Top Secret Page 6

  “Jesus Christ!” Greene said, looking past Mattingly and shaking his head slowly.

  Mattingly decided Greene was now convinced he was being told the truth.

  Greene then said in a tone of reason: “I would be grateful, Colonel, if you told me as much as you’re able about this operation of yours.”

  Mattingly began to do so.

  “So those rumors are true,” Greene said five minutes later. “We are sneaking people, Nazis, into Argentina.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And Eisenhower knows about this?”

  Mattingly did not reply directly.

  “General, outside the Twenty-third and Twenty-seventh CIC detachments, there are four people—now that I’ve told you, five—in the European Theatre who are privy to Operation Ost. I am not at liberty to tell you who they are.”

  “I can understand why,” Greene said, thinking out loud. “Can you tell me why this Cronley fellow was promoted and given the DSM?”

  “Some of it, sir. Using intelligence obtained from General Gehlen, Captain Cronley located the submarine—U-234—in Argentina and recovered the half ton of uranium oxide she was carrying. The operation was not carried out perfectly. SS-Oberführer Horst Lang and a detachment of SS personnel were onboard the U-234 to guard the material. We have reason to believe Lang intended to sell it to the Soviet Union. It was necessary for Captain Cronley to terminate Lang, despite our hope that we would be able to keep him alive for questioning.”

  “By ‘terminate’ I presume you mean Cronley had to kill him?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Do you know why you have been authorized to bring me into this?”

  “Yes, sir. You have a reputation for being very good at what you do. You—and your inspector general—came very close to compromising the security of Operation Ost.”

  “And it was decided that I be told what’s going on so that I’ll understand why I’m now to keep my hands off—keep my nose out of—your business?”

  “Yes, sir. That and to provide assistance . . .”

  “What kind of assistance?”

  “Whatever we might need at some future date.”

  “I don’t suppose I’m authorized to tell Schumann about this?”

  “No, sir, you are not.”

  “Does General Seidel know?”

  “I’m not at liberty to answer that, sir. I can only repeat that you are not authorized to—you are forbidden to—tell anyone anything at all about what I have just told you.”

  “Can I have that in writing?”

  “Sir, the policy is to put nothing on paper.”

  “That figures.” He grunted. “Okay. I’ll tell Schumann to back off.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “Mattingly, I’m sure you appreciate that when I began to nose around, I was doing what I considered my duty.”

  “Yes, sir. I fully understand that.”

  “Unaware that you had—how do I say this?—friends in high places and were involved in anything like this, I gave you a hard time when over my objections you were appointed my deputy. And I was prepared when you burst in here just now to double down on giving you a hard time. No hard feelings?”

  “Absolutely none, sir.”

  “One last question. Who’s that admiral in the picture?”

  Mattingly didn’t reply for a long moment. Finally he said, “General, when you hear, sometime in the next few months, that President Truman has established a new organization, working title Central Agency for Intelligence, and has named Rear Admiral Sidney William Souers to be its head, please act very surprised.”

  Greene grunted again. He then stood and offered his hand.

  “I didn’t hear a word you just said, Colonel. I imagine we’ll be in touch.”

  “Yes, sir, we will.”

  Mattingly raised his hand to his temple.

  “Permission to withdraw, sir?”

  Greene returned the salute, far more crisply than he had previously, and said, “Post.”

  Mattingly started for the door.

  “You forgot your pictures and the general orders,” Greene called after him.

  “I thought the general might wish to study them closely before he burns them, sir.”

  “Thank you.”

  As Mattingly went through the doorway, he thought, He’s not going to burn any of that material. It’s going into his personal safe, in case he needs it later.

  That doesn’t matter. Nothing in that stuff touches on Operation Ost.

  And I think even Admiral Souers would understand why I thought I had to show it to him.

  He had another tangential thought.

  I wonder where Hotshot Billy Wilson is on this miserable German morning?

  That’s next.

