[ONE]
International Tribunal Compound Prison
Nuremberg, American Zone of Occupation, Germany
1505 18 April 1946
The two enormous black soldiers leading the German prisoner out of the cellblock dwarfed him. Both were well over six feet tall. Their muscled arms and chests strained the OD Ike jackets. The prisoner was restrained with handcuffs, shackles around his ankles, and a chain around his waist. He had a black bag over his head.
As the soldiers and their prisoner passed the guardhouse, Jim Cronley stepped out of it. He made several gestures, first putting an index finger to his lips to indicate silence.
This made one of the huge men smile, revealing several gold teeth.
Cronley then raised his eyebrows, making a question of his next gesture, a back-and-forth movement of his right hand.
The man, smiling, nodded.
Cronley finally made a thumbs-up gesture and pointed to an Army 6×6 truck that had been backed up to the guardhouse.
The man smiled, saluted, and then prodded his prisoner into movement. He stopped him at the truck.
Another huge man standing on the bed of the truck reached down to take the prisoner’s hands, then pulled him onto the tailgate, causing the prisoner to grunt. Next, he reached down, grabbed the prisoner by his shoulders and lifted him deeper into the truck bed.
The other man, remaining on the ground, put the tailgate in place and then trotted to the cab and climbed in beside the driver.
The truck horn sounded twice, and the 6×6 began to drive away. As it did, a staff car pulled in behind it and followed.
Cronley turned and walked into the guardhouse. He took a leather folder from his pocket, showed it to the officer of the day—a first lieutenant of the 1st “Big Red One” Infantry Division—and formally announced, “CIC Special Agent Cronley to see SS-Standartenführer Müller.”
“Yes, sir,” the lieutenant said. “Sir, I have to ask if you are armed.”
Cronley hoisted the left side of his Ike jacket, revealing a holstered Model 1911A1 Colt .45 caliber pistol.
“That question was pro forma,” the lieutenant confessed. “I didn’t notice your holster.”
“That’s the idea of the Secret Service cross-draw holster,” Cronley said as he took the pistol out. “You’re not supposed to notice.”
He handed the pistol to the lieutenant.
“Safety on,” he announced, “a round in the chamber.”
“You always carry it locked and loaded?”
“Only when I think I may have to shoot somebody.”
The lieutenant laughed.
He removed the pistol’s magazine and then racked the action, which caused the chambered cartridge to eject and land on the floor. He picked it up and then turned to the staff sergeant standing behind him.
“Escort Mr. Cronley to Müller’s cell. Second tier, Cell 11-R.”
“Yes, sir.”
The guard posted at the cell was a corporal whom Cronley guessed had yet to see his nineteenth birthday. He was wearing a white helmet liner and a white Sam Browne belt. Like the staff sergeant, he was unarmed except for a white police baton.
“Open it up,” the staff sergeant ordered, tapping the iron bars with his baton.
The corporal slid a two-by-ten-inch plank out of the way, then put an eight-inch-long key in the iron keyhole and turned it. Finally, with a grunt, he pushed the heavy door open.
A stocky, nearly bald fifty-year-old male was sitting on a GI bed. He looked up with annoyance mingled with curiosity as Cronley entered the cell.
“Guten tag, Herr Standartenführer,” Cronley said, cheerfully.
“Who the hell are you?” Müller demanded, in German. “And that’s Generalmajor Müller.”
“That’s one of the things I wanted to talk to you about.”
“Who the hell are you?” he repeated.
“My name is Feibleman,” Cronley said. “James Feibleman. I’m the prisoner morale officer.”
“In other words, Biddle or Jackson—probably the latter—sent a Jew to remind me who won the war?”
Well, he knows who Biddle and Jackson are.
And I think he’d challenge me, if he knew who I am. Interesting.
“This Jew was sent to evaluate your morale, your mental condition, to see how depressed you are. We don’t want you to try to hang yourself before your trial.”
“How could I possibly be depressed in such surroundings?” Müller made a sweeping gesture around the cell, then added, “Waiting to be hanged?”
“That’s the point, Herr SS-Standartenführer. We—”
“I’ve already told you that my rank is generalmajor.”
