“Would you see if you can get General Halebury on it for me?”
“Yes, sir,” the Air Forces sergeant said.
“Colonel, what—”
“Colonel Dooley,” Mattingly interrupted him, “patience is a virtue right up there with chastity. I’m surprised you don’t know that.”
He took the telephone the Air Forces sergeant was holding out to him.
“Bob Mattingly, General,” he said into it. “I have Colonel Dooley with me. I wonder if you could give the colonel his marching orders over the telephone?” He paused to listen, then added, “Thank you, sir. Doing so will save a good deal of time.”
He handed the telephone to Dooley.
“Colonel Dooley, sir,” Dooley said, then listened for no more than thirty seconds and concluded the conversation: “Yes, sir, that’s perfectly clear.”
Then he took the handset from his ear and looked at it.
“And what did General Halebury have to say, Colonel Dooley?” Mattingly asked.
“He said that until I hear differently from either you or him, I am assigned to you; that I am to do whatever I’m ordered to do and not ask questions.”
“With a few minor exceptions, that’s it. How did you come here, Colonel? How, not why?”
“I came in a staff car, if that’s what you mean, sir.”
“Which has a driver? Or did you drive it yourself?”
“I’ve got a driver. There’s a group regulation that says majors and above have to have a driver.”
“And what kind of a staff car is it, Colonel?”
“A requisitioned Mercedes—a convertible sedan.”
“And is it adequately fueled for a round-trip to a destination some forty miles from here?”
“I just filled it up, sir.”
“Sergeant, if you would be good enough to pour Colonel Dooley a drink, you may then leave us.”
“Yes, sir.”
When the sergeant was gone, Mattingly said, “Now, Colonel, you may tell us why you came here.”
Dooley looked at the drink in his hand.
“Can I ask what’s going on around here, Colonel?”
Mattingly nodded. “After you tell us why you came here.”
“I wanted to see who was flying that Argentine Connie that I kept from flying into East Germany,” Dooley said.
“That was you in the P-38?” Frade said.
“You were flying the Constellation?” Dooley replied.
“He was,” Clete said, pointing at von Wachtstein.
“‘East Germany’?” von Wachtstein parroted. “What’s that?”
“Technically, it is the Soviet zone of occupied Germany,” Mattingly said.
“And in another couple of minutes,” Dooley said, “you’d have been over it, Captain—and probably got your ass shot down.”
“By the Russians?” von Wachtstein asked.
“Why would the Russians shoot down an unarmed Argentine passenger aircraft?” Siggie Stein asked.
“Maybe they don’t like Argentines,” Frade offered.
“Unfortunately, Clete,” Mattingly said, “there is a slight but real chance—one-in-three or -four, I would judge—that you would’ve been taken under fire by Russian aircraft had not Colonel Dooley here caused you to alter course. Or have been ordered—this is my most likely scenario—to land at Leipzig and interned. You were east of Fulda when Colonel Dooley turned you.”
“Now I want to know what the hell’s going on,” Frade said.
“I recognize that voice. You’re the guy on the radio,” Dooley accused. “You’re the wiseass who called me Little Brother!”
“I plead guilty to both charges and throw myself on the mercy of the court,” Frade said.
“I wondered what that Little Brother business was all about,” von Wachtstein said.
“As a fighter pilot, Colonel Dooley,” Frade said, “I’m surprised you don’t know that the wings of your P-38 are a minor design variant of the wings of a Constellation. Hence ‘Little Brother.’”
“What do you know about what fighter pilots should know, wiseass?” Dooley exploded.
“Well, I agree with those who say most of them should not be allowed in public without their psychiatric nurses,” Frade said, smiled, and sipped his whiskey.
“With certain exceptions, of course,” von Wachtstein chimed in.
“Fuck you, too!” Dooley exploded.
Frade and von Wachtstein laughed.
“Before this gets any further out of hand, Colonel Dooley,” Mattingly said, “for your general fund of knowledge, I think I should tell you that these gentlemen are pulling your chain.”
Dooley was Irish. Once his ire was ignited, it did not go out easily.
