Curtain of Death

by W. E. B Griffin

  “Jim, I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

  “And come to think of it, Jean-Paul and you have been as blind as I have.”

  “Blind to what?”

  “Cousin Luther is not just the low-level flunky running errands for Odessa that we all thought him to be. That’s why I kissed you,” Cronley said. “You have given the DCI what we have been looking for—without any success at all—a high-ranking member of Odessa. The sonofabitch has been in Odessa—in the inner circle of Odessa—from the beginning.”

  “What?”

  “Think about it, Pierre. Where did Odessa start, where was that organizational meeting held?”

  “You mean, the meeting in the Maison Rouge hotel in Strasbourg?”

  “Right. So let’s start with that. Why Strasbourg? Why not in Köln or Munich, or for that matter, Berlin?”

  “So it wouldn’t come to the attention of the SS?”

  “That, and because they knew as soon as they lost the war, Strasbourg would be returned to France. All a Nazi—either a businessman or a senior SS officer—would have to do to avoid getting bagged after the surrender was get across the Rhine into what again would be French Strasbourg.

  “And in the beginning, it was called Die Spinne, right? It had nothing to do with the SS. In fact, they didn’t even want the SS to know what they were up to.”

  “That’s true.”

  “But there was a senior SS officer at the meeting . . .”

  “SS-Obergruppenführer Wilhelm Kramer,” DuPres said. “Who we haven’t been able to catch.”

  “And the SS never heard about Die Spinne, right? If they had, Himmler would have had all those businessmen hung in the Flossenbürg concentration camp where they hung Admiral Canaris. So why didn’t the SS learn about Die Spinne? Because a very senior SS officer . . .”

  “SS-Obergruppenführer Wilhelm Kramer,” DuPres interjected.

  “. . . killed any investigation,” Cronley concluded. “Now, these people couldn’t just paddle across the Rhine in a rowboat to Strasbourg when the time came unless they had somebody there to take care of them. But who?

  “There was an interesting man in the SS . . .”

  “Sturmführer Luther Stauffer.”

  “. . . who was from Strasbourg. And had been awarded the Iron Cross. So SS-Obergruppenführer Whatsisname . . .”

  “Kramer.”

  “. . . looks up Cousin Luther, tells him what they want him to do, hands him a lot of money—and probably documents that will allow him to get through the SS checkpoints looking for deserters—and sends him off to Strasbourg.”

  “That doesn’t explain how he found out you’re DCI,” DuPres said.

  “Let’s say Kramer is still around,” Cronley said. “Maybe still in Germany, maybe in Switzerland, but still running things. By things, I mean what has become Odessa. He has been watching General Gehlen, for the obvious reasons. He has a mole in the Compound, or Kloster Grünau, or both. The mole learns that the South German Industrial Development Organization is now under the DCI, and that the guy really running it is a young captain named James D. Cronley Junior. This word is passed to Cousin Luther.

  “The name rings a bell. His aunt Wilhelmina had been kicked out of the family for marrying an American with that name. Long enough ago to have produced a son who could now be a young captain. Cousin Luther decides—and Kramer, whoever is running Odessa—agrees that a relationship with the chief, DCI-Europe, could prove valuable.”

  “Set him up for blackmail, for example.”

  “But how to establish contact? He could hardly walk up to me and say, ‘Howdy, I’m your cousin Luther, and I’d like you to meet this nice fräulein . . .’”

  “Who will give you a blow job while we take moving pictures . . .”

  “But he could get me to come to him, his poor starving cousin, if he wrote a begging letter to my mother. He’d set me up in the black market and use that to blackmail me. Or use the fräulein you mentioned.”

  “But then you showed up at his door pretending to be a Quartermaster Corps second lieutenant, and since he already knew you were DCI, he thought, My God, the DCI is onto me.”

  “And so he gave Finney the cold shoulder when Finney went there to let your cousin corrupt him.”

