Hinge on the job in Caracas. Lavander’s using the name J. M. Teach on this trip. Our best shot is to try to get to Lavander before he leaves the boat.’
‘Do we know where he’s going to be?’ Eliza asked. ‘This is a calculated guess, but I think he’s arriving in Montego Bay, Jamaica, Friday, early in the morning, I. . . took a wild flyer. I sent him a message telling him not to leave the boat and signed it “Quill.”
‘What if he doesn’t know who Quill is?’ said the Magician.
‘Well, he can’t run. It won’t be delivered until after the boat leaves Honduras. Then there’s no place for him to go.’
‘How about Hinge?’ Eliza asked.
‘He could come in just about any way, but considering the time element I think we can assume he’ll fly in.,
‘We can cover the airport at Montego Bay,’ the Magician suggested. ‘It isn’t that big.’
‘All we have to do is watch customs,’ said Eliza.
‘But of course!’ cried Joli. ‘There is only one customs room. Everyone enters the terminal through the same door.’
‘I’ll cover the airport,’ Eliza said. Even if he’s cautious, he wouldn’t expect a woman to follow him.’
‘Why not?’ said O’Hara.
‘Too macho. . . at least from what you’ve told us about him. He wouldn’t like to admit a woman might be in the same game he’s in.’
‘Maybe. But I also told you he’s a professional. He doesn’t take chances. And he kills by instinct— and in more ways than you can even imagine, Lizzie.’
‘Don’t start that.’
‘What?’ the Magician asked.
‘That Lizzie shit. My name’s Eliza.’
O’Hara looked at her and smiled. His eyes made contact with hers and they defied her to look away. Well, she thought, it’s about time. The first sign of any response to me since I got here.
And O’Hara thought, She’s going to get us in trouble. She’s big trouble I can tell by that look in those eyes and the set in her jaw.
The Magician was just the opposite, he could play it like James Bond or Laurel and Hardy, depending on conditions. And Joli would have other things to do.
‘Okay. I don’t know Lavander except by description, and Montego Bay isn’t that small. He gets loose and we’re in trouble. Suppose Mike and I take the boat and try to get to him before he gets on the street. E-liza, you cover the airport. If Hinge shows, give him plenty of rope — you get too close and he makes you —notices you, that is — he’ll kill you. Remember, this guy likes guns better than people. If you’re lucky, you may stay with him until he lights someplace.’
‘Then what do I do’?’ she asked.
O’Hara thought for a minute. ‘We’ll keep it simple. Use the hotel drop. Where will we be staying?’ he asked the Magician.
‘Half Moon Bay Club. We’ll get three cottages. You can get in and out without ever going near the lobby.’
‘Good. We’ll use the switchboard, If you make Hinge and you stay with him until he stops someplace, call the desk and leave a message for us to meet you there.’
‘There’s two of us,’ the Magician said. ‘We can check every five, ten minutes.’
‘And what about me?’ Joli asked indignantly.
‘Joli, we’ve only got two leads to Chameleon. One of them is Lavander, the other is Danilov. Danilov’s on the dodge, and if he knows Haiti as well as it appears he does, he could be hiding there.’
‘That’s a long shot there, Francis,’ said the Magician.
‘I wouldn’t know where else to begin looking. He’s running. It would seem logical he might go over to Haiti. If he is the Russians’ key man there, it seems likely that he knows the place better than any of them. He also has friends there. Joli, do you think you could hide a cabbage-faced Bulgarian assassin in Haiti?’
‘Monsieur, I could hide a bright-yellow elephant with green polka dots in Haiti.’
‘Good, see what you can dig up on him. Anything at all.’
‘Ah, it has always been one of my fantasies, to play the role of Inspector Maigret. If this Danilov has ever put a foot in Haiti, I will know about it, vite!’
11
By nine o’clock the King Line pier in Montego Bay was a madhouse. Local merchants had arrived at dawn to set up their stalls and makeshift shops, turning the pier into a noisy but colorful flea market. The big cruise ship was tied down, its anchor was dropped and its gangplank was swung into place. The passengers, in their white suits and cotton dresses, trudged eagerly down to the marketplace, to haggle over straw baskets and hats, postcards, coffee beans, wooden sculpture and toys. The din was heightened by a calypso band beating on steel drums in the middle of the square.
O’Hara and the Magician were waiting at the bottom of the gangplank when the first passengers came down, looking for the man they knew only by the meagerest description. He was small, thin and eccentric, that was about all they knew. Several times they had approached men who vaguely fit the description.
‘Are you Mr Teach?’
The answer was always a shake of the head or a hurried ‘No.’
In ten minutes the first rush of passengers had left the boat, and the gangplank was empty. The steward drifted away from the top of the landing bridge to attend to other duties. O’Hara and the Magician boarded the boat. With the rush of activity, nobody paid any attention to them. They were both dressed in sports clothes and could easily have been mistaken for passengers. The purser was standing nearby with a check off list in hand. O’Hara decided to take a chance.
‘Excuse me,’ he said, feigning anxiety, ‘I seem to have missed Mr Teach. We were going ashore together and now I’ve forgotten his cabin number.’
The purser looked at him with a frown but before he could ask any questions, O’Hara looked at his watch. ‘I’m sure he said to meet him here. Is there any other way to leave the ship?’
‘No, sir,’ the purser said, checking over the passenger list. ‘Mr Teach is on A deck. Cabin One-one-six.’
‘Of course! Thanks,’ O’Hara said and rushed away before the purser could ask any more questions.
The Mag waited at the foot of the gangplank while O’Hara went in search of Cabin 116. He found it with little trouble, but Lavander did not answer his knock.
‘Mr Teach,’ O’Hara called, ‘it’s the steward. I have a message for you.’
Still no answer.
Several passengers nodded ‘Good morning’ as they drifted by on their way into town. When the corridor was empty, O’Hara took out a penknife, slipped the blade through the crack in the door and pressed the latch back as he turned the handle. The latch popped. O’Hara swung it open very slowly until he could see the entire cabin.
Empty.
He checked the head. Empty too. He closed the door, bolted it and began to search the room.
The cabin was small but tastefully decorated, the bed a mess and the porthole open. The sounds of pandemonium from the dock drifted into the room as O’Hara quickly searched it.
Lavander obviously travelled light and paid little attention to clothes. There were two suits and a pair of slacks hanging in the closet. His fingers traced pockets and lining. Nothing there. One of the Suits looked as if it had never been pressed, the other had a coffee stain on the lapel. There was one tie, hanging lopsided on a wire hanger, an atrocious, multicoloured flowered tie that still had the knot in it. The suitcase was empty. A few undergarments and shirts were in the dresser drawers, nothing else. There was one book on the night table beside the bed, a scholarly-looking volume entitled The Kingdom of Oil. O’Hara flipped through it casually. Small type and a lot of it.
He checked the cabinet in the head, Lavander’s travel kit, the pockets of a bathrobe hanging behind the door. Nothing.
The entire search didn’t take five minutes.