Of the strange message from Dunstone, Limited, that brought him to London from New York, and a man named Julian Warfield. Of a «financial analyst» at the Savoy Hotel whose plastic card identified him as «R. C. Hammond, British Intelligence.» The pressurized days of living in two worlds that denied their own realities—the covert training, the secret meetings, the vehicle transfers, the hiring of survey personnel under basically false pretenses. Of a panicked, weak James Ferguson, hired to spy on the survey by a man named «Arthur Craft the Younger,» who was not satisfied being one of the richest men in Jamaica. Of an arrogant Charles Whitehall, whose brilliance and scholarship could not lift him above a fanatic devotion to an outworn, outdated, dishonored concept. Of an arthritic little islander, whose French and African blood had strained its way into the Jamaican aristocracy and M.I.6 by way of Eton and Oxford.
Of Sam Tucker’s odd tale of the transformation of Walter Piersall, anthropologist, converted by «island fever» into a self-professed guardian of his tropic sanctuary.
And finally of a shaven-headed guerrilla revolutionary, named Barak Moore. And everyone’s search for an «unseen curia» called the Halidon.
Insanity. But all very, very real.
The sun sprayed its shafts of early light into the billowing gray clouds above the Blue Mountains. McAuliff sat in the frame of the balcony door; the wet scents of the Jamaican dawn came up from the moist grounds and down from the tall palms, cooling his nostrils and so his skin.
He was nearly finished now. They had talked—he had talked—for an hour and forty-five minutes. There remained only the Marquis de Chatellerault.
Alison was still in the bed, sitting up against the pillows. Her eyes were tired, but she did not take them off him.
He wondered what she would say—or do—when he mentioned Chatellerault. He was afraid.
«You’re tired; so am I. Why don’t I finish in the morning?»
«It is morning.»
«Later, then.»
«I don’t think so. I’d rather hear it all at once.»
«There isn’t much more.»
«Then I’d say you saved the best for last. Am I right?» She could not conceal the silent alarm she felt. She looked away from him, at the light coming through the balcony doors. It was brighter now, that strange admixture of pastel yellow and hot orange that is peculiar to the Jamaican dawn.
«You know it concerns you …»
«Of course I know it. I knew it last night.» She returned her eyes to him. «I didn’t want to admit it to myself … but I knew it. It was all too tidy.»
«Chatellerault,» he said softly. «He’s here.»
«Oh, God,» she whispered.
«He can’t touch you. Believe me.»
«He followed me. Oh my God …»
McAuliff got up and crossed to the bed. He sat on the edge and gently stroked her hair. «If I thought he could harm you, I would never have told you. I’d simply have him … removed.»
Oh, Christ, thought Alex. How easily the new words came. Would he soon be using killed, or eliminated?
«Right from the very start, it was all programmed. I was programmed.» She stared at the balcony, allowing his hand to caress the side of her face, as if oblivious to it. «I should have realized; they don’t let you go that easily.»
«Who?»
«All of them, my darling,» she answered, taking his hand, holding it to her lips. «Whatever names you want to give them, it’s not important. The letters, the numbers, the official-sounding nonsense … I was warned, I can’t say I wasn’t.»
«How?» He pulled her hand down, forcing her to look at him. «How were you warned? Who warned you?»
«In Paris one night. Barely three months ago. I’d finished the last of my interviews at the … underground carnival, we called it.»
«Interpol?»
«Yes. I met a chap and his wife. In a waiting room, actually. It’s not supposed to happen; isolation is terribly important, but someone got their rooms mixed up. They were English. We agreed to have a late supper together. He was a Porsche automobile dealer from Macclesfield. He and his wife were at the end of their tethers. He’d been recruited because his dealership—the cars, you see—were being used to transport stolen stock certificates from European exchanges. Every time he thought he was finished, they found reasons for him to continue—more often than not, without telling him. It was almost three years; he was about out of his mind. They were going to leave England. Go to Buenos Aires.»
«He could always say no. They couldn’t force him.»
«Don’t be naive, darling. Every name you learn is another hook, each new method of operation you report is an additional notch in your expertise.» Alison laughed sadly. «You’ve traveled to the land of the informer. You’ve got a stigma all your own.»
«I’ll tell you again: Chatellerault can’t touch you.»
She paused before acknowledging his words, his anxiety.
«This may sound strange to you, Alex. I mean, I’m not a brave person—no brimfuls of courage for me—but I have no great fear of him. The appalling thing, the fear, is them. They wouldn’t let me go. No matter the promises, the agreements, the guarantees. They couldn’t resist. A file somewhere, or a computer, was activated and came up with his name; automatically mine appeared in a data bank. That was it: factor X plus factor Y, subtotal—your life is not your own. It never stops. You live with the fear all over again.»
Alex took her by the shoulders. «There’s no law, Alison. We can pack; we can leave.»
«My darling, my darling … You can’t. Don’t you see? Not that way. It’s what’s behind you: the agreements, the countless files filled with words, your words … you can’t deny them. You cross borders, you need papers; you work, you need references. You drive a car or take a plane or put money in a bank … They have all the weapons. You can’t hide. Not from them.»
McAuliff let go of her and stood up. He picked up the smooth, shiny cylinder of gas from the bedside table and looked at the printing and the inked date of issue. He walked aimlessly to the balcony doors and instinctively breathed deeply; there was the faint, very faint, aroma of vanilla with the slightest trace of a spice.
Bay rum and vanilla.
Jamaica.
«You’re wrong, Alison. We don’t have to hide. For a lot of reasons, we have to finish what we’ve started; you’re right about that. But you’re wrong about the conclusion. It does stop. It will stop.» He turned back to her. «Take my word for it.»
«I’d like to. I really would. I don’t see how.»
«An old infantry game. Do unto others before they can do unto you. The Hammonds and the Interpols of this world use us because we’re afraid. We know what they can do to what we think are our well-ordered lives. That’s legitimate; they’re bastards. And they’ll admit it. But have you ever thought about the magnitude of disaster we can cause them? That’s also legitimate, because we can be bastards, too. We’ll play this out—with armed guards on all our flanks. And when we’re finished, we’ll be finished. With them.»
Charles Whitehall sat in the chair, the tiny glass of Pernod on the table beside him. It was six o’clock in the morning; he had not been to bed. There was no point in trying to sleep; sleep would not come.
Two days on the island and the sores of a decade ago were disturbed. He had not expected it; he had expected to control everything. Not be controlled.
His enemy now was not the enemy—enemies—he had waited ten years to fight: the rulers in Kingston; worse, perhaps, the radicals like Barak Moore. It was a new enemy, every bit as despicable, and infinitely more powerful, because it had the means to control his beloved Jamaica.