Kelly grinned and sat down. He ordered from the waiter and the kid disappeared in the crowd. It was dark now, with the lights on strobe in the center of the dance floor.
"You don't really look Italian," said Kelly with that wide, disarming grin of his.
Parson's face stiffened. "Well, neither do you."
"I don't profess to be," Kelly rejoined.
Parsons eyes narrowed. He glanced at me and then, seeing no expression on my face, turned back to Kelly. "What is that supposed to mean?"
"It is supposed to mean: How can you prove you're the man you claim you are?"
Parson relaxed. "Well, now. I think I've proved it to your colleague. Isn't that enough?"
"I'm the man who has to arrange your transportation to the States." Kelly's face tightened. "I don't fancy trying to smuggle in the wrong man!"
"I'm the right man," Parson said, his accent noticeably diminishing. He began to sound more like the «Corelli» role he had played with me at the Veleta. I sat back enjoying the give-and-take.
"I feel we are talking about two different things, Mr. Parson," Kelly said politely. "I have authorization to arrange transportation to the United States for the man who is the key figure in the Mediterranean drug chain."
"I am the man," snapped Parson.
"The man's name is Rico Corelli. Are you Rico Corelli?" Kelly wore a vague smile that did not touch his eyes.
"Yes. I am Rico Corelli." Parson's lips were white and he had them pressed together very tightly. Tension, tension.
"I am afraid you will have to prove that to my satisfaction, Signor Corelli."
Parson put his hand to his mouth. "Not so loud! That name is known everywhere!"
"No one can hear with all this noise," smiled Kelly. "I repeat, you will have to prove your identity to me."
"But I have already given the material that can prove it to George Peabody."
I shrugged.
Kelly reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out an envelope. It was letter-size. He opened it and drew out a tiny roll of film. He placed the roll in the middle of the table.
The waiter brought Kelly's drink.
Parson stared at the roll.
"My microfilm?" he asked in a hushed voice.
"No. Rico Corelli's," said Kelly.
"But I gave the film to Mr. Peabody! The real Rico Corelli film!"
"Negative, Parson. That is impossible."
"How, impossible?" Parson was running a good bluff, but I could see the tension around his eyes — tiny crow's feet of nerves fanning out into his flesh.
"I am Rico Corelli, Parson. And I dare you to dispute that fact."
Parson's face was like granite. I was reminded of the schist along the ski run. He stared at the roll of microfilm. He picked it up to look at it some more, even went to the trouble of unrolling it.
"No need to try to read it," Kelly said. "It's too small to see. And, anyway, it's a duplicate."
There was a thin bead of perspiration on Parson's forehead. "A duplicate?"
"Oh, yes, indeed," Kelly said with a smile a cobra would have envied.
"And the original?"
"Mr. Peabody has sent it along to Washington for verification with the Narcotics Bureau of his great country"
Parson stared at Kelly for a long moment. Finally he let his breath out in a long sigh.
"Well," he said. "Well, well, well."
"Indeed yes, Barry," I said with a smile. "Well?"
He turned to me, his lips twisted. "What made you set up this kind of charade? I don't understand you."
He was going on the defensive. Mitch Kelly and I had succeeded in our primary intent. We had determined that Parson was not Corelli. If he had been Corelli, he would have scoffed and laughed, and congratulated me on my little game. But he would not have knuckled under. The problem from Parson's viewpoint was that he did not know who Corelli was at all; he suspected Mitch Kelly might indeed be he. And the microfilm unnerved him. His had been fake. This could be genuine. He simply did not know how to proceed.
"Actually," I said with a smile, "this meeting was set up at the instigation of Mr. Corelli." I nodded toward Kelly.
Kelly smiled. "Yes. I wanted to see what the man who had been hired to kill me looked like."
Parson's face was a mask of old leather goods.
"You're being very humorous, Mr. Kelly."
"You can call me Corelli. You hear the similarity, Mr. Parson?"
What a damned coincidence! I thought. There was not an ounce of truth in what Kelly implied — that he had taken on the name Kelly to sound like Corelli. But it played beautifully.
"All right. Corelli. It's a cat-and-mouse game." Parson's forehead was gleaming with perspiration now. "I don't like cat-and-mouse games."
"Nobody does," said Kelly. "Especially the mouse. A minute ago you were the cat. Now you ve got red eyes."
Parson sighed. "Go ahead. What is it you want?"
"I want to know why you tried to play me for a sucker!" I snapped.
Parson smiled thinly. "I've been playing you for a sucker from the first minute I met you, George — whatever your name is, Mr. Secret Agent from America — and I do not distinguish which particular moment you refer to."
"That was unkind," I said softly. "Most unkind of you, Barry-baby." I leaned toward him. "I mean when you took on the role of Corelli at Veleta."
He shrugged, his face fixed in a frozen smile. "Very simple. I'd bugged your car. And I was there when Arturo was killed. I went to Veleta to find Corelli and kill him."
I glanced at Mitch Kelly, and he ducked his head down and drank his liquor.
"Then you were at the cable car engine room the first night?"
"Of course. I followed you to Sol y Nieve to find Corelli. It was simply a matter of being sure I met everyone you did."
"So you knew I was meeting Corelli…" I turned to look at Mitch Kelly"…midnight at the Veleta."
"Right."
"And you were waiting for me when I got there?"
"Exactly." Parson smiled faintly. "I could hardly explain away the coincidence, could I? I had to say I was Corelli when you found me. And, besides, I knew I would eventually find Rico Corelli through you." He turned to Kelly. "As I have."
"It was a kind of sudden inspiration, wasn't it?" I suggested.
"That's right." Parson was gaining confidence.
"And you figured Corelli would surface to find out why you were impersonating him?"
"Something like that"
"And you hoped the fake microfilm wouldn't have been checked by that time?"
"I had to take some chances."
I leaned back, watching him. "Not quite, Barry. Nice try. But not quite good enough."
Parson frowned. "I don't understand."
"The fact is, you cut that brake line in the Renault before I left for Veleta. You wanted me completely out of the picture. You wanted to have Corelli all to yourself at the monument so you could kill him and go off scot free. Right?"
Parson took a deep breath. "I deny it. Why would I go to all that trouble to save you afterward, when your car went out of control?"
Kelly looked at me. It was a telling argument.
But I knew the answer to that "You needed me after Corelli did not show up at the meeting. I was the only one left who could lead you to him. Aside from Juana. But Juana was not authorized to meet with Corelli until I had set it up. You had to have me, Barry. Alive. Why not pretend you were Corelli, until Corelli finally did make himself known to me. Right?"
He sat there stonily.
The lights suddenly went out in the discothèque, and then flared up again. The stereo had been turned off and the dancers had left the postage-stamp floor. Professional Spanish dancers were assembling on the small stage dressed in flamenco costumes. Six guitar players were seated in chairs at the rear of the stage.