Death and Honor

[FOUR]

Office of Ethical Standards, Bureau of Internal Security Ministry of Defense Edificio Libertador, Avenida Paseo Colón Capital Federal, Buenos Aires, Argentina 1220 13 July 1943

Major Gonzalo Delgano, Argentina Air Service, Retired, stood outside the office door of Colonel Alejandro Bernardo Martín, chief of the Office of Ethical Standards, and waited patiently until Martín sensed he was there and looked up at him.

Martín smiled and waved Delgano into his office.

“And how is the soon-to-be chief pilot of South American Airways doing this morning? Have you got time for lunch?”

“Not only do I have time, I need sustenance badly,” Delgano said. “I spent the morning marching around what is to be the airfield of South American Airways.”

“Really? And where is that?”

“In Morón, about seven kilometers from El Palomar.”

“You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“Absolutely. No sooner had I hung up talking to you this morning than Frade was on the phone. He said he would meet me in half an hour at El Palomar, and wanted my opinion of what he called ‘the base.’ I thought he was going to show me some maps—”

“But?” Martín interrupted, smiling.

“When I got to El Palomar, one of his bodyguards—not Enrico Rodríguez . . . the other one?”

“Sargento Rodolfo Gómez, Retired?”

Delgano nodded. “ . . . Gómez was there, with a Ford station wagon. And a few minutes later, Frade landed in a Piper Cub.”

“And where was Sergeant Major, Retired, Rodríguez? In the Piper Cub?”

Delgano nodded again. “With his shotgun. Which I had the feeling he wanted to use on me. Anyway, Rodríguez got out of the airplane and I got in, and off we took. Five minutes later, we landed on what I later learned was the feeding field for Frade’s slaughterhouse. You know, where they hold the beef if too many show up at once?”

"I know the place.”

“There must have been five hundred heads on the field, being rounded up and loaded on trucks by his gauchos—I later learned it was for movement to another slaughterhouse he owns out by Pilar—plus a small army of surveyors, plus half a dozen pieces of engineering equipment—bulldozers, scrapers, that sort of thing—waiting for the surveyors to finish putting flags in the ground so they could get to work.”

“He’s building an airfield out there? Did he tell you why?”

“He did,” Delgano said, smiling. “He said he thought at first he’d build ‘the base’ on Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo but had decided against it . . .” He stopped, shook his head, chuckled, then went on. “. . . because he wanted to spare you having to drive all the way out to the estancia all the time to make sure he wasn’t doing anything he shouldn’t be.”

“He actually said that?” Martín asked, smiling.

Delgano nodded.

“And that he didn’t want to rent hangars and shops—or build them—at El Palomar because he thought they’d want too much rent. And he had been thinking of closing the Morón slaughterhouse anyway.”

“What we have here, Gonzalo, is another incident of Don Cletus telling us the truth but making us wonder what he’s not telling us.”

“Yes, sir, I think that’s the case.”

“But he’s right. We can keep an eye on South American Airways easier in Morón than we could at Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo. I’m presuming it is suitable for an airfield?”

“Ideal, actually. He can put in two runways without much leveling, and there’s a railroad siding. Where cattle have arrived until now, railway wagons of stone from Mendoza will soon start arriving to pave the runways. He’s got everything pretty well figured out.”

“That’s what worries me,” Martín said. “Can he finish his airfield by the time he gets airplanes?”

“Probably not,” Delgano said. “He said we ought to be hearing when the first Lodestar will be at Pôrto Alegre in the next couple of days.”

“You have to admire his self-confidence. He doesn’t have permission from the interior ministry to start his airline, and he’s already building an airfield for it, and buying airplanes.”

“Fourteen of them,” Delgano said. “Which poses the problem of getting the right kind of pilots for them.”

Martín didn’t respond directly.

“On the other hand, I can’t imagine the interior ministry dragging its feet, much less looking unfavorably upon a request for the necessary licenses presented to them by Colonel Perón.”