  [ THREE ]

  Hotel Vier Jahreszeiten

  Maximilianstrasse 178

  Munich, American Zone of Occupation, Germany

  1215 28 October 1945

  First Sergeant Chauncey L. Dunwiddie and Sergeant Friedrich Hessinger had been waiting for Cronley at the Munich airfield. Both had been wearing uniforms identifying them as civilian employees of the U.S. Army. Dunwiddie wore an olive drab woolen Ike jacket and trousers, with an embroidered insignia—a blue triangle holding the letters “US”—sewn to the lapels. Hessinger was more elegantly attired, in officer’s pinks and greens with similar civilian insignia sewn to its lapels.

  Jimmy remembered there were rumors that the pudgy German was making a lot of money somehow dealing in currency.

  “Welcome home,” Tiny Dunwiddie had said, as he reached in the Piper Cub and effortlessly grabbed Cronley’s Valv-Pak canvas suitcase from Jimmy’s lap.

  Jimmy then climbed out, turned to the pilot, and said, “Thanks for the ride.”

  “My pleasure, sir,” the lieutenant said, and saluted.

  Neither Tiny nor Freddy had commented on the twin silver bars of a captain pinned to Cronley’s epaulets at the airfield—the reason the puddle-jumper pilot had saluted him—or in their requisitioned Opel Kapitän on the way to the hotel or during lunch in the elegant officers’ mess.

  It was only after they had gone upstairs—and into Suite 507, above the door of which hung a small, neatly lettered sign, XXVIITH CIC DET.—that there was any clue that anyone had noticed the insignia.

  There, Tiny had produced bottles of Löwenbräu and passed them out. As Freddy was neatly wiping gold-rimmed lager glasses, Tiny said, “When Mattingly called, he said ‘no questions.’ He said you could tell us some of what’s happened to you, or all of it, or none of it. He said he was going to call Major Wallace and tell him the same thing. So it’s your call, Jim. If I can still call you by your first name, Captain, sir.”

  Despite Cronley’s clear memory of Admiral Souers giving the Engineer colonel a very hard time for sharing intelligence that should not be shared, he told Tiny and Freddy everything that had happened in Argentina and Washington.

  “I’m not surprised that President Truman came to offer his condolences,” Freddy said when he’d finished. “From what I know of him, he is a fine gentleman.”

  That came out in such a thick accent that Jimmy had to work hard not to smile. Or giggle.

  Tiny said, “Sonofabitch! And the bastards sent you back before you could even go to her goddamned funeral!”

  Jimmy was touched by Tiny’s emotional response; it was clear he really shared his grief.

  “I stopped at the funeral home on the way to the airport,” Jimmy said softly. “I asked if I could see her. The funeral director guy . . . whatever the hell they call those people . . . said ‘No,’ and I said, ‘Fuck you, I want to see her,’ and he said, ‘No, you don’t. The remains were so torn up from the accident that there couldn’t possibly be open casket services, so the coroner didn’t sew the remain
s up after the autopsy. You don’t want to see her like that, believe me. Remember her as she was when she was alive.’”

  “So, what did you do?” Tiny asked.

  “I broke down is what I did. Cried like a fucking baby.”

  And then, without warning, he broke down and cried like a baby.

  Tiny wrapped his massive arms around him and held him until Jimmy managed to control his sobbing and shook himself free of Tiny’s embrace.

  When he finally got his eyes to focus he saw that Freddy Hessinger was looking at him through incredibly sad eyes.

  “What do you say we get in the Kapitän and go home?” Tiny asked gently.

  Cronley nodded, and then followed Dunwiddie out of the room.

  [ FOUR ]

  Kloster Grünau

  Schollbrunn, Bavaria

  American Zone of Occupation, Germany

  1630 28 October 1945

  When Cronley and Dunwiddie reached the compound, instead of driving through the gate, Dunwiddie had driven the Kapitän completely around the double barbed wire barriers around the perimeter.

