Secret Honor

by W. E. B Griffin

  “I thought I would go see Cletus—and his aunt and grandfather—now.”

  She met his eyes.

  “There will be others at luncheon,” she said. “Humberto and Beatrice Frade. And her doctor.”

  “Oh, really?” he said noncommittally.

  “She called to tell me that they would be spending the weekend at Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo. And I didn’t know how not to suggest they have lunch here on their way.”

  He smiled. “Be sure to give them my best regards.”

  “I suppose I can deal with Beatrice by not telling her about the Cardinal’s dispensation. All I need is her taking charge.”

  “I think that’s a very good idea,” he said. “She’ll learn at Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo, but Mrs. Howell can tell her Pamela Mallín is handling everything. I’ll have a word with Mrs. Howell.”

  “I’d be grateful,” Claudia said, then added, “For other good news, Alicia’s young diplomat friend will be here for the weekend. I didn’t know how to tell her no, either. My cup runneth over.”

  “There’s nothing you can do about that, Claudia, except be grateful that he seems to be a fine young man. I like him.”

  “If he were an Argentine, I think I would, too,” she said, then asked, “You wouldn’t be willing to talk to her?”

  “It would do absolutely no good,” he said. “Haven’t you seen the way she looks at him?”

  “I don’t want to have to arrange another hurried wedding,” she said.

  “You think it’s gone that far?”

  “Haven’t you seen the way she looks at him?” she quoted him, bitterly.

  “If you like, Claudia, I will talk with her,” Welner said.

  “Now?”

  “Let me deal with Cletus first. Am I invited to spend the night?”

  “Of course you are,” she said.

  “In that case, I will see you later this afternoon.”

  She nodded.

  “And of course, Claudia, you could pray,” he said.

  “What makes you think I haven’t been?”

  “More often, then,” he said.

  She shook her head and walked away.

  When Father Welner got behind the wheel of his black 1940 Packard 280 convertible coupe to drive to Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo, he remembered—as he often did—the not entirely good-willed ribbing he had taken from Jorge Guillermo Frade when he’d been given the car by another wealthy family in appreciation of his pastoral services.

  Frade (the best friend he had ever had in his life) had asked him, smiling wickedly, “purely as a matter of curiosity, you understand, Kurt,” how he reconciled the Packard, his custom-tailored suits, and his well-furnished apartment in the expensive Recoleta district of Buenos Aires with his Jesuit vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.

  With a straight face Welner had explained that since he readily admitted to being a weak man and a sinner, keeping two out of three of his vows wasn’t bad. Frade had laughed heartily.

  It took Welner forty-five minutes to drive the sixty kilometers of two-lane macadam roads between the main house (actually a complex of seven buildings) of Estancia Santo Catalina to the main house (a complex of nine buildings) of Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo. His route never took him off the property of the adjoining ranches. The terrain was the pampas, gently rolling hills extending to the horizon in all directions, broken here and there by clumps of trees and spotted all over by grazing cattle.

  He saw the trees planted as a windbreak around the main house of Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo long before he reached the complex.

  Protected by the trees was the big house itself, a rambling structure surrounded on three sides by wide porches; a small church, La Capilla Nuestra Señora de los Milagros; several houses for the servants and the senior managers of the estancia; a large stable; a polo field; the main garage; el Coronel’s garage; and an aircraft hangar, around which were clustered three Piper Cub airplanes and a large twin-engine aircraft, a Lockheed Lodestar airliner, painted bright red.

  In 1935, an enterprising Piper salesman had shipped two of the small, two-seater, high-wing monoplanes to Argentina and demonstrated their usefulness to cattle-raising operations on large ranches. He had almost lost the sale to Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo when he told the owner how useful they had proved to be on Texas’s King Ranch; but Frade had been so impressed with the potential of the airplanes that he swallowed his dislike for anything Texan and ordered two Cubs on the spot, and later ordered two more.

