“I’ll have a crack at it.”

“Mind if I ask why?”

“The only suitable reward for a spy is money. Napoleon said that. I expect to charge you a lot of money. In return for which I offer the possibility, but not the guarantee, that I may be able to dig these guys up for you.”

“How much money? I’m not the Federal Reserve Bank.”

“A thousand a week, American. A bonus of twenty thousand if I find them. And don’t bargain with me. It’s firm.”

“All right. You’re hired,” she said. “You’ve worked for the CIA, I gather. Who else?”

“People who paid me to fly for them or fight for them. You can ask around if you want—a few of them might give me references. You want some names? A lot of them are dead by now, of course. Assassinated in one coup or another. Most recently I was over in Ethiopia but I got sick of it.”

“So you just bugged out?”

“I served out the contract. I don’t just bug out. I’ve done contract work in Rhodesia and back in the old days over in the Congo and some other places. A few years ago I was down in Angola. I never sign on for more than six months. You get tired of places.”

“Do you still fly a plane?”

“When I can get one. I’ve still got my ticket, AFT license, but I don’t do it for fun. I’m not a Sunday warrior.”

“You always fight on the same side?”

“What do you mean?”

“Anti-Communist, I suppose.”

He said, “Not always.”

It was the sum of his answer. She smiled a bit. “You’re as free with information as a gaffer in a poker game.”

“What do you want to know? My ideology? I haven’t got one. Zealots bore the hell out of me. I hang around revolutions because that’s where the work is. You ever read a writer named Ambrose Bierce? I had a long stint in a Montagnard village once, the only book in a language I could read being The Devil’s Dictionary. I committed a couple of his definitions to memory. One of them sums it all up. Revolution is an abrupt change in the form of misgovernment.”

Her eyes puckered with suspicion. She had a feeling he probably had committed a lot of things to memory. She was puzzled by the mask he wore.

As if reading her thoughts he said, “Some people are satisfied with make-believe, or spectator sports or maybe playing a tough game of handball or squash. I’m not the vicarious type, that’s all. Look, we belong to a race that reaches for the moon and then plays golf on its surface. Why get worked up over what this species does to itself? Maybe when I was a lot fresher and greener I had a small capacity for sustained indignation against social injustice but you find it dwindles quickly with age.”

“You’re peculiar,” she said.

“I had a traumatic childhood you see. When I was three years old my father was taller than me. I never got over it.”

“How can you find these Cubans, or whoever, if you don’t even know their names?”

“If I start to look like a proper nuisance they may come after me. Anyhow it’s worth a try. It can’t be done too obviously, of course—if they think I’m advertising for attention they’ll pull back.”

“Isn’t that risky? What happens if they catch you?”

“I’ll be dead and you’ll be shocked.”

“Do you need to be so cold-blooded?”

“You’re pretty defensive, aren’t you? No need to feel guilty, ducks. I’m volunteering, remember? I wouldn’t be much use to you if I was the sort that went all a-twitter every time somebody threatened to cut a sunroof in my skull.”

Carole grunted dubiously: Now he was flexing his muscles again.

He said, “Have you given any thought to what happens if I find this lot for you?”

“I’m not asking you to kill them. Just find them.”

“You needn’t worry. I don’t go around killing people where there may be witnesses afterward. I don’t know of any country where you can defend yourself for murdering a man by producing written instructions from a woman ordering you to kill him.”

She said, “I want them exposed. Tried and convicted and executed. I’ve got to force Washington’s hand because, to mix a mean metaphor, they’re dragging their feet. Not to mention that exposing the terrorists is a good way to guarantee their failure.”

Crobey studied her. He mused. “You’re a lady who’s lived her whole life in a neat plastic-wrapped civilization where people think there’s a difference between the politician in column A and the politician in column B. Somewhere along the line something blows up and you make the amazing discovery that the world contains hate and violence and injustice. Most civilized folks respond forthrightly to that shocking discovery by sulking and whining and complaining. Ducks, I admire you a little because you’ve got the gumption to do something about it, but let’s not pretend that exposing this handful of clowns is going to effect much improvement in the situation. You want revenge, fine, I’ll do what I can for my thousand a week, but let’s not pretty it up with talk about justice and that rot.”

“Where did you pick up that speech? Humphrey Bogart?”

“I’m trying to make a point,” Crobey said, not without a bit of a smile. “My getting hanged or put away in Ures prison forty years isn’t included in the price of your ticket. If it gets dicey I’ll shoot to kill—and so will they. This isn’t an exercise in schoolbook justice. You want to understand that right up front, ducks.”

“I gave up believing in the tooth fairy a while ago, Crobey. I don’t really need your sermons on disillusionment—all I’m asking you to do is find them for me. Now shall we talk about the down payment?”

PART

THREE

Chapter 7

They made the transfer uncomfortably in a heavy chop forty miles off San Juan. A line came across from the catamaran weighted by a small grappling hook; Cielo’s crew drew the two boats together and with great care they cabled the money sacks across by a breeches-buoy system. Then they used the dinghy and everyone got soaking wet.

When the ketch turned about and headed back into the Gulf toward the Mexican town from which it had been rented, the three men aboard her were newcomers to her deck. Cielo and his entourage ensconced themselves along the rails of the catamaran and watched her go. The ketch slid quickly into the darkness, running without lights. A good vessel; they’d never see it again.

It wasn’t a storm, just a wind; the men stood on the open decks drying out in the warm breeze. Someone revved the engines and the catamaran’s stern went down as she wheeled toward home. Cielo with his head thrown back counted stars and felt gloomy. Before sunrise they’d arrive on the coast; the boat had only left port a half day earlier and this was its home registry so there would be no customs inspection, not for a brief fishing foray. The ransom would go ashore without trouble.

Julio was on the half-rotted little dock to greet him: a bear’s embrace. “Hermano—I meant to be aboard the catamaran to meet you but my plane from Mexico was late.”

“No harm.” Cielo batted his brother about the shoulders and they watched the men file ashore. The money sacks went into the station wagon; two other cars stood aslant on the coast road and there wasn’t any traffic at this hour—it wasn’t yet daylight. The catamaran’s captain, who was Vargas’ cousin, shook Cielo’s hand and exposed his teeth in a piratical grin and went away to drive his boat back to San Juan. On the lonely coast Cielo studied the sea and the sky and the mountains; then he spoke to his men. “You know where to wait. Don’t show yourselves. I’ll be along by noon.”