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“No, sir. But I want to send a message to the cardinal.”

“What sort of message?”

McKenna paused before replying, then said, “I want to tell him that the situation is even worse than Cronley presented it.”

“Castle Wewelsburg got to you, did it?”

“It’s made its impression, yes, but not as much as my conversation with Brigadeführer Heimstadter.”

“How so?”

“It took me some time, General, to accept that he’s perfectly willing, maybe even eager, to be a martyr to this new religion and the Thousand-Year Reich. He’s an intelligent man. One would think that after all that’s happened—Hitler’s suicide, Goebbels and his wife murdering their children before committ

ing suicide themselves, the defect of the Wehrmacht, the unconditional surrender, the utter destruction of Berlin, all of that—that he’d at least begin to question what good his suicide could do the cause. That’s what I find really dangerous. How many more are there like him? Intelligent, educated, competent—and clearly out of their minds?”

“More than I like to think, I’m afraid, Father. And you want to tell the cardinal this?”

“I want to get that message to Cardinal von Hassburger soonest. But I don’t want to telephone, as I’m convinced Odessa has people listening. So, what I’m going to do is find someone in Nuremberg’s Jesuit community who’ll carry what I have to say to Rome verbally.”

“Sure, you can ride along with us,” White said. “Okay, Super Spook, let’s go.”

As they crossed the courtyard, White’s aide and then the two teenage bodyguards struggled to their feet, obviously determined to go where he was going despite their feeling ill.

“Cronley,” White ordered, “tell them they’re not going.”

“With respect, sir, no. I have a rule about not breaking hearts.”

“You are one difficult sonofabitch. Did anyone ever tell you that?”

“Yes, sir. But I didn’t believe them.”

* * *

—

Several minutes later, they drove off in the Horch, its top folded down and with both the front and rear seat windshields also folded down.

Cronley was at the wheel. White sat beside him. In the rear, the general’s aide and Father McKenna rode regally in the leather-upholstered rear seat, while the general’s bodyguards rode uncomfortably in the jump seats.

[THREE]

Office of the Chief U.S. Prosecutor

International Tribunal Compound

Nuremberg, American Zone of Occupation, Germany

1710 27 April 1946

“Why do I get the feeling that this isn’t a social call?” Justice Jackson said as White, Cronley, and McKenna entered his office. “And what is that sickening smell?”

“First things first, Mr. Justice,” White replied. “Father McKenna needs to contact the Jesuit community in Nuremberg and doesn’t know the most expeditious manner to find it. I’ve assured him if anyone knows, you do.”

“I don’t have a clue,” Jackson said as he walked to the window and opened it. He took in a deep breath of the outdoor air.

“That won’t work,” White said. “The stench clings to you.”

Jackson acted as if he hadn’t heard.