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“You heard what I just said to Chauncey? About curiosity?”

“What’s that all about?” she repeated.

“I won’t tell her, Captain. You may if you wish.”

“Ma’am, it’s a replenishment of my—the DCI’s—operating funds.”

“In other words, you’re not going to tell me?”

“He just did. Told you all he can,” General White said. “And while we’re on the subject of Admiral Souers, Captain Cronley, he told me of your role in getting done what Colonel Mattingly was unable to do—get Chauncey his commission. Thank you.”

“No thanks necessary, sir.”

“And on that subject, where is Bob Mattingly?”

No one replied.

White looked at Cronley.

“What is it about Colonel Mattingly that you’re not telling me, Captain?”

“I don’t know where he is, sir. I presume he’s in his office in the Farben Building.”

“But he wasn’t at Rhine-Main, and he’s not on the train. Is he, Paul?”

“Not so far as I know, General.”

“Okay. Chauncey, who told you to be at Rhine-Main?”

“Captain Cronley.”

“Captain Cronley—and you are warned, I’m already weary of playing Twenty Questions—who told you when we were arriving at Rhine-Main?”

“Colonel Wilson, sir.”

“And why do you suppose he told you that?”

“Sir, I told Colonel Wilson I needed ten minutes of your time, and he suggested that if Tiny . . . Captain Dunwiddie and I met your plane, I might be able to get it.”

“There’s a protocol for getting ten minutes of my time. You get in touch with my aide-de-camp and ask for an appointment, whereupon he schedules one. Is there some reason you couldn’t do that?”

Cronley didn’t immediately respond.

“And Colonel Wilson is damned well aware of that protocol.”

He looked at his watch.

“There’s no time now. I’m due at my festive lunch. But as soon as that’s over, get Hotshot Billy in here, and we’ll get to the bottom of this.”

“Yes, sir,” his senior aide said.

“What this looks like to me, Captain Cronley, is that you tried to use my personal relationship with Captain Dunwiddie to get around established procedures. I find that despicable. And, so far as you’re concerned, Chauncey . . .”

“Uncle Isaac, Cronley doesn’t have time for your established procedures,” Dunwiddie said.

“What did you say?” White demanded.

“I said, ‘Uncle Isaac, Cronley doesn’t have time—’”