INGRID DOWS - AN ALTERNATE STORY PART 2 - THE JET AGE by Michel Poulin - HTML preview

6000 Santa Monica Boulevard

Los Angeles, California, U.S.A.

While Hedy, Ingrid and Katharine had carefully limited the list of attendees for Howard Hughes burial ceremony at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery, the crowd of guests still numbered close to a hundred persons, nearly all of them Hollywood celebrities and many of those being actresses. Ingrid, her left arm held in a padded sling, whispered to Hedy on seeing all the famous actresses present.

150

‘’Howard was definitely popular among the actresses in Hollywood. Many of them also seem to be genuinely saddened by his loss.’’

‘’Howard was a good man, Ingrid, and he always treated the women around him with respect, contrary to so many misogynistic male executives and actors in Hollywood.

On the other hand, a few of these women seem scandalized by the fact that we are wearing black female business suits rather than black dresses.’’

‘’Too bad if they don’t like that!’ replied Ingrid, who had convinced her two friends to wear like her a suit rather than a dress. That had been a deliberate move on her part to clearly signify to all that they would be in full control of their own affairs...and of Hughes Enterprises. Another deliberate choice that they had made for these funerals had been to completely exclude any media reporter or photographer from approaching the headstone where the hole for Howard’s coffin had been dug. Those who would want to take pictures would have to take them from a minimum of fifty meters away, a distance enforced by a dozen private security guards hired for the occasion. She had also reinforced the security at Howard’s mansion in Hancock Park, but on a permanent basis, by hiring more security guards. However, all these new guards were veteran female security officers from the Fifinellas who had been forced to retire from the Air Force following the cuts ordered by Louis Johnson on behalf of President Truman.

Since the main occupants of the mansion were now three women, Ingrid had been able to make that move without creating too much fuss or cries of ‘blatant feminism’. Ingrid had also hired at the same time Angie Dickinson as her head bodyguard, while hiring more ex-Fifinella female security guards to form a private security force tasked to protect the numerous helicopter landing terminals being built in city centers around the United States. If all went well, Air Fifinella was going to start operating across the United States in about a week from now and would then change drastically the face of commercial air travel in the country.

Despite Howard having been not a bit religious during his life, they had enlisted the services of a priest to say the eulogy at his funeral, to give it at least a bit of a spiritual veneer. That part of the ceremony was however quite short and the time to lower the coffin in the ground came quite quickly. As six men started lowering the coffin in the hold dug for it, the noise of approaching rotors grew progressively louder, until five CH-4 helicopters in the blue livery of Air Fifinella appeared at low altitude on the horizon, heading straight for the cemetery. As the five machines were about to overfly the

151

location of Howard Hughes’ tomb, one of the five helicopter suddenly climbed away, leaving the formation. As the guests to the funeral looked up at the helicopters, Katharine Hepburn spoke softly, tears in her eyes.

‘’A missing wingman flyby... Howard would have liked that.’

‘’He would indeed have loved it.’ added Ingrid, also in tears. ‘’May you continue to fly in your next incarnation, Howard.’

152

CHAPTER 16 – FEMALE TRIUMVIRATE

13:50 (Moscow Time)

Saturday, October 16, 1948 ‘C’

The Kremlin, Moscow, U.S.S.R.

Sergei Kruglov, the head of the Soviet Ministry of Interior, or MGB, was in his small shoes as he was facing a raging Stalin, who was blasting him verbally in the dictator’s office.

‘’YOU PROMISED ME THAT YOUR SERVICES WOULD TAKE CARE OF THAT

GIRL, AND THIS A FULL SIX WEEKS AGO. YET, YOUR MEN FAILED, MISERABLY, ON TOP OF EMBARRASSING US DIPLOMATICALLY AND GETTING OUR

CONSULATE IN LOS ANGELES CLOSED BY THE AMERICANS AS A RESULT OF

THEIR BOTCHED WORK. NOW, THAT GIRL IS A BILLIONAIRE AND IS

CONTROLLING AN AIRCRAFT COMPANY CRUCIAL TO THE AMERICAN MILITARY.

SO, WHAT THE HELL DO YOU INTEND TO DO NOW? FIND MORE EXCUSES?’’

Kruglov was nearly stuttering with fear when he tried to defend himself.

