Griffin W.E.B. - Honor Bound 02 - Blood and Honor

"If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck."

"OK. And this is classified. I could get in a hell of a lot of trouble if they found out I'd told you about this."

"Our lips are sealed."

"We found the allegedly neutral supply vessel—it was flying a Portuguese flag. Tit for tat, the United States violated Argentine neutrality by sending a submarine into Samboromb?n Bay, Argentine waters, and the sub took out the supply ship."

"There's more to it than that. They didn't give you the Navy Cross for finding a Portuguese freighter."

"Yes, they did."

"How did you find it?"

"With an airplane."

"Where'd you get an airplane?"

"It was my father's."

"He's changed sides, has he?" the Old Man asked, and then went on without giving Clete a chance to reply. "You said 'was.' Past tense. What happened to the airplane?"

"It went in the drink."

"It crashed?" Martha asked.

Clete nodded.

"It was shot down, is what you mean, right?" she pursued.

Clete nodded again.

"You went out and found this German ship in an airplane, right? What kind of an airplane?"

"A Beech stagger-wing."

"You went out in an unarmed civilian airplane, knowing full well you were going to get shot at, and probably shot down. Am I getting close?"

"You're a regular Sherlock Holmes."

"Not 'probably" shot down. Almost certainly shot down. That's why they gave you the Navy Cross. And promoted you to Major. You did what you saw as your duty, thinking you were going to get yourself killed. Modesty is a virtue, Cletus, but there is such a thing as carrying a virtue too far."

"Have another oyster, Grandfather."

"And what are you going to do down there now? The last time I spoke with Colonel Graham—"

"The last time you talked with Colonel Graham!"

Colonel A. F. Graham, USMCR, was a Deputy Director of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and Clete's immediate superior officer.

"—he was pretty vague about what you're going to be doing, in addition to being the Assistant Naval Attach?, I mean."

"I'm surprised he talked to you at all," Cletus said.

"It turns out that not only does Howell Petroleum ship a lot of product on that railroad he used to run, but also that we have a number of mutual friends," the Old Man said.

"Senator Brewer, for example?"

"Him too, I suppose. His name never came up. And furthermore, as a favor to the OSS, I’m still carrying that Jew on the Howell books as an oil-depot expert. Of course, Graham talks to me. He knows where I stand in this war. Unlike some other kin of yours, I want our side to win."

"I know how you feel about my father . . ."

"I should hope so."

". . . but I cannot sit here and by keeping my mouth shut tacitly agree to your characterization of him as a Nazi, an Axis sympathizer."

The Old Man snorted.

"This is Clete's last dinner," Martha said entreatingly. "Do we have to get into it over Clete's father?"

"Who's fighting? I'm just calling a spade a spade."

"And I don't like your characterization of Ettinger as 'that Jew.' Christ, you had him to the house as your guest!"

"He's an Israelite, isn't he? What's wrong with that?"

"I give up."

"I have no idea what I've said that could possibly offend you," the Old Man said.

A waiter appeared with small bowls filled with a reddish liquid.

"Crawfish bisque, Gentlemen," he said.

"Wonderful, he said, changing the subject," Clete said.

"Fine. You were telling me what you're going to be doing for Colonel Graham in Argentina."

"Whatever I'm told to do," Clete said. "I expect to spend a lot of time on the canap?-and-idle-conversation circuit."

"In other words, you're not going to tell me," the Old Man said.

"Right."

"Why didn't you just come right out and say it was none of my business?"

"It's none of your business," Clete said, laughing.

"OK. That's settled. What about Henry Mallin? Do you see much of him?"

Enrico Mallin, an Anglo-Argentine called "Henry," was Managing Director of the Sociedad Mercantil de Importacion de Productos Petroliferos (SMIPP). Howell Petroleum, especially Howell Petroleum (Venezuela), was his primary source of crude petroleum and petroleum products.

"From time to time," Clete said, as a very clear picture of Se?or Mall?n's daughter, Dorotea, came into his mind's eye.

"It might pay you to cultivate him a little," the Old Man said. "I've seen some very interesting geological reports about—where is it the whales are?"

"Patagonia?"

"Patagonia.This war isn't going to last forever, and I would be very interested in your opinion of Mallin. Is he, in other words, the man we should have down there to set up exploration for us?"

"You're thinking of doing exploration down there? In Argentina!"

"I said 'we' and 'us,'" the Old Man said.

"You would actually invest your money in Argentina!"

"By the time this war is over, it will in all likelihood be your money . . ."

Damn him! He didn't say that to elicit my sympathy, but he is an old man, and he damned well might be dead before the war is over.

". . . and if that comes to pass, I want you to remember that I told you that oil is like money. It doesn't matter where it comes from; it can be converted into cash."

"I'll try to remember that," Clete said.

"Don't be smug from a position of ignorance, Cletus. Try to remember that, too. You really don't know what this war is all about, do you?"

"In my ignorance, I've been under the impression we're fighting this war because the Japs bombed Pearl Harbor."

"Why did they bomb Pearl Harbor?"

"That's where our Pacific Fleet was."

"Don't you know, or are you being flip?"

"Tell me."

"We're fighting the Japanese—and for that matter, the Germans—over oil. Did you know that the Soviet Union has the largest oil reserves in the world?"

"No, I didn't," Clete said, genuinely surprised.

"The Russians have oil, the Germans want it—need it desperately—so they went to war. Did you know that the German Army and Air Force are already using synthetic petroleum—they make it from coal—for twenty-five percent of their needs?"

"Where did you hear that?"

"From Colonel Graham," the Old Man said. "The Germans have damned little of their own petroleum reserves. Most of the crude they're using, they're getting from Romania. Did you know that?"

Clete, more than a little chagrined, shook his head, "no."

"You probably also thought that Royal Dutch—Shell—was getting its crude from windmill-powered pumps set up in tulip beds next to the dikes in Holland, right?"

"Either there or from the Permian Basin," Clete said. "We— Uncle Jim and Martha—put down . . . Christ, I don't know, thirty, forty exploratory holes for Shell outside Midland."

"You got that right, at least," the Old Man said.

"Sir?"

"You said 'we put down holes.' Right. Howell Petroleum put down exploratory holes on a participatory basis with Royal Dutch. Some of them even came in. Yes, we did, since the last I heard, Howell Petroleum is owned by the Howell family."

"I know that," Clete said, holding up both hands, palm outward, to shut him off.

Two waiters and a busboy appeared. Their appearance did not shut up the Old Man either.

"And when the Good Lord sees fit to take me, with the Howell stock your mother—may she rest in peace—left you, and with what Jim—may he rest in peace—left you, and with what you're going to get from me, you're going to be the majority stockholder, so we're not talking in the abstract, here, Cletus, we're talking about real money!"

"Yes, Sir."

One of the waiters ritualistically poured a half inch of a red wine in a glass for the Old Man's approval. He picked it up and sipped it.