THE GIRL NEXT DOOR
Written by Michael Riles
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
Publishers Note: This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, and events are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to real person, places, or events is coincidental.
Solstice Publishing
Dedication
To my wife and son, Adam and Elizabeth, who told me to never give up, to those who were there for me (American and Russian, Black, White and Asian, Jew and Gentile, Protestant and Catholic) when I was growing up. To my mother and father who did the best they could, to all my brothers who were Chicago’s Boy Scout Troop 812 whose scoutmaster, Mr. Paul M. Bartholomew, was there for me when my parents weren’t. To my friends from the past who came back in to my life, Judie, Ed and Nick as well as my friends, Indian and American, from Business Oriented Software Solutions, past and present, especially my two Davids, Ellie and Ammon. To my new "mom" who gave me the "girl of my dreams", Mrs. Elizabeth Tucker. And finally to all those who volunteer to serve “the sane” to check “the insane and sadistic” by being willing to silently “sit and listen” and be “on watch”; all of them – American, British and the other good soldiers of freedom in the world, I hereby dedicate this book.
Introduction
All he wanted to do was rescue the girl next door, a child who became a woman too fast, like so many children in the United States: like so many in the world, kids robbed of childhoods because of what adults do or rather what they don’t do. She was an angel who was there for the lost boy next door, a boy wanted, then not wanted by adults who didn’t know what they wanted, a child abandoned only to be saved by a mother who assumed the worst about the father, a father who learned later of his son’s existence and who wanted him back.
Marty Landis grew up with a good heart and was lucky enough to have others with good hearts that looked after him. One was a family, a family that lived next door, the family of that little girl, the angel. Marty Landis wanted to pay back a debt he owed her and her family when his parents used alcohol to abandon him. He just wanted to save her, save her from herself, save her from her past and return home in time for the Chicago Cubs opener at Wrigley Field – his team. It was April. The year was 1976.
What is a spy? It is someone who consumes, usually a reprobate who can devour the identities of others including their souls if the price is right. Marty wasn’t a reprobate. He didn’t want to kill all those people, people who didn’t want to kill him, or die before their time. But when your own survival is at stake and death stares you in the face and dances a jig in your presence while mocking you, you embrace the killing machine within.
Some say it’s the Satan in all of us. Others say it’s God, the Creator who either cursed or blessed us with the will to survive. Marty didn’t know which drove him to do what he did. He was just a boy scorned, a bastard, or so they thought---another assumption. Yet the scorn would define him, drive him, and give him a lust for acceptance, a legitimacy he owned all along. He wanted to prove himself worthy. Scorn will do that, especially misguided scorn.
This is the story of a boy everybody thought wasn’t supposed to be, everybody including his mother, the woman who bore him. It’s the story of a soldier-spy who’ll become a war hero, husband, father and, later, a statesman and world leader who, like his idol, Theodore Roosevelt, becomes a “mover and shaker” although some will claim a scoundrel, especially those who gained from the mayhem they inflicted, a mayhem that nurtured their “nobility”.
This is the story of how a nation “lucks out” after a criminal and his “princess” use a “conjugal visit” wisely on a bleak and cold Christmas Day in 1950. What made Marty Landis “tick” goes back to the beginning of what so many thought was the beginning of the end, when the eagle stared down the bear as the two thumped their chests and drew the boundaries, human boundaries they dared each other to cross.
Hatred is oftentimes misdirected. Those who scorned, ridiculed and hated the young Marty Landis did him, and this nation, their nation, a favor. Hate can mold, and drive temperament, and fire up a soul thirsting for a reason for the ridicule. America prepared to see what that hate can do, but for the better, for those who refused to “cast the first stone” in a country that liked to cast stones – a nation called America.
That nation, Marty’s nation, would later apologize for that scorn, a scorn that nurtured a soldier and a spy to lead them: lead them out of the abyss where they had placed themselves.