‘’Comrade Secretary, that Ingrid Dows turned out to be surprisingly tough and dangerous and is now protected by both the American federal police and by her own private security force. Apart from losing directly three good agents, the closure of our consulate in Los Angeles has seriously hampered my remaining covert agents in the Los Angeles area, by cutting their access to communications with Moscow and by preventing the delivery of weapons and explosives via diplomatic pouch.’’

Stalin, apparently not convinced, stared hard at Kruglov.

‘’The United States, thanks to the Second Amendment to its Constitution, is awash with weapons, Kruglov. Are you telling me that your men can’t manage to find weapons local y and didn’t think about keeping reserves of weapons and ammunition? If they didn’t, then maybe they could go serve in a Siberian Gulag...as inmates and with you at their side. I want that girl dead, quickly and in a way that cannot be traced to us.

Do you understand me, Kruglov?’’

‘’Yes, Comrade Secretary!’

‘’Then you are dismissed!’

153

Kruglov, counting himself lucky for not having been demoted and arrested on the spot, turned around and walked out of Stalin’s office like an automaton, sweating profusely and with his face pale.

08:18 (Chicago Time)

Wednesday, October 20, 1948 ‘C’

62nd Street passenger terminal, Chicago Municipal Airport Chicago, Illinois

Michael Moorehead was growing both frustrated and worried as he visited the third airline service counter in a row after arriving by taxi at the Chicago Municipal Airport, reputed to be ‘the busiest in the World’ with an average of 48 departures a day.

His damn alarm clock had failed him (again) and he had awakened late, with the consequence that he had missed his intended United Airline flight to Detroit, where he was supposed to take a connecting flight to Buffalo, his final destination. If he arrived too late today in Buffalo, he could well miss a very important deal about a hotel complex project near the border crossing with Canada and thus possibly lose quite a lot of money.

The young and pretty TWA employee manning her company’s ticket counter made an apologetic smile to him when he asked if there would be a flight to Detroit and then Buffalo soon this morning.

‘’I am sorry, sir, but our morning flight to Detroit left an hour ago. Our next flight to Detroit will depart at four this afternoon. A connecting flight to Buffalo will then depart Detroit at six twenty.’

‘’Damn! That is way too late for me, miss. Look, I just tried first United Airlines, then American Airlines, and they also didn’t have flights to Detroit before noon. Do you know if another airline here has early flights to Detroit and Buffalo?’

The young woman thought for a second before answering him.

‘’Well, there is that brand new airline which just started offering flights, sir. It is called ‘Air Fifinel a’ and was set up by the dead billionaire, Howard Hughes.’

Despite his frustration, Michael Moorehead couldn’t help smile at the name of that new airline.

‘’Air Fifinel a, real y? It doesn’t sound like a very serious airline to me, miss.’

154

‘’Oh, but they are, sir. They are very much ‘avant-garde’ and use helicopters to provide high-frequency regional flights.’

‘’Helicopters? But aren’t they much slower than standard aircraft, miss?’’

‘’Not their helicopters, sir. Their Hughes CH-4 VOYAGER helicopters are actually a bit faster than our own Douglas DC-3, on top of being able to take off and land vertically.’

‘’Oh? The people at the United and the American counters didn’t mention that Air Fifinel a to me when I asked them about any other possible flight, miss.’

The TWA employee then bent forward and lowered the volume of her voice when replying to him.

‘’That’s because United, American and most of the other airlines in the country have a grudge against this Air Fifinella, accusing it of unfairly stealing customers from them. Mister Hughes held a majority share in TWA, which is why we have a better relationship with that new company. And just between me and you, I am jealous of the uniforms worn by their women.’

That made Michael smile again.

‘’Really? Then I wil go see them. Where is their ticket counter?’’

‘’It is the last one down this hall, sir. Their prices are slightly higher than ours but they offer a very flexible and timely service.’’

‘’Well, as they say: time is money. Thank you for your help, miss.’

‘’You are welcome, sir.’

