"Good. Mateo, my plan is to drop by parachute with the negatives at this
point. The plane is then to return and land at San Martin. You will then
make your way to San Hermano by train and go directly to Gonzales by
car."
"Will I be followed?"
"I have a man at San Martin. He will guide you."
"And you?"
"With luck, I'll be in San Hermano before you."
"All right."
"Nine thousand," the captain said. "Border ahead."
"Pour on the coals. Take your stations, men." Segador patted Snub Nose
on the back as the youngster crawled into the glass bubble below the
pilot's feet. The navigator went to the guns in the rear. "Stay here,
Mateo," Segador ordered. He climbed into the mid-ship gun turret.
Hall had once been accustomed to being human super-cargo on board a
fighting plane. This time the feeling irritated him. For want of
something better to do, he took down a tommy gun from a rack near
Segador's seat and examined it for dust and grease. It was immaculately
kept. He laid it across his lap.
"Crossing the border now," the pilot announced.
The plane shot across the heavily wooded mountains, left them well
behind in fifteen minutes. Hall followed the fading shadows of the plane
as it sped over the foothills. In a few minutes, darkness would blot out
the shadows, and then he would again know the strangely exhilarating
feeling of being alone in the skies at night.
"Lieutenant," Segador said, "go up front and check the course."
The major and the sergeant remained at their guns. "More hills ahead,"
the navigator explained to Hall as he passed.
"No lights," Segador ordered.
Hall walked forward, stood behind the men at the instruments. The
navigator was making his readings under a shielded blue light. Millares,
the pilot, pulled back on his stick, slightly, begging altitude at a
minimum loss of air speed as he climbed to put more distance between the
plane and the string of lower hills which lay across their course.
The navigator suddenly became very busy at his radio. "Major," he said
into his microphone, "we are being called by a ground station. They've
spotted us. They want to know who is in command, and what flight this
is."
"Stick to your course," Segador answered. "Maximum speed." He crawled
back to the main cabin.
"What shall I answer, Major?"
"Don't answer them. We'll just act as if we didn't pick up their
signal."
"Yes, Major. They're repeating their request."
"Mateo," Segador said, "this is very bad. I don't know who controls the
ground station. We can't take chances. I'm jumping as soon as it gets
dark."
"That's a matter of minutes."
"I know. Navigator, the plan remains the same, except that I jump in ten
minutes. Ignore all ground challenges on your way back to San Martin."
"I'm jumping with you," Hall said.
"No, you're not."
"If they shoot us down on the way back to San Martin, the negatives will
fall into their hands, if they're not destroyed."
"Suppose we both jump and are both caught?"
"It's a chance I'd rather take, Diego." Hall opened the secret pocket in
the visor of his Cuban Army cap. "Let me leave this set of negatives
with Snub Nose. I have two more sets on me--in my Sam Browne and my
boots."
"I have to think about it." Segador adjusted the harness of his
parachute. Then he picked up his microphone. "Snub Nose," he ordered,
"come back here. Adjust the _companero's_ parachute. He's jumping with
me."
"_Bueno._ I'll show him how to use it, too."
Hall and Segador formally shook hands with the rest of the crew before
they jumped.
For a few long seconds, plunging face downward, Hall could not think. He
saw the plane pass over his feet, silver wings etched against the dark
ceiling. He counted to seven, aloud, his voice lost in the wind. Then he
pulled the release cord. There was the expected moment of tensing pain
as the silk clawed at the night air and the straps of the harness cut
into the insides of his thighs. In his mind's eye there was a picture he
had forgotten: a sand-bagged office in London on a bright May morning,
the English girl with the yellow crutch under her arm as she handed him
the mail. Tear sheets on the series he'd done in Scotland. _Copyright
1940 by Ball Syndicate Inc., Somewhere in England, April 19, 1940._ This
morning I took my place in line inside of a converted Lancaster, watched
the man in front of me lean out and tumble into the clear sky, and then
did exactly as he had done. I counted to ten, pulled my release cord,
and ... And what a hell of a pseudo-romantic way to make a living, he'd
said to himself and to the English girl that morning.
But tonight there was nothing phony about sitting in a canvas sling,
falling through a wet cloud, eyes peeled for the white of Segador's
parachute. Tonight he was no Sunday supplement kibitzer taking a joy
ride amidst men rehearsing for death. Tonight he was finally in the war,
as a combatant.
The tricks he had learned in Scotland served him in good stead now. He
was able to play the cords of the parachute, guiding the direction of
his descent so that he followed Segador. There was little time to think
of anything but the operation of the moment. Fortunately, it was a green
night. Like Segador, Hall could see from a thousand feet that they were
dropping over a sloping meadow. At about two hundred feet, they could
see that they were going to land in the middle of a flock of sheep.
The sheep began to bleat madly and run about in circles, as first
Segador, then Hall, dropped into their pasture. Segador broke free of
his silk, ran over to help the American. "Careful," he said. "With so
many sheep, there must be a herder around. Let me do the talking."
A man in a woolly sheepskin cape was following a cautious sheep dog
toward the spot where they stood. He carried a rifle.
Segador allowed the shepherd to approach to within fifty feet. "_Hola!_"
he called. "We have disturbed your flock."
The shepherd said something to his dog, continued advancing slowly
toward the two men from the sky.
"He is afraid we might be Germans," Segador said. "They hate the Germans
worse than the devil in the country."
"Who are you?" The shepherd was now quite close to them. Hall could see
at once that he was a Basque.
"Vasco?" Hall asked. He poured out a stream of Basque greetings. They
served only to put the shepherd more on his guard.
"I saw you fall from the skies--like _quintacolumnistas_."
"That is true, _companero_," Segador said. "But we are not fifth
columnists."
"Are you of the Republic?"
"Yes."
"The other. He is not of the Republic. His uniform is different, and he
speaks the tongue of my fathers badly."
"He is of the Republic of Cuba. He is a friend of our Republic."
"You both have guns," the herder said. He looked at his dog, who stood
between him and the intruders. "If you are friends, you will give your
guns to the dog. I am without letters, but if you are friends, you can
prove it to an educated man in our village."