Chapter One
“The enemy says that Americans are good at a long shot, but cannot stand the cold iron. I call upon you instantly to give a lie to the slander. Charge!”
General Winfield Scott to the 11th Infantry Regiment, US Army, Chippewa, Canada. June 5, 1814.
The “Big Three” met on February 11, 1945 in Yalta, in the Russian Crimea, the most unlikely spot for a kid from Chicago abandoned at birth by a mafia princess six years later. It was a time when men could pull off the impossible through brunt force, forbearance, that “blood, toil, tears and sweat” Churchill promised. It was supposed to be a Thousand Year Reich but it lasted only thirteen years – lucky thirteen – as common people with uncommon valor stepped forward to win something and go back to being normal – to being common again; common and normal. Marty Landis was a common person, but one with a secret – a secret he would learn later, much later, after he could have single-handedly caused Word War Three between two powers bent on self-preservation – and self destruction, each fearful of the other and each willing to implode the planet before relenting to the others will. They would never know, even when events propelled him to becoming the most un-common of people, the President of the United States.
Socialism gave the world a power hungry cur that became a killing machine. History does give us saints and sinners, but with Stalin the phrase “anti-Christ” was actually mild, almost complimentary. Sadism lusted after the innocent, the duped. It festered like puss as countless millions were murdered or starved. That’s what happens, according to Dostoyevsky, when people forget that “without God, anything is permitted”. The man who planted Marty Landis in the womb knew that but sinned anyway. He never killed, but would do so at the drop of a hat, a wink of the eye if ordered. Anthony Scallini was a good soldier, a potential killer, a killing machine like the boy who grew from his seed within the loins of a woman who bore his namesake, hers and Anthony’s, who married within their faiths, the fathers of their fathers from the land of Garibaldi and, later, Mussolini. It was a fated land that wanted an empire back, an empire that had nurtured a “west” that would falter and rise when least expected.
Marty Landis burst onto the scene in that drab, lack-luster public hospital in Chicago’s downtown. The woman who bore him was aloof and alone, the wife of a mobster serving time in Joliet prison, a man who took the proverbial “rap” as Chicago’s mobsters called it. Two years prior to the birth he was sentenced to five years. Outside two worlds faced off at one another and threatened to annihilate one another while an eight pound boy emerged cold, frightened and alone to the obdurate and impersonal neon and stale paint that started to crack on the walls of the maternity ward.
In 1951 Marty Landis burst in to the world from a woman named Stephanie Scallini, her first and only child. He arrived during the dog days of summer, the tepid, steamy summer that bore down on a people not used to brutal heat, but willing to persevere regardless: a stoic and resilient people used to extremes – especially the winters. They, like their Russian counterparts, kept going regardless. And so would Marty Landis.
Outside those walls lived the appeasers seeking to buy time, to hold off the inevitable. The Bolshevik Bear had been appeased by Hitler and then attacked, something Stalin refused to believe until the Nazi’s could see Moscow through their binoculars. Stalin, not unlike Chamberlain, the former Prime Minister of England and the man who held up a piece of paper with Hitler’s signature of assurance that his appetite had been satiated, had been duped along with the rest of the world. Others would be duped, then and later. Steffani Scallini was a dupe, as she vowed to love, honor and, then, obey. She was a child of the world depression, a time when eyes were large, and appetites larger than what could be satisfied, an austere world that was “tapped out”. The war came when she just eight. Like everybody else in her apartment building she didn’t know where Pearl Harbor was. But war somehow brought a prosperity no one saw coming, In five years money was in the bank, all the banks, by so many since so little could be bought due to rationing. But in 1945 the nightmare for so many others was slowly coming to end only to reappear quickly once the guns fell silent on May 8th, 1945. Before dropping dead America’s Lord Protector died of a cerebral hemorrhage. Roosevelt was a don, a political don who confided to his aids that he knew how to “deal with that old buzzard” referring to Stalin and his ambitions in Eastern Europe. But in April, only weeks before the May 8th armistice, nobody knew if his promulgation was nothing more than bravado. The “buzzard” was loose, but not for long.
