“Jesus, baby!”
“Unless you’re too stupid to see this, to—”
“I’m sneaking Max Ashton out of the country.”
“Just him? Not the others?”
“No, and I suspect that he’ll be back here in a week or ten days, with a diplomatic passport.”
“With the Lockheed?”
“If they don’t know we’re going beforehand—and the telephone line here will go out just before we take off from here, and stay out until I clear El Palomar—”
“‘Clear El Palomar’?”
“Go through customs and immigration.”
“Oh.”
“I don’t think we’ll have any trouble getting through El Palomar. And Humberto is arranging for people to meet us in Montevideo—my estancia managers and somebody from a bank.”
“And with the girls along it will look even more innocent, right? Was that your idea?”
“Humberto’s.”
“Do your sisters know?”
“No. And they’re not my sisters, they’re my cousins. Martha knows.”
“They’re your sisters,” she said. “I will take them to a place I know down by the port. Really marvelous leather goods. How long will your business take?”
“Aside from putting Max in touch with the OSS guy in our embassy in Montevideo, I don’t have any business.”
“But Humberto will arrange a lunch or something to make it look like you do,” she said. “And we’ll all be somebody’s houseguests.”
“Probably,” Clete said.
“You can touch me now, Cletus,” Dorotéa said. “I was going to let you anyway.” She took his hand and guided it to her belly.
“Sometimes he moves,” she said.
“‘He’?”
“God, I hope so,” she said. “Don’t you?”
VII
[ONE]
The Residence of the German Ambassador
1104 La Rambla
Carrasco, Uruguay
0845 2 May 1943
The Residence of the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Führer of the German Reich to the Republica Oriental del Uruguay was a three-story red-tile-roofed villa of indeterminate architecture set against a small hill overlooking the beach of the River Plate.
There was a small balcony outside the master suite of the house, where Ambassador Joachim Schulker, a stocky Bavarian in his late fifties, was having his morning coffee in his bathrobe. From there he could see the small black embassy Mercedes moving down La Rambla, the road that ran from the Port of Montevideo to Carrasco along the River Plate.
At the wheel was his secretary, Fräulein Gertrud Lerner, a buxom woman in her late thirties who wore her straw-blond hair in a bun at her neck. She had a small apartment in the Embassy itself, which was in downtown Montevideo, but also on La Rambla.
Ambassador Schulker watched with his coffee cup in hand as Fräulein Lerner nosed the Mercedes against the gate of the driveway, stepped out of the car, and, marching purposefully in her sturdy shoes, approached the door. Then he set his coffee cup on the railing and went to meet her.
His wife was still asleep as he passed through their bedroom to the corridor outside.
When he reached the foot of the stairs, Fräulein Lerner was standing in the foyer, just inside the front door.
“Good morning, Trude,” he said.
“There is an RCA radiogram, Excellency,” she said, and handed him a yellow envelope.
When she was about the business of the Reich, Trude thought informality was inappropriate.
“Thank you very much, Fraülein Lerner,” he said. “Will you wait just a moment, please?”
He tore open the envelope. It took him just a moment to confirm his suspicions about what the message would contain.
“That will be all, Fräulein Lerner, thank you very much.”
“Jawohl, Excellency!” she barked, and rendered the Nazi salute.
The Ambassador returned it, somewhat casually.
Fräulein Lerner turned and left the building, and drove back to the Embassy.
She was very proud that the Ambassador had enough respect for her ability and trustworthiness to ask her to serve as duty officer on weekends and holidays, a responsibility ordinarily given only to officers and seldom to administrative personnel.
And she had no idea that the appointment had been Ambassador Schulker’s solution to the interminable litanies of excuses about why the officers simply could not serve as duty officer this weekend, or over that holiday.
Ambassador Schulker closed the door, then went to the telephone on a small table in the foyer and dialed a number from memory.
It was answered by a female, speaking Spanish.
“Councilor Forster, please,” he said. “This is Ambassador Schulker.”
Councilor Konrad Forster was diplomatically accredited to the Republic of Uruguay as the Commercial Attaché of the Embassy. He was also—as only Ambassador Schulker knew—Hauptsturmführer Forster of the Geheime Staatspolizei—the German Secret State Police, known as the Gestapo.
Forster came on the line a minute later, sounding as if he had been asleep. “Heil Hitler, Excellency!”
“Heil Hitler, Forster. I need a few words with you. Would twenty minutes from now be convenient?”
“Jawohl, Excellency.”
“Heil Hitler,” Schulker said, and hung up.
He climbed the stairs and entered his bedroom.
His wife woke as he was pulling on his trousers. “Are you going somewhere?”
“I need to see Forster for a few minutes. I won’t be long.”
“Why don’t you have him come here?”
Because whenever he’s been in my home, I feel like a dog has shat on the carpet.
“I won’t be long,” he repeated.