"What is your village?"
"You have guns."
"They are yours, _companero_. See, I take mine. I lay it on the ground
for your dog."
The shepherd addressed his dog in Euzkadi. The dog walked over to the
gun, picked it up in his mouth, dropped it at the peasant's feet. He
then made a trip for Hall's gun.
"You will walk in front of me," the shepherd said. "We will go toward
that stile." He picked up the two pistols, shoved them into his skin
bag.
Segador started to laugh. "I salute your vigilance, shepherd. We had two
guns to your one. We could have shot you first. A coward would have run
for help, first."
"Cowards do not serve the Republic," the shepherd said. He remained ten
feet behind them, ignoring Segador's further attempts at conversation,
marching them toward a thatched hut on the outskirts of a tiny village.
When they approached the hut, the dog ran ahead, started to scratch on
the unpainted door.
An Indian woman with a mestizo baby in her arms stood in the doorway
when the three men reached the hut. "Let them in, woman," the shepherd
ordered.
The inside of the small hut was dark and bare. On a pallet in the far
corner, Hall could see the forms of children huddled in sleep, how many
he could not tell. There was a stone stove, a hand-hewn table and two
benches. In another corner, a fragment of a tallow candle burned
fitfully under a dim portrait. Hall realized, with an inward start, that
the portrait was not of Jesus but of Anibal Tabio.
"Hold the gun."
The woman put the baby on the pallet with the other children, took the
rifle in her hands.
"If you are of the Republic," the shepherd said, "you will allow me to
tie your hands."
"We are of the Republic--and for the Educator, who is now dead."
The woman, who held the gun, backed away, closer to the picture, while
her husband bound the hands of Segador and Hall behind their backs, and
then connected all four hands with a third length of rope.
"Send your woman for the educated man," Segador said. "But hurry. We are
on a mission for the Republic. We must not be delayed too long."
The shepherd took the gun from his wife. "Go then," he said to her.
"Bring Bustamente the Notary to this house."
Two of the children on the pallet were now sitting up, staring at the
visitors with wide, frightened eyes. Segador grinned at them. His eyes
were growing accustomed to the darkness. "Go back to sleep, _ninos_," he
whispered. "We will play with you when you awake."
The kids ducked under the woolly coverlet, hiding their heads.
"Sit down," the shepherd said. "If you are friends, I will offer you the
hospitality of this table." He started to roll a cigarette out of a
fragment of newspaper.
"There are cigarettes in my pocket," Hall suggested. "Cuban cigarettes.
Perhaps you would like one."
The shepherd rose from his own bench without a word, found the
cigarettes, put two in the mouths of Hall and Segador. He struck a rope
lighter, started their cigarettes. Then, still without speaking, he
finished rolling his own cigarette and lit it. "If you are fifth
columnists," he said, "I spit on your cigarettes." There was no rancor
in his statement; it was a polite expression of simple logic.
His wife returned in a few minutes. She was with a nervous little
white-haired man who clung to the waistband of his alpaca trousers. He
carried a shiny alpaca jacket in his free arm--this and the steel-framed
glasses on his ancient nose were his badges of authority.
"This is Bustamente the Notary," the shepherd said.
Bustamente fingered his glasses. "Yes," he said, alive to the importance
of the moment. "I am the Notary." He squinted down his nose at the two
men.
"Major Diego Segador, of the Republic. And this is my colleague, Major
Angel Blanco, of the Cuban Army."
"They fell from the sky," the shepherd said. "Like fifth columnists."
"Is that true, Your Eminences?" Bustamente the Notary was taking no
chances.
"It is true."
"And you have papers?"
"We have papers. Mine are in here. And yours, Major Blanco?"
The Notary adjusted his glasses, turned to the papers while the
shepherd's wife held a candle over them. "Ay," he said. "They look real.
Yes, I must admit they look real. On the other hand, I must also admit
that I have never seen real Cuban papers." This was indeed a problem for
the Notary. He scratched his chin, importantly, cleared his throat with
a rumbling hawk. "What do you think, Juan Antonio?"
"I am without letters," the shepherd said.
"I must admit," the Notary said, not without sadness, "I must admit that
I have never seen real papers of our own army."
"Please," Segador said, "it is important that we get to San Hermano. Is
there anyone in this village who is not for the landowners or the mine
owners or the Germans who has seen real papers? I ask this in the name
of Don Anibal Tabio, in whose name we undertook our mission."
"Justice will be done," said Bustamente the Notary. "This is the era of
justice, my good friends." He tried to punctuate his pronouncement with
Tabio's famous gesture. To do this he had to release his waistband, and
his trousers started to fall to his knees. From the pallet came a
choking snicker.
"Silence!" Juan Antonio hissed to the kids on the dark pallet. "Show
respect for Bustamente the Notary." His wife, at the same time, restored
the Notary's dignity by handing him a length of cord to use as a belt.
He fixed his trousers and then made the moment truly solemn by putting
on his jacket.
"I am sure the Notary will dispense the justice of the Republic," the
shepherd said.
"_Hombre!_ This is very serious," Bustamente the Notary whispered. It
was a loud stage whisper. "We must consider our decision with careful
seriousness, Juan Antonio." He stepped outside of the hut.
Hall could hear his discussion with the shepherd. "The one who claims to
be of us," the Notary said, "he does not talk like an enemy of Don
Anibal, Mayhissoulrestinpeace. How does the other talk?"
"I do not know. He tried to speak in Euzkadi. It is not his tongue."
"It is, in a sense, suspicious then. But we must not be hasty. Justice
begins in the village." The phrase was Tabio's.
"What are we to do, Senor Notary?"
"The laws of the Constitution of the Republic guarantee justice to all
suspects, Juan Antonio. Please tell me all you know about the two
officers."
He listened to the simple recital of the facts. "Ay, it is as I have
observed, _amigo_. There is much to be said on both sides. If they were
Germans or fifth columnists, perhaps they would have shot you first. On
the other hand, since neither of us has ever seen a Cuban uniform, how
can we tell? And if they are ours, why did they drop from the sky into
the middle of a flock of sheep?"