  Cronley wondered what that was all about but, before they had completed the round, decided Dunwiddie wanted both to show the troops that their commanding officer now had twin silver bars on his epaulets and to remind them once again that their first sergeant checked the security of the compound frequently and without advance warning.

  Cronley had learned that behind his back the troops guarding Kloster Grünau referred to their first sergeant with the motto of the 2nd Armored Division, from which they had come—“Ole Hell on Wheels.”

  When they finally entered the headquarters building—which also housed the officers’ mess and, on the second floor, the American officers and the senior German officer prisoners—General Reinhard Gehlen and Oberst Ludwig Mannberg were sitting in the foyer.

  Gehlen was in an ill-fitting civilian suit. Mannberg, previously and now Gehlen’s Number Two, was wearing a superbly tailored Wehrmacht uniform from which all insignia had been removed. Only a wide red stripe down the trouser leg, signifying membership in the General Staff Corps, remained.

  Both stood up when they saw Cronley and Dunwiddie.

  “Captain,” Gehlen said. “I hope that you will have a few minutes for Mannberg and myself.”

  “Certainly, sir,” Cronley said. He gestured toward the door of the mess.

  There was no bartender on duty. Tiny went behind the bar, and in perfect German asked, “May I offer the general a scotch?”

  “That would be very kind.”

  “Oberst Mannberg?”

  “The same, thank you.”

  “Captain?”

  “Jack Daniel’s, please.”

  Dunwiddie made the drinks, taking a Haig & Haig for himself, and delivered them.

  Gehlen raised his to Cronley.

  “In addition to offering our congratulations on your well-deserved promotion,” the general began in a solemn tone, “Mannberg and I would like to offer our condolences on your loss.” He paused, then as if he had read Cronley’s mind, added, “Colonel Mattingly telephoned earlier.”

  As everyone took a sip of drink, Cronley thought, That’s not surprising.

  But what all did Mattingly tell you, General?

  That we had found U-234 and the uranium oxide?

  And that I’d been promoted? But not why or by whom?

  And that my girl—my wife—had been killed in an auto accident?

  Why the hell didn’t Mattingly tell me what he was going to tell you?

  Or tell me what I could tell you?

  Admiral Souers made it pretty goddamned clear that the Eleventh Commandment is “Thou shalt not share classified material with people who don’t have the Need to Know.”

  Technically, you’re both prisoners of war. POWs by definition do not have the Need to Know.

  But you’re only technically POWs, as we all know.

  And I wouldn’t have found U-234 had it not been for you giving me what intel you had about her.

  This is one of those situations where I have to choose between two options, both of which are the wrong one.

  So, what do you do, Captain Cronley, you experienced intelligence officer with two whole days in grade?

  You follow the rules and tell them nothing. Or as little as possible.

  I can’t follow the rules.

  In this Through the Looking Glass World we’re in, the jailer has to earn and hold the respect of the prisoners. Or at least these two prisoners.

  “Thank you,” Cronley then said. “I’m still trying to get used to both situations. So let me begin by giving you, Oberst Mannberg, the best wishes of Fregattenkapitän Wilhelm von Dattenberg.”

  Cronley had spoken in German. He spoke it so well that most Germans thought that he was a Strasbourger, as his mother was.

  “It’s good to hear he survived,” Mannberg said.

  “He was with me when we found the U-234. He persuaded her captain—”

  “That would be Schneider, Alois Schneider?” Mannberg put in.

  “Yes, sir.”

  I’m being interrogated. That’s not the way it’s supposed to be.

  And I don’t think I’m supposed to call him “sir.”

  Oh, what the hell! He was a colonel and I’m a captain who two days ago was a second lieutenant.

  Cronley went on: “Schneider was at Philipps University in Marburg an der Lahn with von Dattenberg. And with von Wachtstein, too, come to think of it.”

  “That’s correct,” Mannberg said.

  “When we got to the U-234, von Dattenberg told Schneider the war was over, and surrender therefore honorable. He just about had him convinced when SS-Oberführer Horst Lang appeared. He pulled a pistol from his pocket and was shot.”

