His father considered that.
“Very well. I think you’ll be safe. Enrico will of course go with you, and Martín’s Internal Security people will be watching Uncle Guillermo’s house.”
Clete nodded.
“I’ll be all right.”
“And I will go to the city too. Perhaps we could even have dinner together or…”
“Why not?” Clete chuckled.
Now that the decision had been made, he felt an enormous sense of relief.
It troubled him.
“Can you think of anything else?” his father asked.
No. Not a thing.
Oh, yeah!
Clete smiled. His father looked at him curiously.
“Dad, how would you like to loan me thirteen thousand dollars?”
“Excuse me?”
“I need to borrow thirteen thousand dollars,” Clete asked. “Will you loan it to me?”
“Of course. But why?”
“It involves a Miña,” Clete said.
“You have become involved with a Miña?” Frade asked, disappointment all over his face.
“One of my men has,” Clete said. “And her Argentine boyfriend found out about it, and is being a real bastard to the girl and her family.”
“I thought for a moment…”
“One of my men, Dad, not me. I can get in enough romantic trouble without paying for it.”
“I never took a Miña,” Frade announced righteously. “Never. Not even in the long, lonely years.”
“Before you met Claudia, you mean?”
His father ignored him. “A man who has to pay a woman is not really a man. I find the custom disgusting.”
“Well, this guy, the Argentine, is apparently a real bastard. He co-signed a mortgage, and when he found out that the girl was seeing one of my officers, he told
the bank he would no longer guarantee payment.”
“I am not surprised. A man who would pay for sex…”
Clete dug in his pocket and came out with the notes he took when Tony came to see him at the hospital.
“The mortgage is with the Anglo-Argentine Bank. The father’s name is Alberghoni.”
“And the man’s name?”