The Argentine Triangle: A Craig Page Thriller (13 page)

A few seconds later, Craig’s mind cleared. The pain eased. He staggered down the hill, grabbing onto rocks and small bushes to keep his footing in the slippery mud. Once he reached the bottom, he realized he had come for nothing. The man had hit his head on a rock that had cracked his skull. He was dead, his face covered in blood.

Craig made no effort to move the body. Climbing back up was even more difficult. Several times he thought he would black out, but finally he made it.

On the patio, bruised and weary, he staggered toward the house. In the mist, in front of the Andes, the sun was dropping fast, but there was still a little more daylight. When he reached the door, he remembered his Beretta, which had skidded into a corner of the patio. He backtracked, picked up the gun, stuffed it into his pocket, and dragged himself outside to the SUV. He found the tracking device attached to the vehicle’s rear bumper. When he got back on the road, he would toss it into the lake.

Washington

G
ina couldn’t believe that she was at a black-tie state dinner at the White House for the president of Brazil. She wasn’t there as a reporter, but as Edward Bryce’s date. Though she found Bryce increasingly repulsive after her evening with Barry Gorman, she was still awed by her surroundings.

The State Dining Room, its walls freshly painted a light blue, contained seven round tables of eight people each. Gina, dressed in the low-cut silk magenta Valentino Bryce said made her look ravishing, was seated between Bryce and Justice Thompson of the Supreme Court. President Treadwell and his wife, Polly, were at an adjacent table with the Brazilian president and his wife.

The only other person Gina knew was Amy, the president’s speech writer, seated across the table from her.

Amy was the president’s mistress, Gina had learned last evening when she and Bryce went to the White House to watch Hitchcock’s
Vertigo
and Polly was out of town. Amy was there supposedly to work on a speech, but midway through the movie the two of them had disappeared into a bedroom. When they emerged, half an hour later, her face was flushed and the president’s clothes were disheveled, his hair uncombed.

Gina was thinking she had to find a way to persuade Edward to arrange the delivery of the arms Estrada wanted. He must be planning to use them. He was sounding increasingly anxious.

A waiter in a white jacket with white gloves served the first course of warm Gulf shrimp over arugula and radicchio with a red pepper coulis.

“Where are you from, Miss Galindo?” Justice Thompson asked as he turned his mostly bald head surrounded by a ring of gray toward her.

“Argentina. Have you ever been there?”

“Once for a conference on human rights issues a year ago. We traveled around. It’s a wonderful country. What I really liked was …”

As he was speaking, she noticed that through his glasses he was looking down her dress, which had slipped a little, exposing the tops of her breasts.

She glanced across the table at Amy who must have sized up the situation because she was winking at Gina and smiling.

Before Gina came to Washington, she would have been embarrassed and humiliated by this situation.

But no longer. Anything was now possible. Her life had taken a bizarre turn. She had been content teaching history at the girls’ school. She never thought about being a journalist. That had been Estrada’s idea. He had arranged a job for her at
La Nación
in Buenos Aires. After a couple of months, she wasn’t enjoying being a reporter—all the sitting around for a story and then meeting deadlines. She decided she should stick with it for a year, because of what Estrada had done for her. Then one day he told her, “Good news. I’ve arranged with the publisher of the newspaper to transfer you to Washington.”

That sounded like fun. She had always wanted to go to the United States to visit. The foreign editor briefed her on her assignment. It didn’t seem that difficult because the White House and State Department regularly issued press releases. All she would have to do was repackage those into articles.

Two days before she left, Estrada had taken her to dinner. In a soft voice, just above a whisper, he explained that he had an important assignment for her in Washington, in addition to being a reporter. He told her about Edward Bryce and how critical he was for Argentina. Then Estrada told her, “I want you to find a way to become close with Edward Bryce. This would be valuable for Argentina. And your father would be proud of you for doing it.”

She had asked Estrada how she could get close to Bryce, but as soon as the words tumbled out of her mouth, she blushed, realizing how naive and stupid she sounded.

Estrada had placed his hand on hers, and said, “In the way that women always get close to men. And after you do, I’ll want you to pass along messages to Bryce.”

Gina may have been inexperienced in many things, but she had studied enough history to realize Estrada wanted her to be a spy. She had left that dinner with Estrada feeling excited. She would be serving her country, as her father had.

