"Yes. I have a guest card. I've played tennis there."
"Good. Look forward to seeing you about seven."
[THREE]
The Belgrano Athletic Club
Buenos Aires
1925 29 November 1942
I wonder what the rules of that game are,Clete thought as he looked out the window of the bar at a cricket game being played under field lights.
He held a scotch and waterhe had told the barman to give him a very light oneand was munching on potato chips, waiting for Nestor to show up.
The Belgrano Athletic Club looked as if it had been miraculously transported intact from England. In the bar, a paneled room with photographs on its walls of the Stately Homes of England, the conversation was in EnglishEnglish Englishand even the bartender spoke as if London was his home.
The bar was for men only, but there were a good number of women outside in the stands watching the game, and parading past the windows of the bar. Good-looking, long-legged, nice-breasted blond women, in lightweight summer dresses.
Just what I don't need after Granduncle Guillermo's dirty pictures. -
I wonder what the boys on Guadalcanal are doing right now.
"Ah, there you are, Clete!" Nestor said behind him. "Admiring the view, are you?"
Clete turned to face him. Ettinger was with him.
"Good evening."
"You remember David, of course. You met him at the bank?"
"Yes, of course. How are you, Mr. Ettinger?"
"We're quite informal here," Nestor said. "It really should be 'David' and 'Clete.' "
"Nice to see you again, David," Clete said.
They shook hands.
"Let me find us something to drink. You all right, Clete, or will you have another?"
"I'm fine, thank you just the same."
As soon as he was out of sight, David asked, "No Tony? I thought maybe I'd be introduced to him too."
"He wasn't invited. He's not even supposed to know who Nestor is."
"I meant I thought Nestor the banker might invite him as a courtesy to an employee of Howell Petroleum. One of the things I've learned is how much Howell money flows through the Bank of Boston."
Clete shrugged.
"Maybe later. Nestor strikes me as a very cautious man." He smiled at Ettinger. "All things considered, you like being a banker?"
Ettinger looked at Clete a moment as if wondering if he should say what he wanted to. He glanced around to make sure no one was within eavesdropping range, and then said, "I had a very strange, disturbing thing happen to me yesterday."
"What was that?"
"I went to see some people I used to know..."
"Used to know"? Oh. In Germany. One of the Jewish families on Nestor's list.
"People named Klausner. A man named Ernst Klausner. We were rather close at one time. Until he found out what I was doing here"
"You told him?" Clete interrupted, shocked and then angry.
Jesus Christ, here he goes again. First he tells his mother he's going to Argentina, and then he tells somebody he used to know
"I told him I was in the Army, nothing else. At that point, he pulled the welcome mat out from under my feet. He told me he was now an Argentinean, not a German, and that as an Argentinean, he should report me to the authorities. For auld lang syne, he wouldn't, but don't come back."
"Jesus! Was this before or after you asked him about the ships?"
"I didn't get as far as asking him anything. And he didn't seem at all concerned what the Germans are doing to Jews in Germany. He's out, and that's all he cares about it."
"Did you tell Nestor?"
"Of course."
Well, Nestor is the Station Chief. If he's not upset that David ran off at the mouth, why should I be?
Because if we get caught, we go to jail, or worse, not Nestor.
"And what was his reaction?"
"He said there were a lot of other names on the list."
Two other men came to the window, effectively shutting off further conversation. A moment later, Nestor rejoined them.
"We owe you an apology for keeping you waiting, Clete," he said, handing Ettinger a drink.
"Not at all."
"We were out buying David a car."
"Really?"
"A '39 Ford, with the steering wheel on the wrong side," Ettinger said.
"You'll have to take me for a ride in it," Clete said.
"As soon as I actually get it, I'd be delighted to."
"This is Argentina, Clete," Nestor explained. "You don't buy a car and drive off the lot with it the same day. With a little bit of luck, David may lay his hands on it in a week or ten days."
"I love the view from here," Ettinger said. "Look at that blonde!"
Clete had noticed her too. A stunning female, wearing a wide-brimmed straw hat and a pale-yellow dress.
"Her husband is probably standing at the bar," Clete said, laughing.
"He's not," Nestor said. "He's one of ours at the bank. And he's out of town. But if he was here, he would take it as a compliment."
"It was intended as one."
"I think maybe we better wander in," Nestor said.
"Wander in where?" Clete asked.
"To the lounge."
"I hate to walk away from the parade," Clete said.
"They'll be in the lounge," Nestor said. "They're not allowed in here, which I think is a rather good idea. But they will be in the lounge, and they will, of course, be at dinner."
Clete's companion at dinner turned out to be the blonde who had caught David's attention.
Her name, she told him in a delightful British accent, was Monica Javez de Frade. But they were not related.
"We're not even a poor branch of your family. No relation at all."
Which means that Nestor told you who I am. Or that word had spread around the bank who I am who my father is after Nestor introduced me around his office.
The proof of that theory seemed to come when she told him that Pablo, her husband, was in "real estate" at the bank, and worked closely with Nestor.
"Agricultural real estate, unfortunately," Monica added, "which means that poor Pablo spends most of his time in the country, leaving poor Monica to spend most of her time alone in the city."
Clete smiled politely, telling himself that her remark had the meaning he was giving it only because his near-terMi?al chastityand Granduncle Guillermo's dirty pictureshad inflamed his imagination.
But during supper, and during the award afterward of small silver cups to the triumphant members of the Banco de Boston cricket team, Monica's knee kept brushing against his. At each encounter, Clete quickly moved his knee away ... until he de cided to leave his knee there. Then the pressure of her knee against his increased. He withdrew it then, telling himself that the cure for his near-terMi?al chastity should not involve a married woman, and especially one whose husband worked closely with Jasper Nestor.
Laying her hand on his arm to distract his attention from one of the cricket players' lengthy tribute to his teammates and for no other purpose, Clete, get your imagination under control Monica asked if he had found an apartment, or whether he was staying with his father.