“Not any longer,” Cronley lied. “That’s one of the things we thought might depress you. The Tribunal has decided once an SS officer, always an SS officer. In other words, the Tribunal does not recognize those late-in-the-war commissionings of SS officers in the Wehrmacht. You will be tried, and almost certainly hanged, as SS-Standartenführer Müller.”
Müller didn’t reply.
“We also thought that learning you’re not as important to Odessa as you thought you were might depress you somewhat. Has it?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Let me paint the picture for you. You’re still here while your friends General der Infanterie Wilhelm Burgdorf and SS-Brigadeführer Franz von Dietelburg are off somewhere enjoying the hospitality of the Organisation der Ehemaligen SS-Angehörigen. Didn’t that suggest to you that Burgdorf and von Dietelburg are considered by Odessa to be more important than you are?”
“As I keep telling you, Feibleman, I have no idea what or who you’re talking about.”
They locked eyes, and then Cronley said, “Well, it’s been nice chatting with you, Herr Standartenführer, but now I must have a chat with SS-Brigadeführer Heimstadter to see how his morale is holding up.”
He turned and left the cell. He heard Müller mutter something bitterly but couldn’t understand what it was.
Well, I managed to upset the bastard.
And when—tomorrow—he gets together with Heimstadter and asks him what we talked about and Heimstadter tells him he never talked with anybody named Feibleman, that will upset both of them.
So, what I do now is go to the Mansion and tell my guys to tell Heimstadter that Müller is singing like a canary.
And then I’ll go out to the Farber Palast and have a well-deserved drink.
And then I’ll go find Ginger and maybe get lucky.
[TWO]
Farber Palast
Stein, near Nuremberg, American Zone of Occupation, Germany
1645 18 April 1946
Colonel Ivan Serov was sitting in one of the armchairs in the lobby when Cronley walked in. He stood up, holding a bottle of Haig & Haig scotch by the neck, when he saw Cronley.
“Thank you, Ivan, but no thanks. I have plans.”
“There are developments you really have to hear.”
“If I go in there with you,” Cronley said, nodding toward the entrance of the bar, “you will have as long as it takes for me to down one drink.”
“We can’t discuss what I’ve come up with in the bar.”
Cronley looked at him.
Jesus, Cronley thought, he’s serious!
Duty, damn it, calls.
Cronley pointed toward the elevator bank.
“This better be good, Ivan. You’re interfering with my love life.”
There were four DCI bodyguards outside the Duchess Suite. One of them opened the door, and Cronley and Serov walked into the suite.
“Shit,” Cronley muttered when he saw that Father McGrath, Tiny Dunwiddie, and Ginger were in the room.
“And hello to you, too,” Ginger said.
“I’m sorry, but I have to have a private word with Colonel Serov,” Cronley said. “We’ll be right back.”
“Actually, James,” Serov said, “I’d hoped to have a word with Father McGrath. In fact, with everybody. I’ve been thinking—”
The door opened again, and Colonel Mortimer Cohen entered the suite.
When he saw Serov, Cohen said, “I wonder why the phrase ‘fox in the henhouse’ suddenly popped into my head.”
“Ivan’s been thinking, Colonel,” Cronley said. “And you’re just in time to hear what.”
Cohen motioned toward the Haig & Haig. “While I am a devout believer in beware of Russians bearing gifts, if I were offered a taste from that bottle the colonel is holding in a death grip, I might be inclined to listen to what he wants to say.”
“How kind of you. James, why don’t you find a glass for the colonel?”
“I’ve been thinking . . .” Serov began when Cronley finished serving the drinks.
“So you keep telling us,” Cronley said.
“I was about to go to Budapest . . .”
“Why?” Cohen asked.
“I came into reliable information that Gábor Péter had von Dietelburg and Burgdorf.”
“So it was the AVO who handled their escape?” Cohen asked.
“That would be a reasonable conclusion to draw.”
Cronley thought, As if you didn’t know.
“I didn’t think I could get Gábor to hand them over to me, but I thought their changed circumstances—and Gábor’s interrogation techniques—might get them to tell me who has Odessa’s money. If we can get our hands on that, it would put Odessa out of business.”
Both Cohen and Cronley nodded in agreement.
