‘‘Then you have to let this el Ferruch alone.’’
‘‘I have been ordered to stop the flow of gold, currency, precious jewels, and fine art through Morocco,’’ von Heurten-Mitnitz said, ‘‘by superiors who believe I will be dealing with picturesque characters in bathrobes.’’
Müller chuckled again. ‘‘And I was so happy when I heard I was escaping from Berlin.’’
‘‘The Americans have another interesting saying,’’ von Heurten-Mitnitz said. ‘‘ ‘There’s no such thing as a free lunch.’ ’’
Müller thought that over for a moment and then chuckled.
‘‘There’s one obvious solution,’’ he said. ‘‘We could arrange some accidents.’’
Von Heurten-Mitnitz did not appear to have heard him.
‘‘There is one other alternative,’’ he said. ‘‘One that would possibly not only solve our problems with young Fulmar, but would be of value to the fatherland.’’
‘‘You mean, turn him into an agent?’’ Müller asked.
Von Heurten-Mitnitz nodded.
‘‘If we could use him to give us access to the pasha of Ksar es Souk, and through him to the pasha of Marrakech . . ."
‘‘Yes,’’ Müller said thoughtfully.
‘‘I don’t think appealing to his patriotism would work,’’ von Heurten-Mitnitz said. ‘‘Nor do I think he will frighten easily. We’ll have to think of something else.’’
‘‘It will work out,’’ Müller said confidently. ‘‘These situations almost always do, if you work hard enough.’’
‘‘And don’t do anything foolish,’’ von Heurten-Mitnitz added. ‘‘Thus it would be helpful if you can get a copy of Fulmar’s dossier. Perhaps something of interest happened to him while he was in Marburg.’’
Müller nodded. ‘‘I’d planned to see my family,’’ he said. ‘‘This will give me an official reason to go to Marburg. I’ll see what I can dig up. But if all else fails, Fulmar will be put on a plane, and you won’t know anything about it until you hear he has returned to the fatherland.’’
‘‘I must ask you not to do anything like that until you have discussed it with me first,’’ von Heurten-Mitnitz said quickly. ‘‘Neither of us can afford to be sent home because we have become persona non grata with our Moroccan friends.’’
Casablanca, Morocco November 28, 1941
There was absolutely no doubt in the minds of the two agents of the French Sûreté, nor of their adviser, a Sturmführer of the SS-Sicherheitsdienst, that if they could stop the American Cadillac they would find that its occupants possessed nearly three hundred thousand dollars in United States and half that much in Swiss currency. In addition, there was a small leather bag stuffed with investment-quality (that is, heavier in weight than three carats) diamonds and emeralds and comparable jewels. On the open market these were worth about as much as the Swiss and American currency combined.
The problem was that the law made no prohibition against simple possession of foreign currency. Neither was the simple possession of jewels illegal. Such a law would be impossible to enforce.
The other problem for the Sûreté and the Sicherheitsdienst was that one of the two young men was Sidi Hassan el Ferruch, the son of the pasha of Ksar es Souk, and the other young man was an American, Eric Fulmar, traveling on an American passport. Word had come from the Foreign Ministry on Bendlerstrasse itself that confrontations with American nationals were to be handled with the utmost discretion. Roughly translated, that meant to avoid touching Americans unless they’d been caught red-handed.
What the Sûreté and Sicherheitsdienst agents wanted was to catch the two of them in the act of smuggling the money and jewels out of the country. If it was not judged wise to shoot him in the act of escaping, the American could at least be tried and jailed, pour encourager les autres, and Sidi el Ferruch could become a much more valuable chip in the never-ending game played by the French with his father.
The object, then, was to catch them.
None of the agents believed that tonight would be the night that would happen. For one thing, el Ferruch knew the agents were on their trail, and for another—unless they had guessed very badly—the obvious destination of the two (and el Ferruch’s Berber bodyguards, trailing the Cadillac in a Citroën) was a restaurant on the Coastal Highway between Casablanca and El Jadida.
The restaurant, Le Relaise de Pointe-Noire
, sat all alone on the rocky Black Point, sixty or more feet above the crashing surf of the Atlantic. There was only one entrance to the restaurant, and there was no way to get from the restaurant down to the beach without passing through that entrance.
The two would never transfer the money or the jewels to someone else at Le Relaise de Pointe-Noire, because that would risk having whoever they gave it to caught with it. Which meant that they intended instead to spend time on one of the chambres séparées overlooking the crashing surf, have their dinner, and then pass the evening in the company of firm-breasted and dark-eyed Moroccan ladies of the evening. Le Relaise de Pointe-Noire had the most attractive poule to be found in Morocco.
It was raining, which meant that the two policemen who had stationed themselves where they could watch the granite outcropping on which Le Relaise de Pointe-Noire was built were going to become very wet and uncomfortable. There was no way to get a car in there, and it had to be watched, against the off chance that either el Ferruch or the American was foolish enough to try to sneak off down the beach. The third agent would go inside the restaurant to see what he could see.
The man who went inside was the senior Sûreté agent, since the German could not do that without calling undue attention to himself. The Sûreté agent with the longest service elected to stay dry.
He stationed himself at the upstairs bar, in a position that allowed him to keep the corridor leading to the chambres séparées under surveillance. He ordered a glass of wine, making careful note of the price in his expense records.