Max Collins - Stolen Away

In a kitchen larger than my one-room apartment back home, a horse-faced woman of perhaps fifty, wearing cook’s whites, was doing dishes. At a large round oak table, seated with her hands folded as if praying, sat a petite, delicately attractive young woman-perhaps twenty-five-with beautiful haunted blue eyes and a prim, slight, sad smile. A small cup of broth and a smaller cup of tea were before her, apparently untouched.

I swallowed and stopped in my tracks. I recognized her at once as Colonel Lindbergh’s wife, Anne.

“Excuse me,” I said.

“Mrs. Lindbergh,” Betty said, gesturing formally toward me. “This is Mr. Nathan Heller, of the Chicago Police.”

Betty Gow exited, while Anne Morrow Lindbergh stood, before I could ask her not to, and extended her hand. I took it-her flesh was cool, her smile was warm.

“Thank you for coming, Mr. Heller. I know my husband is looking forward to meeting you.”

She wore a plain navy-blue frock with a white collar; her dark hair was tied back with a blue plaid scarf.

“I’m looking forward to meeting him,” I said. “And it’s an honor meeting you, ma’am. I wish it were under happier circumstances.”

Her smile tightened, bravely but not convincingly. “With the help of men like yourself, perhaps happier circumstances will find us.”

“I hope so, ma’am.”

There was a sudden sparkle in the sad eyes. “You needn’t call me ‘ma’am,’ Mr. Heller, though I do appreciate the sentiment. Are you tired from your trip? You must be. I’m afraid you missed lunch…we’ll have to get you something.”

That touched me; I felt my eyes go moist, and I fought it, but goddamn it, it touched me. Everything this woman had been through, these past four or five days, and she could still express concern-real concern-about whether my trip had been pleasant, and if I’d missed my lunch.

And then she was up and rummaging in the Frigidaire herself, while the woman who was apparently her cook continued wordlessly to wash dishes. “I hope a sandwich will be all right,” Mrs. Lindbergh was saying.

“Please, uh…you don’t have to…”

She looked over her shoulder at me. “Heller’s a Jewish name, isn’t it?”

“Well, yes. But my mother was Catholic.” Why did I sound defensive, for Christ’s sake?

“So you eat ham, then?”

So much for the discussion of my religious persuasion.

“Sure,” I said.

Soon I was sitting at the table next to a beaming Anne Lindbergh, who was enjoying watching me eat the ham-and-cheddar-cheese sandwich she’d prepared for me. It wasn’t a bad sandwich at all, though personally I prefer mustard to mayonnaise.

“I’m sorry you have to wait to see Charles,” she said, sipping her tea (she’d provided me with some, as well). “But things are hectic here, as you might imagine.”

I nodded.

“Actually, it’s settled down, some, the last two days. Those first several days were sheer bedlam. Hundreds of men stamping in and out, sitting everywhere…on the stairs, on the sink. People sleeping all over the floors on newspapers and blankets.”

“The press is a problem, I suppose.”

“Terrible,” she admitted. “But the troopers are keeping them at bay…and, in their defense, the news people were cooperative when I gave them Charlie’s diet.”

Charlie, of course, was her missing son.

“They published it widely,” she said, with satisfaction. “He has a cold, you know.” She swallowed, smiled her prim, charming smile and said, “I admire men like you, Mr. Heller.”

I almost did a spit take. “Me?”

“Such self-sacrifice and energy. Such selfless devotion.”

She sure had me pegged.

“You brought a mother and a child back together,” she said, “didn’t you?”

“Well…yes, but…”

“You needn’t be modest. You can’t know the hope that gives us, Charles and me.”

She reached out for my hand and squeezed it.

Had I given her false hope? Maybe. But maybe false hope was better than no hope at all.

“Excuse me,” a voice behind us said.

The voice came from the doorway that led to the sitting room and outside; it was a male voice, so my first thought was of Lindbergh himself. Instead it belonged to a square-jawed six-footer about forty with dark blond hair combed straight back and a small, perfectly trimmed and waxed mustache. He was in an officer’s variation of that blue uniform with yellow-striped riding britches; all he lacked was a riding crop, a monocle and a saber.

“Colonel Schwarzkopf,” Anne Lindbergh said, without rising, “this is Nathan Heller of the Chicago Police Department.”

Schwarzkopf nodded, resisting any urge to click his heels. “Mr. Heller-if I might have a moment?”

“Colonel,” Anne said, troubled by Schwarzkopf’s expression and tone, “I thought you were in conference with Charles.”

“Yes, Mrs. Lindbergh. But he and Colonel Breckinridge needed a word in private. Mr. Heller?”

I thanked Anne Lindbergh for her kindness in general and her ham sandwich in particular. Schwarzkopf bowed to her, in his silly formal way, and the two of us stepped into the room beyond the kitchen, a spacious well-stocked pantry.

He looked at me with disdain. “I don’t know how you people do things in Chicago. Judging by what I read in the newspapers, you don’t do them very damn well. Murder in the street. Corruption in city hall. It took the federals to nail Capone.”

“This is fascinating, learning all about Chicago like this. But don’t I have an appointment with Colonel Lindbergh?”

He trained his hazel eyes on me like the twin barrels of a twelve-gauge. “In New Jersey, I run a force of one hundred and twenty hand-picked, highly motivated and rigidly disciplined men.” He thumped my chest with a forefinger-just like that inspector out in the garage had. “You’re in my territory, mister. You’ll play by my rules, or you won’t play at all.”

I grabbed his finger in my fist; I didn’t squeeze it, I didn’t get tough with him. I just grabbed the finger and stopped him thumping me with it. His eyes and nostrils flared.

“Don’t put your hands on me,” I advised. “You might get your uniform mussed.”

I let go of the finger and he drew it back, indignantly.

Through clenched teeth, he said, “You were rude and disrespectful to one of my key people, Inspector Welch, who is no doubt twice the policeman you’ll ever be. You used coarse language of a kind that may be acceptable in Chicago circles, but will not, mister, be countenanced here-not in my world.”

I smiled pleasantly. “Colonel Schwarzkopf, let me make a couple things clear. First of all, I’m just here to advise and to help, because several people wanted me to come, including Colonel Lindbergh. Second, that asshole Welch called me ‘sonny boy,’ twice. Do I look like a refugee from a Jolson picture to you?”

That froze him. He did not know what to say to me. He did not know what to make of me. He just knew, whatever I was, he didn’t like it or me.

“I don’t think you’re going to fare very well with Colonel Lindbergh,” he said, finally, with an icy smile.

“Well,” I said, shrugging. “Why don’t you lead the way, and let’s see.”

Nodding curtly, he did.

Footsteps echoing on hardwood floors, I trailed Schwarzkopf through the foyer past the second-floor stairs and into a large living room where a dog was barking. I didn’t see the animal at first, but its bark was ringing through the open-beamed room, the shrill sound of a small, hysterical pooch. To my left, French doors led to a flat terrace where a New Jersey trooper, in his perfect light-blue uniform jacket with orange piping, stood guard. Despite the bustle of activity elsewhere, this room was empty, but for the barking dog, who revealed himself as a little white-and-brown wirehaired fox terrier on a pillow on a green sofa. Fireplaces stood like brick bookends at either side of the big room, both unlit, emphasizing the coldness of the house.