seeing the numbers clearly under the pond's floodlights.
"Stanley, we made it," he said.
"Someone else didn't, lad," interrupted the colonel.
"And we don't know how the hell it happened."
"What are you talking about?"
"That neo scum bucket I put on a military jet under a drape to Washington at five o'clock this morning."
"What about him?"
"He arrived at Andrews Air Force Base at three-thirty A.m." D.C. time-total darkness; incidentally-and was shot while under military escort to the waiting area."
Chapter Fifteen
"How?"
"A damned powerful rifle with an infrared scope on one of the roofs. Naturally, nothing was found."
"Who was looking?"
"Who knows? As we agreed, I let the word out on a need-to know basis to Knox Talbot's top senior officers that we had a genuine Nazi, when he was flying in, and all the rest.
"So?"
"Someone hired a gun."
"So where are we-"'
"Narrowing everything down, that's where we are. We know about the AA computers, now we've got another four or five deputy directors on the list. That's how it's done, youngster, you keep closing the doors until there's only one or two left in a room."
"What about me, what about Paris?"
"It's a cat-and-mouse, isn't it, lad? This Kroeger wants to find Harry-you-as much as you want to find him, isn't that so?"
"Apparently, but why?)l "We'll only know that when we catch him, won't we?"
"You're not very comforting-" "I don't care to be, get that straight. I want you on your uppers every minute of the day and night."
"Thanks a lot, Stosh."
"Bring me whatever you've got-" "I grabbed everything there was," Latham broke in furiously.
"So don't say 'whatever." Except I forgot to take the goddamn e'd watch!"
"I like that," said the colonel.
"I like anger in situations like this. My place, in an hour, and make three changes of vehicles."
the flames shot upward, bright bursts of fire illuMInating the darkness. The enormous Vaclabruck Tcomplex was nearly completed, including a vast scythed-down field descending from a sloping hill that held fifteen hundred selected disciples of the BrUderschaft from all over the world. The night was cloudless and the torches filled the huge natural arena, both along the surrounding borders as well as in front of the dais, a fifty foot-long table on the crest of the hill where the leaders sat. A microphone was in the center lectern, its wires leading to speakers throughout the area, and on top of tall poles behind the imposing table, spotlighted and fluttering in the breezes, were the bloodred and black flags of the Third Reich, with one startling difference. A white lightning bolt shot down across the swastikas. It was the banner of the Fourth Reich.
A series-of speakers, all in the military uniforms of Nazi Germany, had spoken, their exhortations bringing the audience to clamorous crescendos of fanatical endorsement. Finally, the next to-last orator approached the center of the dais; he gripped the lectern, his fiery gaze sweeping over the serrated ranks, and spoke with quiet, echoing authority.
"You have heard it all tonight, the cries of those around the world who need us, demand us, insist that we take up the sword of global order, purifying the races and eliminating the human and ideological garbage that pollutes the civilized world. And we stand ready!"
The applause, pulsated by roars of approval, rocked the ground, reverberating throughout the surrounding forests.
The uniformed man held up his hands for silence; it came quickly, and he continued.
"But to lead us, we must have a Zeus, a Ftibrer greater than the last-not in thought, for no one could surpass Adolf Hitler in philosophy-but in strength and determination, a leader who will strike down the timid and not be stopped by the cautious strategies of military intellectuals; who will smite the enemies of racial progress, and will attack when he knows the time is right! History has proved that had the Third Reich invaded England when Herr Hitler ordered his armies to do so, we would have a different and far better. world than we have today. He was persuaded not to by the privileged dilettantes of the Junker corps. Our new leader, our Zeus, will never submit to such cowardly interference.. .. However, and I know this will be a disappointment, it is not yet the time to reveal his identity, even to you. Instead, he has recorded a message for you, for each and every one of you."
The next-to-last orator shot his right arm up in the Nazi salute.
As he abruptly snapped it back, an amplified voice came from the speakers everywhere. It was a strange voice,