London, 1946

"YOU WANT ME TO DO WHAT?!"

The MP jumped. "I thought they were soundproofing those doors."

His partner craned his neck, squinted down the hall. "They did."

"IS THIS SOME KIND OF BLOODY JOKE? HAVE YOU GONE COMPLETELY CRACKERS, OR DO YOU JUST THINK I HAVE?"

The first guard lifted an eyebrow, impressed. "Good lung capacity on that one." He listened for another moment. "Quite a vocabulary, too."

"Do you think we should go in there?" asked the second, with no enthusiasm. "It sounds like he might need some help."

"I DON'T GIVE A TOSS WHAT YOU THOUGHT; THINK OF SOMETHING ELSE!"

The guard was a seasoned veteran. He had been at Dunkirk, he had been at Normandy Beach; the point being, he was no shirker and no coward. "They don't pay us enough for that," he said, decisively.

*.*.*.*.*.*.*

London, 1968

"Right, then. We who are about to die salute you," Kay muttered, and rang the doorbell.

It was opened by an older woman, and the broad grin that spread across Kay's face gave the lie to all the wry complaints. "Happy Hanukkah," she managed to get out before being not so much hugged as engulfed.

"Kay, darling! Come in, come in! It's so good to see you," she said, releasing her. "Max! Look who's here."

An older man appeared by the time they'd gotten in the front door and were taking off their coats. "Hi, Uncle Max," she said. "I would like you to meet a friend of mine from work. This is Jack Selden; Jack, these are Max and Ruth Levine." And please don't kill each other, she didn't say aloud.

"It's a pleasure to meet you both," he said. "And thank you for having me here this evening."

"Oh, the pleasure is all ours. Welcome to our home, Mr. Selden," said Ruth, with a gleam of intense interest in her dark eyes. In what had to be the smoothest, most efficient 'divide and conquer' maneuver in recorded history, before Newkirk quite knew what had hit him, Max had swept Kay off towards the kitchen, while Ruth had taken his arm and whisked him straight into the middle of the crowd in the parlor. At which point the tactic became the classic 'hammer and anvil,' trapping him neatly in a pack of honorary aunties, all of whom were very interested to see precisely who and what Kay had brought home with her.

There were far too many names and faces for him to keep straight—the bridge of 'Dear Old Donegal' started running through his head after approximately three minutes or eleven relatives, whichever came first—but he did notice a few things almost immediately. One was that nearly everyone over the age of sixteen had at least a hint of Germany in their voices. Another was that no one seemed to be related to anyone else by blood. It was a family cobbled together from scraps and remnants.

And they were the most frighteningly efficient interrogators he had ever seen. The song in his head switched seamlessly to 'Istanbul, not Constantinople' as he found himself explaining who he was, how he and Kay knew one another, where he was from, a short census of his entire extended family, what he did for a living, where he lived, whether he was now or had ever been married, and pretty much everything else about himself except for his blood type and shoe size. Most of the parts about his job—and Kay's—were entirely fictitious, of course, but they were the old, familiar lies he'd been using for years, and they came more naturally to his tongue than the truth.

Kay was running a similar gauntlet, except that in between questions she was also scurrying back and forth to the kitchen, replenishing the various platters as they emptied. Which they did, quickly and often; he guessed that she was using them as a graceful way to escape any line of questioning that got too uncomfortable.

Three batches of latkes later, he finally caught up with her as she made her way back to the kitchen with an empty tray.

"Bamboo shoots, wasn't it?" he said under his breath.

"Warned you," she said, in the same tones. "How are you holding up?"

"I've been told by eight different people that I'm too skinny and I don't eat enough," he said. "All eight of them emphasized the point by insisting that I take second, third, and, in one case, fourth helpings of various dishes with names I can't pronounce. Five of them went on to tell me that I should get married, because I need someone to take care of me."

"Only five? You're doing well," she said. "I apparently look pale and peaked from working too hard in a stuffy office, and I'm obviously not eating right, either. Oh, and if I don't quit that dreadful job I'm going to ruin my health."

