The Enemy of My Enemy (Clandestine Operations 5)

“Oh, were you?” Fortin challenged. “And have you any other brilliant suggestions?”

“As a matter of fact, mon colonel, I do indeed. If you would buy us a bottle of good cognac, it might help to erase the opinion that James’s lady and the good Father must have evolved to your being, vis-à-vis good manners, the French equivalent of an SS-Unterscharführer.”

“That’s a corporal, Ginger,” Cronley said.

“So far as manners are concerned,” Fortin snapped, “I wonder how the hell someone as impertinent as you, DuPres, ever managed to graduate from Saint-Cyr, much less hold a commission for more than two weeks.”

“That’s the French West Point,” Cronley added, helpfully.

“Apparently,” DuPres said with a shrug, “they desperately needed junior officers to explain big words with multiple syllables to its colonels.”

“You may find this hard to believe, Father McGrath,” Cronley said, “but they’re really quite fond of each other.”

“You could have fooled me.”

Fortin glared at everybody, then asked, “Would you honor me with your presence at the bar, Madame Moriarty? For some decent cognac?”

[FOUR]

“When I heard about the breakout from James,” Fortin said, draining the cognac bottle into his snifter while waving for the bartender to bring another to the table, “I told my people to start looking for them here.”

“You think they’re coming here?” Cronley said, surprised.

“I think they’re headed for Spain, and then, more than likely, for South America.”

“And leave Odessa’s money behind?”

“I’m surprised Mr. Justice Jackson calls you Super Spook. You haven’t figured this out, have you?”

“Please, enlighten me.”

“For a price, the Vatican will provide documents that will get these bastards out of Spain.”

“Really?” Father McGrath said. “I heard that rumored, but . . .”

“It’s no rumor, Father,” Fortin said.

Cronley said, “You think that von Dietelburg and Burgdorf picked up money—enough to pay off the Vatican—from the Odessa guys who got them out and are now headed here?”

“No. I think they’re gone from here, and, if not in Spain, they will be shortly.”

“Then looking for them is a waste of time?”

Fortin ignored the question, and said, “Turning to scenario two: Serov, the NKGB, arranged the escape. It was a professional job, so probably the AVO was deeply involved.”

“Why would Serov want to bust them out?” Ginger asked.

“Money, primarily. He gets them to Budapest, and the AVO gets them to tell Serov where the money is. He grabs the money, then kills both of them as they try to escape. He brings the bodies back to Nuremberg and says, ‘Look what a good guy I am!’”

“How much money does Odessa have?” Father McGrath asked.

“Estimates range from a hundred million in currency to maybe five, ten times that much. And that doesn’t include the gold and jewels.”

“Where did they get it?” Ginger asked.

“The currency that they have—that they stole—came from banks. Most of the gold the same way. But some of the gold is—or was—from teeth . . .”

“From teeth?” Ginger parroted.