I woke up late the next morning and unwittingly violated one of Martha’s rules by ordering breakfast in my room. We were supposed to meet in the breakfast room downstairs. Martha was tactful about it on the phone.
--Could you come down to the breakfast room when you finish, June? she asked when I said I had already eaten.
I left my key with Herr Glucksheim at the front desk. I wondered when he went off duty. I had seen him at one in the morning on Saturday night in our room; he had been at his post the next morning to trace us the way to Frankenstein’s Castle, and he had still been there when we returned. At that time I was convinced he was not working for the CIA, although thinking about it now, and having read Philip Agee’s book, Inside the Company, which divulged where the CIA recruits its sources, our Hotel Manager did seem to be a natural for low echelon tasks--like going through the rooms of people to be kept under surveillance. Even the fact that he klutzed it up and got himself caught in our bathroom is typical, apparently. The simpler the task, the more trouble the CIA odd-jobbers seem to have accomplishing it.
On Sunday morning, a big red and blue parrot had been installed opposite the reception desk. I asked if it said anything. Herr Glucksheim answered that the parrot had cost a lot of money and had to have time to get used to its new home. From which I gathered that it had not said anything yet.
Herr Glucksheim seemed to have gotten used to Martha and Montrice getting used to their new home since they were sitting in a breakfast booth, Martha in a dashiki and her business woman wig, the auburn one, and Montrice in a turban and colorful bathrobe. There had been no objection to their coming down to breakfast en deshabille; perhaps Herr Glucksheim considered it a good advertisement for his hotel, African atmosphere to go with the parrot. The breakfast room was also long since closed, but neither he nor the waiter had suggested they leave. Besides, all in all, we were renting three of his rooms for the summer. There was no sign of Mary Rose.
--June, began Martha immediately. Did Mary Rose say anything to you about where she was going today?
--I haven’t seen her since we all went to bed last night.
--Well, she’s gone over to the Voice of the Lumpen.
--I didn’t know she knew them.
--They called me, said Martha. And said they wanted to see me.
She laughed
--They said they hoped I wasn’t going to start anything. I said, Who, me? Start anything? I’m just here. You want to see me, you know where I am.
--You don’t like Voice of the Lumpen?
Martha burst out laughing and said I was as bad as Mary Rose. I did not know what that was supposed to mean. I had forgotten that Mary Rose had been, and maybe still was, a Panther and as bad as Mary Rose meant being radical in a way Martha did not approve of. As the summer wore on, I learnt that being radical meant, in fact, almost any action not directly controlled by her. She had not forgiven Mary Rose for sleeping with Wiff, or for having been a Panther, the rivals to Karenga’s Nationalists back in Philadelphia, and it was through the Panthers that Mary Rose had gotten the contact with Voice of the Lumpen. Therefore, the VOL was, by definition, what Martha considered to be the opposition. Mary Rose was the obvious instrument to fight them, using the same principle as electing Rizzio major: show the enemy you control one of his people.
--I sent her over to reconnoiter an hour ago, said Martha darkly. If I don’t get a call in fifteen minutes, I’ll have to go over there myself.
Voice of the Lumpen rented a five room apartment which served as office and living quarters, not far from Frankfurt University. They were a group of civilians with one or two ex-GI’s who ran a GI counseling center and put out a newspaper called, naturally, Voice of the Lumpen. It reported stories of GI's fighting for their rights inside the Army in Germany, along with informative articles on the new African republics that had escaped, or could be presented as having escaped, turning into what they called lackeys of imperialism. Congo-Kinshasa is the only one I remember. Maybe it is the only one there was. The idea was not only to show the Black soldier he could fight the Army, but to make him aware of his heritage as part of a black continent with enormous political and economic potential.
In their two years of existence, from 1970-1972, VOL passed through all the overlapping stages of GI organizing of the time: mass meetings of Black GI's with soul food and speeches, armed confrontation with the US military, followed by legal defense, using German lawyers, of soldiers and civilians arrested at any of the above activities. They tried, with their limited effectives, to support any political action started by Black GI's all over Germany; they were nationalist in that they limited themselves to Black GI's but lined up nationalism with Maoism by China’s support of Congo-Kinshasa.
There was a rumor they had connections with Eldridge Cleaver who, in summer 1971, was in Algeria. One of their most successful operations had been smuggling Kathleen Cleaver into Germany easily that summer to speak to a meeting of 1000 Black GI's at Heidelberg University. I supposed they were the left group the UBS had referred to which did not know about the Paris meeting of the Communist League. I don’t know where they got their money, as the saying goes. Till the middle seventies, there was still quite a bit of liberal money available, especially for projects involving Blacks.
--Well, June, we may have to drive over there to get her after all, said Martha.
--Why not call? She may have left already.
At this precise point the Hotel Manager came in and said there was a call for Fräulein Albertson. When Martha had left, I asked Montrice what was all this between Martha and the VOL.
--She have to be very careful, said Montrice.
--I haven’t had much to do with them, but they always seemed to act correctly.
--There are eyes watching her, said Montrice.
I figured I wasn’t going to get much out of her. Martha came back and sat down like someone who has just done a good day’s work.
--She’s coming back, she said. I said if she didn’t, I’d come over and get her. Like I had to do last time. Last time Montrice and I took a cab over, and I told Montrice to get out on the sidewalk and shout up, and they came to the window and told me to come up.
Martha laughed.
--I told them I wasn’t climbin’ three pairs of stairs to see anyone in this world, that I’d just stopped to get Mary Rose. Well, I thought after that she was going to know she was over here to report and nothing else.
--I don’t know why she went over there this morning at all, said Montrice.
--Martha said something about reconnoitering, I said.