"It is very deep, Senor Notary."
"Let us talk softer, Juan Antonio. Perhaps they can hear us inside."
They moved farther from the doorway, conversed in whispers for a few
minutes, and then they started to walk down the dirt street of the
village. Hall and Segador sat patiently, without exchanging a word.
Once, while they waited for the shepherd and the Notary, Segador told
Hall with a look that he thought everything was going to be all right.
Then the two villagers returned with two horses and two donkeys.
"We have decided," said Bustamente the Notary, "that in the interests of
full justice we must take you to see the school teacher in Puente Bajo.
He will know what to do."
Segador sighed with relief. "Thank you, Senor Notary," he said. "And
thank you, _Companero_ Shepherd. I am certain that your decision is the
wisest one could make, and that we shall receive ample justice from the
school teacher of Puente Bajo. But tell me, how far is the village from
here?"
"It is less than five miles, Major."
"I am content."
The shepherd undid the cord that connected the bound hands of Hall and
Segador and, because their hands were still tied behind their backs, he
helped them mount the donkeys. He and the Notary climbed into the wooden
saddles of their small horses, fastening the donkeys' leads to their
pommels.
Segador smiled at Hall, whose donkey was being led by the shepherd.
"Wonderful," he said. "Sancho leads the noble Don home from an encounter
with the sheep."
"Please, gentlemen," Bustamente the Notary said, sharply, "you are not
to address one another. Justice begins in the village, and
justice"--again he aped Don Anibal's gesture--"and justice will be
done."
"We bow to your authority in matters of justice," Segador said, gravely.
He and Hall sat in silence as the convoy cut across a meadow on the
slope and turned toward the outlines of a larger village in the valley.
They jogged toward the dim yellow lights of Puente Bajo, the shepherd
piercing the night quiet with the curses he flung at the heads of the
donkeys every time they balked.
At the outskirts of the town, Bustamente the Notary ordered a halt. "I
have been thinking," he said. "It is my feeling that if the two on the
donkeys are of the Republic and innocent, then we will have committed an
offense against their sacred dignity if we lead them into Puente Bajo
fettered on mangy donkeys. I have therefore come to the conclusion that
perhaps it would be better for me to ride on alone to the school and
bring the teacher back to meet us here, by the road."
"I can agree," the shepherd said. "But wait until I tether their
donkeys." He dismounted, led the donkeys to the side of the road and
tied their forefeet to lengths of rope he fastened to a strong tree.
"Would you want one of your own cigarettes?" he asked Hall.
"Yes. Many thanks. And one for Major Segador, too. And please take one
for yourself."
The shepherd declined with a serious face. "First," he said, "I must
hear what the school teacher has to say about you. He is wiser, even,
than Bustamente the Notary."
Bustamente the Notary and the man who was acknowledged to be even of
more wisdom than he returned out of breath; the school teacher from
trotting after the short horse and the Notary from talking incessantly
to the pedagogue. The teacher was a compact mestizo in his early
twenties, a short youth with a furrowed sloping Indian forehead and
bright beady black eyes. He was wearing a pair of brown-cotton trousers,
a blue shirt without a tie, and rope-soled slippers.
"Are you truly Major Segador?" he asked. And then, without waiting for
the answer, he turned to the shepherd and began to berate him. "You
fool," he shouted, "untie his bonds at once. Do you know that he sat in
El Moro with Don Anibal?"
"I am without learning," the shepherd said.
"It is all right, teacher," Segador said. "The _companero_ did his
duty--and he did it properly. Undo my hand, Juan Antonio, so that I may
shake your hand."
"I am sorry, _companero_," the school teacher said to the shepherd. "I
spoke to you without thinking."
"What is your name, teacher?"
"I am called Pablo Artigas." He helped Hall and Segador get off the
donkeys. "I regret that you have had so much grief in our province."
"Are you a member of the Union?" Segador asked.
"Naturally. For three years--since I am a teacher. Before that I
belonged to the Union of Students."
"And you have your _carnet_?"
"Not with me, Major Segador. It is in my room at the school."
"We will look at it. May we go with you?"
"I will be honored."
"Please, Your Honors," said Bustamente the Notary, "I insist that you
ride the horses. The teacher may have one of the donkeys. I shall walk."
The shepherd reached into his sheepskin cloak. "Here are your pistols,"
he said.
Hall passed his cigarettes around. The shepherd accepted one with a shy
smile. "I am glad that you are not angry, Senor Cuban Major," he said.
"I have never had a Cuban cigarette before."
_Chapter eighteen_
"Fantastic! Sheer fantasy on paper, but it's all true. All roads lead to
San Hermano. First, Lobo. Then, today, the man from Spain. Then ..."
Felipe Duarte could not sit still. He walked around Hall's room at the
Bolivar like a referee during a fast bout between flyweights.
"Ostensibly, Lobo came to represent Batista at the funeral yesterday.
Actually, he came to bring duplicates and even the originals of most of
your negatives--as well as a report on Androtten. I don't know what's in
the Androtten report yet; all I know is that the American Intelligence
Service had something on it, and they gave it to Lobo."
"I tried to reach him on the phone."
"He's busy, Mateo. He's closeted with Lavandero. That's not all ..."
"I know, the de Sola affidavit. I'll have to tell you about Havana,
Felipe. And about the all-night march to Cerrorico through the woods
with Segador and the school teacher and the Notary's mules." _Mateo, eh
Mateo, what did you see in the shepherd's hut? Tabio's picture? All I
could see was poverty, Mateo._
"Hey, you're not listening? What are you thinking of?"
Hall put his shaving brush down, inserted a fresh blade in his razor. "A
thousand things. Cerrorico. The mining stronghold. Segador said the
communists had a good press and that they were reliable. He wasn't
kidding. They must have run off a million leaflets with reproductions of
the Ansaldo pictures and the Havana documents by the time I left."
Later, he would tell Duarte about the ride from Cerrorico in the engine
cab of an ore train, and hopping off at dawn at the Monte Azul station,
and being met by a Pepe Delgado who wore a freshly washed and
ill-fitting reservist's uniform and drove a small army lorry. Segador
had gone ahead on an earlier train.
