Preceded by the Cardinal Archbishop, the casket was carried from its place in front of the altar down the aisle and out of the church, trailed by the family members and the dignitaries of church and state.
Then the people in the first chairs followed, which meant that Clete proceeded down the aisle before the Mallin family did. As he passed the Virgin Princess, she smiled at him with those goddamned fall-into-them eyes, then pursed her lips in a kiss.
Oh, shit!
Outside, the German Ambassador expressed the profound sympathy of the German F?hrer und Volk over the tragic price paid by this heroic son of Argentina in the noble war against godless communism.
Behind him, Clete saw Peter, holding a pillow.
What the hell is that? Oh, yeah. The posthumous decoration.
A German colonel stepped to the casket, read the citation, then turned to Peter and took a decoration from the pillow and pinned it to the Argentinean flag that was draped cockeyed across the casket.
He and Peter then rendered the Nazi salute.
Fuck you, Peter.
What the hell is that decoration they just gave Cousin Jorge for what amounts to gross stupidity?
It looks just like the one Peter is wearing. And the one Peter is wearing is a no-bullshit medal I pulled that out of him during the Christmas Eve armistice. It ranks right up there with the Navy Cross, maybe even the Medal of Honor.
And Cousin Jorge gets it because he got killed flying an artillery spotter he wasn't supposed to be flying in the first place?
Bullshit!
Peter and the German colonel did an about-face and marched back behind the German Ambassador. Six large troopers of the Husares de Pueyrredon picked up the casket, and the procession started off again.
Clete watched them go, exhaled audibly, and said softly, "A Dios, Cousin Jorge. Vaya con Dios." And then turned and walked in the opposite direction.
I don't have to watch the end of this. And I certainly don't want to go back to the house and face Uncle Humberto 's sad eyes again. Or the Virgin Princess. . . . Did she really just tell me she loves me?
I will find the Buick and drive back to the house.
And write a message that will be the sort of thing the skipper of a U.S. Navy destroyer might accept as genuine and that will convince Colonel Graham that letting me have a TBF is the only way I can take out theReine de la Mer.
[FOUR]
4730 Avenida Libertador
Buenos Aires
1420 19 December 1942
Clete entered the house via the kitchen, after parking the car in the basement garage.
He was a little surprised that Se?ora Pellano did not show up in the basement to silently chide him for opening the garage door himself, until he remembered that she was at the Big House. He was surprised again that none of the maids appeared in the kitchen while he prepared a wine cooler with two trays of ice from the refrigerator, then stuffed it with bottles of beer.
But one did appear as he was trying without much success to open the sliding elevator door with his elbow. His hands were occupied with the wine cooler and the necks of two additional bottles of beer he was taking upstairs now so he wouldn't have to come back for them later.
She slid the door open for him.
"Gracias," he said. "And could you please fix me a sandwich? Ham and cheese and tomato? Something like that?"
"S?, Se?or Cletus," she said, wrestling the wine cooler away from him. "Se?or, there are two norteamericanos waiting for you in the library."
"Who are they? Did you get their names?"
No, Se?or Cletus, she said, as if this caused her great sorrow.
When he pushed open the door to the library, Second Lieutenant Anthony J. Pelosi and Staff Sergeant David G. Ettinger, both neatly dressed in seersucker suits, quickly rose to their feet.
"Good afternoon, Sir," Tony said formally.
"Tony. David. To what do I owe the honor? Can I offer you a beer?"
"No, thank you, Sir," Tony said, and then, "Clete, I met Mr. Nestor."
"How did that happen?"
"Dave brought him to the apartment and introduced him."
"You're talking about Mr. Nestor of the Bank of Boston?"
"I know he's the OSS Station Chief," Tony said.
"He told you that?" Clete asked, looking at Ettinger for confirmation. Ettinger nodded, just perceptibly.
"And he also gave a line of bullshit that you have proved yourself... What did he say, Dave?"
"Unsuitable," Ettinger furnished.
"Unsuitablefor the mission, and that he is now relying on me to carry it out. Real bullshit speech. Like in the movie where Pat O'Brien played Knute Rockne, and whatsisname, Ronald Reagan, played the football player." He stopped, then looked at Clete. "What's going on, Lieutenant?" Tony asked.
"I found the Reine de la Mer," Clete said. "That's the German replenishment ship."
"So did Ettinger," Tony said. "He told me on the way over here."
Clete looked at Ettinger.
"I finally found one of the Jewish refugees with some balls," Ettinger explained. "He told me that an agent of the Hamburg-Amerika Line contacted his firmhe works for a ship chandler and asked them to furnish an extraordinary quantity of meat, fresh and frozen, plus other foodstuffs and supplies, for delivery by lighter to the Reine de la Mer in Samborombon Bay, where she is at anchor with 'mechanical difficulties.' The name matched the list. I figured this had to be the ship."
"It is," Clete said. "She's anchored twenty miles offshore in Samboromb?n Bay."
"How did you find her?" Tony asked.
"I went looking for her in my father's airplane."
"So what's this all about?" Tony asked. "If we know where it is, why don't we just go sink the sonofabitch?"
"This isn't the movies, Tony, and I'm not John Wayne, and neither are you two," Clete said.
"Well," Tony said. "Maybe Dave isn't John Wayne, but I always thought that I..."
"Tony," Clete said, smiling, "I got a good look at the ship. Not only is she twenty miles or so offshore, but she's equipped with searchlights and machine guns, and probably with twenty-millimeter Bofors autoloading cannon. There is no way to get near her. Or none that I can think of."
"A small boat, at night?" Ettinger suggested.
"You can hear the sound of a small boat's engine a long way off from a ship at anchor, Dave," Clete said. "And they're certainly taking at least routine precautions; I'm sure that they sweep the area with floodlights at night, post lookouts, that sort of thing."
Ettinger shrugged, accepting Clete's arguments.
"I went to see Nestor as soon as I could when I came back," Clete continued.
"You didn't say anything to us," Tony interrupted, and looked at Ettinger for confirmation.
"I didn't have anything to tell you, except that I'd found her. And that could wait until I talked to Nestor, and listened to what he had to say when I told him there was no way we could damage the ship where she liesnot with just twenty-odd pounds of explosive."
"I can do a lot with twenty pounds of explosive," Tony said.
Presuming you can lay your charges, right? I'm telling you, there is no way to get close enough to that ship to do that."