“And it might cut Himmler’s new religion off at the knees,” Serov went on, “which I now regard as God’s mission for me in this life.”
That sounds like pure bullshit.
But why do I believe him?
“I went from that,” Serov said, “to thinking that Burgdorf and von Dietelburg were not going to tell me or Gábor anything. I think they realize that sooner or later—most likely, rather soon—we’re going to kill them and that they would rather die, and be remembered, as martyrs to the cause of the Thousand-Year Reich and the heretical religion of Saint Heinrich the Divine.
“And then I had an epiphany. I began to think of the money itself, which I had never done before. I realized that it was millions, perhaps even tens of millions, of dollars, pounds, Swiss francs, plus gold and precious stones.
“It would not fit in fifty trunks. It is not readily transportable, and I don’t think it’s buried in the basement of some ruin in Berlin or Vienna, or elsewhere.”
He paused, then finished. “So where is it stored?”
“Damn good question, Ivan,” Cohen said, “one that never occurred to me. Where do you think it is?”
“When one has a fortune that won’t fit in one’s hip pocket, one puts it in the bank. It’s in a bank somewhere.”
“Somewhere in Europe,” Cohen said, nodding in agreement. “The first place that comes to mind is Switzerland. But the last I heard, we had a hundred FBI agents—probably more—in Switzerland looking for Nazi money. So where else?”
“Father McGrath,” Serov said. “Would you please tell us all you can about Pope Pius XII?”
“Seriously?”
“Quite seriously.”
“Okay. So, Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Pacelli became Pius XII in March of 1939. Prior to that, he was papal nuncio to Germany and later cardinal secretary of state. You want more?”
“What would you say, Father,” Serov asked, “was the cardinal secretary’s most significant diplomatic achievement?”
“Oh, I see where you’re going,” McGrath said.
“I think I do, too,” Cohen said. “And it never entered my goddamn mind!”
Cronley thought, And stupid Super Spook has no idea what the hell they’re even talking about.
“I believe you’re talking about the Reichskonkordat?” McGrath said.
“Yes, I am,” Serov said. “Tell us about it.”
“The Pope made a deal with the Nazis,” Cohen furnished. “They agreed to leave the Catholic Church alone and the Pope stopped criticizing the Nazis.”
“There was a good deal more to the Reichskonkordat than that, wasn’t there, Father?” Serov said.
“The Vatican State,” McGrath replied. “I don’t know the details, but Mussolini went along.”
“Yes, he did,” Cohen said. “He declared the less than a half square kilometer of the Vatican an independent country free of Italy.”
“With all the same sovereign rights as the Soviet Union,” Serov added, “and the United States of America, and every other independent country. Correct?”
“When Mark Clarke’s Fifth Army took Rome,” Cohen said, “they were under strict orders not to enter the Vatican. And as soon as Hotshot Billy landed Clarke next to the Colosseum—”
“Our Hotshot Billy?” Cronley interrupted.
“I know of only one Lieutenant Colonel William Wilson,” Cohen replied. “That Hotshot Billy. Before being General White’s aviation officer, when Clarke took Rome Wilson was Clarke’s twenty-one-year-old—maybe twenty-two—personal pilot. Anyway, as soon as Billy dropped Clarke off next to the Colosseum, he flew back to Fifth Army headquarters, where he picked up the Fifth Army’s Catholic chaplain and transported him to Rome. The chaplain then got in a jeep and drove to the Vatican, politely asked to be admitted, and then assured the cardinal secretary of state that the Fifth Army and the United States were going to respect the sovereignty of the Vatican.”
“I never heard any of this,” Father McGrath said. “Fascinating.”
“It gets even more interesting,” Serov said. “Can any of you students of international affairs tell me what every sovereign state has in common with its peers?”
“A national bank,” Cohen said after some consideration. “Christ! Why didn’t anyone come up with this?”
“Into which, I suggest,” Serov said, “just before the Germans departed Rome, or probably earlier, the disciples of Saint Heinrich the Divine deposited just about all of their worldly goods.”
“Why would the Pope—the Vatican—let them do that?” Ginger asked, a second before Cronley was about to ask the same question.
She’s about to be told to butt out, Cronley thought, and not politely.
She wasn’t.
