Death at Nuremberg (Clandestine Operations 4)

“Did you see Janice Johansen’s story in Stars and Stripes?” Dunwiddie asked. “They caught a full bird chaplain in Heidelberg getting regular shipments of Bibles and other religious materials that turned out to be coffee and silk stockings.”

“I saw it,” Casey said. “That was pretty despicable for a man of God.”

“Well, look at the bright side,” Cronley said. “After his general court-martial, he can save souls in Leavenworth.”

“Some fräuleins will spread their legs for a couple of Hershey bars,” Ostrowski said. “Others command a higher price for their services. Do you know if any of the sergeants or the others have higher-priced girlfriends?”

“I’ve only been there a couple of days, Mr. Ostrowski. I’ve been looking for things like that, but so far . . .”

“Casey, you are a bona fide spook now. Marching in the footsteps of our leader, Super Spook. You can call me Max.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Super Spook Junior, you’re doing a great job,” Cronley said. “Keep it up, and for Christ’s sake, watch your back. We’re dealing—you’re dealing—with some nasty sonsofbitches.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And on that cheerful note, let’s get you to the Bahnhof. Unless somebody has something else?”

No one did.

[FIVE]

The Prison

The International Tribunal Compound

Nuremberg, American Zone of Occupation, Germany

0750 27 February 1946

Luther Stauffer was sitting on his bed when Cronley walked into his cell.

“Wie geht’s, Cousin Luther? Looking forward to another day of staring at the walls?”

“Leck mich am Arsch!”

“‘Kiss my ass’ is language unbefitting a Sturmführer. Shame on you. What would Brigadeführer von Dietelburg think?”

Stauffer didn’t reply.

“How’s the food? Did the powdered egg omelet you had for breakfast make you homesick for Strasbourger cuisine?”

“Geh zur Hölle!”

“Unless I reform my sinful ways, going to hell is a distinct possibility for me. You going there isn’t a possibility, it’s a sure thing. As is your spending the next fifteen to twenty years staring at the walls of your cell.”

Stauffer just looked at him.

“

Luther, Hitler is dead. The oath you took to him no longer has any meaning. Himmler is also dead. He took the coward’s way out. He chose to bite on a cyanide capsule.”

“Better to die at one’s own hand, Cousin James, than to let the Jews and their lackeys hang you. Lackeys like you.”

“I don’t think he was worried about being hung. Everybody dies. I almost died a couple of days ago. It was close. Elfriede and her father almost killed me. But they didn’t. Elfriede’s dead. Her father and mother are still alive, and while they stare at the walls of their prison cells for the next twenty years or so, they’ll have plenty of time to wonder if sacrificing their only daughter on the altar of Himmler’s phony religion was worth it.

“Your idol, Luther, Reichsführer SS Himmler, didn’t bite that capsule because he was afraid of being hung. What he was afraid of was being locked in a cage for the next twenty years while people laughed at him. He was far more afraid of public humiliation than dying.”