With renewed hope for making it to Buffalo in time for his business meeting, Michael grabbed his single suitcase and his leather briefcase and walked down the line of counters. He saw nearly at once the sign above the last counter that said ‘Air Fifinel a’, next to a large logo depicting a cute female flying gremlin which made him grin in amusement. His grin however turned into astonishment on seeing the most futuristic royal blue uniform with gold trimmings worn by the very pretty woman manning the ticket counter: it was nothing like what he had seen before and was a two-piece ensemble of double-breasted jacket worn over tights made of some kind of stretching fabric which closely contoured the woman’s body. Two wide cargo-style pockets were visible on each side of the jacket, while the woman wore a pair of shiny black boots with nearly flat heels and which went up to just below her knees. The total result was most attractive indeed, if not to say quite sexy. However, Michael’s biggest surprise was when he

155

stopped in front of the ticket counter and saw the double row of military medal ribbons pinned on the woman’s chest.

‘’Uh, you served in the military, miss?’’

‘’Yes, I did, sir.’ answered with a big smile the woman, who could be about 25 or 26 years-old. ‘’All of us at Air Fifinella served in the 99th Air Wing during the war, in both the Pacific and in Europe.’

‘’Uh, okay! Do you have a flight this morning that could get me quickly to Detroit and then Buffalo, miss?’’

‘’We do, sir! We have a flight which will depart Chicago in half an hour, going along an eastward route connecting Chicago to Detroit, Buffalo, Albany and Boston.

While it will stop briefly at each location to let passengers in or out, you should arrive in Buffalo at about eleven forty, sir.’

Feeling huge relief on hearing that, Michael then took out his wallet.

‘’That will be perfect for me, miss. How much wil be a one-way ticket to Buffalo?’

‘’It wil be 37 dol ars and fifty cents, sir. We would have charged much less and still make a profit but the cost of airfares is still set and regulated by the federal Civil Aeronautics Board11.’

‘’That’s alright, miss: I would have paid about the same for the ticket with United Airlines that I had reserved for this morning. Unfortunately, my alarm clock let me down for one last time: it is now in my trash can.’

The hostess chuckled at that before taking his money and printing a ticket for him. She then handed Michael both the ticket and a small color pamphlet.

‘’Here is your ticket, sir, plus a brochure which will give you some information about our new airline. Be advised that, contrary to traveling by fixed wing aircraft, you keep your luggage with you while boarding our helicopter. You will then be able to store your suitcase behind your seat, in the space between it and the opposite-facing next row seat. Think of it as like traveling by bus, with multiple stops along the way while staying in control of your bags. You could even ask for a slight rerouting if you are alone aboard, in order to better fit your travel needs.’

‘’Now, that’s different! How many seats do you have on your helicopter, miss?

11 Civil Aeronautics Board (C.A.B.): U.S. federal agency which regulated the prices and routes of civilian air travel between 1938 and 1978.

156

‘’Our CH-4s can seat comfortably 24 persons, sir. As for your luggage, we will provide you with a cart if you wish so.’

‘’That’s alright, miss: I have one relatively light suitcase and a briefcase. Will I be able to keep my briefcase with me during the flight, miss? It contains some precious business papers.’

‘’Yes, you wil , sir: there are storage bins over the seats in our helicopters for smaller pieces of luggage. You can now go to Gate 21 and board your helicopter.’

‘’Thank you very much, miss. Your company is truly saving the day for me.’’

Grabbing back his suitcase and briefcase, Michael walked to Gate 21 and was soon able to see for the first time the aircraft he was going to board. Having never flown or even seen a helicopter, he stopped a moment to admire the big royal blue and gold machine sitting outside under a large and high-positioned roof which protected its parking spot from the elements. He then walked to the double doors giving access to the tarmac, where another hostess in futuristic blue and gold uniform took part of his ticket before telling him that he could go outside to his aircraft. With excitement and anticipation growing in him, Michael walked out in the cold and humid air and went to the helicopter’s opened forward left side access door, which doubled as a staircase.

Climbing the stairs of the access door, he was greeted inside by two more women, one of whom wore a set of golden pilot’s wings. Michael’s eyes nearly popped out when he saw that her impressive collection of medal ribbons included that of the Medal of Honor.

‘’My God! I am going to be flown by a Medal of Honor recipient! May I ask you how you earned that medal, Miss Buchner?’’ asked Michael after reading her nametag pinned on the right side of her chest.

‘’You definitely may, sir.’ replied the small woman with an infectious smile. ‘’Me and my copilot sank the Japanese cruiser TAKAO and a destroyer during a battle near the Northeast tip of Australia in 1942.’

‘’Wow! And what kind of aircraft were you flying at that time, miss?’’

