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“What do mean?”

“Who told you somebody poured boiling water on Heimstadter? What the hell were you doing, Brewster, hoping to catch me with my hand in the cookie jar?”

“Enough!” Jackson said, softly but angrily. He let that sink in and then turned to Cronley. “Okay, Jim, what were you up to with Heimstadter?”

“I offered him a deal. He gives us Burgdorf, von Dietelburg, and/or the Odessa money and he gets to go to Argentina.”

“You had no right to propose such a thing! They’re to be properly tried here in court,” Brewster said, righteously indignant. Then, realizing he had overstepped his authority, he looked at Jackson and said, “Am I right, sir?”

“Ken,” Jackson said, evenly, smiling at his aide who had been top of his class at Yale and who he considered a brilliant lawyer. “Jim was simply following the Hotshot Billy Principle.”

Jackson and White exchanged smiles.

“Excuse me, sir?” Brewster asked, confused.

Jackson said, “‘If you need permission to do something that you’re absolutely sure is right, and know your superior is going to tell you no, do it anyway. Success earns forgiveness.’ Or words to that effect.”

“I gather Heimstadter rejected your offer?” White said.

“Yes, sir. Cold. But I gave Father McKenna another shot at it.”

“And?”

“Cold. Frighteningly cold,” McKenna said.

White nodded. “That was, of course, before somebody poured boiling water on him. But if he turned down your offer, Cronley, why would anyone be angry?”

“When we returned him from the Mansion to the prison, we put him alone in the backseat of the Nazimobile and took him on a tour of Nuremberg. Somebody with access to boiling water must have seen him.”

“Isn’t that dirty pool?” Jackson asked.

“On the contrary, I think it was a fine idea,” White said. “I thought so at the time, and now that he’s asked for Father McKenna, I believe it a brilliant idea.”

White turned to McKenna.

“Father, if your message to the cardinal can wait, how about going to see why Heimstadter wants to talk to you?”

[FOUR]

Prison Dispensary

International Tribunal Compound

Nuremberg, American Zone of Occupation, Germany

1935 27 April 1946

A prison guard sat uncomfortably in a folding metal chair in a corner of the room, holding his nightstick in both hands. SS-Brigadeführer Ulrich Heimstadter was lying naked on his stomach in a hospital bed. He was swathed in greasy-looking bandages from just below his neck to his upper buttocks.

“I heard what happened,” Father McKenna said as he walked into the room. “How are you? How are they treating you?”

“I’m in agony,” Heimstadter said.

“Are they giving you anything for the pain?”

“I refused the injection. I wanted my mind clear when I talked to you.”

“What’s on your mind, Ulrich?”