The late Capitán Duarte crashed the sonofabitch, because he didn’t know how to fly the sonofabitch. And he took some poor bastard with him.
He therefore deserves the posthumous award of the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross about as much as Winston S. Churchill does. And awarding it to him is a slap in the face to every pilot who has earned it, including, of course, Hauptmann Freiherr Hans-Peter von Wachtstein.
By the time the funeral procession moved from the courtyard outside the Basilica to the cemetery, Peter was having second thoughts:
Wait. Am I being fair to the poor bastard? Is the coffee cup full of brandy I had for breakfast talking? Or the monumental ego of Hauptmann von Wachtstein, fighter pilot extraordinary? Or both?
Bullshit. Clete Frade was contemptuous when he heard they were awarding this clown—his cousin, by the by—the Knight’s Cross. Christ, even Oberst Grüner was disgusted.
From that point, Peter became less unkind.
On the other hand, even if he was a Hauptmann, Duarte was an inexperienced officer. Inexperienced officers do dumb things, especially before they learn that all the talk of the glory of war is pure bullshit. I did. To save Germany from godless communism, and to bring glory to the Luftwaffe and Der Führer, I did some pretty goddamn dumb things in Spain myself. And in Poland. And in France.
Cletus told me that he went on his first combat mission determined to personally avenge the humiliation the United States suffered at Pearl Harbor.
“It took about fifteen seconds with a Zero on my tail,” Clete said, “to realize that all I wanted out of the war was Clete Frade’s skin in one piece; somebody else was welcome to the glory of avenging Pearl Harbor.”
Clete is an honest man, more honest than I am. I would find it hard to publicly admit a sentiment like that, even though I felt it. And Clete is no coward. He told me that he thought his “chances of getting off Guadalcanal alive ranged from zero to none,” but he continued to fly.
El Capitán Duarte presumably was not a stupid man. He would have learned that lesson probably as quickly as Clete, and surely more quickly than I. It’s a pity he killed himself before he acquired a little wisdom.
An officer is honor bound to face whatever hazards his duty requires; not throw his life, or that of his men, away.
And that brings me back to Cletus Howell Frade.
On one hand, if Clete is in fact an OSS agent, he knows full well the risks he is running coming down here. It may not be spelled out in neat paragraphs in the Geneva Convention, but everyone understands that spies operating in neutral countries get killed by the other side’s spies.
In war, the Geneva Convention permits the out-of-hand execution of spies and saboteurs. The Geneva Convention is quite clear on the subject: A soldier found out of uniform behind enemy lines loses the protection afforded a soldier in uniform. He is presumed to be a spy or saboteur.
But Grüner—he said so—doesn’t know if Clete is an OSS agent or not. And even if he is, he may just be down here to influence his father, or as some kind of high-level message deliverer.
And if Clete is not a spy, where does Grüner get the authority to order his execution?
And if Clete is a spy, what then is Grüner? He is certainly not functioning as an officer of a belligerent army, facing his enemy on a battlefield. He is an agent of an intelligence service. In other words, they are both out of uniform; both are outside the protection—and the restrictions—of the Geneva Convention.
But if Grüner is caught for ordering the murder of Clete—or of his own hired assassins, for that matter—he will escape prosecution…not because his actions are permitted by the Rules of Land Warfare, but because he is carrying a diplomatic passport, which renders him immune to the laws of Argentina.
On the other hand, if Clete killed Grüner on his country’s orders, and was caught, he would face an Argentine judge on a charge of murder. That’s unfair.
Can I thus conclude that since Grüner’s conduct fails to meet the small print in the Geneva Convention, as well as the German Officer’s Code of Honor, I am therefore at liberty to violate the German Officer’s Code of Honor and warn Clete?
By stretching the point, yes I can.
But be honest with yourself, Peter. You don’t want to warn him because you have put yourself through this exercise in moral philosophy, but because you like him. We thought we were witty when we told each other we would like to shoot each other down, meanwhile smiling at each other with warm affection. But beneath the warmth there is also the cold truth. If duty requires, we would try to shoot each other down. Yet there would be no smile on the victor’s face—his or mine.
