When Stars Light the Sky (The Women of Midtown #2)

Chapter 7

7

Pounding on her bedroom door awakened Inga the following morning. She bolted upright, baffled because it was still dark.

“Wake up, Miss Klein. We’ve got work to do and must leave for the embassy in ten minutes.”

She pulled on a robe and hurried to answer her door. Benedict had already moved on and pounded on Andrew’s door, delivering the same message.

“I hoped to go to church,” she called out to Benedict.

There was no change in Benedict’s expression. “There’s already a line forming outside the embassy, filled with anxious Americans who want to get home. No time for church. It’s going to be a long day, so hurry up. We leave in nine minutes.”

There was no point in arguing when he was this stern. She splashed cold water on her face, then pulled on a blouse and her honeysuckle yellow suit. She wouldn’t put it past Benedict to leave her behind if she wasn’t ready when McFee arrived with the automobile. She scooped up her boots, stockings, a hair ribbon, and hurried downstairs in bare feet.

Everyone else was bleary-eyed too, but at least Mrs. Barnes packed some sandwiches from yesterday’s garden party for them to eat on the short drive over. Inga sat on the bottom step while hooking up her boots.

“Why are people coming to the embassy?” she asked Andrew.

“They all need passports to get out of Germany.”

“What’s a passport?”

Andrew’s mouth dropped open in astonishment. She must have just said something terribly stupid, but Andrew explained that passports were official documents well-traveled people used to expedite crossing national borders. Normally they weren’t necessary, but Germany announced that they were about to start requiring them from everyone leaving the country.

“The Germans are afraid men of military age might try to flee the country,” Andrew explained. “Anyone who wants to leave will need to prove they aren’t German. That’s what a passport does.”

A queasy feeling lurched as Inga absorbed the information. “Do I need a passport?”

Andrew shook his head. “Probably not, since the ambassador can vouch you’ve lived in America for most of your life.”

Relief flooded her as they boarded the Pierce-Arrow limousine to set off for the embassy. McFee drove, and he hadn’t even had a chance to put on his chauffeur’s uniform. Eight people crammed into a car built for seven meant they were shoulder to shoulder. She was mashed against Benedict’s side, which probably annoyed him to no end. Everything she did seemed to annoy him, especially when she started finger-combing her hair.

“Get your hair out of my face,” he groused.

She gathered the long fall of her hair over her other shoulder to weave it into a loose braid. Without a mirror, a braid was the best she could manage to control her wild mane of hair. Corkscrew curls didn’t obey orders, and she tied a ribbon around the end.

To her amazement, the line of people snaked all the way down the front path of the embassy and around the block. Hundreds of them!

“Everybody out,” Benedict said the instant the automobile stopped rolling. She was closest to the door and hopped out first.

A man carrying a suitcase and wearing a bowler hat approached. “Are you the embassy staff?”

“We are,” Benedict confirmed.

“When are you opening up?”

“In about five minutes. Hang on.”

People in the crowd looked anxious and uneasy. Everything suddenly felt terribly real. Inga scurried to catch up to Larry, grabbing his elbow. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do,” she whispered.

“I don’t either,” he whispered back.

Benedict overheard and scowled. “We are going to process twenty thousand passports for every American in Berlin who wants to leave,” he said. “Brace yourself. This crowd is desperate to get out of the country before the shooting starts, and we are their only hope of getting that piece of paper.”

Inga gulped, wishing she could be on her way to New York as well.

Benedict concentrated on getting a production line set up inside the embassy ballroom. Worktables were placed at intervals, each staffed with an embassy clerk and a stack of passport applications. He arranged for the Marines living at the Soldat Barracks to come help with the processing. He sent a clerk to a printer to run off five thousand copies of passport applications as soon as possible. In the meantime, the staff interviewed each applicant, asking a handful of questions to verify they were eligible for an American passport.

They were from all walks of life, but most were students, businessmen, and tourists. Others were people who had been born in Germany but immigrated to America decades earlier. They had been in the country visiting relatives or on business, and so getting them a passport was going to be a challenge.

The case of Dr. Werner Haas was typical. Dr. Haas was a physician, making him a valuable asset for a nation heading into war. He was fifty-nine and too old to join the army, but not too old to serve in a hospital.

