“That’s the call you have to make, Gonzo. What does your honor demand of you?”
“Goddamn you, Cletus!”
Delgano stood up.
“If I walk out of here without giving you an answer, are you going to shoot me?”
“I should, but I couldn’t, and I think you know that.”
“I’m going to take a walk. I think better when I’m walking. And I also pray better while walking, rather than on my knees.”
He walked quickly to the door, then turned back toward Frade.
“Don’t come after me,” he said. “And for Christ’s sake, don’t try to reason with me.”
When Delgano had been gone for twenty minutes, Frade relit the cigar he had been holding unlit for most of that time and walked to the door. He spotted Delgano on the threshold of the runway, walking slowly back and forth across the markings. Delgano could have been talking to himself.
Finally, Delgano threw his hands up in what could have been a gesture of frustration—or one of decision—and started walking purposefully back toward the terminal building.
He walked up to Frade, who had stepped out of the building.
They locked eyes for a long moment.
“May God damn you, Cletus. And may God forgive me.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means,” Delgano said, his voice strained with emotion, “that if you promise to try to remember the Lodestar is not a fighter, I’ll let you fly to Canoas.”
Clete nodded. “Muchas gracias, mi amigo.”
Then he saw tears in Delgano’s eyes and felt them well up in his own. He grabbed Delgano and hugged him tightly.
[TWO]
Canoas Air Base Pôrto Alegre, Brazil 2135 11 August 1943
Canoas ground control told them to turn off the runway onto Taxiway 6 and hold; a Follow-Me would meet them.
The checkerboard-painted truck appeared two minutes later and led them to a remote corner of the field, across the runway complex from Base Operations. A Constellation was parked there, and before they could bring the Lodestar to a stop next to it, a MP jeep—a red light on its fender flashing brightly in the night—came racing up, followed by a staff car on the bumper of which was the starred plate of a general officer.
United States Army Air Forces Brigadier General J. B. Wallace, his aide-de-camp, and two MPs, one of them a captain, were standing on the tarmac when Frade opened the passenger door and got out.
Frade resisted the Pavlovian impulse to salute.
“Welcome back to Canoas, Señor Frade,” Wallace said.
“I didn’t expect to be met by the base commander, sir,” Frade said.
“Well, I would think the circumstances rather dictated that I should, wouldn’t you?”
“Very kind of you, sir.”
Delgano came out of the Lodestar somewhat awkwardly, carrying a canvas overnight bag in each hand.
Wallace eyed him warily, glanced at the Connie, then said, “The . . . others . . . arrived a few hours ago. May I ask who this gentleman is?”
“El Señor Delgano is South American Airways’ chief pilot.”
“And will he be going with us to meet . . . the others?”
“Oh, yes,” Frade said.
General Wallace made a rather grand gesture toward the staff car.
Wallace’s aide indicated that Frade and Delgano should get in the backseat. As the general got in the front passenger seat, the aide extended his hand for the overnight bags, then put them in the trunk and got in the car behind the wheel.
“Blow the horn at them,” General Wallace ordered, then reached over and did it himself. “Let’s get the show on the road!”
The siren on the MP jeep began to howl, and both vehicles took off.
General Wallace turned in his seat to face Frade. “May I speak with Mr. . . . Delgano, you said? . . . here?”
“Anything you have to say to me, sir, you can say to Captain Delgano.”
“I had a personal message from General Arnold directing me to place all my facilities at the disposal of the OSS for this operation of yours.”
“Did you?”
And General Arnold didn’t mention that this operation of mine is sort of a secret, and that running us around the base behind a MP jeep with its siren and strobe going might not be such a good idea?
You didn’t think that might make people wonder what the hell is going on?
“What I’ve done is put the crew of the Constellation in the visiting officers’ BOQ. I’ve put you—and the others—in a senior officers’ quarters—a rather nice little cottage that was, fortunately, vacant. I hope that’s all right, Mr. Frade?”
“Fine. Thank you, sir.”
“And put it under secure guard, of course,” General Wallace concluded.
There was another MP jeep in the driveway of a red-tile-roofed cottage. It was parked nose out, and its headlights illuminated the lawn of the adjacent cottage, where two Brazilian women—obviously maids of some sort—stood with their arms folded, almost visibly wondering what all the activity was about. As the general’s escort jeep pulled to a stop and its siren died, the MPs in the parked jeep jumped out, popped to attention, and saluted the staff car.
“Would you like me to come in with you, Mr. Frade?” General Wallace asked. He already had his front passenger door open.
“That won’t be necessary, General, thank you. What I want you to do, if you’d be so kind, is to get us a car and driver to use while we’re here. It’s getting late, and we still have to go to the officers’ club for dinner.”
“I can arrange for the club to deliver your dinner, if you’d like. Security might be a problem there.”
“We’d rather go to the club, if that would be all right. And speaking of security, you can send the MPs away, please.”
“Is that wise?”
“I think so. I appreciate your concern, but we’re all armed.”
“Whatever you say, Mr. Frade. Can you give me some idea how long you’ll be here?”
“We’ll leave at first light. And as soon as we break ground, the Constellation will go back to the States. I presume that if I need anything, I can get in touch with you by asking the operator for the commanding general?”
Wallace nodded, then said rather formally, “I’ll be available around the clock, Mr. Frade.”
“I’ll make sure General Arnold knows of my appreciation of all your efforts, General.”
“That’s kind of you, Mr. Frade. But unnecessary. I am just doing my duty.”
“And doing it in an outstanding manner, in my opinion. Thank you again, General.”
Frade reached across the seat, shook Wallace’s hand, and got out of the staff car. Delgano followed him and they walked to the door of the cottage. There Frade turned and waved to General Wallace as he drove off.
He looked at Delgano and shook his head.
Delgano smiled. “We have officers like that in the Ejército Argentino, too. Many of them are colonels and generals.”
“Shame on you, Major Delgano.”
Frade lifted the knocker on the door and let it fall.
One of Howard Hughes’s Saints pulled the door open a crack and, when he recognized Frade, opened it all the way.
"Be on your guard,” Frade announced. “I sent the MPs away.”
He intended it to be a joke. If it amused Howard’s Saint, there was no sign of it on his face.
“They’re in the kitchen,” Howard’s Saint said.
Len Fischer was still wearing major’s leaves and MP insignia on his uniform, but the white leather accoutrements were gone. Oberstleutnant Wilhelm Frogger was wearing suit pants and a white shirt with the tie pulled down. Frade saw Frogger’s suit jacket on the back of a chair.
Frade said, “What happened to your pistol, Len? And the fancy holster?”
“Good evening, sir. It’s nice to see you again, sir. I’m fine, thank you.”
“Don’t let that major’s leaf go to your head, Len,” Frade said, then motioned toward Delgano. “You remember Captain Delgano, right?”