The White Vixen

by David Tindell

  It was a bit more difficult this time, with her legs tucked under her hips and Ian deep inside her, and the two of them rocking together besides, but she leaned back, supporting herself with her arms, and arched her back. To her surprise, this produced an extremely pleasant sensation, which Ian accentuated with deeper thrusts. She felt her orgasm building quickly, much more quickly than the night before, and before she could help herself she began moaning, then he shouted and heaved upward just as she reached her own zenith. She actually felt his essence erupt inside her, and they held the delicious pose for a few seconds before he slowly lowered his buttocks back onto the damp sheets, his powerful hands still clamped on her hips, and he released them as she leaned forward and lay forward on top of him. Their panting gradually slowed.

  “You really must go?” he said at last.

  “Yes,” she said reluctantly, and the finality of it began to take on real meaning to her. Two weeks since the mission, one week since their first dinner together, and now they had just made love for the, what, fourth time? Fifth? Ian had gotten forty-eight hours’ liberty, they’d spend that first night together and that was the first time, the next morning the second, and then last night after one final day together exploring Hong Kong. “I was lucky to get my leave extended, actually.”

  “I rather think I’m the lucky one,” he said, kissing her. She met his tongue with hers, and inside her, she felt the stirrings of desire again, but deeper this time, and that voice she’d dreaded hearing: Be careful. Remember the pain. She pushed the voice aside and surrendered to the desire.

  Three hours later, they were at the airport. Her flight would be on time, and she looked forward to the comfort of the commercial jet. In Tokyo she’d catch an Air Force cargo plane to Hawaii, another to Los Angeles, and yet another for the final leg to Hurlburt Field, Florida. The free passage on the military birds would almost make up for the Spartan conditions she’d have to tolerate. That would make the jet lag even more difficult, to say the least. Well, she’d done it before.

  “I said, ‘A penny for your thoughts?’”

  She turned to Ian. “Sorry. Just thinking about the time changes and so forth.”

  They were walking down the broad aisle of the terminal toward her departure gate. She had one bag slung over her shoulder, with Ian pulling her suitcase. Back at the hotel, she’d fretted somewhat over her outfit, finally choosing the same black pin-striped pants-suit she’d worn on the flight to Singapore, only this time she wore a white tee shirt underneath. A single Chinese ideogram, which could roughly be translated as “strength”, was printed in red on the chest.

  Ian laughed. “You know, you’re really quite remarkable.”

  “How do you mean?” she asked.

  “Well, a few hours ago you were practicing the most elaborate yoga poses I’ve ever seen, with exquisite discipline. Then, of course, in bed you are, shall we say—”

  “A bit less rigid?” she filled in with a grin.

  “I wouldn’t really call it that, because it implies you’re rigid otherwise. No, I meant you’re not quite like you are at other times. Like now, for instance, or earlier, when we were shopping.”

  They arrived at the gateway and she led them to some empty seats. “And how am I now?”

  He looked away from her, gathering his thoughts, then back at her. “There’s something about you,” he said, looking at her intensely. “I’ve never been around a woman like you. And damn few men, for that matter. The Americans call it charisma. Yet you don’t flaunt it, like so many do.”

  She sighed. She felt flattered, yet at the same time embarrassed, just a bit. “The Japanese call it shibumi,” she said after a moment. “You could translate it to mean a sort of restrained elegance.”

  “And I presume this is from your martial arts training?”

  She nodded. “It’s the martial way, the way of the warrior,” she said. “Most study the martial arts to learn how to fight, or to show off. It’s much more than that. It’s a way of life.”

  She looked back at him, and his eyes were still intense. He was trying desperately to understand her, she knew, because he cared for her so much. And how did she feel about him? She’d been in love before, and over the past couple days she’d felt the stirring deep inside her heart that heralded its coming, but she’d pushed it back with a determination that surprised her. She would not allow it back, because if it came, the inevitable pain would follow. The voice came again from within: Remember Jimmy? Remember Franklin? It will happen again!

