Honor Bound (Honor Bound 1)
Page 268
“I was thinking we should drink to Peter’s promotion,” Clete said.
“Oh, yes,” the Princess said, and after sort of a farewell squeeze, removed her hand from beneath the table and picked up her champagne glass.
[SIX]
The Embassy of the German Reich
Avenue Córdoba
Buenos Aires, Argentina
1630 26 December 1942
Major Freiherr Hans-Peter von Wachtstein took a long, effusive time to thank Señor Cletus H. Frade and the ladies for the pleasure of their company at luncheon.
He’s doing that, Clete reasoned, so he will be seen. I wonder what the hell kind of a favor he wants? Or whether he is the one who wants the favor, or his Colonel, with some scenario à la Graham and company in mind?
“And we will be in touch soon, Señor Frade?”
“Like I said, Hansel, anything but my toothbrush or my girl.”
“You should stop calling him that,” Alicia protested. “He is not a child.”
“My friends can call me Hansel,” Peter said. “You may call me Hansel, Alicia, if you like.”
“All right,” Alicia said. “I think I will. I like ‘Hansel.’”
Peter shook Clete’s hand a second time, then walked through the gate in the fence onto the embassy grounds. A large, brilliant red flag with the Nazi swastika hung limply from a flagpole on the lawn.
“Can we drop you at my father’s place, Alicia?” Clete asked, turning to face her in the backseat.
“Please,” she said.
“This is not the way to your house,” the Princess accused ten minutes later, somewhat indignantly turning on the seat of the Buick to look at him.
“This is the way to your house,” Clete said.
“We are not going to your house?”
“No.”
“I have somehow offended you?”
“I have some stuff to do.”
“I thought you would like my little caress,” the Princess said. “All the boys here beg me to do that to them.”
“And do you?”
“All the time,” she said. “But I will never do it again to you if you don’t like it. And besides, we can’t go to my house. Mother thinks I am having luncheon and then bridge at the Belgrano Athletic Club. I can’t go home before eight-thirty.”
“What if your mother finds out you were with me?”
“Mother would understand, I think,” she said. “My father…”
“He will find out,” Clete said. “Then what?”
“I’ll tell him we are in love,” she said. “But I would rather not face that today. Is there some reason I can’t wait at your house, while you do—what was it you said—your ‘stuff’?”