W. IV - Honor Bound 05 - The Honor of Spies

There was a burst of applause.

"As you can well understand, this has to be accomplished with the greatest secrecy. The Communists are everywhere. And the Jews. The Antichrist.

"El Coronel Schmidt and others have been working on establishing these refuges for German scientists--and their families--for some time, and will continue to do so.

"But there is another problem, the real reason I am here. This is always distasteful for professional officers, but again, we must deal with things as they are rather than with things as we may wish them to be.

"I am speaking of treason, which von Clausewitz described--I forget the exact quote . . ."

Probably because I just made this one up. But it does sound like something he would say.

". . . but it was to the effect that treason is simply another way of showing cowardice in the face of the enemy. On the battlefield, there is a simple way of dealing with those who throw down their arms and refuse to fight. One conducts a summary court-martial to establish that those are the facts. And if they are, the traitors, the cowards--whatever they are called--are tied to a post, stripped of their military insignia, offered a blindfold, and shot, with as many of their former comrades in arms as can be gathered watching.

"In the First World War, when soldiers of regiments refused to fight, every tenth soldier in the regiment was shot. We Germans believe in honor and justice, and we don't shoot people we don't know for sure have run from the enemy. But we do execute those we know have shown their treason, their cowardice.

"I am ashamed to tell you that a trusted officer of the German Embassy in Buenos Aires, Wilhelm Frogger, and his wife--who, like my wife, was an agent of the Sicherheitsdienst, the secret police branch of the SS--have deserted their post and gone over to the enemy.

"They were assisted in running by an American, a slimy Jew by the name of Milton Leibermann, who works for the American FBI. Leibermann thought that--probably with the assistance of the head of the OSS in Argentina, a man named Frade--he could hide the Froggers from us, save them from the execution they so rightly deserve.

"He was wrong. I am almost positive that some excellent detective work on the part of the Sicherheitsdienst agents in the embassy has located them. In Mendoza. Once we are sure of this, SS-Hauptsturmfuhrer Sepp Schafer and I will carry out the unpleasant duty of executing these swine.

"It gets worse. I have to tell you that an officer of the SS, Sturmbannfuhrer Werner von Tresmarck, has deserted his post in Montevideo, Uruguay. He went--initial investigation indicates this happened within the last week--to Paraguay, taking with him a substantial amount of money he stole from the embassy. There hasn't been time for a summary court-martial, of course--it may have to take place in Germany, as he is entitled to be judged by officers of equal or superior rank and there are not three officers like that available here--but when it takes place, and if it finds this swine guilty, SS-Hauptsturmfuhrer Sepp Schafer and I will run him down, recover what he stole, and carry out his execution."

I don't think, judging by the looks on the faces of these people, that I would have any trouble at all finding volunteers for a firing squad for either the Froggers or von Tresmarck, or both.

"There is only one thing worse than a traitor," von Deitzberg said solemnly. "And that is someone who encourages--by argument, or by payment--another to betray the duties and obligations which he has sworn an oath to God Almighty to carry out.

"So the silver lining in this despicable black cloud for me will be the opportunity to kill Milton Leibermann of the FBI for doing this to the Froggers, and especially, especially, Don Cletus Frade of the OSS, who tried and failed to turn his father into a traitor, and when that distinguished officer refused, murdered his own father--or had him murdered, which is the same thing--so that he could place the Frade assets in the service of Roosevelt and international Jewry."

Von Deitzberg saw the look on el Coronel Schmidt's face.

Didn't know that before, did you, my friend?

Why the hell didn't I think of that until just now?

Goebbels is absolutely right: The bigger the lie, the more people who'll believe it.

[FOUR]

Casa Montagna

Estancia Don Guillermo

Km 40.4, Provincial Route 60

Mendoza Province, Argentina

1300 7 October 1943

Don Cletus Frade, who with his wife was sitting on the verandah of Casa Montagna sipping wine as they watched the fifth chukker of the game between the Ramapo Valley Aces and the Mountain Husares, did not pay much attention to the dark green 1939 Ford Tudor when it first appeared.

For one thing, the appearance of Gendarmeria vehicles--he had come to think of their color as "Gendarmeria Green"--was routine, and for another, it was a good match. A dozen new mallets, two dozen new wooden polo balls, and a supply of red-and-blue polo shirts-- real polo shirts, with the players' position numbers on their chests and backs--had arrived on a training flight of an SAA Lodestar, and there were now four players properly identified on each side.

And everybody on the field knew how to play the game. Captain Sawyer had once told Major Frade, with pride, that he'd been rated as a four-goal player. Captain Sawyer was by no means the best player on the field today.

Frade didn't even pay much attention to the Ford until it drove up to the verandah. There was a sort of motor pool beside one of the outbuildings, and he expected the Ford would go there. And then the driver of the Ford jumped out, ran around the front of the car, and opened the rear door. Two men in civilian clothing got out. One was Inspector General Santiago Nervo of the Gendarmeria and the other was el Coronel Alejandro Bernardo Martin of the Bureau of Internal Security.

Both officers walked directly to Dona Dorotea and kissed her, and then--Nervo first--turned to Don Cletus, who stood up and then asked, "What the hell are you doing here?"

"Our duty, Major," Nervo said as he wrapped his arm around Frade's shoulders. "I hope we're not too late for lunch."

"How the hell did you get here?"

El Coronel Martin first embraced Frade, then answered the question.

"With the polo mallets," he said.

"Excuse me?"

"We were on hand to meet the Ciudad de Buenos Aires when it returned from Lisbon," Martin said. "I asked your chief pilot, Gonzalo Delgano, if there was any way at all he could think of to get us to San Martin de los Andes in a hurry, and he was kind enough to say he would look into it . . ."

"That was nice of him," Clete said dryly.

". . . and he asked a few questions, and learned that a training flight was scheduled for one of your Lodestars; that, among other things, it was dropping off polo mallets and some other equipment for you at Mendoza; and he could see no reason why it couldn't drop us off at San Martin on the way back."

"Why not?" Clete said. "SAA always tries to cooperate with the BIS."

"So Capitan Delgano . . ."

"I thought he was a major," Clete said.

Nervo chuckled.

"He was a major," Martin said. "Now he's retired."

"Oh," Clete said. "I didn't know that."

Nervo, smiling, shook his head.

"So he not only arranged for us to go along with the Polo Mallets Training Flight--until just now, when we drove in, I wondered about those mallets--but flew the plane himself."

"Right after he came back from Lisbon? How obliging of him."

"He said something about there not being much to do but watch the needles on the fuel gauges drop. Anyway, he flew us to San Martin, and now here we are. By a fortunate coincidence, another training flight is scheduled to land here about four, and Major--excuse me, Capitan --Delgano has been kind enough to arrange it for us to go back to Buenos Aires on that."