  But now Jo Ann felt the warmth stirring around inside her again. She reached over and touched Ian’s hand. “My art of tae kwon do has five basic tenets,” she said. “Courtesy, integrity, perseverance, self-control, and indomitable spirit. The tenets provide me with guidelines, with means of focusing my ki, and things like shibumi sort of naturally follow.”

  “They’re quite effective, believe me,” he said. He leaned over and kissed her. For a moment, their lips parted and his tongue sought hers, and she responded. Then she pulled away. “Something wrong?”

  Eyes moist, she turned away. “I’m sorry, Ian,” she said. “I’m just…just not sure where we are going.” Or where she wanted it to go. Did she want to go there again? Take the risk?

  His hand gripped hers. “Neither am I, but I’d certainly like to see it go somewhere. Wouldn’t you?”

  She blinked away a tear, surprising herself. “I don’t know,” she said. Why did she put herself in this position? Things had been going so well; she had her work, and her training, and her studies, and someday she would achieve her ultimate goal, a steady posting so she could get a house of her own, some cozy little rural place, with a couple of cats, and a garden. She could see the living room right now, could see Ian sitting in it, snuggling with her as they watched TV, or read together, or just talking, their lives joined….

  No. She reached deep down inside, summoning her strength, and pushed the emotions away. Her discipline had kept her going, gotten her through Stanford and the Academy, through the endless hours of training, through the peril of her missions, all the way up through Fonglan Island. Discipline had kept her alive, yes—but life was more than just staying alive, wasn’t it?

  Discipline had also gotten her past Jimmy, and then Franklin. But they weren’t over, not really; the memories were still in there, the joy and the love, then the searing pain of betrayal. She dealt with them only by ignoring them. But any time a new man came along, the memories started rustling back in their dark corner, trying to get out. She had to keep the new man from getting too close, or they’d come out and hurt her again.

  She looked back at Ian. He could understand discipline, certainly. He was a warrior, too, although a Westerner, and thus different. He saved her life…and then fell in love with her. Could he ever understand why she couldn’t, wouldn’t allow herself to love him?

  Reaching up, she touched his cheek. “Ian, I really can’t explain how I feel. But I do care about you. A great deal. You must believe that.”

  He took her hand and kissed it. “That makes me feel better,” he said. “Thought I was losing you there.”

  She glanced at a clock on the wall, and saw that her flight would be called in about twenty minutes. “When will you be returning to England?” she asked.

  “We sail day after tomorrow,” he said. “Heading east, calling in Tahiti, then Chile and around the Cape and over to the Falklands. The Admiralty apparently are a bit concerned about the Argentines. A couple days there, then likely home. A long haul, but I should be in London in about ten weeks.”

  “Perhaps we can see each other then,” she said, surprising herself.

  He smiled. “I’d like that. I’d like that a great deal, in fact.” That grin, so dashing…

  “Wuthering Heights,” she said.

  “What?”

  “The movie,” she said. “I finally remembered. You reminded me of someone, an actor in a movie. I saw it in college, in a film appreciation class. Laurenc
e Olivier in Wuthering Heights.”

  “Oh, my,” he said. “What a coincidence. I had been thinking that you resembled an actress. France Nuyen, French and Vietnamese, I believe. She played an alien warrior queen on an episode of Star Trek.” He laughed. “I had no idea we were so famous.”

  She smiled back, and this time when the stirrings came, she didn’t move to stop them.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Buenos Aires, Argentina

  December 1981

  “The president will be with you in a moment, sir,” the attractive secretary announced, putting her telephone back in its cradle.