“Sir, I appeal to your sense of justice,” Dr. Haas implored in a heavy German accent. “I have lived in Philadelphia for thirty-five years. I am an American citizen. My children and grandchildren were born in Philadelphia. I own a home in Philadelphia. I came to Berlin for my mother’s funeral, and now I am not permitted to leave?”

“I’m going to help you, but it will take time,” Benedict assured the older man. “We’ll need to wire to Philadelphia to confirm your residency, then we’ll expedite your passport as soon as possible.”

He led the man to the room where Larry and Inga were busy sending wires. Inga concluded her message first, and Benedict introduced her to Dr. Haas.

“Inga, this is Dr. Haas. I need you to wire his name and address to the mayor’s office in Philadelphia to confirm his residency. Send a similar message to his church to document how long he’s been a member there.”

It was a more rigorous procedure than most applicants, but the Germans might try to block Dr. Haas from leaving unless his paperwork was flawless. Even as he spoke, Benedict sensed tension rising from the older man, who gritted his teeth and choked back a curse.

Inga’s smile was gentle as she guided the older man to a chair. “Have a seat,” she said, her soft voice filled with reassuring cheer. “And don’t worry. We’re going to get you home, okay?”

The man visibly relaxed, even though he still looked ready to weep. “Thank you,” he stammered.

Benedict returned to the reception hall, now overheated with hundreds of people lined up before the ten tables. Ambassador Gerard hadn’t stopped jabbering on the reception hall telephone ever since they started processing applications. Benedict had overheard a few snatches of his conversation about tickets and box seats and dinner arrangements. For pity’s sake, it sounded like Gerard was worried over his opera tickets being canceled. Mrs. Gerard kept running to-and-fro like an eager puppy, even tilting the telephone receiver to listen in on her husband’s call, giggling and grinning and annoying Benedict to no end.

A panicked man from Milwaukee reported that his son, a young man of eighteen, wanted to volunteer to fight for the Germans. The man’s English was so bad that Benedict switched to German to ask if his son was an American citizen.

“ Ist Ihr Sohn amerikanischer Staatsbürger? ”

“ Ja! ” the man replied forcefully. He went on to report that the boy was born and raised in Milwaukee, but always loved Germany and was fluent in the language. This was his first trip abroad; the boy made fast friends with his German cousins, and all of them were on fire to join the military.

“Please,” he begged. “Jacob is my only child. He doesn’t even know what this war is about, and now he will become cannon fodder. Please help get him out.”

There wasn’t much Benedict could do. He could get the young man a passport but couldn’t force him to board a ship to go home. Benedict sagged in his chair as he watched the man depart. The lines of people at the tables for American citizens moved much faster. The clicking of typewriter keys and thumping of papers being stamped and stapled were the sounds of progress.

Meanwhile, Benedict’s line moved at a snail’s pace since he handled the troublesome cases of people who’d been born in Germany. The next two people approaching his table were elderly German nuns, swathed in black habits.

“Someone tried to block you from leaving?” he asked.

“ Ja ,” the younger nun replied. “They think we are spies for the Vatican. I told him we are nuns from Brooklyn who only came to celebrate the anniversary of our holy order.”

Benedict frowned as he began the paperwork. Paranoia was to be expected in the early days of any conflict, and these two old ladies were going to be forced to prove their innocence before the German Foreign Office would let them leave. He wrote out instructions for Larry to contact the nuns’ convent in Brooklyn to begin the process of verifying their identities.

He’d just begun taking the information from his next case, a father with a wife and twin toddlers, when Ambassador Gerard inserted himself at the front of the line, pushing aside a haggard mother holding a squirming toddler.

“Success!” Ambassador Gerard chortled, oblivious to the poisonous look from the mother he had just elbowed. Benedict could use some good news, but if this involved opera tickets, he’d be tempted to strangle the ambassador.

“I have chartered a steamship to carry Americans back home. The Holland American Steamship line shall have slots reserved for eight hundred American citizens to sail for New York on Friday.”

Benedict rocked back in his chair, stunned at the extraordinary news. He stood and offered a handshake. “Well done, sir.”