Reconnoitering what?
--June, you want to ask that waiter could he get us some more ice water?
He couldn’t because all the ice they had was what was in the three ice trays, and we had long since finished that. But it made a diversion. I recognized Martha’s tactics but had never, like football or cricket, played that game myself. Mary Rose, I felt, had been sent by Martha to VOL, but since she had not come back on time, she was being turned into someone who had gone over there for some mysterious purpose of her own. I wondered if they were going to go on building like this, but Martha, probably sensing I was not wholly on her side, started analyzing her telephone conversation.
--She wanted to know if she could stay and look after one of those VOL girls’ children. I had to tell her I hadn’t brought her over here as a baby-sitter for Voice of the Lumpen, and she was to come right back here to the hotel unless she wanted to stay there permanently.
I remembered that Martha had paid her two sisters trips over.
--I don’t know why she got so uptight about me going over to VOL, said Mary Rose later that afternoon. They’re not so many of us over here we can’t all work together. I didn’t know any of them before, but one of the girls has a child, and so do I, and I know how hard it is to have to do political work with a child, and I said I’d baby-sit.
--I didn’t think it was very nice to say she’d leave you there permanently, I agreed. If anyone had said that to me, I’d have felt like staying. But, of course, if you have a child to get back to...
--Oh, she didn’t mean it, said Mary Rose. I didn’t know her very well either before I agreed to come. Another sister was supposed to be going and then didn’t, and I ran into Martha at a block party, and she asked me. But now I think, if she thought I had left her for the VOL, she’d haul me back by the hair.
We both laughed. I was learning. Martha was a local boss, even more than she was a Nationalist. No one was supposed to initiate anything but her. Since she said she had brought Montrice along as a personal nurse, she certainly could not spare her second assistance to baby-sit for another group. Frankfurt was a section of the black world where the locals had already set up an independent operation. Martha might be having problems of how to move about in the German population--that, plus my car, is why she thought she needed me--but she was at home in controlling a rival group of Blacks--and any group not under her direct control was, in her eyes, a rival group. Mary Rose had been sent to VOL as bait and then jerked back. From now on, if VOL wanted her, they would have to go to her headquarters at the Sun.
6. The Meeting
Although Martha was never to admit it, it was thanks to this visit of Mary Rose to the VOL that we first heard about the Darmstadt soldiers being shut up in the Crypto Compound overnight. I might have told her, but I didn’t. On my second day, I hadn’t yet realized that Martha was here to collect three cases to bring back to the Black Caucus, although Cora had mentioned this group in her letter. I had caught on to the fact that Martha was running a one-woman operation, handling everything herself, and I knew the Darmstadt 53 had enough handlers and supporters already, so I did not think she would be interested. All credit belongs to Mary Rose for telling Martha about it and then going out with Sgt. Wifford to Darmstadt to set up a meeting. Because without Mary Rose, Sgt. Wifford would have done much less work for Martha than he did. Martha had planned this from the beginning, of course, sending Mary Rose off with him while we drove out to some other base to talk to other Black GI's. Black GI's were all listening that summer. It was enough for us to drive onto a base using Montrice’s ID card and get out of the car, Martha in her wild wigs and bright blouses, Montrice looking like everybody’s mother, and a white lady at the wheel like, I liked to think, the white woman who got shot driving people back from the Montgomery Freedom March. Mary Rose and Wifford were listened to because she was young and pretty, and so they apparently did not care much that he was a sergeant. In fact, that he had made rank and was willing to speak to them about black identity was all in his favor.
Martha did best with apolitical, young country or city boys, realizing that the Army was not going to solve any of their problems but not knowing what to do about it. The meeting Wifford set up in Darmstadt, however, consisted of people who were, for the most part, political; some of them were like Wifford in opposing things like a theoretical moon base for the military, but some had been connected with black groups back in the States, from the NAACP to the Panthers and were still as active as they could be in exile.
--First, said Wifford, we’re going to the base to meet some of the brothers and talk with them there. Then we’ll go up to my friend’s house.
--Checking me out, eh, Wiff? asked Martha with a smile.
--Now, Martha, did I say that? asked Wifford, getting into his car with Mary Rose. A lot of them don’t know where the meeting is, so it’s easier if we all meet first on base.
Martha glanced back at Montrice as I started our car, preparing to follow Wifford through Frankfurt to the Darmstadt Autobahn.
--I can read that nigger like a plate glass window, said Martha.
Actually, being checked out turned out to be the pleasantest part of her evening. She had dressed for it in a white boubou and her black Afro wig, the one I thought of as the Peace Wig.
--If I ever get back to Philadelphia from this trip, she said in the car, I am really going to start in on the Queen.
--What Queen?
Philadelphia background material was usually doled out to me on our car trips.
--When we have a ceremony, and we all get dressed up in our regal robes--the way I’m dressed now is nothing next to it--we come out one by one and stand there and last of all comes the Queen. The last time we did this--you know how clumsy I am--when it was my turn, I almost tripped over my robe, and one of the brothers shouted: Hey, Martha, watch it! Why, everyone was so worried about me getting to where I was supposed to get without puttin’ my feet through my robe, they just didn’t notice the Queen comin’ in at all.
I wondered how any black woman could have gotten the Queen position if Martha wanted it, unless it had all happened before Martha was old enough to know she wanted it.
We met Wifford and two cars of GI's in front of the Bratwurst stand across from Kelly Barracks in Darmstadt. We all got out; our party stood in front of our two cars, and the GI's in front of their two cars. No one said much, and everyone looked at Martha. She stood there very quietly and let them look. One of the GI's asked what group she was from in the States, and she said she wasn’t from any group; she had just heard Black soldiers were getting a rough deal over here in Germany, and Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm had given her credentials enabling her to make a report on the situation. Then their chief said, Okay, let’s go, and we all got back into our cars and followed Wifford into the housing area.