I wonder which of us would be good enough to shoot down the other. I have more victories, but until recently, most of my opponents were inexperienced pilots flying inferior machines.
Clete’s kills were experienced pilots, flying aircraft at least as good as his own. He’s probably a damned good fighter pilot.
I like him, but I would be willing to kill him in the air; as he would me. That would be an honorable death for a warrior. And my conscience, like his, would be untroubled. But for me to stand by silently waiting to hear that his throat has been cut by Grüner’s hired assassins would not be honorable, and I could never find an excuse to forgive myself.
A final thought came to him:
My father would understand my decision.
That brings me back to how do I tell him?
He will almost certainly be at the Duarte mansion for the reception after the funeral. I will somehow manage a minute alone with him.
[SIX]
1420 Avenue Alvear
Buenos Aires, Argentina
1605 19 December 1942
“I wondered what happened to you,” Señorita Alicia Carzino-Cormano said, walking up to Hauptmann Freiherr von Wachtstein and smiling at him over the rim of her teacup. “Is this pretty awful for you?”
Peter bowed and clicked his heels, but there was not time for him to reply before Señorita Isabela Carzino-Cormano walked up to them.
“Señorita,” he said.
Isabela gave him her hand to be kissed, and he kissed it.
“I was deeply moved when the decoration was given to Poor Jorge,” Isabela said.
Peter nodded.
“Isn’t that decoration the one your government gave our Poor Jorge?” she asked, touching Peter’s Knight’s Cross.
“Yes, it is,” Peter replied. “I wondered if either of you charming ladies have seen el Teniente Frade?”
“I don’t think he’s here,” Isabela said. “I think his father’s disgraceful behavior embarrassed him and he left.”
“Excuse me?”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Isabela!” Alicia protested.
“Of course,” Isabela said. “You are too much of a gentleman to have noticed him.”
“Noticed him doing what?”
“Weeping in the church, like a child. And, of course, quite drunk.”
“I understand he was quite close to el Capitán Duarte,” Peter said.
And holds himself responsible for the poor bastard’s death.
“If Cletus is not here, then he’s probably at the Guest House,” Alicia volunteered.
If I can get to a telephone, I can call him.
“Señorita, do you happen to know where I could find a telephone?”
“Finding the telephone is easy,” she said. “There are two lines here. But if you intend to make a call…”
She inclined her head. Peter saw a group of people near a telephone set in an alcove in the wall. A gentleman was speaking excitedly into it, and he was oblivious to the dirty looks of the others waiting for it.
“I was thinking of calling a friend,” Alicia said. “But it was no use, so I gave up.”
“Señorita, I am staying at the Alvear Palace. My call is important. Official business. Might I suggest that you walk down there with me and make your call from one of the telephones in the lobby?”
; Inspiration! I don’t know where that idea came from, but it was divinely inspired. I can walk out of here with her—if I can get rid of the older sister, that would not be a bad idea, in any case—which will satisfy Grüner’s curiosity about what happened to me. And I can telephone Clete from my room.
I don’t have his goddamned number! How the hell do I get the number?
“In Argentina, Capitán, young ladies of a certain position do not go to a gentleman’s hotel,” Isabela said.
Shit!
“Señorita, I am a stranger to your country. No offense was intended.”
“And none should have been taken,” Alicia said. “If you need to make a telephone call from the hotel, I’ll be happy to walk there with you. It would be nice to leave here anyway.”
“You are very gracious.”
And you have marvelous eyes. I wonder why I never noticed that before.
“Señorita, what are the customs of Argentina? May a stranger to your country telephone a young lady of a certain class and ask her to take dinner with him?”
“If the stranger is a gentleman, and you certainly are,” Alicia said, “and they have been properly introduced, and we have, in the presence of the young lady’s mother, then it is acceptable.”
