"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 Emba.s.sy. Lobo says he can meet us both for lunch at the Emba.s.sy."
"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 G.o.d, but she was a b.l.o.o.d.y 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 Emba.s.sy. 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 Emba.s.sy. "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 b.a.s.t.a.r.d! 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 n.a.z.i and the Italian officers. Most of the Falange doc.u.ments 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 h.e.l.l 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 Amba.s.sador"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 Emba.s.sy."
"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 pa.s.sports 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 s.p.a.ces 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 n.o.blemen who had been ruined by the _rojos_. He was lying, of course--the paintings had all been taken from Spanish museums by the n.a.z.is. 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 n.a.z.i agents who had been guests of Trujillo in the Dominican capital that month."
Hall borrowed an empty office in the Mexican Emba.s.sy 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 Amba.s.sador"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 Amba.s.sador"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 Emba.s.sy. 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 Emba.s.sy 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."