“I see that we are,” Cranz snapped. “Why was this flight so rough?”
“I regret that, Herr Standartenführer, but landing on a dirt strip with the winds coming off the ocean is not like landing at El Palomar. But not to worry, sir. The Storch is a splendid airplane.”
The man wearing the suit walked up to the airplane and again gave the Nazi salute as soon as Cranz had climbed out.
Von Wachtstein busied himself taking tie-down ropes from the Storch and, when he had them in hand, said, “I wonder if anyone has a hammer for the tie-down stakes, Herr Standartenführer?”
“Erich,” Cranz was saying to the man in the suit, “this is my pilot, Major Freiherr von Wachtstein, who received the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross from the hands of Der Führer himself.”
Now he’s going to dazzle this guy, whoever he is, with my Knight’s Cross?
The man threw another Nazi salute and said, “A great honor, Herr Major. I am—”
Cranz silenced him midsentence with an imperiously raised hand.
“I think it better, Herr Schmidt, that the fewer facts von Wachtstein knows about you, the better. No telling who’s liable to be asking him questions. Am I right, von Wachtstein?”
“The Herr Standartenführer is quite correct. How do you do, Herr Schmidt?”
They shook hands.
“Now, what is this about tie-downs, whatever you said?” Cranz asked.
“The Storch has to be tied down, sir. I have the ropes and the stakes, but I need something to drive the stakes.”
“If I may, Herr Standartenführer?” Herr Schmidt said.
Cranz nodded.
Schmidt turned toward the workers at the trucks and bellowed, “Two men and a hammer. Two hammers. Here. Immediately!”
There was sudden frenzied activity at the trucks to comply with the order.
Which, von Wachtstein decided, was indeed an order.
“Herr Schmidt” gave it like an officer.
And those guys are responding to it like soldiers.
He talks funny. I can generally tell where somebody’s from in Germany by their accent; I can’t with this guy.
So, what does that mean?
That he’s not a German? Somebody like Günther Loche, maybe? A German who came here from Germany.
What do they call them? Argo-Germans.
The Loche family are better Nazis than Hitler.
And those soldiers understood his German, making them more Argo-Germans?
Argo-German Nazis in the Argentine Army?
What the hell is going on here?
Two of the men in blue coveralls, each carrying a heavy iron hammer, trotted over to them.
“Major von Wachtstein will tell you what he needs done,” Herr Schmidt said.