“We’re having the Paraguays for lunch,” she said. She meant the Paraguayan Ambassador and his wife.
“I know. I’ll be back in plenty of time.”
“On your way out, would you ask Juanita to bring me my coffee?”
“Certainly.”
He started for the garage, but changed his mind. It was a nice day, and Forster lived only five blocks away. It would be a nice walk, and good for him.
The message Fräulein Lerner had delivered to him was for Forster.
The German Embassy in Montevideo was not considered sufficiently important to the Thousand-Year Reich to have its own communications section. Thus routine messages to and from Berlin were transmitted over “commercial facilities,” which in the case of this message meant they were routed, via the German Post Office, to Geneva, Switzerland, where they were retransmitted as ordinary radiograms over the facilities of RCA, which of course meant the Radio Corporation of America, which of course meant that copies were furnished to the American OSS detachment in Geneva.
Important messages—those it was hoped would not be read by the Americans en route—were routed through the German Embassy in Buenos Aires, 200 kilometers across the Rio Plate. They were usually sent to Montevideo by messengers, who three times a week rode the overnight steamer between the two capitals. In the case of something really important, the couriers were flown across the river in a light aircraft assigned to the Embassy in Buenos Aires.
The exception to this procedure was for messages between the SS in Berlin and Hauptsturmführer Forster. These were transmitted as routine messages—that is to say, via RCA to and from Switzerland—in a code known, at least in theory, only to Hauptsturmführer Forster.
Ambassador Schulker did not share the common belief that the Americans were intelligence amateurs and therefore incompetent. In his mind they had often proven this wrong, most recently when they had not only intercepted some sort of secret smuggl
ing operation into Argentina, but in the process had not only eliminated the military attaché of the Buenos Aires Embassy and a senior SS officer but had accomplished that in such a manner that diplomatic protests could not be made.
He would not be at all surprised to learn that the message he was about to pass to Hauptsturmführer Forster had already been decoded and read by the Americans in Geneva.
But, of course, he said nothing. Forster had told him the transmission system was foolproof, and a wise man never argued with the Gestapo.
He reached Forster’s quarters in five minutes. Forster lived in a neat little bungalow two blocks off La Rambla. His car, an Opel Kadet—appropriate to his rank—was parked inside the fence.
He rang the doorbell, and Forster opened it himself.
He was a slight man in his early thirties who wore his black hair slicked down, just long enough to part. There were also wire-framed glasses, with round lenses. In short, he looked very much like Heinrich Himmler. Schulker wondered whether this was intentional—brush mustaches like Hitler’s had also become fashionable—or whether it was simply that Forster and Himmler were a type of German, as for example stout Bavarians were a type, and hawk-featured Prussians and Pomeranians were another.
Forster was wearing a silk dressing gown and a foulard, and held a silver cigarette holder in his hand.
He probably thinks he looks like a gentleman, Schulker thought. God knows, he likes to play at being a diplomat. But he really looks like neither. He looks like what he is, a clerk, with an exaggerated opinion of his own importance, wearing clothing he associates with that of his betters.
“Heil Hitler, Excellency! Good morning.”
“It was such a pleasant day, I decided to walk,” Schulker said, raising his arm to return the salute.
He stepped inside the house, and Forster closed the door.
“You have a message,” Schulker said. “Fräulein Lerner just brought it to the residence.”
He handed it to him, showing absolutely no interest in it.
He knew Forster well enough by now to know this was the best way to learn its contents. It was elementary psychology. Forster believed he was an important man. Indeed, he had almost certainly been told this by his Gestapo superiors.
But if you are an insecure little man—which was how Schulker thought of Forster…which did not challenge his belief that Forster was also a very dangerous man; the two characteristics were not mutually exclusive—who continually needs the approval of peers and superiors. As Forster works alone and secretly in his Gestapo role, he has neither.
The only person he can talk to about his important duties is me, and so long as I show no interest in his affairs, the only thing Forster can do to earn my admiration is to tell me more than he should.
“It may be important,” Forster said self-importantly. “May I ask you to wait, Herr Ambassador?”
“Of course, if you think it is important.”
“I’ll have the girl bring you a coffee,” Forster said, leading Schulker into the sitting room.
“Thank you.”
Twenty minutes later, having decrypted the message, Forster was back, even fuller of self-importance.
“There has been a development, Excellency, vis-à-vis the incident in Argentina,” he announced.
Schulker looked at him without expression.
“You will have certain responsibilities in this regard,” Forster went on. “But for the moment, all I can tell you is that Sturmbannführer von Tresmarck will shortly be ordered to Berlin.”
Schulker nodded.
“Your instructions in this regard will come via Buenos Aires,” Forster said.
Schulker nodded again.
“In the meantime, in other words, until you receive this information through your own channels, nothing must be said to the Sturmbannführer.”
“I understand.”
“At this moment, I can tell you only that these actions are being ordered at the highest level.”
