Christopher Reich - The Runner

Behind his grin, Seyss gritted his teeth. “Jerry,” he responded heartily. “Jerry Fitzpatrick.” He’d chosen the name with a bent toward irony.

“Hello, Jerry. Where you from over there?” Seyss sighed inwardly. He was due at the bar any minute now. “County Mayo. Have you been?”

“Me? Heck, no. But you have to say hello to a chum of mine, Billy McGuire. He’s always going on about his aunt or uncle in County Antrim. Stay right here, I’ll go get him.”

“Certainly.” But Seyss had no intention of doing any such thing. He waited till Jennings was across the room, then hurried to the bar. He checked his watch and saw that he was five minutes late. Taking a seat on a leather stool directly under an ornate cuckoo clock, he glanced to his right and left. He was looking for a Captain Jack Rizzo. Bauer’s description of the man was less than perfect: tall, dark hair, loud — a typical American. Funny, Seyss thought. He would describe a typical American differently. Chatty, undisciplined, and lazy, with lousy posture to boot.

A steady stream of officers approached the bar, ordered drinks, then headed back to the main salon. Half fit Bauer’s description. Not wanting to call attention to himself, Seyss asked for a whisky, paying with a lone twenty he’d discovered floating in his pockets.

The crowd was growing by the minute. At least a hundred Americans milled about the dancefloor: officers, civilians, and plenty of women. One or two couples had pushed their way to a corner of the parquet floor and were dancing. With all the talk it was becoming difficult to hear the band. Seyss gave himself ten more minutes, then he’d go. He didn’t want to risk being caught up in conversation with Jennings or his buddy, McGuire, from County Antrim. Americans were so damned friendly. Five minutes gabbing and they thought they were your best pal. The last thing he needed was to meet someone who’d actually been to Ireland.

A hand on his shoulder interrupted his thoughts.

“Pardon me, boy, is this the Chattanooga choo-choo?”

Seyss inclined his head and spoke the insipid words that had been rattling inside his head all day long. “Track twenty-nine, boy, can you give me a shine?”

“Jack Rizzo, how are ya?”

Seyss introduced himself as Jerry Fitzpatrick, and said he was fine, thank you.

Rizzo leaned on the bar, snapping his fingers to garner attention. “Bartender, give me a double scotch, easy on the ice.” He pointed to Seyss’s half empty glass. “You okay or you need another?”

“I’m good, thanks.” As Bauer had said, Rizzo was tall and dark, but his doleful eyes and heavy beard gave him the appearance of a Mediterranean — what the SS Eugenics Office would label “skull type IV -not suitable for incorporation into the Reich”.

“Your pal told me you wanted to have a look at some of my merchandise,” Rizzo said.

“That would be lovely,” Seyss answered equably. “I’m in the market for some rather specific items. I’m planning on opening a small museum back home in Dublin. I hope it doesn’t inconvenience you too much.”

“That’s what I’m here for, friend. Not to worry.” Rizzo tapped his hand in time to the music, looking this way and that. With a mighty swig, he drained his cocktail, then leaned closer and whispered, “Wait till you see this place. Goddam warehouse is loaded with enough of Ivan’s crap to start another war.”

“ Another war ?” Seyss knitted his brow in horror. “We wouldn’t want that.”

“Just joking, Jerry. Drink up and let’s get out of here.”

The armory in Wiesbaden was the size of a soccer field and had been hastily built from cheap corrugated iron. Installations similar to it had sprung up all over Germany in the fall of 1941 when on a front two thousand miles long, the Fuhrer’s armies had advanced unchecked across the Russian countryside. What glorious days! One city after another had fallen: Kiev, Minsk, Smolensk. In their wake, the conquering troops had left behind a million prisoners of war and the weapons they had laid down. Captured soldiers were marched to the rear, or when expedient, shot. Their weapons — pistols, machine guns, tanks, and artillery — were destroyed or loaded onto flatbeds for shipment to Germany.

Seyss waited in the front seat of the Buick as Rizzo spoke to the lone sentry guarding the armory. It was clear by their easy banter that the two were well acquainted. A bill or two exchanged hands, and after a pat on the back, the sentry pulled open the gates and waved them through. Rizzo drove the Buick to the rear of the armory, braking beside a pair of tall barn doors. “Shall we see if we can find what you’re looking for, Mr Fitzpatrick?”

“Very kind of you indeed.” Seyss swung open the door, glad for the chance to stretch his legs. Speaking English for the past three hours had left him with a terrible headache. Rizzo was the kind of man who viewed silence as a personal threat. He’d gabbed constantly, demanding Seyss’s view on everything from the best way to avoid the clap to the question of trans- versus consubstantiation. Everything two good Catholic boys needed to square between them.

Rizzo went round to the trunk and returned with two army-issue flashlights and a crowbar. He handed a flashlight to Seyss and said, “Power only runs till seven around here. Even with the lights on, it’s pretty dim. I know my way around this place, so follow me.”

Seyss watched Rizzo unlock the doors, biting his tongue to keep from saying that he, too, knew his way around the place. Stepping inside the pitch dark warehouse, he ran a hand along the doorframe until he felt the rounded plastic form of a light switch. He flicked it and a few doddering bulbs came to life. A mountain of crates rose before him, a pine ziggurat of Soviet weaponry.

Rizzo turned on his flashlight and shone it into the gloom. “Your pistols, rifles, machine guns and what-not are right in front of you — these six aisles to the left. Ammo is kept in a separate pen at the back of this dump. Uniforms are all the way to your right. Ivan’s trucks are in the garage next door. Beauts, wait till you see.”

Seyss tucked away the information. “Let’s start with the firearms, shall we, Captain?”

“You’re the boss, Jerry.”

Seyss moved quickly from one aisle to the next until he found what he was looking for. He brought down a crate of Tokarev TT-33s and had Rizzo pry it open with his crowbar.

He removed a pistol and examined it. Little effort had been taken to properly pack the guns. A stubble of rust grew from the barrel. He grasped the slide and drew it back. It didn’t budge. He picked up another pistol, then another, until he’d found four in working condition. Laying them on top of the crate, he moved on. A little looking turned up a decent submachine gun, a Degtyarev PPSh-41, or Pepshka , still packed in cosmoline, and a Mosin-Nagant sniper’s rifle with a scope attached and twenty-seven notches cut into its stock.

“If you don’t mind, I’ll need a few rounds as well.” Seyss adopted a docent’s earnest tone. “We would like to give our visitors the fullest idea of what our boys were up against.”

Rizzo hesitated a moment, then shrugged and told Seyss to follow him. Inside the ammo pen, Seyss gathered a few hundred rounds of various shells, no more than the four man team could divide among themselves. If they needed more, they would find it en route.

Getting his hands on the proper uniforms took less time than he expected. An hour of digging through heavy cardboard cartons turned up a two dozen tunics of coarse pea green wool whose sky blue epaulets bore a slim golden stripe. The uniforms belonged to the NKVD — the Russian state security police that functioned as a combination of Nazi Germany’s own Gestapo and army field police. He picked out three he thought would fit his men, then spent a few extra minutes making sure he found a suitable uniform for himself. He knew first-hand that offices of the NKVD took particular pride in their appearance. On three separate occasions, he had masqueraded as one — the last time in Kiev for an entire month. Posing as Colonel Ivan Truchin, hero of Stalingrad, he had convinced the local artillery commander to place his guns at the city’s southern flank in advance of a German counter-attack he knew would be coming from the north. His experience had imparted to him one lesson above all others: ordinary Russian troops feared the NKVD more than the enemy itself.