  “Yeah,” Cronley said. “It all fits, Pierre and I just had another pleasant thought. If Serov knows as much about Odessa as I think he does, he’d probably like to have a long chat with someone high up in Odessa. What I’m thinking is that he might be willing to swap Colonel Mattingly for Cousin Luther.”

  “He’d have to be convinced that Luther really knows all of Odessa’s secrets. How are you going to do that?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe just tell him what Luther has told us.”

  “He hasn’t told us anything.”

  “That brings us back to Sergent-chef Ibn Tufail.”

  “You’re willing to . . .”

  “Yeah, I am,” Cronley said.

  The door opened and Florence Miller walked in.

  “Goddammit, I told Sergeant Martin we didn’t want to be disturbed,” Cronley exploded.

  “So he said,” she replied. “But I told him you’d think this was really important.”

  She handed him a SIGABA printout.

  Priority

  Top Secret Lindbergh

  Duplication Forbidden

  From Polo

  via Vint Hill Tango Net

  2210 Greenwich 7 February 1946

  TO Altarboy

  Copy to El Jefe

  Meet Saa flight 744 ETA Tempelhof 1730 9 February with blackened window school bus or similar vehicle to securely transport one adult male, one adult female, two adolescent males and eight man security detail to secure location.

  Polo

  End

  Top Secret Lindbergh

  Oh, shit!

  Admiral Souers has decided to swap the Likharevs for Mattingly.

  I should have known that the minute things seemed to be going well enough for me to pat myself on the back, things would really fuck up!

  Well, that swap just is not going to happen.

  How I’m going to stop it, I don’t know.

  But I am going to stop it.

  “Florence, get me a seat on the next Air Force flight to Berlin.”

  “I’ve already done that, sir. You couldn’t make the last flight today . . .”

  Which means I won’t be able to meet the SAA flight!

  “. . . so you’re on the first flight tomorrow at 0715, ETA Berlin 0810. And I called Mr. Dunwiddie to tell him about the bus. I thought you’d want me to.”

  “Florence, you’re a jewel,” Cronley said. “Have somebody meet me at Tempelhof.”

  “You’ll be met, sir.”

  “Pierre, I’m going to try to convince Comrade Serov that Luther is valuable enough to swap for Colonel Mattingly.”

  “I don’t think that will work, but good luck.”

  [ FIVE ]

  44–46 Beerenstrasse

  Zehlendorf, U.S. Zone of Berlin

  O835 10 February 1946

  There were three staff cars, their exhausts showing they were anticipating passengers, lined up in the drive when Cronley arrived in the staff car that had picked him up at Tempelhof.

  He was out of the car before it came to a complete stop, and ran into the building.

  There were four men in the foyer, all of whose clothing indicated concealed firearms. One of them was large and burly, and the other three were small and wiry, almost delicate.

  Part of that fucking “security detail” in the SIGABA message.

  Who are they?

  Doesn’t matter.

  “Where’s Colonel Likharev?” Cronley demanded.

  “Excuse me?”
one of them asked.

  That’s a Spanish—Argentinian—accent!

  What the hell?

  Cronley whipped out his DCI credentials and held them in the face of the large man.

  “I am James D. Cronley, chief of DCI-Europe, and unless you want to find yourself in deep shit, you better tell me where Colonel Likharev is!”

  “Given the time difference between here and Mendoza,” a voice said, “I’d wager the guess that at this hour he’s snuggling up against Señora Likharev in their bed at Estancia Don Guillermo.”

  Cronley snapped his head toward the speaker.

  “That was your cue, Little Brother, to say, ‘What a pleasant surprise! What in the world are you doing here?’” Cletus Frade said.

  “You sonofabitch!”

  Frade opened his arms.

  “Come to Big Brother, Chief of DCI-Europe,” Frade said.

  Cronley did so. They embraced.

  When they finally broke apart, Cronley asked, “What the hell are you doing here?”

