Garden of Beasts Read Free Page A

smart for this.”
    “Smart?”
    Manielli said, “We been to your place, Paul. You got books. Damn, you got a lot of books. You’re even in the Book of the Month Club.”
    “They’re not smart books. Not all of ’em.”
    “But they are books,” Avery pointed out. “And I’m betting a lot of people in your business don’t read much.”
    “Or can’t read,” Manielli said and laughed at his own joke.
    Paul looked over at the man in the wrinkled white suit. “Who’re you?”
    “You don’t need to worry—” Gordon began.
    “I’m asking him.”
    “Listen,” the Senator grumbled, “we’re calling the shots, my friend.”
    But the fat man waved his hand and then replied to Paul, “You know the comics? Little Orphan Annie, the girl without the pupils in her eyes?”
    “Yeah, sure.”
    “Well, think of me as Daddy Warbucks.”
    “What’s that mean?”
    But he just laughed and turned to the Senator. “Keep pitching your case. I like him.”
    The rail-thin politician said to Paul, “Most important, you don’t kill anybody innocent.”
    Gordon added, “Jimmy Coughlin told us you said one time that you only kill other killers. What’d you say? That you only ‘correct God’s mistakes’? That’s what we need.”
    “God’s mistakes,” the Senator repeated, smiling in lip but not in spirit.
    “Well, who is it?”
    Gordon looked at the Senator, who deflected the question. “You have relatives in Germany still?”
    “Nobody close. My family came over here a long time ago.”
    The Senator asked, “What do you know about the Nazis?”
    “Adolf Hitler’s running the country. Sounds like nobody’s really crazy about it. There was this big rally against him at Madison Square Garden in March, two, three years ago. Traffic was a swell mess, I’ll tell you. I missed the first three rounds of a fight up in the Bronx. Got under my skin…. That’s about it.”
    “Did you know, Paul,” the Senator said slowly, “that Hitler’s planning another war?”
    That brought him up short.
    “Our sources’ve been giving us information from Germany since Hitler came to power in thirty-three. Last year, our man in Berlin got his hands on a draft of this letter. It was written by one of their senior men, General Beck.”
    The commander handed him a typed sheet. It was in German. Paul read it. The author of the letter called for a slow but steady rearmament of the German armed forces to protect and expand what Paul translated as “living area.” The nation had to be ready for war in a few years.
    Frowning, he put the sheet down. “And they’re going ahead with this?”
    “Last year,” Gordon said, “Hitler started a draft and since then he’s building up the troops to even higher levels than that letter recommends. Then four months ago German troops took over the Rhineland—the demilitarized zone bordering France.”
    “I read about that.”
    “They’re building submarines at Helgoland and’re taking back control of the Wilhelm Canal to move warships from the North Sea to the Baltic. The man running the finances over there has a new title. He’s head of the ‘war economy.’ And Spain, their civil war? Hitler’s sending troops and equipment supposedly to help Franco. Actually he’s using the war to train his soldiers.”
    “You want me… you want a button man to kill Hitler?”
    “Lord, no,” the Senator said. “Hitler’s just a crank. Funny in the head. He wants the country to rearm but he doesn’t have a clue how to do it.”
    “And this man you’re talking about does?”
    “Oh, you bet he does,” the Senator offered. “His name’s Reinhard Ernst. He was a colonel during the War but he’s civilian now. Title’s a mouthful: plenipotentiary for domestic stability. But that’s hooey. He’s the brains behind rearmament. He’s got his finger in everything: financing with Schacht, army with Blomberg, navy with Raeder, air force with Göring, munitions with Krupp.”
    “What about the