I should deem it an honor and a pleasure to meet with you. Our mutual friend will give you the details. I shall be staying in Savanna-la-Mar, albeit incognito. He will explain.
I do believe our coming together at the earliest would be mutually beneficial. I have long admired your past (?) island activities. I ask only that our meeting and my presence in Jamaica remain confidential. Since I so admire your endeavors, I know you will understand.
Chatellerault
Chatellerault …?
The Marquis de Chatellerault.
David Booth’s «employer.» The man behind a narcotics network that spread throughout most of Europe and the Mediterranean. The man Alison feared so terribly that she carried a lethal-looking cylinder of gas with her at all times!
McAuliff knew that Whitehall was observing him. He forced himself to remain immobile, betraying only numbness on his face and in his eyes.
«Who is he?» asked McAuliff blandly. «Who’s this Chatel … Chatellerault?»
«You don’t know?»
«Oh, for Christ’s sake, Whitehall,» said Alex in weary exasperation. «Stop playing games. I’ve never heard of him.»
«I thought you might have.» The scholar was once again staring at McAuliff. «I thought the connection was rather evident.»
«What connection?»
«To whatever your reasons are for being in Jamaica. Chatellerault is, among other things, a financier with considerable resources. The coincidence is startling, wouldn’t you agree?»
«I don’t know what you’re talking about.» McAuliff glanced down at Chatellerault’s note. «What does he mean by your past, ‘question mark,’ island activities?»
Whitehall paused before replying. When he did, he spoke quietly, thus lending emphasis to his words. «Fifteen years ago I left my homeland because the political faction for which I worked … devotedly, and in secret … was forced underground. Further underground, I should say. For a decade we have remained dormant—on the surface. But only on the surface. I have returned now. Kingston knows nothing. It therefore demands confidentiality. I have, with considerable risk, broken this confidence as an article of faith. For you … please. Why are you here, McAuliff? Perhaps it will tell me why such a man as Chatellerault wishes a conference.»
Alex got out of the chair and walked aimlessly toward the balcony doors. He moved because it helped him concentrate. His mind was racing, some abstract thoughts signaling a warning that Alison was in danger … others balking, not convinced.
He crossed to the back of the chair facing Whitehall’s bed and gripped the cloth firmly. «All right, I’ll make a deal with you. I’ll tell you why I’m here, if you’ll spell out this … activity of yours.»
«I will tell you what I can,» replied Charles, his eyes devoid of deceit. «It will be sufficient, you will see. I cannot tell you everything. It would not be good for you.»
«That’s a condition I’m not sure I like.»
«Please. Trust me.»
The man was not lying, that much was clear to Alex. «Okay … I know the north coast; I worked for Kaiser’s bauxite. I’m considered very pro—that is, I’ve put together some good teams and I’ve got a decent reputation—»
«Yes, yes. To the point, please.»
«By heading up this job, the Jamaican government has guaranteed me first refusal on twenty percent of any industrial development for the next six years. That could mean millions of dollars. It’s as simple as that.»
Whitehall sat motionless, his hands still folded beneath his chin, an elegant little boy in a concerned man’s body. «Yes, that is plausible,» he said finally. «In much of Kingston, everything’s for sale. It could be a motive for Chatellerault.»
Alex remained behind the chair. «All right. Now, that’s why I’m here. Why are you?»
«It is good you told me of your arrangement. I shall do my best to see that it is lived up to. You deserve that.»
«What the hell does that mean?»
«It means I am here in a political capacity. A solely Jamaican concern. You must respect that condition … and my confidence. I’d deny it anyway, and you would soil your foreigner’s hands in things Jamaican. Ultimately, however, we will control Kingston.»
«Oh, Christ! Comes the goddamn revolution!»
«Of a different sort, Mr. McAuliff. Put plainly, I’m a fascist. Fascism is the only hope for my island.»
10
McAuliff opened his eyes, raised his wrist from beneath the covers, and saw that it was 10:25. He had intended to get up by 8:30–9:00 at the latest.
He had a man to see. A man with arthritis at a fish store called Tallon’s.
He looked over at Alison. She was curled up away from him, her hair sprayed over the sheets, her face buried in the pillow. She had been magnificent, he thought. No, he thought, they had been magnificent together. She had been … what was the word she used? Parched. She had said: «I’m parched and I’ve been to the well …» And she had been.
Magnificent. And warm, meaningful.
Yet still the thoughts came back.
A name that meant nothing to him twenty-four hours ago was suddenly an unknown force to be reckoned with, separately put forward by two people who were strangers a week ago.
Chatellerault. The Marquis de Chatellerault.
Currently in Savanna-la-Mar, on the southwest coast of Jamaica.
Charles Whitehall would be seeing him shortly, if they had not met by now. The black fascist and the French financier. It sounded like a vaudeville act.
But Alison Booth carried a deadly cylinder in her handbag, in the event she ever had occasion to meet him. Or meet with those who worked for him.
What was the connection? Certainly there had to be one.
He stretched, taking care not to wake her. Although he wanted to wake her and hold her and run his hands over her body and make love to her in the morning.
He couldn’t. There was too much to do. Too much to think about.
He wondered what his instructions would be. And how long it would take to receive them. And what the man with arthritis at a fish store named Tallon’s would be like. And, no less important, where in God’s name was Sam Tucker? He was to be in Kingston by tomorrow. It wasn’t like Sam to just take his leave without a word; he was too kind a man. And yet, there had been times …
When would they get the word to fly north and begin the actual work on the survey?
He was not going to get the answers staring up at the ceiling from Alison Booth’s bed. And he was not going to make any telephone calls from his room.
He smiled as he thought about the «horrid little buggers» in his suitcase. Were there horrid little men crouched over dials in dark rooms waiting for sounds that never came? There was a certain comfort in that.
«I can hear you thinking.» Alison’s voice was muffled in the pillow. «Isn’t that remarkable?»
«It’s frightening.»
She rolled over, her eyes shut, and smiled and reached under the blankets for him. «You also stretch quite sensually.» She caressed the flatness of his stomach, and then his thighs, and then McAuliff knew the answers would have to wait. He pulled her to him; she opened her eyes and raised the covers so there was nothing between them.
The taxi let him off at Victoria’s South Parade. The thoroughfare was aptly named, in the nineteenth-century sense. The throngs of people flowing in and out of the park’s entrance were like crowds of brightly colored peacocks, strutting, half acknowledging, quickening steps only to stop and gape.