The Assassination Option Part 21

"Who is he?" El Jefe asked.

"The Twenty-second's executive officer. But he really runs the outfit. 'Major, you're not going to believe this, but that wet-behind-the-ears second lieutenant you put on the road block? He's now a captain, and . . .'"

"That can't be helped," Dunwiddie said. "You are now a captain. And if this Major Connell is curious enough to ask Mattingly, Mattingly will either tell him how you got promoted or that it's none of his business."

"Or tell him," Hessinger said, "just between them, that for reasons he doesn't understand, Jim was transferred to the DCI. Where . . . witness the black market goodies . . . he has already shown he's absolutely way over his head and a petty crook to boot."

"You don't like Colonel Mattingly much, do you, Freddy?" El Jefe asked.

"He is a man of low principle," Hessinger announced righteously.

Cronley laughed.

"Don't laugh," Hessinger said. "He's determined to get you out of chief, DCI-Europe, and himself in. You noticed he sent copies of that letter to the admiral and Ashton? Showing what a really nice guy he is and what an incompetent dummkopf black marketeer you are."

"Where is Ashton, by the way?" Cronley asked.

"He asked for a car to take him into the PX in Munich," Hessinger began.

"Christ, Freddy, we could have sent somebody shopping for him," Cronley said. "I don't want him breaking his other leg staggering around the PX on crutches."

"I offered that," Hessinger said. "He refused. But don't worry."

"Why the h.e.l.l not?"

"Because he really went to the orthopedic ward of the 98th General Hospital in Schwabing. I told Sergeant Miller-"

"Who?"

"Taddeus Miller. Staff sergeant. One of my guys," Dunwiddie furnished.

". . . to (a) not let him out of his sight, and (b) to call me and let me know where he really was."

"You didn't think he was going to the PX?"

"He was lying when he told me that. I could see that."

"You could see that he was lying?"

"I could see that he was lying. I always know."

"You always know?"

"Just about all the time, I know. You and General Gehlen are the only ones I can't always tell."

"Thank you very much," Cronley said.

"I have to know why you think so," El Jefe said.

"You don't want to know. He knows," Hessinger said. "It's not a criticism, it's a statement of fact."

Which means he didn't suspect a thing about Rachel until I fessed up.

Which makes me wonder how low I've fallen in his estimation?

Or Tiny's?

How far is all the way down?

"Quickly changing the subject," Dunwiddie said. "What are you going to do with your black market goodies, Captain, sir?"

"I'm tempted to burn them, give them to the Red Cross . . ."

"But you can't, right, because of your mother?" Hessinger asked. "Your parents?"

Cronley gave him an icy look, but didn't immediately reply. Finally he said, "I don't have the time to just run off to Strasbourg to play the Good Samaritan, do I?"

"You might. You never know."

"Freddy, you are aware that we're waiting to hear from Seven-K?" Cronley asked.

"Of course I am. What I am suggesting is that I don't think she's going to say 'Meet me at the Cafe Weitz tomorrow at noon.' There will probably be four or five days between her message and the meeting. Perhaps there will be time then. Or perhaps our trip to Vienna can be tied in with your trip to Strasbourg."

"Got it all figured out, have you, Freddy?" El Jefe said.

"Not all figured out. I learned about Jim's family just now, when you did. But by the time we hear from Rahil, I will probably have a workable plan."

"The thing I like about him is his immodesty," El Jefe said.

"When one is a genius, one finds it hard to be modest," Hessinger said solemnly.

"Jesus Christ, Freddy!" Cronley said, laughing.

"My own modesty compels me to admit that I didn't make that up," Hessinger said. "Frank Lloyd Wright, the architect, said it to a Chicago Tribune reporter."

[TWO].

Quarters of the U.S. Military Government Liaison Officer The South German Industrial Development Organization Compound Pullach, Bavaria The American Zone of Occupied Germany 1625 8 January 1946 When the door closed on Lieutenant Colonel George H. Parsons and Major Warren W. Ashley, Cronley looked around the table at General Gehlen, Mannberg, El Jefe, Hessinger, and Tiny and said, "Why does it worry me that they were so charming?"

Gehlen chuckled.

"I would say that it has something to do with a 'well done' message General Magruder sent Colonel Parsons," Hessinger said. "For the time being it is in their interest to be charming."

"What are you talking about?" Dunwiddie asked.

"What 'well done' message?" Cronley asked.

"The Pentagon sent a request for an update on Russian troop strength, especially tanks, in Silesia. You knew that, right?"

"And the general got it for us. Them."

