The Assassination Option (Clandestine Operations 2)

“I’m glad you said that,” Wallace said. “Both things.”

“Sir? Both things?”

“I’m glad you seldom make the same mistake twice, and I’m glad you said ‘Colonel.’”

“Sir?”

“For one thing, you are hereby cautioned not to say it out loud again,” Wallace said. “But don’t forget it. Now that my secret—that I’m the senior officer of the DCI present for duty—is no longer a secret to you, remember that when you have the urge to go off half-cocked. Get my permission before you do just about anything. For example, like forming an alliance with Commandant Jean-Paul Fortin of the Strasbourg office of the DST to investigate Odessa. I have a gut feeling that somehow that’s going to wind up biting you in the ass. And if your ass gets bitten, so does mine.”

“You want me to try to get out of that?”

“To coin a phrase, that cow is already out of the barn. But I want to hear everything that comes your way about that operation.”

“Yes, sir.”

“So long as you don’t FUBAR anything that would necessitate your being relieved, the longer, in other words, everybody but you—correction: you, Hessinger, and Dunwiddie—believes you to be the chief, DCI-Europe, the better. So conduct yourself accordingly, Captain Cronley.”

“Yes, sir. Sir, you didn’t mention Gehlen.”

“An inadvertent omission. Gehlen knows. But let’s keep him in the dark a little. He’s smarter than both of us, but I don’t think he should be the tail wagging our dog. And unless we’re very careful, that’s what’ll happen. That which-tail-should-wag-whose-dog analogy, by the way, came from the admiral, via Schultz.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Anything else?”

“Can’t think of anything, sir.”

“Then go to bed, Captain Cronley.”

XI

[ONE]

U.S. Army Airfield B-6

Sonthofen, Bavaria

American Zone of Occupation, Germany

&n

bsp; 1125 18 January 1946

The olive-drab Stinson L-5, which had large “Circle C” Constabulary insignia painted on the engine nacelle, came in very low and very slow and touched down no more than fifty feet from the end of the runway. The pilot then quickly got the tail wheel on the ground and braked hard. The airplane stopped.

The pilot, Captain James D. Cronley Jr., looked over his shoulder at his instructor pilot, Lieutenant Colonel William W. Wilson, and inquired, “Again?”

“If you went around again, could you improve on that landing?”

“I don’t think I could.”

“Neither do I. Actually, that wasn’t too bad for someone who isn’t even an Army aviator.”

Cronley didn’t reply.

“How many tries is that?” Williams said.

“I’ve lost count.”