Cronley shut down the engine and opened the window.
Schröder, smiling, made a gesture with his hand demonstrating Cronley’s last-second efforts to line up with the runway.
“I was thinking we might need a windsock,” Cronley said.
“I think that’s a very good idea.”
“On the way to Sonthofen, why don’t you tell Sergeant Dunwiddie here how to make one?”
“Why don’t you tell Tedworth how to make one,” Dunwiddie challenged, “while Herr Schröder and I are bouncing down the bumpy roads in the dark?”
“Because as an officer I am dedicated to preserving the privileges of rank,” Cronley said piously.
Dunwiddie smiled and shook his head.
“Speaking of officers,” he said, “Mattingly called. I didn’t think you wanted him to know what you were really doing, Charles Lindbergh, so I told him you were off in a jeep somewhere, and I would have you call him when you got back. That was about an hour ago.”
“Okay. Thanks. I’ll call him. Have a nice ride.”
I’ll call him after I see the Russian NKGB agent.
He nodded and smiled at Schröder, then in a loud voice called out “Clear!” and started the engine. He taxied back down the runway to where a dozen soldiers were waiting to push the Storch off the runway and out of sight.
—
Cronley found Mannberg in the officers’ mess bar. He was reading Stars and Stripes, the U.S. Army newspaper, over a cup of coffee.
Cronley sat beside him and said, “When you’re through with the Stripes, I’d like to see the NKGB agent.”
“Of course,” Mannberg replied, and laid the newspaper down.
Cronley could see that Mannberg was unhappy.
“I don’t want to interfere in any way with your interrogation,” Cronley said. “I just want to see him.”
“May I ask why?”
“I think I should.”
“Of course,” Mannberg said, and stood.
As they walked out of the bar, Cronley saw the zipper jacket Lieutenant Colonel Wilson had given him. It was hanging from a peg by the door.
Schröder must’ve left it there—returning it to me—when he came back from Sonthofen. It still has the Liaison Pilot’s wings.
To which neither of us is entitled.
Cronley took the jacket and put it on as they walked to what had once been the monastery’s chapel.
At least it’ll cover my captain’s bars, and if I speak German, the NKGB guy will think I’m another German.
Why is that important?
Because, on the rank totem pole, a U.S. Army captain is far down from Gehlen and Mannberg.
Unless he already knows Kloster Grünau is being run by me. Which he probably does.
Which means—Tiny’s people grabbed him before I returned from the States with my brand-new captain’s bars—that if he does know who I am, he thinks I’m a second lieutenant, which is really at the bottom of that totem pole.