  “At the moment, waiting for Ludwig Mannberg to find his shoes. When he finally does we’re going out to the Glienicke Bridge so that I can have a look at Senior Major of State Security Ivan Serov. Would you like to tag along?”

  Oh, shit!

  “That’s what I’m here to do, Clete. But right now, I’m wondering if I should let you go with me.”

  “You’re taking that chief, DCI-Europe, title seriously, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah. I am. And unless you came here to tell me I’ve been relieved, I’m calling the shots.”

  “What El Jefe said to me, Jimmy, was, ‘I think it would be useful if you went to Berlin to see how you can help Cronley. Maybe between the two of you, you can pull a miracle and get Mattingly back.’”

  Cronley didn’t reply.

  “El Jefe meant ‘get Mattingly back even though there’s no way we can swap the Likharevs for him.’”

  Again, Cronley didn’t reply.

  “Yeah. Hansel told me you were thinking of going to Leavenworth. Noble of you, Jimmy, but unnecessary. There was never any thought of swapping the Likharevs for Mattingly. The admiral said it would set a very bad precedent.”

  And once more, Cronley didn’t reply.

  “So do you have any miracles in your back pocket, Jimmy?”

  Mannberg, Dunwiddie, and Ostrowski came out of the dining room and walked up to them.

  “No miracles,” Cronley replied. “I’ve got a couple of things going. If, repeat if any of them work, maybe . . . I’ll tell you what I have in the car on the way to the bridge.”

  “Okay.”

  “Who are these guys?” Cronley asked, nodding toward the four men.

  “BIS guys. Bernardo Martín loaned them to me.”

  “What for?”

  “El Jefe’s idea. Serov’s people will be watching to see if we sent the Likharevs here from Argentina. We obviously don’t want Serov to know they’re not coming. So when we landed at Tempelhof, they saw us hustle Major Fernandez—Colonel Likharev”—Frade pointed to the large man—“and his wife and the boys”—Frade indicated the others—“bundled to the ears against the cold, off the plane and into the school bus.”

  “You’re sure they were watching at Tempelhof?”

  “If your mole read the SIGABA Polo sent, which El Jefe is sure he did, we think it reasonable to presume they were.”

  “It’s quarter to nine,” Mannberg said. “We better get going.”

  [ SIX ]

  The Glienicke Bridge

  Wannsee, U.S. Zone of Berlin

  0900 10 February 1946

  When the Red Army truck began to back onto the bridge, Cronley led the procession—Frade and Mannberg immediately behind him, and Dunwiddie and Ostrowski immediately behind them—onto the bridge to meet it.

  When the truck stopped and opened its doors, revealing Colonel Mattingly sitting chained to a chair, Serov appeared and walked to the line marking the center of the bridge.

  “Well, James,” Serov said, “how nice to see you. I’ve been wondering where you were.”

  “Busy doing the Lord’s work, Ivan. You know how it is.”

  “And who is this gentleman?”

  “Lieutenant Colonel Cletus Frade, U.S. Marine Corps, at your service, General Serov.”

  “It’s Senior Major Serov, Colonel . . .”

  “If you say so.”

  “And your role here?”

  “Surely a senior officer of the NKGB knows what General Sun Tzu said about the wisdom of knowing one’s enemies.”

  “But James and I are not enemies, Colonel. We are professional officers engaged in a transaction that benefits both of us.”

  “I’m not surprised that’s the way you look at it,” Frade said.

  “So tell me, James, how is the movement of Polkóvnik Likharev and his family going? Everything going according to schedule?”

  “Ivan, I have a new friend,” Cronley said.

  “Really?”

  “You’ve heard of Odessa?”

  “Something.”

  “Well, my friend is high up in the Odessa organization and has been telling us how it works.”

  “Actually, we know how it works. And what does this have to do with anything?”

  “I thought you might like to talk to my friend.”

  “What did you say his name was?”

  “I didn’t.”

