“One of my lieutenants, two of my sergeants, and me.”
“Can you keep it that way?”
“Of course.”
“You’re right, Santiago, I owe you.”
“Yeah, you do,” Nervo said.
Martín offered him his hand, then went to his locker and dressed quickly.
The moment he stepped into the street outside the men’s locker room, he heard the starter of the Dodge grind, and a moment later the car started moving toward him. He signaled to Sargento Lascano to stay behind the wheel and climbed into the backseat. “The officer’s sales store, please, Manuel,” he ordered.
“Señor, I don’t know where—”
“On the Avenida 9 de Julio, across the avenue from the French Embassy.”
“Sí, Señor.”
“You’ll learn these places soon enough, Manuel,” Martín said.
But I think it will be some time before I start telling you things like what I have just learned. That the new Assistant to the Minister of War, the distinguished el Coronel Juan Domingo Perón, has rented an apartment and installed in it his new mistress, who will be fifteen years old next month.
Lascano returned to Avenida Libertador by turning right onto Calle Arribeños, then making a right when the street dead-ended at one of the parks scattered throughout the Barrancas del Belgrano. As he did, Martín happened to glance up and saw the miniature Statue of Liberty that had been erected there about the same time the real one was going up in New York Harbor.
I wonder if Cletus Frade knows that’s there? For that matter, I wonder if the American Ambassador does?
Lascano drove downtown at a shade under the speed limit.
By the time they had passed the Hipódrome, and the Frade family’s guest house, a medium-size, turn-of-the-century mansion, which was across the street from it, Martín became aware of their pace.
The police are not going to stop this car, much less issue a summons to any car carrying me, or any other officer of the Bureau of Internal Security. So what do I do? Tell him to go faster? And give him the idea that he can ignore the speed limits?
“Manuel, pick it up a little, will you? I’m running late.”
“Sí, Señor.”
The speed increased another five miles an hour.
“A little more, please, Manuel.”
Manuel added another five miles per hour to their velocity.
Martín was pleased.
Lascano errs on the side of caution. That’s a desirable characteristic in the intelligence business. The trick is knowing when to take a chance.
The officers’ clothing store was in a turn-of-the-century mansion much like the Frade place on Libertador.
“Where should I park, Señor?” Lascano asked. “There are no-parking signs.”
“Right in front,” Martín said. “I won’t be a moment. I have to pick up a uniform.”
“Señor, I’d be happy to go in for you.”
I wonder if he volunteered to go in for me because he would rather not sit at the wheel of an illegally parked car on the busiest street in Buenos Aires? Or because he is simply trying to please me?
“It will be quicker if I go,” Martín said, giving him the benefit of the doubt. “But thank you, Manuel.”