As the armies of the east and west raced across Germany they stumbled upon what looked like internment camps. One was near the German town of a Buchanwald. Expecting to find British and American POW’s, the American liberators gazed in shock at the emaciated bodies of people later identified as the intelligentsia and leadership personnel from all over occupied Europe, the wretched refuse arrested by the Gestapo. The Russians came across another such camp, in Poland, near the city of Auschwitz. What they witnessed would forever haunt those who survived the vicious street fighting that took place from Vienna to Berlin as Americans and Russians linked up at the Elbe River on April 27, 1945. The US 1st Army under General Hodges and the 1st Ukrainian Army under Marshall Koneff shook hands as the two split Hitler’s Reich into two lifeless parts. A year later Winston Churchill addressed a crowd of Americans in their heartland. The erudite Englishman knew what Stalin was all about.
“From Stretin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the continent of Europe.”
Critics of Churchill both in Britain and the United States took exception to the former PM’s statement claiming Russia and the West “had a lot to learn from each other”.
As was the usual case, many would have to learn “the hard way”. And they did, and would have, were it not for the birth of a baby boy named Marty Landis and the “girl next door” named Rossina Riasnovsky.
They were two souls destined to meet, flee, and come together later, later at a pivotal point in the history of the girl’s native land. Though she was not born there, her heart and soul remained. The heart was American. The DNA and the soul were Russian.
Like the fissionable atom itself, she and that boy were destined to collide.
They would collide at the worst possible time, in the worst possible place.
They would collide in one of many man made Hells on earth.
Chapter Two
How did Marty Landis come to be? Like so many in a land claiming to be conservative and mainstream there were secrets, secrets that are born when restraint is cast aside. And this secret started on the job. Stephanie Scallini met a mobster and loved him. She would get back at him with a rendezvous with a rogue. Within her she bore and nurtured a future spy within the womb for all to see while doing something unheard of – working while “carrying”. She had the flowers, the proposals, the ring, the wedding date, the “I do” and the cake. Then came the arrest---the arrest of her husband, two years ago, before the seed was planted.
Illinois Bell Telephone had grown like a monster during “the war”. It had to. Millions of men were conscripted to fight “the war” and communication was needed to handle the comings and goings of those millions of servicemen traversing from point A to point B. In the winter of 1950 the staff and management of the Northside branch of Chicago’s Bell Telephone office on the corner of Broadway and Hollywood Avenue had gathered for a New Years Eve Party. A week ago they had their Christmas bash. On the wall was a drawing of a stork with a baby dangling from its beak, the year 1951 etched on its diaper.
At a remote corner of the room Stephanie and her supervisor, a man ten years older than her, broke away from his adoring wife and maneuvered towards another part of the office where a door led to a supply room. As they stealthily made their way there a man was heard talking to a group of people.
“Can you believe how Truman pulled that off!”
The group had gathered to “smoke and joke”, a common GI parlance of the time since so many GI’s had returned home five years ago.
“Don’t tell me you had your money on Dewey,” another man shouted from the food table nearby after overhearing their conversation.
As the employees feasted on the spread laid out for them the man and woman maneuvered discreetly inside the darkened room. They clearly wanted to feast on “something else”. Outside another woman in her mid-forties entered the political conversation.
“I heard the Tribune had lots of job openings after that SNAFU! You’d think they’d at least wait until the polls closed.” She was referring to the Chicago Tribune, the “World’s Greatest Newspaper” that had mistakenly declared victory for Thomas Dewey before the final tally in the 1948 race against Harry Truman. One man reached for a bag he brought with him. He took out an original copy of the paper and held it up for all to see.
“DEWEY WINS!” It read, as everybody burst out in laughter. “I kept one. Talk about a souvenir.”
Inside the small supply room the two nestled together as he pinned her against the door and proceeded to put his arms around her.