"To be fair, that's entirely possible," Newkirk murmured. "Does the word 'Helsinki' ring any bells?"

"Oh, come on. What choice did I have? He would never have touched that coffee if I didn't have some first. He was much too careful, and already horribly suspicious. He would've assumed it was poisoned."

"Possibly because it was."

"Pfft. That's what antidotes are for." She grinned at him. "This really is above and beyond the call, Penny, and I'm grateful."

"I'm having a good time," he said. "Your relations are all lovely, and the food is top-notch. Whatever it is."

"Tell Aunt Ruth that; she'll be very happy to hear it. I hope you saved room for dinner, though. You don't want to miss the brisket."

"Wait, there's more food coming?"

She snickered. "Several courses. Loosen your belt, commend your soul to God, and hope for the best."

"Which would have been nice to know before that fourth helping," he mock-grumbled as she hurried away, still giggling.

*.*.*.*.*.*

London, 1946

"Where the hell is he, Stephens?"

Hogan had spent the last two days in a state teetering between panic and fury. He had no cards left to play. No one seemed to know or care what had become of Newkirk— if they did know, they weren't telling him—and the meetings he'd been asked to attend were officially over. It had been made very clear to him that quite a few high officials were eagerly looking forward to his departure; he was out of time and out of options, and if he was, Newkirk probably was, too. Stephens, despite a working relationship that had lasted nearly three years, was a man about whom Hogan still knew almost nothing… except that Stephens always seemed to know everything. Stephens was his last, forlorn hope, and Hogan was past tact.

"Good afternoon, General Hogan," Stephens said mildly, and glanced at his watch. "Let me see. Two o'clock. Hmm. By now, he's probably trying to claim that he was nowhere near the Fox and Grapes, and that he had nothing to do with the incident."

"What incident?"

"Oh, nothing important. Last night, a bit of a pub brawl turned into a small-scale riot when the bartender discovered that the cash box had gone missing during the fracas."

"Last night? Last night he was already in jail."

"Ah, but, you see, he wasn't. Not officially. There are no records of him being in custody, which means that he has no alibi."

"He wasn't there! How did he get caught up in any of this?"

"How? We found three very disreputable chaps who were more than happy to perjure themselves, that's how. They're probably singing like the proverbial canary even as we speak. And the judge lost a son at Dunkirk, and a daughter in the Blitz; he isn't going to ask too many questions, not for the sake of a Nazi propagandist. The book is already as good as thrown."

"Stephens… what are you saying?"

"That it's over. You can stop harassing your superiors; there's no longer any point," Stephens said calmly. "He'll get six months. With good behavior, he'll be out in three."

Hogan shook his head, stunned. "Why, Stephens? Why are you doing this? This is insane!"

"Because I happen to want him incarcerated at this particular time. That's all. Given a bit more time, perhaps I could have come up with something more convincing than a pub brawl gone bad, but you didn't leave me much of an alternative. You've been staging a one-man Normandy Invasion on his behalf, and I had to stop it while I could."

"So he was right. You set up your little kangaroo court… because of me. Because I was trying to get him the hell out of here," Hogan said. His eyes narrowed. "Because breaking people out of the pen is so far out of my wheelhouse that you thought this would stop me? Or were you just looking for a reason to grab me, too?"

"I wish I could. If I could have gotten your entire team, I would have. It's such a pity you're a Yank."

"Tell me about it. Having rights is an awful inconvenience. Jesus Christ, Stephens… I thought you were one of the good guys. Why would you do this to him? Again?"

"Because it was necessary. For the greater good of a great many people, he needs to spend the next few months in prison."

"What greater good? What are you talking about?"

