braced it against a lower panel. He walked into his destroyed bedroom, threw a sheet over the ripped mattress, removed his shoes, and la down.
Within minutes he was asleep, and within minutes after that his telephone rang. Disoriented, Latham lurched off the unbalanced surface of the bed, grabbing the phone from the bedside table.
"Yes? .. . Hello?"
"It's Courtland, Drew. I'm sorry to call at this hour, but it's necessary."
"What happened?",
"The German ambassador-"
"He knew about tonight?"
"Nothing at all. Sorenson called him from Washington and apparently raised hell. Shortly thereafter Claude Moreau did the same."
"They're pros. What's going down?"
"Ambassador Heinrich Kreitz will be here at nine o'clock this morning. Sorenson and Moreau want you here too. Not only to corroborate the reports, but' obviously to protest vigorously the personal attack on you."
"Those two old veteran spooks are mounting a pincer assault, aren't they?"
"I haven't the vaguest idea what you're talking about."
"In the Second World War it was a German strategy. Close in on both sides, squeeze the enemy so he has to run north or south or east or west. If he chooses wrong, he's finished, which he will be because the points are covered.
"I'm not military, Drew, but I really don't think Kreitz is an enemy."
"No, he's not. In fact, he's a man with a historical conscience.
But even he doesn't know who's in his ranks here in Paris. He'll damn well stir up the waters, and that's what Sorenson and Moreau want him to do."
"Sometimes I think you people speak a different language.".
"Oh, we do, Mr. Ambassador. It's called obfuscation in the interests of deniability. You might say it's our lingua franca."
"You're babbling."
"I'm dead tired."
"How long does it take you to get from your place to the embassy?"
"First I have to go to the garage where I keep my car-"
"You're in a Deuxi&me vehicle now," Courtland interrupted.
"Sorry, I forgot.. .. Depending on the traffic, about fifteen minutes."
"It's ten past six. I'll have my secretary wake you at eight-thirty and I'll see you at nine. Get some rest."
"Maybe I should tell you what happened-" It was too late, the ambassador had hung up the phone. It was just as well, thought Latham. Courtland would want details, prolonging the conversation.
Drew crawled up on the bed, managing at the last to replace his telephone. The only good thing to come out of the night was the fact that he'd be spending a week, or however long it took to restore his flat, at a very fine hotel, and Washington would pick up the bill.
The white glider swept down in the late afternoon crosscurrents into the valley of the Brotherhood. Upon landing, it was immediately hauled under a covering of green screening. The Plexiglas canopies of both the forward and aft cockpits sprang open; the pilot in pure white coveralls emerged from the former, his very much older passenger from the latter.
"Komm," said the flyer, nodding toward a motorcycle with a sidecar attached.
"Zum Krankenhaus."
"Yes, of course," replied the civilian in German, turning and lifting a black leather medical bag out of the aircraft.
"I presume Dr.
Kroeger is here," he added, climbing into the sidecar as the pilot mounted the seat and started the engine.
"I would not know, sir. I'm only to bring you to the medical clinic. I do not know any names."
"Then forget I mentioned one."
"I heard nothing, sir." The motorcycle raced into one of the screened corridors and-, making several turns, sped across the valley to the north end of the flatland. There, again covered by the screening, was the usual one-story structure, but somehow different. Where the other structures were basically solidly built of wood, this was heavier, sturdier---cinder block layered with concrete with an enormous generator complex on the south side, the continuous hum low, powerful.
"I'm not permitted inside, Doctor," said the pilot, stopping the motorcycle in front of the gray steel door.
"I'm aware of that, young man, and I've been told how to proceed. Incidentally, I'm to leave in the morning, "at the earliest light. I trust you know that."
"Yes, I do, sit. The winds then are the best."."
"They couldn't be any worse." The doctor got out of the sidecar; the flyer sped off as his passenger walked to the door, looked up at the camera lens above, and pressed the round black button to the right of the frame.
"Dr. Hans Traupman by orders of General von Schnabe."
Thirty seconds later the door was opened by a man in his forties dressed in white hospital attire.