Curtain of Death (Clandestine Operations 3)

American Zone of Occupation, Germany

1705 25 January 1946

“That was cutting it pretty close,” Tom Winters said to Cronley, when Cronley had shut down the L-4’s engine.

“I’ve always found it exciting to land in the dark,” Cronley said, then turning serious, went on: “I was tempted to play it safe and go into Schleissheim, but I hate to land there.” He paused, and added in a mock thick German accent, “I think the NKGB is watching.”

“What would they have seen?”

“You and me and the tail number of this aircraft. If they were watching Strasbourg, they saw us take off. But where did we go? Since they can’t get close enough—especially when it’s getting dark—to the Compound strip to read the tail number, they don’t know we landed here. They can guess, but they don’t know, and the less they know about anything the better.”

“It’s that bad?”

“Write it on your forehead.”

“Yes, sir.”

“To coin a phrase, ‘All’s well that ends well.’ We got in here all right, Tom—and with a case of champagne.”

—

Claudette Colbert pulled up in a Ford staff car just as they had finished taking the case of Crémant d’Alsace from the plane.

“Welcome home,” she said. “How’d everything go?”

“Very well. Where’s Freddy?”

“He went into the office. You need him?”

“I can tell him what and why when we get there.”

Winters said: “Did my wife find quarters to her satisfaction?”

“She did and she’s already moved into them. She and Mrs. Moriarty. They’re right next to each other.”

—

At the refurbished cottage that was now the quarters of Lieutenant and Mrs. Thomas Winters, the case of Crémant d’Alsace was divided. The Winterses got two bottles, both of which were promptly chilled and then consumed by Lieutenant Colonel and Mrs. Jack Bristol, the Moriartys, the Winterses, Miss Colbert, and Captain Cronley to “wet down” the Winterses’ new quarters.

Two bottles went to Lieutenant and Mrs. Moriarty, who promised to save them for th

e wet-down supper she would have for her new quarters just as soon as she could, and to which she hoped her new friend Claudette would come. “With anyone Dette wishes to bring with her,” she said.

When Cronley and Claudette left, he took the remaining two bottles with him.

Cronley walked toward the driver’s door of the staff car.

Dette said, “It would look better if I drove.”

Cronley went and got in the front passenger seat.

“Look better to whom?” he then asked.

“Think about it,” she said as she started to drive off.

Three minutes later, as they waited in line to be passed through the checkpoint in the center fence, she said, “Them,” and nodded toward the Pole and soldiers who were examining the identity cards of the people in the car ahead of them.

Cronley didn’t reply.