"The bigger picture," Stephens said. "Think about it, Hogan. He's a no-hoper from the slums who was put on trial for his life for the high crime of having been forced to read a German propaganda statement after more than four years in captivity. A few weeks after the judge regretfully admitted that the court couldn't quite twist the law enough to justify committing a judicial murder and grudgingly released him, he was picked up on a completely ridiculous charge and sent right back to the penitentiary, with nothing to look forward to except the grim certainty that he'll keep being sent there until someone trumps up a semi-plausible excuse to hang him… and that it won't take long. By this point, he must hate this country and everyone in it with a blazing fury, wouldn't you say?"

"I think I already do, and yeah, he probably should. He doesn't, but he should."

"Quite. And that is precisely what we are hoping his cellmate thinks."

"His cellmate? And just who is that?"

"He goes by the name 'Albert Greenaway.' Presumably, that's an alias, but we don't know his real name yet. He's almost certainly a Nazi deep-cover agent, and he was arrested last week."

"Well, bully for you. So charge him with espionage."

"If we do, we'll lose the rest of his network. If, however, we can infiltrate that little vipers' nest while he's serving a brief sentence for some innocuous crime, we might be able to get them all. But in order to do that, we would need a very particular sort of person to gain Greenaway's trust. Like, say, an infamous Nazi collaborator who got off on a technicality."

With a soundless crash, the world rearranged itself, and all the pieces slotted neatly into their new configurations. Hogan was no stranger to this sort of manipulative plan, but usually he was the one on the other end of the con job. He found that he didn't much care for the view on this side. "Newkirk."

"Yes."

"My God. How much of this did you set up?"

"Not nearly as much as you probably think. Some improvisation was, sadly, necessary."

"So wrecking his life was part of some master plan? He agreed to this?"

"Eventually. It took some… spirited debate, but he works for me now." Stephens saw the expression on Hogan's face, and his voice softened. "It's not what you're thinking, Hogan. He wasn't hiding anything from you. When you spoke with him, he genuinely had no idea about any of this, or that we were planning on bringing him back into the service."

"That's pretty damned fast. It's only been a couple of days, and he was locked up for most of them."

"Yes, well… we had to adjust our timing a bit after you got involved."

"Baloney. I wasn't involved until this week. He was in jail the day after Germany surrendered."

"That was one of the parts that needed some improvisation."

"None of that improvisation seems to have been for his benefit. If, as you say, this Greenaway thing wasn't something you'd planned from the start, why in hell didn't anyone do something to help him when it all went down? Half the high command knew that those charges were nonsense."

"Oh, more than half. And as it happens… there was one officer who really did try his best. Testified at length and in excruciating detail. And I do mean excruciating."

Hogan ran through a mental list. "Well, that's something. Roberts, right? He knew better than anyone the sort of work we were doing."

"Not even close. He might have actually been helpful. No, it was another of your old chums. I'll give you a hint. It was the one you were always happiest to see leave."

Hogan closed his eyes. "Please tell me it wasn't Crittendon."

"Exactly what I said when I heard."

"Oh, God. How bad was it?"

"Well, he started off with their first meeting, when Newkirk refused to leave Germany, collapsed their half-dug escape tunnel, sabotaged the fence wire they were cutting, and got Crittendon recaptured. After that it got a bit less heartwarming."

Hogan face-palmed. "Sounds like his work, all right."

"With friends like him, one hardly needs enemies," he agreed. "If it's any comfort, he blamed some of the trouble on you. Said that firmer discipline on your part might've kept Newkirk from going to the bad."

"Unbelievable," Hogan muttered. "Just unbelievable."

"I know. By the time he was done helping, it was essentially a question of whether it made more sense to have the hanging on the spot or if they should wait until they could arrange for drawing and quartering as well. If the light fixtures in that courtroom had been a bit sturdier, I really don't know what might have happened."

"I don't think that's funny."

"Good. I wasn't joking. It was touch and go for a while there."

"This isn't fair," Hogan said inanely.

"Nothing about this damned war has been fair. Nothing about this hopeless world of ours is fair. I'm doing what I can to fix things, but I'm not God," Stephens snapped. "Go home, General Hogan. There's nothing more for you to do here."

