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“They have been together for the last ten minutes.”
“Where?”
“Perón’s apartment on Arenales. Jimmy said we didn’t know (a) where he would be going to work—the Casa Rosada, the Edificio Libertador, or the Labor Ministry—and (b) if we could get into any of those places with your guys.”
“How do you know he was in his apartment?”
“Jimmy’s idea. We went into the lobby and used the house phone—”
“At two o’clock in the morning?” Clete interrupted.
Jimmy grinned.
“Actually, oh-two-thirty, Clete. I called, acting like an angry neighbor, and told him to turn down the volume on his radio. Your Tío Juan blew his cork. It was him, all right. So we left Father Welner, O’Reilley, and your guys there, then went back to Jorge Frade and got in the red Lodestar. At oh-eight-hundred, they knocked on his door.”
“The concierge let them in?”
“It’s hard to say no to a priest, Clete,” Jimmy said. “Even more so if he has six guys with Thompsons standing behind him. The concierge and Perón’s security detail—two guys—were very cooperative. They knew who Welner is.”
“How’s Dieter?” von Wachtstein asked.
“We’re going to see him after I show you the bad news from Estancia Condor,” Frade said, and motioned for them to go in the hangar.
—
The hangar was crowded with soldiers. Too many to count, but Jimmy guessed about forty. Plus of course the eighteen ex–Húsares de Pueyrredón they had brought from Buenos Aires.
“General Martin,” Frade
explained drily, “was able to persuade the commanding officer of the Húsares de Pueyrredón that the BIS needed half a squadron of troopers for an unspecified classified mission.”
Master Sergeant Sigfried Stein was sitting at a table on which he had set up a Collins 7.2 and a SIGABA. The SIGABA’s electric typewriter was clattering.
“More from down there, Siggie?” Frade asked.
“No. But I thought a printout would be more useful than the tape.”
He pointed to the coiled strip of paper, which was the first product of an incoming message.
The typewriter stopped clattering.
Stein took two sheets of paper from the machine and handed them to Frade, who handed them to von Wachtstein.
“Read over his shoulder, Jimmy,” Frade said. “Or take the tape.”
Cronley, who knew what a pain in the ass reading from the narrow, fragile tape was, looked over von Wachtstein’s shoulder. Frade picked up the tape and started to read it again.
* * *
SUBJECT: SITUATION REPORT 0705 22 OCT 1945
TO: GENERAL DE BRIGADE B. MARTIN, BIS
AS OF 0615 22 OCT THE UNDERSIGNED HAS ASSUMED CONTROL OF ESTANCIO CONDOR AND THE RADIO RELAY STATION HEREON.
IT WAS NECESSARY TO PLACE UNDER ARREST ONE (1) CAPTAIN, TWO (2) LIEUTENANTS AND SIX (6) OTHER RANKS OF THE 10TH MOUNTAIN REGIMENT SIGNALS COMPANY PLUS TWO (2) LIEUTENANTS AND TWENTY-FOUR (24) OTHER RANKS OF THE 10TH MOUNTAIN SERVING AS A PROTECTIVE DETACHMENT HERE INASMUCH AS THEY REFUSED TO ACKNOWLEDGE THE AUTHORITY OF THE UNDERSIGNED.
THE 10TH MOUNTAIN CAPTAIN, AFTER INTERROGATION, TOLD THE UNDERSIGNED THAT EL CORONEL KLAUSBERGER HAD TELEPHONED HIM AT APPROXIMATELY 2300 HOURS 21 OCTOBER TO ALERT HIM TO THE POSSIBILITY THAT UNAUTHORIZED PERSONNEL WERE LIKELY TO APPEAR AT ESTANCIO CONDOR WITHIN THE NEXT DAY OR TWO, WHEREUPON HE WAS TO PLACE THEM UNDER ARREST AND REPORT THE EVENT TO HIM. KLAUSBERGER ALSO STATED THAT REINFORCEMENTS ARE ON THE WAY BUT DID NOT STATE THE STRENGTH OF SUCH REINFORCEMENTS OR WHEN THEY CAN BE EXPECTED.
