“Herr Brigadeführer,” Cronley said as he and the priest approached Heimstadter’s bed, “I hate to tell you this, but you look like a beached whale.”
When it looked as if McKenna was going to leave the room, Heimstadter called, “Please stay, Father.”
“What did you do,” Cronley pursued, moving to the head of the bed in order to meet Heimstadter’s eyes, “jump into the shower before testing the water?”
“You know very well what happened.”
“What’s on your mind?”
“If I stay in the prison, I’m going to be killed.”
Cronley nodded. “Quite probably.”
“If you agree, with Father McKenna as my witness, that you will transfer me some place I’ll be safe, I’ll give you information you will find valuable.”
“First, I get you transferred and then you give me that valuable information? As in the sun will rise tomorrow?”
“The information I will provide will allow you to arrest four—possibly more—Odessa officers, each of whom almost certainly has far more information regarding the location of von Dietelburg and Burgdorf than you do. You will also be able to seize a considerable amount of Odessa’s assets.”
“I’m having trouble believing my good fortune,” Cronley said. “And believing you.”
“Once we get through stage one—once, in other words, that you will be forced to accept that I’m telling the truth—I’d like to go to stage two, revisiting our conversation about Argentina.”
Cronley was silent, then said, “Getting you moved to some other place will take at least two or three days. What I will do immediately is post a couple of MPs in here. Okay?”
Heimstadter considered that for a minute, then the whole of his body seemed to go limp, his head dropping to the pillow. He sighed as he nodded.
“Approximately six kilometers to the north of Castle Wewelsburg,” he said, “there is a small complex of buildings surrounded by several hundred acres of farmland. It was formerly the Experimental Farm of the Ministry of Agriculture. The complex is currently being run as a farm under the supervision of your military government.”
He raised his head, and went on. “Somewhere on that farmland is a building built in secrecy by the SS when the castle was being renovated. The building today appears deserted, damaged in the war. But under it is the complex of rooms originally designed to work with the castle.”
This sounds like pure bullshit, Cronley thought, his eyes locked on Heimstadter’s.
So why am I believing it?
He said, “And . . . ?”
“And there are at least four—and possibly, probably, as many as six—Odessa officers living there.”
“And nobody has seen them? Come on, Heimstadter!”
“They are hiding in plain sight, as the expression goes, working on the farm. Driving tractors, trucks, et cetera. One of your warrant officers—his name is Wynne—is glad to have them. The remote location of the farm makes it difficult to hire the local farmworkers, and these men are good workers.”
“Warrant Officer Wynne?”
“He’s the American in charge. There are half a dozen other American soldiers on the place.”
“How do you know all this?” Cronley said.
Stupid question. He’s not going to tell me how he learned.
They pass messages—and other contraband, like cyanide—in and out of this Compound like it’s a post office. Even Morty Cohen can’t stop it, and God knows he tries hard.
The look on Heimstadter’s face showed that he, too, thought it was a stupid question.
He said, “What the farm is, Captain Cronley, is a splendid example of what can happen when the victorious Americans and the defeated Germans put the war behind them and cooperate.”
I’d like to kick that flabby white ass of yours from here to Berlin.