Top Secret Part 32

"I knew, and he knew I knew, that he meant Teniente Coronel Martn. But what the h.e.l.l?

"So we stopped in Buenos Aires long enough to pick up an impressive doc.u.ment saying that I was the sole heir of the late Colonel Frade, and flew to Puerto Alegre in a Brazilian Ford trimotor."

"And they gave you a replacement Staggerwing?"

"No. They gave me a Lockheed Lodestar painted Staggerwing red."

"What the h.e.l.l?"

"Much later, I found out that what had happened was that when the order had come down from the commander in chief to instantly send a Staggerwing painted Staggerwing red to Brazil, for further s.h.i.+pment to a Colonel Frade, there was a little problem. There were no Staggerwings in the Air Force inventory, and Beech had stopped making them in 1939. There was, however, a Lodestar fresh from the factory, with an interior designed for the comfort of some Air Force general. So they painted it Staggerwing red and flew it to Brazil.

"Gonzo was less than thrilled. He had permission 'from his wife' to bring a Staggerwing into Argentina, not a sixteen-pa.s.senger twin-engine transport. I told him he could watch from the ground as I took off for Buenos Aires in the Lodestar."

"Where'd you learn to fly a Lodestar? In the Marines?"

"Well, I had some time in your dad's Twin Beech, of course, and I had some time in the right seats of Gooney Birds, C-47s, on Guadalca.n.a.l. I lied about how much time I had doing that, then talked the Air Force guy who'd flown the Lodestar to Brazil into giving me a quick transition-I shot a couple of touch-and-goes.

"At the last minute, Gonzo says he'll come with me if I agree to fly to Santo Tome, in Corrientes, instead of Buenos Aires. I asked why, but he wouldn't tell me. Turned out my father had built an airstrip at Santo Tome for the Staggerwing when he commanded the Hsares de Pueyrredon. I found out later he and Martn wanted me to take the Staggerwing there from the git-go."

"I don't understand."

"Telling me would've meant they'd have had to also tell me that General Rawson had decided he was going to have to take over for my father in Operation Blue, the coup d'etat, and that was about to happen. If it fell apart, Rawson and the other senior officers would be jailed, or more likely shot. Unless they could get out of the country. To Uruguay."

"In the Staggerwing," Jimmy said, connecting the dots. "That n.o.body knew you had."

"Right. You can cram eight people into a Staggerwing if you have to. So we flew to Santo Tome. Gonzo called Martn, and Martn told me to fly the Lodestar to Estancia San Pedro y San Pablo, without being seen, and keep it under cover until I heard from him.

"By then I had pretty much figured out what was going on. I asked, and he told me.

"A week later I got a call, and flew the Lodestar to Campo de Mayo, the big army base, from where General Rawson was running the revolution."

Jimmy smiled. "And because the revolution succeeded, the Lodestar wasn't needed to get the bra.s.s out of Dodge City. But you still got to be a good guy by making it available."

"Ahem," Clete said theatrically. "Let me tell you how I got to be a good guy. The good guy. A hero of the revolution. Rawson had two columns headed for the Casa Rosada-the Argentine White House. Once they got there, the war would be over. But it didn't look like they were going to get there anytime soon, if at all. Both column commanders had decided the other guys were the bad guys-and they were shooting at each other.

"Everybody in the Officers' Casino, which was revolution headquarters, was running around like headless chickens. Rawson was in contact-by telephone, no radios worked-with one of the columns. He orders them to stop shooting at the other column.

"'Not until they stop shooting at us!'

"Rawson could not reach the other column. 'What am I supposed to do? I cannot go there personally and tell them to stop. It would take an hour and a half to get there-and everybody will have shot everybody else.'

"I politely volunteered: 'General, if I may make a suggestion. There's a soccer field at the Naval Engineering School. I can land one of your Piper Cubs there and you can personally tell them to stop shooting at the other good guys and resume shooting at the bad guys.'

"Rawson was desperate. He let me load him in the back of a Cub. He was terrified. It was his third flight in a Cub. Worse, knowing both columns had machine guns, I flew there on the deck. Around and in between the apartment and office buildings, instead of over them.

