Robert Conroy: North Reich

"Let's get your ass warmed up and we'll get this all sorted out. Who knows, maybe you’re even telling the truth."

The police station was a small cement block building located at an intersection a few miles inland from Lake Ontario, and near the village of Youngstown. If the place had a name, Tom never did find out and he really didn't care. He was just too cold and miserable. He thought he was in Niagara County in upper New York, but even that was irrelevant. Nor was he particularly concerned by the stares he received by the two other cops and one middle-aged woman dispatcher as he walked across their office to a holding cell that was blessedly warm and dry. They gave him more blankets and a couple of towels. He was beginning to think he would live.

The dispatcher's name was Sadie and she made him a cup of broth while the chief, a burly middle-aged man named Charley Canfield, made some phone calls. There were no army installations nearby, so Canfield satisfied himself with calls to U.S. Customs and the State Police. He quickly determined that nobody was looking for a six-foot white male in his early thirties, in excellent condition, with short brown hair and brown eyes, along with significant scarring on his left shoulder.

Canfield declined to call the Pentagon with a number that Tom provided on the grounds that his budget was for shit and he couldn't call long distance because he didn't have the money. When Tom said he could call collect, Canfield said he would try, but not until morning when it was more likely that people were awake. Tom reluctantly agreed.

Sadie brought him some baggy sweat pants and a sweat shirt both of which clearly belonged to somebody very large. Despite his exhaustion, it began to occur to Tom that the local cops weren't anywhere near as hostile as they had first been.

When Tom was dry and reasonably warm, Canfield entered the cell and sat on the bunk across from his. "Who were the clowns who were shooting at you?"

"They were Black Shirt thugs from the Canadian Legion. For some reason they thought I didn't belong in Occupied Canada."

Canfield was at least five years older than Tom, probably in his early forties, and Tom's first impression was that Canfield appeared very competent for a small town cop. He was a couple of inches taller than Tom and looked like he could easily handle himself in a fight with a couple of town drunks.

"Next question, Mr. Grant, and don't be pissed if I hold off calling you colonel for the time being, what were you doing in Canada that so thoroughly annoyed the junior Nazis?"

"I'd just as soon not discuss that."

Canfield smiled knowingly. "Okay, so you were doing some spying. Did you find anything interesting?"

"Other than the occupying Nazis don't like people snooping around, no. Tell me, chief; were you in the last war?"

"I spent a few months of my misguided youth in a trench filled with mud, rats, and rotting body parts, so the answer is yes. I'm still in the military. I'm a major in the New York National Guard. Now, how did you hurt your arm and get those nasty scars?"

Tom thought about not answering, but the scars on his body were hard to ignore. "Nothing heroic, chief. It was an automobile accident a year ago at Fort Benning, in Georgia. Some idiot second lieutenant forgot to post road guards while a tank was crossing and my car was squashed by an M-3. Thirty tons of armor will always win out over a jeep. My driver was killed, burned to death. I had a dislocated shoulder and got burned trying to pull him out."

Tom suppressed a shudder. He could still hear the kid screaming while he died in the flames. He explained that the lieutenant in charge of the crossing had been court-martialed for neglect and dishonorably discharged. The army had wanted to give Tom a medical discharge, but there was a war on and it was felt that his skills could still be used. Even mediocre Academy grads were needed, and he'd then been posted to an intelligence section in the Pentagon.

"I got a medal for trying to save the kid, but it wasn't worth it."

"They never are,” Canfield said sympathetically. “I got a Purple Heart and was put in for the Silver Star in the last one. For some reason, I never got it, but what the hell. Maybe I'll get a chance this time."

"Well you might just. Don't be surprised, Chief Canfield, if your unit is activated fairly soon."

The next morning, a call to the Pentagon did confirm that Tom was who he said he was. The officer at the Pentagon said that he was to report in as soon as possible and seemed surprised that he was without clothes, money, and in a far corner of New York state that was so isolated that it didn't have a telegraph office. Tom was informed that if he could make it to Buffalo, money would be wired to him.

Chief Canfield thought the situation was hilarious — serious yes, also but downright funny. "Tell you what I'm going to do, Colonel Tom. You and I are going to my place and I'm going to give you some old clothes I was going to give to the local church. Then I'm going to front you twenty bucks of the county’s money so you can hire one of the locals to drive you to Buffalo. Niagara Falls would have been a little closer, but maybe you army people can't read maps. I would also like the twenty back. I wasn’t joking when I said we were short of money."

Tom assured Canfield he would get his money back if he had to use his own funds. Shortly after lunch, Tom found himself in a pickup truck with a taciturn farmer who had clearly taken a vow of silence, which was fine by Tom. He wanted to collect his thoughts. Two hours later, he was dropped off in Buffalo in front of the Western Union office, across the street from the Greyhound Bus Station. Working with Western Union proved a little difficult since he had no identification and they were understandably loath to give a hundred dollars of the government’s money to a stranger who looked like a derelict. A quick telegram to the Pentagon solved that. Tom got himself a bus ticket to New York City and, on checking the schedule, saw that he had enough time to buy himself some better clothes. He also gave the farmer twenty to pay back Canfield.

After an eternity on a bus that made far too many stops, he made it to New York and the airport that was known as either the New York Municipal Airport or LaGuardia after the current mayor who'd had it built. From there he took a flight on a DC-3 to the new Washington National Airport.

It took him two full days to get from upper New York to Washington, D.C. So much for modern, high speed travel, he thought. Worse, he had used up almost all the money he'd been fronted and barely had enough for cab fare to his apartment. He had the miserable idea that the hundred dollars had been an advance on his pay, rather than a gift from Uncle Sam.

Tom's apartment was outside Fort Meade and close to his offices in the Pentagon. As he walked up the two flights of stairs, his legs began to ache and he realized just how tired he was. A note was pinned to his door. He was ordered to report as soon as possible. Obviously, none of the brass gave a shit about how tired he was. He realized he didn't have a key to his apartment and swore. He was about to head to the manager's office, hoping that the lush of a superintendent was sober enough to remember Tom to let him in, when he realized that the door was slightly ajar. He was about to push it open when something hit him in the back of the head. He fought unconsciousness for a moment, but a second blow finished him.

"Good morning, major. The nurse said you were awake."

Tom blinked. His head hurt like someone was digging in it with a shovel. Worse was the throbbing between his eyes that was nauseating him. The doctor understood and quickly gave him a bucket. Tom emptied the contents of his stomach and then some additional stuff. Finally, he got control and gratefully took a glass of water from the doctor. He didn't have any military rank on him, so Tom presumed the man was a civilian. The world started to spin, so he sagged back on his bed.