  Within six months of their arrival, he was flying one of them himself, first around Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo, and then to visit Señora Claudia de Carzino-Cormano at Estancia Santo Catalina. Within a year, there had been at least one Piper Cub at each of his four estancias, and landing strips had been built at both of his vineyards.

  When Frade learned he was being appointed Deputy Commander of the 2nd Cavalry Regiment at Santo Tomé in Corrientes Province, he had ordered a larger six-place Beechcraft biplane, known as the “Staggerwing,” its upper wing being placed to the rear of the lower.

  As soon as he took command at Santo Tomé, Frade had put his cavalrymen to work turning one of its pastures into a landing field for the Staggerwing.

  It was an overnight trip by rail from Santo Tomé to Buenos Aires, and there was only one train a day. In the Staggerwing, he could fly to Buenos Aires after the morning parade, spend several hours conducting the army’s—and his own—business, and then fly back to Santo Tomé in time to take the salute of the regiment at evening parade.

  El Coronel Frade had quickly become an advocate for the use of light aircraft in the army, and during the 1941 annual maneuvers (he had become by then Commanding Officer of the Húsares de Pueyrredón Cavalry Regiment, following in the steps of his father and his grandfather, who had founded the regiment), he had used Piper Cubs for reconnaissance and for message delivery.

  This outrageously unorthodox behavior had shocked the cavalry purists, of course, but their criticism had been muted by their belief that Frade was almost certain to be become el General Frade, or El Presidente Frade, and most likely both.

  Shortly afterward, Frade had with unconcealed pride shown Welner the story in the New Orleans Times-Picayune headlined, “Lt. Cletus H. Frade Earns Marine Corps Wings of Gold.” At the same time, he had observed, “Of course, flying is in our blood.”

  The Staggerwing Beechcraft was now on the bottom of Samborombón Bay, having crashed in flames after Cletus H. Frade had flown it into the antiaircraft weaponry of the Portuguese-registered Reine de la Mer. But also on the bottom of the bay were the Reine de la Mer itself and the German U-boat tied up alongside her when she was torpedoed by the American submarine Cletus Frade had led to her.

  The official Argentine story was that the Reine de la Mer had been destroyed by a mysterious explosion.

  The Lockheed Lodestar had been sent by the OSS to replace the Staggerwing. The official US story was that it was a gift, a small token of the respect and friendship felt toward Colonel Frade by the President of the United States.

  Father Welner finally pulled up in front of the big house.

  A heavyset man in his forties, wearing a full mustache and carrying a 7mm Mauser cavalry carbine in one massive hand, came quickly off the porch and opened the Packard’s door. “Padre,” he said, not quite able to wholly restrain his Pavlovian urge to salute. It turned into an awkward wave.

  Welner had known for years Sargento Rudolpho Gomez, Argentine Cavalry, Retired.

  “Rudolpho,” Welner said, offering his hand. “Señor Clete?”

  “In el Coronel’s garage,” Rudolpho said. “With Enrico. Shall I put your bag in your room, Padre?”

  For years, a small apartment in the sprawling structure had been set aside for Welner’s exclusive use.r />
  “No, thank you, I won’t be able to stay.”

  Welner stepped onto the porch, then walked down it and around the corner of the house to the rear. The working buildings were behind the big house. In front of the house, in the direction of the airstrip, was a carefully tended, formal English garden.

  When he reached what was still known as “El Coronel’s Garage,” he found Cletus Howell Frade nearly buried—both feet off the floor—in the engine compartment of an enormous black Horch convertible sedan. Only a soiled pair of khaki trousers and a battered pair of American cowboy boots were visible.