“A very good question, my dear,” Serov said. “One to which I have given much thought.”
“And what did you come up with?” Cohen asked.
“How about,” Cronley said, “quote, the first duty of a Catholic priest is to protect the Holy Mother Church, unquote.”
“You want to explain that?” Cohen said.
Cronley nodded. “There was a priest in Strasbourg, a parish priest—more important, the priest from the parish in which our friend Kommandant Jean-Paul Fortin had been raised. When the Germans moved into Strasbourg, the priest promptly began to collaborate with them. That collaboration resulted in the torture, then deaths, of Fortin’s family, after which their bodies were thrown into the Rhine. The SS had learned that Fortin was in England, serving as an intelligence officer on De Gaulle’s staff, and the bastards wanted to send him—and Strasbourgers generally—a message.
“After the war, Fortin looked the priest up and demanded to know why he had done absolutely nothing to aid his family. The priest was unrepentant. He told Fortin sorry, his first duty as a priest was to protect the Holy Mother Church. And, as we know, Fortin put .22 caliber rounds in his elbows and knees before throwing him in the Rhine and watching him try to swim.”
Serov said, “I think we safely can assume that Pius XII thinks of himself as a priest with a similar first duty.”
“You aren’t suggesting,” Ginger said, more than a little unpleasantly, “that the Pope knowingly went along with hiding the Nazi money?”
“What I’m suggesting is several things, none of which suggests the Pope is anything but a devout servant of God. But I think we have to consider that he was in Germany for many years as papal nuncio, which means ‘speaker for the Pope.’ He speaks German fluently. During that period, he met many decent Germans who were both devout Catholics and opposed to Nazism. He also met many devout Catholics who were also devout Nazis, some of whom were in the SS.
“All of these people hated communism, as did the Pope. The Pope regarded—regards—communism as the greatest threat to the Holy Mother Church.”
“And it is,” Father McGrath said, thoughtfully.
“They thus became allies of the Church, the Vatican,” Serov went on. “And by 1945, it became clear to His Holiness that the Germans were about to lose the war. The Vatican has its own intelligence service—”
“Every priest is a Vatican special agent,” Cohen put in. “I’d say their intelligence service makes everybody else’s, including ours, look like bumbling amateurs.”
“That is not an exaggeration,” Serov said. “I think we can safely presume that Pius knew all about the mass murders in the extermination camps and, more important, about Odessa. And that as a man of God—now, this is pure conjecture—he was worried about the retribution the Allies—particularly, perhaps, the retribution of the Jews, but even more particularly that of the Soviet Union—were about to wreak on the Thousand-Year Reich.”
“If I can go off at a tangent, Colonel,” Father McGrath said, “how much do you think the Vatican—the Pope—knew about this heretical religion Himmler was trying to start?”
“Had started,” Serov corrected. “And, again, this is pure speculation. I’m sure he heard something about it and dismissed it as harmless Nazi nonsense. Like that elevator shaft they were digging to reach the underworld.”
“That was really loony tunes, wasn’t it?” McGrath said, chuckling.
“Father, with all due respect, if you really believe in something, it’s not—what was that charming phrase you just used?—loony tunes. That is what’s so dangerous about the religion of Saint Heinrich the Divine. They’re true believers, as devout as any monk in one of those mountaintop monasteries in Greece who spend eight hours a day on their knees praying.”
“You really believe that, Ivan?” Cronley asked.
“Devoutly,” Serov said.
Cronley sighed. “Okay. Let’s say your theory is right on the money. What do we do about it?”
“Odessa, like any organization, has routine expenses. They have to make withdrawals from their account at the Vatican Bank to pay them. One way they can do this is to send someone into Rome, into the Vatican. That would pose the problem for them of getting their agent back across the border with a briefcase, or even a suitcase, full of money.
“I think it far more likely that when one of their largest depositors needs to make a withdrawal, the Vatican Bank sends a courier to them with the funds.”
“A courier?” Cohen asked, dubiously.
“Perhaps a lowly priest whose luggage is unlikely to be searched by customs officials when he is crossing a border. But I think the courier is most likely to rank higher in the Vatican hierarchy. At first, I was thinking of a monsignor or a bishop, of whom there is a plethora in Rome, and especially within the Vatican bureaucracy. But then, letting my imagination run wild, I thought the couriers are probably red hats.”