  “Thank you,” Wilhelm Baumann said, but she was already back at her typewriter, staring at a steno pad through horn-rimmed glasses. Willy looked over at the door to the inner office, and at the stern-looking, sidearmed suboficial of the Gendarmaria Nacional standing at parade rest next to it. Besides himself, the secretary and the sergeant, there were no other people in this office, which occupied a surprisingly small section of La Casa de Gobiermo, the Government House, known since 1873 as Casa Rosada, the Pink House. Willy had never been inside the massive building, but had occasionally viewed it from Plaza de Mayo across the street, pondering its rather odd mix of styles, the result of decades of modifications by Swedish, French and Italian architects. A few times he’d been part of crowds who filled the plaza to hear a speech by the president from the building’s large balcony. Dieter told him of hearing Juan Perón, and his charismatic wife Evita, speak more than once from that very stage. The current president had not yet chosen to address his people that way, although he spoke to them on nationwide television and radio shortly after assuming power. Even though he had an appointment, Willy made sure to check the flagpole on his way in; yes, the presidential banner flew underneath the Argentine colors, signaling that the president was in.

  In some respects, Willy Baumann should have felt insulted. His request for an audience with General Leopoldo Fortunato Galtieri should have resulted in a personal invitation to meet him at his estate, perhaps even for a private dinner. Instead, there was this rather brusque summons to this office, in the mid-afternoon of what had turned out to be a hot December day. Another indication of how much—or how little—importance Galtieri attached to this meeting; even the lowliest Argentine bureaucrat typically would have left his office by now, especially during summer, when his unreliable air conditioner would be taxed beyond its capacity to provide tolerable working conditions indoors.

  The German inside Willy Baumann forced him to shake his head at the thought. Dieter Baumann had worked from dawn to past dusk for years, and even today spent two to three hours a day on official Bund business, if his health permitted. His son had naturally grown into the same habit. The Americans would call him a workaholic, but the Baumann men were only doing what their fellow Germans had done for centuries. When there was work to be done, you did it, and there was always work to be done.

  But being forced to meet Galtieri here was not a good sign. The general was definitely sending a message: the junta’s relationship with the Bund was about to change. Well, that was most likely true. There had been days when the president of Argentina would present himself to the Bundesführer at the German’s estate, and come literally with hat in hand. Perón himself had done it with the Reichsleiter back in the forties; rumor had it Perón even offered the Reichsleiter the pleasure of Evita’s company for an evening, an offer that may or may not have been accepted, depending on who was telling the story. Knowing the Reichsleiter’s legendary capacity for women, Willy tended to believe it. While this president, or his successor, would eventually be reminded of who was really running this country, Willy hoped things would be a bit more businesslike this time.

  As he waited for his summons, Willy reviewed what he knew about Galtieri. In his fifty-sixth year, a 1949 graduate of the School of the Americas, Galtieri was in command of the Argentine Army’s II Corps upon the junta’s takeover in 1976. He was known as one of the more ruthless members of the high command, and had been personally in charge of one of the government’s most notorious detention centers during the “Dirty War” in the late seventies. As part of the junta’s campaign to eliminate dissent in the country, thousands of Argentines were arrested and imprisoned, most of them tortured, many executed, many others simply made to disappear. Willy had read one particularly chilling account of a female prisoner and her visit with Galtieri: “He asked me, ‘Do you know who I am? Do you know that I have absolute power over you? If I say you live, you live. If I say you die, you die. As it happens, you have the same Christian name as my daughter, and so you live.’”

  While Willy was not afraid of Galtieri, or any Argentine alive, he knew this man was not one to be trifled with. This president not only had command of the entire armed forces, but the Gendarmaria, and while that body was not nearly as formidable as Germany’s Schutzstaffel, the dreaded SS, it could still cause no end of trouble for the Bund. So, things would have to be handled rather delicately, but firmly. Willy was grateful that Dieter had asked him to handle the meeting. The leadership of the Bund was well aware of the challenges that lay ahead, especially now that the more reliable, and recovering, Viola was out of power.

  The door to Galtieri’s office swung open, and the Gendarmaria sergeant snapped to attention. A man wearing the uniform of an Argentine Army infantry captain stepped out into the secretary’s office, and Willy rose to his feet, automatically straightening his suit with an unobtrusive tug of the jacket.

  “Señor Baumann,” the captain said with a tinge of distaste, “el presidente will see you now.”