“Meaning what?” Dooley demanded.
“They are—or were—fighter pilots.”
“And then we grew up and they let us fly real airplanes,” Frade said.
He and von Wachtstein laughed again.
“That one,” Mattingly said, pointing to von Wachtstein, “received the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross from the Führer himself for his services as a fighter pilot. And that one”—he pointed to Frade—“had seven, I believe they’re called ‘meatballs,’ painted on the nose of his Grumman Wildcat.”
Dooley looked at Frade.
“No shit?” he asked. “Seven Jap kills?”
Frade nodded, then said, “But no convertibles. What the hell was that on your nose?”
“None of your fucking business,” Dooley flared anew.
“What did you do, pop some poor bastard out for a Sunday drive?” Frade pursued.
“Go fuck yourself,” Dooley said.
“All right, enough!” Mattingly said. “I’ll stand you all to attention, if that’s what I have to do.”
Dooley looked at von Wachtstein and said, “You’re telling me he was a Kraut fighter pilot? What the fuck . . . ?”
“Stand to attention, Colonel!” Mattingly ordered. “I said enough.”
“I’d like to know about the convertible,” von Wachtstein said, his tone of voice no longer joking or mocking.
“Go fuck yourself,” Dooley said.
“You’re at attention, Colonel!” Mattingly said, coldly furious. “You say one more word without permission and I’ll send you back to General Halebury under arrest pending trial for insubordination!”
Dooley stood to attention.
After sixty seconds, which seemed much longer, Mattingly asked, “Is your temper and foul mouth under control, Colonel Dooley?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Stand at ease,” Mattingly said, then turned to von Wachtstein. “Was your question about the convertible serious, von Wachtstein, or more of this sophomoric bantering?”
“It was serious, sir. I had a reason for asking.”
“Answer von Wachtstein’s question, Colonel Dooley,” Mattingly said.
Dooley shook his head, exhaled audibly, and with visible reluctance said, “When we were in Tunisia, we were flying interdiction missions—shoot anything that’s moving—and I shot up a Kraut staff car on the desert.”
“And then had it painted on your nose?” Frade asked disgustedly. “Jesus Christ!”
“That’s enough out of you, Clete,” Mattingly said.
Dooley went on: “I didn’t have it painted on my plane until General Halebury made it mandatory. That was much later, after we came to Europe. He said painting swastikas on the noses inspired junior officers.”
“And you didn’t?” Mattingly asked.
“When General Mattingly issued the order, I had four kills. What they were was that powered glider, the ME-323—”
“The Gigant,” von Wachtstein said and, when he saw Clete’s look, added, “We saw one just now. Very large aircraft, originally designed as a glider. Then they added four engines. It carries a great deal, very slowly.”
Clete, remembering, nodded.
“I got my four kills on one day,” Dooley said. “They were flying low across the Mediterran
ean at maybe one hundred twenty-five miles an hour. It wasn’t aerial combat; it was murder. So I never painted swastikas for them on my nose. And then we’re getting ready for the invasion, in England, and Halebury issues the order to paint kills on the nose. Still, I don’t. And he sees my plane and eats my ass out. So then I painted four swastikas and the staff car on my nose.”
“I saw seven swastikas,” Clete said.
“I got two Messerschmitt Bf-109s and a Focke-Wulf Fw-190 after the invasion.”
“Do you remember where you strafed the staff car?” von Wachtstein asked softly. “And when?”
Dooley looked at him curiously, but after a moment answered: “About half past three on the afternoon of April seventh, 1943. Right outside Sidi Mansour, Tunisia. I remember that because when I got back, my squadron CO and the exec didn’t—and I got the squadron and my railroad tracks. Why do you want to know? Is it important?”
“You made just the one pass?” von Wachtstein asked. “You didn’t go back to make sure everybody was dead?”
“There were just two people in the car,” Dooley replied. “Both in the front seat. I saw the car go off the road and turn over. There was no need to make a second pass. Why do you need the details?”
