A Spy in the Shadows (Spy Noir Series Book 1) Read online

  A Spy in the Shadows

  By

  Randy Grigsby

  Copyright © Randy Grigsby 2013

  Published by Randy Grigsby

  All Rights Reserved

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are a product of the author’s imagination or are used factiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Cover Design: Luke Lee

  Dedicated to

  Joyce

  ‘Our days on earth are like a shadow.’

  -I Chronicles 29:15

  “Ultra was decisive.”

  -General Dwight D. Eisenhower

  -Preface-

  On 20 March 1943 a Junkers 290 aircraft took off from a German airfield in the Crimea carrying six highly trained commandos. Avoiding Soviet antiaircraft units in northern Iran, the plane safely reached ground two hours later near a salt lake northeast of Qum.

  Operating under direct orders of SS Brigadefuhrer Walter Schellenberg, head of Section V of the RSHA (espionage and subversive warfare), this special unit’s objective was to make its way to Tehran and meet up with German intelligence officers awaiting their arrival. They took with them transmitters, weapons, ammunition, explosives and two hundred pounds sterling.

  Once in the city, these selected soldiers were to set up radio contact with Berlin and commence Operation Long Jump—a secret plan personally approved by Adolf Hitler to assassinate the Big Three attending the Tehran Conference. Winston Churchill. Franklin Roosevelt. Joseph Stalin.

  And change the course of the Second World War.

  ----

  NOVEMBER 22 1943. MONDAY

  -One-

  Shahr-e Rey. Ten kilometers south of Tehran, Iran. 7:35 p.m.

  Leni Boland stood at the arcade-like balcony staring out across the vast desert. The lights of the ancient Iranian city glistened against the blackness of the Ashkan Mountains as a rare night rain floated like a mist beneath the dull streetlamp below, and water drops fell on the clay balcony tiles at her feet.

  Her heart pounded against the inside of her chest.

  Living among the enemy for all these months, finally an opportunity had been handed to her tonight, and for the first time she honestly felt the sacrifice might be worth it.

  Leni had begun the affair with Major Benjamin Fields of British Intelligence just over two months ago when he arrived in Tehran. A dashing, powerful man, Fields had strutted around the embassy like some proud peacock making certain all the ladies knew he was available. Within the first week the major had made several advances toward Leni, a matter that she had encouraged. After all she was lonely and what was there not to like about him? But it hadn’t taken her long to realize that her romantic liaison afforded her, besides Fields offering her much more in the bedroom than her husband ever could, access to information.

  Turning from the street below, Leni stepped inside through the wide doors and sat at a writing table and began copying Winston Churchill’s itinerary for the next month from a single typed page taken from the major’s briefcase dated 12 November. ‘Depart London by special night train. Arrive in Cairo seven days later.’ From that she had calculated that the Prime Minister would arrive in Tehran by November twenty-seventh or twenty-eighth at the latest. His purpose was obvious to Leni because it was her husband who headed the security detail at the British Embassy concerning the upcoming conference in Tehran. A meeting of the allied leaders. Churchill. Roosevelt. And Stalin.

  She finished copying the schedule in short order, and that gave her time to pause and wonder about notes someone—most likely Fields—had penciled in the margins . . . ‘SLU’ . . . what could it possibly mean? A code? Perhaps the initials of someone important? A second reference to ‘SLU’ was jotted halfway down the page, a line extending from the note into the text ending in an arrow with Churchill’s name circled. Had Fields scheduled time to discuss this with the English leader? There were other puzzling marks throughout the text appearing to her to be some sort of editing.

  Whatever the reason, Leni was certain she should do everything in her power to understand the details written on this paper. If it was significant to Fields—and Churchill—it was important to her.

  A noise snapped behind her. Startled, Leni spun around.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  Fields loomed menacingly at the bedroom door. He had slipped on his trousers and was bare-chested. His dark hair was tossed across his forehead, his large face frowning owlishly at her.

  Leni slowly stood, pushing the chair beneath the desk, an effort to shield the briefcase from his view as she slipped the papers into the middle drawer. Her mind instinctively clicked through the approaching possibilities, but she prepared for the worst.

  He took several steps toward her. “I woke up and you weren’t there.”

  “I didn’t want to wake you once I had noticed you had dozed off.”

  “Is that so?”

  Leni felt for the derringer in her robe pocket as Fields drew closer and at the same time let the robe slip from her shoulder. “I was reading,” she smiled seductively. “But now that you’re awake I’ve thought of a better way to spend our time until I have to go.”

  Fields drew in a long breath. When he pressed his body against her, Leni leaned back against the desk—and his briefcase fell from the chair. He swung around with one rapid motion, shoving her hard back onto the couch, then straddled her, his eyes wide, pinning her arms above her head. His breath was hot and angry on her face. “Now—why were you meddling in my papers?”

  Her mind clicked. Act frightened. “Benjamin, if this is a joke please let me up. You’re scaring me.”

  Fields tightened his grip on her wrists. “It’s not a joke, darling, trust me.” He stood and pulled her up to him until she was sitting on the edge of the couch. He went to the desk, opened the drawer, and held up the papers. “What could you possibly want with these?” His eyes blazed. “Unless . . . unless!”

