Carnival of Shadows

  “And the significance of the badge relates to the Masons?”

  “It does, yes,” Ebner said, “and the fact that you mentioned that specific flower intrigues me, because it has two meanings.”

  “Which are?”

  “Well, the forget-me-not emblem was first used in the midtwenties by the Grand Lodge Zur Sonne. It was the symbol for their annual convention in Bremen. Then, just ten or twelve years later, the same badge was selected for the annual Winterhilfswerk drive. In fact, the badge was even made by the same factory. As far as I understand, the forget-me-not badge was worn as a sign of membership by the Freemasons during that period, a badge they could wear without fear of persecution.”

  “So someone who wears this badge could be a Freemason?”

  “Well, the very same badge was chosen as the Masonic emblem for the first Annual Convention of the United Grand Lodges of Germany in 1948. Masons all over the world wear it as a sign of respect and commemoration for those who died during the Holocaust.”

  Travis leaned back in the chair. “The more I learn, the less I understand,” he said.

  Ebner smiled. “Sounds like life, Agent Travis.”

  “No, seriously, I am absolutely baffled by this, Dr. Ebner. I really have no idea what I am dealing with here.”

  “This relates to the matter we discussed a few days ago? Fekete Kutya and your dead Hungarian?”

  “It does, yes.”

  “Well, the boundaries and borders between most European mainland countries were ever-shifting and disappearing during that period, Agent Travis. Still, there are lands that were one nation before the war and are now considered another. It was a time of unparalleled upheaval, politically, socially, even geographically. People were moved, extradited, expelled, displaced, and even now there are many hundreds of thousands who have yet to be repatriated. It is hard to say who came from where, and when you factor in their religious and political affiliations, you find both pro-Axis and resistance within the same families. There are Nazi war criminals already released from prison, even before Holocaust survivors have managed to establish what actually happened to their own homes and families. I don’t believe we’ve even begun to understand the true horror and tragedy of those years, and I don’t imagine we ever will.”

  Travis was quiet for a time, lost among his own thoughts.

  “So what is it that you are trying to establish here, Agent Travis?”

  “The true identity of our Hungarian, but more than that, the real reason for his presence in Nebraska. Why he was here, and more important, why he was murdered here and whether the people I suspect of involvement were in fact involved or have been set up.”

  “And the man with the badge is a primary suspect?”

  “Yes, he is.”

  “And he is Irish, living in America, and worked with British military intelligence exposing Nazi sympathizers in Ireland?”

  “So he says.”

  “And this can’t be verified through your own contacts and resources within the Bureau?”

  “Uncertain.”

  “That surprises me greatly, Agent Travis, especially if your man is a Freemason. After all, isn’t Mr. Hoover in possession of the greatest intelligence dossier library in the world? If anyone knew whether your Irishman was a white hat or a black hat, it would be the FBI, would it not?”

  “One would think so, Dr. Ebner, yes.”

  “Well, I can see that you are wrestling with something far greater than the history of charitable donations for the Nazi party during the Second World War,” she said, again wearing that wry smile. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”

  “I don’t think so, no,” Travis said. “You’ve been very helpful indeed, and I really appreciate it.”

  “Well, I don’t doubt that you’ll get your man, Agent Travis. After all, that’s what the movies tell me about you G-men.”

  “I am beginning to wonder whether the G stands for Gullible, Dr. Ebner.”

  “You know where I am,” she said. “And I don’t keep social hours.”

  “Appreciated. A voice of sanity in amid all this madness.”

  Sarah Ebner laughed. “Well, if I am the closest you can get to the voice of sanity, Agent Travis, then you must be dealing with something far darker than I can imagine.”

  Travis rose and buttoned his jacket. “I think I might be, Dr. Ebner. I really think I might be.”

  39

  The McCaffrey Hotel was silent and cold. Travis let himself into his room. It was a few minutes before two. From his jacket pocket, he took the photo of Andris Varga and put it on the desk beside his typewriter. Beside it he placed the print card and the tattoo diagram. It now seemed so ironic that the tattoo so closely resembled a reversed question mark. The questions he had been asking were now reversing in his own mind. The ones he had asked were not the ones he needed to be asking.

  After a while, Travis lay down in his clothes. He did not possess the energy to undress. He held that picture above him, focusing his attention on it, trying to think of nothing but the man’s face, the way those dead eyes stared back at him, trying to determine what step he should next take.

  If this man was known to the Bureau, if he had in fact been held by the Bureau at any time, then records would exist. But where? Here in Wichita, in Kansas City itself, or perhaps no other place but Washington. Did people like Tom Bishop and Frank Gale know about this? And Clyde Tolson? Did Tolson know? If Tolson knew, then Hoover knew, and if Hoover knew, then it had to be nothing less than a sanctioned operation, and if the execution of a man for a sanctioned operation had taken place, then where did such things end? There are some who can be sacrificed for the greater good. Was that what had happened here? There are some who are worth more to us dead than alive?

