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

The door opened and Father Kurt Welner, S.J., trailed by Mother Superior, came into the room.

"Well, you two, are you about ready to have that beautiful baby of yours baptized?"

"Would it matter?" Dorotea asked. "We're outnumbered."

"Dorotea!" Mother Superior said. "You should be ashamed of yourself."

"And when we have that out of the way, Dorotea," Welner said, "Mother Superior and I have been talking about moving you to the hospital. You'd be more comfortable there."

"What is that, what they call a double standard?" Dorotea challenged. "We can't lie to you, but you can lie to us? You don't give a tinker's damn about my comfort. You think I'd be safer in the convent when Schmidt comes here."

"Baby, you would," Clete said.

"Call me Ruth, Cletus."

"What?"

" 'Whither thou goest, I will go,' and I'm not going anywhere without you. This house is where we live. I'm going to be here when my husband leaves to do what he has to do about this Coronel Schmidt, and I'm going to be right here when my husband comes back."

There was a long silence.

"You don't deserve her, Cletus," Mother Superior then said.

"I know," he said.

[FOURTEEN]

Casa Montagna

Estancia Don Guillermo

Km 40.4, Provincial Route 60

Mendoza Province, Argentina

1905 16 October 1943

Don Cletus Frade, having been run out of his bedroom by Mother Superior, went to the bar, wondering if he should feel guilty that this was going to give him the opportunity to have a stiff drink.

"Gentlemen," the president of the Argentine Republic called, "I give you Don Cletus Frade, proud papa of Jorge Howell Frade."

There was applause.

"Sleepless nights and diaper changing will come later," the president added.

Not knowing how to respond, Clete walked to the bar, reached for a bottle of Jack Daniel's, poured, had a healthy sip, and then turned to face the men in the bar. He raised the glass to them.

The bar was crowded. Everybody but General Nervo seemed to be there, even the two Husares de Pueyrredon Cub pilots and Siggie Stein.

The president reached over and patted the seat of an armchair next to where he was sitting with el Coronel Martin, Roberto Lauffer, and the Reverend Kurt Welner, S.J.

I'll be damned--they saved a seat for me.

He took it.

"Where's General Nervo?" he asked.

"Right there," Father Kurt said, pointing to the door. Nervo was walking through it.

Nervo started toward them, changed his mind, went to the bar, made himself a drink, and then came to them, taking the last empty armchair.

"Tell me, Don Cletus, what kind of a pistol did you give Senor Kortig when he went real-estate shopping?"

"One of the Ballester-Molinas from the arms cache. Why?"

"And you did remember to give him ammunition?"

"Of course I did. Actually, what I did was give him a couple of my magazines. The 1911 and the Ballester-Molina are almost identical, and I didn't want to have to root around in the arms cache for first magazines and then ammo."

"In other words, you would say that Kortig's pistol was loaded with ammunition from your Springfield Arsenal?"

"Either Springfield or Rock Island Arsenal. Why the curiosity?"

"Because a .45 ACP shell casing marked Springfield Arsenal was found on the floor of the men's room of the Hotel Edelweiss in Barlioche. Also in the men's room was the corpse of a man carrying the National Identity booklet of Jorge Schenck.

"Someone blew his brains all over the wall."

"My God!" Father Welner exclaimed.

"When did you learn this?" President Rawson asked.

"I just talked to Subinspector General Nolasco. He tells me that he was sitting outside the hotel keeping an eye on el Coronel Peron when a shot was heard. He went inside, where patrons pointed him toward the men's room. On his way there, he saw Father Silva, Senor Alvarez, and Senor Kortig sitting at a table in a sort of outside bar. In the men's room, he found Senor Schenck sitting in the urinal, his back against the wall with a small entrance wound--surrounded by powder burns--in his forehead, and a much larger exit hole in the rear of his skull. And the cartridge case I mentioned.

"Now, I'm just a simple policeman, but I'm wondering how many other people besides Senor Kortig and armed with a pistol firing cartridges made in the United States were likely to have also been in the Hotel Edelweiss at the time."

"Nolasco has arrested this man?"

"Your orders, Mr. President, were for Nolasco to keep an eye on Coronel Peron but to take no action unless directed by you or me."

"Did this man know Schenck, Cletus? Von Deitzberg?"

"After hearing this, I'd said they had at least a casual acquaintance," Clete said. "Kortig was trying to protect Valkyrie."

"Kortig is involved in Valkyrie?" the president asked. When he saw the look on Frade's face, he added, "Yes, I know about Valkyrie. Unlike some other senior officials of my government, the foreign minister keeps me abreast of things in which he thinks I might be interested."

Clete nodded.

"What I'm wondering now is whether my Tio Juan knows who blew von Deitzberg away," he said.

"I'm still wondering what Peron is doing in Bariloche," Martin said. "It seems to me that if he knows what Schmidt is up to, he would be in Buenos Aires."

"Yeah," Nervo said thoughtfully. "He told the local police he was on a little holiday."

"Nolasco hasn't spoken to Coronel Peron?" President Rawson asked.

Nervo shook his head.

"Well, what do we do?"

"Arturo, before you make any decision," Father Welner said, "I am compelled to tell you that Senor Kortig is of special interest to the church."

"What the hell does that mean?" Clete asked. "That the Vatican, the Pope, knows about Valkyrie? Are they for it, against it?"

"My orders, Arturo," Welner said, "are to assist Senor Kortig in any way possible. If you feel it necessary, I'm sure the Papal Nuncio will confirm this."

"My God!" Rawson said.

"I'm sure you will make any decision you do only after careful, prayerful thought," Welner said.

"Senor President," Martin said. "If el Coronel Peron is involved with Schmidt--and I think he is--he wouldn't admit it, and it would be very hard to prove."

"Cat got your tongue, Nervo?" the president said. "Usually, you're bubbling over with helpful suggestions."

"First thing in the morning, Mr. President, instead of Cletus taking you flying in one of those little airplanes looking for Schmidt, he flies you to Buenos Aires. You can do that, right, Cletus, in your red airplane?"

Clete nodded. "I can do that."

"And Martin and I go looking for Schmidt in those little airplanes. And stop him."

"Which would see you both lying in a pool of blood on a country road," President Rawson said.

"But you would be in the Casa Rosada, Mr. President," Martin argued.

"Unless I am in a position to look my senior officers--some of whom doubtless know what Schmidt plans--in the eye and tell them I have personally placed el Coronel Schmidt under arrest pending court-martial, my being in the Casa Rosada would be like--what was that phrase Cletus used ?--'pissing into the wind.'

"What we're going to do is what we originally decided. We will search for Colonel Schmidt and, when we find him, order him to return to San Martin, and when that's done, Cletus can fly me to Buenos Aires."

"And what if shortly after you find Schmidt, you find yourself under arrest?" Nervo challenged. "Or in that pool of blood on a country road that you mentioned?"

"Well, if that happens, General, there won't be anything else we can do to stop this country from having a civil war, will there?"