“No,” Fischer said simply. “The only weapons I’ve ever fired was in Basic Officers’ School—the .45 and the M1 Garand.”
“Okay, I’ll give you my .45,” Schultz said, and took his pistol from his waistband. “Watch it; it’s locked and cocked.”
Fischer looked at him in confusion.
“All you have to do is take the safety off,” Schultz said. “Push this down.” He demonstrated. “There’s a round in the chamber, ready to fire.”
“Okay,” Fischer said without much enthusiasm as Schultz locked the weapon and handed it to him.
“Now that he’s got a loaded pistol, what’s he going to do with it?” Frade asked.
“He’s coming with me in the truck. To the house. Give us a ten-minute head start, then drive slow. See what Delgano’s up to. If he gives you the ‘come with me’ business, you make a signal—scratch your ear, something like that—and we come out of the garden and tie him up. Then you take off.”
“That’s your suggestion?” Dorotea asked, her tone on the edge of sarcasm.
“You got a better one, Dorotea?” Schultz asked.
“You come out of the bushes,” Frade added thoughtfully, “tie Delgano up, and then you go out to the house, torch the radar, bring everybody to the hangar, and I fly everybody to Uruguay.”
“That’d work,” Schultz said.
“Everybody presumably includes me?” Dorotea asked.
“Of course,” Frade said. “Jesus! Did you think I’d leave you here?”
She didn’t respond directly.
“And the Froggers?” she asked softly.
Enrico said, “I will send a gaucho to Casa Chica and have Rodolfo take them out on the pampas. For the time being, Sargento Stein can stay there.”
Frade looked doubtful.
“We don’t have time to go back and get them,” Dorotea said. “And if we did manage to get them to Uruguay, what would we do with them there?”
Clete felt a chill.
“When we get to Uruguay, I’ll contact the OSS guy in the embassy there,” he said, speaking slowly. “Maybe he can think of some way to get them to Uruguay, and what to do with them there. They’re important to Dulles, and I don’t want to kill them unless I have to.”
“That’s risky, Cletus,” Dorotea said.
“Maybe. But the last time I looked, I’m in charge. Enrico, you will stay on the estancia. I’ll get word to you one way or the other.”
“I will go with you,” Enrico said.
“No one will be trying to kill me in Uruguay. And once this is over, one way or the other, you can come to Uruguay with Sargento Stein.”
“Don Cletus . . .”
“I’m not going to argue with you, Enrico. You will do what I say.”
After a long moment, Enrico said,
“Okay, let’s do it,” Frade said. “I’ll give you fifteen minutes. If, when you get to the big house, something smells, send somebody to warn us.”
Enrico nodded.
“Don’t shoot yourself in the foot with that .45, Fischer,” Frade said.
Captain Gonzalo Delgano, chief pilot of South American Airways, who was sitting in a wicker chair on the verandah of the big house and resting his feet on a wicker stool, got up when he saw the Horch with Don Cletus Frade at the wheel and Doña Dorotea Frade beside him roll majestically up the driveway.
Clete saw that Delgano was wearing a well-cut double-breasted suit.
Dorotea waved cheerfully at him as Clete stopped the car.
Delgano came down the shallow flight of stairs from the verandah.
“Gonzalo! What a pleasant surprise!” Dorotea said.
“I’m sorry to intrude, Doña Dorotea,” Delgano said. “But something important has come up.”
“Oh, really?”
“What’s up, Gonzo?” Frade asked as they embraced and kissed.
“I had hoped to see Mr. Fischer,” Delgano said.
“He’s not here?” Dorotea asked.
Delgano shook his head.
“Well, he’s probably taking a ride,” she said. “He’s quite a horseman.”
“Why do you want to see Fischer?” Clete asked.
Antonio Lavallé appeared. He was wearing a crisp white jacket.
“May I get you something, Doña Dorotea? Don Cletus?”
“I’d like some coffee, please,” Dorotea said. “Darling?”
“That’d be fine,” Clete said.
“I was hoping Mr. Fischer would demonstrate his machine for me,” Delgano said. “The one that cuts the paper tapes so that air base transmitters can endlessly repeat the station identifier.”
