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“I needed to talk to you. I told you that.”

“Jimmy, I have to get out of here,” von Wachtstein said.

“I was going to give you a letter to give Clete . . .”

“Something wrong with the SIGABA?”

“. . . saying something I didn’t want anybody with SIGABA access to see. I ran out of time, so I need you to pass it verbally.”

“Jesus! What the hell are you up to?”

“As soon as you get to Buenos Aires, get Clete alone and tell him this. Tell him exactly this. Memorize it.”

“I’ll write it down.”

“No. Just memorize it.”

Von Wachtstein’s eyebrows went up as he nodded.

“Okay. What’s the message?”

“That I am not going to obey any order to turn over the Likharevs to the Russians, even if that means I’ll have to spend the rest of my life in Leavenworth.”

“What’s Leavenworth?”

“The Army prison. It’s in Kansas.”

“Mein Gott, you’re serious, aren’t you, Jimmy?”

“Yeah. I’m serious. I’m just not going to do it.”

“So they’ll get somebody else to do it. Have you considered that?”

“Another sentence for you to repeat to Clete: ‘And I will do my best to fuck up any transfer by anybody, and I mean anybody, else.’”

“I don’t know if you’re stupid or noble. My father did the noble thing and got himself hung from a butcher’s hook.”

“As far as I know, the intelligence community doesn’t use butcher’s hooks.”

“You do something like this, they’ll come up with something.”

“Just do what I’m asking, Hansel, please.”

Von Wachtstein looked into Cronley’s eyes for a moment.

“How long are you going to be at the Glienicke Bridge?” von Wachtstein asked.

“I don’t know. Serov said he’d show us Colonel Mattingly at nine o’clock.”

“After that, you’re going back to Munich?”

“On the eleven-o’clock courier flight to Rhine-Main. Presuming the weather lets the plane get out of here. Otherwise, I’ll have to drive.”

“All of you?”

“Just me. Mannberg and Ostrowski need to be here in case I can’t get back in time for Serov to put Mattingly on display tomorrow. The sonofabitch will expect to see at least one of us.”

“When you finish at the bridge, get to Tempelhof as quick as you can. I’ll hold off taking off as long as I can. With a little bit of luck, you can ride with me to Rhine-Main.”