“That does seem unlikely, doesn’t it?” Delgano said dryly. “What are we going to do about pilots?”

“How many pilots are required for fourteen aircraft?”

“Don Cletus, when he told me my first job was to recruit pilots, said we’d best plan for four per aircraft at a minimum. That’s fifty-six. Call it sixty, at least.”

“We can’t get that many from the air service,” Martín thought aloud.

“And that’s probably as many pilots as Aeropostal has.”

“They have seventy-one,” Martín said. “Seven of whom are quote inactive end quote air service officers.”

“If we have half a dozen air service officers to watch the others and keep their eyes open, generally—”

“Can we find that many willing to quote resign end quote?” Martín asked. It was obvious he didn’t expect an answer. “Let me think about that, Gonzalo.”

“Yes, sir. And while we’re just a little off the subject of airlines, Clete—”

“ ‘Clete’?” Martín parroted.

“I realize it’s not very professional of me, Colonel, but the cold fact is I like him. He’s a nice chap, funny. And you have to admire the way he jumps in and gets things done.”

“I agree with everything you say, Gonzalo. But Frade—despite his not-at-all-convincing denials—is a serving officer of the American Corps of Marines in the OSS. What he’s trying to do is not necessarily—indeed, rarely—in the best interests of Argentina.”

“Who’s going to win the war? Don’t answer that if it puts you on a spot.”

“It doesn’t matter who I think will win it. There are a lot of people here, including President Ramírez and Colonel Perón—perhaps most importantly, Colonel Perón—who think German efficiency and the invincible Wehrmacht will come out on top.”

“The Wehrmacht was run out of Africa, and just a couple of days ago, the Allies invaded Sicily. And it’s Berlin that is being bombed just about daily, not Washington.”

“It would not behoove either of us as Argentine officers to publicly disagree with our president’s—or, again, perhaps more importantly, Colonel Perón’s— assessment of the world situation. For one thing, we might well be wrong. The late Colonel Frade also thought the Germans were going to be invincible.”

“For which he got himself shot.”

Martín met Delgano’s eyes for a long moment.

“Before we got into this potentially dangerous conversation, Gonzalo, you started to say something? ‘A little off the subject of airlines’?”

“Oh, yeah. I told you that von Wachtstein brought two friends with him to dinner at Estancia Santa Catalina? The Lufthansa pilot and the new commercial attaché for the German embassy?”

“What about them?”

“Frade managed to make me understand that he didn’t think the commercial attaché was what he said he was, and that I should make you aware of this.”

“How so?”

“The implication was he wasn’t either a friend of von Wachtstein’s or a diplomat.”

“He has a diplomatic passport,” Martín replied. “And there has been no word from our embassy in Berlin suggesting he’s not bona fide.”

“Do you think it’s possible there are people in our embassy who might close their eyes—”

“What about the Lufthansa pilot?” Martín asked, shutting off the question.

“Well, he’s what he says he is. He and von Wachtstein flew together all over Europe and Russia. And we know he flies the Condor.”

“Why are you smiling, Gonzalo?”

“Señorita Isabela Carzino-Cormano was quite taken with him,” Delgano said. “And vice versa. As we speak, they’re having lunch in the Alvear. She’s going to show him around Buenos Aires.”

“That amuses you?”

“The possibility Estancia Santa Catalina might ultimately come into the hands of a couple of Luftwaffe pilots does.”

“You think that’s likely?”

“Ten minutes after she met him, she was miraculously transformed from grieving widow, sort of, into . . .” His eyebrows went up.

“Into what?”

“She did everything but back into him, wagging her tail,” Delgano said. “Doña Claudia saw it. She didn’t know what to think.”

Martín shook his head and smiled.

“Tell you what, Gonzalo. Nose around Aeropostal and see who you think would be useful to us and South American Airways—in that order. I’ll look into the new commercial attaché.”