“It’ll be midnight soon,” he purred as he started to unbutton her blouse. The two kissed passionately as he placed his hand under her bra to feel her ample bosom – hard and erect they way he liked women.
“I don’t know if I want to wait that long,” the woman cooed with every caress.
“You can read minds too? What other talents do you have?” The man proceeded to fondle the woman between her legs as she arched her head back and nestled her chest against his. She undid his belt allowing his pants to fall. The two then turned towards one another and proceeded to have intercourse from standing position. The crowd outside counted down to midnight.
“Is the door locked? We don’t want anybody walking in.” The woman moaned slightly as the man fondled her breast.
“Yeah, like my wife,” the man whispered as a surge of feeling took hold of him signaling the arrival of climax. Outside a woman wandered around looking for someone, apparently her husband – the man inside the room who, along with his lover, was oblivious to everything.
“Especially your wife,” the woman moaned,” who you’re going to leave, right?”
“Yes, Stephanie,” the man replied as he caught his breath as the crowd outside counted down.
“Three, two, one HAPPY NEW YEAR!”
In tandem with the shouting outside the adulterers screamed out as both arrived. It was perfect timing. When they were done they just held on to one another before he “withdrew”. Stephanie just stared forward and wondered when the man she thought loved her was going to tell his wife it was over. Stephanie wanted to live with a man, to be with and provide for a man. That’s the way it was then.
During the war women entered the workforce in record numbers. They had to in order to defeat the maniacal, the Nazi’s and their Samurai counterparts who were bent on world dominance. The men were gone and the assembly line needed workers. Women answered the call as the money flowed like water into their paychecks to construct an arsenal – the arsenal of Democracy. When the war ended many soldiers attended school on the GI Bill of Rights. Their wives and sweethearts continued to work in other industries in order to shore up those manufacturing jobs for the men who didn’t want to go to school just yet, or not at all. Many supported their husbands who attended college, or they both worked to save up for the accoutrements needed for a home. The phone-company was an industry that hired many of those women in need of “supplemental income”. That was the job Stephanie Scallini, the “other woman”, did at the Chicago office. She, and others like Frances Landis, became the first voice one heard whenever someone dialed 0 for operator on those big, black rotary phones that were being manufactured in mass once war industries were re-tooled. Stephanie hoped for a miracle. She didn’t get pregnant with Tony those first months after their marriage and wasn’t with child when the police came to arrest him.
Eight months passed quickly. Stephanie Scallini, the quiet woman, was showing. It was odd to see a woman pregnant and working. Usually it was due to a soldier who never returned or a wife who bore his child before he shipped out and was stuck in a zone of occupation, the chess-board where American and Russian knights and pawns jousted over territory, each move calculated to deter the other.
“So Stephanie,” Frances Landis inquired. “Will you and your husband be attending the company picnic this weekend?”
Stephanie knew the baby belonged to the man whose name appeared on the door. His name was Floyd Blanchard, the Operations Manager. Everybody assumed Stephanie was married. No one knew of the affair. Stephanie was able to deliver a ruse to the curious, one that involved a fictitious husband who worked odd hours hinting it was “sensitive work” for a government agency. Stephanie smiled nervously and gazed at her friend as the deceit continued.
“Uh, no,” Stephanie said being evasive. “I want to be home in case---in case the water breaks. But thanks anyway Fran.”
“Well,” Frances replied. “We have a car. And the picnic is in Grant Park which is closer to Cook County Hospital than where you live.”
Stephanie thought fast. She smiled and told her she would talk to “Joe” which was the name she pulled out of the air. She told her she needed his permission.
“Great!” Frances replied. “Now maybe we’ll finally meet your hubby. The way you’ve kept him such a secret we thought he was Oppenheimer or some other nuclear highbrow!”