  A heavyset man in his late forties, with a carefully cultivated, now graying cavalryman’s mustache, was sound asleep and snoring on a leather couch near the door of the garage. He had a short-barreled Browning semiautomatic 12-gauge shotgun in his lap, and there was a leather cartridge belt beside him. He was Suboficial Mayor (sergeant major) Enrico Rodríguez, Retired. Sergeant Rodríguez had been born at Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo, and left it at sixteen to become batman to newly commissioned Subteniente Jorge Guillermo Frade. He had served his officer until his death, and had himself been left for dead in the bloody and bullet-riddled Horch.

  Though still recovering from his wounds, he nevertheless now saw the protection of el Coronel’s only son as his mission in life, and was determined not to fail him, as he thought he had shamefully failed to protect his father.

  The last time Welner had seen the Horch, the hood, windows, and doors had all been pierced by bullet and buckshot holes, and the bright red leather upholstery and carpeting had been stained black with blood.

  On the car there was no sign of any of that now. But against the wall of the garage were both bullet-holed sections of the split windshield, apparently replaced so recently there hadn’t been chance to throw them out.

  I wonder how Cletus is going to manage leaving Enrico home when he goes on his honeymoon?

  Or, for that matter, whether he should? A number of people in Argentina, not only Germans, would like to see Cletus Frade dead.

  Including Enrico Mallín.

  That’s not true. I should be ashamed of myself for even thinking that in jest.

  No father likes to learn that his beloved nineteen-year-old unmarried daughter is about to become a mother; but Enrico would really not like to see the father of his forthcoming grandchild dead. Perhaps dragged across the pampas for a kilometer or two behind a galloping horse, but not dead.

  Father Welner bowed his head without really thinking about it, and offered yet another prayer for the peaceful repose of his friend’s soul. Then he walked up to the car.

  As he approached the car, from beneath the hood came a profane, colorful string of expletives—an interesting combination of cultures, Father Welner observed with a smile: Texan, United States Marine Corps, with a soupçon of Spanish Argentine thrown in.

  “I will pray to God, my son,” Father Welner announced loudly, unctuously, in British-accented English, “that He may forgive, in His infinite mercy, your profane and obscene outburst.”

  Cletus Howell Frade, a lanky, dark-haired, 180-pound twenty-four-year-old, wiggled out of the engine compartment. His face was grease-stained, and he held several wrenches in his grease-stained hands.

  “What brings you out into the country?” he challenged, smiling. “I thought you hated fresh air.”

  “I am the bearer of good news,” Welner said. “The Cardinal Archbishop has agreed to permit Dorotéa’s priest to participate in your wedding.”

  “That’s great,” Clete said. “So what happens now?”

  “I think we can have the wedding next Saturday.”

  “Why not tomorrow?”

  “Because things aren’t done that way. Arrangements have to be made.”

  Clete snorted.

  “I’m also here as your confessor, my son,” Welner said. “To hear your confession.”

  “You know what you can do with your confession, Father,” Frade said.

  “Marriage is a sacrament,” Welner said. “You are required to confess, and be granted absolution, before taking those holy vows.”

  “I’ll give you ‘marriage is a sacrament,’” Clete said. “But you can put your absolution in the same place you can put my confession.”

  “Nevertheless, having concluded that you do in fact heartily repent your sins, and intend to go and sin no more, I grant you absolution. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.”

  He made the sign of the cross.

  “I wish you wouldn’t do that,” Clete said, no longer smiling. “It makes me uncomfortable.”

  “But on the other hand, I am now comfortable with assisting in celebrating the nuptial mass.”

  Clete shook his head in resignation.

  “Let me have one more crack at this sonofabitch, and then I’ll buy you a beer,” he said.

  “Unless it would strain your hospitality beyond the breaking point, I’d really rather have a glass of Champagne.”

  “My vino is your vino, Padre,” Clete said.

  Welner chuckled, and followed him down the cement stairs into the work area beneath the huge automobile.

  El Coronel’s Garage—Welner wondered how long it would take before it became known as “Señor Cletus’s Garage”—was better equipped than most commercial garages. One wall was completely covered with tools, each in its own place, outlined in red paint.