"You should have seen the leaflets yesterday, Mateo. Just as the funeral
procession was at its greatest the army planes appeared overhead and
started to drop the leaflets by the ton. And an hour after the leaflets
fell from the skies, the pro-United Nations papers were all over the
country with front-page reproductions of the pictures and the
documents."
"And all that time I was sleeping on an ore train. Who is this man from
Spain you mentioned, Felipe?"
"It is fantastic! After Mogrado got my message, he rounded up two
Spanish Army surgeons who knew Ansaldo. They made affidavits, too. That
isn't the half of what Mogrado did. He reached the Spanish underground
in Spain via a cable to Lisbon. And this morning the Clipper came in
from Lisbon, and what do you think?"
"I can't think. But don't tell me it's fantastic, Felipe."
"But it is fantastic. There is a man on board the plane, a typical
_senorito_. He has papers with him that say he is a Spanish diplomat.
The minute he steps ashore, a mug from the Spanish Embassy recognizes
him. 'He is a fraud, a _rojo_, a defiler of nuns and an arsonist of
cathedrals!' he shrieks. It's fantastic! The man with the papers lifts a
heavy fist and he lets fly with a blow that knocks out the fascist's
front teeth. 'Baby killer!' he hollers, and then he turns around to the
airport officials and he says he is a Mexican citizen who used fake
papers to escape from Spain and he demands that they take him under
guard to the Mexican Embassy. In the meanwhile he says they'll have to
kill him if they want to take his papers before he is delivered in
person to the Mexican Embassy. Is it fantastic, Mateo?"
"For God's sake stop telling me that!"
"But it is fantastic! He makes them drive him to the Mexican Embassy,
and the Spanish official is screaming like a stuck pig that the man is a
Spanish citizen and an agent of the Comintern."
"Who is he?"
"He is a Spaniard, of course. The underground sent him. They had cadres
in the office of the Falange National Delegation. They took out the
Falange party records of Ansaldo and Marina, put them under a camera,
and sent the pictures to San Hermano with this agent. It was a farce. I
was in the next room, listening to him as he told the Ambassador that
his name was Joaquin Bolivar. Then I walked in, the sweet light of
recognition on my ugly face, shouting 'Joaquin! My old University pal,
Joaquin! Don't you recognize your old Felipe Duarte?' The Ambassador
just watches me. The man's papers are still in a sealed envelope before
him.
"It is enough for him. He slams his hands down on the papers and says he
claims them in the name of his government. 'I will take the
responsibility for Senor Bolivar,' he says. 'I have reason to believe he
is a Mexican national.' I ask you, Mateo--is it fantastic?"
"No. It's just efficient. Where is he now?"
"The Ambassador took him and his papers to see Lavandero. He's giving a
deposition and an interview to the press."
"I ought to take in the interview."
"No. Stay away. Segador thinks it will be wiser if you stay away. But
that isn't all. Do you remember the picture of Ansaldo that started you
off on your wild-goose chase?"
"Vaguely. What about it?"
"There is a doctor in the Institute of Tropical Medicine in Puerto Rico.
He is the head of the pro-Loyalist Spanish society on the island ..."
"Ramon Toro?"
"Toro. You know him? Well, he must be a man worth knowing. He has a
collection of _Avance_--that was the Falange organ in San Juan, starting
with issue number one. When he sees the picture of Gamburdo embracing
Ansaldo--it was on the front page of _El Mundo_ in San Juan--a bell
rings in his head. He starts going through his _Avances_, and what do
you think? He finds the picture you were looking for in an August issue.
So he rips open his suitcase, pastes the whole issue of _Avance_ between
the linings, and arrives at the San Hermano airport last night. He
doesn't stop. He takes his bag straight to the editor of _La
Democracia_, empties it of his clothes, and pulls out the ..."
"Christ! Toro had it all the time!"
"It's on the front page of _La Democracia_ this morning. I was in such a
rush to get here that I left it in my office. I tell you, all roads lead
to San Hermano. Every time I hear a plane overhead, I think, aha! more
anonymous Republicans and underground agents and Cuban generals are
coming in with more documents. It's fantastic!"
"Did anyone else turn up?" Hall was feeling better than he had in years.
He was one of many now, he knew, one of an army who marched in uniform,
out of uniform, but an army which knew the enemy and knew how to fight
him. Mogrado, Fielding, Duarte, Segador, Rafael, Pepe, Vicente,
Iglesias, even poor Rivas for all his cringing and breast-beating--the
army was strong, and it was growing stronger with the taste of victory.
That was all that mattered, now.
"I guess that's the beginning of the end for the Falange," he said.
"The hell it is, Mateo." Duarte was coming down to earth. "It will be a
long row to hoe. Your State Department has been distributing judicious
hints that a unilateral policy toward Franco will upset the apple cart.
They're after an all-Hemisphere policy toward Spain. All that this means
is that none of the countries, except my own, will dare to break with
Franco until Washington takes the lead. Not even this one."
"You're crazy."
"I'm a diplomat, Mateo. Mark my words."
"I hope you have to eat those words by the end of the week." Hall doused
his face with bay rum, patted it with a towel. "When did they call the
troops up? Pepe started to tell me about it when he drove me over last
night, but I fell asleep as soon as he got started."
"Three days ago, Mateo. There was a meeting of the Student Council to
Aid the United Nations at the University. The hall was packed. Then the
Cross and Sword gunmen stormed the entrances and fired point blank into
the crowd. There were over fifteen deaths, and so many injured that the
University authorities established an emergency hospital in five lecture
rooms. Your Jerry has been there since. The commanding general of this
area is loyal to the Republic; he called up the reserves."
"What about Jerry? I've been trying to reach her all morning."
"She is wonderful. All the patients are trying to teach her Spanish."
"What are we waiting for? Let's go to the University."
"Not me. I've got to go back to the Embassy. Lobo says he can meet us
both for lunch at the Embassy."
"I'll make it. Let's go. Oh, one more thing. I put through some calls to
New York. And some are coming in. I gave your office as one of the
places I could be reached."