  “James, you disappoint me. You didn’t really think I would entertain the notion of this friend of yours being a substitute for the Likharevs, did you?”

  “It ran through my mind.”

  “Why should I think he’s of any value at all?”

  “Well, he allowed us to bag two Nazis I know you’ve been looking for.”

  “Who would that be, James?”

  “SS-Brigadeführer Ulrich Heimstadter is one of them.”

  “Never heard of him.”

  “And Standartenführer Oskar Müller is the other.”

  “Never heard of him, either. Why were you looking for them?”

  “What we were thinking, General . . .” Frade began.

  “You don’t listen very well, do you, Colonel? Either that, or you’re trying, and succeeding, to be very rude. I’ve told you my rank twice. Enough!”

  “. . . is that Heimstadter and Müller plus Jimmy’s friend in Odessa certainly would be more valuable to you than Colonel Mattingly.”

  “You’re a fool, Colonel!”

  “Now who’s being rude, General?”

  “Pay close attention to me, Colonel,” Serov said, coldly furious. “I’m not going to exchange Mattingly for Heimstadter and Müller! Have the Likharevs here on Thursday!”

  “I politely suggest, General,” Frade said, “that you don’t have the authority to make a decision like that. So why don’t you ask Commissar of State Security Nikolayevich Merkulov what he thinks of my offer and let us know on Thursday?”

  Serov, white-faced, glared at Frade but said nothing.

  “I don’t see any point in meeting tomorrow,” Frade said. “For one thing, it will probably take Comrade Merkulov, who we both know is a little slow, longer than twenty-four hours to make up his mind, and for another, you’re not going to do anything to Colonel Mattingly without his permission. So we’ll see you here same time on Thursday.” He paused and then raised his voice. “See you on Thursday, Mattingly!”

  “You will come to regret this, you arrogant sonofabitch!” Serov exploded.

  He turned and marched quickly away, gesturing impatiently for the truck to start moving. The doors remained open and swung back and forth as the truck drove off.

  When the truck turned right at the end of the bridge and disappeared from sight, Cronley turned and, with the others following him, walked off the br
idge.

  —

  “Well,” Cronley asked, when he, Frade, Mannberg, Ostrowski, and Dunwiddie were crowded into the staff car, “has anyone got anything to say except Clete really pissed off Serov?”

  “How about the die has been cast?” Mannberg said.

  “Pissing him off was the idea, wasn’t it?” Dunwiddie said. “And Colonel Frade really did that.”

  “Well, as soon as we get back to the house, we can find out what happened at Wissembourg,” Cronley said. “I think we should all start praying.”

  Frade and Ostrowski chuckled.

  “That’s what I have been doing,” Mannberg said, obviously dead serious. “I think we’re at the point where we need a little help from the Almighty.”

  —

  “Vatican, Altarboy for Top Kick. The line is secure,” the ASA operator said.

  “Put him through,” First Sergeant Tedworth said.

  “Honest Abe?” Cronley asked.

  “Sir, it went off so smoothly I didn’t believe it.”

  “Praise the Lord! Both of them?”

  “Both of them.”

  “Where are they now?”

  “In separate cells under the chapel. And . . . you may not like this, Captain. Wearing GI blankets.”

  “What’s that all about?”

  “Major Bischoff was here when we flew in. Said General Gehlen had sent him to find out how things had gone. He wanted them naked in the cells. I didn’t think that was what you wanted. So we compromised on taking their clothes and giving them blankets. It’s cold as a witch’s teat in those cells, and I didn’t think you wanted them catching pneumonia.”

  “Good call, Abe,” Cronley said. “But keep Bischoff away from them until we get there.”

  “Yes, sir. And when will you get here?”

  “As soon as we can get on the Air Force courier flight to Rhine-Main. Have Winters and Schröder waiting for us at Rhine-Main. Tell them to leave now.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Is Sergeant . . . Miss Miller there?”

  “Yes, sir. You want to talk to her?”

  “Ask her if she takes shorthand.”