‘’An AH-4 attack helicopter, sir. This Hughes CH-4 is actually a civilian transport variant of the AH-4. Did you serve in the war, sir?’

‘’Yes, but I was a desk-bound administrative officer and was stuck here in the continental United States, so I didn’t see any combat. Wel , congratulations for your Medal of Honor, miss.’

‘’Thank you, sir. Norma wil now show you to your seat.’

157

Looking then at the stewardess, Michael found her to be an extremely attractive young woman in her late teens with red curly hair and a most sexy body. He then was stunned to see that her triple row of medals was topped by the Silver Star...with cluster, denoting a second award of what was the third highest American military award for bravery.

‘’Holy! I real y am going to be flown by a crew of true heroines today. And what did you do to win twice the Silver Star, Miss Mortenson?’’

Norma Jean Mortenson (better known later on as Marilyn Monroe) blushed with timidity at his question, which made her even more attractive and cute to Michael Moorehead.

‘’I didn’t actual y fight when I earned my medals, sir: I was serving as an airfield guide during the war, helping to direct planes on the ground and to park them. I earned my first Silver Star by being part of the first girls to land near Manila during a big air assault operation. I earned my second Silver Star by acting as a driver for Major General Dows, when she landed in Berlin in 1944 in order to go negotiate a peace Armistice with the Germans. My air unit had just killed Hitler and most of his top followers by bombing Berlin and other spots, so driving through Berlin with all those German soldiers staring at me made me feel like I was naked.’

Michael gently smiled at the young redhead on hearing that.

‘’I am sure that they were just admiring your beauty, miss.’

‘’Thank you, sir. You are too nice. May I see your seat number, sir?’’

‘’Of course, miss!’

Norma looked at his ticket, then led the businessman down a wide aisle to a seat which was part of two pairs of seats facing each other and which were empty at the time. She then showed Michael how to store his suitcase in the ample space left between the reclining backs of his seat and of the opposite-facing seats of the next row, securing it with an elastic net clipped to the seats framing, then opened a storage bin situated above his seat, so that he could put his suitcase in it. As he sat down in his seat, Michael saw that the helicopter was still less than half full. As Norma went back forward to greet another passenger, Michael looked around the passenger cabin, which had eight rows of three seats and a wide aisle separating single seats from pairs. Those seats were actually very comfortable and very wide and could be reclined, while a number of thick, round windows allowed him to look outside. Soon enough, a young couple with a toddler girl of maybe three and a boy of about two entered the cabin, to

158

then take the group of four seats situated behind his group of seats. Another passenger, a thin man with graying hair and short beard, followed them in before the door of the cabin was closed and the engines of the helicopter, situated above the cabin, came to life. The machine then backed out of its parking spot at the terminal, apparently on its own power. Once safely away from the terminal building, the helicopter’s engines gradually increased increased in both noise and power. When it rose in the air with authority, surprising Michael, the vertical acceleration made him feel heavier in his seat.

The two toddlers sitting behind him obviously liked that sensation, as they both squealed with joy. The CH-4 then fully demonstrated its power and agility by quickly accelerating forward while still climbing, taking a heading parallel to that of one of the pair of runways of the airport. Staying below the dispersed cloud cover, the helicopter then gave its passengers a good look down at the eastern districts of Chicago, then at its harbor area, as it sped eastward at a quite impressive speed over the waters of Lake Michigan.

As they flew at an altitude of 2,000 meters above Lake Michigan, Michael took the time to look at the pamphlet the hostess at the Air Fifinella counter had given him.

What he read made him nod his head in appreciation: that new airline had dozens of landing pads dispersed around the United States, linking a number of main operating nodes, like Chicago, Detroit, Boston, New York, Washington and Miami in the East and Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego along the West Coast.

There was also a southern route linking San Diego with Phoenix, El Paso, Houston, New Orleans, Tallahassee and Jacksonville, while a Midwest route linked Houston to Dallas, Oklahoma City, Wichita, Omaha, Sioux Falls and Minneapolis. Those main operating nodes in turn spread their services to numerous secondary routes radiating from them.