"Don't be late."
* * * * *
Jerry could spend only a few minutes with Hall on the University steps.
"Gonzales told me that you were safe," she said. "And also what you
accomplished. I'm proud of you, Matt."
"I worried about you," he said. "Were you scared when you found yourself
in a war zone?"
"No. Just angry. Maria Luisa was at the meeting when the shooting
started. She wasn't hurt, thank God, but she was a bloody mess when she
got home. Gonzales and I left for the University at once. I've been
here, since. We've had four deaths to date."
"When can you get away?"
"Not till dinner time. But things are easing up. We've been able to
transfer more than half of our cases to the hospitals."
"The Bolivar at eight."
He took a cab to the Mexican Embassy. The driver was beaming as he shut
the door. He told Hall that the early returns were overwhelmingly in
favor of Lavandero. "Yes, senor," he laughed, "the fascists are on the
run today. The lines formed outside of the polling places three and even
four hours before they opened. Did you see what fell from the planes
yesterday? Did you see the papers? Those dirty fascists!"
Duarte had figures to back up the cab driver's story when Hall reached
the Mexican Embassy. "It is a wonderful victory, Mateo," he said. "The
tide is running so strongly that Gamburdo is expected to concede the
election before the polls close at five."
"The bastard! Where's Lobo?"
"He'll be here in a minute. Let me show you some of the leaflets. I'll
bet you haven't seen one yet."
The leaflet was the size of a standard newspaper page, printed on both
sides. There was the large picture of Gamburdo embracing Ansaldo smack
up against the shot of Ansaldo, in fascist uniform, giving the fascist
salute along with the Nazi and the Italian officers. Most of the Falange
documents proving the Axis ties of Gamburdo and the Cross and Sword were
also reproduced on the single sheet.
"It turned the election," Duarte said. "Until yesterday, the fascists
were spreading the story that Lavandero had kept Ansaldo from operating
in time. Gamburdo was so anxious to grab the credit for Ansaldo that he
dug his own grave."
"He's not in the grave, yet."
"Be patient."
Lobo walked into the office. He was wearing his regulation tan uniform.
"Mateo," he shouted, "you're a fraud! I heard you were wearing a Cuban
officer's uniform."
"It's in shreds, Jaime."
Lobo eased his long frame into Duarte's favorite chair. "I thought you'd
never gotten through," he said. "After the second day of silence I was
sure the fascists had clipped your wings. Don't bother to tell me about
your hardships, though. I've already seen Segador."
"Everyone has seen Segador," Hall laughed. "Everyone but me. When the
hell do I see him?"
"He's very busy, my friend. He's responsible to a government, you know,
not to himself, like you."
"_Mierda!_"
"That reminds me. There's an American officer in town. From Miami."
"Intelligence?"
"Naturally. He's a very nice guy, Mateo. The American Ambassador's
daughter here told him that you are an agent of the Comintern. He told
me that he knew she was crazy. He asked me to tell you that he's a
straight-shooter and he wants to speak to you. In a friendly way, of
course. Name's Barrows. A lieutenant-colonel. Know him?"
"No. What about Androtten?"
"What about Barrows, first? If I were you, I'd give him a ring. He's at
the American Embassy."
"All right. Shall I ask him to lunch with us?"
Barrows was not free for lunch. He arranged to meet Hall at Duarte's
office at three. "He sounds human," Hall admitted.
During their luncheon, Lobo told Hall and Duarte what he had learned
about Androtten from the American Government. The man was a German named
Schmidt or Wincklemann (he had used passports in both names) who had a
record as a German agent which went back to 1915. He had spent some time
in Java, some years in Spanish Morocco, and the year of 1935 living in a
villa at Estoril, the beach resort outside of Lisbon. "The record
doesn't say what he was doing in Portugal," Lobo said. "My guess is that
he was working with Sanjurjo."
"I'd back you on that," Hall said. "The old rumhound needed someone to
hold his hand before the war."
"There are blank spaces in the record after that," Lobo said. "The next
entry is the spring of 1938, when your Androtten was known as
Wincklemann. He turned up in Rome as an art dealer specializing in
Spanish masterpieces. He sold two Goyas and a Velasquez to three rich
ladies in the British colony; told them the paintings were from the
private collections of Spanish noblemen who had been ruined by the
_rojos_. He was lying, of course--the paintings had all been taken from
Spanish museums by the Nazis. Wincklemann disappeared, and the ladies
finally sold the paintings back to the Franco government in 1940 for the
same price. The last mention of Wincklemann or Schmidt is a paragraph
from a letter mailed to Washington from Mexico in July, 1941. The letter
was from the junta of Dominican opposition leaders and mentioned a
Gunther Wincklemann as one of four Nazi agents who had been guests of
Trujillo in the Dominican capital that month."
* * * * *
Hall borrowed an empty office in the Mexican Embassy for his appointment
with the American officer. It went off well. Barrows was a
plain-speaking man in his early forties, with the handshake of a young
and vigorous boiler maker. He had a nice, unhurried way about him, his
frosty blue eyes surveying Hall with good humor while he fussed with his
thick-walled pipe. "I'd heard all sorts of conflicting stories about
you," he said, smiling at the conflicts.
"I can imagine," Hall said.
"I wish I could tell you half of them."
"I know the Ambassador's half. Heard it in Havana."
Barrows snorted. "Have you a match that lights?" he asked. "I've been
trying to get this pipe started for days." He refused a cigar. It was a
match that he wanted. Hall had a lighter whose flame burned long enough
to light the pipe. "There now," he said, "now we can talk. I know that
you heard about the Ambassador's report. If it will make you feel any
better, Skidmore got his tail singed for it." He was highly amused.
"Good." Hall was warming up to Barrows. "I hate stuffed shirts."
"So do I. But frankly, Hall, I'd like to drop the subject. I--I need
your advice. Unofficially, of course. But I need it. It's about the
reports that the late Roger Fielding made to the British Embassy. You
saw them, I understand."
"Only once. A few nights before he was killed."
"That's what I was told. Commander New in the British Embassy told me.