We had to walk up the usual four flights of stairs. The apartment
was smaller than Wifford’s place, after all he was a sergeant, and almost full of Black GI's. I don’t remember meeting whoever owned it. His wife effaced herself too, just as Mrs. Wifford had effaced herself. This wife had no personal reason to be unhappy with us since her husband was not involved with Mary Rose but, to anticipate a little, the next time we needed someplace to meet in Darmstadt, Wifford said we couldn’t use this place anymore. Maybe the wife was worried about her husband getting in trouble with the Army. Or maybe it was a negative reaction to Martha’s speech that night.
There was some talk about whether each of us should say something or Wifford should just introduce Martha and let her talk, and the rest of us would take part in the discussion afterwards. Neither Montrice nor Mary Rose nor I wanted to talk, and so that was settled. I can’t remember a word Martha said. In private, she talked very well; this was the first and only time I was ever to hear her in public, public being more than five or six people. But speaking in public seemed to be one of the things she could not do, and that she should have been able to do, and she knew it. It was probably why she wasn’t queen. Many people talk well who have nothing to say, especially manipulators, but while Martha was a first class manipulator, she was a chess player manipulator, interested in moving people where she wanted them to go, but her words served only as an instrument of her manipulation. They could move people towards a particular objective, but they were not moving. The forty Black GI's crowded into the apartment that night were enough of a mass to nullify any chess board techniques. It was different from talking to the group of brothers gathered around the car. These soldiers wanted to know what was happening back in the World, but Martha wanted to talk about her trip to Germany.
--What about the Panthers? someone asked.
--There aren’t any Panthers left in Philadelphia, said Martha.
--What about Angela Davis? asked another.
--Angela is a very sick girl, said Martha.
This soldier was more persistent.
--But I mean, about her case, and support for her and everything.
--I have inside information, said Martha mysteriously. But it would be better if I don’t talk about it here on base.
--I think we all have to support her as a Black woman, he answered, but no one in the room took it up.
--Now I heard how Black soldiers over in Germany are getting a rough deal, began Martha. So I went down to Washington and got a personal letter from Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm, authorizing me to make an inquest into conditions over here. Now one of the ways we have decided to do this is to take up two or three cases where the rights of Black soldiers have been violated. I am over here to choose these cases and take them back to the Black Caucus in Congress who will take them right up to the Supreme Court. Now I already have one case, and I’m looking for two more. One of them is in the Frankfurt stockade this minute on a trumped-up murder charge where he suppose to have pushed some white dude out the window. That was because his two so-called friends had accepted a deal. You all know how that works out. They brought me and his mother over here to testify for him, and I never seen anything so set up in my life. That dude was settin’ on the window sill, and my boy from Philadelphia was suppose to have said to the other two, You hit him high and I’ll hit him low, but Black people don’t use that kind of language—that’s redneck talk.
This anecdote was disappointing to the soldiers who had come to hear a pep talk and had ended up with what sounded like a people’s lawyer. What I was beginning to think it was, as the GI's say, was that Martha wanted a career in politics and had figured this German trip as a way to advance. She had become boss of her block back in Philadelphia but had not become Queen of the Black Nationalists. She could not speak in public, but she could trip over her own feet when someone else was speaking, and there is plenty of room for trippers in politics, although they often stay stationary themselves. Tripping is not enough to get you to be Queen or Congresswoman unless you are the only one using that technique, and I imagine that in Philadelphia there were others, many others, like Martha, looking towards the Black Caucus in Washington. Martha at least got a letter from one of them, Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm, but Mrs. Chisholm only wrote that she knew Martha and hoped her trip to Germany would be facilitated in any way she might require; it did not say that Mrs. Chisholm took any responsibility for anything Martha might do.
The meeting petered away. One or two of the soldiers had come to talk about a case which might qualify, but Martha did not want any terrorist cases because the VOL was handling those, and she had too much political acumen not to be aware that two more simple murders like Willy’s window shoving were no reflection of the situation of Black soldiers in Germany which, after all, was what Shirley Chisholm and the Black Caucus were interested in. I don’t remember any of the Darmstadt brothers being there or talking about their case.
By the time we got to the Wiener Wald for a late dinner, Martha was in a very bad mood. Charlie and Coates turned up--Dog had already left for the States--and the Wiener Wald was not pleased to see us, either because we were all black, so to speak, or because they were due to close in thirty minutes, or both. The menu was almost exclusively composed of chicken: fried chicken, baked chicken, broiled chicken--everything but boiled chicken and, in fact, nothing but fried chicken because it was so late. And potato salad. This displeased everyone in our party. Martha said that at Sammy’s back in Philadelphia, you could get chittlins and ribs at two in the morning, and that she had never seen a deader town than Frankfurt. Charlie said he didn’t know, but he’d noticed what looked like a night-club downstairs. Then everyone got very enthusiastic suddenly, and I was sent to ask the waitress about it. She said it had nothing to do with the Wiener Wald, and we’d have to go and find out ourselves.
--We’ll give them the test, said Martha. June, you come down in case they talk German at us.
Martha was wearing her royal robes, and Wifford was well-turned out as usual, so I walked behind them. I was still maintaining my guerrilla image with blue jeans and an ammunition belt. Both Wiener Wald and night-club were in a re-modeled house taking up the entire corner of the Eckenheimer Landstrasse. The night-club was in the basement, announced by an awning extending out over a large opening revealing a broad pair of stairs leading downwards. Martha and Wifford approached a typically sinister doorman/maitre d’hôtel, perhaps even bouncer though he looked slight for the job, who emerged from his particular hell to tell us we could not go in. He said it was a private club.