“What are red hats?” Ginger asked.
“Cardinals,” Serov said.
“Cardinals?” Cohen parroted, dubiously.
“Cardinals,” Serov repeated. “Let your imagination run free, Colonel, after I propose this scenario: Let us suppose that Odessa needs some cash—say, a million dollars in U.S. or pounds or francs, or a mix thereof. But a briefcaseful? The Vatican Bank is notified, either by Odessa’s man in Rome—and I think we can presume they have one—or by other means. They don’t want it in Rome, of course, but in Berlin.”
“Why Berlin?” Cohen challenged.
“It seems logical to assume that Odessa’s leadership is there,” Serov said. “There’s a lot of places for them to hide. I’m not saying they have a headquarters in the normal sense. I think the head of Odessa at any time is a former senior SS officer. His deputy is the next-senior former SS officer. Und so weiter. They hold their staff meetings in the back room of a bar, or a bordello, never twice in the same place.”
Cohen looked thoughtfully at him, nodded, then said, “Okay. Go on with your scenario.”
“In the American Zone of Berlin,” Serov said, “on the Kurfürstendamm, are the ruins of the Protestant church, the Kaiser Wilhelm. The lord mayor of Berlin, Oberbürgermeister Arthur Werner, who enjoys the respect of U.S. High Commissioner John Jay McCloy, has recently announced he thinks that rather than spending all the money it would take to rebuild the church, it should be left as it is as a monument to all the Berliners who died in the war.
“As a general rule of thumb,” Serov went on, “whatever the lord mayor wants, McCloy gives him. So there sits the Kaiser Wilhelm Gedächtniskirche on the K’damm. The Vatican hears of this and is not overjoyed. Far better for them to have a usable, functioning Catholic church than a monument for the masses.
“What to do? They decide to make an offer that Werner and McCloy might find hard to refuse. They will pay for the restoration of the Kaiser Wilhelm if they can turn it into a Roman Catholic place of worship.”
“Why the hell would Werner or McCloy go along with that?” Cronley asked.
“Agreed. And they almost certainly, politely, would decline the cardinal’s kind offer. One is always polite to a prince of the Church. Especially one with credentials as a diplomatic representative of the Vatican.”
“And,” Cronley added, “one who travels as a member of the Vatican royalty is expected to travel: on a private railroad car.”
“A private railroad car bearing the insignia of the Vatican,” Serov said, “with the Vatican flags flapping on the front of the locomotive.”
“And the cardinal’s entourage,” Cronley went on, “at least one archbishop, several bishops, and a platoon of monsignors and priests. All of whom are carrying briefcases to assist them in carrying out their priestly duties. And in one of those briefcases is the million-dollar withdrawal.”
“Mrs. Moriarty,” Serov said. “I’ve heard it said that your fiancé is known in the intelligence community as Super Spook because he figures things out before his superiors.”
“So,” Cronley said, ignoring that, “all we have to do is keep an eye on the entire entourage to see which one is going to hand the briefcase with the money in it to somebody from Odessa. Which is going to be damned difficult for us.”
“Ivan,” Cohen said. “Why do I suspect that you already know that a cardinal is going to Berlin?”
“Because I’m NKGB. We know everything.”
Cronley grunted.
Serov said, “His Eminence Cardinal Heinrich von Hassburger—”
“He’s German?” Cronley asked.
“You see what I mean, Mrs. Moriarty?” Serov said. “Super Spook figured that out before Colonel Cohen did.”
“Will you please stop calling me Mrs. Moriarty?” Ginger blurted, bitter anger evident in her voice.
Cronley wondered, Now, what the hell is that suddenly all about?
Ginger, her voice rising, went on. “I know—Jimmy told me—that he believes you had my husband killed, thinking he was Jimmy. And here we sit, acting like we’re all best friends.”
There followed a long, awkward silence.
“Strange bedfellows,” Father McGrath then mused aloud.
“And I’m more than a little uncomfortable, frankly, hearing you talk as if the Pope himself is involved with Nazis,” Ginger said.
“That must be because you’re a Catholic,” McGrath said. “His Holiness can do no wrong.”
