“Yes,” he said. “It does imply that they will be willing to insure us if we don’t carry passengers.”
“My God!” Claudia exploded. “Why should we have an airline that can’t fly passengers?”
“Well, I’ve heard air freight is the wave of the future,” Frade said flippantly. “We could move polo ponies around, I suppose. And certainly chickens.”
Dowling looked as if he couldn’t believe what he heard. Duarte shook his head. Perón frowned. Claudia glared at him.
“That’s the sort of really stupid remark your father would make when he thought he was being clever!” she said.
Now Perón smiled.
Dowling’s attitude and behavior had had Frade boiling under the skin, and now something in Claudia’s attitude made him really angry. It pushed him over the edge, although he didn’t realize this until he had finished replying.
With an edge to his tone, Frade blurted: “I find it just a little difficult to behave as the managing director of this airline should behave because I have no idea what’s going on. You’re right, Claudia. That was a flip remark, and thus stupid. It won’t happen again.” He looked at Humberto Duarte. “I presume the meeting has been called to order?”
Duarte raised an eyebrow. “Actually, no, Cletus. I didn’t think it was necessary.”
“Well, it is, and get your secretary in here to take the minutes.”
“Is that supposed to be clever, Cletus?” Claudia challenged sarcastically.
“I really hope so, señora. But not clever in the sense that you have been using the term.” He turned back to Duarte. “You going to get her in here or not, Humberto?”
Duarte picked up a telephone and politely asked his secretary to come right in and bring her notebook with her.
As she came through the door, Frade stood.
“Please sit here, señora,” he said. “You’ll be able to hear better.”
She sat down.
“I’d like to sit there, Humberto,” Frade said, pointing at the chair at the head of the table—which happened to be where Duarte was seated. “All right?”
Duarte’s face showed he didn’t at all think that it was all right, but he gave up the chair.
“Why don’t you sit by Claudia?” Frade said, then sat down at the head of the table.
“Are you ready, señora?” Frade asked Duarte’s secretary.
She nodded, her pencil poised over her stenographer’s notebook.
There was a large glass water pitcher sitting upside down on the table. Clete pulled from his right boot a hunting knife with a five-inch blade and gave the thick glass pitcher a healthy whack.
The sound was startling.
Frade then formally announced: “This special meeting of the board of directors and of the stockholders of South American Airways, S.A., is hereby convened in the Banco de Inglaterra y Argentina building, Bartolomé Mitre 300, Buenos Aires, Argentina, at seventeen hundred hours and eight minutes on 30 July 1943 by Cletus Howell Frade, managing director.”
He looked around the room.
“Also present are board members Señora de Carzino-Cormano, Señor Humberto Duarte, and Coronel J. D. Perón. Also present are Father Welner, SAA Chief Pilot Captain Gonzalo Delgano, and Señor Ernesto Dowling. There being a quorum present, I move the waiving of the minutes of the last meeting.”
They were all looking at him in bewilderment that bordered on shock.
“Am I going to hear a second of the motion on the floor, or will it be necessary for me to put the question to the stockholders?”
Duarte raised his hand and softly said, “Second.”
/> Frade nodded once. “The vote is called. All those opposed signify their opposition by raising their hands.” He silently counted a three-second pause, then went on: “The chair, seeing no opposition, announces the motion carries. There being no old business requiring action at this time, the chair calls for new business. Señor Dowling, would you be so kind as to brief the board in detail on any insurance problems SAA is experiencing or may experience in the future?”