  Stay frightened, Leni thought. “It’s not at all what it appears. Really, it isn’t, I promise.”

  “Oh, it isn’t?” Fields waved the papers in her face. “Reading these . . . my . . . personal papers?” Then his face slackened as the conclusion struck him. “Why, you know about Churchill . . . the meetings . . . everything.”

  “Let me explain, Benjamin.”

  “Don’t waste your time,” he hissed. “I’ll see that you spend the rest of your days in prison for this act of mistrust—or in front of a firing squad.”

  Leni was closer now.

  “You . . . you . . .” Fields trembled with anger.

  Leni was beside him. “You’re right, of course,” she said quietly this time, a seductive whisper.

  “Damn it all,” he whispered.

  Leni pressed her body tightly against him and felt him relax just for an instant as she cleared the derringer from her robe pocket. She pressed the weapon forward until she felt the barrel jam against stomach muscles, and pulled the trigger.

  A loud pop echoed.

  Fields spun against the sudden shocking pain, falling heavily across a chair, and then landed on the floor with a heavy thud.

  Leni moved quickly, grabbing a pillow from the couch. She knelt over him. Blood bubbled at the corner of his lips, his eyes rolling in fear. “Mistake . . . mistake . . .,” he mumbled.

  “Yes, Benjamin, I’m afraid you’ve made a terrible mistake,” she told him. “Poor, Benjamin. But if it’s any consolation at all, you were a great lover.” She folded the pillow around the derringer, covered his face and
pulled the trigger. The smell of cordite burned her throat as the room fell silent.

  Suddenly chilled, she wrapped the robe tightly around her and crossed her arms. She went to the desk, her hands shaking badly as she finished off a glass of red wine and lit a cigarette. Gradually the night wind stirring through the door and the nicotine in her lungs calmed her. Her heart slowed and Leni felt more like herself again. One of Germany’s best agents. Calculated. Methodical. Always working out the details. And that was exactly what she would do with this Churchill matter in Tehran.

  Later, Leni dressed and stood in front of the bath mirror and straightened her makeup. In the next room, she took the papers from Fields’s briefcase, folded them and placed them in her purse.

  Walking to the door, Leni glanced back at the body on the floor. How terribly sad. A man of great secrets, conquered by the simple seduction of the flesh. Men were such fools. She locked the door behind her after stepping into the hallway, and took the lift to the ground floor. Out into the street, her excited breath became small, white clouds in front of her face.

  Leni walked across the street to her Chevrolet coupe parked at the curb. She started the motor and glanced at her watch beneath the dim dashlight.

  She would be late.

  ----

  Tehran.

  The Palace Hotel entrance was a flurry of activity. Polished sedans pulled up to the front door depositing women dressed in their lavish dresses and men looking stunningly brave in gleaming military uniforms. Leni drove up in the line of automobiles beneath the glistening lights, and an Iranian boy in a starched white uniform rushed and opened the door for her. A doorman with a polite smile held open the hotel door.

  Leni—back in character—flittered through the doorway searching for her husband.

  Colonel Robert Boland stood in a gathering of men off to the right in the lobby. He was a large man whose frame and personality often towered over those around him. He had a heavily tanned face, a clipped mustache, and wavy dark hair with the first hints of gray at the temples. When they made eye contact, Leni waved and ran to him and she hooked her arm in his. “Have I missed anything, darling, other than boring conversations about the war, or how poorly the Iranians live?”

  The man standing next to her husband laughed boorishly, pulling a thick cigar from his mouth. “I’d say you haven’t missed much at all,” he said.

  Boland squeezed her arm. “We’re contemplating where Hitler will place that dreadful Rommel now that he’s no longer a threat to Cairo, dear. I would think you’d appreciate that we’re giving that detail some thought.”

  Laughter from the men.

  “Oh, that horrible Rommel,” she said. “I absolutely dreaded every moment the man was in the desert.”

  “He’ll reappear somewhere. He is, after all, Hitler’s best military man.”

  Several men agreed openly.

  “Darling,” Leni drew close and whispered, “I’m really sorry I’m late.”

  Boland kissed her lightly on the cheek, “An embassy officer’s wife should never be late, especially at an important function such as this one. And—especially since I have such an early appointment tomorrow morning. This week is a big affair for this city and I’m not nearly prepared.”

  “Oh, you’re meeting, I forgot,” Leni said thinking of the papers hidden away in her coupe.

  “You’ve forgotten about the most important meeting of the war and it takes place right here in Tehran?” He smiled sympathetically. “Sometimes I overlook these sorts of things don’t interest you in the least.”

  “Politics absolutely bores me to tears.”

  “Poor Leni.”

  “Don’t feel too sorry for me, after all I have my own pleasures, Robert.” She gave his arm a gentle squeeze. “And—I’ll make it up to you later for being late to your little show.”

  Boland smiled. “Then I won’t be able to stay mad long, shall I?”

  -Two-

  Cairo. Two days later.