  “Von Dattenberg shot him?” General Gehlen asked. “Or Schneider?”

  “I shot him,” Cronley said.

  He saw Tiny’s eyebrows go up at that, and realized he had left that out when he’d told Tiny and Hessinger what had happened.

  “Wounded or killed?” Gehlen asked.

  “Killed. I had a Thompson.”

  “I’m sorry that was necessary,” Gehlen said.

  “I thought it was necessary,” Jimmy said a bit defensively. “There were other SS types, armed with Schmeissers, standing with him. I couldn’t take the risk that things would get out of control.”

  “I’m sure it was, Captain Cronley,” Gehlen said. “I regret the death of that swine only because there’s a good deal he could have told us. Is Colonel Mattingly aware of this?”

  “I didn’t have the chance to tell Colonel Mattingly. But Colonel Frade knows about it.”

  “Well, if there is anything to be learned from the rest of them—either the SS swine or the crew of U-234—Oberst Frade will learn it,” Gehlen said with certainty.

  Clete was just complimented by Gehlen, one of the best intelligence officers in the world. I’m sorry he didn’t get to hear that.

  “Well, that leaves U-977,” Mannberg said. “Did you get anything on her at all?”

  “Von Dattenberg and Schneider seemed to agree there are only two credible scenarios,” Cronley said. “Worst: that, despite what we thought—that she was headed for Argentina or Japan—U-977 either went to Russia directly from Norway, or met a Russian ship on the high seas. Best scenario: that she was sunk while trying to get through the English Channel, or shortly after entering the Atlantic Ocean.”

  Gehlen nodded thoughtfully. “I’ve heard nothing—nothing at all—about either scenario, or about U-977 itself from our people in Moscow. That’s not surprising, and I will of course order them to keep trying. But I think we are going to have to presume the Soviets now have the uranium oxide loaded onto U-977.”

  He exhaled in disappointment or
resignation or both.

  “Well, we tried,” Gehlen went on. “And, largely due to your efforts, Captain Cronley, we did better than I expected we would.”

  Is Gehlen soft-soaping me, or does he mean that?

  Gehlen looked at Tiny. “Would you agree, Dunwiddie, that we should now turn to what has happened here?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Gehlen met Cronley’s eyes. “Two nights ago, Dunwiddie’s diligent troops apprehended a man as he attempted to pass outward through the outer barbed wire. He was found to be in possession of a nearly complete roster of my people here in Kloster Grünau, a nearly complete roster of those who have been moved to Argentina, and, finally, an equally nearly complete roster of my people we hope have made it out of the Russian Zone but have not been located yet.”

  “Jesus!” Cronley exclaimed. “Who was he?”

  “There seems little question that he is an NKGB agent,” Mannberg said.

  Dumb question!

  Who else would it be? The German census bureau?

  My ignorance is showing. And why not? A year ago, I’d never heard of the NKGB.

  But now that I am, as of the day before yesterday, a captain, of military intelligence, I of course know that’s the acronym for the People’s Commissariat for State Security, the Soviet secret police, intelligence, and counterintelligence organization.

  Am I really sitting here, discussing an NKGB agent with a German general who used to run the German intelligence organization dealing with the NKGB?

  And have I just told him that it was “necessary” for me to shoot an SS-Oberführer so that he wouldn’t get in the way of my grabbing a half ton of the dirt from which atom bombs are made?

  This would be surreal if I didn’t know it was real.

  A year ago, I hadn’t even heard of the atom bomb, and the only thing I knew about the SS was what I learned from the movies.

  I wonder if the writers of those Alan Ladd Against the Nazis movies knew that the way it works in real life is that when you shoot a real Nazi sonofabitch you want to throw up when you see the life going out of his eyes and his blood turning the snow red?

  What did Major Derwin ask me in the O Club bar at Camp Holabird? “Did you find yourself in over your head?”