--What is this shit? asked Martha.
Charlie and Coates had followed us out, and we had an evaluation session right there in the parking lot.
--We could storm them, suggested Coates.
--That’s what I’d like to do, said Martha. But what I have to evaluate is my mission in coming over here. I am here to help soldiers. If we get the police down on us, will this be better or worse for what we really want to happen here in Germany?
Of course, she was perfectly right. Wifford suggested they drive off somewhere and see who could take action on a higher level. Martha thought this would be fine, and she and Wifford drove off in his car. The rest of us went back to the Wiener Wald.
--Where’s Martha? asked Montrice.
We told her about the club.
--They just the same everywhere, said Montrice. Up here I can’t even get them to bring us ice water.
I remember the lack of ice water as a minor nightmare of the summer. There never was enough ice water at the Sun Hotel in the morning either. In the Wiener Wald, the two tired waitresses were regarding us with dislike. I don’t know how long they had been on their feet that day, but the conflict between the German working class and the American working class was evident.
--I don’t know why they don’t bring our chicken, said Montrice. It’s probably just some warmed-up old bird they had left over from lunch.
Mary Rose had not participated in any discussion since we left Darmstadt. Martha’s downgrading of Angela Davis had ruined any feeling of sisterly solidarity Mary Rose had been trying to build up. She got up and left the table. The ice water came. Charlie and Coates went outside.
--Where they goin’? asked Montrice.
I shrugged.
--I don’t like this, said Montrice. You know Martha don’t want anyone smokin’ hash on this trip.
--You think that’s what they went out for?
--Yes, I do, said Montrice and got up.
She walked to the door of the restaurant and hollered; Mary Rose, you come right in here.
I didn’t hear what Mary Rose said.
--I said, you come in here this minute, said Montrice.
--Yes, mother, said Mary Rose.
--You know Martha want us to stay together all the time she away, said Montrice.
It occurred to me that Montrice wasn’t fooling around with any image of herself as guerrilla fighter the way I was. She had been a wife and mother and manager of a household since the beginning of our trip. Now she brought Mary Rose inside with a sort of moral grip on her upper arm. I did not say anything. It was their fight. In which I was wrong. Charlie and Coats had stayed outside. In any sort of democratic organization, we all should have discussed our policy towards drugs. But we let Martha play organizer, Montrice mother, and the two soldiers set up as favored children. Like all boys. I did not want to play great white teacher, and so I shut up, taking what elements I could out of the situation to justify my shutting up. This time I was ready to go along with Montrice because I thought hash-smoking a poor way to get busted when we were there to fight the Army. There was, in fact, a two-to-one chance that the MP’s could drive by and bust Charlie and Coates in the parking lot that Saturday night. Mary Rose was put down while neither Charlie nor Coates got criticized, nor Wifford, for that matter, for sleeping with her.
By the time Martha got back, we were all sitting around the table listening to Charlie and Coates chat about something, almost a traditional assembly of men and women where the men do the talking and the women listen. I think Martha had wanted to put Wifford in perspective about Mary Rose and that that was the real reason she drove off with him. At any rate, he never slept at the Sun Hotel again, and the question of storming the night-club had died. What was left of the evening we spent discussing the chicken and potato salad at the Wiener Wald which were dried out and soggy respectively. Martha repeatedly asked me what sort of place this was I had taken them to, and so I paid for half the dinners. Maybe that was why she had brought it up.
--You can take her home, Wiff, said Martha out in the parking lot.
--Don’t try to buy me off, said Wifford laughing.
Martha laughed with him.
--I’m not buying you off, she said. I just thought you’d like to drive her home.
Mary Rose went on not saying anything.
--We done just missed the last train to Hanau, said Charlie.
--June will drive you out, said Martha.
I shook my head.
--I can drive if you want, said Mary Rose.
I hesitated. Every time I have lent my car, there has been an accident.
--Wifford can take them, said Martha. Mary Rose will come with us.
--I’d rather have Mary Rose, said Wifford.
--That little car of yours won’t fit four people, said Montrice.
--You can take my car, I said to Mary Rose. But be careful; it’s a miserable road.
--How do we get home then? asked Montrice.
--I’ll drop you at the hotel first, said Mary Rose.
--Wifford will take them, repeated Martha. They can all go out in June’s car and he can bring it back tomorrow.
--What about my car? asked Wifford.
--You can leave that at the hotel.
Back at the Sun, Martha said we should have our evaluation session before going to sleep, but Mary Rose and I went off to our rooms and left her to evaluate with Montrice if she wanted. Wifford brought my car back the next morning and took Mary Rose off to see an Army couple in Kaiserslautern, while Martha, Montrice, and I went out to the Frankfurt Airport to meet Thursgood Stickney, Republican aid to Democratic Congresswoman, Shirley Chisholm. His arrival was more important to Martha than all the rest of us put together. She wanted his job.
7. The Congressional Aide
Press release from Task Force Albertson on the German Inspection Visit of Thursgood Stickney II, Republican Aide to Congresswoman Shirley Chisolm, Democrat.