"Oh, yes there is. I want to hear this from him. I left him high and dry once, and I'll be damned if I do it again," Hogan said. He meant that quite literally, too. "You're going to bring me to wherever you're holding him, you're going to give us a chance to talk in private, and let me tell you, if I don't like what I hear, I will stage that one-man invasion."

Stephens, unfazed, didn't even blink. "No," he said. "No, General, I'm not going to do that. First of all, I don't take orders from you, and even if I did, there is far too much at stake. I am not going to risk losing an entire network of fifth columnists, or, for that matter, risk compromising my agent's cover, thereby putting him in even more danger than he already is, simply to salve your conscience. No."

"But…" Hogan said, and then stopped, because he had no idea what he wanted to say next.

"Go home, General," Stephens repeated, more gently this time. "Stand down. You're not his handler anymore; I am. I'm giving him what he needs. He'll be fine."

"And just what is it you think he needs?" Hogan asked. "Besides 'more jail time,' of course."

"Exactly what you gave him. A purpose," Stephens said. "And a team."

"You really don't get it, do you?" Hogan said. "We didn't have a 'team' back in Stalag 13. We wouldn't have survived if that was all we had."

"What, then?"

"Brothers, you jackass. We were a family."

"I know," said Stephens, heavily. He reached into an inside pocket and extracted a letter. "I know. Perhaps someday. Here. He insisted." He cleared his throat, straightened his jacket, and turned to go. "When his mission is over, I'm sure he'll be in touch. And not before. Good day, General Hogan."

Hogan, silenced, watched him leave. He looked at the envelope in his hand, tore it open.

Colonel—

Sorry for leaving so abruptly, but times being what they are, when someone offers you a position, you'd best take it before they change their mind. My nan used to say that the reward for a job well done was usually a harder one; we'll have to see if she was right. I'm sure our mutual friend gave you the broad outlines, so you'll understand if I'm not much of a correspondent for a little while, but I'll write when I can.

Thanks for everything, Colonel. I heard a little about what you were trying to do for me, and it means a lot. I doubt I'll be making it to the Colonies anytime soon, but otherwise, things are probably going to be all right now.

Yours truly, Peter Newkirk, Esquire

PS: Did you really threaten to punch a certain field marshal in the throat, or was Stephens just having a go at me? From what I've heard, none of his men would have tried too hard to stop you if you did. –PN,E

Hogan stared at the note for a while, the words blurring a bit. Trust Newkirk to end with a joke. He put it neatly back into the envelope and tucked it into his pocket, his mind racing in a hundred different directions at once.

If the light fixtures in that room had been a bit sturdier, I really don't know what might have happened.

If this is the part they need me to play, then that's who I'll be.

Wars demand a few sacrifices—and if you think the wars are over simply because the guns are silent, you're a fool.

You can stop harassing your superiors; there's no longer any point.

There are only two things you can do with a man like that; shoot him or promote him.

You're not his handler anymore; I am.

The reward for a job well done is usually a harder one.

The greater good of a great many people.

Things are probably going to be all right now.

There wasn't much left to do, was there? Except hope that Newkirk was right, hope that he'd be all right. He let out a deep breath, and slowly started back towards his borrowed quarters. No, there wasn't much left to do at all. Except finish packing… and go home. And try to live with himself.

*.*.*.*.*.*

Author's note: Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery, who became the Chief of the Imperial General Staff in 1946, apparently had no gift for tact or diplomacy. That said, no, Hogan didn't actually threaten anything of the sort.

'Dear Old Donegal' is a WWII-era pseudo-Irish patter song sung by Bing Crosby. The bridge is just a long, rhyming list of Irish surnames, as the singer is introduced to half the town. Allen Sherman did a parody version of it in 1963, called 'Shake Hands with your Uncle Max,' with the same joke, except, of course, all the names are Jewish. (I couldn't resist including an actual Uncle Max.) And 'Istanbul' is better known these days in They Might Be Giants' cover version, but it's from 1953 and sung- more slowly- by The Four Lads.