“Did they say why?”
“They told Major Wallace it concerned a matter of national security they were not authorized to share with him.”
“Let me talk to him.”
“He’s not here. After he told them to get the fuck out of his office, and they did, he got in the Admiral and left.”
“Where did he go?”
“If I told you that, the FBI would know, too. You can probably guess where he went.”
One of two places, Cronley thought.
Either Kloster Grünau to warn me. Or the Farben Building to see Mattingly.
Cronley was silent a moment.
“Freddy, if they’ve tapped your phone,” he said, finally, “the FBI will know you’ve told me all this.”
“So what? They can’t do anything about that. If they say anything, they’re admitting they tapped this telephone line. They’re not authorized to tap it, and I know that, and they know that I know that.”
“Under those circumstances, I suppose I could safely say something myself, couldn’t I? Like, ‘FBI agent eavesdropping on this private conversation, go fuck yourself!’”
“That wasn’t very smart,” Hessinger said.
“No. It was, however, satisfying. And on that cheerful note, I will say goodbye, Special Agent Hessinger.”
“No. Not yet. There’s more.”
“What?”
“Mrs. Colonel Schumann wants her Leica camera back.”
“What Leica?”
“The one she says she left in the Kapitän when you took her to the bahnhof to meet her husband the colonel.”
“I know nothing about a Leica.”
“She says you have to have it. She’s so sure you have it that she didn’t go to Frankfurt this morning with the colonel. She says she wants it back before she gets on the train to Frankfurt at four-forty.”
“She’s still at the hotel?”
“Waiting for you to give back her Leica.”
That’s not what she’s waiting for.
“You call Mrs. Schumann, tell her I’m in Berlin, that I don’t have her goddamned Leica, and that I will get in touch with her as soon as possible.”
“I would rather not do that.”
“That wasn’t a suggestion.”
“Would it bother you if I told you that sometimes I like you less than I do at other times?”
“Not at all. Goodbye, Special Agent Hessinger.”
—