Thursgood Stickney II arrived in Frankfurt, West Germany, on his European tour to investigate the conditions for Black soldiers in West Germany, with stopovers in Greece, Spain, and Turkey. Your correspondent was on hand to meet him at the Frankfurt Airport on the morning of August 10th, along with an official Army representative from General Herring’s office in Heidelberg, as well as a member of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of the Colored Peoples), and Miss Martha Albertson from Philadelphia and her party. We all gathered in the Oasis Restaurant a few minutes before Mr. Stickney’s plane was due to touch down from Athens, only to be informed that there had been a delay in takeoff and no definite time could be announced for the eventual arrival of the aircraft. Lt. Col. Lucas, personal aide to General Herring and a living example, if indeed one is needed, that a Black man can reach a high and responsible position in the Armed Forces of the United States of America, sent his driver for further information and suggested we all have a coffee while waiting for further news of Mr. Stickney. Miss Albertson expressed the common hope that Mr. Stickney’s plane had not crashed. Mr. Arbuthnot, a prominent Washingtonian businessman and member of the NAACP, announced his intention of spending the entire day in the Oasis Restaurant if necessary, so great was his desire to contact Mr. Stickney for certain business reasons.
The seating arrangement at table was as follows: Colonel Lucas at one end with Miss Albertson at his right, one of her aides at his left, another to her right, and Mr. Arbuthnot at the other end of the table. Colonel Lucas’ driver must have taken his coffee, if he had any, at the stand-up bar outside.
Table conversation turned on events in the American military community in Germany. One of the members of Miss Albertson’s group asked Col. Lucas for details of the recent incident concerning fifty-three Black soldiers locked up overnight inside the Crypto Compound at Darmstadt, but Colonel Lucas was unable to be of any help concerning this question except to clarify that there were no detention facilities in West Germany called the Crypto Compound. Miss Albertson’s aide, her driver as it turned out, then asked Col. Lucas if the fifty-three Black soldiers in question had only dreamt they were detained, to which Col. Lucas replied that there were many things going on in Germany of which he was unaware in his position as personal aide to General Herring down in Heidelberg. Miss Albertson’s aide countered that such an occurrence should have rocked all Germany, and Col. Lucas promised to look into the matter. He then turned the conversation to a lighter subject and complimented his interrogator on the unusual ammunition belt she was wearing around her waist. Miss Albertson informed him that she had brought the belt in question in from Philadelphia, and Col. Lucas remarked that he hoped none of them had any designs on his life. Miss Albertson immediately exonerated herself from any such imputation. Col. Lucas then described a recent such attempt taking the form of a hit-and-run driver who had seemingly tried to off Col. Lucas while he was crossing the Heidelberg Bismarck Place. Mr. Arbuthnot remarked that some of those German drivers should be shot, and Col. Lucas voiced an uncertainty as to the nationality of the driver due to his understandably faulty memory consequent to his shock and fear for his life, mentioning as corollary that he had received an impression of green Army license plates on the car which had so narrowly missed him. He revealed these suspicions to Miss Albertson in a jocular, good-humored fashion concerning the likelihood of a member of her group being the culprit. Miss Albertson then employed her well-known charm to reassure Col. Lucas that now she had met him, she would not dream of letting anything happen to him and was ready to protect him with her own life. Col. Lucas, still in the spirit of fun which had characterized the whole conversation, hardly dared, he said, to ask the cause of such devotion, but Miss Albertson said she would give him a very frank answer which was that she always preferred working with someone she knew she could handle than with a stranger who might pose problems for her. Col. Lucas then asked if she was sure she could handle him, and she replied that she had no doubt about it, and he said it would be his pleasure, and Mr. Arbouthnot repeated his statement that he would sit there all day if he had to.
Mr. Arbuthnot’s unexpected reiteration of his previous announcement regarding his plans for spending the day was prompted by the return of Col. Lucas’ driver who, with Miss Albertson’s driver, was the only white in the assembly. Like the famous white dove of song and story, he brought the information that Mr. Stickney’s B-52 from Athens had had to return to that cradle of Western civilization for repairs and was not expected until five o'clock that afternoon. Mr. Arbuthnot consulted his watch and informed the gathering that it was then eleven-thirty. His resolution to spend the intervening five and a half hours in the Oasis seemed to be weakened by the information regarding the delay. A difference of opinion in the Albertson contingent as to the advisability of joining Mr. Arbuthnot in his projected vigil was quickly resolved by the future information that the round trip from the Sun Hotel to the Frankfurt Airport could hardly exceed an hour under the most unfavorable traffic conditions. Col. Lucas announced his intention of returning to Heidelberg for lunch. This brave resolution lent heart and courage to his companions, inspiring them to affront and overcome every difficulty separating them from the Congressional Aide, with the exception of spending the next five and a half hours in the airport. The morning meeting was adjourned by consent and a consensus resolution to be on hand at seventeen hundred hours that same afternoon. The place of meeting was not specified.
At sixteen hundred hours that same afternoon, therefore, the same six people plus one were to be found at strategic positions on the terrain of the Frankfurt Airport: Mr. Arbuthnot of the N-double A-CP was standing behind the rope which protected the passengers emerging from customs from the immediate affectionate onslaught of their friends and/or relations; at a respectful distance behind him was the driver plus a Sp/5 belonging to Colonel Lucas; Col. Lucas himself had joined Miss Albertson and her two female companions in the Oasis. As homage to the informal relations previously established on the same spot five hours earlier, Col. Lucas himself had discarded his uniform for mufti and was now sporting a green sports jacket, yellow shirt and flowered tie. I thought I’d leave all the protocol at home, he is quoted as saying. This new accoutrement gave rise to a quickly dominated hilarity on the part of the three ladies, cut even shorter by the announcement over the loudspeaker to the Oasis Lounge that flight 472 from Athens was touching down. Col. Lucas and Miss Albertson excused themselves forthwith, leaving Miss Albertson’s aides to pay for the partially consumed refreshments. But everybody was on time after all for the long-desired arrival of the most important aide of all, the Congressional Aide, Thursgood Stickney II.
