Von Wachtstein laughed.
Boltitz’s face turned red.
“Clete,” Karl said, “I have been meaning to discuss my relationship with Beth with you.”
“Yeah, I’ll bet you have, Karl. Confession is good for the soul!”
Von Wachtstein laughed again, this time louder.
“What are you three laughing about?” the baroness called.
“I don’t think you really want to know, Alicia,” Clete called back. “In case anybody needs to ‘freshen up,’ do it now. As soon as Dulles’s plane takes off, we go wheels-up for Mendoza.”
IV
[ONE]
Casa Montagna Estancia Don Guillermo Km 40.4, Provincial Route 60 Mendoza Province, Argentina 1550 14 May 1945
Casa Montagna had been built by Clete’s Granduncle Guillermo after he returned from a tour of Tuscany and had had an out-of-character very good year at both the Hipódromo and the poker tables at the Jockey Club.
“In other words, damn the expense!”
Casa Montagna had been built on a natural plateau two thousand feet above the vineyards of the estancia. Carving a road up to it out of the granite of the foothills of the Andes had taken two years. The last—upper—kilometer of the road was so steep it had to be taken in a vehicle’s lowest gear.
The plateau was perhaps three hundred meters wide and two hundred meters long. A low stone wall on three sides kept people and animals from falling off the mountain.
The main house was built of natural stone and stood three stories tall. The third floor had dormer windows, and the red tile roof extended over a verandah whose pillars were covered with roses. From the front of the house, there was an unobstructed view of the Andes Mountains. The rear of the house was against what anywhere else would be called “the mountain” but here was referred to as “the hill.”
Enrico Rodríguez had told Clete that Clete’s mother had loved Casa Montagna, and also that it had been her last home in Argentina. It was from Casa Montagna that his parents had left to catch the train in Mendoza for Buenos Aires, and from there the ship that took them to New Orleans, where she had died in childbirth.
El Coronel Frade had never set foot in Casa Montagna again.
Clete Frade led Peter and Alicia von Wachtstein, Karl Boltitz, Beth Howell, and Enrico Rodríguez into the bar.
They found—sitting around tables holding a collection of bottles of various intoxicants and plates of cheese and sausage—Major Madison R. Sawyer III, Master Sergeant Siggie Stein, the Reverend Francisco Silva, S.J., Wilhelm Fischer, Otto Körtig, Ludwig Stoll, and el Subinspector General Pedro Nolasco. Pouring wine at the bar was the estancia’s manager, el Señor Pablo Alvarez.
“I was under the impression that cocktail hour began at seventeen hundred,” Cletus Frade announced sternly, hoping he sounded like an indignant lieutenant colonel who had just caught his subordinates at the sauce when they should have been about their duties.
Except for a few smiles and chuckles, he was ignored.
Sawyer, Stein, and Fischer quickly rose and, their hands extended, went to von Wachtstein and Boltitz. That civilized gesture quickly degenerated into hugs and embraces.
“I now believe it,” Körtig said. “I never thought you’d get away with getting them. Clete, you are truly an amazing man.”
“Please tell that to my wife, Otto,” Clete said.
Frade sat down beside Körtig, offered his hand to Pedro Nolasco and then to Stoll.
“If you would be so good, Ludwig,” he said. “Hand me that bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon before Pedro gets into it again.”
When the hugs and back-patting were over—as if suddenly remembering their manners—Boltitz and von Wachtstein, with their women following them, came to the table where Clete sat with Körtig.
Körtig and Stoll stood up.
“I know who you are, of course,” Körtig said. “But not which is who.”
Peter came to attention, clicked his heels, nodded, and said, “Peter von Wachtstein, Herr Oberstleutnant.”
Pedro Nolasco’s eyebrows rose.
Clete thought: I wonder how long it’s going to take to get Peter to get that Pavlovian reaction out of his system.
Körtig put out his hand. “I was privileged to be a friend of both your father and Claus von Stauffenberg, von Wachtstein. I’m very glad to see you here.” He paused and added, “Where we rarely come to attention and click our heels.”
Otto, Clete thought, you’re reading my mind.
“And where I am known as el Señor Körtig,” Niedermeyer finished.
“That was stupid of me, wasn’t it?” von Wachtstein asked after a moment’s reflection.
After pausing long enough to make it clear that he agreed with von Wachtstein’s assessment of his own behavior, Körtig then gestured at Stoll. “My deputy at Abwehr Ost, the former Hauptmann Ludwig Wertz, now known as el Señor Stoll.” Körtig paused, then asked, “And by what name are you now known?”
God, Clete thought admiringly, you’re a good officer!
“His own,” Clete answered for him. “When he and Boltitz got off the plane from the United States, Father Silva’s boss—the Black Pope’s nuncio to Argentina, otherwise known as Father Welner—”
Subinspector General Nolasco laughed. He had told Clete the head of the Society of Jesus was known as “The Black Pope.”
“—handed them libretas de enrolamiento in their own names, stating they’d immigrated here before the war,” Clete finished.
“How do you do, Señor Körtig?” Boltitz asked.
“And I knew your father, too. I presume this charming young woman is la Señora Boltitz?”
“The charming young woman is the Baroness von Wachtstein,” Clete said, then pointed. “That one is my sister, Beth, who has high hopes that Boltitz will eventually make an honest woman of her.”
“I can’t believe you said that!” Beth said. And then added, “You sonofabitch!”
Nolasco laughed again.
All the Germans—especially Boltitz—looked uncomfortable.
“She loves me unconditionally, as you may have just heard,” Clete said. “Beth, see if you can say ‘hello’ nicely to the gentlemen.”
“Before we get down to serious drinking,” Frade announced when the handshaking was over, “I think we have to get into how the surrender in Europe is going to affect things here. There have been some interesting developments, some concerning U-boats that may or may not be headed here. Karl and Peter have already heard all this; there’s no reason for them to hear it again. Enrico, why don’t you give them a tour of the place and show them what’s changed while they were in Fort Hunt? Give us two hours or so.”
Frade exchanged glances with Boltitz.
That should be enough time for you and Beth to figure out how to be alone.
[TWO]
Casa Montagna Estancia Don Guillermo Mendoza Province, Argentina 1810 14 May 1945
It had taken all of the two hours that Frade had guessed it would, but the conclusion drawn by all was essentially that nothing, for the moment, was really changed by the unconditional surrender of the Thousand-Year Reich. Until they heard from Colonel Gehlen and learned what was going to happen to what they now called the “Gehlen organization,” they would have to wait and see what happened next. And the U-boats were a wild card that they could do nothing about—even if they did exist—until more intel could be collected.