"The general already had that intelligence on his Order of Battle. So the Pentagon asked for it one day, and the next day it was in Was.h.i.+ngton. Then General Magruder sent Colonel Parsons a 'well done' message. I am suggesting that if being charming to us produces 'well done' messages from General Magruder, Colonel Parsons is happy to polish our bra.s.s b.a.l.l.s."

"I don't think you have that metaphor down perfectly, Freddy," Tiny said, chuckling, "but I take your point."

"How do you know Magruder sent the 'well done' message?" Cronley asked.

It took Hessinger a moment to frame his reply.

"I thought it would be in our interest to know what General Magruder and Colonel Parsons were saying to each other," he said finally. "So I established a sort of sub-rosa arrangement with Technical Sergeant Colbert of the ASA."

"This I have to hear," El Jefe said. "A sub-rosa arrangement to do what?"

"Give us copies of every message back and forth."

"In exchange for what?" El Jefe asked.

"You told me, when I told you we didn't have enough people to do what we're supposed to do, you said that I should keep my eyes open for people we could use, that you-we-now had the authority to recruit people from wherever for the DCI."

"So?"

"Sergeant Colbert has ambitions to be a professional intelligence officer. She thinks the next step for her would be to get out of the ASA and join the DCI."

"And you told him you could arrange that?" Cronley asked. "And then, 'she'? 'Her'?"

Hessinger nodded.

"I told her-her name is Claudette Colbert, like the movie actress-"

"Like the movie actress? Fascinating!" Cronley said. "Is there another one? Sergeant Betty Grable, maybe?"

"-that I would bring the subject up with you at the first opportunity. And I suggested to her that you would be favorably impressed if she could continue to get us all messages between the Pentagon and Colonel Parsons without getting caught."

"Jesus!" Cronley exclaimed. "Freddy, I'm sure that you considered that if we had this movie star sergeant transferred to us, she would no longer be in a position to read Parsons's messages."

"I did. She tells me that it will not pose a problem."

"Did Claudette Colbert tell you why not?" El Jefe asked.

"As a gentleman, I did not press her for details," Hessinger said. "But I suspect it has something to do with her blond hair, blue eyes, and magnificent bosoms. Women so endowed generally get whatever they want from men."

"Is that so?"

"That is so. When Claudette looked at me with those blue eyes and asked me for help in getting into the DCI, I was tempted for a moment to shoot you and offer her the chief, DCI-Europe, job."

"Thinking with your d.i.c.k again, were you?" Cronley asked.

"That was a joke," Hessinger said. "I don't do that. We all have seen what damage thinking with your d.i.c.k can do."

As Cronley thought, That was a shot at me for f.u.c.king Rachel Schumann, he simultaneously felt anger sweep through him, and sensed Tiny's and General Gehlen's eyes on him.

I can't just take that. Friends or not, I'm still his commanding officer.

So what do I do?

Stand him at attention and demand an apology?

Royally eat his a.s.s out?

His mouth went on automatic and he heard himself say, "The damage that thinking with one's male appendage can cause is usually proportional to the size of the organ, wouldn't you agree, Professor Hessinger? In other words, it is three times more of a problem for me than it is for you?"

Dunwiddie chuckled nervously.

El Jefe smiled and shook his head.

Cronley realized that he was now standing up, legs spread, with his hands on his hips, glaring down at Hessinger, who was still in his chair.

"Okay, Sergeant Hessinger," Cronley snapped. "The amusing repartee is over. Let's hear exactly what I've done to so p.i.s.s you off that you felt justified in going off half-c.o.c.ked to enlist the services of a large-breasted ASA female non-com in a smart-a.s.s scheme that could have caused-may still cause-enormous trouble for us without one G.o.dd.a.m.n word to me or Captain Dunwiddie?"

Hessinger got to his feet.

"I asked you a question, Sergeant!"

Hessinger's eyes showed he was frightened, even terrified.

"I was out of line, Captain. I'm sorry."

"Sorry's not good enough, fis.h.!.+"

Where the h.e.l.l did that come from? "Fish"?

College Station.

The last time I stood with my hands on my hips screaming at a terrified kid, a fish, scaring the s.h.i.+t out of him, I was an eighteen-year-old corporal in the Corps . . .

He saw the kid, the fish, standing at rigid attention, staring straight ahead, as he was abusing him, reciting, "Sir, not being informed to the highest degree of accuracy, I hesitate to articulate for fear that I may deviate from the true course of rect.i.tude. In short, sir, I am a very dumb fish, and do not know, sir."

I didn't like abusing a helpless guy then, and I don't like doing it here.

"Sit down, Freddy," Cronley said, putting his hand on Hessinger's shoulder. "Just kidding."