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Old 03-29-2015, 10:17 PM   #196
Johnny1A.2
 
Join Date: Feb 2007
Default Re: The First Interbellum (1918-1939)

LATER.

Conners was still pondering the implications of what Lake had
just told him and shown him, when one of the younger Aces
appeared at the doorway of the lab/library area, and called out
his name.

"Sir," the young man added, "there is a phone call for you. It's
the King of Aces, and it's urgent."

“When is it not?” Lake said dryly to Conners as his chief left
the room to go answer the telephone call.

“Never yet,” Conners replied with a smile. “But there’s urgent
and there’s urgent. We’ll see which it is.”

Conners made his way to his private office, wondering what the
‘King of Aces’, as the group unofficially called Robert McLaird,
had on his mind this time. He had not spoken with McLaird in
weeks, because his superior was wrapped up in some very quiet
talks with other members of the military intelligence community
leadership, about matters above even his own pay grade.

Conners reached his office, locked the door, and picked up the
phone with the special private line that linked him with his
superior in Washington. It had been a considerable chore to
install that line, bypassing the telephone company for the sake
of privacy, but it was necessary in their line of work.

“Hello, Conners speaking,” he said.

A few terse sentences were exchanged, and had anyone been in
the room to see, they would have noted that his face went blank,
utterly controlled, as Conners listened to McLaird.

The discussion went on for over an hour, with Conners doing
more listening than talking, except for the occasional question.

“I understand, Bob,” he finally said. “We’ll be ready as soon
as you get here.”

He hung up, and called his main lieutenants to his office, those
that were in the headquarters facility. They included some of the
original seven of the Seven Aces, and some of the recruits since
who had been with the team for a while, and who had proven
themselves in various ways.

“Robert McLaird is on his way to Miami,” Conners told his men
when they had assembled. “He should be arriving by tomorrow
morning, and he’ll brief us in more detail then.”

“That’s good time,” Brady Joneson said.

“He’s already halfway here,” Conners told him. “He used one
of the intermediate stations on our private line, he’s on the train
right now with some his men and more detailed information.

“In the meantime,” Conners went on, “I’ll tell you what I know
already so we can be ready tomorrow. Make sure you all get a
good night’s sleep tonight, it may be a while before we get any
another chance for one.”

Conners rose, walked over to a stand where he had set a large map
of part of upstate New York, and pointed out a city.

“This is Harrystown, New York,” Conners said, “a little burg in
the northern part of New York State. Anybody here ever hear
of it?”

None of them had.

“I’m not surprised,” Conners went on. “I never had either until
today, apparently it’s a quiet little place, a little over ten thousand
people, surrounded by farmland, not much else going on most
of the time. You know the sort of place, nice place to live but no
reason to visit it.

“Well, apparently about ten days ago there was a fire, or maybe
an explosion, of some kind in a warehouse in the business district
there. What brought it to Bob McLaird’s attention was reports of
the presence of known agents of the Bolshevik state in Russia in
Harrystown after the fire, poking into the matter.

“There seemed to be no reason for
that, so it caught the boss’
attention and he looked more closely, and a bit of digging informed
him that not only were there Russian operatives in Harrystown, but
also Italian and French intelligence personnel as well, along with
some private players known to Army Intelligence.

“Bob is bringing details dossiers and information with him on the
train,” Conners went on. “But obviously either something very
interesting was going on in Harrystown, or somebody somewhere
thought there was. But there’s nothing about the place that would
seem to fill the bill for that.”

“I take it,” Lake said dryly, “that at least a few of us can expect
to be paying a visit to the Empire State.”

“Bank on it,” Conners told him.


At about the same time that Conners was engaged in this preliminary briefing, in
a small village in northern France, a young man was walking through the fields on
his way back to his home after a day of work as a laborer for a local farmer. As he
was approaching the edge of town, however, a car came racing along the narrow
rural road, coming to a sudden stop in front of the startled man. Before he could
do more than let out a startled exclamation, four large men emerged, grabbed and
overpowered the young man, and forced him into the car.

The entire incident required no more than a few moments, and the victim had not
the slightest chance to either escape or defend himself. Moments later, the car was
racing away through the usually quiet fields, their victim helpless within.

Why does this matter to us? We shall see.

MORE LATER.
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