All of those points were in or near the downtown areas of the cities and towns they deserved, making them easy and quick to access by the majority of the people living in those areas. Also, the flight frequencies along those routes were much higher than for those from other airlines, most probably due to the time saved by not needing to taxi on the ground between air terminals and runways, or to effect long takeoffs and landings from airports often situated away from the cities they served. Allied with the obvious savings in not having to build and maintain long, expensive runways, Michael could easily understand how this Air Fifinella could beat other airlines hands down in terms of practicability and attractiveness of its service to customers. He thus decided that he was going to fly with this new airline as much as possible, partly because of its

159

accommodating service and partly to encourage those brave ex-military girls. Another reason for liking Air Fifinella was when young Norma started offering one free alcoholic drink to each adult passenger, while non-alcoholic drinks were available at will. On his side, Michael chose a cup of bubbly Champagne, accompanied by a platter of caviar on toasts and an assortment of cheese and liver pâtés. Barely two hours and fifteen minutes later they landed at the vertical in Detroit, where the helicopter stayed on the ground only long enough to let some of the passengers come off and new passengers to get in, while bags of mail and parcels were quickly taken out of holds situated in the big side sponsons glued to the fuselage. Taking off again as soon as everybody was aboard and seated, the helicopter then flew towards Buffalo, in the state of New York, while still staying below the cloud cover. When he was finally able to walk out of the CH-4 in downtown Buffalo, Michael looked at his watch and smiled with satisfaction: he was now going to easily make it in time to his business meeting.

It took only a few days after it started to operate around the country before Air Fifinella became most popular among the American travelling public. Businessmen in particular ran to its ticket counters at airports and downtown helipads, attracted by its frequency of flights, extensive regional coverage, speed of travel between nodes and quality of service. Rich celebrities, politicians in a hurry, and professional sports teams travelling to matches also flocked to Air Fifinella, with many of them publicly praising it after their initial flights in CH-4 helicopters. One place in the United States where Air Fifinella experienced a particularly big success was in Hawaii, which was not yet an American state, where helicopters proved most useful to link the islands composing its archipelago. Another impact of the success of Air Fifinella was the boom in sales of Hughes CH-4s to other airlines, including foreign ones, with the first foreign sales going to a Canadian regional company serving the coastal areas and islands of British Columbia, where there were few airports available. However, what made Ingrid, Hedy and Katharine most happy about the quick success of Air Fifinella was the fact that it gave a decent, well-paying job and a chance to continue to fly to so many female veterans from the 99th Air Wing who had been forced by military cuts to leave the Air Force.

160

CHAPTER 17 – AN IMPOSSIBLE DILEMMA

18:20 (California Time)

Thursday, October 21, 1948 ‘C’

House at number 407, Ohio Street

Saint Vincents Hill District, Vallejo

Northeast of San Francisco, California

‘’HELLO, GRETA, I’M HOME!’ shouted Sven Larssen as he entered his house at 407 Ohio Street, in the old district of Saint Vincents Hill, in Vallejo, a small town situated across the Napa River from the Mare Island Naval Shipyard, where both he and Greta worked, he as a ship steel welder, she as an administrative secretary. Greta’s head and torso popped up at the door to the kitchen, with her smiling to Sven.

‘’They made you work late today, Sven.’

‘’There was some emergency repair work to be done on a submarine and I volunteered to stay a bit late. I then stopped at the park afterwards to relax a bit after work.’

Greta, whose real name was Sonya kaltigins, raised an eyebrow at that last sentence: it was a coded way to signify that he had gone checking their secret dead drop box for any updated request or orders from their handler at the Soviet consulate in San Francisco.

Sven, whose real name was Sergei Zubov, then said the coded sentence meaning that he had found a package in the dead drop box.

‘’I got to find a lost dime as I was watching and listening to birds. I am going to go wash up before having supper.’

‘’Take your time, dear: I wil keep the fish chowder warm.’

Sven grinned at that: he genuinely loved fish chowder the way Greta did, with big chunks of fish and various seafood in it.

Going to the bathroom of their small house, Sven quickly undressed and took a short shower before going to their main bedroom to put on a clean, relaxed dress outfit.

Instead of going to their combined kitchen and dining room, he then went down to the basement, where he had a small clandestine photo lab and secure storage room.

161

Taking the small roll of film he had collected from the dead drop box; he then took half an hour to develop it and print its content. Clipping the fresh film prints so they could dry, he quickly read the pages of text and examined the five photos from the film. He was then both surprised and disturbed by what he saw and had to sit down to calm down while letting out a few choice swear words.