Shortly after she began sleeping with Bryce, her enthusiasm collapsed like a balloon that was punctured on a spike. The sex wasn’t fun. She felt dirty after she went to bed with him.

The jewelry he was giving her and the Watergate apartment he had rented made her feel like a whore. The reality sunk in that Estrada had plucked her from teaching as a way of getting to Bryce.

She would have preferred abandoning Washington and returning to teaching in Argentina. But she couldn’t let Estrada, the Republic, and her father’s memory down. She had been depressed about her situation. Then Barry Gorman came along.

Justice Thompson touched her arm. “Don’t you think so?”

“Oh absolutely,” she replied without having the vaguest idea what he was talking about. I better pay attention, she decided.

“As I was saying,” he continued, “your country is democratic now, but it wasn’t that long ago during the Dirty War that babies were kidnapped and pregnant women arrested, their babies taken from them at birth, and then they were executed.

“At the conference we heard from an organization, called the Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo. It was trying to find those children who had been given to supporters of the regime for adoption and restore them to what remained of their biological families.”

“What happened to those babies was terrible,” Gina said, “but don’t judge our whole country by the actions of a few evil people.”

Bryce turned to his right and was pleased that Gina was engaged in an intense conversation with Justice Thompson. Gina was young; still she had intellectual sophistication. If he married her, he wouldn’t have to worry about her gaining the respect of his contemporaries or others in Washington power positions.

A waiter returned with the main course, a rack of lamb with an assortment of vegetables. Another poured wine. Bryce looked at the bottle: Silver Oak cab, a very fine California wine. He was reminded of what President Nixon did at some White House dinners. He had waiters pour American wine for all the guests and Chateau Margaux for himself from an unmarked bottle.

Before eating the lamb, he glanced at the next table and at Treadwell. The president looked well, Bryce thought. Still, Dr. Lee had told Bryce not to be deceived by that. He was happy he had persuaded Treadwell to go to Bethesda Naval for a cardio workup. He prayed it would come out alright. That was about all Bryce had succeeded in convincing Treadwell to do. His entreaties to end the affair with Amy had been summarily rejected by the president, who laughed and said, “Sex with her does my heart good. Keeps my blood moving. You know what it’s like with a younger woman.”

“Yes, but I’m considering marrying Gina,” Bryce had told Treadwell.

“Then do it,” the president had said.

“I’m worried people will think she’s marrying me for my money and position, even though we’re in love.”

“Do it,” Treadwell had repeated.

Bryce decided he would. He had to wait for the right time to ask her.

Thirty minutes later, after dessert was cleared, Bryce watched Treadwell stride to the podium. Speaking without a note, he delivered a five-minute speech extolling the long friendship and ties binding the United States and Brazil. He then moved on to praise the great progress the Brazilians were making in strengthening their economy. He closed by looking forward to close cooperation on many issues in the future.

Treadwell had told Bryce that was what he called his standard one-two-three foreign visitor speech. The format could be adapted for the visiting head of any country. Treadwell was a good enough speaker that he didn’t have to memorize the words written for him. He always got the essence right. What Treadwell totally ignored this evening, was the acrimonious discussion he had had with the president of Brazil that afternoon, with Bryce in attendance, on the issue of United States arms supplies to Argentina.

Treadwell sat down. When the Brazilian President Dumont stood up, Treadwell leaned back in his chair and relaxed, expecting a similar couple of minutes of meaningless platitudes. Then he heard the Brazilian president say, in halting English, “Many of you in this group are our friends, and there are certain times that blunt talk is necessary among friends.”

Bryce sat up in his chair. He looked at Treadwell who was now ramrod straight in his own chair, the president’s eyes focused on the speaker. Protocol was being breached. State dinners were never for serious talk. That only came in the meetings before and after dinner. A deathly silence fell over the room.

“For several months,” Dumont continued, “we have watched with increasing dismay and alarm the huge quantities of American arms flowing to our neighbor Argentina. I mean planes, tanks, grenade launchers, and all of the other weapons for a state-of-the-art army. You should not delude yourself. Those weapons have no defensive purpose. They can only be used by General Estrada in some new aggressive military adventure.

“Let’s not forget that Brazil and Argentina fought a number of wars over the years, primarily in connection with border issues. We had thought all of those issues were resolved, but perhaps our neighbors believe otherwise.