Ambassador Gerard pumped his hand. “Thank you! It gets better. I had to pay the fees myself in order to secure the berths, but I’ll spring for the first shipload of passengers from my own pocket. Going forward, the weekly sailings will have a hundred berths reserved for Americans wishing to get home. My wife shall set up a table in the dining room, and anyone who wants a berth can come pick up tickets as soon as we have them.”

It was beyond generous. The Gerards were among the wealthiest people in America, but leasing a steamship was still a major expense. It was especially valuable because word had been sent that Germany had frozen all foreign bank accounts to stave off a run on their currency.

By two o’clock in the afternoon, hunger began to claw. They’d brought cheese and crackers from Alton House, but the cheese was gone because Inga started doling it out to hungry people waiting in line. It was Sunday, so the markets and restaurants were all closed. Inga looked affronted when he told her to quit giving away their food, but at least they still had plenty of crackers left.

He was about to return to his desk when he spotted a familiar figure wandering into the processing room.

“Fr?ulein Zinnia?” he asked in surprise. The aristocratic young German woman was not someone he expected to see at the embassy. It looked as if she was on the verge of tears.

“Mr. Kincaid!” she said, grasping his arm. “My father’s butler reports he was arrested in London. The British won’t let him leave.”

“Why have they arrested him?” Benedict asked.

“Because he’s German, and they think he might be a spy. It’s ridiculous! My father was in England to teach a class at Oxford. Please, is there anything you can do?”

What a disaster. Baron Werner von Eschenbach was an Anglophile whose moderating influence on easing relations between Germany and the British could have been helpful. Arresting him was the height of stupidity, but tempers were running hot.

“Do you know where he was taken?”

“I have no idea, and I don’t know what to do.”

Zinnia couldn’t go to the British Embassy for help since a state of war made it impossible. Only the neutral nations still had open diplomatic channels to find Baron von Eschenbach and arrange for his release.

Negotiating between the warring nations was going to become one of his new duties. As more nations descended into the abyss of war, Benedict prayed the United States could remain a voice of sanity in a world spiraling out of control.

Closing the embassy that night was a challenge, as the line of Americans desperate to obtain a passport still stretched around the block. Benedict instructed the Marine Guard to spread the word that the embassy would close at nine o’clock and would reopen at eight the following morning. He hoped people would heed the message and disperse, but dozens of people still lingered outside at closing time. Benedict ordered the Marines to stand by as they boarded the waiting automobile to get back to Alton House. Even so, a few in the waiting crowd castigated them for leaving when people still needed passports.

Those people were probably in no mood to hear that the staff had been on duty for twelve hours, and that they had more work ahead of them at home tonight. Benedict put a sheltering arm around Inga as she hurried toward the car. He eyed the crowd and held the car door as the others scrambled aboard. He was the last to squeeze inside, pulling the door shut behind them with a resounding thud.

“Thank goodness that’s over!” Inga said once the wheels started rolling.

“It’s not over,” Benedict said dryly. “Today was merely the opening salvo. Brace yourself for the ensuing barrage tomorrow morning. There are an estimated thirty thousand Americans stranded behind German lines, so we have an avalanche of work ahead of us. As soon as we get home, we will meet in the kitchen for a quick meal and do a postmortem of our performance today.”

Everyone in the car looked aghast, except Inga, who chimed in with her typically bright, curious tone. “What’s a postmortem?”

“It’s an examination of a dead body to account for why the patient died,” Andrew said. “Thank you for that lovely assessment of our work today.”

Andrew sounded annoyed, but Inga burst out laughing. “You’re so funny,” she said and nudged Benedict’s arm, prompting a pleasant, tingling sensation to flare from where she’d touched him. It must be the exhaustion because Inga Klein was the last woman on the planet who ought to appeal to him.

“I’m not funny, I’m serious. In the coming days our work is going to get harder as the reality of war sinks in and more people decide to evacuate. Today was a trial by fire, but now we have a better understanding of the problems and which areas to improve. I’ll ask Mrs. Barnes to make us some sandwiches, and then we’ll discuss our plan for tomorrow.”

