She smiled at him sweetly. “I merely point out, Senhor — I mean, Captain — that you entered the driveway at a speed far in excess of the limit posted on the gate, which is a violation of Article Twelve, Section Fourteen of the Traffic Code; that you quite obviously did not have your vehicle under proper control — covered, if I am not mistaken, by Article Eighteen of the same section — and that you did not make the slightest attempt to see if another car was leaving as you were entering.” She frowned, as if trying to remember. “I’m not exactly sure which article would handle that. Probably several.” She looked at him calmly. “If I ever meet anyone trained in police work, I must be sure to ask him.”
Da Silva fought to keep from exploding. “Senhora! How would you like—”
“A punch in the jaw?” She shook her head chidingly, her thick hair swirling. “I’m sure it’s your standard method, Captain, but I should be very careful if I were you. In police school, I happened to be first in my class in both judo and karate.”
“If you could manage to stop talking long enough to listen,” Da Silva said through clenched teeth, “I intended to ask you how you would like to move your car and permit this ridiculous interview to end. I happen to have work to do.”
“Oh? Certainly.” She smiled at him sweetly. “I only hope you perform your work better than you drive, Captain.”
“Senhora!”
“Good-bye, Captain. Desculpa qual-quer coisa.”
This standard apology for inconveniencing someone was so patently false that it left Da Silva speechless. So this was his thanks for having been so pleasant the night she drove him from the airport, was it? This was his reward for trying to keep the present discussion on a gentlemanly level, for maintaining — in the face of unwarranted slander — the chivalry of which the Da Silvas were so justifiably proud, eh? Well!
He watched as she climbed into her car with a swirl of skirt that momentarily revealed an extension of excellently shaped leg; she backed from the gate post expertly, swung the car about, and drove past him with her hand raised in a faintly sardonic salute. With a black scowl on his face, Da Silva climbed into his Jaguar, straightened it out, and continued into the parking lot, pulling into a slot reserved for ambassadors with a jerk that not only brought a protesting shriek from the Jaguar’s innocent brakes, but also undoubtedly violated several more articles of Section 14.
He marched up the steps, straight-armed the double doors at the top, and gave the poor receptionist a look that caused her to think that Captain Da Silva had mistakenly confused her with some enemy of the public. She hastened to verify his appointment and send him on his way before he started taking out the handcuffs or possibly even his gun. The secretary of the minister was also taken aback by the sinister appearance of the captain when he stamped into her office; she hurried to inform the minister of his expected visitor on the intercom, opened the door hastily for the captain, and then quickly closed it as he strode in.
The minister of foreign affairs rose, moving around his enormous desk, coming forward with his hand outstretched. He was a heavy-set man of Da Silva’s height, with iron-gray hair and dark eyes set deep in sockets beneath a jutting brow. His face was rugged, made up of sharp planes that culminated in a jaw as rigid as granite. He grasped the captain’s hand in a grip that was both strong and friendly.
“Ah, Captain Da Silva! It’s been a long time; several years, I believe. Not since that affair of your friend Bailey. How have you been?”
“Fine, sir.”
The piercing eyes studied the face before him. “Well, Captain, you’ll pardon me, but you certainly don’t look it. What’s the trouble? You seem disturbed. Anything to do with the case?”
Da Silva shook his head. “No, sir. It’s... it’s something personal.”
“Ah?” The minister returned to his desk and seated himself, waving Da Silva to a chair across from him. He waited until his guest was seated and then leaned back, tenting his fingers, smiling at the other. “A woman, eh?”
“No, sir. It’s just that—” Da Silva suddenly relaxed, answering the other’s smile with a rather rueful grin. “Yes, sir. But not in the sense you mean.”
“I didn’t know I meant it in any particular sense,” the minister replied. He smiled once again, and then leaned forward, erasing his smile instantly, getting down to business. “Well, Captain, for the time being, I’m afraid you’ll have to put your personal problems out of your mind. What about the bridge?”
Da Silva frowned, bringing his mind back to the reason for his visit, studying the rugged face, the sharp eyes. “May I ask you several questions first, sir? I didn’t have an opportunity to talk to you personally before I went out there.”
The minister nodded. “Of course.”
“Well, sir, the first one is this; Why did they ever build a bridge out there in the middle of nowhere in the first place? The nearest civilization — if you want to call it that — is that small village, and that’s eighteen kilometers away, and not even on a map. To be honest, I had no idea there was a bridge up there in the jungle until I was given this assignment.”
“You didn’t know?” The minister considered him calmly. “There wasn’t any particular secret about it. We’re building many bridges and roads and airfields in places where there aren’t any people.” He shrugged. “Why? Why did we build Brasília, or the highways from Brasília to Belém and to the south? Precisely because there wasn’t anything there, Captain. And we wanted to put something there.”
He swiveled his chair, staring somberly out of the window at the bustle of the crowded city spread below, and then swung back, frowning thoughtfully across the desk.
“I’m sure another question in your mind is what a bridge at the far end of the Mato Grosso — but still well within our national borders — has to do with the Foreign Office. Well, Captain, let me explain. To begin with, you know as well as I do — as well as all Brazilians do — that our country needs to develop the interior. We can’t continue to crowd our growing population into the few major cities along the coast nor can we afford to continue to feed them by using all of our few exportable resources to pay for the importation of food. And just for this reason of developing the interior was Brasília built, and the Belém highway, and the new airfields, and so forth.
“Now, regarding this particular bridge and its reason for being there and its connection with the Foreign Office — our government has concluded arrangements with the Japanese government for a large settlement of new immigrants to move to that part of the Mato Grosso. Our tests show that the soil can be quite productive once the land is cleared. Contrary to popular belief, the climate is not too bad, the annual rainfall is ample but not excessive, and there are no hostile Indians there. The animals should not be any more of a problem than they have been in other sections that have been developed, and less than in many. And the rivers in that area can furnish transport, as well as provide fish for food. We feel that once this particular settlement is established, by judicious locations of highways we can develop quite an agricultural community there, capable not only of feeding itself, but also of contributing greatly to the economy of Brazil as a whole. The arrangements for these immigrants and their settlement on the land naturally come under our jurisdiction. Once they are completely settled, of course, they’ll pass to another department.”
He paused, as if to see whether Da Silva was keeping up with his explanation, studied the captain’s face a moment, and then continued, satisfied.
“This particular bridge happens to be important because the Água Branca River that it crosses — crossed, I should say — is not navigable above the village of Santa Isabel. It was necessary to bridge it to provide access by means of a road we plan to build from the proposed settlement to Santa Isabel. From there on down to the Paraná the river can handle any size boat that would be required for some time.” He paused again. “Now do you understand, Captain?”