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“He say what he wants?”

“He sounded pissed.”

—

“Major Wallace, Fulda. I have Mr. Cronley on the line. The line is secure.”

“Put him through.”

“You’re connected with Major Wallace, Mr. Cronley. The line is secure.”

“Let me guess,” Cronley said, without any preliminaries. “You need a ride to Frankfurt to see if you can help find Mattingly.”

“I had Kurt Schröder fly me up here at first light,” Wallace said, “expecting to see you. What the hell are you doing at the monastery?”

“Max just showed Lazarus the Buenos Aires pictures. Janice thinks they got to him.”

“General Seidel was going to hold a conference at 0900.”

“Past tense?”

“He’s postponed it until you can get here.”

“Please express my regrets to General Seidel and tell him I am not available.”

“I tried that. He wants you there.”

“Did he say why?”

“No.”

“I don’t want to go. I really have other things to do.”

“Get back in your airplane and get your ass up here.”

“That sounds like an order, Major, sir.”

“Thirteen-thirty, Seidel’s office in the Farben Building. Be there. Break it down, Fulda.”

[ TWO ]

Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff, Intelligence

Headquarters, European Command

The I.G. Farben Building

Frankfurt am Main

American Zone of Occupation,

Germany

1335 27 January 1946

Cronley considered, and decided against, walking into Major General Bruce T. Seidel’s office, popping to attention, saluting, and announcing, “Reporting as ordered. Sir.”

Not that it would make Seidel forget that he was a captain, but rather in the hope that it would make the European Command G-2 remember that he was chief, DCI-Europe, and DCI-Europe was not a subordinate command of the European Command.