Canidy said, "What the hell?"

And then his mind raced.

I thought that this Kappler guy was okay. That he wanted the war to end.

Hell, he was the one who tried hiding that Tabun here.

Amazing how fast the rules change in this game.

How the hell am I going to get to Kappler in Messina and take him out? By-what?-June sixth?

Maybe if I go through Muller?

Yeah! I could get them both at once, maybe with some C-2.

Or make it look as if Muller got Kappler, right before Kappler shot him.

Everyone hates that sonofabitch.

"Message back: Wild Bill's orders received and understood-"

There suddenly came from downstairs the unmistakable sound of a young woman screaming.

Again?

But now she sounds terrified, not angry. . . .

John Craig stared at Canidy, who was pulling out his .45 again as he explained, "Andrea. I left her in the kitchen."

Then they could tell that Andrea's screams were getting louder and closer-and that she was running up the stairs.

Canidy pushed the Sten within John Craig's reach, then aimed his pistol toward the top of the stairs. As he strained to discern how many pairs of feet were pounding on the steps-sounds like it's just her-he stuffed the decrypted message into his pants pocket.

Andrea then appeared, alone, at the top, wide-eyed and tears flowing.

"Are you okay, Andrea?" Canidy said.

"It is Mariano!" she cried.

Well, that's what you get for not staying in the kitchen like I told you.

So much for being a tough girl.

She ran to Canidy, then buried her face in his shoulder and began sobbing.

Canidy looked at John Craig, who stared at Andrea.

"I think I'm dreaming again," John Craig said. "My God, she is more beautiful than Tubes said."

Andrea, her ample chest heaving, turned her head and dabbed her sleeve at her tears.

Then she seemed to notice John Craig for the first time.

She must have heard him mention Tubes.

"Andrea," Canidy said, "this is John Craig, a friend of Tubes."

"Ciao," John Craig said, and made a half-attempt to get up, then winced with pain.

As she started to make a weak smile in reply, her face suddenly showed great concern.

"Is bad!" she said, and quickly went to John Craig and knelt beside his deeply bruised and swollen foot.

Andrea Buda tried for what to Canidy felt like an hour to get him to understand what she clearly insisted was to happen next. All he knew for certain was that it had something to do with John Craig's foot-she pointed to it and repeatedly said, "Is bad!"-and that she wanted it done somewhere else but in Mariano's house.

Finally, she grabbed Canidy's hand and led him across the room. As she started to pull him down the stairs, Canidy called back to John Craig, "Sit tight, Gimpy. I'll get this figured out."

Canidy then guessed that Andrea was going to have him do something with Mariano. But then she led him, not to the living room, but to the kitchen, and then out the front door.

Ten minutes and five blocks later, they came to another residential street and then to another house. As Andrea pulled a key from her pocket, she pointed to the door and then to herself and said, "My casa."

They entered, and Canidy saw that it was more or less similar to Mariano's-with one main exception. It was not destroyed. It was furnished simply and very neatly kept.

They stood in the kitchen, which had a basic wooden table with four wooden stools. Andrea went to one of the lower cabinet doors and took from it a small black bag that she then put on the table. She dug into it and produced a roll of tape.

It's her medical bag.

She held it up to Canidy, then pointed in the direction of Mariano's house, then motioned from it to the tape roll.

"You want to bring Apollo here?" Canidy said.

She looked at him not completely comprehending, then repeated the gestures.

He nodded. But it will have to be after dark.

Fifteen minutes later, Andrea was again kneeling at John Craig's feet, her medical bag nearby. He was lying on his torn mattress. She had moments earlier just come out of the small bathroom carrying a large bowl of water. She carefully put the hurt foot in the water, then soaped a sponge and began slowly cleansing it.

From John Craig's expression, Canidy thought he looked like he'd died and gone to heaven.

"You going to be all right for a while, Gimpy?" Canidy said to him. "I need to go talk to Palasota about my new priority."

John Craig's mop of hair nodded as he gave Canidy a thumbs-up.

When Dick Canidy returned two hours later, he was still annoyed that going back to see Jimmy Skinny basically had been a wild-goose chase.

He's gone God Knows Where, and when I finally repeat "Vito" often enough that they get the goddamn midget to show up at the front desk, the sawed-off wiseguy hands me a note from Palasota with a hotel room key-after I specifically said that I did not want to stay there.

