"I decide what's important."
"I decide what I tell you."
"That's not the way it works."
"Yes, it is," Clete said.
Commander Delojo looked at Graham, anticipating a satisfactory reaction to Clete's insubordination.
"If you tell me what you know, about Ettinger, I mean," Graham replied, the reply disappointing Delojo, "I-or Stevenson-will fill in any blanks from what we know."
"In front of Milton Leibermann?" Clete asked.
"In front of Milt," Graham said.
"Including why Ettinger felt he had to go to Montevideo?"
"Yes," Graham said simply. "Milt knows what Ettinger was up to; I told him."
Maybe, if the OSS had been talking to the FBI all along, David would still be alive, Clete thought angrily.
He looked at Leibermann.
"I was told that Ettinger was found dead of stab wounds in the sand dunes on the River Plate beach north of Carrasco. The murder was probably done for hire, by Uruguayan gangsters, and the murder was paid for by Standartenf?hrer Goltz, or somebody working for him. But at Goltz's orders. Goltz is also the guy who gave the orders to have my father killed."
"You must have a pretty good source of information," Graham said. "That's about all we have. Except why the Uruguayan police believe the murderers were Uruguayan criminals. Do you want to hear that?"
"Please."
Graham looked at Stevenson and gestured for him to furnish the informa-tion.
"They severed Sergeant Ettinger's penis and placed it in his mouth," Stevenson said. "In the... How do I put this? This is what the gangsters down here do to stool pigeons. The idea, apparently, was to send a message to people."
"What kind of message? To who?"
"To the German Jewish community in Montevideo and here," Stevenson went on. "That Ettinger-in his role as a German Jew, not an OSS agent-had talked too much, which means at all, about the ransoming operation the Ger-mans are running. The message is that anyone who talks about it will be killed, and in that manner."
"I think we ought to send the Germans a message," Clete said. "That any-body who orders the killing of one of us gets a rifle bullet between the eyes."
"Shoot Standartenf?hrer Goltz, you mean?" Graham asked.
"Or blow his brains out," Tony Pelosi said. "If Clete had let me do that when I wanted to, maybe Dave would still be alive."
"Tell me about that," Graham said evenly.
There was something in his voice Clete didn't like, and he tried to signal Tony to button his mouth, but Tony had his attention focused on Graham and didn't see him.
And probably wouldn't have understood me anyhow.
"I came up with a way, Colonel," Tony said, not at all reluctant to show off his expertise, "to blow the bastard's brains out his ear. I even tested it on a cow's head Enrico got me from the slaughterhouse. All you need is a piece of plastic explosive about as big as the first joint on your thumb. You put it in the earpiece of a telephone. I can rig it to blow five seconds, whatever, after you pick the phone up, or on command, sending house current down the existing telephone wire pair. Two-twenty-volt current fucks up the whole phone system, but who cares?"
"This testing you did, Lieutenant Pelosi," Graham asked, and now there was ice in his voice, "was that before or aft
er Major Frade told you you were not to try to kill Standartenf?hrer Goltz?"
Tony now sensed he was in trouble.
"I thought maybe I could talk Cl-Major Frade into changing his mind, Sir," he said.