“Any ideas on how you’re going to do that?”
“I’m headed into Nuremberg. Do you want to tag along?”
“What are we going to do in Nuremberg?”
“Try something I admit is desperate.”
[TWO]
“This is a magnificent automobile,” Father McKenna said as they cruised in the Horch Sport Cabriolet with its canvas top folded down. “I have never been in one.”
“I liked it better before Justice Jackson said he doesn’t care to ride in it because it makes him look like a Nazi big shot en route to a party rally.”
Cronley raised his right hand over his head and rotated it back and forth as if waving to the masses. The priest chuckled.
“That thought occurred to me, too. Where’d you get it?”
“It used to belong to a DCI colonel who got himself kidnapped by Serov. When I got him back, they sent him to the States, and I grabbed the car.”
“Why don’t you get rid of it?”
“That would be admitting I made a mistake. Like you Jesuits, I never admit to making a mistake.”
The priest ignored that.
“What are we going to do in Nuremberg?”
“We’re not going to do anything. I’m going to try to talk Justice Jackson into letting me take SS-Standartenführer Oskar Müller and SS-Brigadeführer Wilhelm Heimstadter out of their cells for a few days.”
Cronley looked at the priest as if trying to judge his reaction. When there was none, he said nothing.
Three minutes later—which seemed much longer—Father McKenna said, “I’m getting the impression that’s all you’re going to tell me. Can I get you to change your mind? Curiosity is killing me.”
“Okay. I don’t think it will work, but I’m going to make clear that their only chance to dodge the hangman—and instead win a trip to Argentina—is if they roll over on von Dietelburg and Burgdorf. I don’t expect them to, but I want to judge their reaction. To see if it’s as strong as it was the last time I offered them a deal.”
“Where are you going to put them when they’re out of their cells?”
“One of them I can stash in the Mansion—DCI headquarters—downtown. I don’t know about the other. Maybe put him in Strasbourg with my friend Colonel Jean-Paul Fortin.”
“Cronley, I’ve spent a lot of time in prisons.”
“I’m shocked! What did they get you for?”
“As a chaplain,” McKenna said, tiredly.
“And?”
“Cronley, if I offer an observation and then a suggestion, will you think about it before you immediately issue a withering opinion of it?”
“Have at it.”
“Prisoners have nothing to do all day and all night but think. As a result, they are usually able to outwit their guards. I’m not talking about escaping, obviously, but communicating with other prisoners, for example.”
“I’ve heard that, but so what?”
“Another thing I noticed is that prisoners don’t trust each other and are thus prone to suspect that prisoner A is a snitch, that prisoner B is getting special treatment for some nefarious reason, et cetera. Still with me?”
Cronley nodded.