He's not exactly up on the San Hermano scene yet, you know. He thinks
that after the job you and Lobo did in Havana that he ought to turn the
originals of the Fielding reports over to the government. What he
doesn't know is who to hand them to. He wants to know who will use them
and who will burn them. He thought that since you were an American, he'd
ask me to get your slant on it."
"I get it," Hall said. "You want one guy who is certain to be an
anti-fascist. Someone who will know just how to use the information."
"Exactly. I don't suppose I have to tell you, Hall, that the enemy has
been sinking our shipping in the South Atlantic and the Caribbean at a
rate that spells one hell of a long war. I know, as you do, that
Falangist Spaniards on shore are working with the Nazi undersea raiders.
But even if we wanted to, we couldn't send enough Marines to South
America to root 'em out. We've got to rely on the local governments to
do the job."
"Yeah." Hall was bitter. "We want this Republic to root out the
Falangists, so we send an Ambassador who plays footy with the Falangists
in public and calls the anti-Falangist President a dirty Red."
"You're carping, Hall."
"All right. I'm carping. I'm a taxpayer, it's my prerogative to carp. We
want the Latin American Republics to get tough with the Franquists who
are helping the Nazis sink our ships, so we sell the Spanish fascists
the oil they transfer to the Nazi subs, and we send an Ambassador to
Madrid whose only exercise is kissing Franco's foot in public every
Sunday morning, and when any of our sister Republics want to break with
Franco we dispatch a sanctimonious buzzard in striped pants from the
State Department and he tells them to lay off Franco, Spain's Saviour
from Atheism and Communism. How in the hell can we expect the Latin
Republics to crack down on Franco's stooges at home when we ourselves
play up to Franco in Madrid?"
"Let's have that lighter again." Barrows was cool and unruffled, the
smile that danced across the smooth lines of his face never wavered.
"I'm a soldier," he said, pleasantly. "I can't discuss policy. I can
only talk tactics. You know that, Hall. Tactics is the art of working
with an existent situation and licking it--not waiting for the
millennium. You think our policy toward Franco Spain should be changed.
Maybe you're right. Maybe it will be changed. But, in the meanwhile,
Franquists in Latin America, in this country specifically, are putting
the finger on our ships. Fielding's reports might be accurate. If we are
to act on them, we need the help of pro-Allied members of this
government. Who is our man?"
"There is one man in these parts who can be trusted completely to do the
right things with those reports," Hall answered. "Give him the reports,
and after the polls close he'll be in a position to round up every
fascist Fielding listed and put them on ice for the duration. He's an
army man--Major Diego Segador."
"And you think he's our man, eh? Would you mind writing his name in my
book, and the best place to reach him?"
Hall carefully printed the information Barrows wanted and then, as he
returned the book, he said, deliberately, "But there's one thing you
should know about Segador. He's everything I said he is, and more. But
he's also a leftist. He's very close to the Communist Party."
"So what?" Barrows said, casually. "The Russians are killing plenty of
Germans, and I understand their chief is a member of the party, too. Man
named Stalin, or something like that."
"Do you mind if I call you unique?"
"Not at all. But let me ask one. What are you planning to do for the
duration? Ever think of G-2?"
"Yeah. I applied before Pearl Harbor. They turned me down so hard I
thought I was hit by a truck. I applied again on December 8th, 1941. It
was still no soap. I was for the Loyalists in Spain, you know. That made
me what the brass hats term a 'premature anti-fascist' and definitely
not officer material."
"I didn't know about that," Barrows said. "What would you do if the door
was opened for you now? Understand, I'm not making an offer. I'm just
asking."
"I don't know," Hall said. "I don't think the door would be opened. If
it was--I'd have to think about it."
"May I have your lighter again?"
Hall watched Barrows make a major operation of relighting his pipe, and
recognized it as the officer's neat device for creating a break in a
conversation that needed breaking. Barrows had a way of making the
ritual of lighting his pipe serve as the curtain that falls on a given
scene of a play.
"The Ambassador," Barrows smiled. "He's been tearing his nice white hair
since you got back from Havana. You put him on an awful spot, you know."
"It'll do him good, the old bastard. Do you know what Tabio told me
about him a few days before he died? He said that he was with Skidmore
at a dinner a few days after Germany invaded Russia and that Skidmore
said he was glad that now the Russians would get what was coming to
them."
"Not really?"
"Lavandero was there. He'll back me up." Hall stopped. "Say, I have an
idea," he said. "There's one thing I can do for G-2. I can write a
report on Skidmore. I'll do it right after the elections."
"Oh-oh! It'll mean trouble with the Spats Department."
"Spats?"
"State. But you make your report, and give it to me. I'll turn it in
with the rest of my stuff when I get back. Why not? You're a civilian.
The worst that can happen to you after you write the report is that
you'll have trouble getting passports and visas."
"I don't give a damn," Hall said. "And I'll do something else. You gave
me an idea. I'm still a civilian, you said. Swell, then I won't be
climbing over anyone's brass hat if I see to it that a copy of the
report reaches the White House."
Barrows leaned back in his chair, laughing. "He told me that you
threatened to do just that," he said. "But he's just a harmless old
duffer, Hall. He told me he wanted to shake your hand."
"He can shove it. Did you meet his daughter?"
"Once. She doesn't like you."
"Ever receive any reports in Miami about her?"
"You know I can't answer that question, Hall."
"O.K. That means--oh, I guess it means that you got reports that she
sleeps around plenty. But her political life is more important to G-2
than her sex didoes."
"Gossip?"
"Fact. She's secretly engaged to be married to the man who killed
Fielding. The Marques de Runa. But don't worry--he'll never be brought
to trial for it. He's in Spain. Left by Clipper over a week ago with his
chauffeur, the man who actually ran poor Fielding down."
The officer from Miami laid his pipe down on the desk. "This is pretty
serious," he said. "I don't want to get it all by ear, old man. Would
you mind talking while it was taken down? Not only about Margaret
Skidmore. About everything you can give your Uncle about the Falange?