“It’s his work! It keeps him busy. I’ll talk to him,” Stephanie assured her friend. She got up to go to the bathroom as Floyd, the manager and the man who got her in a “motherly way”, peeked out from behind the door to his office. Stephanie said nothing to him from the moment she knew. She just assumed he would “do the right thing” now that she was “with child”; his child, or so she thought. She waited for a response, a decision. She waited as so many would wait. Little did she know Floyd applied for a transfer to another office in another city. He headed west as she headed for the delivery room at Cook County hospital, the only person with her being her mother whom she lived with. She never made it to the company picnic. A baby boy would come in to the world with more questions than answers. A boy who was destined to make history – the accidental soldier-spy who would become a congressman and then, once the new maniacs arrived on the scene, President of the United States only it was no accident: heat seeking missiles are not an accident.
It was a normal delivery as deliveries go. Doctors fresh from the front lines of Europe and Asia were packed in to the hospitals to handle the massive “baby-boom” that was sweeping the country. Stephanie was there with yet another story along with another alias. The admission attendant accepted her new story about the mystery husband as Stephanie was ordered to give “one more push”.
“OK Mrs. Marino! One more push! One more!”
The doctor was patient with Mrs. Scallini, a.k.a. Mrs. Marino, as she contorted in pain by doing what she was told to do. Soon the telltale sound of life was heard.
“We have a boy, Mrs. Marino. A beautiful boy!”
Like an artist unveiling a prized sculpture the doctor bragged as he took the infant and placed him on Stephanie’s chest, severing the umbilical cord as she lay exhausted and distant. Stephanie forced a smile, one that was faked to deter suspicions. Stephanie was a good actress. This was the first of numerous “academy award” performances. The nurses attending to her patted her on the shoulder.
“Don’t worry HON! Red Cross will locate your soldier boy husband. If they don’t, I’ll get Harry Truman to personally hunt him down for you.”
Stephanie gazed at the life she brought in to the world and then looked away with an odd blend of anger coupled with relief. She bore a son who was destined to make history.
Two days later Stephanie was working “the script” as she argued with the clerk in the admissions office.
“No! Really!” She bantered. “My husband is in Berlin! With the army of occupation!”
“Mrs. Marino, I used this service number. Red Cross has no James Marino listed. You sure the number is correct?”
The clerk was an older woman in her fifties. On her desk draped with black cloth was the picture of an airman, an officer, next to a B-29. Obviously he was one of many who never made it back. Stephanie took the clipboard and checked it.
“Let me see it again. Oh God I’m sorry! The last three are 536 not 563. That’s my fault.” The attendant nodded slightly and returned to her room.
“His last three are 536, not 563! You’re sure Hon? OK! I’ll try again.”
The female attendant returned and picked up the phone. She needed confirmation of active duty status in order to have the bill taken care of by the Army. Suddenly, Stephanie’s eyes were drawn to the blank birth certificate and other documents bearing her fake name. Everything was on the counter. She waited for the attendant to return to her office and lift the phone before lifting the papers and racing out of the hospital with the baby. Stephanie was gone in a split second as the attendant hung up and returned.
“Mrs. Marino! Red Cross can’t locate anyone under---Mrs. Marino? Mrs. Marino?”
The attendant looked around. Stephanie was gone. That evening Stephanie nursed the baby with a bottle. Her mother, a woman in her 60’s, stood nearby with a note in her hand and a worried look on her face.
“It’s a letter from the parole board. Anthony will be out in two weeks.” Stephanie gazed up with a look of absolute dread.
“The end of the month? Oh Momma? What do I do? He doesn’t know---about---him!”
Stephanie looked down at the nursing infant as the mother gazed outside their window from their second floor apartment in an area of Chicago west of downtown or “the Loop” as it was called. Her mother’s demeanor turned very serious.
“You know what you have to do! You have to give up that baby,” she insisted.
“Adoption? But they’ll ask questions. Lots of questions,” Stephanie replied.
The newborn gazed off after finishing his bottle. Stephanie glanced at him with a cold look of detachment. Suddenly, her mother raised the possibility of an out.