  Jorge Guillermo Frade had truly loved his Horch touring sedan, and had insisted on maintaining it himself, although there were more than a dozen mechanics on Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo.

  From the moment it had arrived in Argentina until Cletus had suddenly appeared there five months before, only two people had ever been behind the wheel of the enormous German convertible touring car, el Coronel and Suboficial Mayor Enrico Rodríguez.

  Father Welner looked up at the car’s undercarriage, where Clete, standing on a wooden footstool, was illuminating the lower side of the engine with a work light.

  “What exactly are you doing?” he asked.

  “I’ll be damned,” Cletus Frade said.

  “I was thinking in terms of mechanics, rather than your spiritual condition.”

  Clete chuckled, reached into his pocket for a wrench, and began to unbolt something.

  He’s obviously a skilled mechanic. Why should that surprise me?

  In a moment Clete dropped off the footstool, clutching an eighteen-inch-long piece of metal tubing, bent into a contorted shape. He started to show it to the priest but was interrupted by the sudden appearance of a thin stream of lubricating oil. He quickly found a bucket, arranged it to catch the oil, then motioned for the priest to follow him out of the work pit. He headed for Enrico, then stopped and turned to the priest. “I had entirely too much oil pressure,” he said. “The needle was almost off the dial. I couldn’t figure out why.”

  “And now you can?”

  He showed the priest the length of tubing. “Here,” he said, pointing to a spot near one end, close to the connecting fastener. “See?”

  “I don’t know what I’m looking at.”

  “You see that dent?” Clete said. “Jesus, it damned near pinched the flow off completely.”

  “What did?”

  “Whatever hit the pipe there,” Clete said.

  “What did hit the pipe there?”

  Clete met his eyes. “I’ll guess a buckshot,” he said. “I think a metal-jacketed .45 bullet would have just gone right on through.”

  The assassins of el Coronel Jorge Guillermo Frade had been armed with Thompson submachine guns firing copper-jacketed 230-grain bullets, and with shotguns firing 00-buckshot pellets.

  What a stupid question for me to ask.

  “Can it be repaired?”

  “I
don’t know. I think it can be expanded from the inside; it’s close to the end. If it can’t, I’m fucked.”

  “Among the many gentling effects I devoutly hope Dorotéa will have on you is the cleaning up of your language.”

  Though they were not speaking loudly, their conversation was enough to wake Enrico. He opened his eyes and put his hand on the pistol grip of the shotgun, then recognized the priest and quickly rose to his feet. “Padre,” he said.

  “Enrico. How are you feeling?”

  “I am fine, Padre.”

  “He’s lying through his teeth, Father,” Clete said in Spanish. “Isn’t that a sin? Lying to a priest?”

  “One of the worst,” Welner said. “Unless, of course, it’s in a good cause.”

  “Every morning, when I tell him to stay in bed,” Clete went on, “he tells me that he can’t sleep. So I let him come down here, and five minutes later he’s sound asleep and snoring like a sea elephant.”

  “I just closed my eyes for a moment,” Enrico said.

  “Two hours ago,” Clete said. He handed Enrico the piece of tubing. “See the dent?”

  “Sí, Señor.”

  “That’s why we had too much oil pressure,” Clete said. “Can you get that out of there? Without ruining the tubing?”

  “Of course, Señor Clete.”

  “If you rupture the tubing, I’m fu…in trouble, Enrico.”

  “I understand, Señor Clete.”

  “Father Welner and I are going up to the house.”

  “Sí, Señor.”

  [TWO]

  There were perhaps twenty cases of wine and Champagne stacked against the side of the big house near the kitchen door. Clete reached into one of them and came out with two bottles. He looked at the priest and gestured at the stacked cases. “This goddamn thing is getting out of hand,” he said. “This is all for the reception.”

  “The sacrament of marriage, Cletus, is not a ‘goddamned thing.’”