  It was Sayed, the trusted Egyptian cab driver, who drove the American agent out of the city at dusk. He had a dark, serious face, a man regrettably burdened with supporting a wife and five children. But he considered himself most fortunate that he had made it on the list of reliable drivers to be employed, with substantial pay, to transport British and American officers arriving in great number in Cairo over the last two months.

  The taxi bumped along the road leading to the great pyramid of Cheops, a column of dust trailing behind as they passed through a village of mud huts shaped like beehives. Sayed glanced into the mirror. This one, he had noticed before, this American sitting in the back seat reading a newspaper in the fading afternoon sunlight. Black hair combed back from a handsome face. Medium height, thick shouldered a boxer once perhaps, only thinner now. The stress of war pinched his features, but that wasn’t a surprise to Sayed who considered himself an excellent judge of men. He had learned long ago these Americans took it upon themselves to save the world. Sayed looked in the mirror again just as the American glanced up from his paper and stared out the window. The sadness was obvious. Who really knew the reason why?

  ----

  Booth Salinger was born in Richmond, Virginia in 1913. When he was fourteen, his father had been transferred to a strange land named Iran where Riza Shah, the leader, had introduced a program to modernize his country. Salinger’s father was sent over as an executive with Anglo-Persian Oil Company and served as a technical advisor. Salinger’s mother took a position at the newly founded University of Tehran.

  Young Booth, over the next six years would learn many things about the strange country, which would be an advantage later in his military career. It was also in Persia that he met his future wife.

  There had been an older brother, Warren, the athlete in the family, killed in a car accident on the highway south of Tehran the year after they arrived. It was Salinger’s older brother who was his father’s favorite, and after his death his father was never quite the same. Booth swore someday he would find something to do in life that would impress his father.

  In 1929 his father was reassigned to the corporate office in Boston and they left Iran. As a boy of sixteen his heart was broken. Julia, the daughter of a British officer, had to be left behind, and he was certain he would never see her again. In time, the pain of leaving her drifted away. Salinger graduated from high school and focused on what he would do with his life. He was drawn to the newly formed Army Intelligence group when they set up a recruiting station on career day at the university he was attending.

  His mother and father were gone now. Father first when he died suddenly of a heart attack during a business trip to Europe where he was attending a meeting in Prague. Then mother passed away, as quietly as she had lived, in her sleep. They had died within eight months of each other, which should have taught Salinger something about love.

  Salinger joined the Army Intelligence in June after graduation, and quickly rose to the top of his class. War was imminent and America suddenly found itself lacking an intelligence organization. Chosen to be among the first recruits trained by British Intelligence, he was sent to a school established in Canada. There he went through rigorous training, instructed in the many talents demanded by his work; Morse code and radio transmitter repair; killing silently with garrote, knife or bare hands; and parachuting into and surviving in almost any kind of terrain.

  Salinger’s first assignment was Madrid in the summer of 1941 where agents were needed in Spain to sort out information and determine if that country would stay officially neutral. His invaluable reports impressed Bill Donovan head of President Roosevelt’s newly formed Intelligence organization. When the Office of Strategic Services was structured by presidential order in June 1942, Salinger’s major assignment came three months later, involving an operation in Tehran. He was sent to Iran to set up clandestine radio stations and to support Soviet operations in the mountains.

  Salinger and another agent pulled off one of the most daring resc
ues of the early Iranian operation. A chief pilot of French Morocco was hiding in Tabriz. Salinger and the agent drove to the city in northern Iran in an old Ford, hid the pilot in the trunk covering him with an oriental rug, and promptly delivered him to the British Embassy in Tehran. From there, the pilot was flown to Gibraltar and then to London with his crucial mountain terrain maps.

  It was in between these missions, while in Cairo for some rest that he and Julia met by accident, rekindled an old relationship, and married two months later.

  All of this impressively accomplished by the time Salinger was twenty-eight. But his downfall lay just ahead.

  In the late spring of 1942, Salinger became involved in an ill-fated design in the mountains south of Tehran when the Germans uncovered the operation.

  On the road to Hamadan, the Germans set an ambush while Salinger was delivering an Iranian officer to Tehran where he was to testify about subversive pro-German activities. The ambush had been swift and precise, what they should have expected from the German partisans. Later, Salinger learned that three of his men were dead on a Hamadan street outside a safe house where other informers were being kept.

  Pulled out of Tehran deeply rattled, and deemed beyond useful by his superiors Salinger was sent to Bern; a city of mountainous charm, which given time he was assured, would cure his maladies. He had taken a room at the Baur au Lac Hotel at the southern end of the Bahnhofstrasse, a grand place overlooking the lake, where in the summer businessmen would eat lunch in the pavilion among the thick gardens. It was a good place to sit and remember.

  Salinger had waited at the hotel on the lake for three days before he dialed a number in London. They informed him they were sending someone to pull him out. The next morning he waited in a rented Renault parked along the Bahnhofplatz in front of the Schweizerhof Hotel. He watched patiently as people queued before the mirror-like wall of Bern’s main railway station as a heavy snow fell.