"Gamburdo is different," Smith said. "He has different ideas, and he can't be pressured by the bolos."

"I'm doing a story on Gamburdo for a magazine back in the States. You get around. Tell me more about Gamburdo. I've got him down as the coming man on the continent. Am I half c.o.c.ked, or is he really hot?"

Orville Smith discussed Gamburdo, Tabio, the political scene. He talked about the politicos, about their ideas, about the gossip which followed them in their careers. Carefully prodded by Hall, he spoke fluently for nearly two hours. It was a very revealing monologue. It told Hall how Orville Smith had spent his three years in San Hermano. Week-end parties at the estates of wealthy Spanish planters. Dinners, c.o.c.ktails, high ma.s.ses, weddings, fishing trips with the Vardienos and the Fernandezes and the Gamburdos. Info straight from the horse's mouth.

Tabio the tool and or agent of bolshevism. The better element. How social legislation would push taxes up and cut down returns on American investments. Vardieno gives lovely parties on his island. No, not many lately. No oil for the boats, hard enough to get it for his narrow-gauge Diesel locomotives. Fine lad, young Quinones; made the golf team at Princeton. The Vardieno girl in the Press Bureau? That would be the one who went to finishing school in the States. She just started in at the Bureau for some experience. Cross and Sword? Oh, I know the pinkos back home would call it fascist. It's not, really. Conservative, for free enterprise and private ownership. All the better-element folks belong or support it. Do I know any labor leaders? No, never met one. Did I ever spend a week-end in a small village hotel? No, thank you, the roaches are bigger than sparrows in the sticks.

Hall thought about the art of diplomacy. You take a kid from the FFV's and at an early age you wrap him in cellophane and send him off to some nice, prophylactic boarding school, well-heeled white Gentiles only, thank you, High Episcopalians preferred, and only nice clean thoughts, none of them less than a century old, are gently swished against the cellophane until some of them seep through by osmosis. He meets only the sons of the better element and outside of an adolescent clap he picks up on one wild week-end with some of the boys in New York he has no real problem until he's eased out of prep and then he has an idea he wants to go to Harvard but the family prevails and he does time at Princeton, nearly makes varsity football but a high tackle in a practice scrimmage changes his mind, and then he is ready for his place on the board of the mill but someone--a nice girl of fine breeding, no doubt--puts another idea in his head. So he goes to Georgetown, fills out a lot of nasty forms, and then, _voila!_, the young monsieur arrives in Paris as Third Secretary and dreamily sends that first letter home to the folks: h.e.l.lo Folks, here I am in Gay Paree learning how to be an Amba.s.sador.

And then in Paris, Hall thought, listening to Orville Smith, your young Third Secretary naturally gravitates to his French equivalents, the young bluebloods who were reared in French cellophane and got the same ideas, only in French, in their own versions of Princeton and Groton.

The better element meets the better element, and he makes factual, intelligent reports. The Popular Front falling into hands of the bolos.

This he learns at a week-end party on Flandin's yacht. The Croix de Feu and the Cagoulards are fine, conservative forces. Only the pinkos call them fascists, but Bertrand de Juvenal, the fledgling amba.s.sador's pal, knows otherwise. Sit-down strikes, forty-hour week, vacations with pay--he puts them all down in his reports; communist, of course. Got the lowdown on the beach at Cannes just the other day. Daladier is the man to watch. Yes, he is in the Popular Front. But Daladier's different.

He's like Monsieur Laval, the French Calvin Coolidge. Fine force for sensible government. There will be no war, Munich has settled that. Got the lowdown from Flandin himself. Germany will be defeated. Spent a most fascinating week-end with General Weygand. Marechal Petain is man of the hour. Marechal Petain will make France another Verdun. Vichy wants to be friends with Washington. The Marechal indignantly denies, in private, that that was a n.a.z.i salute you saw in the newsreels, sir, he says he was just waving at the cameramen. But Bertrand de Juvenal does not deny, and Laval does not deny, and Daladier weeps in his collapsed house of cards. And then comes the transfer to San Hermano at a better rating.

Smith pointed to the suburbs of San Hermano ahead of them. "We made good time," he said. "We'll be in the Emba.s.sy in ten minutes."

"Good going. You can drop me at the Bolivar, if you don't mind."

"Not at all, old man. But say, why don't you drop by for a spot of lunch with the old man and the boys at the Emba.s.sy? We'd love to have you with us and, besides, the old man will probably want to see for himself that you're in one piece."

Hall looked at his watch. "What time do you have lunch?"

"About one."

"Good. I'd like to join you. But I'll still have time to stop off at the Bolivar to change and pick up my mail. I'm expecting a letter from my sweetheart."

Pepe was waiting in his cab in front of the Bolivar. He was contrite and subdued. "I nearly killed you with my stupidity, Mateo," he said. "I should have known that cafe was owned by Falangistas."

"It's nothing, Pepe. I had it coming to me. I'm all over it now, anyway.

What's new?"