“Let’s also not forget that Argentina is the nation that attacked Britain in the Falklands. If they dare to move against Brazil, they will be humiliated as thoroughly as they were in the Falklands. For we have our own sources of arms, a much larger population, and a more powerful army.

“I strongly suggest that you halt these arms shipments and reign in General Estrada. If not, Washington will suffer the consequences of these actions.”

The Brazilian president sat down to a stony silence and a horrified audience.

All eyes turned to President Treadwell. Bryce wondered whether he would accept the challenge and respond in kind, telling the Brazilian that Argentina had reports and satellite photos confirming significant Brazilian troop movements near the Argentine border. Estrada had forwarded the reports to Bryce through Gina, and he had given them to the president.

Treadwell stood up to the deathly silence. He said, “We will move into the Green Room for a concert by the Tokyo String Quartet.”

Bariloche

C
raig drove forty-five minutes from the cabin where he had struggled with the red-faced man to Antonia’s house. He decided not to call first, rather to show up and hope she was home. If she had time to think about it, she might not want to talk to him.

Taking a cautious approach, he turned the corner onto Avenue Santa Fe and drove by the house, a simple wooden structure in a neighborhood jammed with other similar houses, without stopping. Everything looked normal. He didn’t dare park the new SUV in front of Antonia’s for fear of bringing attention from a policeman who happened to be passing. He continued driving for two more blocks until he reached the parking lot for a soccer field. He parked there and hobbled back to number fifteen. As he did, he kept looking around, making certain he wasn’t being followed.

Before he had a chance to knock the front door opened. Someone had been watching him approach the house. A frail man in his forties with a professorial appearance, metal frame glasses, and thin brown hair was staring at Craig.

“What do you want?” he said.

“I’m looking for Antonia.”

“Who are you?”

“A friend of Pascual’s.” At the mention of the name, a look of terror gripped the man. “She’s not here,” he said softly, turning his eyes away from Craig.

“I can wait.”

“She’s not coming back.”

Craig was certain the man was lying. “Then where can I find her? I want to help her.”

“Give me a number. I’ll pass it on.”

Neighbors were now staring at Craig from nearby houses. He felt very uncomfortable. “Can I come inside?”

Before the man could respond, a woman hiding behind the doorway said, “Let him in Pierro.”

When the man moved away from the door, Craig followed him inside. As Pierro closed the door the woman stepped out of the shadows. She was tall and willowy with short black hair and dark skin from time in the sun. She was dressed simply in a white blouse and navy blue skirt.

“I’m Antonia,” she said, and pointed to the man at the door. “Pierro’s my husband. Who are you?” She spoke in a husky voice that showed none of the fear Pierro demonstrated.

He heard girls giggling nervously and looked across the room. Two sets of eyes, young girls, maybe six and eight, were watching from behind the edge of a curtain.

“Back to your room, you two,” Antonia called. “Do your school work.”

The girls disappeared into the back of the house. “What do you want?” she asked Craig.

“To know what happened to an American who met your brother Pascual a week or so ago. I’m a friend of his.”

Before Antonia could respond, Pierro said, “Don’t talk to this American. He’ll get all of us killed.”

“That’s not true,” Craig said.

Antonia turned toward Pierro. “I’ve been searching for someone to tell. Someone who could avenge Pascual.”

“Leave it alone,” Pierro said, his voice trembling with fear. “Tell him to go now before it’s too late.”

Craig was watching Antonia. From her face he knew she disagreed with her husband. Would she defy him?

“Give us a few minutes to talk,” she told Craig. Then she led Pierro into another room. For several minutes, Craig heard whispers, angry ones, coming from Pierro. Finally, the voices stopped. Antonia returned alone.

“Let’s go into the kitchen,” she said to Craig.

She turned on the light and closed the blinds. “I have nosy neighbors. We don’t have to advertise that I have a foreign visitor. Want something to drink?

“I could use a glass of brandy.”

She poured one for him and water for herself. He took a large gulp. It made him feel better.

“You’re walking badly. An injury?”

“One of Colonel Schiller’s thugs attacked me.”

She looked alarmed.

“Don’t worry, it was thirty kilometers from here. I made sure no one followed me.”

As Craig sat down at the table, he winced.

“You want me to take a look at it?” she asked.

“Are you a nurse?”

“No, but I’m a ski instructor and lifeguard. I’m trained to give first aid.”