‘’The fucking idiots! How stupid could they be to ask this from us?’

He then decided to go upstairs to have supper while the prints dried up.

Greta noticed at once his frustrated look when he entered the kitchen.

‘’Something’s wrong, Sven?’’ she asked, making him nod his head in response.

‘’Yes: our handler’s sanity. He knows perfectly wel that we were never trained as assassins or saboteurs, yet he is ordering us to go kill someone in Los Angeles, at the risk of burning up our cover, which took years to develop. And that someone is not a nobody: it is ex-General Ingrid Dows, for fuck’s sake!’

‘’General Ingrid Dows, whose air unit kil ed Hitler in Berlin in 1944? But why would they want to kill such a woman? Our country should be grateful to her for that.’

‘’I know! I myself have a lot of admiration for that young woman. However, the biggest problem with those new orders is about why they are tasking us with a job we have not been trained for. They must realize that our jobs at the Mare Island Navy Shipyard makes us one of their prime clandestine source of information about the U.S.

Navy in California. Why waste us on what could well be a suicide mission for both of us?’

Greta thought over that for a second before nodding her head.

‘’I think I know why, Sven. Let me get the copy of the Los Angeles Times I bought this morning.’

Now curious, Sven sat at their small kitchen table and took the newspaper Greta handed him when she returned from their lounge.

‘’Please read the article on Ingrid Dows on Page Two: it says that a second assassination attempts against her was made while she was being treated for her bullet wound from the first attempt against her. Somehow, despite being in a hospital bed, she managed to shoot down her would-be assassin, which the FBI claims was a Soviet clandestine agent. The FBI tried to keep that story under wrap but it finally got out of the bag, with a source for the newspaper saying that this Soviet agent survived and talked, making it possible to the FBI to dismantle our spy network in Los Angeles and in other

162

parts of California. Our handler at the San Francisco consulate is probably running out of action agents, which is why he is ordering us to go kil Dows.’

Sven passed a hand on his face then before starting to read the article in question.

Once he was finished reading, he looked up at Greta, disillusion on his face.

‘’And they expect us to go kil such a dangerous woman? She is also protected by a small army of private bodyguards watching over the mansion she is now living in, plus has more than probably a few FBI agents watching over her as well. Unless we are lucky as hell, we will never get even close to her. I know how to shoot a pistol or a rifle but I am no sniper, and neither are you, Greta.’

‘’I know: my sniping is done on a typewriter. At least, that failed assassin must not have known about us, or we would be already in jail on espionage charges.’

‘’Agreed! Our cover is quite deep, with only our handler at the consulate knowing about us. If they knew about us, there would be no point for the FBI to simply watch us instead of arresting us at once.’’

‘’So, what do we do now, Sven? If we obey those orders, we will be either kil ed or captured and jailed. If we ignore or disobey those orders, then we could well be targeted for assassination by our own government.’

‘’I...I don’t know, Greta. Just let me think about it for a moment while I eat your fish chowder.’

A now downcast Greta served a large bowl of chowder to Sven, then served herself and sat next to him at the table. Both stayed silent as they ate slowly and tried to find a solution to their mortal dilemma. Greta, who was acknowledged by Sven to be the brains in their team, then spoke slowly after a few spoonsful of chowder, using for the first time Sven’s real name.

‘’Sergei, when we were recruited by the NKVD, before it became the actual MGB, you were from Saint Petersburg, while I was from Riga12. We were young, idealistic and ready to serve Mother Russia against fascists and capitalists. We then masqueraded as a Norwegian couple fleeing the Nazi invasion in 1940 and were accepted into the United States as refugees from the Nazis. We have now been living and working in this country for eight years and have become quite fond of the life in the United States. Yes, it is still a capitalist country but the workers here do have a decent life, like the one we are 12 Riga: Capital of the Baltic state of Latvia. Became part of the Soviet Union in 1939 but harbored a strong Russian ethnic minority before that.

163

presently living. I still love Mother Russia but I am not blind and can see the excesses committed by Stalin, who even made a pact with Hitler in 1939 when it suited his needs.

