MARIA ELENA PUEYRRED?N DE FRADE
1812-1858
Jesus Christ, Pueyrred?n's daughter! My what? My great-grandmother? This is the reason I got that saber salute from the Capit?n of the Husares de Pueyrred?n at the Edificio Libertador yesterday. Down here, that's like being related to George Washington.
He touched the limp body the hooded woman was carrying, tenderly, almost reverently, then climbed back on the ladder.
Why do I suspect that Colonel Graham knows more about my family tree than I do ? He's a clever sonofabitch, and damned well knows that nobody's going to easily throw Pueyrred?n's great-great-grandson out of Argentina.
When he put his head through the hole in the upper-chamber floor, he could see out of the tomb. Specifically, he found himself looking farther than decency allowed up the marvelously formed, silk-stocking-clad legs of a young woman in a black dress.
He had two thoughts, the first of them not very relevant:
There seems to be plenty of silk stockings down here. I wonder why there's such a shortage of them in the States? Women are painting their legs in the States, including a line down the back of the leg, so it looks like they're wearing stockings.
His second thought, since he had recognized the legs, was more to the point.
Jesus,Dorotea! I forgot all about her. Somebody must have told her where I was, and she came to personally deliver Part Two of the Dear John letter she started on the phone last night.
Christ, I'm going to miss her!
He came out of the hole. Dorotea had been waiting for him. He gave her a wait-a-second signal and turned to the monk to thank him for the tour of the family tomb.
And suddenly, on seeing the embroidered cloth-covered table, it was as if his brain, which had been out of gear, suddenly dropped into high.
They're going to put el Coronel's casket on that table. That's what he meant when he said they had moved my grandfather. He was here, for God only knows how long, until today, or yesterday. The casket of the last one to die goes on display in front of the altar for however long it takes for the next family member to croak.
The next one to croak is very likely to be me.
Jesus, what a weird custom!
Christ, I better say something to Tony, leave a letter of instructions or something. I don't want to go on display in here!
Or do I? What's wrong with being with my father and Uncle Willy?
Jesus Christ!
"Is everything to your satisfaction, Se?or Frade?" the monk asked.
"Perfectly. I am in your debt, Sir, for your thoughtfulness."
"Your father, Se?or Frade, your family, have always generously supported the Recoleta Cemetery."
That's a pitch for money. I'll be damned!
What the hell do I say to him ?
I'll have to ask somebody Humberto about giving them money. How much and to whom.
"Again, I thank you for your thoughtfulness. And I will never forget it."
The monk smiled, turned, bowed before the altar, and walked out of the tomb.
Clete followed him. He saw Lauffer, standing twenty yards away, motion to the monk to join him.
He thinks I want to be alone with the pretty girl. What did General Lee say at Appomattox Courthouse? "I would rather die a thousand deaths . . ."?
"What do you say, Princess? How's tricks?"
"I really wish you wouldn't call me that," Dorotea said in British-accented English.
"Sorry. You said you had something on your mind, Dorotea?"
"This is probably the worst possible place, at the worst possible time, to tell you this," she said. "I'm really sorry."
Oh, I don't know. This is a cemetery. Shouldn't dead love get a decent burial?
"What is it, Prin . . . Dorotea? I probably won't be nearly as upset as you think I'm going to be."
She moved close to him and looked into his eyes.
"We're going to have a baby," she announced softly.
Even as he spoke the words, looking into her eyes, he knew the question he was croaking"Are you sure?"was unnecessary.
"Of course I'm sure."
"Oh, Princess!"
"Does that mean 'Three cheers, hurrah!' or 'Oh, my God!'"
"Princess, you really surprised me with this one."
"In other words, "Oh, my God!'?"
"I thought I was going to get a Dear John," he said.
"I have no idea what you're talking about, Cletus. What's a 'Dear John'?"
"It's a letter a girlfriend writes her boyfriend in the service. 'Dear John, I'm sorry to tell you this, but someone else has come into my life.'"
"Sometimes you are a bloody ass, Cletus," Dorotea said angrily, and loudly enough so that the monk turned. "I love you, and until this moment I was laboring under the delusion that you loved me, too."
"Princess, I love you more than my life," Clete said. "When I thought I was going to lose you, I wanted to jump in the goddamned River Plate."
She looked at him. Her tongue came out and licked her lips in a nervous gesture he found exquisitely exciting.
"Yes," she said.
"Yes what?" he asked, confused.
"Yes, I will marry you. Or wasn't that a proposal?" she asked, a naughty glint in her eyes.
"It was," he said. "But I don't think this is the place to get on my knees."
"Or the time. You had better wait a couple of days before you ask Daddy for my hand. And speaking of the devil, so to speak, what he thinks I'm doing is trying to find the loo, so I'm going to have to go back."
She stood on her tiptoes and kissed his cheek.
"I would really like to put my arms around you and really kiss you," she said. "But not here with the monk watching. Can you wait?"
"I don't have any choice, do I?"
"None," she said brightly, turned, and walked away.
She's not wearing a girdle under that dress. She really has a magnificent fanny. And as far as that goes, a magnificent everything else, too.
And she's carrying my child!
Why couldn't you keep your pecker in your pocket, you stupid sonofabitch?
Capitan Lauffer raised his eyebrows questioningly: Don't you think you should be getting back to the church? Clete nodded and walked to him.
[TWO]
1420 Avenida Alvear
Buenos Aires, Argentina
1215 10 April 1943
"Would you like something to eat, Cletus?" Humberto Valdez Duarte asked, walking over to where Clete stood at the bar set up in the downstairs reception, helping himself to a bottle of scotch.
Is that just good manners, or an expression of concern for my welfare, or is he worried that I 'm going to climb into a bottle the way my father did when they buried Cousin Jorge Alejandro?
"I'm all right, thank you. Can I fix you one of these?"
"There is supposed to be someone . . ." Humberto said impatiently, and looked around the empty reception. A door leading to the butler's pantry opened as he watched, and two barmen in starched white jackets came through, carrying a large, galvanized tub filled with ice and various bottles. "Ah, there they are!"