  And then there was Doyle. Turncoat, or savior for those who would otherwise have been deported to concentration camps across Germany and Poland? And if Doyle was a Freemason, then how did that relate to the Bureau’s own support of the Freemason Brotherhood, the fact that Hoover himself was in high office within that organization?

  Travis’s mind reeled back and forth between what he had believed for so long and the possibilities that were now being presented to him. It seemed ironic that the very thing that was now his greatest source of anxiety was his imagination. That imagination seemed fired up, alive with endless ideas and thoughts, and there was nothing he could do to turn it off. Did he want to turn it off? Did he want to go backward, to undo all of this, to return to his previous certainty, his unalterable perspective on life? He was reminded once more of Wendell Holmes’s words: Man’s mind, stretched by an idea, never regained its former dimensions. So true, so terribly, painfully true, and yet somehow so real and human and alive. He had been robotic in his attitude, assuming that those above him in the Bureau were to be believed, trusted, relied upon, their integrity and honesty unquestionable. But now—with the removal of the corpse from the Seneca Falls morgue, the disconnection of his communication lines into the Bureau itself, the revelation regarding the Bureau’s prior knowledge of Varga—what was the truth? Was he now beyond the bounds of the law himself? Was he now in the firing line if he did not come back with the information they wanted? And what did they want?

  Travis got up and sat on the edge of the bed once more.

  He could not sleep. He could not think. He needed to see Doyle.

  Travis left the hotel and drove straight to carnival site, and here he pounded on the door until Valeria Mironescu appeared—sleepy-eyed, still in her robe—and asked him what was going on.

  “I need to see Doyle,” Travis told her.

  “What time is it?”

  Travis glanced at his watch. “Nearly three,” he said.

  “Three? In the morning? For Christ’s sake—”

  “Valeria, I need to see him. I found out who the dead man was.??
?

  “What’s happening?” Doyle called out from within the caravan.

  “It’s Agent Travis. He wants to talk to you,” Valeria told him. “He says he’s found out who the dead man was.”

  “What? Seriously? At this time? Tell him to come back later…”

  Travis went up the steps and pushed past Valeria Mironescu. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I really am, but this can’t wait.”

  “Jesus Christ, Travis, what the hell is going on?” Doyle asked as Travis appeared at the foot of the fold-down bed.

  “I went to Kansas City, Mr. Doyle. I went to the Bureau office and I found out who the dead man was.”

  “Well, that was a bit stupid of them, wasn’t it?”

  “Stupid? Of whom?”

  “Having evidence of the man’s identity in the Kansas City FBI office. That, as you Americans say, was really dumb, don’t you think?”

  “I don’t think that’s the point, Mr. Doyle. I think the point is that they knew who he was before they even sent me here…”

  Doyle leaned up. He was naked, and he pulled the bedclothes up around his chest and put a pillow behind his head. “Now?” he asked. “Do we really have to do this now?”

  Travis looked at Doyle in disbelief. He could not fathom Doyle’s seeming nonchalance at such a startling revelation.

  “Yes, now,” Travis said. “This is incredible.”

  “What is?” Doyle asked.

  “That they knew who he was. That they sent me here, all the while knowing precisely who he was.”

  Doyle shook his head. “Honestly, Michael, I think that’s the least of your concerns right now.” He reached for a pack of cigarettes and lit one, and then spoke to Valeria. “Looks like we’re up, my dear. Would you make some coffee?”

  “Of course,” she said. “Agent Travis? Coffee for you as well?”

  “Coffee?” Travis asked. “You ask me if I want coffee at a time like this?”

  Neither Doyle nor Valeria replied. They both looked at him with somewhat bemused expressions.

  Travis stood in the middle of the caravan.

  “It’s a cup of coffee, Agent Travis,” Valeria said. “It’s not going to make anything better or worse right now. Actually, to be honest, if it’s a good cup of coffee, it might make things a little better.”

  Travis stopped moving for a moment. He didn’t speak. He just stood there and looked at Doyle and the woman.

  “She’s right, Michael,” Doyle said. “Just slow down for a minute. I understand—”

  “I don’t think you do, Mr. Doyle,” Travis said. “These are the people I work for. This is like finding out that your parents aren’t who you thought. This is like finding out that your wife is actually a Communist—”

  Doyle started laughing. “Oh, Christ almighty,” he said. “I think it’s a great deal more problematic than that, my friend. You have just found out that you are a pawn in a game of chess, Agent Travis. Maybe you’re a rook, perhaps a bishop, but certainly you are no king or queen. And the truth, if you really want to know the truth, is that you have always been a pawn, and you will forever be a pawn, because there is a line right there in front of you. You have just seen that line, my friend, and you understand a little of what that line means. I can tell you now that those who cross that line never come back. They can’t. They know too much. They threaten the status quo. If you remain behind that line now, then you and I will take a very different path from one another. You will file your report, and I will be in custody, as will Valeria, Gabor, Chester, Mr. Slate, and anyone else who might be considered of use. And then, one day, perhaps soon, perhaps in a year, perhaps in a decade, once our capabilities have been exploited to their maximum effect, we will find ourselves in an untenable position, much the same position as your dead man found himself, and then we will be excused from the game.”

