Sawyer laughed. Dorotea glared at him and asked, “How much of that wine have you had?”
“Not as much as I’m going to,” he said, and reached for another bottle of Don Guillermo Cabernet Sauvignon 1917.
Mother Superior returned much sooner than Frade thought she would, this time trailed by Father Welner, Oberstleutnant Frogger, and Herr Wilhelm Frogger. But no nuns.
“Enrico,” she said, “I didn’t know about Marianna until Cletus told me. I am so very sorry.”
“Marianna and El Coronel are now at peace with all the angels, Mother,” Enrico said. “I have avenged their murder.”
“ ‘Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord,’ ” Welner quoted.
“I have avenged them,” Enrico repeated.
Mother Superior changed the subject: “Frau Frogger—”
“Frau Fischer,” Cletus interrupted her. “Fischer. There’s nobody named Frogger here.”
Mother Superior looked at him very coldly.
He met her eyes. “The name is Fischer. And make sure your nuns don’t fo rget that.”
“Cletus!” Dorotea started to protest.
Mother Superior stopped her with an upraised hand, then went on: “La Señora Fischer, in addition to what else might be troubling her, is not only exhausted but has apparently been beaten.”
“That was after she tried to kill a woman with a fireplace poker,” Clete said. “The woman she tried to kill didn’t like it much.”
“So Father Welner told me,” Mother Superior said calmly. “She’s lost a tooth and may require dental attention. We can deal with that if it becomes a problem. What she needs now is rest. Sister Mónica will be with her overnight. If she awakens, I have prescribed—given Sister Mónica—a sedative to give her. I’ll try to talk to her tomorrow afternoon.”
Staff Sergeant Sigfried Stein came into the library. When no one said anything to him, he announced cheerfully, “I bring greetings from Vint Hill Farms. We’re up. And to the estancia.”
“Good man,” Frade said.
“You must be Major Stein,” Mother Superior said.
Stein looked at Frade, who nodded.
“Yes, ma’am,” Stein said.
“Both la Señora Fischer’s husband and her son have told me that the very sight of you triggers feelings—uncontrollable feelings, irrational feelings—of rage in la Señora Fischer.”
“I don’t think she likes Jews very much,” Stein said.
“And you are a Jew?”
“Guilty,” Stein said.
“What is your first—I almost said ‘Christian’—name?”
Stein looked at Frade again, and Frade nodded again.
“Sigfried,” he said, not very pleasantly. “Jewish first name Sigfried.”
“May I call you ‘Sigfried’? Or would you prefer ‘Major Stein’?”
“Siggie is what people call me,” he said finally.
“Forgive me, Siggie,” Mother Superior said. “I have to ask you this: Have you even done anything to her—said something cruel, or struck her, restrained her, anything like that?”