“I’ll be okay.”

“I hope you gave as good as you got. For my brother’s sake.”

He realized she had decided to take a chance with him, putting her life and her family’s at risk by talking with him. He could do no less. “I killed the man.”

She closed her hand into a fist. “Good for you.” Then she sat down across from him. “You’ll have to forgive my husband, Pierro. He’s a good man, but timid by nature. He just wants to protect us. And now is a tough time for him. He’s a bookkeeper. He’s been out of work for more than a year since the factory closed.”

“Tell me what happened to your brother and the American he met.”

She sighed and closed her eyes.

“If it’s too painful or you’re afraid of putting your family at risk, you don’t have to talk to me.”

When she opened them, she stared straight at Craig. “No,” she said. “Quite the opposite. I’m glad you came. As I told Pierro, I made an effort to learn the truth. I’ve wanted to tell someone what happened, but I was afraid of taking it to the wrong person.”

“You can trust me.”

“I’m willing to take a chance.”

She took a deep breath and began. “Pascual met an American with a strawberry mark on his face …”

“He was my friend,” Craig said interrupting her.

“Pascual met the American …”

Craig couldn’t bear to hear Dunn being referred to as a nameless American. “Please call him Dunn. That was his name.”

“Alright, Pascual met Dunn at the café where he was singing in the evenings. Maybe it was a chance meeting, or maybe Dunn knew Pascual was a driver for the biggest limo company in town and targeted him.” She shrugged. “I don’t know that part. The first I heard about it was the night before it all happened. He told me that an American CIA agent wanted his help. He had told Dunn he had to think about it. He wasn’t only afraid for himself. He was worried about the danger to me and the girls. I convinced him to do it … Because of what happened to our parents, he had to help. We have to stop the generals.” She shook her head and bit down on her lower lip.

Craig deduced she was sorry now that she had convinced Pascual to help Dunn, leading to her brother’s death.

“What exactly did Dunn want from Pascual?”

“To arrange to be the driver meeting some foreign visitors arriving by private jet the next afternoon at one for a meeting with Estrada at a villa on the lake.”

“And then?”

“To find out who the visitors were. Listen to what they said in the car. He was to meet Dunn that night and report.”

“Where were the visitors coming from?”

“Your friend Dunn didn’t know. That was one piece of critical information he wanted.”

“Did Pascual pick up the visitors?’

She shrugged. “I don’t know. I never spoke to my brother after he called Dunn that morning and said he would help. That greasy swine, Jose Lopez, who runs the limo company wouldn’t say a word to me.”

“What were you able to find out?”

She rolled her hands into fists and gripped the chair hard. Her whole body was shaking. The words tumbled out of her mouth. “The day after the airport pick up, the police pulled the Lincoln Town Car Pascual was driving out of the lake. My dead brother was in the driver’s seat with his seatbelt on. The official police explanation was that Pascual was drunk and drove into the lake by mistake. They had the results of a blood-alcohol test to back it up, but I didn’t believe it for a minute.”

“Why not?”

“The police said Pascual had a bottle of scotch in his pocket. But he never drank scotch.”

“That’s not much to go on.”

“I talked to an old friend of my father’s, an auto mechanic. For me, he went down to the garage where they were trying to salvage the car for Lopez. What he learned was that the brake line had been cut. He saw indentations on the rear bumper. He had no doubt that someone had cut the brake line then pushed the car from the back into the water.”

She looked at Craig with huge, round eyes, pleading with him to help her comprehend. “How could they have done this to Pascual? He was kind and gentle. He wasn’t Dunn. What could he do to them?”

Craig looked at her sympathetically. “There are some evil people in the world. There always have been.”

That didn’t satisfy her. She shook her head pensively.

“What about my friend, Dunn? What happened to him?” Craig asked.

“Soldiers ambushed him at the deserted spot where he was supposed to meet my brother that night. They were shooting at him. He tried to escape by running across a farmer’s field to reach a getaway car he had parked on the main road. Unfortunately for him, the farmer had two German Shepherds. The dogs took him for an intruder. They chased and attacked him in a muddy field.”

Craig gulped hard, visualizing the terror Dunn was facing—soldiers firing bullets at him, dogs howling and flying through the air to pounce on the heavyset former agent. He held his breath, waiting to hear what happened next.

