The Grandfather Clock (23 page)

“
Boom!” Charlie slammed
both of his hands on the table. “And you are here to take back what
is rightfully yours!”

I shook my head. “If only it were that
easy. I have no idea how to go about this.”

“
What’s he gonna do? Sell
it?” Glen deadpanned.

“
Apparently he lucked out.
Legend has it, these hills are full of Nazis with
money.”

“
They’re mostly dead,”
Andrea spoke for the first time. “But there are a lot of Germans
here. The schools teach German.”

“
There’s a wild story out
there that Hitler didn’t die in Berlin,” I said. “They say he died
here.”

“
Rubbish,” Glen
said.

“
Obviously,” Jill
seconded.

“
Oh,” Charlie jumped back
in, “and you know. You were there. Whatever! Who is to say that
Hitler didn’t escape?”

“
I doesn’t really matter
if he did or didn’t,” I said. “A lot of other Nazi officers did
settle here.”

“
So why are you sitting
here?” Glen asked.

“
Trying to muster up the
courage, I guess.”

“
Charlie lifted his glass
as if to offer a toast. “If you need us, you know, for a little
‘backup,’ we’re in.”

“
Speak for yourself,
Charlie!” Andrea said. “I’d be less worried about Nazis and more
worried about the football team.”

I appreciated Charlie’s eagerness to
join me in trekking to the address that Jorge had given me for
Marco’s father. We set out shortly after daybreak. It was a
three-mile hike down a two-lane road leading out of town and up
into the hills. The truth was, without Charlie, I might not have
gone so boldly. I certainly wouldn’t have headed out on foot so
eagerly. Charlie was oblivious, going on and on about English
Premier League Soccer. I repeatedly tried to focus him by telling
him to follow my lead and that I hoped that Marco would listen and
be reasonable.

“
So, one thing I don’t
get,” he said. “If she broke up with him, why did he steal
your
shit?”

“
Well,” I gulped. “I did
sleep with his girlfriend. Big mistake.”

“
Wait, I thought you were
dating her friend. Klara was it?”

“
Yes. It was a big
mistake.”

“
So this guy is not just
mad at his girl. You slept with her? Does this gun
work
?”

“
No, no, it’s two hundred
years old.”

“
And you just let me
follow you up here. You know, that’s a pretty big detail you left
out.”

“
Hey, we had a lot to
drink. I forget what I did and didn’t tell you.”

Charlie never broke stride. “Well this
ought to be fun.”

The small home was built into the side
of a wooded hill, a combination of stone and wood. It was worn, but
cared for. A light rain began to fall. We stood at the end of the
drive, checking for an address. The GPS on my phone said it was the
place. Charlie looked apprehensive. We’d come that far. I wasn’t
turning back now, so I walked up the path hoping Charlie would
follow.

I knocked on the heavy door. I
couldn’t see in any of the windows. A beat-up Fiat sat alongside
the house. The door opened wide and I was faced with a small,
shirtless man in his forties. He bore no apprehension about the
visitors at his door. I couldn’t draw a resemblance to Marco, but I
couldn’t deny it either.

“
Hola,” I said. “Habla
Inglés?”

“
No.”

I looked at Charlie, who looked at me
expectantly. I wished I had gotten Andrea to warm up to me a little
more. She and Jill were getting massages instead.

“
Um. Marco? Rios?
Aquí?”

And the door slammed.

I knocked again hesitantly. A short
burst of Spanish came through the door. It sounded
final.

Charlie shrugged and
smiled.

We turned back and headed down the
road toward town. That was probably Marco’s father and now Marco
would know I had come to find him. Wishful thinking hoped that
wasn’t true, but deep down, I had a feeling I was right. Then the
blue Fiat came rumbling down the road. I didn’t realize who it was
it until it stopped next to us. The man, now wearing a shirt,
reached over and pushed open the front passenger door.

Charlie’s enthusiasm for the mission
was completely gone. “You better get in,” he said. “I’ve got to go
see what Glen’s doing.”

I looked at the man. Surely, if he
meant us harm, he wouldn’t invite two men, both larger than he,
into his car. “See you back at the hostel,” I said.

We rode in silence into Bariloche. My
knees banged against the dashboard and my arm extended out the
passenger window. It was still a struggle to for the man to work
the gear shifter with my left leg in the way. The cup holder held
what looked like a dirty gourd with day-old tea leaves in the
bottom. The radio was tuned to news. I began to relax a
little.

“
This is a beautiful
town,” I said, in English, slowly, as if that would help him
understand. Then I began to gesture broadly out the window, which
startled him, causing the wheel to shake. I put my hands in my lap.
He was definitely jumpy.

“
American?” he
asked.

“
Yes. Um, sí,” I
replied.

His face was serious. After another
minute he spoke again, this time forcefully. I didn’t catch a
single word except perhaps “Marco.”

I looked at him wide-eyed. “I don’t
understand.”

He growled, annoyed.

“
Celeste,” he
blurted.

I nodded, to show I recognized the
name.

He shook his head and mumbled. Did he
know what this was about?

He continued talking, but now it was
almost to himself. It sounded like a father’s typical complaints
about a young son. I stared straight forward.

We turned north into the heart of the
town. Things were a little more run down than the tourist section
along Nahuel Huapi Lake. We stopped in front of a dull two-story
concrete apartment building. If the main part of town had German
influence, this building was the East German representation. My
heart was pounding, and I hoped it didn’t show. We got out of the
car and the man lead me up a set of stairs to door on the second
floor. A little girl, no more than five, answered.