What a clusterfuck this is becoming!

Canidy again entered the house calling out, "Apollo!"

And again there was no answer.

And again he pulled out his .45 and went up the stairs, approaching the top cautiously.

"Sonofabitch!" he said as he quickly looked around the room.

There was no sign of John Craig van der Ploeg or Andrea Buda. The room held only the shredded mattresses and the makeshift table.

And the wireless is gone! What the hell?

He looked under the hidden door in the floor and found only empty space between the joists.

Damn it!

Canidy then pounded down the stairs and checked the rest of the house.

As he went to the living room at the back of the first floor, he realized something had changed.

Fucking Mariano is gone!

How did that happen?

I could barely move him. No way that John Craig or Andrea could have.

Canidy covered the five blocks back to the casa that Andrea had announced was hers. He knocked at the door, and when there was no answer, jimmied the lock, searched the house-but found absolutely no trace that they had been there.

When Canidy reached the single-story brick building that was Frank Nola's import-export office, the metal hasp on the wooden door was not only closed but had a heavy dull brass padlock securing it.

What the hell?

Tweedle Dee said he was coming back here.

Canidy looked around, then exhaled audibly.

I need to get my bearings and think this whole damn thing through.

And fast. I'm supposed to be-somehow-on my way to Messina. . . .

He reached in his pocket and pulled out the note and key from Jimmy Skinny.

Palasota had written: Sorry. Best I can do right now. Get cleaned up, rested. Check back. J

[THREE].

Office of Chief Executive Headquarters, Kappler Industrie GmbH Berlin, Germany 1015 1 June 1943 "I have just come from the Reich Chancellery," Wernher von Braun announced in a tone that was anything but pleasant as he came through the massive double oak doors held open by Wolfgang Kappler's executive assistant. Inge Gelb was an unassuming, slender blond forty-year-old.

Kappler, seated at his desk, slid shut the top drawer that contained his Luger 9mm pistol, and stood. He noted that von Braun, in his SS uniform, had dispensed with greeting him with a stiff arm and a hearty "Heil Hitler."

"And it's nice to see you again, too, Wernher," Wolfgang Kappler said, purposefully sarcastic as he gestured for the assistant to close the door and told her, "Inge, absolutely no interruptions, unless it is Herr Krupp calling."

Kappler noticed that von Braun seemed unbothered by the mention of Krupp and the possibility of Krupp's call interrupting their meeting.

"Jawohl, Herr Kappler," she said, almost bowing as she backed out and pulled the two doors shut.

Kappler's wife had been responsible for the design of his luxurious office. There was a rich mix of dark-stained hardwood paneling and thick burgundy woolen carpeting, as well as grand oil paintings showing four generations of Kapplers. The furnishings were in the baroque style of Louis XIV, the ornately carved pieces projecting, she'd said, the majestic power that reflected that of the chief executive industrialist himself.

Kappler looked over at von Braun, who now stood by the wall of floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked a bend of the meandering River Spree. He stood erect, hands on his hips, staring out at the gray and dreary day. Kappler, wearing one of his fine suits, could see von Braun's reflection in the glass.

He looks ridiculous in that SS uniform.

But I suppose he had to wear it to please Hitler-anything not to give him the slightest excuse to anger him.

Then again maybe, like Schwartz, he likes wearing it.

"And how was your visit with Adolf?"

Wernher von Braun turned and walked to the desk and took a seat in one of the leather-upholstered gilded armchairs. Kappler gestured toward the silver tray with the silver coffee service and, after von Braun nodded, poured them both cups.

"Let me begin, Wolfgang, by asking you something. Have you ever had the pleasure of being at the receiving end of one of Hitler's furious sessions? One in which Der Fuhrer is so angry that his face glows red as a beet, his spittle pelts you in the face, and the climax of his screaming and yelling is when he rips the eyeglasses from his face and throws them across the room?"

Wolfgang Kappler took a sip of coffee as he thought, I've always thought it a serious sign of abhorrent behavior that Hitler would even keep a stockpile of extra eyeglasses just so he could throw and break them. That's calculating. And sadly childlike, if not outright demented.

"No, Wernher, I have not had the pleasure of being in Adolf's company in many years. And, even when I did-and I was around him quite a bit in those early days-he then was not prone to such dramatics."

Von Braun raised an eyebrow.