Comfort to the Enemy and Other Carl Webster Stories

  Carl and his dad were both grinning at each other.

  Virgil said, You're a dirty dog.

  Carl said, You know how serious he takes himself?

  That's what I'm talking about. What's he do now? Did you tell him you just took a wild guess?

  What's wild about it? I know she's the one he's seeing. Tony said he stopped by, no one answered the bell, so he went around back and saw them in the kitchen. They were caught so she had to open the door. She called Jurgen Jim. She said Jim was a relative from out of town, stopped by on his way to the coast, but didn't say which one.

  Stopped by in his short pants, Virgil said.

  But never turned around so Tony didn't see PW on him anywhere. But it was the shorts in October and his haircut gave him away, Tony said he believed the guy was German, but could not say it as an absolute fact or he'd have to report it, and turn Shemane in. I said, 'For what? She didn't help him escape, did she?

  What's she doing she'd be arrested for? Virgil said, Giving comfort to the enemy.

  That's what bothers Tony. I said, 'Giving him comfort and maybe a dose at the same time.' I told him not to worry about it, I'd talk to Shemane and find out what's going on.

  *

  Shemane saw Carl coming up the walk and changed her mind about wearing a sweater with the slacks. She turned from the window to her closet, put on her favorite Chanel jacket, no bra, the nubby black wool, and left it unbuttoned.

  The doorbell rang as she looked in on her mom across the hall, Gladys sitting in her corset at the vanity smoking a cigarette. Her mom said to the mirror, Somebody's at the door. Shemane said she was getting it and went down the stairway running the fingers of both hands through her blonde hair, messing up her pageboy. The guy in the dark suit and tie, no topcoat, had got out of the Chevrolet standing in front. She didn't recognize him, but liked the way his hat sat on his head. If he wasn't from Kansas City, one of Teddy's guys, he was a local hotshot who'd heard the stories about her and had to have a look.

  Shemane opened the door and watched him touch his hat before showing his marshal's star. Now he offered his card, looking her in the eye with a pleasant expression, and told her he was Carl Webster. She looked at the card that said he was Deputy United States Marshal Carlos Huntington Webster. He didn't look like a Carlos, but she liked it better than Carl. She offered her hand saying, I'm Shemane, Carlos. What can I do for you?

  He took her hand in both of his, feeling her fingers and rings in what she felt was an intimate way. He said, I hope you have time for me. I need to talk to you about something I've been wondering about.

  She knew he meant her German, but liked the way he could state his business and still show fun in his eyes. Shemane said, Come in, Carlos, and tell me what you'd like to drink.

  *

  Whatever you're having, Carl said, following her through the dim living room, the dining room and into the kitchen, Shemane asking him if he liked martinis. Carl said he did, but had never longed for one.

  Two stem glasses and a jar of olives waited on the kitchen table, a long table with a porcelain surface. It reminded him of his dad saying he had been circumsized on their porcelain kitchen table, and if he got any more famous the table might be worth something. Shemane brought a pitcher of martinis from the refrigerator and filled the glasses, saying, I love martinis. You know why?

  They make you drunk?

  They do, don't they? You get tipsy before you know it. How many olives?

  Two, Carl said, seeing what he could see where he jacket opened while she fished olives out of the jar.

  I like four, Shemane said, raised her eyes to his and then her glass in a move that held the jacket open a few seconds. Carl waited until they'd both had a drink and Shemane offered him a cigarette; he struck a kitchen match with his thumbnail and she touched his hand holding the match while she got a light. He said, I understand you're interested in German prisoners of war.

  Who told you?

  Tony Antonelli. He says you drive around looking for prisoners working.

  Once I saw a bunch of 'em marching out of a field to where the trucks are waiting, all of 'em singing away. I can't get over how much they look like Americans but are so different.

  You can't see Americans singing like that, can you? Serious about it?

  They're way behind the times, Germans. What I can't understand, why we're at war with them instead of helping them fight the Russians, the Bolshevik hordes. They're the bad guys.

  Is that what Jurgen says?