Antonia continued in a quavering voice. “He was able to kill one of the dogs. But the other one drove him to the ground and was mauling him when Estrada’s soldiers reached him. They were yelling at him, ‘Who sent you? Who sent you? Tell us and we’ll shoot the dog.’ He screamed out, ‘Betty Richards.’ They let the dog kill him, then they shot and killed the dog.”

Craig was horrified. “No,” he cried out. “No. Are you sure that’s what happened?”

“This whole area is a small community. People talk. I found the farmer, who was cursing Estrada’s men. He was sickened by what they had done. When this was all happening, he had come out of his house and run toward the scene. He reached your friend when the soldiers did. Afterwards, he heard them say they would cut up the American and bury him in the woods. The farmer wanted them to pay for his dogs. They threatened to kill him if he didn’t bury his dogs, then go back into the house and keep his mouth shut.”

“You blame Estrada for all of this?”

Her face hardened with conviction. “He had to be responsible. The visitors were coming to meet the general. These troops the farmer encountered must have been working for him. And …” She was hesitating. Craig knew there was something else.

“Please tell me,” he said.

“The evening after my brother’s funeral, two soldiers came here to the house. They vowed to kill me and my children if I ever tried to challenge the police report about what they called ‘Pascual’s accident.’”

For Craig, horror at what had happened to Dunn gave way to rage that permeated his entire body. He rolled his hands into fists. One day, he would kill Estrada and whoever else ordered Dunn’s death—if it was the last thing he ever did.

Antonia’s eyes filled up with tears. Some rolled down her cheeks. She wiped her face with a paper napkin. “I’m sorry. My brother was an innocent. Come. I’ll show you.”

She led the way. Craig followed into what had obviously been Pascual’s room. It looked as if he still lived there. Two guitars rested against a wall. Several piles of music were on a desk. Next to them was a woman’s picture and an unfinished poem with the title
Love Not Guns
. A tennis racket and a couple of cans of balls stood in the corner.

Craig pointed to the woman’s picture. “His girlfriend?”

“A woman in town he was seeing. Her husband died last year. She has three small children. They were planning to get married next year.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Pascual had so much to live for. He was a dreamer. I have to live with the guilt. I encouraged him to help your American friend. I couldn’t let Estrada and the generals come to power again. Not after what happened to our parents. These people have to be stopped before they create the nightmare all over again.”

She had alluded to that earlier, and Craig had let it pass. But not now. It was a critical part of the story. “Tell me about it.”

“Pascual and I were always close. We were children the last time the generals ruled. They said my parents were Communists, but they weren’t. So in March of 1981 they came to our house. There were five officers with machine guns. It was this house.” Her face turned pale and sad. Craig thought she would cry. Then her grim determination took hold.

“This is a great country,” she said. “With many wonderful people. But sometimes a few rotten ones take control, and one night, the army was on a sweep through the Bariloche area searching for Communists. An informer had given their commander the address of our house.

“My father was an auto mechanic. He was also a brave man and believed in freedom. Though he had rejected the appeals of the Communists to join their party, he had been vocal in speaking out against the rule of the generals. He had also armed a bomb that blew up a military transport killing ten soldiers.

“When he heard a knock on the door, he shouted to my mother, ‘Take the children into the bedroom and hide under the bed.’

“I was peeking out through a crack in the door. I saw my father run into the kitchen and grab a heavy knife he used for carving beef. He put on a light jacket, and concealed the knife underneath it, gripping it tightly in one hand. The commander didn’t bother to knock. He kicked open the door with a powerful boot.

“With a machine gun at his side, the commander moved up close to my father, who held his ground in the center of the room, refusing to cower before this Fascist and his four armed soldiers.

“ ‘Eduard Frigero,’ the commander announced, as if he was preparing to announce a death sentence.

“ ‘I am Eduardo,’ my father responded proudly.

“ ‘You’re coming with us. You and your whole family.’

“Before the commander had a chance to raise his gun and anyone had a chance to fire, my father yanked his arm out from behind the jacket. He took two steps forward and plunged the knife into the commander’s chest.

“As he did, all four soldiers opened fire. Machine gun bullets riddled my father’s body.”

Antonia began to cry again with loud sobs, her body shaking with emotion. Her story was ripping Craig apart with anguish. He sensed there was more to it, but he didn’t want to prolong her agony. “You don’t have to continue.”