“On the afternoon of seven April 1943, near Sidi Mansour, while riding in a staff car, a friend of mine serving in the Afrikakorps was attacked by an American P-51 Mustang. His car went off the road and overturned. Were you flying a P-51, Colonel?”
Dooley nodded. “You knew this guy?” he asked.
Von Wachtstein nodded. “Quite well. We were good friends. He told me what had happened to him. His name was Claus von Stauffenberg. Oberstleutnant Graf Claus von Stauffenberg—the officer who later saw it as his duty to try to kill Hitler.”
“The guy with the bomb under the table that didn’t go off?” Dooley asked.
“The bomb went off,” Mattingly said. “But the force was deflected from Hitler by the massive leg supporting the table. Hitler lived, and later that day the SS stood Colonel von Stauffenberg against a wall on Bendlerstrasse in Berlin and executed him with Schmeisser submachine-gun fire.”
“I don’t know how to handle something like this,” Dooley said. “If I’m supposed to say I’m sorry, I’m sorry. Hell, I was sorry when I did it.”
“Colonel, for what it’s worth,” von Wachtstein said, “I can assure you Claus would bear you no hard feelings. You were doing your duty, as he did his.”
“The details match too closely for this to be a coincidence,” Mattingly said, as if to himself. “I would say it is what happened.”
“Yeah,” Dooley said. “His version of what happened and mine match too closely.”
“There is one detail von Wachtstein didn’t tell you, Colonel Dooley,” Mattingly said. “Some time later, Peter’s father was executed, in a very cruel manner, for his role in the bomb plot.”
Mattingly poured a half-inch of scotch in his glass and tossed it down.
“Well, I hope that everybody is now very sorry for all the cruel things you’ve been saying to one another, and that we can now play nice and maybe even get on with the business at hand.”
The comment—and the tone of his voice—made everyone smile or chuckle.
“Which is?” Frade asked.
“First, I tell Colonel Dooley that everything he sees or hears from now on is top secret, and that if he ever—now or ever—breathes a word of it to anyone, he will be soundly spanked, or castrated with a chain saw, or both.”
That earned him more smiles and chuckles.
“And to answer Colonel Frade’s question about what happens now, what happens now is that we drive out into the countryside, to Kronberg im Taunus, where after we get something to eat I will tell you what happens now. You know Kronberg im Taunus, von Wachtstein?”
“The Schlosshotel, Colonel?”
Mattingly nodded.
“It used to be a club for senior officers,” von Wachtstein said.
“It has been requisitioned as the headquarters of the Forward Element of OSS SHAEF,” Mattingly said.
“Is that what you guys are?” Dooley asked. “OSS? I knew it had to be something like that.”
“Colonel, I told you before that patience is a virtue right up there with chastity. This time, write it down. Von Wachtstein, can you find the Schlosshotel?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then why don’t you lead the way in Dooley’s car? We will follow you in the Horch, presuming Frade can show me how to get it out of low gear.”
“I know the Schlosshotel,” Enrico Rodríguez said. “And how to get there.”
“And he also knows how to get a Horch out of low range,” Frade said. “I suggest you let him drive.”
“Splendid idea,” Mattingly said. “That will permit you and me to ride in the backseat and acknowledge the roar of the party faithful.”
Mattingly then mimed waving regally at an imaginary crowd.
[FOUR]
Frankfurt am Main, Germany 1815 19 May 1945
“Not very pretty, is it, Clete?” Mattingly asked as Enrico drove them down what was a narrow alley through the rubble of what had been a suburban area of Frankfurt am Main.
Only some walls of a few buildings were left standing. Here and there, gray-faced men and women searched the rubble for whatever they could salvage.
“It’s unbelievable,” Frade said.
“And you ain’t seen nuttin’ yet. Berlin is worse.”
“You’ve been to Berlin?”
“I flew over it in a puddle jumper,” Mattingly said, “as the Russians were taking it.”
He saw the look on Frade’s face and went on: “In North Africa, before I was called to the priesthood of the OSS, I was a tank battalion commander in Combat Command A of Second Armored Division—”
“I saw the armored division patch,” Clete said.