"I have the complete list of where the pa.s.sengers from the _Marques de Avillar_ are staying. Their names, too. Except the names of the two men who are at the Gamburdo ranch. But they are still there."

"Did you recognize any of the names?"

"My friends are examining the lists now. I'll have them back for you in the evening."

"Have you seen Duarte?"

"I told him about you. He wants you to call him at the Mexican Emba.s.sy."

"I will, later. I have to go to my room for a minute, and then I want you to take me to the American Emba.s.sy. I'm having lunch there." He entered the hotel and asked for his mail at the desk. There was a message from Jerry, a short gossipy note from his publisher, and another love letter from Havana.

The note from Jerry was very short. "I missed you, you dog," it said.

"Phone me when you return to town. Jerry."

The letter from Havana, mailed the day after the first letter, was almost a duplicate of the first. Again it protested its love, but this time it said, "How many times must I tell you that the man you think is your rival is unworthy of all human decencies? Far from being a rival in my eyes, I look upon him as a creature worse than an a.s.sa.s.sin. You must believe me; I detest the man." Hall put the letter in his wallet.

He examined his room carefully. It had not been searched, the stethoscope was still in its hiding place, his clothes were just as he had left them. Everything was as it had been. Hall took out his portable typewriter, copied the _El Imparcial_ story which had been killed, and sealed the copy in an envelope. He went downstairs, got into the cab, and slipped the envelope into Pepe's pocket.

"Give the envelope to Dr. Gonzales," he said. "And tell him to get the information to Major Segador right away."

"I'll drive right out to the doctor as soon as I leave you. Shall I wait for you outside of the American Emba.s.sy after I see the doctor?"

"I think you'd better."

Amba.s.sador Skidmore seemed pleased to see Hall. "You gave us quite a scare, young fellow," he said, his ruddy face beaming, white hair bobbing as Skidmore shook his head from side to side in mock anxiety.

"Ah, you newspaper boys," he laughed. "Always going off on a tear when you are least expected to! And here poor Joe Fernandez was so sure that the Reds had made hamburger out of you, Hall."

"I'm sorry I spoiled a good story," Hall said. "I'd better call Fernandez on the phone before he sends out another alarm."

"No need to, my boy," the Amba.s.sador said. "Joe Fernandez is joining us at lunch."

Fernandez showed up with a former Senator, a dignified old dandy named Rios, who sported a silver-headed cane, a waxed, dyed mustache, and a Cross and Sword emblem in his lapel. They shared the table in the Amba.s.sador's small private dining room with Hall, Orville Smith and the Amba.s.sador.

The publisher fawned over Hall like a long-lost brother. "You are safe,"

he exclaimed. "Thanks be to the Virgin Mother! What happened? Was it very bad?"

"I got drunk," Hall said. "That's all that happened."

"Ridiculous, Senor Hall! You are a man who can take his drink. You were drugged. Mark my words, senor, you were drugged. You don't know these Reds."

Orville Smith winked broadly at Hall. "The main thing is," he said to Fernandez, "that Hall is safe now. I'm sure he appreciates your concern, Don Jose." In deference to the Amba.s.sador's three-word Spanish vocabulary, Smith and the others spoke English. Rios, who spoke only Spanish, sat between Skidmore and Smith, who acted as their interpreter.

"What province did you represent in the Senate?" Hall asked the former Senator.

"San Martin, in the north."

"Don Joaquin is a great statesman," Fernandez interrupted. "But when El Tovarich prepared his gangsters for the elections two years ago, he armed the Red miners and they held their guns in the ribs of Don Joaquin's majority."

Hall listened to Smith translate this account of Rios' defeat at the polls before he spoke. "And do you plan to run again, Senor Rios?" he asked.

Fernandez answered for the dandy. "He will run again," he shouted, "and he will be elected. Fire can fight fire. Guns can fight guns."

"I have _pantalones_," Rios said. "I am a man of honor."

"Don Joaquin's const.i.tuents demand that he runs again," Fernandez said.

He turned to the Amba.s.sador, became his own translator. The ex-Senator nodded happily at every word Fernandez addressed to the Amba.s.sador, as if by nodding he could bolster the words whose meaning he had to guess.

"How do you think things will go in Congress today?" Hall asked Fernandez.

"The same as every year, Senor Hall. Ceremonials, the speech, and then--_quien sabe_?"

Rumors rose from the table. Everyone had a choice rumor to air. Rios had it on good authority that Tabio's illness was merely a pretext; the President was afraid to face the Congress lest they force him to justify his wild socialistic measures which had put the national budget in such dire peril. Orville Smith informed the men at the table that Tabio's illness had taken a more serious turn. "In fact, I understand that Dr.

Ansaldo has informed the government that he will refuse to operate on Tabio without the written permission of the Cabinet." Fernandez spoke of Ansaldo's skill as a surgeon.

"How about Gamburdo's speech, Joe?" the Amba.s.sador said. "You promised to bring me an advance copy."