"So's my paper. So's Goodhew's submission to Cabinet, if it ever gets there. Where there's a will ― remember, Nicky? We won't hide behind the arguments ― remember? We'll get every country involved round a table. Face them off. Challenge them to say no. International hardball, that's what you used to call it. We both did."
Denham loped to the wall behind his desk and plucked a cord from the folds of a heavy muslin curtain. A large-scale, map of Central America appeared, covered by a transparent skin.
"We have been thinking about you, Leonard," he said archly.
"It's action I'm after, Nicky. I've been doing a lot of thinking of my own."
A red boat was pinned off the port of Colón abreast of a dozen grey ones. At the southern end of the Canal, projected routes to east and west of the Gulf of Panama were overlaid in different colours.
"We haven't been idle while you've been so industrious, I assure you. So ship ahoy. The Lombardy, her gunwales awash with arms. We hope. Because if they're not, we're in the most frightful shit, but that's another story."
"Is this the latest position anyone's got for her?" said Burr.
"Oh, I think so," said Denham.
"It's the latest we've got, that's for sure," said Eccles, dropping a green telegram into the centre tray. He had a lowland Scottish accent. Burr had forgotten about it. Now he remembered. If there was one regional accent that grated on his ear like fingernails on a blackboard, it was lowland Scots.
"The Cousins' wheels grind exceeding slow these days," Eccles remarked, after a small suck of the front teeth. "It's that Vendon woman, Bar-ba-ra. Everything has to be in triplicate for her." He gave his teeth a second suck of disapproval.
But Burr kept talking only to Denham, because he was anxious not to lose his temper. "There's two speeds, Nicky. Limpet speed and the other one. American Enforcement's being given the runaround by the Cousins."
Eccles did not look up from his reading as he spoke. "Central is the Cousins' bailiwick," he said, in his borderer's accent."The Cousins watch and listen; we get the take. No use in setting two dogs after one hare. Not cost-effective. Not. Not these days." He tossed a telegram into a tray. "Bloody waste of money, in fact."
Denham was talking before Eccles had quite finished. He seemed concerned to hurry things along:
"So let's assume she's where she is when last reported," he proposed enthusiastically, poking at the Lombardy's stern with his twig-like forefinger. "She's got her Colombian crew ― not confirmed, but we'll assume it ― she's headed for the Canal Buenaventura. All exactly as your marvellous source recites. Bravo him, her or it. If things happen in the ordinary way ― and one assumes that she'll want to look as ordinary as she'll hit the Canal sometime today. Right?"
Nobody said "Right" back.
"The Canal's a one-way street. Down in the mornings. Up in the afternoons. Or is it t'other way round?"
A tall girl with long brown hair walked in and without a word to anybody swept her skirts under her and sat herself primly before a computer screen as if she were about to play the harpsichord.
"It varies," Eccles said.
"Nothing to stop her turning tail and pissing off to Caracas, I suppose," Denham continued as his finger prodded the Lombardy into the Canal. "Sorry, Priscilla. Or up the road to Costa Rica or wherever. Or down this way and hit Colombia from the western side, long as the cartels can guarantee a safe harbour. They can guarantee most things. But we're still thinking Buenaventura, because you told us to. Hence the lines on my nice map."
"There's a fleet of army lorries lined up in Buenaventura to receive them," Burr said.
"Not confirmed," said Eccles.
"It bloody well is," said Burr, without lifting his voice in the least. "We had it from Strelski's late source via Moranti, plus there's independent corroboration from satellite photographs of lorries moving down the road."
"Lorries move up and down that road all the time," said Eccles. And stretched both arms above his head as if Burr's presence were draining him of energy. "Anyway, Strelski's late source is discredited. There's a serious school of thought says he was full of shit from the start. All these snitches fabricate. They think it'll earn them more remission."
"Nicky," Burr said to Denham's back.
Denham was pushing the Lombardy into the Gulf of Panama.
"Leonard," he said.
"Are we boarding her? Are we pulling her in?"
"You mean, are the Americans?"
"Whoever. Yes or no?"
Shaking his head at Burr's obduracy, Eccles posted yet another telegram ostentatiously into a tray. The girl at the computer had tucked her hair behind her ears and was pressing keys. Burr could not see her screen. The tip of her tongue had appeared between her teeth.
"Yes, well, that's the bugger, you see, Leonard," said Denham, all enthusiasm again. "Sorry, Priscilla. For the Americans ― thank God ― not for us. If the Lombardy hugs the coast" ― his striped arm made a bowler's arc until it reached a route that followed the complex coastline between the Gulf of Panama and Buenaventura ― "then, so far as we can see, she's got the Americans by the proverbial short-and-curlies. The Lombardy will then be sailing straight from Panamanian national waters into Colombian national waters, you see, so the poor old Americans won't get a look in."
"Why not arrest her in Panamanian waters? The Americans are all over Panama. They own the bloody place, or think they do."
"Not so at all, I'm afraid. If they're going to pounce on the Lombardy with all guns blazing, they'll need to sail in behind the Panamanian Navy. Don't laugh."
"It was Eccles laughing, not me."
"And in order to get the Panamanians to the starting line, they’ve got to prove that the Lombardy has committed a crime under Panamanian law. She hasn't. She's in transit from Curaçao and on her way to Colombia."
"But she's stuffed with illegal bloody guns!"
"So you say. Or your source does. And of course one terribly hopes you're right. Or he, she or it is, rather. But the Lombardy wishes the Pans no ill and she also happens to be Pan registered. And the Pans are frightfully reluctant to be seen providing flags of convenience and then inviting the Americans to tear them down. Very hard, in fact, to persuade them to do anything at the moment. Post-Noriega tristis, I'm afraid. Sorry, Priscilla. Sullen hatred is more like it. Nursing one very wounded national pride."
Burr was standing. Eccles was watching him dangerously, Like a policeman who has spotted trouble. Denham must have bade him stand, but he had taken refuge in the map. The girl Priscilla had stopped pressing keys.
"All right, hit her in Colombian waters!" Burr almost shouted, jabbing a finger at the coastline north of Buenaventura. "Lean on the Colombian government. We're helping them clean up their shop, aren't we? Rid themselves of curse of the cocaine cartels? Busting their dope laboratories for them?" His voice slipped a little. Or perhaps it had slipped a lot and he only heard a little. "The Colombian government is not going to be exactly overjoyed to see weapons pouring into Buenaventura to equip the cartels' new army. I mean, have we forgotten everything we talked about, Nicky? Has yesterday been declared a top-secret area or something? Tell me there's some logic in this somewhere."