"I mean, precisely."
Bradley shrugged. "We don"t know exactly, but we think it"s somewhere in the Harz Mountains, probably south, in the area of Thuringia."
"And is that where you plan to go, Mike?"
"Yes," Bradley replied.
"You"re going to follow the advance?"
"Yep. As far as I can go."
"With the fighting troops?"
"Yes."
"I don"t want you getting yourself killed."
"I"ll try not to," Bradley said.
Gladys stared steadily at him, her face showing concern. He was touched and wanted to kiss her lips, but was too shy to do so, because McArthur, filling up their gla.s.ses again, was grinning broadly at both of them.
"Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "let"s drink up and fall down!"
They touched gla.s.ses and drank as a combo started playing a Cole Porter medley. The American novelist, all belly and beard and drunken bellowing, stood up and lurched out of the bar, trailed by his admirers. A French woman crossed the room, giving address cards to the men. She stopped in front of Bradley, glanced at Gladys and McArthur, smiled and gave McArthur a card and said, "Call anytime," then gracefully pa.s.sed on. McArthur studied the card thoughtfully, slipped it into his shirt pocket, and said, "A night of love in Paris at a price. To the victor the spoils." Gladys chuckled and McArthur grinned, his eyes scanning the noisy room, then he raised his eyebrows and said, "Well, well! We have an unexpected visitor!"
Bradley looked up in surprise as his urbane, friendly adversary, Lieutenant Colonel Wentworth-King of the SOE, London, emerged from the crowd around the bar, carrying a gla.s.s in his right hand, a swagger stick under his left arm, looking dashing in his British army uniform and peaked cap. He stopped at their table, grinned, and said sardonically, "I thought I recognized you, Bradley! What on earth are you doing here?"
"Just celebrating the liberation of Paris. Nothing more, nothing less."
"I"m sure... And in the presence of Major General Ryan McArthur, of the Manhattan atomic bomb project. Accidentally, no doubt." He smiled guilelessly at McArthur and said, "Good to see you again, sir. Mind if I join you?"
"Pull up a chair," McArthur said. "It"s party time in the Ritz."
When Wentworth-King had taken a chair, Bradley introduced him to Gladys. "Ah!" he exclaimed softly, shaking her hand. "Gladys Kinder, the well-known American journalist. I"ve read your articles in Collier"s and elsewhere. Your work is spread far and wide."
"What I write is widely syndicated," Gladys explained. "I don"t really write that much."
"I enjoyed your regular London column," Wentworth-King said. "It made me feel quite heroic. Not that you mentioned me personally, but you were kind to the British."
"I"ve won a heart," Gladys said to Bradley. "Where have you been hiding this lovely man? You must invite him more often."
Wentworth-King beamed and McArthur chuckled while Bradley tried to hide the spasm of resentment that unexpectedly shook him. Wentworth-King was charming his lady and he didn"t like it one bit.
"So what are you doing in Paris?" he asked Wentworth-King, after throwing an angry glance at Gladys.
"I came in this morning," Wentworth-King replied, "to set up a base of operations and grill a few Frogs. Still chasing your rocket engineers, are you?"
"Yes," Bradley said tersely.
"Then you might be interested in knowing that the Russians have captured Blizna, in Poland, including Himmler"s mock village and disguised rocket proving ground."
"Any reports on anything unusual?"
"So far, no. But then the Russians don"t talk a lot. We only know that since it"s a proving ground, they certainly found a few rockets."
"A great help," McArthur said.
Wentworth-King grinned, unperturbed, then smiled charmingly at Gladys. She returned his smile, and then, catching Bradley"s accusing glance, hid her face behind her gla.s.s.
"Can I take it," Wentworth-King said, returning his attention to Bradley and McArthur, "that you chaps are still convinced that Wilson is working on something more advanced than the V-1 and V-2 rockets?"
"I"m convinced of it," Bradley said.
"Well, just to prove that I"m a decent chap at heart no hard feelings and so on you might be interested in knowing that the most unusual reports have recently been coming into the SOE headquarters in London."