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“Right,” Canidy said. “That should be enough to protect you as you attempt to secure the fair maiden’
s affections.”
“One can only hope.”
Fulmar pulled on his suit coat.
“Changing the subject,” Canidy said, “I was doing more than cleaning your weapon while you primped in there.”
“Yeah?”
“This has nothing to do with your qualities as a roommate but I decided that I may not be here when you get back.” He paused. “Probably won’t be.”
“Why is that?”
“Well, I have, as you say, enough information to get started…and the clock is ticking. I’ll take my new friend Johnny here and get to work. Unless you think there is anything that I can do to help you.”
Fulmar looked off in the distance in deep thought.
“Not for me, Dick,” he said finally. “But I do wish I could go with you.”
“Get done what you have to and maybe you can.”
Fulmar nodded.
“I’ll take care of the room. Just tell them when you’re leaving it for good.”
“Thanks, Dick.”
They stared at each other a long moment, then embraced.
When they finally released one another, Canidy was not sure of his voice and simply nodded good-bye as Fulmar quietly picked up his overcoat and went out the door.
[ TWO ]
New York City, New York
0015 8 March 1943
The traffic at midnight had been nearly nonexistent and the cab had flown up First Avenue. Too fast for Fulmar, who did not want to arrive too early. He wanted a little time to clear his head—walking in crisp, cold air always seemed to work—and to get a good look at Yorkville before meeting Ingrid Müller.
He had the cabdriver drop him at the northeast corner of Second Avenue and Eightieth Street, which was just inside the southern edge of Yorkville.
This section of Manhattan’s East Side—known for its heavy concentration of German residents and their shops and restaurants that recalled dear ol’ Deutschland—covered an area that went from about Seventy-ninth Street up to Ninety-sixth or so, and from the East River on over to Third Avenue.
Ingrid Müller had told Fulmar to meet her at Wagner’s Restaurant and Market, Eighty-fifth at Second, and as the cab drove off he started walking slowly in that direction.
He was surprised—though he wasn’t sure why—that there were still quite a few people out and about in the cold at this late hour.
As he passed a dimly lit bakery and coffee shop—the sign read: KONDITOREI KAFFEEHAUS—he looked inside and saw that it was about a quarter full of patrons.
That impressed him, but not quite as much as the reason why it took a bit of effort to see the people inside: From the top of the shop’s window, next to a chalkboard menu, hung a huge American flag. It filled half of the big window, and he guessed that if they could have put a bigger one there, they would have.
As he approached the next block, Fulmar saw that someone had pasted on the side of a redbrick apartment building a series of U.S. Navy recruitment posters so that they covered—mostly, anyway—the pro-Nazi graffiti beneath.
Block after block, he passed more nicely kept shops and apartment buildings.
By all appearances, Yorkville seemed just another normal New York neighborhood.