Facts, names, addresses, opinions--the works. I brought a young
lieutenant with me from Miami; he was a crack stenographer in civilian
life. How about spending a few hours with us?"
"Sure. I can give you the rest of the day, if you like."
"I'd like it fine. But if you don't mind--not here."
"O.K. Dr. Gonzales' house. It's on the outskirts of the city, and we'd
be alone."
* * * * *
Hall spent the rest of the day at Gonzales', dictating to the
lieutenant. While they worked, Duarte phoned to tell him that Gamburdo
had formally conceded the election. "What are your dinner plans?" he
asked the Mexican.
"None. I have to finish a long report on the elections before I eat.
Where and when are you eating?"
"I don't know. I thought that for sentimental reasons I'd eat with Jerry
and Pepe and Vicente and Souza at the Bolivar. Lobo is tied up for the
evening."
"I'll join you when I can, Mateo."
Later, when the American officers left, Hall tried to reach his friends
by phone. Arturo, the desk clerk, told him that Souza had taken the day
off and that Pepe and Vicente had been called up with the reserves. He
gave Hall a list of numbers where he might possibly find Pepe. Hall
finally reached him at the Transport Workers' Union. "Can you eat with
me tonight?" he asked.
"Yes. Where are you? Our officers just handed us our new orders. I am to
be your driver and Emilio your guard."
"What?"
"Sergeants Delgado and Vicente at your orders, sir."
"Is this official?"
Pepe laughed heartily. "Official," he said. "We can show you our
orders."
"I am at Gonzales'. Can you pick me up now?"
"At once."
The sergeants were there in fifteen minutes. Pepe now drove an Army car
whose color matched his uniform. They drove to the University for Jerry.
Soldiers were everywhere, patrolling the city, guarding both the Axis
diplomatic buildings and the commercial houses owned by known fascists.
The streets were crowded with civilians. They hung around the cafes,
listening to the latest election bulletins over the cafe radios, or they
congregated under the government's loud speakers in the plazas and the
broad avenues. Even though Gamburdo had already conceded his defeat, the
people awaited the results of each new count, cheered each new electoral
repudiation of the Falange candidate. Everywhere the sidewalks, the
gutters, the doorways of stores and buildings were littered with whole
or tattered copies of the leaflets exposing Gamburdo and Ansaldo.
"We gave them a licking they won't forget so quickly," Pepe chortled.
"Yes, but they are still alive, Pepe. They took a licking in the last
Spanish elections, too."
"_De nada_," Vicente said, grimly. "Let them try to make a second
Spanish War in our Republic. We'll drown them in their own blood."
Jerry was waiting for them on the University steps. "Matt, it was
amazing. Translate for me, will you? I think Pepe and Vicente would like
to know, too. As soon as the word was flashed to the wards that
Lavandero won the election, the serious cases started to pull through,
and the others are just about ready to dance. I've never seen anything
like it!"
Duarte joined them as they were finishing their soup. He was pale and
upset. "The Axis got the news pretty quickly," he said. He picked up a
bottle of brandy, poured a half tumbler and downed it in a gulp.
"For Christ's sake, what happened, Felipe?"
"The Nazis," he said. "This afternoon, a few minutes after Gamburdo
quit, a Nazi submarine deliberately sank one of the Republic's unarmed
freighters. It happened less than thirty miles from where we're sitting.
That isn't all. The ship had time to wireless for help before she sank.
And the Nazis waited until the rescue boats had picked up the survivors
before they surfaced again and sank each of the boats with their deck
guns."
"When did you find out?"
"Hours ago. I kept quiet because I wanted to make sure about Souza. Now
it's been confirmed. He was on one of the rescue boats. He is dead."
"Why, the dirty ..."
"Wait, Mateo. There is something else. Don't go. You had a call from
Radio City in New York. They want you to broadcast to America at ten
o'clock tonight. The Siglo station has the hook-up here."
The clock on the Bolivar dining-room wall read eight-thirty. "I'd better
go right over," Hall said. "Eat and wait for me here, Felipe. Don't
bother to drive me, Pepe. I'll walk. It's less than two blocks. Have
some more brandy."
"I'm going with you," Jerry said.
* * * * *
"_Come in, San Hermano ..._" Over the long-wave from Radio City.
The station announcer gave Hall his signal. Hall mopped his face with
his sleeve, glanced at his notes. "For a few hours this afternoon here
in San Hermano," he said into the microphone, "most of us believed that
virtue is its own reward, that the truth by itself is the most powerful
weapon in the hands of a democracy.
"At three o'clock this afternoon, the fascist candidate for the
presidency of this Republic conceded defeat in an election marked by the
dramatic revelation of his ties with the Falange in Madrid and the Nazis
in Berlin. There was no bloodshed, no disturbances. Democracy had scored
a bloodless victory in San Hermano.
"For thirty-five minutes and twelve seconds, the elections remained a
triumph for the ideals of the late president, Anibal Tabio, a man in the
traditions of our own Abraham Lincoln. It was Tabio's life-long belief
that 'Ye shall know the truth and it shall make you free.' But Tabio,
like the leaders of the last Spanish Republic, placed too much faith in
the power of good and decency and progress and had too little fear of
the fascist powers of evil abroad in this world.
"At exactly thirty-five minutes and twelve seconds after the fascist
Gamburdo conceded the elections to his Popular-Front opponent, the
people of this Republic learned that the world has grown much smaller
since Lincoln declared that no nation could exist half slave and half
free. Today what Lincoln had to say about one nation goes for one world.
This one world, our one world, is now torn by a global war. It is a
total war. The people of this democracy struck at the Axis today by
overwhelmingly defeating the Axis candidate at the polls. It took the
Axis exactly thirty-five minutes and twelve seconds to answer the
democratic people of this free nation. The answer was delivered by the
torpedoes and deck guns of a Nazi submarine lurking thirty miles from
the docks of this port...."
He talked on, glancing at the station clock frequently. There was a lot
he wanted to cram into his fifteen minutes. If possible, he hoped, he
would be able to get in a few words about the big feature story on the
front page of the bulldog edition of _El Imparcial_.
