The First Casualty

3

He was waiting for Mary when she walked into the hotel’s rear entrance ten minutes before she was due to report for work. Short, stocky man with a jowly face that reminded her of a bulldog.

“FBI,” he said, peremptorily showing her a badge in a wallet as he took her by the arm.

“I needs to get to work,” Mary protested. “’Sides, I answered questions yesterday.”

“This won’t take long.” the man assured her, his grip on her arm tightening.

A few minutes later, they were back in the doctor’s suite. For the hundredth time, Mary noted how bare it was of personal effects. No photographs, no framed certificates, nothing but furniture placed there by the hotel, furniture that definitely had become a little shabby. Thankfully, the bed was freshly made and empty.

A closer look around showed drawers pulled out, drawers of the bureau, drawers of the two bedside tables, drawers of the two side tables in the sitting room. A quick glance into the bath showed a yawning-open medicine cabinet. There was no trace of toilet articles, the safety razor, shaving brush and mug, toothbrush, or tube of toothpaste, all of which were usually aligned on a glass shelf under the mirror above the sink. The door of the closet also hung open. It was completely empty of the rows of suits with shoes lined up beneath.

There were two other men already in the sitting room, one of whom stood, offering one of the two club chairs to the jowly man. Mary sensed an air of deference toward him, like he was the boss. No one offered Mary a seat, so she remained standing.

The jowly man sat and removed his hat, placing it carefully on a table. His dark hair, brushed straight back, glistened with some sort of pomade.

“Mary,” he said in a voice much more friendly than she had heard yesterday, “look around. You see anything different?”

She did as she was told. “Yes, sir. All his things are gone.”

“All?”

“Far as I can see, yes, sir.”

“Did he have any special place, a sort of hiding place?”

“Not that I know of, no, sir.”

“Maybe a place to put documents, papers.”

“I don’ know nothing ’bout any missing papers.”

He jumped to his feet so suddenly, Mary took a step back. “Aha!” he exclaimed, pointing an accusatory finger. “Who said anything about missing papers?”

Mary looked from the jowly man to the other two men and back again. “They weren’t missing, you wouldn’t be asking me ’bout them.”

The man who had given up his chair made an unsuccessful attempt to hide a smile and drew a glare from Mary’s interrogator.

The questions, most of which had been asked yesterday, lasted another fifteen minutes before the man looked at the other two. “Anything you can think of?”

As one, both shook their heads.

The man pointed to the door. “You can go for now, but we might want to talk to you again, so don’t go anywhere. Understand?”

Mary nodded. “Yes, sir. I ain’t going nowhere.”

“Good.”

As she took the elevator down to the basement to collect her cleaning supplies, a number of thoughts spun through her mind: She had become inured to the rudeness of some white people, like Mr. Bulldog back there. It no longer bothered her. But the doctor must have been somebody besides the quiet-voiced, meek, little man with a funny accent whom Mary had known. What kind of papers would he have that would interest the FBI? A spy for the Nazis? She smiled at the thought of the mousy little man carrying a gun and taking pictures of… what? The Brooklyn Navy Yard? But then, weren’t spies supposed to look like something else?

Then a thought came out of the blue and popped into her head, a thought so engrossing she didn’t hear the uniformed elevator operator the first time he announced the basement. He had to repeat himself before she remembered where she was.

The jowly man. She had seen his picture before, both in the papers and at the Apollo Theater when movies with newsreels replaced live entertainment. The blocky figure, the swept back hair. But most of all, the bulldog face. That was him, she was sure.

But why would the head of the FBI come all the way from Washington to question her?