  “I don’t…”

  “Understand? Is that what you were going to say, Agent Travis? That you don’t understand? Oh, yes, you do, Agent Travis. You understand perfectly well what I am saying, and you have understood it for some considerable time. This is a game—”

  “What game? You keep calling it a game—”

  “Because that’s precisely what it is, my friend. A game of war. A game of politics. A game of human conflict, of money, of power and influence and religious persecution, of the obliteration of civil liberties and basic human rights. This is the game played by dictators and newspapers and drug companies and arms manufacturers and the banks in Switzerland when they agreed to look after all that Nazi gold. This is the game that every government plays when they choose to turn a blind eye to genocide and racism and religious persecution. This is the game of who can accumulate the most damning evidence against his opponent and keep it hidden, keep it safe, and then use it to blackmail his way out of criminal prosecution for what he has done. That is the game, Agent Travis, and you have been supporting that game for all your years in the FBI.”

  Valeria laughed. “The Felonious Bureau of Idiots.”

  “The Foul Brethren of Injustice—”

  “Enough!” Travis said

  “You don’t have any friends, Agent Travis,” Doyle said. “And you actually never have. Not since Esther Faulkner.”

  Travis looked at Doyle, his eyes even wider. “D-don’t you bring Esther into th-this, Doyle.”

  “She’s already here, Michael. Always has been. You carry her around like a mantle over your shoulders.”

  Travis sat down on the floor with his back against the wall. He pulled his knees up to his chest and linked his hands around his calves.

  Valeria poured the coffee. She brought cups to both Doyle and Travis, and then she herself sat on the edge of the bed beside Doyle. She looked down at Travis sympathetically.

  “Now you look like the child you once were,” Doyle said.

  Travis looked at Doyle, at Valeria, and then he shook his head without a word.

  “So, tell me,” Doyle went on. “Who was our mystery man?”

  “I think there is a more pressing and relevant question, Mr. Doyle.”

  “There is?”

  “The question is, who are you?”

  “I am many things, Agent Travis. Who would you like for me to be?”

  “Are you a Freemason?”

  Doyle looked surprised, and then he laughed. “My badge?” he asked.

  “Your badge.”

  “You are a hardworking and diligent man, I’ll give you that,” Doyle said. “Did you wonder for a time whose side I might actually be on?”

  “I did, yes.”

  “Because it would then hold your preconceptions intact. I would remain the bad guy.”

  “Yes.”

  “But you didn’t really believe it, did you, Agent Travis? Not in your heart?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “I am glad to hear that. There’s hope for you yet.”

  “You think so? You really think there’s hope for me? The whole edifice is coming apart in front of my eyes.”

  “Perhaps so, but in its place will be something far stronger, I assure you.”

  “You know that Hoover is a Freemason.”

  “Of course. He was recently given the grand title of Thirty-Third Degree Inspector General Honorary.”

  “And you?”

  Doyle shook his head. “It is not relevant nor important. Let us just say that everyone has their place, and no matter how high we find ourselves, there is always someone a little higher.”

  “What are you saying? That—”

  “I am saying, Agent Travis, that you have determined the name and nationality of your dead Hungarian, and now it’s time to find out who he really was and what he was doing here. I know you know that, and I know that’s what you are doing anyway, but sometimes we all need to be reoriented.”

>   “His name was Andris Varga,” Travis said. “He was from somewhere called Kecskemét, yes.”

  “And they knew he was Fekete Kutya?”

  “According to the file, yes.”

  “And was there anything else about him in this file?”

  “That he was arrested for murder in June of 1954 in New York.”

  Doyle was quiet for a little while. He drank his coffee, finished his cigarette, and then he wrapped the uppermost blanket around himself and moved to the end of the bed. He put his feet over the end of the mattress and sat beside Valeria.

  “I wonder what he was doing,” he said, almost to himself.

  “What he was doing?” Travis asked.

  “Your Hungarian friend,” Doyle said. “I was just wondering what function he performed. They have him in a jail cell in New York. He is a Hungarian immigrant, probably got into the USA illegally, and now he is over a barrel, as they say. I am sure the conversation was very straightforward. It was a choice of doing whatever was asked of him, or he was back on a plane to Hungary that same afternoon. Maybe he had to get out of Hungary for whatever he’d been doing there. If he was Fekete Kutya, then we can be sure he wasn’t selling flowers in Batthyány Square, right?”

  “I don’t know who he was,” Travis said. “I don’t know what he did in Hungary, and I have no idea why he was here.”