The Automobile Club of Argentina Hotel
Santo Tome, Corrientes Province
1430 15 April 1943
Finding the Automobile Club Hotel was simply a matter of asking an old woman walking along the side of the road to Santo Tome where it was. Feeling somewhat foolish, he took the borrowed car-a 1939 Ford Fordor-on a trip up and down the streets of Santo Tome until he was sure he wasn't being followed, then drove to the hotel.
It wasn't what he expected. The name had suggested an Argentine version of a motel built on the side of a road, with both economy and easy automobile parking as the design criteria. This was a new building on the outskirts of town, overlooking a sweeping curve of the Rio Uruguay. It was surrounded by a large lawn studded with tall palm trees. It looked, more than anything else, like one of the small, exclusive, oceanfront resorts north of Miami.
It had two wings extending from a central core housing a restaurant and bar. Each was two stories tall, with a palm-shaded parking lot. To the right were tennis courts, and when he entered the lobby, he saw that on the far side a large swimming pool surrounded by umbrella-shaded tables sat overlooking another gardenlike area extending down a slope to the river.
His eye was caught by a statuesque olive-skinned woman whose more than ample breasts and rear end were barely concealed beneath a bathing suit whose brevity would have certainly caused her arrest in the United States.
He took a chance that Ashton was using his own name, and asked the desk clerk for the room number of Se¤or Maxwell Ashton.
Se¤or Ashton and Party, the desk clerk told him, were in Apartment 121.
"And Party"? What the hell is that all about? Delojo said he was alone.
Clete found 121 -what looked like a three-room suite, with a private patio, overlooking the swimming pool-without difficulty; but there was no answer to his knock. He knocked louder, and when that failed to get a response, looked around for someone who might be an OSS agent.
There was no one at the pool except a diminutive mustachioed cigar-smoking Latin in bathing trunks and a flowered shirt who was unabashedly watching the statuesque olive-skinned woman in the scant bathing costume climb the diving board ladder.
Neither was there anyone who remotely looked like an American among the half-dozen men he saw in the restaurant, bar, or on the tennis courts. Just to be safe, he asked a dour-faced man in his late forties if his name happened to be Ashton, and received a curt "No, Se¤or" in reply.
What the hell do I do now? Where the hell could he be9 If he has his team with him, where the hell are they?
He made one more sweep of the place, then returned to the borrowed 1939 Ford sedan.
The diminutive mustachioed Latin who had shared his fascination with the statuesque lady in the revealing swimming costume walked up to the car as Clete was unlocking it.
"Why do I have this feeling that you are looking for me?" he asked in Eng-lish.
Clete stared at him in utter surprise.
"Excuse me, Se¤or," the little man said in Spanish. "I obviously have made a mistake."
"You're Ashton?" Clete asked.
"Major Frade?"
Clete nodded.
"Why don't we have a beer by the pool?" Aston said. "I don't think I'm be-ing watched, but you may be."
Clete followed him to one of the umbrella-shaded tables by the pool.
Clete had no sooner settled himself in one of the chairs than the statuesque lady, smiling invitingly, walked up and sat down.
"Consuelo," Maxwell Ashton said in Spanish, "this is Se¤or Smith, the business associate I told you I would probably meet."
"I'm very happy to know you, Se¤or," Consuelo said, almost coming out of the bathing suit as she leaned over to offer Clete her hand.
"The pleasure is entirely mine, Se¤orita," Clete said.
"Why don't you go take another dive, Consuelo," Maxwell Ashton said, "while Se¤or Smith and I transact our business?"
She smiled and stood up and strolled toward the diving board. As she walked, she rearranged as well as she could her bathing costume over her left buttock, which had escaped.