I want to continue living here, in the United States and preferably in California. If we try to obey those stupid orders, we will likely be killed or captured, then jailed. Spending the next decades in jail is not my idea of a good life, Sergei. And once out of prison, we will likely be deported back to the Soviet Union, where either a Gulag camp or a firing squad wil be awaiting us. We need to find a way out of this trap.’

‘’I agree, but how, Sonya? If we do nothing, then we will be marked for death by our own government. If we do try to obey our orders, we are most likely to be killed or captured.’

Sonya thought a bit more before answering Sergei.

‘’I think that there is a way for us to keep both our lives and our freedom, however we wil have to accept some risks in the process.’

‘’I’m listening.’ said quietly Sergei. Sonya then spoke further for a minute or so, exposing her idea to her mate. At the end of it, Sergei gently took hold of her hand and looked her in the eyes.

‘’Let’s do it, Sonya. Whatever wil happen, I want us to stay together, for the better and for the worst.’

10:34 (California Time)

Saturday, October 23, 1948 ‘C’

FBI head offices in Los Angeles, California

The young female receptionist who received Sven and Greta at the visitors’ desk of the FBI head offices in Los Angeles greeted them with a wide, warm smile.

‘’Good morning and welcome to the FBI Los Angeles offices! May I help you?’’

Sven/Sergei was the one who answered her while keeping the volume of his voice low.

‘’Yes, miss: we would like to speak in private with a senior agent.’

As the receptionist was picking up her phone receiver, she asked another question to Sven.

‘’And may I ask the reason for your request, sir?’’

‘’Yes: we are here to denounce a pair of Soviet spies living near San Francisco.’’

The smile on the receptionist’s face vanished at once and she then became all business.

164

‘’If you will take place in those chairs, sir, I wil get Senior Special Agent in Charge Manning to see you.’

‘’Thank you, miss.’ replied Sven before going to sit down with Greta in two of the padded chairs placed along a wall of the reception area. There, they nervously waited while holding hands, hoping for the best. A young man in a suit came to see them after a minute and bowed politely to them.

‘’If you will please follow me, mister and misses.’

Sven and Greta got on their feet, then followed the young agent down a corridor lined with doors, to finally be invited in a large office where a graying man sat behind a desk.

The man, who had to be in his fifties, got up from behind his desk and came to shake hands with the couple. However, Greta didn’t miss the way he discreetly examined them up and down.

‘’Good morning! I am Senior Special Agent in Charge George Manning, in charge of the Los Angeles offices of the FBI. I am told that you have some information about Soviet spies operating in the San Francisco area?’’

‘’That is correct, sir.’ answered Greta, who then glanced at the young agent, who had stayed by the door. ‘’Uh, could we speak in private, Mister Manning?’’

‘’We can, but you wil first have to accept to be searched for weapons. With the recent assassination attempts against ex-General Dows by Soviet agents, you will understand that I have to exercise some caution.’

‘’That is perfectly understandable, Mister Manning. We don’t have weapons of any kind on us but feel free to search us.’

‘’Thank you! Jeff, if you would please check them out for weapons.’’

‘’Right away, sir.’

That body search was done in a few seconds and in a polite manner, then Manning told his junior agent to leave and close the door behind him, then invited the couple to sit with him around a low coffee table before eyeing them soberly.

‘’So, tell me about you and about those Soviet agents, mister.’

‘’Well, my name is Sven Larssen and I work as a welder at the Mare Island Navy Shipyard. I fled Norway in 1940 to escape the Nazi invasion. My wife Greta works at the shipyard as well, but as a secretary and also fled Norway with me in 1940. We live in a house in Vallejo, across the Napa River from Mare Island. The two Soviet spies we came to tell you about also work at the Mare Island Navy Shipyard.’

165

‘’And what tells you that these two people are Soviet spies, Mister Larssen?’’

asked Manning while preparing to scribble notes on a pad in front of him. This time, it was Greta who answered him, seeing that Sven was hesitating.

‘’We know them because we are these two Soviet spies, sir.’’

Seeing Manning immediately tense up, Greta/Sonya hurried to add more words.

‘’Please hear us, sir: we are ready to defect and to provide you information in exchange for immunity from prosecution and for your protection.’’

While still tense, Manning did force himself to keep calm externally: instances of Soviet defectors were not new and such exchange of favors had been done before.

‘’Alright, miss. Tell me your story and why you want to defect.’

Taking a deep breath first, Greta then spoke slowly, to let time for Manning to scribble notes.

