“When you get to Munich, and start making reports to me, keep in mind that Colonel Mattingly is not in the loop.”
“That bad, huh?”
“I am presuming you are telling me that you will have no problems in Munich working for Captain Cronley?”
“I will try very hard to be a very good boy in Munich.”
“Think Major Hammersmith, Jack.”
“It will be foremost in my mind, sir. How do I get to Munich? That’s a long haul in a jeep.”
“Leave your jeep here. I’ll see that it gets back to Marburg. What happens now is that after Major Wallace tells General Bull about this shooting, which is probably happening right now, he and General Gehlen will come here and have a look at you.
“Presuming you remember to think Colonel Wallace, don’t break wind, and you pass their muster, the three of you will go out to Eschborn. There, Gehlen and Wallace will get in their Storch.”
“They have a Storch?”
“DCI-Europe has two of them. The one they’ll be in will be piloted by a guy who used to fly Gehlen around the steppes of Russia in one.”
“A German?”
Greene nodded.
“Now a special agent of DCI. Major Wallace and Mr. Gehlen of the Süd-Deutsche Industrielle Entwicklungsorganisation.”
“The South German Industrial Development Organization?” Hammersmith made the translation. “Which is what?”
“What we are now calling what used to be Abwehr Ost. They will be flown to a village about twenty miles from Munich, Pullach, which is now the organization’s headquarters. You will follow in an L-4 that the U.S. Constabulary has generously provided. Have a good time in Munich, Jack.”
“I appreciate this, Homer. Thank you.”
“No thanks required. I was asked to provide my best CIC agent. I have done so.”
“Nevertheless, thanks, Homer.”
“You’re welcome, Jack. Now don’t embarrass me.”
[ FOUR ]
Suite 507
Hotel Vier Jahreszeiten
Maximilianstrasse 178
Munich, American Zone of Occupation, Germany
0815 24 January 1946
Cronley came out of the corridor into the office. He was wearing ODs with triangles.
“I thought you’d still be in bed,” he said to Claudette, who was sitting, in triangled pinks and greens, at her desk. “You all right?”
“Under the circumstances.”
“Wallace and the general won’t be here until nine-thirty or later.”
“Later. The major called just now. They’re about to take off from Eschborn.”