Hawk turned and gazed momentarily out the window, his brow knitted. "All right." he said finally. "You know the procedure. I want a complete written report with budget estimates, the works. I'll get Stransky to help you with the figures…"
"Begging your pardon, sir, but there really isn't time for that. The trail in Argentina is already getting cold."
Hawk sighed. "Skip the paperwork. Give what you have to Mary, and I'll have Stransky work it up. We'll get the team on it."
"Thank you, sir," Carter said, getting to his feet.
"Do what you have to do. No sense going about this half-assed. But be careful, please."
In the outer office Carter gave Mary the complete rundown on everything that had happened in Iceland. When it was all down on tape, he pecked her on the cheek and left.
The rain had stopped, but the afternoon was chilly. He climbed into his car, drove quickly home, and packed his suitcase. When he was ready he called a cab for the airport.
His flight had left Washington at 6:00 p.m., and twelve hours later he was watching the sun rise over the Rio de la Plata as the vast sprawl of greater Buenos Aires came into view through the ragged clouds.
He had no real idea what he would find here, but he knew that he could not let this go. He kept seeing Lydia's note in his mind's eye. He kept seeing her against the bleak backdrop of Iceland.
The plane dipped south and rumbled to a landing at Ezeiza Airport about thirty miles from the city. Carter deplaned, was passed through customs with no problem, and caught the airport bus into the metropolitan area.
Ever since the Falkland Island war with Britain, the situation here was strained at best. He could see it on the faces of the other passengers, and he kept to himself for the long ride. What he didn't need at this moment was any kind of a stupid incident.
It took nearly forty-five minutes before he got downtown to the Sheraton. He checked in, went upstairs, and when he was cleaned up from the trip, ordered breakfast from room service. Next, he telephoned Juan Mendoza, who was AXE's chief of station here. His cover was political editor for La Nacion, and in fact he was one of the most politically knowledgeable men in Argentina.
But Carter had forgotten that business in Buenos Aires rarely begins before ten, and even though it was an hour later here than in Washington, for Argentinians it was still early. Mendoza's wife answered with a few mumbled words thickened with sleep. But Carter's urgent tone brought her awake. Juan was indisposed at the moment, but she promised to have him telephone the hotel immediately.
Room service arrived with his breakfast, and the waiter set the cart by the floor-to-ceiling window where Carter could watch the city come to life. When he was alone he pulled two file folders from his suitcase, poured himself a cup of thick, black coffee, and began to read.
The first was the Interpol file on Victor Hauptmann, and it covered essentially the same ground Einarsson had covered earlier, only in greater detail, with definite dates and places.
The second file was the AXE computer printout of all the reports from other agencies — the CIA, the French SDECE, and the British SIS — on Hauptmann. Most of it consisted of material filed by intelligence agency stations in Bolivia, Uruguay, Venezuela, Panama, and Chile.
On one of the back pages, reference was made to a Paraguay school for assassination. It was a jungle camp run by members of certain security forces and was designed to teach the art of political murder to any with the money to pay for it. The school was reportedly Cuban-staffed and backed. Hauptmann had apparently attended the school in 69 and 70, and Carter noted with some satisfaction that the encoding for his own career dossier was included in the "see also" listing at the bottom of the page. He remembered the place well. In 78 he had put it out of commission.
Carter was about to pour his third cup of coffee when Mendoza called. He was mildly sarcastic about how nice it was to hear from a man he hadn't seen in two years at practically the crack of dawn, and the two of them traded friendly banter for a few minutes. They had worked together once before on the Venezuelan oil pipeline, having discovered a plot to sabotage it. Ever since that time they had been friends.
"What brings you here, my friend? Business?" Mendoza finally asked. "I didn't see it on the wire."
"Business," Carter said. "Victor Hauptmann. The name ring a bell?"
"You've been traveling in some tough circles if you've been near him, amigo. The local toughs call him 'the exterminator'." A very bad man but the best there is for certain types of work."
"Who can afford him lately? Any rumblings?"
"Nothing. It would be doubtful he's working for anyone local. He lives here. He'll keep his nose clean in his own backyard."
"It would be someone with an interest in Iceland."
"Iceland? Are you kidding? What possible connection could there be between Argentina and Iceland? Most of Argentina hasn't heard of the place, much less even know where it is. We've got problems enough with the Maldivas without taking on another island."
"I killed Hauptmann two days ago in a lava field a hundred miles south of the Arctic Circle. The files say he was Argentinian. Someone here must know what he's been up to lately — who he might have been working for.
Mendoza took a while to answer. "It's too bad your boy isn't a Red," he said finally. "We've got Russians crawling all over the place down here. But when it comes to the extreme right, our info is definitely thin."
"I have files on him thick enough to choke a horse, Juan. But not a damn thing on his activities for the past few years. He seemed to have dropped out of sight. And for a man like Hauptmann, that doesn't mean retirement."
"The local police have no love lost for Hauptmann and his kind. They might be able to help."
"Anything else?" Carter asked, somewhat disappointed.
"There is one other source you might try. A kid named José Braga. They say he's phenomenal. A walking computer. He's with the Committee for a Free Argentina, one of our local groups. They keep tabs on all the right-wingers this side of the equator, and Braga keeps it all in his head."
"Too dangerous to keep files?"
"That's what I'm told. This Braga has total recall. If anyone might know where Hauptmann has been and what company he's been keeping, Braga would."
"Where do I find him?"
"That's the hard part. Right now the Committee is on the run. A little mishap with a bomb at a meeting of the conservative party. They're wanted pretty badly just at this moment."
"How do I get to Braga?"
"You might try a priest at St. Dominic's. Father Wilfredo. He's been their spokesman in the past. He hasn't spoken with the police of course, but if you say the right things he might arrange a meeting."
"Thanks."
"Best of luck, amigo. You're going to need it with that crowd. The Argentinian Federal Police are very good, and they've had no luck."
"Carter hung up, but only after Mendoza had extracted a promise from him to come out for dinner sometime soon. There was no offer of help. It was AXE policy; agents were to have a certain autonomy unless they requested help or clearly needed it. Juan had just been doing his job.
Using information from the AXE background file, Carter contacted the CIA liaison in the Argentinian Federal Police, a Captain Vargas. Using Vargas's cryptonymn, he asked that any information about Victor Hauptmann be sent to his room at the Sheraton. Vargas, of course, thought Carter was CIA and agreed to do it. Carter didn't like to step on interservice toes this way, but he did not want to go through a lot of lengthy explanations at the moment. If the kid Mendoza had mentioned could not be found, he was evidently good. If the waters got too muddied around Carter, Braga might go deeper.