«I think you made sure of that before I started,» broke in Holcroft. «Yes, I’m finished. Here.»
He walked in the bright afternoon sunlight, trying to make sense out of things, the soft ocean breezes caressing his face, calming his anger and his frustration. He strolled on the white boardwalk overlooking the immaculate sand of Guanabara Bay. Now and then he stopped and leaned against the railing, watching the grown-up children at their games. The beautiful people, sunning and stunning. Grace and arrogance coexisted with artifice. Money was everywhere, evidenced by the golden, oiled bodies, too often too perfectly formed, too pretty, all flaws concealed. But again, where was character? It was somehow absent on the Copacabana this afternoon.
He passed that section of the beach that fronted his hotel and glanced up at the windows, trying to locate his room. For a moment he thought he had found it, then realized he was wrong. He could see two figures behind the glass, beyond the curtains.
He returned to the railing and lit a cigarette. The lighter made him think about the thirty-year-old ledgers’ so painstakingly doctored. Had they been altered just for him? Or had there been others over the years looking for the Von Tiebolts? Regardless of the answer, he had to find another source. Or other sources.
La comunidad alemana. Holcroft recalled the words of the attaché in New York. He remembered the man’s saying there were three or four families who were the arbiters of the German community. It followed that such men had to know the most carefully guarded secrets.
Identities are concealed every day… A stranger coming to Rio looking for Germans who have disappeared is undertaking a potentially dangerous search… «la otra cara de los alemanes.»
They protect each other.
There was a way to eliminate the danger, Noel thought. It was found in the explanation he had given the translator at the Ministry of Immigration. He traveled a great deal, so it was plausible that someone somewhere had approached him, knowing he was flying to Brazil, and asked him to locate the Von Tiebolts. It had to be a person who dealt in legitimate confidentiality, a lawyer or a banker. Someone whose own reputation was above reproach. Without analyzing it deeply, Holcroft knew that whoever he decided upon would be the key to his explanation.
An idea for a candidate struck him, the risks apparent, the irony not lost. Richard Holcroft, the only father he had ever known. Stockbroker, banker, naval officer … father. The man who had given a wild young mother and her child a chance to live again. Without fear, without the stain.
Noel looked at his watch. It was ten minutes past five—past three in New York. Midafternoon on a Monday. He did not believe in omens, but he had just come upon one. Every Monday afternoon Richard Holcroft went to the New York Athletic Club, where old friends played gentle squash and sat around thick oak tables in the bar and reminisced. Noel could have him paged, talk to him alone—ask for help. Help that was to be rendered confidentially, for confidentiality was not only the essence of the cover but the basis of his protection. Someone, anyone, had contacted Richard Holcroft—man of stature—and asked him to locate a family named Von Tiebolt in Brazil. Knowing his son was going to Rio, he quite logically asked his son to make inquiries. It was a confidential matter; it would not be discussed. No one could turn away the curious with greater authority than Dick Holcroft.
But Althene was not to be told. That was the hardest part of the request. Dick adored her; there were no secrets between them. But his father—damn it, stepfather—would not refuse him if the request was based in genuine need. He never had.
He crossed the smooth marble floor of the hotel lobby toward the bank of elevators, oblivious of sights and sounds, his concentration on what he would say to his stepfather. As a result, he was startled when an obese American tourist tapped his shoulder.
«They calling you, Mac?» The man pointed toward the front desk.
Behind the counter the clerk was looking at Noel. In his hand was the familiar yellow message envelope; he gave it to a bellhop, who started across the lobby.
The single name on the slip of paper was unknown to him: CARARRA.
There was a telephone number below, but no message. Holcroft was bewildered. The lack of a message was unusual; it was not the Latin way of doing things. Senhor Cararra could phone again; he had to reach New York. He had to build another cover.
Yet, in his room, Holcroft read the name again: CARARRA.
His curiosity was aroused. Who was this Cararra that he expected to be called back on the basis of a name alone, a name the man knew meant nothing to Holcroft? In South American terms it was discourteous to the point of being insulting. His stepfather could wait a few minutes while he found out. He dialed the number.
Cararra was not a man but a woman, and from the sound of her low, strained voice she was a frightened woman. Her English was passable but not good; it did not matter. Her message was as clear as the fear she conveyed.
«I cannot talk now, senhor. Do not call this number again. It is not necessary.»
«You left it with the operator. What did you expect me to do?»
«It was a … êrro.»
«Yerro? Mistake?»
«Yes. A mistake. I will call you. We will call.»
«What about? Who are you?»
«Mas tarde!» The voice descended to a harsh whisper and was abruptly gone with the click of the line.
Mas tarde … mas tarde. Later. The woman would call him again. Holcroft felt a sudden hollowness in his stomach, as sudden as the abrupt disappearance of the frightened whisper. He could not recall when he had heard a woman’s voice so filled with fear.
That she was somehow connected with the missing Von Tiebolts was the first thought that came to his mind. But in what way? And how in God’s name would she know about him?
The feeling of dread came over him again … and the image of the horrible face contorted in death, thirty thousand feet in the air. He was being observed; strangers were watching him.
The whine of the telephone receiver interrupted his thoughts; he had forgotten to hang up. He depressed the button, released it, and made the call to New York. He needed his protection quickly; he knew that now.
He stood by the window, staring out at the beachfront, waiting for the operator to call him back. There was a flash of light from the street below. The chrome of a car grille had caught the rays of the sun and reflected them skyward. The car had passed that section of the boardwalk where he had been standing only minutes ago. Standing and absently glancing up at the hotel windows, trying to spot his room.
The windows… The angle of sight. Noel moved closer to the panes and studied the diagonal line from the spot below—where he had been standing—to where he stood now. His architect’s eye was a practiced eye; angles did not deceive him. Too, the windows were not that close to one another, befitting the separation of rooms in an oceanfront hotel on the Copacabana. He looked up at this window, thinking it was not his room because he saw figures inside, behind the glass. But it was his room. And there had been people inside.
He walked to his closet and stood looking at his clothes. He trusted his memory for detail as much as he trusted his eye for angular lines. He pictured the closet where he had changed clothes that morning. He had fallen asleep in the suit he had worn from New York. His light-tan slacks had been on the far right, almost against the closet wall. It was habit: trousers on the right, jackets on the left. The slacks were still on the right, but not against the wall. Instead, they were several inches toward the center. His dark-blue blazer was in the center, not on the left side.