"All of which convinced Rawson, who became president, that not only was I the world's best pilot, but at least as brave and willing to risk his life for Argentina as had been my great-great-grandfather Juan Martn de Pueyrredon.

"That paid off when we were starting up SAA and some bureaucrat discovered that I didn't have an Argentine pilot's license."

"Tell me about that . . ." Jimmy said.

- But somebody at Casa Montagna had come looking for Clete, and he never had the chance to tell that story.

- ". . . that's where the Squirt'll be from now on. Next to my Uncle Jim," Clete now said.

And then he drained his half-full gla.s.s of Dewar's.

Jimmy held his gla.s.s out to be filled.

"You sure? You don't want to be s.h.i.+t-faced when we dine with the Schumanns."

"I'm sure."

And then he changed his mind.

"No. You're right. I want to be very careful around Colonel and Mrs. Schumann."

VII.

[ ONE ].

Schlosshotel Kronberg Kronberg im Taunus, Hesse American Zone of Occupation, Germany 1805 1 November 1945 The huge dining room looked just about full. Officers in their pinks and greens and a surprising number in the rather spectacular Mess Dress uniform, and their ladies, filled just about every table.

"In my professional judgment," Lieutenant Colonel Cletus Frade, USMCR, said to Captain James D. Cronley Jr., AUS, as they stood in the doorway waiting for the attention of the matre d'hotel, "there are enough light and full bull colonels in this place to form a reinforced company of infantry. And they all seem to have brought two wives with them."

"And you've noticed, I suppose, that you and I are the only ones not wearing the prescribed uniform. You think they'll let us in?"

Frade was wearing his forest green Marine uniform and Cronley his olive drab-OD-Ike jacket and trousers. Both were "service" uniforms.

"We're about to find out," Frade said as the matre d' walked up to them.

"We are the guests of Colonel Schumann," Frade told him.

The matre d' consulted his clipboard, then led them to a table in a large alcove on the far side of the dining room.

Colonel Robert Mattingly was sitting alone at a table with place settings for ten people. He was wearing Dress Mess-an Army dinner jacket-with lots of gold braid stripes and loops and lapels showing the wearer's rank and branch of service, which in Mattingly's case was the yellow of Cavalry.

Mattingly stood as Frade and Cronley approached. He put out his hand to Frade.

"The Schumanns and General Greene and his wife should be here any moment." He looked at Cronley. "I really wish you had brought pinks and greens."

"Sir, you didn't tell me to." Then he added, "Sir, I'm obviously out of place here. Maybe it would be better if I left."

"Actually, Cronley, maybe that would be . . ."

Cronley saw that Clete had picked up Mattingly's quick acceptance of his offer to leave and didn't seem to like it.

"Just sit down and try to use the right fork," Frade said to Cronley, then looked at Mattingly. "Do these people always get dressed up like this, or is it some kind of holiday I'm missing?"

"I'd say what they're doing, Colonel-half of them, anyway-is making up for the good times they missed."

"I don't understand," Frade said.

"Well, Colonel . . ."

That's the second time Mattingly's called Clete "Colonel."

With emphasis. What's that all about?

Ah, he's reminding Clete he's a light bird talking to a full bull colonel and should have said "sir."

I wonder why Clete didn't?

". . . two months ago many of the officers here tonight-even some of the wives-were behind barbed wire in j.a.panese POW camps."

"Really?"

"The story I heard was that General George C. Marshall asked himself, 'What do I do with officers who've been behind barbed wire since 1942 when they're finally freed?' And then came up with the answer. He sent many of the ones from the Philippines and j.a.pan here, and many of the ones from German POW camps to j.a.pan.

"They get a command appropriate to their rank-nothing too stressful, of course-in Military Government or Graves Registration-there will be permanent military cemeteries all over Europe-or on staff somewhere. If they need medical attention, and a lot of them do, there are good Army hospitals here and in j.a.pan. They get requisitioned quarters much nicer than what they'd get at Fort Bragg or Fort Knox. With cheap servants, not that cheap matters, as most of them got three years of back pay as soon as they got off the planes that flew them to the States. And nice clubs, with very low, tax-free prices. Getting the picture?"

