Iate a hamburger down in the drugstore, then walked up to the Sheraton, timing it to arrive at just five past nine. The FBI would be dead on time, of course – and that made him the host.

I'd cheerfully said I'd 'see' him up in the 24th-floor bar, but I'd forgotten the lighting they went in for there: a small frosted-glass lamp parked in front of each drinker. Just enough light to make every woman look beautiful and every bar bill unreadable. A big hotel thinks of such things.

So I just stood there looking lost, until somebody stood up from one of the tables, walked across and said quietly, 'Mr Carr?'

About all I could tell in that light was that he was a little shorter than me, a little wider in the shoulders, and with lightish crew-cut hair. His age could have been anything from twenty-five to forty-five. We sat down and a waiter with radar eyes took my order for Bacardi Silver Label and bitter lemon.

Ellis said: 'You know Bacardi have got over sixty per cent of the rum market in the States and only about three per cent in Puerto Rico itself. Funny. Some people think they came in here after Castro nationalised their plant in Cuba. But they've been here since 1936. Biggest taxpayer on the island now. And the Puerto Ricans still don't drink their rum. Funny.'

FBI small-talk. If I'd ordered Scotch he'd have made me feel at home by reciting the life story of Bonny Prince Charlie.

The waiter brought my drink and Ellis managed not to say 'Cheers' and we drank. I said: 'We now come to the main attraction of the evening: a friendly talk from the FBI.'

He leant his elbows on his knees and twiddled his glass and said: 'Let's just call it advice, Mr Carr. You probably know we helped the Federal Government draw up a black list of pilots grounded for illegal flights to Cuba. Either for Castro or against. Those are all American pilots, of course; we can't pull a flying licence out from under anybody else. But – like withall these things – there's always a list of people who aren't on the list. Cuban, Mexican, Venezuelan, Colombian – and some English.'

'The grey list.'

'It's been called that.'

'A bit of trouble with the Customs whenever you land in the States. A bit more difficult to get somebody to service your plane. A bit of a problem with visas. Just enough to take the profit out of a flight. You meanthat list?'

'I've heard it happens,' he admitted.

'I haven't been in Cuba in four years. Not even illegally.'

'Sure. And none of those things have happened to you.' He sipped his drink. 'But the list's being expanded; that always happens, too. The State Department's getting worried about the República Libra now.'

'About that earthly paradise? Just because it goes in for a little midnight beating-up, arrest-without-trial, a few basement executions?'

He shook his head slowly. 'No. Oh, sure it happens. But it always has. We don't like it, but… No. They're worried about a real blow-up. The opposition to the generals has been building up since Jiminez went back in. You knew about that?'

'I'd heard a rumour.' Jiminez was the Republica's Robin Hood – or a lousy Commie or a great liberal leader or a racketeer gangster or… The only thing anybody really knew about Jiminez was that he thought Jiminez would make a great next president of the República, and the sooner the better. The better for whom nobody would know until it was too late.

He'd been down in South America somewhere for the last four years: skipped or chased out by the two generals who were currently running the República: Castillo of the Army, Boscoof the Air Force. The Navy was just a couple of old subchasers and a few PT boats, so the admiral didn't rate a part-dictatorship. The admiral, if he'd got any sense, lived in the nearest bar and was careful to keep his ships slightly unserviceable so nobody could suspect him of political ambition.

Ellis said: 'Jiminez is supposed to be up in the hills organising things – and I mean organising. This isn't shotgunsand machettes. Castillo's got half the army out chasing them and last week they captured a three-inch mortar. That didn't get into the Repúblicain somebody's hip pocket. Now you see where I'm going?'

As my night vision improved, I could pick out a little more about him. But still not his age. He had light, steady eyes and a knobbly face full of small muscles, frozen in the weary I've-read-the-file-on-you expression that's the first lesson taught at the FBI Academy.

He was wearing a milky-coffee-coloured lightweight suit with the jacket kept buttoned, probably because he had a gun on his belt. Shoulder holsters went out with double-breasted suits.

I saw what he was getting at, all right. But I also saw why the Repúblicahad suddenly decided to spend good beer money on a dozen jet fighters. They didn't need them for aerial defence – one nice thing about the Caribbean is that nobody ever goes to war. They can't afford it. With everybody on his own island, a war would mean a big navy, invasion fleets, long supply lines. So they keep their troubles at home. But a properly handled squadron of jets can be a good ground-attack weapon: fast, flexible, plenty of fire-power. You won't catch a rebel by hauling a tank over mountain roads at 5 mph. But a jet jumping over the hill on a couple of minutes' notice might do it.

Ellis said: 'Well, Mr Carr?'

Just to annoy him, I said: 'I thought the FBI was confined to the United States and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. Aren't you treading on Central Intelligence Agency ground?'

'Screw the CIA,' he said calmly.

'If you say so. But the Republica's still CIA territory.' I gave a careful pause. 'Had you thought the CIA might have hired me?'

His head came up with a jerk, and even in that light I knew I was getting a hard, penetrating stare. Then he said slowly and quietly, 'I don't think so. We know quite a bit about you, Mr Carr. English, thirty-six years old, ten years in the RAF, mostly on fighters. You were in combat with one of our squadrons in Korea, on an officer exchange scheme. The lasteight years you've been a civil pilot; the last five out here, in business for yourself. You're not married, but you're not queer and you're not a fanatic. No, I don't think you're working for them.'

'Or in other words, screw the CIA.'

'Short, back, and sideways.' He leant back in his chair. 'We're getting off the point. The FBI's interest is because the arms being found in the Repúblicaare mostly American arms. Okay, so most guns in the Caribbean are American anyway. But somebody's getting them into the República, and from somewhere. That could make it FBI business. Just could.'

'Well, if you can't blame it on the CIA, why not try Cuba? I haven't heard that the generals were top of any popularity polls overthere.'

He put his hands flat on the table. 'Mr Carr, in the last five years we've blamed Cuban Communists for everything except hurricanes, and I expect the Weather Bureau's working on that. Sure, they cause trouble; they're trying to. But we've had trouble in the Caribbean since Columbus. The Negro blood hates the Spanish blood, the English and Americans are looked on as a bunch of slave-drivers, and anybody who speaks French thinks everyone else is a slob anyhow. And the military think the civilians are lazy cows and the civilians think the military are trigger-happy racketeers. And they're both damn right.'

He took a deep breath. 'In the Caribbean and Latin America we've averaged one revolution a year – the successful ones, mind, not the ones that go blooey – every year for the last 150. Without the help of Communism. On top ofthat mess, Communism's just an extra pint of bat's blood in the pot.'

'You'd better not let J. Edgar Hoover hear you.' He opened his mouth, and I added quickly: 'Don't say it: it could be treason.'