“Wonderful! And might I presume to avail myself of this acceptable custom in the next day or two?”
“You may call, and I will see if I am free.”
“You can’t tell me that now?”
“You may call,” Alicia teased, “and I will see if I am free.”
“I will adjust my schedule to yours,” Peter said. I will, as a matter of fact, now that the subject has come up, do everything necessary, including standing on my head, to see that fantastic hair undone and spread out on my pillow. “But for now, Señorita, may I accept your gracious offer to walk to the hotel with me, so that I can use the telephone.”
“You may not care about your reputation, Alicia,” Isabela said. “But I do. I can’t let you go to the Alvear alone with el Capitán von Wachtstein.”
“How do you propose to stop me?” Alicia said. “Wrestle me to the ground?”
She has a spark too. I like that.
“Perhaps,” Isabela said, “under the circumstances—I would have to ask Mother—we could escort an honored guest of our country to the Alvear.”
“I’ll ask Mother,” Alicia said firmly, and turned to Peter. “You will wait for me?”
“With my heart beating frantically in anticipation of your return.”
He watched her move across the foyer. The curve of her hips is magnificent too, and she has a delightful walk. When she disappeared behind a door, he turned to Isabela. “And will you excuse me a moment, Señorita?”
“Certainly,” Isabela said.
And with a little bit of luck, you won’t be here when I come back.
He walked quickly across the foyer toward a corridor.
One of the servants surely knows the number of the Guest House. I just hope this corridor leads me to the kitchen.
He was in luck in the kitchen, which he hoped would turn out to be an omen: The first person to notice him there was the housekeeper from the Guest House.
“May I help you, mi Capitán?” Señora Pellano asked, smiling as she walked up to him.
“I was wondering if you could give me the telephone number of the Guest House, Señora?”
“Is there anything I can do for you there, mi Capitán? I’m afraid the telephones here are all tied up. And in just a few minutes I will be returning to the house on Libertador myself. I would be happy…”
“Thank you, no, Señora. If you would just give me the number, please, Señora.”
“I will write it down for you,” Señora Pellano said.
As he came back into the foyer, Oberst Grüner was waiting for him.
“I was about to organize a search-and-rescue party for you, von Wachtstein,” Grüner said. “What were you doing in the kitchen?”
“Looking for someone, Herr Oberst.”
“For whom?”
Peter gestured across the foyer to where the Carzino-Cormano sisters were standing.
“For them. Or at least for the younger one. They come in pairs down here, I have just learned.”
“With a little bit of skill, I’m told, they can be separated,” Grüner said with a smile. “Which answers my second question for you.”
“Which was, Herr Oberst?”
“If you would like to come by my quarters for a light supper with myself and Frau Grüner.”
“Herr Oberst is most kind.”
“There is always something for you to eat at my quarters, Peter,” Grüner said. “But that fräulein is, I would judge, a rare opportunity. Good luck!”
“Thank you, Herr Oberst, for your understanding.”
He bowed and clicked his heels and walked away, toward Isabela and Alicia Carzino-Cormano.
A little gemütlich family gathering, Herr Oberst? A little Apfelstrudel mit Schlagobers, and a little glass of schnapps, while you await word that your thugs have murdered a very decent human being? Fuck you, Herr Oberst. Willi would understand what I’m doing.
“Mother said it’s all right if both of us go,” Alicia reported.
“How very gracious of you to join us, Señorita Isabela,” Peter said.
Shit!
[SEVEN]
Suite 701
The Alvear Palace Hotel
Buenos Aires
1705 19 December 1942
The odds are that my telephone is not tapped, Peter von Wachtstein thought as he waited for the hotel operator to connect him with the Frade Guest House. What reason would Grüner—or anyone else—have to tap it?
“Hola?” Cletus’s voice came on the line.