Thursgood Stickney II’s appearance, like his name, distinguished him from the crowd of travelers, stay-at-homes, tourists, onlookers, and arriving passengers, all filling all available space in the inadequate but at that moment being enlarged airport. Congressional Aide Stickney was small and thin and light. His summer seersucker was free of crease and grease, his shirt white and his tie black knit. He had rejected, if indeed he had ever accepted, the modish Afro hair style for a crew cut clip which, combined with his untinted horn rim glasses, lent an air of scholarly distinction to his general appearance belied, however, by the clear boyish voice with which he greeted his welcoming committee. Gallantry being his secret weapon, he allowed Miss Albertson to take his arm and lead him out to the waiting platform in front of the airport while Col. Lucas’ aide took charge of his baggage, and the first aide, if we may be excused the pun, fetched the car from the reserved Army parking place. Miss Albertson seemed to have made similar arrangements for her aide to fetch her car, with the result that Mr. Stickney found two cars lined up waiting for him as he stood there, flanked on one side by Miss Albertson and on the other by Col. Lucas, Mr. Arbuthnot bringing up the rear. Miss Albertson told Col. Lucas that the presence of Mr., Stickney in her car was of prime necessity for the future scheduling of his visit and that she would send her black aide with Col. Lucas in the Army car as a guarantee that she would not kidnap Mr. Stickney. Col. Lucas took this badinage with his customary good sportsmanship and, indeed, it looked as if Miss Albertson could, by the sheer weight of her presence, have had no difficulty in spiriting away Mr. Stickney whose comparatively small stature and insignificant bulk indicated he would be able to pose no effective opposition in a physical contest with Miss Albertson. Mrs. Montrice Jackson thereby shared the honors of Army officialdom together with Mr. Arbuthnot while Miss Albertson and Mr. Stickney stepped ceremoniously into the rather stringent accommodations offered by the back seat of the Peugeot 304 station wagon. A meeting place was agreed on in the Europaische Hof, the best hotel in Heidelberg.
During the trip from Frankfurt Airport, Miss Albertson informed Mr. Stickney of the situation in Germany, and Mr. Stickney said she should not worry about him because he wanted to do whatever the folks on the block wanted him to do. He gave his multifold qualifications for such availability explaining that his role in politics had often consisted of reconciling irreconcilable elements, citing as example an occasion when this role had consisted of appearing before a member of the Black Panther Party and explaining to them why he was a Republican. He did not give further details of this gathering but seemed to feel it sufficient proof of his ability to reconcile the irreconcilable. In case Miss Albertson did not consider it sufficient proof--and we may assume a doubt struck Mr. Stickney suddenly as to exactly what political group Miss Albertson was associating with in Philadelphia, a city happily favored with a wide choice of political groups under the sobriquet of The City of Brotherly Love. He added that in case Miss Albertson might require more proof of his diplomatic talents or of his own place on the Washington scene, he had had a personal interview with his President before embarking on the present tour of inspection. Miss Albertson then informed him that her group had had to work under very difficult conditions collecting the information requested of her by Shirley Chisholm. She went on to give a specific example of these conditions by mentioning that two nights previous, there had been a CIA attack on her hotel, and since that time she had not felt it wise to put any of her facts on paper for fear of it being stole. Mr. Stickney said that he would be seeing Mrs. Chisholm, whom he referred to as Shirley, as opposed to Miss Albertson who undoubtedly could have referred to the Congresswoman as Shirley, and would have been justly annoyed at any imputation that she could not have done so but, in fact, chose always to address Mrs. Chisholm by her last name plus title, often preceded by her first name as well. Thus, Mr. Stickney said he would be seeing Shirley as soon as he got back, emphasizing his position as Mrs. Chisholm’s aide while at the same time bringing out, all unconsciously as it were, the weakness of his position as a Republican Aide to a Democratic congresswoman. Miss Albertson said she would not have her report ready in time for Mr. Stickney’s departure, but that she would accompany him on certain parts of his tour so that they could more effectively pool their information and present a united front to U.S. Army officialdom, thus reinforcing the image of power it was essential for the Black Caucus back in Washington to represent. Mr. Stickney said he was ready to go along with Sister Martha on whatever project she considered useful. Miss Albertson then lay out her strategy for taking General Herring by storm the following day, discounting Col. Lucas as a negative element whose position as buffer between General Herring and the outside world could easily be circumvented. Mr. Stickney agreed with this estimate of the situation, adding, however, the codicil that he had to go along with the Army personnel assigned to him because they were his only means of penetrating the Army installations he had come to inspect. Miss Albertson said he need not worry too much about that and that she would be able to show him things about the Army he would never see on an official inspection. Mr. Stickney remarked that that was what he was there for. He seemed relieved, however, when the small French car turned into the petunia-landscaped courtyard of the best hotel in Heidelberg.