‘’First off, our names are Sergei Zubov and Sonya Kaltigins. He was born in Saint Petersburg, Russia, while I was born in Riga, in Latvia, from Russian parents.

Both of us were in Norway, reporting the ship traffic there to the NKVD, when the Nazis invaded Poland, then Norway. Our masters saw that as an opportunity to infiltrate us as Norwegian refugees into the United States in 1940. Since Sergei’s skil s as a steel welder were judged important for the American war production effort, we were relocated in Vallejo, where we started working for the Mare Island Navy Shipyard at the end of 1940, after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor. Our job, directed by the Soviet consulate in San Francisco, is to find out what we could about the U.S. Navy submarines being built, maintained and repaired at Mare Island, plus monitor U.S. Navy activity through the shipyard. Please understand that we were trained solely as information gatherers and not as saboteurs or assassins. We never physically hurt any of our coworkers at Mare Island and never did acts of sabotage: we just kept our ears and eyes open and reported to our consulate via a dead drop box system what we found.’

Manning nodded his head in understanding, ready to believe this Greta/Sonya: the widespread popular belief that showed every spy as a sinister killer and saboteur was mostly a fable. The best, most effective spies in history were typically the quiet ones, staying in the shadows and being as inconspicuous as possible. They also tended to live like your average man or woman, in order to be able to disappear in a crowd. In the case of this couple, that was actually a bit off, as both were tall, fit and good-looking Nordic types.

‘’And what decided you to want to defect, Miss Kaltigins?’

166

‘’We decided to do so last Thursday evening, after we received new orders from our handler at the Soviet consulate in San Francisco. Those orders, which we found completely stupid and irresponsible in view of our prior training and present work at Mare Island, told us to go to Los Angeles and assassinate Ingrid Dows, the ex-General who now lives in Hollywood. Before you ask, no, we don’t know why our masters wanted us to go kill Dows. Me and Sergei discussed those orders together, not understanding why our handlers would ask us to do such a kind of job while knowing that we were not trained action agents. With our lack of action skills and in view of the fact that some of our expert agents had already failed badly at killing Dows, we realized that, if we ever tried to follow our orders, we had about zero chances to succeed. On the other hand, we also realized that refusing to follow orders would likely mark us for death in the eyes of our government. There was also the fact that, if we got captured and then jailed for espionage, we would then eventually be deported back to the U.S.S.R. after we would be freed from jail, something that would either spell death for us or internment in some Siberian Gulag camp. Don’t laugh but me and Sergei actually admire General Dows, for all that she did to defeat the Nazis, including killing Hitler in Berlin. Ironically, I heard more than once coworkers at Mare Island call Dows a socialist, notably for the way she opposes racism and promotes equal rights.’

Manning nodded his head again at that. In truth, his own FBI boss, Edgar Hoover, had more than once railed about Ingrid Dows for her political and social views, calling her more than once a ‘socialist’ and even a ‘communist’. Up to now, he tended to believe what this woman had told him.

‘’So, what kind of deal are you trying to obtain, Miss Kaltigins? What do you want exactly and what are you ready to give to us in exchange?’

Sergei and Sonya looked at each other, then Sonya spoke again to Manning.

‘’In exchange for providing you with information, we would want immunity from prosecution and a new identity and home relocation, in order to disappear and start our lives anew. Ideally, we would like to be able to continue working in the same kind of jobs which we hold now. I am certain that Sergei’s skil s and experience as a steel welder could be useful to a civilian shipyard not involved with military contracts. I am on my part an experience secretary who can speak English, Latvian, Lithuanian and some Polish, on top of Russian, of course. As for what kind of info we are ready to provide you in exchange, we can start by giving this to you.’

167

Sonya then opened her purse, which had been searched for weapons by the junior FBI agent, and took out of it a small booklet she then gave to Manning.

‘’This is the codebook we use to encrypt and decipher messages between us and our consulate. As far as I know, all our clandestine agents use that same codebook around the United States, with that codebook being changed every three months or when there is a known compromise.’’

Manning stared for a moment at the small booklet as if it was a major religious artifact before looking back at Sonya and Sergei, a smile on his lips.

‘’Well, I think that we have a deal, lady and gentleman.’’

11:09 (California Time)

Sunday, October 24, 1948 ‘C’