The Honor of Spies

And, again, after a moment, he nodded.

"What happens to the property of a dead man? It goes to his wife, right?"

"Right."

"That would be fine, but the wife is already dead. Then what?"

Peron thought about that a moment, then said, "They would look for other relatives, who would have the right of inheritance."

"But not back to the German Embassy, right?"

"No, of course not. The Germans don't want anything about this program to come out."

"So what happens to you, Inge," Evita asked, "when the Germans find out their hundreds of millions of pesos' worth of property is now going to the Argentine relatives of a dead man they never heard of?"

"I would either be taken back to Germany and, after they tortured me enough to convince themselves I was telling the truth, executed. I know too much. Or they might just execute me here."

"Which means that the relatives get the properties," Evita said. "What about this? We go back to Buenos Aires. We find some notary we can trust and Inge transfers all the properties to someone else. Tomorrow. As soon as we get back to Buenos Aires. And then Inge Schenck disappears. You've got some cash?"

Inge nodded. "There was a lot of cash in Manfred's briefcase. It's now in my luggage."

"Perhaps it would be wise to let me keep it for you," Peron suggested.

Inge did not reply.

"So the whole thing depends on us getting to Buenos Aires before the Gendarmeria finds out Inge is dead. Can we do that, Juan Domingo?"

He took a long moment to consider the question.

"They told me that 'senior officials' will be here in the morning," he replied, "and as soon as they are here, we'll be free to go. I will suggest that Senora Schenck be allowed to fly the body to Buenos Aires for burial; that will serve to avoid the questions of a funeral service and interment here." He paused. "Yes, it can be done. Will be done."

"You know someone who can be trusted to hold this property for us?"

"Oh, yes."

"Inge," Evita asked. "Would you say that sharing half of these properties with us would be a fair price for getting you out of your predicament?"

After a moment, Inge nodded.

[SIXTEEN]

Altitude 500 meters

Above Highway 146

Five Kilometers West of Highway 146/143 Intersection

Mendoza Province, Argentina

17 October 1943

Don Cletus Frade pointed out the front window of the olive-drab Piper Cub.

Two kilometers ahead, and five hundred or so meters above, an identical Piper was flying in wide circles to the right of Highway 146.

Two minutes after that, Clete pointed out the window again, this time downward to a large cloud of dust raised by a vehicular convoy of ten large Ejercito Argentino trucks, preceded by a Mercedes sedan and followed by two pickup trucks, the bed of one filled with cans of gasoline and the other with spare tires on wheels.

The president of the Argentine Republic looked where Frade was pointing and then, cupping his hands around his mouth, shouted, "So far, so good."

Clete had taken off shortly after 0500--as soon as he had enough visibility to do so--and flown cross-country toward a guesstimate position eighty kilometers southeast from San Luis on Highway 146.

An hour and thirty minutes later, just about the time he had decided that putting a twenty-liter can of avgas in the lap of the president of the republic just before takeoff had been the right thing to do, dark smoke rising from gas-and oil-filled cans told him that gendarmes from San Luis had come through.

The smoke pots on the highway had the "runway" marked out to Clete's specifications: "No rocks and twice the length of a polo field."

He landed, took the gas can from the lap of General Rawson, and then topped off the Cub's fuel by pouring the avgas the gendarmes had brought from a can through a chamois cloth filter.

Fifteen minutes after landing, he was airborne again.

The second Husares de Pueyrredon Piper, the one he saw now, had taken off immediately after he had and flown the dirt road from Mendoza, carrying General Nervo, to its refueling point. Then it had taken off and continued down the dirt road until it intersected Highway 146, onto which it had turned to the northeast.

It came upon the convoy first--which wasn't surprising, as it had less a distance to fly--and had then followed orders by flying wide circles to the right of the road.

Clete flew his Cub to intercept the other one, and signaled to the pilot that he was going to fly low over the road to make sure it wasn't full of large rocks and then land. The Husares de Pueyrredon pilot nodded his understanding.

Clete pushed the nose down and headed for the road. At probably three hundred feet, using the cloud of dust as a wind sock, he decided that he had gotten lucky. By flying into the prevailing wind, which was the way you were supposed to do it, he would end his landing roll right in front of the Mercedes.