Clete had another unpleasant thought. The Mercedes was the car assigned to the military attaché of the German embassy. It had been Peter’s to use—after Oberst Grüner, the military attaché, had been killed at Samborombón Bay— as the acting military attaché. But that had changed with the arrival of Korvettenkapitän Karl Boltitz, who had been named the military attaché.
Is Boltitz here with Peter?
As if reading his mind, Dorotea said, “That’s the official car. That means Boltitz is probably here, too.”
“Yeah,” he said, and looked at her.
Jesus Christ, she even thinks like I do!
When they walked up on the verandah, they could see Korvettenkapitän Boltitz through the sitting-room window. He was in an armchair. La Señorita Isabela Carzino-Cormano was sitting on a footstool next to him, hanging on his every word.
Looks like El Bitcho has become just another goddamn Nazi, Clete thought. She’s as bad as Frau Frogger.
Alicia saw them through the same window and seemed less than overjoyed at their arrival. Although she and Dorotea had been close friends since childhood, and although she knew that if it hadn’t been for Clete going to El Coronel Perón, who had gone to some of his high-ranking Nazi friends to request a favor, right now Peter von Wachtstein would be in Germany flying the Me-262 jet fighter instead of here safe—relatively—in Argentina.
Alicia got off the couch and was standing behind the Carzino-Cormano butler when he opened the door.
“Peter is here,” she greeted them. “And Karl Boltitz.”
That it was a warning showed in her eyes.
“How nice,” Dorotea replied cheerfully. “Are you going to ask us in?”
“Of course,” Alicia said, then raised her voice. “Mama, Dorotea and Cletus are here.”
She led them into the sitting room.
Von Wachtstein and Boltitz stood.
“Oh, how nice,” Claudia Carzino-Cormano said, smiling bravely. “You’re just in time for dinner.”
“Then our timing is perfect,” Cletus said, went to her, really kissed her cheek, and thought: I’m glad you don’t know there’s two other Nazis at Casa Chica, one of them sitting on your couch reading from my father’s copy of Goethe’s love poems.
He turned to the men.
“And how is the diplomatic corps tonight?”
“Señor Frade,” Boltitz said. “How nice to see you. And you, señora.”
“Hello, Frade,” Peter said. “How are you? Dorotea?”
“Can I get you something to drink?” Claudia asked.
“I thought you’d never ask,” Clete said. “If that’s merlot that Major von Wachtstein is drinking, I’d love some of that.”
He sensed Isabela’s eyes and looked at her. Her eyes were as hateful as he expected.
“What a joy it is to see you, Isabela,” Clete said. “And you seem so happy. Been pulling the wings off flies again, have you?”
“Cletus!” Dorotea and Claudia said, almost in unison.
“Karl,” Claudia then said, “you’ll have to forgive him. He’s always teasing Isabela.”
“I am not!” Cletus said.
“Changing the subject,” Peter said. “There’s a rumor going around that your first airplane has arrived.”
“Not a rumor at all,” Clete said. “It’s at El Palomar. After a two-hour-and-sixteen-minute flight from Pôrto Alegre.”
“That’s fast.”
“Fast and smooth,” Clete said. “American aviation genius at work.”
That earned him, as he expected it would, another dirty look from Isabela.
“Not as fast as the Condor, certainly,” Isabela said.
“I don’t know,” Clete said innocently. “How fast is the Condor, Isabela?”
Her expression showed that she did not have a clue. She looked at Peter.
“It’ll do a little better than three hundred kph,” Peter furnished. “It cruises at around two fifty-five.”
“The Lodestar tops out at a little better than three forty-five,” Clete said.
“But it won’t cross an ocean, will it?” Isabela challenged.
Gotcha, El Bitcho!
“Isabela,” Clete explained politely, “the Lodestar, first, never was designed for long flights. And, second, it’s obsolete. That’s why they’ve sold them to South American Airways. We—the Americans—don’t need them anymore.”
“Then you Americans don’t have an airplane like the Condor that will cross oceans?” she pursued.
“I didn’t say that, Isabela,” Clete went on, trying not to sound condescending. “Right now, the Americans every day fly the Douglas DC-4 across both the Pacific and the Atlantic. And there’s a new Lockheed—”
“There is?” Peter asked.
Clete turned to him. “The Lockheed pilots who delivered the Lodestar to Pôrto Alegre told me their new one—they call it the ‘Constellation’—has just been certified. At cruise altitude, seventy-five hundred meters, it cruises at five hundred seventy kph. For eighty-seven hundred kilometers. With a full load. Thirty passengers.”
“Very impressive,” Peter said, meaning it.
“I’ll believe it when I see it land at El Palomar,” Isabela said.
“That’s probably never going to happen, Isabela,” Clete said, paused, and when he saw she was about to snap back at him, added, “When the first Constellation lands here, it’ll belong to South American Airways, and will of course land at Aeropuerto Coronel Jorge G. Frade.”
“The two of you stop it!” Claudia said. After a moment, she asked, “What did you just say, Cletus?”
“About where the Constellation will land when it comes here, you mean?”
“You know very well that’s what I mean. What are you talking about?”
“The chief pilot of South American Airways—you remember him, Claudia, Major Delgano?”
She nodded. “And?”
“He came to see us this morning to tell me that he and my Tío Juan”—he paused and looked at Boltitz—“El Coronel Juan Domingo Perón is not really my uncle, korvettenkapitän, but he likes me to call him that. Anyway, Tío Juan and Major Delgano thought it would be nice if we named our new airport after my father, and wanted to know what I thought of the idea.”
“Damn you, Cletus!” Claudia said, having trouble with her voice. “You are just like him! Same awful sense of humor!”
“Oh, I don’t think they were fooling, Claudia. Tío Juan told Delgano he was going to have a word with the president. I wouldn’t be surprised if somebody’s already painting a temporary sign.”
“If la señora is so pleased,” the butler announced from the door to the dining room, “dinner can now be served.”
“As our hostess,” Clete said while the coffee was served, “already is offended by my bad manners—”
“And with damned good cause,” Claudia interrupted, “thank you very much, Cletus.”
Clete nodded once, then went on: “—I would not dare anger her further by filling the room with cigar smoke. I am therefore going to take my coffee onto the verandah for a smoke. If anyone would care to join me . . . you, perhaps, Isabela?”
She snorted.
“All are welcome,” Clete went on. “I have cigars but regrettably no cigarettes. ”
“I’d like a smoke,” Boltitz said. “With your permission, la señora?”
“Go,” Claudia said.
The three men went not only onto the verandah but off it and into the garden, where they could not be overheard. There, Frade extended his cigar case.
“I don’t use them, thank you,” Boltitz said.
“Put one in your mouth anyway,” Frade said. “In case El Bitcho is watching us out the window, as I suspect she is. Or will be.”
Boltitz nodded and took a cigar.
Von Wachtstein took a cigar, lit it, and puffed appreciatively.