“I understand your position, Forster.”
“I will be providing further details as it becomes necessary for you to learn of them.”
“I’m at your disposal, Forster, if I have to say that.”
“The Gestapo appreciates your cooperation as always, Excellency,” Forster said.
“We are both serving the Reich and the Führer,” Schulker said. “And now I must get back. We’re having the Paraguayans for lunch.”
“Let me know if you hear anything interesting,” Forster said.
“Of course,” Schulker said, and, raising his arm at the elbow, added, “Heil Hitler!”
[TWO]
Estancia de los Dos Caballos Blancos
Kilometer 87, Route National 1
Entre Rios Province, Uruguay
0945 2 May 1943
“You decent?” Beth Howell asked, putting her head in the door of the master bedroom.
“Yeah, come on in,” Clete called. “I’m out here on the balcony, or patio, or whatever the hell it is.”
She walked across the bedroom to where he was standing on a small area outside the room, which overlooked the rolling hills of the pampas. He was wearing a polo shirt, khaki trousers, and a battered pair of Western boots.
Clete smiled at her and pointed to a coffeepot. She helped herself.
“If breakfast is anything like dinner last night, it will be noon before it’s ready.”
She poured herself a cup of coffee.
“I knew you were alone, Clete,” she said, smiling at him.
He looked at her. She was wearing a skirt, a pullover sweater, loafers, and white bobby socks. She looked very American.
“I just happened to open my door when I saw Dorotéa coming out of this one. In her bathrobe, looking as chipper as can be. What is that, Cletus, do as I say, not as I do?”
“Jesus, you didn’t say anything to her, did you?”
“She said, ‘Good morning, Beth,’ and I said ‘Good morning, Dorotéa.’”
He shook his head.
“Well, it will be legal on Saturday,” Beth said. “What’s the harm in jumping the gun a little, right?”
“So far as you’re concerned, it is do as I say, not as I do.”
“She really loves you, Clete, I can tell. I’m happy for you. For both of you.”
“Thanks, Beth.”
“And for a small consideration, I won’t tell Mother.”
“Well, I think Mom has figured out that we’re already more than just good friends.”
“I’ve been working on her—Mom asked me to—to get her to come to the States to have the baby.”
“I wish she would, but I don’t think that will work. She’ll want to be around her mother.”
“Mom’s been working on her, too. Pamela, I mean.”
“I hope she’s successful,” Clete said.
“You think everything’s OK with Captain Ashton?” Beth asked.
“Once we got out of the airport at Carrasco, he was home free,” Clete said. “By now he’s probably already in Brazil.”
“He’s a nice guy. I like him.”
“Yeah, he is.”
“When he comes back to Argentina, what am I supposed to do, pretend I never met him before?”
“Since he was never in Argentina, how could you have met him?”
“OK. Marjorie told me to ask.”
She sipped her coffee, then gestured around at the rolling hills.
“I like your spread, Clete,” she said. “It’s so green….”
“As opposed to Big Foot Ranch, you mean? Yeah, this is great farmland. The topsoil is black and five, six feet deep. Too good, really, to graze cattle and sheep, which is about all they do with it.”
“I like i
t down here,” she said. “I almost hate to go back.”
“Nobody special’s waiting for you?”
She snorted. “Nobody who looks at me the way you look at Dorotéa.”
“How do I look at Dorotéa?”
“Like she’s everything you want in life.”
“Guilty,” he said.
“When the war is over, what are you going to do? Stay here? Or come home?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Somehow I can’t see Dorotéa in Midland.”
“What about ‘Whither thou goest,’ et cetera, et cetera?”
“It’s really strange, Beth, but I feel I belong here. Too, I mean. I will always be a simple roughneck-slash-cowboy from Midland, Texas, but—”
“‘Simple’? The one thing you have never been is simple. You’re really a chip off the old blockhead.”
“Which blockhead is that? My father? Or the Old Man?”
“I was thinking of the Old Man, but now that I think about it, probably both. I can see how you eat up this ‘el patrón’ business.”
“Meaning what?”
“Just what it sounds like. You like it. That’s an observation, not a criticism.”
“There is something to be said for putting out your hand and somebody putting a cup of coffee in it.”
“That’s not what I mean, I mean, I thought about it. You’re half Argentine. I knew that, but I never understood it until I saw you here. This is your country, too.”
“You’re speaking to Major Frade of the Marine Corps, the United States Marine Corps.”
“You know what I mean, Clete. Face facts.”
“What I’m doing right now is facing that fact. I am a Marine Corps officer. When the war is over, then I’ll worry about what else I am.”
“OK,” she said. “Are you going to get married in that gorgeous Marine uniform, Major Frade?”
“I never thought about what I would wear,” he confessed. “But, hell, yes, that’s a great idea.”
A maid came onto the patio and told El Patrón that breakfast was being served.”
Secret Honor Page 20