“—Colonel I. D. White commanding,” Mattingly went on. “I was visiting him—by then he was a major general and commanding Hell on Wheels—when he had his bridges across the Elbe and was about to head for Berlin. Ike ordered him to hold in place. The general was slightly miffed. He kicked the windows out on his command post—you know, an office on the back of a six-by-six truck.”
“Really?”
“Hell hath no fury that remotely compares to I. D. White in a rage,” Mattingly said. “But eventually he calmed down a little. Then he looked at me and said, ‘I’d really like to know what’s going on there, but as I am under a direct order that not one man of Hell on Wheels is to go there, I can’t send somebody to find out.
“‘But it has just occurred to me, Colonel, that you are no longer under my command. If you asked to borrow one of my Piper Cubs, I would of course make one available to you. And I don’t have the authority to tell you where you can or cannot go, do I?’”
“So I said, ‘Point taken, General. General, have you got a puddle jumper you could let me use?’ And I got in it and flew over Berlin.”
“And?”
“One of the first things I saw was Red Army troops—they use Asiatics as assault troops—neatly lined up to gang-rape women in the streets. They are not very nice people, Clete.”
“Jesus Christ!”
“When we flew over the Reichstag, there was a large gasoline fire merrily burning in the inner courtyard, outside the Hitler Bunker. I can’t be sure, of course, but I suspect I was watching the incineration of Der Führer and his bride. Or perhaps the Goebbels family, Mommy, Daddy and the six children to whom Mommy had just fed cyanide pills. Whoever it was, the sickly smell of burning flesh was without question.”
“I’d heard of the burning bodies but not the gang-raping troopers,” Clete said, and once again said, “Jesus Christ!”
“At that point three MiG-3 fighters appeared and suggested, by shooting tracers in front of us, that we were not welcome, and we took the hint and flew back across the Elbe.”
“They tried to shoot you down?”
“They
made it clear they were capable of doing so if we didn’t go back where we belonged.”
“They’re supposed to be our allies, for Christ’s sake.”
“General Patton suggests that we’re going to have to fight them sooner or later, and I suspect he may be right.”
“My God!”
“Quickly changing the subject,” Mattingly said. “Where we’re going now is to the Schlosshotel Kronberg, which—along with this car—I have requisitioned for the OSS. One of my guys had been there before the war, and suggested that since we could use it, we add it to the Don’t Hit Under Any Circumstances target list for the Eighth Air Force.”
“You had the authority to do that?”
“Ike now likes the OSS. Particularly Allen Dulles, David Bruce, and their underlings, including this one. Yeah, I had the authority to do that. But that’s what they call a two-edged sword. If that weren’t true, I wouldn’t have been saddled with this ‘deal with the Russians’ business.”
“I don’t understand,” Frade confessed.
“Why don’t we wait until we’re all together? Let me finish about the Schlosshotel.”
“Sure.”
“It was built in the 1890s by the Dowager Empress Victoria of the German empire, and named Schloss Friedrichshof. Her husband, Frederick III, was the emperor. Damn the expense, in other words, nothing’s too good for Ol’ Freddy.
“In 1901, the Empress’s youngest daughter, Princess Margaret of Prussia, inherited it from her mother. Margaret married Philip, Prince of Hesse, and the castle was part of her dowry.
“And now, so to speak, I have—or the OSS has—inherited it from His Highness.”
He looked at Frade.
“Did I say something amusing?”
“No. I was just thinking you sound like a history professor.”
“As a matter of fact, I was a history professor. Sewanee. The University of the South. Actually, I was professor of history and romance languages.”
“I’ll be damned. How did you wind up as a tank battalion commander?”
“You ever hear that an officer should keep his indiscretions a hundred miles from the flagpole?”
Frade nodded.
“Same thing applies to a professor, particularly one at an institution operated by the Episcopal Church. I solved my problem once a month by driving into Memphis, where I became a second lieutenant in Tank Company A (Separate) of the Tennessee National Guard. Second lieutenants, as I’m sure you remember, are expected to drink and carouse with loose women.”
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