By Order of the President (Presidential Agent 1)

[FIVE]

Hacienda San Jorge Near Uvalde, Texas 2130 15 November 1998

There were still almost a dozen cars packed in the drive of the Big House when Fernando returned from San Antonio and he remembered his grandfather saying that the only thing Spanish people liked better than a wedding or a christening was a funeral.

Well, he had a big one. A heart attack is a classy way to go and the funeral had been spectacular. They’d actually run out space to park airplanes at the strip, and even the Texas Rangers had sent an official delegation. Great-great-grandfather Fernando Castillo had been one of the original Texas Rangers.

There were lights on in his grandparents’ bedroom, which meant Abuela was still awake, and he went there, through the kitchen, so he wouldn’t have to deal with the hangers-on in the sitting room.

“How you doing, Abuela?” Fernando asked as he bent over his grandmother and kissed her forehead.

She was sitting in one of the two dark red leather-upholstered reclining armchairs facing a large television set.

“Holding up, I guess,” she said, touching his cheek. “Carlos got off all right?”

“Yes, ma’am. I guess he really had to go; the minute we walked in base operations at Kelly and he gave his name, a pilot came up—a major—and said his plane was on the tarmac. An Air Force Lear. Pretty spiffy for a lowly lieutenant, huh?”

“Carlos is a captain now,” she corrected him. “And what he’s doing is very important.”

That doesn’t sound like just the doting opinion of a loving grandmother.

“Do you know something I don’t?” Fernando asked.

“I heard you two talking last night,” she said. “You know as much as I do. So stop it. I don’t want to spar with you, Fernando . . . your grandfather was always saying that, ‘I don’t want to spar with you,’ wasn’t he?”

“Yes, ma’am, he was.” He paused and then went on, “Abuela, the Grin . . . Carlos had a couple of drinks last night. Maybe a couple too many.”

“He had more than a couple too many,” she said. “It’s a family tradition, Fernando. When Jorge was killed in Vietnam, your grandfather was drunk for a week. And then, when we finally could bury Jorge, he was drunk for another week.”

“He loved Grandpa, Abuela.”

“You don’t have to tell me that,” she said, then added, “Why don’t you fix yourself a drink and then sit in your grandfather’s chair?” When she saw the mingled surprise and confusion on his face, she further added, pointing to a half-full brandy snifter on the table between the chairs, “I poured that when you drove away. I’ve been waiting for you to come back to drink it.”

“Anything you say, Abuela.”

“We have to talk about Carlos,” she said. “This is as good a time as any.”

“Yes, ma’am. What is that, cognac?”

“Brandy,” she said. “Argentine brandy. The difference is, the French call their brandy ‘cognac’ and charge through the nose for it. I thought you knew that story. ”

“No, ma’am.”

“We went to Argentina on our wedding trip, to the King Ranch. Your grandfather was a classmate of Eddie King at A&M and he’d been down there with Eddie several times before we were married. It was a fine place for a honeymoon. And when he found out that the Argentine brandy, which he liked better than the French, was just a couple of dollars a bottle, he was as happy with that as he was with me. He loved a bargain and he hated the French.”

“I know,” Fernando said.

He went to a chest of drawers on which sat a tray with a bottle of brandy and another snifter on it, poured the brandy, and then went and sat in the reclining chair.

“I feel funny sitting in here,” he said.

“You shouldn’t,” she said. “You’re now head of the family. Your grandfather would approve.”

She picked up her glass, raised it in toast, and said, “Here’s to you, dear Fernando. Go easy on God, my darling. He’s doing the best He knows how.”

She took a healthy swallow of the brandy and then looked at her grandson.

“Let’s talk about you, Carlos, and the family,” she said.