Curtain of Death (Clandestine Operations 3)

“He can’t go on living in the MP kaserne,” he went on. “And wait till you hear what he came up with at Stars and Stripes.”

Cronley thought: If I issue this kid CIC credentials, Wallace will go through the roof.

General Gehlen, in German, said: “Mr. Schröder has been telling me, young man, that you learned something interesting when you were at Pfungstadt. Why don’t you tell us what that was?”

Wagner looked between Gehlen, Cronley, and Ziegler in confusion.

He’s wondering who the guy in the seedy suit is, and what he’s doing here.

Schröder picked up on Wagner’s confusion at the same time.

“Karl-Christoph,” he said in German, “this is General Gehlen. You can tell him.”

Wagner nodded, and then began, in German, to tell them what he had learned in Pfungstadt.

Cronley had just heard enough to conclude, I’ll be damned. He did find something, when Wallace suddenly jumped to his feet and stood at attention. A moment later, Augie Ziegler looked where Wallace was looking and jumped to his feet.

Cronley looked where Ziegler was looking and jumped to his feet when he saw that Lieutenant Colonel William W. “Hotshot Billy” Wilson was holding the door to the office open for Major General I. D. White.

White, who was wearing ODs and highly polished tanker’s boots, marched into the office. His uniform was crisply pressed, but there were no ribbons on his breast.

“As you were, gentlemen,” he ordered conversationally. Then he saw Janice.

“Good morning, Miss Johansen. I really am glad to see you.”

“Why don’t I think that’s because of my feminine charms?”

White laughed. Genuinely, not to be polite.

“Because of your feminine charms, and also because you’re at about the top of the list of people on my See As Soon As Possible List.”

“Not at the top? I’m crushed. Who is?”

“General Gehlen,” White replied.

Then he smiled at General Gehlen, and said, “General, I’d ask for a few minutes of your time right now, but I’m getting the impression that I just interrupted something interesting.”

Gehlen smiled and chuckled.

“What?” White demanded. “Is it important?”

“Just as you came through the door, General, the Eighth Psalm came to mind,” Gehlen said.

White considered that a moment.

“‘Out of the mouth of babes . . .’” he quoted.

“I believe this young man has,” Gehlen said, nodding at Wagner, “uncovered how the Odessa organization is moving people we’re looking for around Europe.”

“How?”

“On Stars and Stripes delivery trucks.”

“General Greene told me his CIC people had looked into that and—”

“Mr. Hammersmith, whom General Greene describes as his best CIC agent, told me—told us—the same thing. That’s why, listening to this young man, the Eighth Psalm came to mind.”

“This, I have to hear,” White said, and turned to Wagner. “Who are you, son?”