  She sipped her drink and used her fingers to get one of the olives. You talked to him?

  Not yet.

  What're you gonna do, put him on bread and water for a week? What do you want me for, cooking his dinner once in a while? I don't even know how to cook. He stays a few days -nobody has any idea he's in my house -and always gives himself up.

  The thing the Army doesn't like, Carl said, it makes them look dumb.

  They are, if they can't keep him inside.

  What's he talk about?

  The war.

  He believes they're winning?

  When we first met he did. Not anymore. He reads everything he can get his hands on, the paper, magazines... She smiled for the first time, a real smile. He read that book about you, 'The Hot Kid of the Marshals Service'? Tony gave me a copy. Jurgen read it one time when he was here and asked me about you.

  I said he knew more than I did. He's smart, he's educated... I went to high school two years and we argue about things. He gets what he knows from all he reads. I got mine listening to guys who know how to make money. Or, what I say sometimes, having lived as a child in a whorehouse and came out in one piece.

  Carl said, What do you hear from Teddy?

  She paused, You know Teddy or you know of Teddy?

  The day we met, Carl said, he had a guy hit me in the gut with a baseball bat. The next day he wanted to hire me. I know Teddy. What surprises me, he's been nice to you all this time.

  Shemane sort of shrugged. He can be a sweet guy.

  He's like a father to you?

  You're kidding, right?

  When did Tony give you the book?

  When it came out--Tony was writing about white slavers abducting me. Teddy loved being called a white slaver. He's read the book, says it's pretty good, very factual about Kansas City when Pendergast owned the town. Teddy keeps asking me to come up for a visit, like I've never been to Kansas City. I tell him I'm busy.

  Doing what?

  Taking care of mom.

  You tell Teddy about Jurgen?

  There was a silence. She stared at him and said after a moment, Why would I?

  Brag about a guy, a German officer, escaping from a prison camp so he can be with you? Risk getting shot? What'd Teddy say, he'd like to meet him?

  I haven't told him, Shemane said.

  *

  Wesley Sellers was in his office waiting for Carl.

  Well, I put your boy Gary Marion in with the Kraut. I told him to leave his sidearm here and get it on the way out, and I'm glad I did. He wasn't in the cell two minutes he takes a swing at Jurgen. Jurgen grabs the folding chair Gary brought in and bangs him over the head with it. We had to run him to the hospital to get his scalp sewed up. Something like seventeen stitches.

  Carl said, And now Gary wants to shoot him. Wesley said, I wouldn't be surprised. Say he caught him trying to escape.

  Chapter Four

  Jurgen Schrenk, Escape Artist

  Otto Penzler's rank was SS Sturmbannfnhrer, or Storm Command Leader; but for the p ast few months, since the July 20th attempt on Hitler's life had failed, he was signing cam p d irectives and memoranda Major Otto Penzler.

  Jurgen could talk to Otto. Both were from Cologne, Otto five years older and wit h f ive more years in the army, the Abwehr branc h o f military intelligence his first few years. Bot h w ere schooled in National Socialism and coul d t alk the Nazi talk. Otto had joined the SS, h e t old Jurgen with a straight face, to be se
en as a n a ctive guardian of racial purity. Jurgen said , Not because it's elite and you like the blac k u niform. In the African desert Otto ha d c ommanded Panzers and was known among his men as the Scharfrichter, the Executioner of British tanks. At the Deep Fork camp he was a member of the Escape Committee.

  This day in October Otto came into the solitary confinement room with the metal folding chair the guard had given him. Jurgen, sitting on his cot, squinted in the overhead light that came on.

  I have news you won't like, Otto said, unfolding his chair and seating himself to face Jurgen. But first, I have to ask why you don't come to the Committee with your escape plans. It upsets them.

  I've told you, Jurgen said, I don't make plans. I have a place where I go under the fence.

  There's a guard you take care of?

  I came back the first time, he asked me how I escaped. I told him I go out for a few days, that's all, I'm not actually escaping. I gave him a service medal. I give him swastika pins and arm bands, spoons, utensils from mess kits.

