“And then I thought it was probably Odessa. I think I’m getting close to von Dietelburg, and they know it.”
“Thank you,” Serov said.
“For what?”
“For believing me. I could see in your eyes that you do.”
Jesus!
“Say nighty-night to your pals, Adonis. It’s get-tucked-in time,” Janice Johansen said.
No one had seen her enter the bar.
“I was about to ask James to have dinner with us, Miss Johansen,” Serov said. “We’d love to have you join us.”
Janice gave him the finger.
“Why? So you could put cyanide in his soup? On your feet, Jimmy boy!”
Cronley stood up. Janice took his arm and propelled him toward the door.
The bodyguard followed them out of the bar.
XI
[ONE]
The Mansion
Offenbach Platz 101
Nuremberg, American Zone of Occupation, Germany
1005 25 February 1946
Brigadier General Homer P. Greene was sitting with Colonel Mortimer Cohen, Max Ostrowski, and Cronley in the sitting room of the Mansion, when Colonel Harold Wallace and another officer walked in.
“Good morning, General,” Wallace said.
Greene answered Wallace’s unspoken question. “I drove down last night. Morty thought talking about this over the phone was a bad idea.”
“Everybody knows everybody, right?” Wallace said.
“I don’t know this officer,” Cohen said.
“Sorry, this is Lieutenant Colonel Bill Conroy, my operations officer,” Wallace said. “Another OSS retread. We served together in London, then in France.”
The two shook hands.
“Congratulations, Cronley,” Conroy said. “You’re still alive. I just saw the Horch.”
“My bullet-ridden Horch, you mean? The one with all the blood on the upholstery?”
“I had it towed here,” Cohen said. “It was causing too much interest at the Palast.”
“What Palast?” Wallace asked.
“The Farber Palast. Where Cronley rests his weary head at night,” Greene said. “The chief of protection for Justice Jackson couldn’t be expected to sleep in a tawdry room in this tawdry dump.”