“I’m not Catholic, Father Jack. I’m, like you, an Episcopalian.”
McGrath said, “The Jesuits have a saying: ‘Give me a child until he is seven and I will give you a man.’”
Dear God, Cronley prayed. I don’t know where this is going, but please don’t let it go back to Serov whacking Bonehead, thinking it was me.
God either answered Cronley’s prayer or Bruce Moriarty Jr. independently decided that the world should know that it was time for him to eat or time for his diaper to be changed, or both.
Ginger rushed to deal with the howling infant.
“As I was saying before Super Spook’s interruption,” Serov said, “His Eminence Cardinal von Hassburger, and his entourage, will depart Rome for Berlin on 25 April. That gives us a week to set things up.”
Cronley thought, You are one cool sonofabitch, Ivan, I’ll give you that.
“What I suggest,” Serov said, “is that after we have our breakfast, we drive to the castle. Now, that poses a question for you, James. What about your Polish agents?”
“What about them?”
“We’re going to need all the manpower we can put our hands on if we’re going to snatch the cardinal’s briefcases.”
Cronley thought, What is he talking about now?
He said, “What do you mean, ‘snatch the cardinal’s briefcases’?”
“When I was plotting this scenario of trailing whoever has a briefcase, I considered the possibility that we would fail. That would mean Odessa would get the money. Then I saw a solution to that dilemma. And that was to snatch the briefcases of whomever we suspected of delivering them to Odessa.
“Doing so, I concluded, would have several advantages. It obviously would keep Odessa from getting the money, for one thing. And it would cause consternation both to Odessa and His Eminence Cardinal von Hassburger. He would wonder if the real purpose of his coming to Berlin was about to be exposed.”
“And they couldn’t call the cops, German or American, could they?” Cronley said. “‘Bishop Frankenstein was walking down the K’damm when some arch criminal snatched his briefcase, which held a million dollars in it.’ And the cardinal would have to tell Odessa, ‘Oops! Sorry, you ain’t getting no money.’ And even if we got caught by the cops—German or MPs—while snatching the briefcase, they’d have to explain the million bucks.”
“Only if that briefcase contained the million,” Cohen said. “But that is a bridge we can wait to cross when we get to it.”
“Returning to your Polish DCI agents, James,” Serov said, “what about them? God knows we need the manpower. But Poland is a devout Roman Catholic country, and we all heard what Father McGrath said about what the Jesuits say—”
“I get the point,” Cronley interrupted. “Well, there’s one way to find out.”
Cronley walked to the door and called out, “Max, come in here. We need to talk.”
A moment later, Ostrowski entered the room, and said, “What about?”
He was followed by Ginger Moriarty. As she passed Cronley, she thrust Baby Bruce into his arms. The infant began to howl.
Serov began clapping, and others joined in, some of them laughing.
“I don’t think he likes you, Super Spook,” Father McGrath observed.
Having no other option, Cronley sat down in an armchair and began to bounce the infant up and down, as he had seen Ginger do.
“He’s not a martini, Super Spook,” Cohen offered. “Try rocking him gently.”
Cronley did. Almost immediately, the baby stopped howling, and he seemed to be smiling at Cronley. Without realizing what he was doing, Cronley kissed the infant, which earned him more applause.
“Did I miss anything important?” Ginger asked, innocently.
“Almost,” Serov said, then gestured at Cronley. “The floor is yours, James.”
Still rocking the baby in his arms, Cronley said, “Max, I may be about to royally piss you off, but I have to get into this. What would your reaction be if I told you Odessa was hiding its money in the Vatican Bank?”
“My reaction? Surprise. I never thought about that possibility . . .”
Because you’re a devout Catholic, right? Shit.
“. . . I thought the Swedes probably had it. I mean, we’re talking about a hell of a lot of money. I didn’t think they would be hiding it in the basement of a burned-out building in Leipzig or Frankfurt am Main.”
“You never mentioned this to me.”
“You never asked,” Ostrowski said, simply.
“What would you say if I told you Odessa is making a withdrawal from the Vatican Bank—probably a million dollars—and is sending it by messenger to Berlin?”
“Oh, I see where this is going,” Ostrowski said. “And the messenger is a Vatican priest?”