  Otto Penzler, also liked to wear shorts and the soft desert cap with the long peak, brought out a pack of Camels, gave one to Jurgen and lighted them. Jurgen got up from the cot to stretch and lean against the wall.

  What is the news I won't like?

  Rommel's dead, Otto said.

  He waited for Jurgen who began to nod his head.

  They killed him, Jurgen said.

  They made him take poison.

  But he wasn't at Wolf's Lair?

  Not anywhere near it. Stauffenberg arrived with the explosive device in his briefcase. He's already lost an arm and an eye for the Fnhrer so they don't make him open the case. Huesinger was there with maps of the eastern front. Stauffenberg placed his case under the map table and excused himself, he has to make a phone call. He's outside, walking away from the conference room and the device explodes. Stauffenberg assumes the Fnhrer is dead.

  Why wasn't he?

  He must have moved away from the table. Rommel was named with the ones in the plot, not as an active participant but in favor of doing away with the Fnhrer. Rommel was Germany's favorite general -the reason he was offered poison and not hanged by the neck. If he accepted it he'd be given a state funeral and his family would be treated with honor and supported for life.

  If he'd insisted on a trial---

  He knew better. He'd be found guilty and his family would be on their own. We don't have to worry about it, Otto said, do we? The Committee wants to know why you go out.

  They know why.

  They would like the woman to be German.

  What is Morrissey, English, Irish? I know she isn't a Jew or a gypsy, or a Latin from Manhattan.

  The only thing you do with her is go to bed?

  The only thing being everything, Jurgen said. But I'm also thinking of something, an event I'd like to see happen.

  Otto said, Do you know that south of McAlester, not far, is an army ammunition plant where they store bombs? The Committee wants you to blow it up. Do something for the fatherland for a change.

  I can tell who strung up Willi Martz. You want me to?

  "Be serious for a change."

  All right, how do I get inside the place?

  You'll find a way.

  Do I have to activate the bombs?

  I said, see if blowing the place up is possible.

  Do you remember, Jurgen said, the train ride from Norfolk, Virginia to Oklahoma? How long it took, and we're still only halfway across the country? Let's say I find a way to do it. There is a tremendous explosion at this barren expanse of land in the middle of America. My only thought about it would be, 'So what.'

  I'll tell them you don't think it's feasible.

  No, tell them I've been thinking about a mass escape," Jurgen said, on the Fnhrer's birthday next April. Three-hundred and sixty thousand German prisoners of war, in all the camps in America, all walk out at the same time.

  Otto waited, looking at Jurgen. And do what?

  Nothing, Jurgen said and moved his shoulders, rubbing his back against the wall. Or they steal cars and drive around wherever they are, honking the horns.

  To what purpose?

  You need a purpose? All right, first to show that we can do it, Jurgen said. And second, to let them know we have a sense of humor. Americans don't think we do.

  How do you let all the camps know about the mass escape?

  Announce a special celebration planned for the Fnhrer's birthday.

  All the mail is censored, Otto said, and goes through our post office at Camp Hearne in Texas. How do you tell about the escape?

  We bring our people at the post office into the plan, Jurgen said. They know how to slip notes into letters already passed by the censor.

  They smoked their cigarettes and were quiet until Jurgen said, Why don't you come out with me sometime? I remember your girlfriend in Benghazi, the very pretty blonde Italian? I'm thinking Shemane could fix you up.

  The time they finally get tired of looking stupid and shoot you, Otto said, is the time I happen to be with you.

  *

  Last night after seeing Shemane, Carl went back to his dad's house. He told Virgil about Gary Marion, the one who wanted to be the new hot kid, how he took a swing at Jurgen and Jurgen laid him out with a chair.

  Gary wants to be like you, Virgil said, but didn't have your upbringing, learning the finer points of being a man.

  They were in the kitchen so Carl used the phone there to give the operator the number.

  Virgil said to Narcissa at the stove, the woman stirring tomato sauce in an iron pot, He's calling Kansas City.

  Ask him he wants to stay. We having his favorite.