"Fascinating," Frade said. "I never thought about what would happen to them after the 'welcome home' parade."

"General Greene told me the story when I was ordered to give up this place-it was headquarters for OSS Forward-so they could turn it into a club for senior officers."

Cronley looked around the room. He couldn't tell, of course, which of the officers in their dress uniforms had been prisoners. But no one in the room looked anything like the hollow-eyed walking skeletons in rags he'd seen in the newsreels of prisoners being liberated.

Or even like Elsa.

He had first seen Elsa von Wachtstein not a month earlier, carrying a battered suitcase in a refugee line approaching a checkpoint three kilometers north of Marburg an der Lahn. She was emaciated, her face gray, her hair unkempt-a thirty-two-year-old who looked fifty. But she was the daughter of Generalmajor Ludwig Holz and daughter-in-law of Generalleutnant Graf Karl-Friedrich von Wachtstein-both brutally killed for their roles in the attempted a.s.sa.s.sination of Adolf Hitler in July 1944. Jimmy had last seen her in Buenos Aires, when she'd reunited with her brother-in-law-and now one of Clete Frade's closest friends-Major Hans-Peter von Wachtstein.

"And speak of the devil," Mattingly said as he got to his feet.

General Greene and a formidable-looking woman were walking up to the table.

Frade and Cronley stood.

"Good evening, General, Mrs. Greene," Mattingly said.

General Greene shook his hand. Mrs. Greene nodded.

"Mrs. Greene, may I introduce Colonel Cletus Frade, USMC, and Captain Cronley?" Mattingly said.

She nodded, and then asked, "How is it you're in olive drab, Captain?"

"Captain Cronley didn't expect to be here tonight, Grace," General Greene said.

"The dress code-it's posted as you come in-says 'Pinks and Greens, or more formal, after Seventeen Hundred.'"

"Grace, for G.o.d's sake, ease up," General Greene said.

I wondered before, Cronley thought, why Rachel, and not the general's wife, was president of the Officers' Wives Club. Now I know. If this pain-in-the-a.s.s was, there'd be n.o.body else in it.

"Rules are rules and decorum is decorum," Mrs. Greene said.

"You're absolutely right," Frade then said. "I'd have him taken outside and shot but I'm as guilty as he is. I'm not wearing a pink uniform either. I don't even own a pink uniform."

Both Mrs. Greene and Mattingly glared at him, she because she obviously was not used to being challenged, much less mocked.

Clete put away all that scotch! He's plastered!

And Mattingly sees it.

This is going to be fun. Or a disaster.

"Actually, Colonel Frade," Mattingly said, "the term is 'pinks and greens.'"

Frade ignored him. He wasn't through.

"Does this Army dress code prescribe female attire?" he asked.

"What do you mean by that?" she snapped.

"Just curious. In the Naval Service, officers don't tell our ladies what to wear. And of course vice versa."

Mrs. Greene's mouth opened in shock, but she didn't get to say whatever she had intended. General Greene, with relief evident in his voice, quickly announced, "Ah, here come the Schumanns and the McClungs."

Colonel Schumann was wearing Mess Dress; Major McClung pinks and greens.

When everyone was in the now-crowded alcove, waiters closed doors, ones that Cronley hadn't seen before, shutting off the alcove from the main dining room.

When all the male handshaking and female cheek-kissing was over, and they took their seats, Rachel was sitting across, but not directly across, from Jimmy. He just had time to decide he wasn't going to get groped when he felt her foot pressing against his.

Momentarily, but long enough so there was no question of it not being by accident.

When a waiter appeared for their drink orders, Cronley tried to do the right thing. He really wanted a Jack Daniel's, but knew he shouldn't. On the other hand, he didn't like scotch, so if he ordered a scotch, not liking scotch, he would drink it slowly.