It was a long and lachrymose account of how Mexico was suffering because
the food of the nation was being rushed to the American armed forces and
how the war had forced inflation and shortages on that suffering
Catholic country whose people had no quarrel with Hitler and no love for
the Godless Stalin.
The red sweep-second hand raced Hall through his account of this story.
"It is no accident that this piece of Axis propaganda should be featured
on page one of the nation's leading pro-Franco paper tomorrow," he said.
"This is the Falange line for Latin America. This is the unnecessary
acid the Axis is preparing to inject into the very real wounds Latin
America is suffering and will suffer from this total war."
The announcer standing at the other microphone drew his hand in front of
his own throat. Hall's time was up.
Jerry rushed into the studio from the anteroom, where she had been
listening to the talk over the studio radio. She kissed him, took his
hand as they went downstairs and into the narrow street which led to the
Plaza de la Republica. "Where do we go from here, Matt?" she asked.
"God alone knows. Let's get married tomorrow. That's one thing we'd
better do while we still have a chance. I used to think I belonged in
the army. The army doctors rejected me for combat service; I'm too
banged up. Twice I tried to get into Intelligence, the first time before
Pearl Harbor. They wouldn't touch me with a fork. Saturday, Colonel
Barrows hinted that they were less squeamish about accepting
anti-fascists into G-2. He hinted that maybe I could get an Intelligence
commission."
"I'll go in as a nurse if they accept you, Matt."
"That's a big _if_, baby. But if they don't, we can go on fighting the
fascists in our own way. We won't get Legion pins and ribbons and
bonuses after it's all over, and the only uniforms we'll ever get to
wear will be decoy outfits like the one I wore when I left Havana. But
the fight will be the same, and the enemy will be the same. And we won't
have to worry about getting stuck on an inactive front. We can pick our
fronts.
"When it's all over, we'll go to Spain and we'll spit on Franco's grave
and I'll show you where a great man named Antin died and where a kid
lieutenant named Rafael killed fourteen fascists with one gun and we'll
walk down the Puerta del Sol in Madrid with the most wonderful people
I've ever known--what's left of them--and we'll dandle black-eyed
Spanish kids on our knees until our guts begin to ache for kids of our
own and then we'll make a kid of our own and fly back so he'll be born
in Ohio like his folks and grow up to be a good anti-fascist President
or at least an intelligent American Ambassador to San Hermano. Ah, I'm
talking like a fool, baby, talking like a drunk in a swank bar off
Sutton Place."
The loud speakers on the lamp posts of the Plaza suddenly came alive.
"Attention, everyone! Attention!"
"Wait," Matt said. "Something's up."
"Attention! This is the Mayor of San Hermano speaking. Eduardo Gamburdo,
wanted for the murder of Anibal Tabio, has fled the country. The Cabinet
and a quorum of the legislature, meeting at six o'clock tonight, have
unanimously voted that President-Elect Esteban Lavandero should be sworn
in as President immediately. At ten o'clock tonight, President Lavandero
took his oath of office from the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in
the Presidencia. I will repeat this announcement. Attention...."
Hall translated the announcement. "Now Lavandero has been introduced.
I'll translate as he goes along."
"Citizens, members of the Popular Front parties, members of all
parties," Lavandero began. "This afternoon, at three thirty-five
o'clock, a submarine which has been positively identified as being of
German nationality torpedoed a ship bearing the flag of our Republic
within our national waters. The ship was sunk. The survivors and the men
on the boats which set out from shore to rescue them were shelled by
this submarine. The losses have been enormous. At the last official
count, we had lost over eighty citizens, all victims of fascist
bestiality.
"Tomorrow, I shall go before the Congress and speak for a declaration of
war against the Axis. Tonight, my first official act has been to promote
Major Diego Segador to the rank of Colonel for outstanding services to
our Republic, and to appoint him Emergency Chief of the Defense of San
Hermano. I have asked Colonel Segador to speak to you now."
Hall put his arm around Jerry. "The war has come to us," he said. "We
don't have to look for it any longer."
"Citizens," Segador said. "Our city is in sight of a wolfpack of Nazi
submarines of undetermined size. The lights of our city are therefore at
the service of the fascist enemy. If you are on the streets, go into
your houses, or into the nearest cafes or other buildings. If you are
indoors, put out your lights, wherever you are. In five minutes, the
street lights of the city will be turned off. This announcement is being
recorded, and will be repeated for the next thirty minutes, or as long
as one light remains lit in San Hermano. Our lights are the eyes of the
submarines--we must blind their evil eyes.
"Soldiers on duty, remain at your posts and await further orders.
Soldiers off duty, report at once to your commanding officer. Sailors
off shore ..."
They stood together, watching the people hurry off the streets, watching
the lights go out in the lamp posts, in the cafes, in the houses of the
old Plaza. They remained near the loud speaker, listening to the
announcement repeated, listening to the national anthem, listening,
finally, to the dark silences of the night. They remained frozen to the
cobbles of the Plaza de la Republica which had been born in the days of
the empire as the Plaza de Fernando e Isabel and whose cobbles bore the
shadows of the edifices of the Conquistador generations and the Segura
generations and the democratic decade. Monuments of all manners of life
rose in dark, brooding piles on all sides of the Plaza; the slave life
and the life that was half slave and half free and the free life which
now had to fight for its freedom. In the dark Plaza, they could almost
hear the young heart of the city, of the Republic, beating slowly,
steadily, confidently.
"Darling," she said, "I'm not afraid of anything any more. I'll never be
afraid again."
"I know," he answered. "That's what this war is about, baby. It's the
war of the people who are not afraid to live their own lives. Let's go
back to the Bolivar, baby. Pepe and Vicente are still expecting us."
Pepe and Vicente were sitting in their lorry, waiting for them.
"_Companeros_," Pepe said, "Duarte is waiting for you inside. You will
all have to stay at the hotel tonight."
"That's all right, Pepe."
"We have to go back to our barracks," Vicente said. "We are called."
"Yes, _companeros_," Pepe said. His uniform looked less strange on him
in the blackout. "We cracked the thick skull of the Falange today,
_companeros_, but the black heart is still pumping."