Jack 1939 by Francine Mathews

Author:Francine Mathews [Mathews, Francine]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Historical, Thrillers, Suspense, Espionage, Germany, Espionage; American
ISBN: 9781594487194
Publisher: Riverhead Books
Published: 2012-07-04T14:00:00+00:00

* * *

THE MAN SEEMED INCLINED to let him make the first move. He remained in his chair, tamping tobacco into the bowl of his pipe with sharp, erratic movements.

Jack rose casually from the table and approached the fire; he held out his hands to the embers. Aware of the weight of cold beyond these walls; of Diana, undressing upstairs; of this silent man in his chair.

“You are Mr. Kennedy,” the German said softly after a while. “The ambassador’s son.”

“I’d hoped my name wouldn’t mean a thing here.” Strike the note of self-mockery. Two men of the world, who understand the value of honesty, stuck in the snow. What had Dobler told Wohlthat, in that short incomprehensible exchange? He possessed a smattering of French and he’d wasted years in compulsory Latin; neither of them was of the slightest use in hunting Nazis. Ignorance lay like a mortar in his path, but he’d come all this way. He’d have to risk something. The image of Daisy Corcoran’s brutalized breast rose in his mind.

He offered his hand. “Jack Kennedy.”

“Helmuth Wohlthat. Please, young man. Sit.”

He drew up a chair. “I’ve heard your name somewhere before. You’re a friend of the Little Sisters, aren’t you?”

“Gott im Himmel,” Wohlthat breathed, “what a disaster, no? Sister Mary Joseph! The account book! My God, the account book! Your father has some message for me?”

Jack’s hands clenched but he managed to keep his expression vacant. Your father. Wohlthat could call him that, they were such pals. What to say to the guy? Nothing definite. Buy time. “He was hoping you had one for him, sir.”

Wohlthat put his head in his hands. “What can I do but beg his forgiveness? An unmitigated disaster! All those names—your father’s, his friends, the most important people in England and America—in Heydrich’s clutches!”

Jack sat back in his chair, staring at the banker’s face.

Parsing out the words. Rejecting their meaning.

Parsing them again.

Sickness rising in his throat.

Dad’s name was in the stolen account books. Joe Kennedy, ambassador to the Court of St. James’s. Along with others—the power structure of two continents, probably. Men and women who’d tried to buy an election for Hitler. Who’d committed a crime. Roosevelt would call it treason—

They executed for treason.

“This’ll break him,” Jack muttered. “Destroy him completely. Everything he’s worked for.” He thrust his hands through his hair, kicked free of the chair, and began to pace before the fire. “Hell, this’ll screw all of us. Once the press gets wind of it—the whole world knows—Roosevelt’s ambassador on Hitler’s payroll . . .”

And then a random thought stopped him dead.

What if Roosevelt already suspected Dad of disloyalty? And had sent Jack himself out on the hunt?

It was no secret the two men did not see eye-to-eye. Or that Jack’s father was considering a run for the White House in 1940. What if Roosevelt intended to destroy Joe Kennedy with the crime Jack was unearthing? He could simultaneously gut his rival, and use the evidence of Hitler’s plot to convince America to enter the coming war.

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