A moment later the door opened and Dorothy, Germaine and Virginia appeared, each looking as bedraggled as any woman who has been awakened too early.
"Winnie!" Germaine's face lighted up like a traffic go-sign. She crossed the room and kissed me. "I thought—"
General Wakely coughed, severely.
"Mrs. Tompkins," he announced, "I'm Major-General Wakely. This is G-2. The C.I.C. has rounded up your husband's chief associates for this interview. We're about to close in on the most dangerous Nazi spy-ring in existence. You know Mrs. Rutherford, of course, and this other woman goes under the name of Mrs. Jacklin."
"My name is Mrs. Jacklin," Dorothy replied with feeling, "and the O.S.S. will want to know by what authority—"
Wakely waved her and the O.S.S. aside. "Very clever, Mrs. Jacklin, or should I say Mrs. Von Bieberstein?" He turned back to Germaine. "Thanks in part to your husband, Mrs. Tompkins," he continued, "we have at last got on the track of Hitler's ace operative in the Western Hemisphere, Kurt Von Bieberstein, or should I say Frank Jacklin? We almost had him cornered five years ago but he took advantage of the confusion after Pearl—after the Navy let us—after the declaration of war, and went into hiding as a naval officer. It was only by accident, when Mr. Tompkins accidentally supplied the missing link, that we found the trail again."
"That's handsome of you, General," I said, "but I think that Counter-Intelligence deserves full credit."
He beamed at me.
"And what am I doing here, General Wakely?" Virginia cooed at the specimen of military manhood.
Wakely smiled before he remembered that he was a pattern of military efficiency. "You are known to Counter-Intelligence, Mrs. Rutherford, as one of the best agents in Z-2."