Джон Болл - The First Team

Hewlitt shifted his position and looked again at the man who was interrogating him. “I can’t honestly claim that, I didn’t have that much time. I liked the other possibility better and I bet on it.”

“How?”

“I said to him, ‘And so have you.’ If it was a recognition signal, I gave it back to him.”

“In your opinion, Mr. Hewlitt, is that why he let you go?”

“Yes, Mr. Pappas, it is. I realized that he could check up and determine within a very short time if I was in any way a member of, say, an enemy underground organization in this country, but it did buy me enough time to get out of the White House and into Percival’s hands. Do you know Percival, sir?”

Pappas nodded. “Yes, I know him. I am fully aware of what took place after you and Miss Stoneham reached the safe house.”

“I’m reassured that you are,” Hewlitt said.

“One more point: were you able simply to walk out of the White House without any interference from the guards or anyone else?” “Yes, sir. Major Barlov was very helpful there.”

“Please explain that.”

“Colonel Rostovitch said to me, ‘Meanwhile I give you a message; deliver it.’ I said that I would as soon as I was able. Then he said, ‘We have devices of which you do not dream. We have used them. Inform them that their submarine, the one named for the Filipino traitor and that has the high diver on board, was found and sunk by us early this morning.’ ”

Hewlitt noted at once that Pappas paid particularly close attention to that answer, especially the latter part of it.

“That is a reasonably exact quotation of his words?”

“I believe, Mr. Pappas, that it is verbatim.”

“Excuse me for a moment, if you please.”

Hewlitt was alone for some time. He ran over in his mind the interview he hatl just had and reassured himself that he had quoted Rostovitch accurately. He was not likely to forget a speech like that, particularly with the references to the Filipino traitor — which Ramon Magsaysay had most certainly not been — and the high diver, which was most likely another code designation.

When Pappas came back he had with him another man; he was not unduly tall, but his shoulders were exceptionally wide and the tautness of his physique could not be concealed by the slacks and sport shirt that he wore.

There were no introductions; the newcomer simply said, “Mr. Hewlitt, would you mind repeating to me the exact words of the message that Colonel Rostovitch gave to you?”

Since the other two men were standing up, Hewlitt got to his own feet. “Certainly not. The message was, ‘We have devices of which you do not dream. We have used them. Inform them that their submarine, the one named for the Filipino traitor and that has the high diver on board, was found and sunk by us early this morning.’ ”

“That is verbatim?”

“I’m certain of it, sir.”

“Did you gain any other impression from his manner?” Pappas asked.

Hewlitt turned toward him. “Only that he was trying to impress me with his authority and the meaning of his message. Of the news he was giving me.”

“Did you believe him?” the muscular man asked.

Hewlitt had not decided whether he liked this new man or not, he seemed a trifle peremptory. The fact that he had not as yet introduced himself could have been responsible for that impression.

“Not entirely, no,” he answered. “In the first place Magsaysay was a distinguished patriot; a traitor betrays his own country. One untruth in a statement casts doubt on all of the rest. Then that bit about the high diver sounded like another code device to me — that’s just a guess, of course. As to the submarine part, I couldn’t evaluate that because I simply didn’t have enough data to go on.”

The new man relaxed visibly in his manner. “All this is very interesting, Mr. Hewlitt, including your opinions. Apparendy you displayed excellent resourcefulness and your point about President Magsaysay is very well taken. As it happens, I’m the high diver, but you were right about Amy Thornbush and that was where it counted.”

Hewlitt felt much relieved. “Thank you, sir. Pardon my asking, but I was told that I was to meet the First Team on this trip. Am I still programmed to do that?”

“You will,” Pappas promised.

An air of expectation prevaded the conference room during the showing of the Solomon Fitzhugh tape. Those who saw it knew that Ed Higbee had already given it his approval, but when it was over they did not hesitate to express their own opinions. The consensus was very strong that the senator had done his best and that he would be believed as much as anyone who could be put on the air. That was enough for the admiral; in one of the few easy decisions he had made he O.K.’d the program to be aired that same evening.

“Some other things,” he told the people around the table. “We have had some intelligence input from Europe that, in the main, tends to refute Rostovitch’s claim that Magsaysay has been sunk. Part of it is reverse English — simply the fact that if they had done it, they would have trumpeted about it more loudly than they have. Hewlitt, the White House interpreter, is in here now and both Ted Pappas and Walt have interviewed him. Ted, what did you think?” Major Pappas was ready as usual. “He’s nobody’s fool; based on what he told me, and he wasn’t boasting in any way, I’m inclined to believe that he did outmaneuver Rostovitch at their one meeting. At least he didn’t panic and blow his top, and that in itself is notable. One other thing: Rostovitch definitely told him, according to his story, that the high diver was on board Magsaysay. In other words, he was still unaware that she put in at Wainwright or that Walt was back on the job with us. So he missed one trick at least.” “Did you get anything else from the interpreter?” General Gifford asked.

“I liked his candor and the way he handled himself. I’m inclined to think he’s pretty good — for an amateur.”

“We might make a pro out of him if we need to,” Colonel Prichard said. “I have a thought in the back of my mind and if it works out, he could be very useful.”

“I suspect that I have the same idea,” the admiral said, “but we don’t have the time to go into it now. What I want next is to grease the machinery for a maximum feedback on tonight’s broadcast. The more we know how well it goes over, the better we’ll be able to set up the next moves.”

Ed Higbee responded to that. “We’ve already got a very good net spread. I should be able to start giving you reactions minutes after it’s over. There are a lot of good newspapermen in this country, and many of them are with us. They’ll get the story.”

“Fine,” the admiral concluded. “We might as well catch some rest, because it’s going to be a busy night.”

The air-raid sirens that had been quietly hooked up at a hundred different control points began to sound at eleven minutes after ten, Eastern Standard Time. They did not all come on at the same time, because there was no need for a national hookup and establishing one would have entailed enormous difficulties. By individual timing they all responded within a time frame of thirty seconds, which was more than satisfactory as far as the plans that Ed Higbee had laid were concerned. By the hundreds of thousands, by the millions, Americans throughout the country turned on their radios and TV sets to find out what was going on. On many of the radio stations they were told to tune the proper channels on TV; the coverage was far from complete, but it was wide enough to insure the fact that the whole country would know what had happened before the night was over.

On the selected channels the regular programming disappeared, often in mid-sentence. It was a considerable technical achievement that the tubes remain blank for only a few seconds before an off-screen voice cut in. “We interrupt this program to bring you a special news broadcast.” Those most potent of all words in broadcasting guaranteed attention; most of the persons who heard them thought that it was the enemy talking, but they listened to find out what new disaster was about to befall them.