W. IV: Honor Bound 05 - The Honor of Spies

The captain of the Oceano Pacifico, who had been in one of her boats, had been more than effusive in describing von Wachtstein's cool courage under fire. Courage was something to be expected of an officer who had received the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross from Hitler personally, of course, but Cranz wasn't really sure if von Wachtstein had been extraordinarily lucky or whether the snipers had intentionally spared him.

What Cranz was sure of was that the attack made clear that the embassy housed a traitor. And he was just about certain that that was the reason Frogger had deserted his post, taking his wife with him.

Not that Frogger was the traitor. So far as Cranz knew, the Froggers were--or until their desertion, had been--patriotic Germans. They had lost two of their officer sons in Russia, and the third, the eldest, Frogger's namesake, Oberstleutnant Wilhelm Frogger, had been captured when General von Arnim had surrendered the Afrikakorps.

Furthermore, Cranz knew that Frau Else Frogger secretly had been on the payroll of the Sicherheitsdienst, the Secret Police of the SS, and had been charged with reporting on the other Germans in the embassy to Oberst Gruner.

There was a downside to these faultless patriotic credentials. The Froggers had seen enough of the functioning of the SS-SD to know that with as much at stake as there was, if the actual traitor in the embassy could not be found, one would be created. Himmler and Bormann would want to be told the problem had been dealt with.

The Froggers knew that if Cranz, who had replaced Gruner, and Naval Attache Kapitan zur See Karl Boltitz, who had come to Argentina with Cranz, and almost certainly was working for Admiral Canaris, could not find the traitor, they would be replaced. In which case, they would be sent--if they were lucky--to the Eastern Front. Or to a concentration camp.

Furthermore, Frogger was aware that while he was privy to the secrets of Operation Phoenix, he was by no means a member of the inner circle. He knew too much.

Worse, he was privy to many of the details of an even more secret operation--which didn't have a code name--run by SS-Brigadefuhrer Ritter Manfred von Deitzberg, first deputy adjutant to Reichsfuhrer-SS Himmler. Von Deitzberg had charged Cranz with making sure that this operation--in which senior SS officers were enriching themselves by arranging the release of Jews from concentration camps, and their subsequent movement to Argentina, on payment of a substantial ransom--was kept running and kept secret.

Cranz therefore thought it very likely that when the Froggers had been ordered to return on the next Condor flight to Berlin, Frogger had decided--or his wife had decided, or the both of them--that they had been set up as the scapegoats. And knowing what that meant, they had deserted their posts.

Now they were going to have to be killed before they could barter their knowledge of Operation Phoenix and the ransoming operation for their own sanctuary.

Peron said: "While I am fully aware of the problem the Froggers pose, Karl, I don't want anything to happen to Cletus Frade. He is my godson. His father--my dearest friend--died unnecessarily and I don't want the death of Cletus weighing on my soul as well."

"I understand your position, Juan Domingo. But--the reason I asked you to receive me on such short notice--I have come up with a rough plan that, since Cletus Frade is in the United States, poses no threat to him whatever."

"We don't know when he will return," Peron said.

"But not within the next three or four days, wouldn't you agree?"

"No, of course not," Peron said impatiently. "He just got there. He has to do what has to be done to get the SAA pilots the licenses Lloyd's of London insists they have to have, however long--three or four days--that will take, and then fly back here."

"De Filippi will know," Cranz said. "More important, will he tell you when Frade will actually be here?"

"Of course."

"And you will tell me?"

"Why would you want to know?"

"As I said, Juan Domingo, I know, and respect, your feeling vis-a-vis your godson. If I know when he will return, I can either adjust my plan, or call it off completely, if it would in any way put Frade at risk."

"I'm glad we understand one another," Peron said.

"May I speak bluntly, Juan Domingo?"

"Please do."

"I think you are as aware as I am of the problems the Froggers will cause both of us if we can't return them to German control and get them out of Argentina."

"Let's hear what you have in mind," Peron said tartly.

"The reason I'm sure the Froggers are in Tandil is that one of my men has seen them there."

"You sent someone from the SS to Tandil?" Peron asked on the edge of anger.

"I sent an Argentine, an ethnic German who works for me, down there to see what he could learn. Would you like to hear from him what that is?"

"How could I do that?

"He's here, in the foyer. May I get him?"

Peron considered that for a long moment.

"You did consider, of course, that Martin's men would see you bringing him here? What that would mean?"

"I'm sure they did," Cranz said, smiling. "He was driving my car; he's my chauffeur."

Peron considered that a moment, then smiled.

"You are good at what you do, aren't you, Karl? Yes. Bring him in."

[THREE]

Building T-209

Senior German Officer Prisoner of War Detention

Facility

Camp Clinton, Mississippi

1850 6 August 1943

Building T-209 had been erected in four days just over a year before. Sitting on concrete blocks, it was a one-story frame structure containing a living room, a kitchen, and two bedrooms.

In each of the bedrooms, a curtained-off cubicle held a sink, a toilet, and a cement-floored shower. The furniture was what was prescribed in an Army Regulation titled "Colonels Through Major Generals, Temporary Bachelor Accommodations, Furnishings For."

That is to say, the single beds in the bedrooms were marginally larger and had more comfortable mattresses than the " Cots, Steel w/mattress" provided for officers of lower rank. And the living room held a simple, if comfortable, cloth-upholstered couch, two matching armchairs, and a coffee table. There was a refrigerator and a stove and a kitchen table with two chairs in the kitchen. Officers of lesser rank had none of these creature comforts.

A very large fan on a pole had been placed in the open kitchen door so that it blew toward the open living room door. It didn't cool the cottage much against the stifling heat of Mississippi in August, but it was much better than nothing.

Colonel J. Stanton Ludlow, Sr., Corps of Military Police--a tall, gray-haired fifty-six-year-old; a "Retread," having served in World War One--entered Building T-209. He was trailed by a serious-looking lieutenant, a wiry twenty-two-year-old with closely cropped black hair.

They found six men in the living room, three of them in uniform.

The officers in uniform rose and came to attention in respect to the presence of the Camp Clinton commander. Two of them, a lieutenant and a major, wore MP brassards and the other accoutrements of military policemen, including holstered Model 1911A1 .45 ACP pistols, on their khaki shirts-and-trousers uniforms. The third wore short khaki pants and a khaki tunic onto which had been pinned and sewn the insignia of an oberstleutnant--lieutenant colonel--of the Afrikakorps.

The third was of course Oberstleutnant Wilhelm Frogger, who had been captured when General Hans-Jurgen von Arnim had surrendered the Afrikakorps, and who was the sole surviving son of Wilhelm and Else Frogger.

"At ease," Colonel Ludlow ordered, and turned to the eldest of the three civilians, who was sitting in one of the armchairs. He was wearing a sweat-soaked shirt. He had his sleeves rolled up and his tie pulled down. Gaily striped suspenders held up his pants.