  “Thank you, Capitan,” Willy said, nodding. He nodded also to the secretary and flashed a smile. “And to you, señorita.” The captain stepped aside as Willy strode confidently into the presence of the second most powerful man on the continent.

  Galtieri’s office was spacious but not ostentatious. The walls were adorned with paintings from Argentine history. Willy recognized one of them, showing Manuel Belgrano at the signing of the country’s Declaration of Independence in 1816. The only portrait was one of Julio Roca, the general who quashed the Indians for good in 1879 and later served twelve years as president. Roca’s victory had opened the pampas for settlement by European immigrants, mostly Italians and Spaniards, and not a few Germans. Galtieri, like most of his countrymen, had the blood of many nationalities flowing through his veins.

  The furnishings were sparse. A sitting area to the left contained two stuffed chairs, two sofas and a coffee table. Straight ahead was a fireplace, obviously a relic of an earlier time, topped by an empty mantle. Above it hung the Roca portrait. And to the right was the desk of the president.

  Galtieri stood as Willy entered the office. The general was in full Army uniform, the left breast of the jacket sagging with medals and ribbons. Willy guessed it had just been removed from the slightly swinging hanger on the nearby coat tree. Galtieri himself had a leonine head crowned by full white hair, his face tanned and lined. He was about six feet tall, close to Willy’s own height. Galtieri was standing ramrod straight, but not comically so; a military man, comfortable in command. His opinion of Galtieri moved up a notch.

  The captain announced him simply as “Señor Wilhelm Baumann”. Willy took three steps to Galtieri’s desk and came to attention, although not as rigidly as if he’d been in uniform, and bowed slightly. “Mi presidente, it is an honor and a privilege to be received by you,” Willy said in perfect Spanish Lunfardo, the dialect common in Buenos Aires.

  Galtieri did not offer his hand, but merely nodded and motioned to one of the two chairs facing his desk. “Please be seated, señor,” he said in a baritone voice that was obviously accustomed to command.

  Willy had been carefully prepared for this interview. His father, along with two other senior Bund members, had impressed upon him the need to show courtesy and respect, no matter what Galtieri’s attitude. Forty years of dealing with Argentine leaders, military and civilian, provided plenty of exp
erience to draw upon. “He is accustomed to ordering people around,” Dieter said. “They all are. Once they sit behind that desk they are quite full of themselves. They are convinced they will succeed where others have failed, that they will bend this country to their own will. They will fail, of course, and eventually be ousted, and we will still be here. A part of him will know this, and he will fear that knowledge. You can use that, but carefully.”

  “What can I do for you, Señor Baumann?” Galtieri asked, sitting back in his chair. In his right hand he gripped a fountain pen, twirling it casually.

  Willy offered his most respectful smile. “Mi presidente, I have come to pay my respects to you on behalf of my father, Dieter, and the entire membership of the Siegfried Bund. I bring to you our sincere congratulations upon your accession to the presidency, and our desire to work closely with you to help build a greater Argentina for all of us.”

  Galtieri smiled. “You Germans. You are, as the Americans say, full of shit.”

  Willy blinked, but didn’t lose his smile. “I beg your pardon, sir?”

  The pen kept twirling. “So you come here representing the Siegfried Bund,” the general said. “Dieter Baumann saw fit to send his boy to meet with me, did he?”

  Willy’s smile narrowed. “My father sends his regrets that he cannot attend personally. He is not in the best of health.”

  “So I have heard,” Galtieri said. “Perhaps if my good friend General Viola were in this chair, Dieter might have been healthy enough. But there are others who might have come, from the Old Guard. Perhaps even your Reichsleiter. But then, he does not travel much, does he?”

  He had to be careful. Galtieri may have known all there is to know about the Reichsleiter, but chances were all he knew was what his predecessors knew, which was very little. “I am afraid I do not know—”

  “Come, come, señor, let’s not play games. I know all about your beloved leader. We have quite a dossier on him, you know. Did you think such an influential man could live in our country for over thirty years and we would not have a dossier?”