Not this phone line, but his! Grüner has a man—Comandante Habanzo, or something like that—in Argentine Internal Security. And Grüner has him thinking that Clete is an American agent, which means he almost certainly will have tapped Clete’s line. And if Grüner’s man hears about this conversation, then Grüner will hear about it!
Shit!
“Is that Leutnant Frade?”
It’s Peter. What the hell does he want?
“Former Lieutenant Frade, Hauptmann von Wachtstein. What can I do for you?”
“I am taking tea with two ladies, Teniente,” Peter said. “The sisters Carzino-Cormano. At the Alvear Plaza. I thought you might care to join us.”
He’s drunk. What the hell is he doing with the Carzino-Cormano girls?
“The invitation is most gracious, mi Capitán, but just between us fighter pilots, Isabela Carzino-Cormano cannot be numbered among my legion of female admirers. In English we would say that my presence would piss on your parade. I’ll pass, thank you, and in the morning you will be most grateful that I did.”
“I would like to impose on your well-known good nature, and ask that you reconsider.”
What the hell is going on? Oh, shit. He wants me to get El Bitcho off his hands; he has carnal desires for Alicia.
“Peter, I don’t think you can separate them.”
“Hope springs eternal in the human breast.”
“What if someone sees us together, Peter? I don’t think that would look wise to that boss of yours.”
“We are in a neutral country. I will simply be acting as an officer and a gentleman, asking you to join us when you happen to walk in and pass our table. We’re in the lobby restaurant. You know it?”
“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes. I hope you know what you’re doing.”
“So do I, Cletus.”
[EIGHT]
As soon as he was out of the garage, Clete stopped the Buick and put the top down. His uncle Jim spent a good deal of time during Clete’s last year at Tulane listing the many inconveniences of owning and driving a convertible. But you could sum up his entire list under one heading: the top. The mechanism was delicate, he told Clete fifty times; and once it was out of alignment it was almost impossible to repa
ir. That meant the roof would leak, and that meant the floor pan would rust out. And it meant that the leather upholstery would rot, or else get stiff and crack.
And if the top was wet, and you put it down before it dried, it would shrink. So when you tried to put it up, the mechanism would not be up to the strain of stretching it and would pull itself out of alignment. Whereupon the roof would leak, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
“Only idiots own convertibles,” Uncle Jim said. “Why anybody smart enough to graduate from college would even think of wanting one, I’ll never know.”
That lecture came the day Uncle Jim told him to get off his lazy ass and help Martha weed the tulips by the driveway. When he got there, he found the Buick Roadmaster convertible with a large yellow bow tied to the bull’s-eye hood ornament.
Clete thought of Uncle Jim every time he put the roof up or down. Now he thought of Uncle Jim and the Virgin Princess. On the one hand, she was a kid who wanted a ride in the convertible. On the other hand, she was a perfectly gorgeous woman who mouthed “I love you” to him in the Basilica of Our Lady of Pilar. And pursed her lips at him as he walked out.
What the hell am I going to do about her?
A man was standing under a tree fifty yards from the Guest House, studiously looking the other way. Twenty yards farther down Avenida Libertador, the momentary glow as he took a drag on his cigarette revealed another man sitting at the wheel of a small Mercedes sedan parked with its lights out.
If those two guys are not cops—what do they call them, “Internal Security”?—watching me, then I’m the Commandant of the Marine Corps.
I will do nothing about the Virgin Princess, except ignore her like she has hoof-and-mouth disease. As long as Internal Security is interested in me, I have to stay away from her. I certainly can’t let them get interested in her.
Jesus H. Christ, she was so beautiful in the church!
When the top was down, he turned up Avenida Libertador toward the two watchers. When he was parallel with the one under the tree, he blew “Shave and a Haircut Two Bits” on the Buick’s loud horn, waved cheerfully, and called out, “Buenas noches, Señor!”
Then, impulsively, he floored the accelerator and roared down Avenida Libertador. In the rearview mirror, he saw the parking lights of the Mercedes come on, and the man under the tree running toward it.
Honor Bound Page 47