Griffin W.E.B. - Honor Bound 01 - Honor Bound

Clete followed him outside.

They were on the top floor of the ornate, stone, turn-of-the-century building. The balcony indeed faced an open body of water.

"The water's dirty," Tony observed.

"I think this is still the River Plate," Clete said. "You don't get to the Atlantic until you're in Punta del Este. That's up that-a-way, about a hundred miles." He pointed.

"That breeze feels good. Jesus, I hate this hot weather. You realize it's only a couple of weeks 'til Christmas? Sweating on Christmas!"

"Why don't we open all the blinds—in the bedrooms, especially—and the doors, to let the breeze in. And then go down and have dinner and see what happens? Play a little roulette, maybe?"

"Jesus, I'm still recovering from lunch, and we didn't eat that until three," Tony replied. "I think I'll just sit out here and watch the water go up and down."

"I don't think Ne—we were sent here to try our luck," Clete said. "And if someone were trying to contact us, they'd prefer to do it in a crowd, rather than up here in the room."

Tony considered that a moment, then said, “Let me take a leak. I'll be right with you."

When he came out of his bathroom, Clete handed him five fifty-dollar bills.

"What's this for?"

"To gamble. It's your Christmas present from the taxpayers of the United States."

"And what if I win?"

"You will be expected, of course, to turn all your winnings over to the government."

"In a pig's ass I will."

"Shame on you, Lieutenant Pelosi!"

They had a very good dinner in the dining room. It was in the center of the building, a large, somewhat dark space from whose three-story-high ceiling hung four enormous crystal chandeliers. A grand piano was at one end of the room, beside the bar, and a pianist played light classical music for most of their meal. Later it was replaced with a string quartet.

The room was full of prosperous-looking people, Clete thought; but nobody there was an aristocrat. Successful businessmen, he decided. Or ranchers in from the country for a night on the town. Moneyed, but not rich-rich like the sixteen or so people at Aunt Beatrice's and Uncle Humberto's dinner table.

Uncle Humberto's guests were rich-rich; they smelled of money and privilege. And they were simply fascinated with Dear Jorge's long-lost son. Half a dozen of them simply refused to speak Spanish with him, insisting on proving their worldliness by showing they spoke a second language as well as their native tongue.

He'd heard somewhere that in the Russian Court—before they booted the Czar out and murdered him and his family and threw their bodies down a well—the official language was French.

Clete thought of that after noticing that just about everybody had a pronounced loathing for the Russians, with a lesser but concomitant sympathy for the Germans.

Dear Beatrice's Poor Jorge had been murdered by the filthy communists, not killed in battle in Russia while accompanying an invading army. The Germans did not shoot their aristocracy, and they were engaged in fighting the filthy, godless communists. Thus, they could not be all bad.

This talk bothered him; but he managed to resist a growing temptation to mention the Germans' murder of several hundred thousand Jews—he was not sure if he believed Nestor's several millions figure; he didn't want to. But he didn't want to get in an argument with anybody either, not when Aunt Beatrice was liable to pop up at his side at any moment, and tell him again how much he looked like his mother and Poor Dear Jorge, both of them now together and with God and all the blessed angels ... and how they took baths together and splashed and laughed and were so happy when they were infants.

Aunt Beatrice was out of her mind; there was no question about that. But Uncle Humberto was worse. He was not floating around on a drug-induced cloud. He was in the here and now and knew what was going on. Humberto kept looking at Clete out of big, dark, immensely sad eyes— How is it that you are alive, and my Jorge is dead?—until he saw Clete looking back. Then he put on a wide, toothy, absolutely phony smile and gave him a thumbs-up sign.

The Mallins were there, of course. Not only were they part of that social circle, but it would be unthinkable not to invite them after they were so kind to Dear Cletus when he arrived.

The Mallins, less the Virgin Princess. Aunt Beatrice's dinner to meet Dear Jorge's son had been a grown-ups' party; children not welcome. Clete wasn't sure at first if he was relieved or disappointed, but soon admitted he was goddamned disappointed.

At least I could have looked at her every once in a while.

All things considered, it was a lousy evening at Aunt Beatrice's and Uncle Humberto's.

No one tried to speak to Clete or Tony at dinner, and there wasn't even any eye contact from the other diners.

Nor was there anyone who paid the slightest bit of attention to them in the casino, except when Tony delivered a loud Cicero, Illinois, "Oh, shit!" when he drew a king to a pair of fives and a two at the Vingt-et-Une table and dropped almost a thousand dollars.

By then it was midnight, and Clete decided he had been wrong about a possible contact in the casino. Nestor told him to spend the night here, he decided, because that's what an American in Uruguay on business would be expected to do.

"Let's go to bed," he said to a sad Tony Pelosi as he counted what was left of his money.

Tony was sad, but without good reason.

"I'm up six hundred over the two fifty you gave me," he announced in the elevator. "And if I hadn't gotten that fucking king!"

"Don't be greedy. Greedy gamblers always lose."

"My father says that all the time," Tony agreed. "You say that too?"

"I thought I made it up," Clete said, straight-faced.

Pelosi was in his room less than two minutes when Clete heard him call, excitedly, "Hey, Frade! Come in here."

Clete walked across the sitting room. Tony was in his underwear, and he was holding what looked like an oversized telephone to his ear.

"What the hell is that?"

"It's a walkie-talkie."

"A what?"

"A radio. A two-way radio!"

"That little thing?"

"I seen them demonstrated at Bragg. They're new. Not yet issued."

Pelosi pointed to a small leather bag on the bed, not much larger than a woman's purse.

"That was on the rack at the foot of the bed when I came in," Pelosi said. "With this inside."

He handed Clete a three-by-five-inch filing card—obviously American—on which was typewritten:

(1) Speak English

(2) Your call sign is''Hunter.''

(3) You will contact''Mallard.''

(4) You have 45 mins possible, 1 hr stretching it, battery power. (90 mins, 2 hrs, using

spare set)

(5) Leave walkie-talkies in Wardrobe Punta de E. on departure.

Clete took the radio from Tony and examined it dubiously. There was a nameplate on it:an/prc-6 motorola corp. Chicago, ill.

"These things really work?"

"Yeah. Well, now we know how we talk to the drop plane."

Clete put the walkie-talkie to his ear and heard a hiss.

"There's two of them?" he asked.

"Yeah. Take that one into your room, and we'll see if they work."

Clete went back to his room, examined the walkie-talkie again, pulled out an antenna that looked as if it should be mounted on a car fender, put the radio to his ear, and depressed a two-inch-long lever markedpress to talk.

"Dr. Watson, can you hear me?"

"Yeah. You're coming in five by five."

"I will be damned. Dr. Watson, over and out."

He walked back to Tony's room.

"What's the range of these things?" he asked.

"I don't know," Tony replied, thinking about it. "Maybe a mile. Maybe longer if we're talking to an airplane."

"Start thinking about how we can get these into Argentina,"