“
Lito!” she screamed,
jumping into the man’s arms. He picked her up and put one foot in
the doorway. A woman emerged from the kitchen where water was
running. She looked at me without surprise. Perhaps he had called
her before leaving his house.

“
Sprechen Sie Deutsch?”
she said, to my surprise.

“
Um, no,” I said. “English
or French. En francaise?”

“
No,” she said. “Okay a
little English. Is not very good.”

“
Okay. I understand,” I
said slowly. “Are you Marco’s sister? Um, hermana de
Marco?”

“
Yes.”

The woman was young. Mid-twenties. I
thought she might be a year or two older than Marco.

“
What do you come here
for?” she asked.

“
Ah, I knew Marco in
Paris. His girlfriend, Celeste. You know Celeste?” She nodded and
uttered something Spanish to her father. “I know Celeste. When
Marco left to come here, he took something from me.” I paused
trying to make sure I was clear. “He took something that belonged
to me. Do you know about this?” I gestured at her and her
father.

She looked at him and back at
me.

“
Thief?” she blurted. “No.
Not what he say. Job. He do job to sell.”

“
Oh, no,” I said. I
rummaged through my backpack and pulled out my iPhone from France.
I pulled up a picture of the blunderbuss. “Have you seen this? This
is mine.”

She only glanced at it for a moment, a
sign that she did recognize it. Her father nodded slightly and said
something.

“
He sell it,” she
said.

“
What? He already sold
it?” I looked to her father.

“
No,” the woman said. “You
buy. You help.”

“
Me buy?” I shook my head.
“It’s mine. Mine. It belongs to me.”

“
How do you
know?”

Clearly Marco had lied about the
gun.

“
Where is Marco? Where is
the gun?” I asked holding up the picture on the phone.

“
I do not know,” she said.
“He meet with man. Old man.”

“
What? Who? Now?” I was
confused because everything she said was present tense. “The gun
belongs in a museum. Do you understand ‘museum’?”

“
Yes, museum,” she said.
She went to a table by the door and retrieved a piece of paper.
“Your phone number.” I wrote down the number. “Marco speak to a
woman I know. Your name?”

“
Michael. And
yours?

“
Eva.”

“
Where is
Marco?”

“
Football.”

“
Tell him I’m here.
Michael. I want to talk to him.”

“
He’s not bad,” she said.
“No trouble. They will not hurt him?”

“
They who?” I
asked.

She looked at her father and said
something in Spanish.

“
What?” I
asked.

“
You go,” she said opening
the door. “Thank you.” She forced half of a smile.

I walked out into the drizzle and
followed the street down a slope toward the waterfront. I called
Vince.

“
Hello?” came his confused
response to the unknown number on his phone.

“
Good morning, Vince. Did
I wake you?”

“
No, it’s Friday. I’m just
getting to a job site. Good morning, or I guess good afternoon to
you.”

“
Actually, it’s morning
where I am still. Just barely.”

“
I thought you left New
Orleans.”

“
You will never believe
what is happening. I’m in Patagonia.”

“
Patagonia? Like, South
America, Patagonia?”

“
The only one,” I said,
and launched into a recap of the past week.

“
Listen, I need you to
talk to mom. Don’t alarm her. But just see if you can find any clue
as to what Grandpa was doing with the gun. Maybe she has a box of
old letters sitting around. Maybe she was just holding back. She
said she doesn’t know anything, but she’s got to dig
deep.”

“
Michael, are you
safe?”

“
I think so.”

I was starving when I got to the
hostel. I ducked into a cafe and ordered a bratwurst and a bowl of
stew. I stared in a daze out at a street that could have easily
been in Munich. I was waiting for a phone call that may never come.
Then I saw Jill and Andrea.

I beckoned them into the cafe. Jill
looked at me wide eyed. “What happened this morning? Where’s
Charlie?”

“
Charlie bailed on me the
minute he got nervous,” I said. “I met Marco’s father and sister.
They don’t speak much English. They were wary of me, but also
seemed concerned for Marco. I think I’m waiting for a call from a
woman Marco was meeting with. I’m not really sure.”

Andrea continued to display little
interest in the topic.

I continued. “If I don’t get a call,
I’m going to have to go back to the sister.”

“
What a little wanker
Charlie is,” Jill laughed. Her interest only went as far as
Charlie.

“
Michael,” Andrea said in
serious tone, “I don’t know much about what you are dealing with.
But this isn’t America. It isn’t France, or even Germany. The
stories of Nazis hiding here after the war aren’t just stories.
They were here before the war, after the war. They had kids and
grandkids. It’s unspoken. This is Argentina. What do we care of
ex-Nazis? We have our own history that we don’t speak
of.”

“
Well, I’m not just going
to let it go. What do you suggest? Should I go to the
police?”

She burst out laughing. “Yeah. Pretty
sure they aren’t going care about your precious gun. Just don’t be
surprised if people aren’t exactly forthcoming when an American
starts asking questions about Nazis and accusing a local footballer
of stealing.”

I could see her point. In
that light, the cooperation I got from Eva was surely out of
concern that Marco was in over his head. The type of person who
would buy a stolen item like the
Tromblon
de Napoleon
was worthy of
suspicion.

Jill and Andrea retreated to the
hostel. It was early afternoon and I was tired. There was no sign
of Charlie or Glen in the room and I collapsed on my bed, starting
at a phone that refused to ring. I began searching the Internet for
stories of Nazis in Patagonia. It was then that I ran across the
word “Inalco.” It was the name of the estate where Hitler
supposedly lived until he died two decades after the war. I fell
asleep reading on my phone the myths of Hitler living his last days
on the shores the lake outside my window.