“Actually, a cardinal.”
“And you have plans for the cardinal, right? And you’re wondering if as a Catholic I’m willing to go along?”
“You and the other guys,” Cronley said.
“I’m sorry you had to ask. But the subject never came up before between us, did it?”
“No, it didn’t.”
“Okay, Jim, let me lay it out for you. I was born and raised a Roman Catholic, and I’m sure you know what the Jesuits say about that. During the war, before I got in my Spitfire and set off to kill as many Germans as I could, I always—whenever I could—found some priest to hear my confession and give me communion.
“And now I confess my sins and go to mass every Sunday. But it’s different now. I do it because it helps me remember going to mass in Poland. In our parish church, Saint Luke’s. With my mother and father and my sisters and brothers. They’re gone, as you know. All I can do is remember them. And try to run down the Nazi bastards responsible.” He turned to Serov and added, “And the communist bastards, Colonel, who were just about as responsible.”
Serov remained silent.
Ostrowski looked back at Cronley and finished. “The best way I can do this is as a DCI agent. So, Jim, what are our, repeat, our plans vis-à-vis the cardinal?”
“The other guys feel this way, Max?”
“They do, take my word for it. Or hand me a Bible and I’ll swear on it.”
“Your word is good enough for me.”
“Let me add this. The more devout of us, which includes me, have a hard-on . . . My apology, my lady . . .”
Ginger made a Don’t fret gesture.
“. . . for this heathen religion Himmler was trying to start. We figure if we can shut down Odessa, no more money will flow to these disciples of the devil. So, let me ask again, what are our plans for the cardinal?”
“His name is von Hassburger,” Cohen said. “He’ll depart Rome for Berlin by rail, aboard a special Vatican train, on April 25th, a week from today. The ostensible purpose—or his second purpose—is to offer to pay for the reconstruction of the Kaiser Wilhelm Church on the K’damm, providing that the rebuilt church is Catholic.”
“I thought Arthur Werner wanted to leave it as is, as a memorial to Berliners who died in the war?”
“He does,” Cronley said. “And while His Eminence is trying to talk Werner into changing his mind and accepting his generous offer, the cardinal’s flunkies will be trying to hand the briefcase with the ‘withdrawal’ slip in it to Odessa.”
“And you intend to follow the guy with the briefcase to wherever Odessa is?”
“No,” Cohen said. “We’re going to snatch the briefcase—make that briefcases, plural—until we have the one with the money. That will keep the money from Odessa and cause general consternation for both Odessa and the cardinal. And then we try to identify ‘suspicious persons’ and get them to lead us to Odessa.”
“So, when do we go to Berlin?” Ostrowski asked.
Cronley said, “You just said that your guys have a . . . That your guys don’t like the religion of Saint Heinrich the Divine. Which makes me suggest a change to Colonel Cohen and Colonel Serov’s scenario.”
“Why am I sure I’m not going to like this?” Cohen said.
“The original plan,” Cronley went on, “was for Cohen’s guys and mine to head for Berlin on the next train out of Nuremberg. And rendezvous at our safe house in Zehlendorf. In the meantime, we were going to tour Wewelsburg Castle, then drive into Frankfurt and catch the aptly named Army train the Berliner to Berlin. But now I think we should give a tour of Wewelsburg. I think it would be inspiring.”
“So do I,” Serov said right away and turned to Cohen. “Colonel, I think we should give everybody a tour.”
“Okay, then, that’s what we’ll do.”
“Max,” Cronley said, “after setting up protection for Justice Jackson—”
“Does he know what you’re—we’re—up to?”
“No,” Cronley said. “We’re taking on the Vatican by stealing their money, and I don’t think he’d approve. After setting up his protection—and that’s the priority—could you send some of our people to Wewelsburg tonight?”
“Done,” Ostrowski said. “And we’ll see you there tomorrow morning.”
“We’ll leave here no later than six,” Cohen said.
“I suggest we make that five,” Serov said.
Ginger stood up, walked to Cronley, and extended her arms to take the baby.
“That being the case, it’s bedtime for us, Super Spook.”
Everyone else stood.
Cronley handed her the child and then escorted the others out of the Duchess Suite.