“Very powerful man.” A ridiculous twinge of jealousy moved in Sir Denis’s mind: the thought that Patricia was being sent on this mission because she could influence the man at the American Embassy with her sexual favors. To distract himself from that unwelcome—and certainly unworthy—idea, he said, “I thought Uganda and the United States were at odds.”
“Oh, this is a simple commercial deal,” she said dismissively. “U.S. government permission is really a formality, just to guard against our buying things like atom bombs.”
“You expect no difficulty, then,” Sir Denis said, happy to have that ungracious suspicion put to rest.
Which Patricia did, emphatically. “If there were any difficulty in it,” she said, “they wouldn’t send me. I’m just a glorified courier.”
Sir Denis smiled, extremely happy, then saw Baron Chase looking at him with a crooked grin. Flustered, imagining for just an instant that Chase could read his mind, Sir Denis sat back against the Daimler’s upholstery and permitted the conversation to proceed without him.
Patricia had to be let off first, of course. Her hotel was small but elegant, on Basil Street in Knightsbridge. “Very convenient to Harrods,” Sir Denis commented, risking another smile, willing himself not to know whether Chase was watching.
“That’s why I chose it,” Patricia said. Then she stood for a minute on the sidewalk while the chauffeur removed the luggage from the trunk and turned it over to a dark-blue-uniformed bellman who had trotted briskly out of the hotel. Chase was also staying here, but would be going on first to the meeting that had brought him to London.
While Chase was looking the other way, Patricia mouthed at Sir Denis, “Call me.” He nodded, and his smile this time could have cracked his cheeks.
After they dropped Patricia off, the Daimler had to maneuver the endless stretch of traffic jam along Knightsbridge to Hyde Park Corner, then rolled through Green Park and past the Queen Victoria Memorial and St. James’s Park along the Mall to the impressive multidomed sweep of Admiralty Arch. Trafalgar Square was also crowded with the usual black taxis, red double-decker buses, endless scooting little Morris Minis looking like dirty washing machines on wheels; the chauffeur steered them around past the National Gallery, took the left, shot up toward Leicester Square, made another left, and ducked into the underground parking garage beneath one of the new tall office buildings that the British appropriately call office “blocks” and that are making sections of London (or at least so Sir Denis thought) look more like some lesser city—Indianapolis, perhaps, or Montreal.
There was no conversation in the car after Patricia’s departure, but in the elevator up from the parking subbasement to the twenty-third floor, Sir Denis said, “You realize, I’ll only be introducing you. I won’t be staying.”
Baron Chase’s cynical grin flickered again, like phosphorescent fire on a bog. “I know,” he said. “Your skirts will remain clean.”
“If you like.”
And in fact it was close enough, Sir Denis had to admit. When he had left Uganda, three weeks earlier, he’d carried to Zurich with him the results of his strange conversations with Chase; the man’s hesitancies, non sequiturs, moral probings, and the final message to Emil Grossbarger: “Tell our friend I can’t discuss the details with neutrals. He must send me somebody of his own.” Grossbarger had laughed when Sir Denis repeated this message and, like Sir Denis, had understood it at once, saying, “Zis is crooked business he hass for me.” Sir Denis had agreed, and had been disappointed but not surprised when Grossbarger had gone on, “Vell, ve’ll listen to him. It might be amusing.”
In the next two weeks, Sir Denis had been home to São Paulo, and to Bogotá, and to Caracas; all on matters dealing with the concerns of the Bogotá Group but having little to do with the Brazil-Uganda deal. Coffee prices and coffee supplies this year were unusually volatile throughout the world; in addition to the untimely frost that had destroyed so much of Brazil’s crop, an earthquake had reduced Guatemala’s production to a fraction of normal, and continued civil war in Angola made the crop there uncertain. The Bogotá Group was concerned about stability in the coffee market. They liked the price high, but not too high; they liked their product’s supply to be less than demand, but only slightly less.
Returning to London three days ago, principally to serve as a conduit of opinion between the Bogotá Group and the International Coffee Board. Sir Denis had found that Emil Grossbarger was also in town, and had a commission for him. “Zis Baron Chase is coming Sursday. I shall meet viss him in my solicitor’s offices. Vould you be so kind as to perform ze introductions? You should leave immediately afterward, of course,” he’d finished, his mobile mouth moving, and had gone off into gales of laughter.
Sir Denis had agreed, realizing at once the two reasons for Grossbarger’s request, neither of which had anything to do with formality or politeness. The first was that Grossbarger would want assurance that the man he was talking to was in fact Baron Chase and not some secondary figure sent by Chase in his stead for reasons of his own. And the second was accountability: Grossbarger might at some time in the future want to be able to prove that the meeting had actually taken place.
So it was that Sir Denis had traveled today out to Heathrow in the Daimler provided by Grossbarger, where he had been given the totally unexpected present of Patricia Kamin. His mind full of Patricia he now rode upward in the elevator with Chase, then led him down the corridor to Suite 2350: heavy mahogany double doors with the law firm’s title affixed in brass letters—eight names, the last two separated by an ampersand, but nothing to indicate what business these eight men might have joined to undertake.
The receptionist, an American girl but with a narrow-nosed oval English face, recognized Sir Denis, announced him, and very shortly the secretary came out, an older woman, dowdily dressed in the seeming parody of a rural postmistress. Sir Denis and Chase followed her down the carpeted hallway past doors closed or ajar, from behind which came the murmurs of serious, intense conversations.
Grossbarger’s London solicitor was named Lissenden (number five on the entrance door); rather than a working attorney, he looked most like the sort of tall graying distinguished actor who makes a living portraying lawyers and heads of intelligence agencies and sometimes—though not quite so effectively—doctors. He was emerging from his office as the others arrived; with a hurried wave, backing away as though embarrassed, he called too cheerily, “Well, I’ll leave you to it!” and disappeared through another doorway. Sir Denis wondered if Chase understood that Lissenden was avoiding at all costs being introduced to Baron Chase; a quick glance at the man’s profile proved nothing.
Emil Grossbarger was seated in a large armchair with its back to the sweep of plate-glass window; behind him, the low gnarled roofs of Soho could be seen far below.
Sir Denis performed a flat uninflected introduction: “Emil Grossbarger, may I present Baron Chase from Uganda. Baron Chase, Emil Grossbarger from Zurich.”
“Forgive me if I don’t stand,” Grossbarger said, gesturing at the walker beside his chair. “I’m not ze man I was.”
“I’m sure you are, Mr. Grossbarger,” Chase said, stepping briskly forward to bow slightly as he took Grossbarger’s hand. “The body may be less. I’d guess the mind is more.”
“Vat a compliment!” Grossbarger said, actually squirming with delight, pumping Chase’s hand. His mouth moved like a reflection in water, and to Sir Denis it seemed the old man really was taken with the flattery.