Col. Lucas’ car was already parked opposite the broad steps leading up to the lobby, the driver standing outside wishing, perhaps, that he was a civilian and had the right to smoke in this actual intermission, theoretical continuation of his duty hours. Colonel Lucas and Mr. Arbuthnot and Mrs. Montrice Jackson were perceived at a table in one corner of the lobby in the company of a tall, bespectacled Black man carrying a variety of photographic equipment suspended by a series of straps around his neck and shoulders. He was introduced to Mr. Stickney and Miss Albertson as Mr. Powers, an American photographer working out of Heidelberg, and was greeted by Miss Albertson’s driver as an old acquaintance from various public meetings and demonstrations in which they had both participated. The gathering then repaired for refreshment to a somewhat larger table in the adjoining lounge while Mr. Stickney took the elevator to his room in order to repair whatever invisible damages the 1000 kilometer trip from Athens had wrought on his personal appearance. Mr. Arbuthnot momentarily declined to be of the company, due to business negotiations necessitating a call to the United States, but he added that he hoped to be able to put the call through from the hotel in time to join them for dinner. Col. Lucas excused himself also on the pretext of a call to his home at Patrick Henry Village to inform them there of his absence for dinner, thus leaving Miss Albertson’s party and the photographer together over their various drinks. Mr. Power, the photographer, said he had been told of Mr. Stickney’s presence in West Germany and was there to accompany the group to General Herring’s office in the morning. Miss Albertson remarked that they would see each other at that time. Mrs. Montrice Jackson announced her intention of taking a little walk through the lobby to look at the show windows. Miss Albertson’s aide repaired to the well-appointed ladies room where she later told Mrs. Jackson that she had considered taking the brush on the glass-topped dressing table but had refrained on the grounds that it would be silly to be picked up for taking a hairbrush when so much else was at stake. The precise nature of what was at stake was not elaborated on but seemed to be understood by Mrs. Jackson.
Mr. Stickney soon descended to the lobby sporting another or the same conservative dark grey suit and black knit tie, a mode of accoutrement he seemed to affect, and there was a general discussion of plans for the immediate future, principally those concerning more substantial refreshment than that offered by the bar of the Europaische Hof. This last establishment was unanimously rejected by all as a dining choice due to its excessive prices. The Heidelberg residents were then called upon to offer suggestions. Col. Lucas consulted his handsome Rolex watch and lamented that, due to the advanced hour, a certain Chinese restaurant in the near vicinity would already have closed its doors. The limits on restaurant availability posed, Mr. Power, the photographer, said there was only one good restaurant where they would be sure of being excellently restored and, at the same time, commodiously seated; the price was also of some consideration but would not be comparable with that charged by the Europaische Hof. Mr. Arbuthnot remarked that price made no difference.
The Montpellier Restaurant was so named because Montpellier in France was the twin city to Heidelberg. Candlelit and carpeted, it specialized in chafing dishes prepared under the eyes of the happy consumer-to-be. The cellar was stocked with the best French wines and, all in all, a most agreeable two hours were spent there by the party of Americans. The conversation remained general, no one mentioned the Crypto Compound or the incarceration of the fifty-three Black soldiers of Darmstadt, and Miss Albertson’s aide, later questioned on the subject, remarked that the closest parallel she could think of in modern history would have been a dinner with fairly high-up officers in the German Wehrmacht who deplored the Nazi upstarts and were presenting a civilized image to a group of perhaps French civilians.
At the conclusion of this pleasant meal, arrangements were decided on for the morrow. Col. Lucas would arrange their reception by General Herring at whatever morning hour they preferred, excusing the necessity to limit their choice to morning which was the usual time reserved by the General for the pleasant task of receiving visiting Congress people. Mr. Stickney modestly objected to this title, although it did not seem to be completely displeasing to him, saying, not yet, not yet, as if his visit to the US Forces in Germany was already the first step of a campaign trip to be successfully crowned by a seat in the august hall of the American legislators. The hour of nine was the one selected by the assembly as appropriate both for the General and for the visitors, Col. Lucas remarking that this would enable Mr. Stickney to accomplish part of the second part of his mission, the first part consisting of the aforementioned interview, the second part visiting some of the military installations in and around Heidelberg. Miss Albertson said that she would be accompanying Mr. Stickney on his morning visit to the General, but that she had made her own arrangements for visiting the bases. Mr. Power, the photographer, said that he would be there to take pictures for the Stars and Stripes, the most important Army newspaper. Shortly thereafter the company separated, the three ladies returning to the Sun Hotel in Frankfurt, Messers. Stickney, Arbuthnot and Power departing with Col. Lucas to their various destinations.
8. General Herring’s Office
Press release cont.
Eight-fifteen the following morning found the travelers from Frankfurt once more installed in the lobby of the Europaische Hof. Col. Lucas’ driver, still perhaps wishing he could smoke, was standing next to the Chrysler in the courtyard. Of Mr. Stickney, Mr. Arbuthnot, and Col. Lucas himself, nothing was to be seen. An inquiry at the desk from Miss Albertson’s aide elicited the information that Mr. Stickney had breakfasted in his room and had not come down yet. Mr. Power, the photographer, entered the hotel lobby covered with seemingly more photographic equipment than the previous evening and joined the three ladies at a corner table. He said he did not think he agreed with all this running around after Congressional aides as if that would change anything in the status of the Black man in the world. To this, Miss Albertson replied that she was not running after nobody. Shortly afterwards, however, she told Mrs. Montrice Jackson to go outside on the steps of the Europaische Hof to keep an eye on Colonel Lucas’ Chrysler.
In the meantime, the coffee arrived. Immediate payment was requested by the waiter due to their non-residence in the hotel. To a suggestion from her aide that the consummations be billed to Mr. Stickney, Miss Albertson said she did not want to be in that little fairy’s debt for anything; she preferred he should be in her debt, as was in fact the case, Mr. Stickney having borrowed twenty German marks off her the previous evening for the dinner that had finally been paid for by Mr. Arbuthnot. Miss Albertson then added that Mr. Arbuthnot was sucking around Lucas and Stickney to get an Army contract for some enterprise near Chicago and gave it as her opinion that those Chicago niggers would stop at nothing.
