Empire and Honor (Honor Bound 7)

And almost certainly why I suddenly clearly remember discussing the Kasidah with Frade, when both of us sat in his library suffering the effects of having consumed most of a bottle of Rémy Martin . . .

—

“Cletus,” Martín had said, “have you ever heard of the Kasidah?”

“The what?”

“I think of it as a splendid one-sentence philosophy for people in our profession.”

“We say, ‘Don’t look in the mirror,’” Frade said.

“Meaning, ‘Never forget your enemy doesn’t think like you do’?”

“Precisely.”

“The Kasidah of Haji Abdu El-Yezdi says, ‘The truth is a shattered mirror strewn in myriad bits and each believes his little bit the whole to own.’”

Frade had considered that for a moment, and then replied, just a little thickly: “I like that. I adopt it herewith. ‘The truth is a shattered mirror,’ et cetera—whatever you said—‘so don’t look in the mirror.’”

“Better yet,” Martín had replied, “‘don’t look in the mirror, because the truth,’ et cetera, et cetera.”

“Okay. Who was the genius who thought this up? Some Arab?”

“Actually, Haji Abdu El-Yezdi was the pen name of an Englishman, Sir Richard Francis Burton.”

“The dirty book guy?”

“I gather you’re familiar with the Kama Sutra?”

“I was thinking of the translation of One Thousand and One Nights with all the dirty parts left in it. What’s the Kama Sutra?”

“An ancient Hindu book offering illustrated practical instructions on how to perform sexual intercourse.”

“How did I miss that?”

“I can’t imagine.”

“Wait. I know,” Cletus had said. “I’m a Texan. We don’t need practical instructions on sexual intercourse. It comes to us naturally. But I’m not surprised you Argentines need an illustrated ‘How to Screw’ manual.”

Before Martín could reply to that, Doña Dorotea Mallín de Frade had come into the library, causing a change of subject.

—

. . . The situation here at Aeropuerto Coronel Jorge G. Frade, Martín now thought, is like a broken mirror. And not only do all the players believe they have the truth, but they are determined that no one else learn anything about their truth.

The official purpose of the Argentine diplomats and other government officials going to Germany was to facilitat

e the return of Argentine nationals who had been trapped in Germany to their homeland.

Martín was deeply suspicious of this on-the-surface noble purpose, wondering why so many of his countrymen had been trapped there in the first place. Until Argentina had declared war on Germany on March 27, 1945, not quite six weeks before the Germans surrendered unconditionally on May 7, Argentines, as neutrals, had been perfectly free to leave Germany simply by taking a train to Sweden or Switzerland.

The stated purpose of the Argentine businessmen in going to Germany was to protect their business interests in what had been the Thousand-Year Reich.

Commerce between Germany and Argentina had been one-way since 1940. The Germans had bought all the Argentine foodstuffs, leather, and wool that they could. But nothing had gone the other way because the Germans had nothing to sell. And what the Germans had bought they paid for with U.S. dollars, British pounds, and Swiss francs. The reichsmark, for all practical purposes, was worthless. And now all that remained of foreign currency in what had been the Reichsbank was controlled by the Allies, who were holding it for reparations. Germany could not buy anything from anyone, and had nothing to sell to anyone.

So why did just about every SAA flight to Germany carry Argentine businessmen?

The answer to this question, in Martín’s mind, also applied to the question of why the government was so interested in repatriating its citizens from Germany.