“We’ve had nothing but crackers all day,” Larry grumbled. “I have a weak constitution and could use something more substantial. Can’t we have a proper dinner?”

Everyone was famished, and Benedict was in no mood for whining. “Sandwiches are perfectly adequate. We have got important work to do, so choke them down and quit complaining.”

“Cheer up,” Inga told Larry. “Maybe there are some cold oats left.”

Dead silence reigned for approximately two seconds before everyone else burst out laughing. It wasn’t even funny, but Larry chortled so loudly it hurt Benedict’s ears. The laughter went on and on. Andrew had to wipe tears from his eyes. Why was everyone following Inga’s lead instead of his own? They were heading into a crisis, yet Inga never missed an opportunity to poke fun.

He was still annoyed as they arrived at Alton House, dark and closed up for the night. Inga ran ahead into the kitchen, and her voice was as bright and cheerful as though she hadn’t just worked twelve straight hours.

“Oh, look,” she chimed from the dark recesses of the kitchen. “Mrs. Barnes made us a huge pot of chicken and dumplings. And an apple pie!”

Benedict strode toward the kitchen, which smelled amazing. Sure enough, a large pot of stew was in the warming oven, and Inga was already cutting the apple pie into slices. Plates and silverware clattered as people began lining up, and everything smelled so good he was tempted to scoop up a spoonful directly from the pot. Instead, he waited until everyone else had filled their bowls before he helped himself to a serving of meaty chicken and dumplings, his mouth watering at the prospect.

Chatter abounded as he joined the others around the kitchen table. Everyone had a story to tell about interesting people who’d flooded the embassy today. A group of traveling acrobats from San Francisco, a student from Chicago training to become a church organist, a traveling salesman from Cincinnati selling coonskin hats. The embassy staff had been hunkered down at their posts all day, and it felt good to touch base and simply share for a while.

In a few hours it would begin again, and they needed to do a postmortem on their operations today. Maybe he could think of a better term for it that wouldn’t leave him wide open to Inga’s teasing. An assessment of their operations? An audit? None of it sounded any friendlier than “postmortem,” but perhaps there was a way to phrase things in a more positive manner.

Their biggest problem was the lack of preprinted forms. They ran out of passport applications before lunch. It was anyone’s guess as to whether a printer would be able to supply more.

“Maybe we should buy our own duplicating machine,” Inga suggested. “That way we won’t be at the mercy of the printer.” She went on to describe a mimeograph machine, which she used at her former job in New York. Benedict once considered buying one of the hand-cranked duplicating machines for the embassy but rejected it in the interest of staying on good terms with the local printers. Germans weren’t overly friendly to foreigners in the best of times, and patronizing the local tradesmen seemed a politically astute decision.

“Aren’t those copying machines terribly difficult to use?” Larry asked, casting a worried look over the top of his spectacles.

“Not at all,” Inga said. “So long as you’ve got the right carbon-backed paper, any typewriter can make a master copy of a form, then run off copies on a rotating drum. I’ve done it a million times. Can I get anyone seconds on chicken? There’s plenty left.”

She thoughtfully refilled bowls for Andrew and Colonel Reyes, but Benedict kept his arms folded. He’d get his own refill before he’d accept help from Inga.

Why he wouldn’t let her do a favor for him didn’t warrant too much scrutiny. It would be best to keep her at arm’s length. Inga’s riot of blond curls spilling over her shoulders was continually distracting. Her soft smile that was never far beneath the surface was appealing and warm and well ... sexy.

He dragged his mind back to the business at hand. “Miss Klein, please look into the viability of purchasing a mimeograph machine for the embassy. Larry, contact the Corps of Engineers and see if they can spare us another wireless operator. I propose we ask the Marine Guard to establish order among the crowds that will be forming outside the embassy. Can I entrust that to you, Colonel Reyes?”

“Certainly,” he replied.

Benedict nodded. Exhaustion tugged, but it was a good sort of exhaustion. It came from a job well done. Although they’d made mistakes today, they succeeded in helping hundreds of people on their journey home. While darkness began engulfing the world, the people in this room had worked in tandem to stave it back while creating an avenue of escape for countless people. They would keep the beacon of hope lit at the embassy until everyone who wished to escape back to America could get there.