  I think he's moved back, Virgil said, so he can call long distance and it won't cost him nothing.

  Who is he calling this time?

  Carl said, I want to speak to Teddy. Tell him Deputy U. S. Marshal Carlos Webster is waiting but won't wait too long. Understand?

  Virgil said to Narcissa, He wants to talk to that gangster, Teddy Ritz. Louly said the waitresses at his club had to wear teddies, that's all, and high heels.

  Carl said into the phone, Teddy?... Yeah, it's been a while. I hear you got thrown out of your job. It's what happens the guy you're working for goes to prison.

  Virgil said to Narcissa, You remember Pendergast? Ran Kansas City wide open till the serious people got down on him.

  Saying this while Teddy was telling Carl not to worry about him, his club was the hottest spot in town, wall to wall GIs.

  Carl said, I hear you're still being nice to Shemane, and waited while Teddy decided what to tell him.

  Shemane, Teddy said, I can talk to Shemane and know she's listening and gets what I'm telling her ... besides being the best ten minutes in bed I've ever had in my life. You been talking to her?

  I had to question her about a German POW she's seeing.

  She visits this guy?

  He busts out and visits her. Spends a couple of days at her house and gives himself up. Jurgen Schrenk. She must've told you about him.

  He gives himself up, Teddy said. Then what?

  They put him in solitary for a week, but it doesn't stop him from busting out. Four times this year.

  What's Shemane do for him?

  What do you think? She comforts him. Couldn't she get locked up for that? I'm not after Shemane, I want to find o ut what this Nazi's up to, Carl said, making Jurgen a Nazi to get Teddy's reaction.

  One of the bad guys, uh?

  He's Afrika Korps, those guys grew up Nazis. They want you to know they're tough as nails and the only reason they surrendered, their tanks ran out of gas. This Jurgen can't sit still. I keep expecting him to start blowing up oil wells or setting fire to storage tanks. I mean for the hell of it, something to do.

  Impress Shemane, Teddy said, get her excited.

  She thinks he's a nice guy. She says we ought to be helping the Germans fight the Bolsheviks.

  Jurgen fed her that?


  She needs somebody to tell her what's going on over there, the Nazis trying to get rid of the Jews, sending them to slave-labor camps. I imagine you have people over there seeing it firsthand.

  Virgil said to Narcissa, You know Teddy's Jewish.

  He looked over to see Carl nodding his head, listening to Teddy for several minutes before saying, Come on- you believe that? How do you know it's true? He listened again and said, What's the guy's name, Zigmund? I wish you'd let Shemane know about it -yo u s ay she pays attention to what you tell her. Give her a call and set he r s traight. She could help me find out what Jurgen's up to.

  He hung up and looked over to see Virgil and Narcissa watching him.

  Teddy says last year a million and a half Jews in Poland disappeared.

  *

  The light came on as Carl entered the solitary confinement room. He unfolded the chair saying, This is the one you hit him with? and sat down.

  Jurgen pushed up from the cot. The same kind.

  What did you say made him take a swing at you?

  Nothing. He wanted to fight, Jurgen said. He walked in saying, 'You don't tell me where you go, I'm gonna beat the snot out of you.' Is that a popular American expression now, to beat the snot out of someone?

  What did you say to him?

  I told him where I go is none of his business. He kept referring to us as Krauts. 'You Krauts act like you're on vacation here. You Krauts act like you're better than us. I said 'Maybe we are. He said, 'You think you can take me?' and came toward me with the chair in front of him, folded, holding it in both hands. He pushed the chair at me, let go of it to swin g a t my face, but now I had the chair. I raised it as he threw his punch and his fist hit the metal seat. I raised it higher and brought it down on his head. I hit him with it again as he fell to the floor.

  Gary said you were waiting for him and took him by surprise, Carl said. You grabbed the chair out of his hands and hit him with it.

  You believe what this fellow tells you, Jurgen said, or you believe me?

  It doesn't matter, Carl said. Gary's the good guy and you're the enemy. He asked you to tell him where you go when you slip out---