“And if they have their floodlights on, the submarine will have a better target than running lights.”
There was no response from anyone.
“Has anybody got a better idea?” Clete said.
“I’m not sure if it’s a better idea,” Graham said, “but it’s another idea. What about a boat? If there was a boat, I’m talking about a small boat, say, twenty-five feet, running around out there.”
“The last three guys who tried that disappeared,” Clete said. “No way. They would just blow it out of the water. I’ll find the ship with the airplane and get them to turn their lights on.”
There was silence for a moment, then Graham said, “OK. The first priority is to take the transmitter and the receiver ashore. I’ll go to the U.S. Embassy and have them bring them ashore under diplomatic immunity.”
“That should be no problem, Sir,” Commander Jernigan said. “I have some crates for the Embassy. I’ll just crate up some radios and send them ashore with the other diplomatic cargo.”
“Clete, what about putting Captain Jernigan’s communications officer together with Sergeant Ettinger?”
“That would depend on the communications officer,” Clete said without thinking, then added, “Sir, no disrespect intended. But does your communications officer know radios, or is he just filling the billet?”
“I’ve got a chief radioman who knows all there is to know about radios,” Captain Jernigan said.
“Then he’s the man, Sir, who should get together with Sergeant Ettinger,” Clete said.
“Then that’s our first order of business,” Graham said. “Getting the Chief in here, telling him what we need, and then getting him ashore to meet Ettinger.”
“I think our first order of business is to see my father,” Clete said.
Captain Jernigan’s eyebrows rose in question, but he didn’t put the question in words.
“Do you know where he is?” Graham asked.
“By now, he should be at his house, here in Buenos Aires.”
“OK. We’ll go face the lion in his den,” Graham said. “Captain, you have my authority to make your Chief privy to your orders. When I visit the Embassy, I’ll arrange for him to call on the Naval attaché.”
[THREE]
1728 Avenida Coronel Díaz
Buenos Aires
2005 24 December 1942
“I will listen to your plans, Colonel,” el Coronel Jorge Guillermo Frade said to Colonel A. F. Graham, USMCR, “and you have my word as an officer that they will not go further than this room. But I must tell you, Sir, that I do not share my son’s confidence that you are now telling him, or me, the truth.”
They were seated around a large table in the library. A silver coffee service had just been delivered, together with a walnut cigar humidor. Having dismissed the servants, el Coronel Frade ceremoniously served the coffee and offered the cigars.
Frade was seated at the head of the table, with Clete and Graham facing each other across it. Enrico had pulled a chair up from another table, and was sitting with the Remington in his lap, five feet behind el Coronel Frade. He had declined coffee, but he now held a large, thick, black cigar in his teeth.
“If I were in your position, mi Coronel, I would feel exactly the same way,” Graham said calmly, lighting a cigar.
Frade nodded. “Proceed, Colonel. I will listen.”
“A United States submarine, the Devil Fish, which has been on patrol off the coast of Africa, has been ordered, at best speed, to rendezvous with the destroyer Alfred Thomas, which is here in Buenos Aires. The rendezvous will take place at a point one hundred nautical miles off Punta del Este, Uruguay. Her estimated time of arrival…”
Frade held up his hand. Graham stopped.
“Two things, Colonel Graham.”
“Sir?”