only issued to guys in the front-lines, right?"
"Who else would want to eat them? Now what's this all about?"
I thought about Willoughby and how he was probably just a little rat who pilfered supplies when he had the chance. That was a court martial offense, but turning him in wouldn't get me anywhere. Better to leave a little leverage in case I needed it later.
"Probably nothing. Not worth going into. So where do we start Kaz?"
We were each thinking fast, trying to come up with some explanation as to how we'd gotten the information from Bessette's office. An explanation that didn't involve rooftops and late night burglary.
"Late last night we made contact with Agency Africa," Kaz blurted out first, as if he didn't trust me to concoct a good story. I had forgotten that his job was to find out if any part of the pre-war Polish spy network still existed and make contact after we were established in Algiers. "We asked if they knew anything about the political prisoners," Kaz continued, "and gave them the names of the French officers involved, Villard and Bessette." Then he looked up at me. Not a bad cover story. I picked it up, using Agency Africa as the source of the information I'd discovered.
"They said Bessette is as crooked as they come, that he's involved in drug smuggling. He recently had a French Army officer killed after he threatened to expose him."
"Do they have proof?" Harding asked.
"An eyewitness, but no other hard evidence. They did tell us two things about the supply depot at Bone where Villard was headed with the prisoners. First is the password: Le Carrefour."
"Crossroads," Kaz translated for us.
"Go on," said Harding. I took a deep breath. It was just a hunch, and I had been wrong before, but there was something about that matchbook, and all those bills in Bessette's desk drawer.
"A contact for the smuggling operation can be made in a bar, Le Bar Bleu, in Bone, near the supply depot. There's a link between Villard, the prisoners, and the smuggling operation."
I didn't know that there was such a link. Maybe Bessette just collected matchbooks. But I had to keep this thing going in the same direction that Diana was headed, or I'd never see her again.
"Interesting," said Harding, giving me a once-over that said he believed me about as much as he believed we'd be home by Christmas. "What was the name of this contact?"
I looked at Kaz, who simply shrugged. "We were not given a name, Major."
"Man or woman?" he asked. We both hesitated for a heartbeat, but It was long enough for Harding.
"Never mind," Harding said, "I don't want to undermine the enthusiasm of my junior officers, even if they use unorthodox and illegal means."