Part 24 (1/2)
AVAILABLE TRANSPORTATION NECESSARY DRUGS.
TREAT VENEREAL DISEASE CONTRACTED BY KEY.
PERSONNEL STOP FERTIG.
4.
CROYDON AIRFIELD LONDON, ENGLAND 14 FEBRUARY 1943-ST. VALENTINE'S DAY ”I think the thing to do with Charity Hoche, Helene,” Lt. Colonel Stevens had said to Helene Dancy earlier that morning, ”is for you to meet her at the airport, run her past the officer's sales store, get her into uniform, and take her out to Whitbey House. She is a young lady who attracts a great deal of attention, and to the extent we can, I think we ought to keep her out of sight.”
Colonel Stevens had then decided that it would be best to put Charity Hoche into the uniform of a WAC first lieutenant.
”We'll think about actually getting her a commission,” Stevens had said. ”In the long run, that might be the thing to do. But for the short run, anyway, I think it makes more sense than putting her into a civilian specialist's uniform. That attracts attention.”
The first impression Capt. Helene B. Dancy had of Miss Charity Hoche was not particularly favorable.
Miss Hoche descended the stairway from the door of the ATC C-54, ”the Was.h.i.+ngton Courier,” wearing the uniform of a War Department civilian, with the uniform cap perched perkily atop a ma.s.s of long golden hair. Neither Capt. Dancy nor Colonel Stevens had expected that Miss Charity Hoche would arrive in England in a civilian specialist's uniform.
She also managed to display a good deal of shapely thigh and lace-hemmed black petticoat as she came daintily down the stairs. She wore the gabardine uniform topcoat over her shoulders.
Two officers (one of them, in Capt. Dancy's opinion, old enough to know better) hovered solicitously around her. They were rewarded for their efforts with a radiant display of perfect white teeth between lips that Capt. Dancy thought had entirely too much lipstick of a too dazzling shade.
A double-decker London bus had been driven onto the field to transport the arriving pa.s.sengers to SHAEF Billeting. There they would be given a two-hour orientation lecture, known as the ”Be Kind to Our English Cousins speech.” The trouble with Americans, in the opinion of many Englishmen, was that they were ”overpaid, overs.e.xed, and over here.”
The purpose of the orientation lecture was to remind the newly arrived Americans that England had been at war for more than three years; that there was a ”ration scheme” for practically everything the English needed to live; and that the British quite naturally resented the relative luxury in which the American taxpayer was supporting its citizens in the United Kingdom.
The lecture, Capt. Dancy decided, seemed to have been prepared with Miss Charity Hoche in mind. But she would not hear it.
Capt. Dancy showed her identification card to the guard and walked out of the terminal building and intercepted Charity Hoche as she was being escorted to the bus.
”Miss Hoche?” she said. ”I'm Capt. Dancy. Will you come with me, please?”
The pudgy lieutenant colonel who was carrying Charity's makeup kit looked crushed.
Capt. Dancy happened to meet Charity Hoche's eyes and found herself being examined very carefully by very intelligent eyes.
”My luggage?” Charity asked.
”It'll be taken care of,” Capt. Dancy said.
Charity said good-bye to the two officers and followed Capt. Dancy into the terminal, then to the Ford staff car.
”Where are we going?” Charity asked when she was in the car, and then, without waiting for a reply, ”Is it hard to drive one of our cars on the wrong side of the road?”
”The 'other' side of the road is the way I think of it,” Capt. Dancy said. ”And the answer is 'no, you have to be careful, but you soon get used to it.' ”
”How did I get off on the wrong foot with you so soon, Captain?” Charity challenged.
Because you're young and spectacularly beautiful and look and act as if a serious thought and a cold drink of water would kill you.
”If I gave that impression, Miss Hoche, I'm sorry,” Capt. Dancy said. ”Where we're going is to my billet. There, we're going to put your hair up, take some of that makeup off, and do whatever else is necessary to make you credible as a WAC officer.”
Charity Hoche seemed oblivious to the reproof.
”Captain Dougla.s.s thought you might want to put me in a WAC uniform, but he wasn't sure. I've got the insignia and AGO card of a first lieutenant in my purse.”
Dancy looked at her in surprise.
”So, all we'll have to do, then,” Charity said sweetly, ”is pin on the insignia, put my hair up, and take some of the makeup off, right?”
She gave Capt. Dancy a dazzling smile.
”But before we do that,” Charity went on, just as sweetly, ”I think we should go by Berkeley Square. Not only do I have three 'Eyes Only' for Mr. Bruce, but I have crossed the Atlantic with a Colt 'Banker's Special' hanging from my bra strap. It hurts like h.e.l.l, and I want to get rid of it.”
”I'll be d.a.m.ned,” Capt. Helene Dancy said.
”Won't we all be, sooner or later?” Charity asked.
”Apparently, I was wrong about you,” Capt. Dancy said.
”I don't know about that,” Charity said, ”but you were wrong about Colonel Stevens. You should have known he wouldn't have let me come over here if I was a complete fool.”
5.
OSS LONDON STATION BERKELEY SQUARE LONDON, ENGLAND 1610 HOURS 14 FEBRUARY 1943.
David Bruce, Chief of London Station, was surprised to sense his office door being quietly opened, and when he looked up, to see the face of Capt. Helene Dancy waiting to catch his attention.
”Sorry to disturb you, Sir,” Capt. Dancy said.
Bruce's eyebrows rose in question.
”Miss Hoche is here,” Capt. Dancy said.
Bruce frowned. He didn't want to see Charity Hoche. He wanted, in fact, to nip in the bud any idea of hers that she would enjoy with him the same close personal relations.h.i.+p she was supposed to have with Bill Donovan.
He had directed that Helene Dancy pick the girl up at Croydon and take her directly to Whitbey House in one of the station's 1941 olive-drab Ford staff cars. En route, Helene was supposed to relay his orders to her to make herself useful wherever Lieutenant Robert Jamison felt she would fit in.
Jamison was Adjutant of Whitbey House Station. His job had been to relieve Canidy of as much of the administrative burden as he could. He had done a good job, but not only was he admittedly unhappy with what he called his chief clerk's role, but he was also qualified, in Bruce's opinion, to a.s.sume greater operational responsibility.
Jamison wanted to go operational, which was different from a.s.suming greater operational responsibility.
Bruce had already decided that was out of the question, not because Jamison couldn't do it but because he knew too much for the OSS to risk having him captured. With Canidy the exception that proved the rule, OSS personnel privy to OSS plans and intentions in more than one-their own-case were not permitted to go operational.
No attempt had been made to brief Jamison on any particular operation, but he did the paperwork, and he was as bright as a new dime. There was no question in David Bruce's mind that Jamison knew far too much about too many things to send him off somewhere where he was likely to find himself being interrogated by the Sicherheitsdienst.