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“Fair enough. Out of school, DCI-Europe is about to be tripled in size. It needs a senior officer to run it. It’s as simple as that.”
“So Harry gets to pin his eagle on, and Jimmy gets to do what? Run the motor pool for the tripled-in-size DCI-Europe? Something like that?”
“He gets to do something he’s uniquely qualified to do.”
“Like what?”
“For example, acting as liaison between General Gehlen and Mr. Schultz and me, and between DCI-Europe and DCI–Southern Cone, and keeping Justice Jackson from being kidnapped by the NKGB.”
Janice considered that a moment.
“I think you’re too smart, Admiral, to try to con me . . .”
“Thank you.”
“So I’ll take that as the truth. I think our Red friends are going to cause trouble at Nuremberg, and Jimmy’s good at screwing up their evil intentions. But what’s with him wearing his medals? For that matter, what’s he doing here at Mattingly’s farewell party?”
“Since your interest in Captain Cronley’s welfare touches the cockles of this old sailor’s heart, Janice, I’ll tell you. You see General Seidel standing in the line with General Greene and Colonel Mattingly?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, he’s being transferred to the Pentagon. He and his staff—who are not going to Washington with him—think it’s a promotion, and that means they think G-2’s war on the DCI is going well. When they see me—and Jim wearing his new Legion of Merit—they will know that’s not so. And when Homer Greene drops into the conversation that DCI, in the person of Jim, is taking over protection of Mr. Justice Jackson, they’ll really get the message.”
“How does General Greene feel about me doing that?” Cronley asked.
“He said he thinks you’re just the guy for the job,” Souers said. “His CIC people there now—the Twenty-first CIC Detachment—are of course Army. The Army—the 1st Infantry Division—who has been charged with providing security for the trials thinks that includes protecting Bob Jackson and his people. There have been conflicts between the 1st Division and Greene’s people.”
“I suppose it’s occurred to you that you guys spend as much time in turf warfare as you do fighting the Red Menace?” Janice asked.
“Oh, yeah,” the admiral said. “That thought has passed once or twice through this old sailor’s mind. If you have a solution to our problem, Janice, I’m all ears.”
When she didn’t immediately reply, the admiral said, “That being the case, why don’t we all go over and make our manners to Generals Seidel and Greene and, of course, Colonel Mattingly?”
“That should be fun,” Janice said. “Homer Greene told me that Mattingly was practically in tears about my yarn about his drunken driving in East Germany. He said it would follow him for the rest of his life and ruin his career. Homer said what he said was ‘I’d like to strangle that bitch.’”
She put her hand on Cronley’s arm.
“Let’s go, sweetie,” she said.
“Into the valley of death,” Colonel Wallace said, “marches the noble DCI.”
II
[ONE]
Farber Palast
Stein, near Nuremberg
American Zone of Occupation, Germany
1905 20 February 1946
A three-vehicle convoy rolled up to the palace, whic
h was red-roofed and three stories tall. In the lead was a gleaming Horch touring car. Following it was an olive-drab 1941 Ford staff car whose bumper markings identified it as the eleventh vehicle assigned to the 711th MKRC. Bringing up the rear was a U.S. Army three-quarter-ton ambulance. The red crosses that had once adorned the vehicle’s sides and roof had been painted over, and its bumper markings identified it as the twenty-third vehicle assigned to the 711th MKRC.
Captain James D. Cronley Jr. was at the wheel of the Horch. It was an enormous vehicle. Its fenders and hood were painted black, and the sides canary yellow. Spare tires encased in gleaming black covers were mounted in the front fenders, and there was a gleaming black trunk mounted above the rear chrome bumper.
