Castillo sensed eyes on them and saw that an elderly, nice-looking couple a few tables away was smiling at them.
Romeo and Juliet are holding hands, sipping a very nice Chardonnay, waiting for their caviar, while an elderly couple, probably remembering their youth, smile kindly at them.
And Romeo and Juliet are also under the watchful eyes of two Russian gorillas and Corporal Lester Bradley, USMC—all of whom are prepared to deal with however many bad guys, having miraculously located us, might at any moment crash through the door with Uzis blazing.
“What are you thinking?” Svetlana asked.
He lied.
“I was wondering if you’re going to be honest enough to admit that the Uruguayan fish eggs are as good as Russian.”
“I will be polite and say ‘very nice’ if they are at all edible, which I rather doubt.”
Everything else was still going so smoothly that he could not get Castillo Rule Seven out of his mind.
They had attracted much less attention than he expected when the limousine rolled up to the door of the Conrad. He thought there would be at least some people gaping at the limo to see the bride of the rock star or the rock star himself or a combination thereof emerge.
There were no gapers.
Their accommodations were first class, suggesting that Cedric Lee-Watson was not only a heavy roller, indeed, but a very unlucky one as well. They were all on an upper floor of the hotel, in suites with balconies that had provided Lester with an easy place to set up the AFC radio and Svetlana with a view of the swimming pool.
“I’ve got my bathing suit,” Svetlana had announced, instantly triggering memories in Castillo’s mind of the last time he had seen her in—actually mostly out of—it.
He had restrained his carnal urges until they returned from their swim, but had been on the verge of unleashing them when she entered the shower.
The telephone had dashed that hope. It was Alex Darby calling from Montevideo to announce that he and the others were in Montevideo and what he suggested was that they stay there overnight and drive to Shangri-La in the morning, rather than meet in Punta del Este and drive to the estancia together.
Castillo immediately decided that that was a sound proposition, based on a careful analysis of the tactical situation, which would also provide the opportunity for him to have a romantic dinner with Svetlana in some restaurant overlooking the blue South Atlantic.
With Svetlana and no one else.
“That’s fine with me, Alex,” he had pronounced solemnly. “We’ll see you at the estancia, say, about eleven, maybe a little later.”
Why jump out of bed in the morning?
All sorts of interesting things could likely happen if we don’t rise with the roosters.
Those plans hadn’t gone off perfectly. No sooner had he hung up the telephone and gone into the bedroom than Svetlana had come out of the shower and stood in her unmentionables while aiming a roaring hair-dryer at her hair.
When she saw him looking at her, she flicked off the dryer. “What do we do now?”
He gallantly put aside the first thought that occurred to him and suggested instead that when she had finished dressing—“No hurry, sweetheart”—that they walk along the beach until they came to a nice restaurant.
She’d smiled and flicked the dryer back on.
But that hadn’t gone off exactly as planned, either. They were perhaps a quarter-mile down the beach when he noticed that walking along the roadside, with a car trailing, were Corporal Lester Bradley and two of the Russian gorillas who had met the plane. The former wore a black fanny pack, which hung heavily, as if it possibly held, for example, a Model 1911A1 Colt .45 ACP semiautomatic and three or four full magazines, while the latter wore coats and ties and who knew what weaponry concealed.
The headwaiter of the Restaurant Lo de Tere discovered a last-minute reservation cancellation a remarkable thirty seconds after Castillo had slipped him the equivalent of twenty-five U.S. dollars.
“I’m in a generous mood,” Castillo then had told the headwaiter, holding up another twenty-five dollars’ worth of Uruguayan currency. “There’s a hungry-looking young man, looks like a college student, hovering near the door, probably wondering if he can afford your excellent restaurant. You tell him you have special prices for students and put the difference on mine.”
The extended Uruguayan currency had been snatched from his hand.
Let the gorillas bribe the maître d’ themselves.
Five minutes later, as Bradley was shown to a table near the door, he saw the gorillas in conversation with the maître d’, and a minute or so later another canceled reservation was apparently discovered, for they were shown to a table near Lester.
The Uruguayan caviar was delivered in an iced silver tub, with toast triangles and a suggestion that it really would go nicely with champagne, and they just happened to have several bottles of Taittinger Comtes de Champagne Blanc de Blancs 1992 on ice.
“Bring us a bottle of your finest Uruguayan sparkling wine,” Castillo said. “I’m told that, like your caviar, your sparkling wine is much better than what’s available in Europe.”
The wine steward was visibly torn between national pride and selling expensive French champagne, but smiled.
He returned shortly—as Svetlana dubiously eyed the caviar—with a bottle of Bodegas y Viñedos Santa Ana Chef de Cave ’94.
Finally, as Castillo sipped at the wine, she steeled herself and used a tiny spoon to extract from the tub enough Uruguayan caviar that would partially cover a fingernail, then put it—with what Castillo thought was exquisite grace—into her mouth.
Her face contorted.
“Bad, huh?”
“It has to be Russian! It is marvelous!”
Using the tiny spoon, she thickly covered a toast triangle with caviar and put it into his mouth. And immediately began to do the same thing for herself.
This is not the time to confess I’m not too fond of fish eggs.
“Well?” Svetlana asked.
“Marvelous,” Castillo said, forcing a smile and a swallow.
They found themselves looking into each other’s eyes.
Svetlana put her hand to his face and slowly ran her fingers down his cheek.
“Oh, Carlos, my Carlos, I am so happy!”
“Me, too, Svet.”
And I mean it.
And the evening is still young.
And I am not going to remind myself of Rule Seven.
[FOUR]
Estancia Shangri-La
Tacuarembó Province
República Oriental del Uruguay
1215 4 January 2006
When Castillo stopped the Hertz rental Volkswagen in front of the main house, there were already five vehicles parked there. All were nosed-in at the hitching rail, to which were tied three magnificent horses.
One of the vehicles was a Chevy Suburban with Argentine diplomatic license plates. That told Castillo that Alex Darby and Dmitri Berezovsky had arrived. There were two identical Ford pickup trucks, which Castillo guessed belonged to the hired hands from China Post Number One. And there were a smaller, older Ford pickup and a Chrysler Town & Country minivan. The older truck, he reasoned, was being driven by Ambassador Lorimer; the minivan by his wife.
As Castillo opened his car door, Colin Leverette, at the wheel of an identical rental Volkswagen, pulled in beside him.