“Hear, hear,” Wattersly said.
Nervo didn’t reply. He just looked between Frade, Martín, and Wattersly as he took several deep swallows from a whisky glass that La Vallé had handed him so quickly that Clete decided La Vallé must have had it waiting.
Finally, Nervo took a last sip, signaled La Vallé for another, and went on, his voice now very calm.
“Within the officer corps of the Armada Argentina, I would estimate twenty- or twenty-five percent are German sympathizers. What that translates to mean, come the civil war, is that the navy—after the Nazis are hung, or forced to walk the plank, or simply shot—will be firmly in the hands of the pro-British forces, which means they will be able to bring the Casa Rosada, the Retiro train station, and Plaza San Martín under naval gunfire.
“At those locations, proud and patriotic soldiers—after standing the anti-Germans in the officer corps against a wall and shooting them for treason—will engage the Armada Argentina with field artillery.
“I’m not sure if you know this, Cletus, but everybody else in your library knows that this has happened before in the history of the Argentine Republic. I don’t intend to let it happen again,” Nervo said softly, then took another sip of his fresh drink.
“None of us do,” Martín said.
“I’d say the general has summed up the situation rather well,” Wattersly said.
Lauffer nodded.
“All right, Cletus,” Nervo said. “Your turn. Tell us—the truth—about your airline.”
Frade looked at him.
And now I’m going to have to lie.
Frade then bought a moment of thought by passing his empty glass to La Vallé.
I really don’t want to lie to Nervo—to any of these people—but I certainly can’t tell them that SAA has already begun to infiltrate Gehlen’s men into the country.
So what to do?
“When in doubt, tell the truth” isn’t going to work here.
What about “The truth, part of the truth, but nothing about Gehlen”?
La Vallé delivered a fresh drink to Clete, who took a sip, then began: “You’re going to find this hard to believe, General, but here’s what I know. President Roosevelt wanted to punish Juan Trippe of Pan American Airways because of Colonel Charles A. Lindbergh.”
“The first man to fly across the Atlantic?” Nervo asked.
“Yes, sir. What happened is . . .”
It took five minutes—which seemed longer—for Clete to relate the story. Nervo never for a second took his eyes off Clete’s while he listened.
“That’s what I know, General,” Clete finished.
“And you believe this story?”
“Sir, the proof is at Aeropuerto Jorge Frade: three Lockheed Constellation aircraft.”
“Edmundo?” Nervo asked.
“That story is so incredible, I’m tempted to believe it,” Wattersly said.
“Why was Father Welner on the first flight to Portugal?” Martín asked Frade.
“Yes,” Nervo added. “Why?”
“He came to me just before we took off,” Frade immediately answered. “He said that the Vatican wanted him to carry a message to the cardinal archbishop here that they didn’t want to trust to their usual communications channel.”
“And I’m sure that’s true,” Nervo said. “Jesuits don’t lie. The message probably said, ‘Bless you, my son, go and sin no more.’ But I’d like to know why else Welner wanted to go to Portugal.”