The conversation was cut short by Mr. Stickney running light-footedly down the grand staircase of the Europaische Hof, followed by Col. Lucas and Mr. Arbuthnot moving at a slightly less swift but lively clip. Mr. Stickney called out, Good morning, ladies, as he sped by their table in no way moderating his momentum. Miss Albertson immediately got to her feet and with surprising lightness for such a heavy woman headed after Mr. Stickney’s party, followed by her aide and, at a certain distance, by Mr. Power, momentarily detained by the various pieces of photographic equipment he had divested himself of to have coffee. “ Mr. Stickney would certainly have succeeded in making his getaway with Col. Lucas, favored by the superior horsepower of the Chrysler, if Miss Albertson had not had the foresight to place Mrs. Montrice Jackson on the outside steps of the Europaische Hof, thus showing a tactical grasp of the unfamiliar surroundings worthy of a great general. As Mr. Stickney sped by her and jumped through the open car door, closely followed by Mr. Arbuthnot, with Col. Lucas running around to the front seat, Mrs. Jackson shouted, Thursday, don’t you leave this place without waiting for Martha! She then walked down the steps to stand directly in front of the car until Miss Albertson and her companions had time to make their appearance.
Col. Lucas, for his part, might have given orders, which might have been obeyed, to make a quick back-up and sudden swerve to the right, calculating that Mrs. Montrice Jackson would not simply throw herself bodily under his wheels, but such orders, if they were ever contemplated, were obviated by an incoming non-partisan car effectively blocking the gates. Then too, it is unlikely that any soldier would have run down any woman and trusted to his colonel to assume the responsibility. Col. Lucas, seeing he was stopped, ordered the car stopped too and told the inhabitants of the back seat, that is, Mr. Stickney and Mr. Arbuthnot, to open the door for Miss Albertson. Not until Martha Albertson had her foot inside the car did Montrice Jackson step out of her vanguard post in front of the powerful twelve horsepower motor, for which bravery in an extreme situation she was recognized by the Colonel’s invitation to enter the car herself. How the four visitors fit into the back seat, Mr. Arbuthnot being a fairly hefty man, although not on Miss Albertson’s scale, and what was said regarding the foiled getaway, your correspondent, not being present, has no way of recording. A chance remark from Mr. Stickney to the effect that, being somewhat late, they had thought to start, expecting the others to catch up with them at 7th Army Headquarters, Campbell Barracks, remained without authentication. “Miss Albertson’s aide with the ammunition belt offered Mr. Power transportation in her Peugeot in return for his help in locating Campbell Barracks, an installation with which he was familiar. Although Col. Lucas’ car had long since gone inside, their entrance into the former Nazi Headquarters was unimpeded by the sentry, who accepted Mr. Power’s statement that they were part of Col. Lucas’ party. Miss Albertson’s aide left Mr. Power at the main building while she followed another sentry’s indications as to parking. Once inside the building, she was directed upstairs to General Herring, although by the time she penetrated the outer office, her dinner companions of the previous evening were all inside. “Therefore, our information concerning the interview between General Herring and Miss Albertson, and incidentally Mr. Stickney, is of necessity incomplete. Our correspondent has been able to interview none of the people actually in the inner sanctum of the General’s office, and the aide, our main source, spent that hour and a half on a chair in the General’s outer office, inspired by Mrs. Jackson’s vigilance earlier in the morning and now assuming the position of sentry for the little party of women with whom she had the honor to be associated. “The negative side of this circumstance is, of course, that we have no protocol or notes of the actual conversation in the inner office--except for column 1 of the Stars and Stripes newspaper, capped by a photo of General Herring and Mr. Stickney with their arms around each other, the free hand of each raised in the V-for-Victory sign of World War II. Appropriated by the Peace Movement of the 60’s, the resulting ambiguity of this sign made it a fitting symbol for this encounter of which there is no record outside Mr. Power’s picture and its caption. The words which passed between General Herring and his four morning guests are lost. “Miss Albertson’s aide has been able to provide the significant information that the interview, originally scheduled for fifteen minutes of mere protocol, lasted an hour and a half. During this time, the aide was in a position to report the events in the outer office which, on the morning of Miss Albertson’s visit, seemed, to a first-time observer, particularly tumultuous; for one thing, by the time the aide got to the outer office, the interview had already changed from Mr. Stickney’s interview by General Herring to Miss Albertson’s interview of General Herring. The alternate voices coming through from the inner to the outer office were those of Miss Albertson and General Herring. From time to time a small sound could be heard, indicating that Mr. Stickney was trying to place a word, and once the authoritarian pitch of Mrs. Montrice Jackson recalled him, apparently, to order. Shortly afterwards, Mr. Stickney himself appeared alone in the outer office. His plan for flight, if that is what it was, was hindered by Col. Lucas’ presence inside the General’s office, thereby immobilizing the official car so that poor Mr. Stickney had to content himself with perpetual motion, entering and leaving the office several times within the next half hour in a vain attempt to counteract the weight of Miss Albertson’s presence. Immovable, she passively obliged General Herring to call his secretary at fifteen minute intervals to cancel his succeeding appointment. Not until eleven o’clock did Mr. Stickney emerge from the General’s office for the last time, tugging in his small wake not only Miss Albertson but General Herring, Colonel Lucas, Mr. Arbuthnot, and Mrs. Jackson. Mr. Power had disappeared after taking the V-for-Victory picture. The bonhomie of the little group that had so agreeably dined together on the previous evening and played practical jokes on each other that very morning was, on its emergence from 7th Army Headquarters, somehow irretrievably shattered. The ladies were allowed to leave the building unescorted and find their own way to the parking lot.
Nevertheless, Miss Albertson seemed not dissatisfied with her morning’s work.
--That’ll show him, trying to shake me off, she said.
She did not define whom she referred to as him; Mr. Stickney seemed the most likely candidate, but the Mr. Arbuthnots, Colonel Lucases, and General Herrings of the world had been shaking off the Marthas for years before meeting this particular unshakeable one. This morning they had been showed.
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