The first order of business was to locate where the Argies were keeping the international scientists they had kidnapped and were using as human shields. It was eight o’clock at night, and, as they suspected, there were hardly any people about. They saw an occasional shape moving amid the buildings, but most people were wisely inside. When they peered through the occasional lit window, they could see men lounging around on sofas watching DVDs or playing cards in rec rooms or in their own private bedrooms reading books or writing letters home. The first area they checked seemed to be dorms for the oil workers, an unlikely candidate.
They searched several warehouses, thinking the scientists could be tucked into a back room, but found nothing but oil equipment and hundreds of drums of a drill lubricant called mud.
When they were coming out of one of the buildings, a dark figure was waiting by the door. “What were you doing in there?” he demanded, his voice muffled by a scarf but the accusatory tone unmistakable.
“Trying to figure the place out,” Juan answered in Spanish. The stranger was dressed as a civilian, so he went on the offense. “If we’re to defend you guys, I need to know every square inch of this place. So if you don’t mind, we will get back to it.”
“Yeah?” He was still suspicious. “Then why skulk around at night?”
Juan made a gesture to Linc that said, Can you believe this guy, and replied, “Because I very much doubt the Americans will be sporting enough to attack during the day, and what looks like cover when it’s bright may not be so good in the dark.”
With that, Juan shoulder-bumped the guy as he passed, and he and Linc moved on without a backward glance. When they were out of sight behind the rounded corner of a dormitory, Juan did look back and saw their interrogator had vanished.
Linc chuckled. “My Spanish may be rusty, but that sure sounded like a line of the purest bull I have ever heard.”
“I was just telling Max that the more outrageous the lie, the more likely it’ll be believed.”
Because the facility was designed to be camouflaged from satellite observation, it was not laid out in a neat, efficient grid. It wasn’t until they were at the very southern edge of the base, near where Linc had earlier spotted a hidden SAM battery, that they saw a lone building on stilts shaped like an igloo lozenge. Light spilled from the window in front, but the rest were darkened.
They climbed the steps. Juan opened the outer door, and he and Linc stepped into a vestibule lined with pegs on the wall for parkas and racks for overboots. Neither man made to remove their clothing, and they just casually opened the door into the structure. Two soldiers were on their feet, both with pistols drawn. They had heard the outer door open and close and were on alert. When they saw it was two soldiers wearing Argentine gear, they relaxed. The room had all the charm and ambiance of a broken-down trailer.
“What are you guys doing here? We’ve got duty until twenty-two hundred hours.”
“Sorry. We’re not here to relieve you,” Juan said. “We were sent to look for the Major. Has he been around?”
“Espinoza was here checking on our prisoners about two hours ago.” The guard gestured to a locked door behind him. “Haven’t seen him since.”
Now Juan had a name to go along with the face. “Okay, thanks.” They turned to go.
“Hold on. Who is that under there, Ramón?”
Bold as brass he said, “No, Juan Cabrillo.”
“Who?”
“Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo. I just transferred into Ninth Brigade from MI.” Meaning military intelligence, meaning, I’m probably an officer so you’d better cut your questions short.
“Yes, sir,” the trooper said, swallowing hard. “If I see Major Espinoza, I’ll be sure to tell him you’re looking for him.”
It was difficult to put menace in his voice because he was so bundled up, but Juan managed when he said, “Best if this discussion didn’t take place, Private. Understood?”
“Sir. Yes, sir.”
Linc and Cabrillo returned to the blistering-cold night, where the stars shone so brightly that the surrounding ice glowed. “Bingo,” Linc said.
“Bingo indeed. Now we just have to rescue the hostages, close this place down, and neutralize an eight-thousand-ton cruiser without the Argentines realizing we were ever here.”
The two men continued to reconnoiter for another three hours, moving f
reely about the base. It seemed nothing was off-limits, with the exception of the makeshift jail. Juan was acutely interested in the oil-and-gas-processing plants. They were located in huge hangar-sized buildings that were covered in insulating layers and then snow and ice. Inside each was an industrial-sized tangle of pipes and conduits that joined and diverged in a system only an engineer could understand. One of the plants was set well back from the beach. The other was partially built over the water on stilts driven into the seafloor. Not only was natural gas processed in this structure, but they discovered the massive furnace used to keep superheated air flowing though the pipes under the bay. Everything appeared fully automated, but such importance was placed on this key system that a workman sat watch in an enclosed office a short distance away. He nodded to what he thought were two soldiers when he spotted Linc and Cabrillo. They waved back, and the worker returned to his anatomy magazine.
By the time they returned to the dock, it was past eleven. Both men were exhausted and chilled to the core. They jumped for the workboat, and Juan was just ducking under the pier to get onto the submersible when a guard shouted, “Stop right there! What are you doing out after curfew?”
Juan straightened. “I forgot my iPod this afternoon when I went out with the Chinese surveyors.”
“I don’t care what you forgot. No one is allowed outside after curfew. Get up out of there. You’re coming with me.” He brought up his machine pistol.
“Easy, pal,” Juan said calmly, thinking it was just rotten luck they were found by the most dedicated soldier in the Argentine Army. “We don’t want any trouble.”