Ziff under fire

Part 24 - A need to know basis

Dunc unfurled his wings and gently lifted off the back of the car using his momentum to gain altitude. A few powerful flaps and he spun into an elegant wing tip turn so he was heading back down the road. He dove toward the pursuing car, which frighted the driver into swerving, and then he half looped into an Immelmann turn. His timing was so perfect he landed on the hood of the car and, with his toe nails gripping the windshield wipers, he spread his wings to block the drivers view. The driver braked and the car slid off the road and down a steep bank, catapulting Dunc into full flight.

'Yee-Ha, gloik,' Dunc announced via my earphone. 'Mission accomplished. The posse's stuck in the ditch. They're trying to push the car back onto the road.

'Awesome,' I told him. 'Meet us back at the house.'

Dunc arrived a few minutes after we did. 'That was awesome flying, Dunc,' I told him.

'Ah'm verra guid but I couldna ha' done it sober.'

Sergei was hastily collecting the papers from the table. 'I have microfilm of the latest bomb designs from Los Alamos and the extraction plant designs. If they find them,' he groaned, 'they will hang me.'

He started stuffing papers into the old cast iron stove.

'No, no,' Kozak said calmly. 'Do not burn zhem. You will come wiz us. Put ze papers in your bag and do not worry. Murga will be most interested. Well done everyone.'

Little Boy, the U-235 bomb first used on Hiroshima, Japan, 1945 August 06.

We hurried to the barn but there was a delay while Kozak fiddled with what appeared to be a cell phone with odd little bumps on it.

One of the wooden wall lit up with a dim blue glow and we all stepped into the light.

We arrived in a small room half filled with a large bed, three big closets and several leather suitcases. There was barely room for all of us. Kozak fell onto the bed and stretched out with a big smile on his face. ''ome at last,' he said.

That was unexpected. I hadn't imagined Kozak have a home anywhere. 'Where is 'ome?' I asked him.

'Near Wesel,' he said. 'It is a small town on the Rhine river in north west Germany. This is where I lived when I Murga brought me to zis time.'

I looked out of the small window at a narrow street paved with cobble stones. It was raining. Opposite there was a row of connected old houses with steep tiled rooves.

'Close the curtains,' Kozak said. 'I mean drapes. We are not 'ere and we 'ave to change.'

Sergei sat down beside him looking bewildered. 'That was . . . strange. How did we get here?'

Kozak chuckled. 'Zat . . . is top secret. As we spies say, "only on a need to know basis."'

After a minute he jumped up, opened the closet and rummage through the coats and shirts on hangers inside. He finally pulled out several uniform jackets, trousers and tall black leather boots. 'See if zese will fit you,' he said to us. 'Try ze boots first.'

While Sergei, Beryl and I tried on boots and the baggy trousers, Dunc climbed up on the bed to get out of the way. 'Ziff,' he said, 'Ah have to let Ondy know when we are. He will be dead worried when he finds out yeh're missing. That means ah'll have find his local agent. So ah'll be away for a few days at least. D'yeh think you can survive without me?'

'Don't worry,' Beryl said, 'I'll take care of him.'

'How are you going to find us?' I asked.

'Ssh,' Dunc whispered. 'Yonnie hacked Kozak's transponder so ah can track him, and ah got the address of the house where Murga has yehr parents.'

'Good work, Dunc. See you soon, eh?'

'Dinna forget Wesel will be bombed flat on February 16. Okay. Then ah'll be off. Will yeh no give me a boost through the window.'

Beryl struggled to get the window open while I lifted Dunc up onto a chest of drawers. He squeezed through the opening and launched into flight with a goodbye, 'Guluk oik.'

Kozak was turning the dial of an old fashioned telephone with one finger. When someone answered, he spoke rapidly in German. The conversation lasted less than a minute before Kozak hung up the 'phone and returned to the closet. He tossed out more boots and trousers before opening one of the suitcases revealing that they were filled with socks, shirts and underwear. 'I am pleased to see zat goose 'as gone. 'e was making me nervous.'

He gave Beryl, Sergei and me wristwatches and Beryl showed me how to wind up the spring and reset the watch hands. This had to be done every day. We synchronized the watches to local time. I was half past eight in the morning. Beryl warned me that in German that was, 'halb neun.' (halb noyn. Half before nine).

We managed to find something that fitted all three of us although I had some trouble with the buttons on the baggy trousers and the tall jack boots were too loose until Kozak suggested I wear two pairs of socks. Beryl was reluctant to trade her steel toed sneakers for boots but Kozak insisted she had to look like a vicious secret police officer not a bag lady.

The last items were dark grey jackets with black swastikas on red armbands. On the collars were badges with what that looked like two stylized lightening bolts. Kozak said they were runes. The soft caps had two badges on the front. One was a stylized eagle. Below it was a skull and crossbones.

Kozak was a blur of motion as he sorted through all the uniforms and underwear until he had two small suitcases filled with spare clothing for all of us. We packed our civilian clothes in one of the closets while Kozak produced soap, towels and toothbrushes and then we took turns in the tiny bathroom, washing and shaving.

When we were all smartly dressed and packed ready to go, we climbed down the narrow staircase to a tiny kitchen. Kozak produced bread, sausages and bottles of beer from a cupboard and we ate. I wasn't too sure about the chunks of bread which Kozak hacked from a loaf of something he called Schwarzbrot, which translated as black bread. It seemed to be seeds stuck together with black glue. But the sausages were delicious. The beer was good too.