“Well, before we went to see him, we dropped the QM disguise. The captain and Hessinger put on triangles and the captain showed Fortin his CIC credentials.”
“Cut to the chase, Al,” Cronley ordered.
“It came out, after Fortin had played cute with us for a while, that he’d had people sitting on Cousin Luther’s house. And those people had told him about the 711th staff car and ambulance, so he’d called USFET and asked what it was. So Fortin asked if the captain could explain what he was doing in a vehicle with the markings of a nonexistent QM outfit.”
“Meaning your clever idea is now known to USFET?” Hammersmith asked.
“I asked him what USFET had told him,” Cronley said. “He told me that my secret was safe. So I showed him my DCI credentials, and he let me know he knew about the DCI, even when it had been formed. That told me Fortin was far more important than he wanted people to think. I think he’s a colonel, not a major.”
“I understand that happens from time to time,” Wallace said.
“So then he gets me Cousin Luther’s dossier,” Cronley said. “Which showed that shortly after the Germans came to Strasbourg, Luther joined the LVF—Légion des Volontaires Français. He was sent to Russia, won the Iron Cross, and got himself promoted to lieutenant. Later on, he was taken into the SS as a sturmführer—a captain.
“There was a photo of Cousin Luther in his sturmführer’s uniform”—Cronley pointed to the top of his head—“skull-and-crossbones insignia and all. He didn’t mention that in his letter to my mother.
“Anyway, Fortin said that Cousin Luther had next gone, near the end of the war, to the Waffen-Grenadier-Brigade der SS Charlemagne. Fortin said he thought it was likely Luther knew the war was lost, deserted the SS, made his way home to Strasbourg, and went into hiding.”
“Did this officer tell you why he gave you access to Herr Stauffer’s dossier?” Mannberg asked. “That seems a bit odd.”
“I thought so, so I asked, and Fortin said he was hoping the DCI was working on the Odessa Organization. He said he was almost as interested in Odessa as he was in dealing with collaborators.”
“Is Odessa for real?” Ziegler asked. “The story I’ve been getting is that it’s like those SS werewolves who were supposed to be around Obersalzberg prepared to die to the last man defending Hitler. Which was pure bullshit.”
“Unfortunately, Herr Ziegler,” Gehlen said, “Die Organisation der Ehemaligen SS-Angehörigen—the Organization of former German SS officers—is real, is efficient, and, in my opinion, is very dangerous.”
“That’s quite true,” Mannberg said. “But I wasn’t aware that the French were actively involved in doing anything about it. Did Commandant Fortin—”
“I don’t know about the French being interested, Colonel,” Cronley interrupted, “but I believe Fortin is, and he explained why. And his explanation explains why I think he’s a lot more important than he wants people to think he is.”
“And you’re going to explain to us that explanation, right?” Wallace said.
“I would be crushed to think you were making fun of me, Major, sir.”
“Perish the thought. Just get on with explaining the explanation, please, Captain Cronley.”
“Certainly, sir. I am always happy to explain things to people who have trouble understanding things.”
Hammersmith thought: The word is “sophomoric.”
But everybody, including Gehlen, is smiling. My God!
“You will be rewarded in heaven, Captain, if you do so,” Wallace said.
“Okay. Fortin is an armored officer, which of course sets him above officers in lesser services . . .”
“Okay, Jim. Enough,” Wallace said.
“. . . who was a captain at Saumur, the French cavalry school, when the war started. Then he was at Montcornet with de Gaulle. Freddy told us that was the only battle the Germans lost in France in 1940—”
“General Rommel,” Gehlen offered, “once told me, with admiration, that de Gaulle attacked with two hundred tanks and recaptured Caumont. And was stopped only when his tanks were taken out by Stukas.”
Cronley nodded thoughtfully, then went on: ?
?Fortin said that when de Gaulle got on a plane to England, de Gaulle took him along. That’s what they call having a friend in high places. During the war, Fortin said he served with Leclerc’s 2nd Armored Division. He said he returned to Strasbourg with Leclerc, who left him there in charge of the DST.
“Now, if I were a cynical man, which Major Wallace here has been urging me to be, I would wonder why a guy who was with de Gaulle at Montcornet, and fought with the 2nd Armored Division in Africa and then across Europe, was only a major.”
“And what do you think is the case?” Mannberg asked.