“Wait a second,” Wilson said, in no way deterred from his idea. Even as he spoke, the picture seemed to clarify for him. “Suppose it wasn’t anyone working for these men; suppose it was one person, or a group, who has decided to organize crime in Brazil under one roof?”
“You mean like the Mafia?”
“I mean exactly like the Mafia! Look,” Wilson said, beginning to get excited by his idea, and leaning over the table to expound it more forcefully, “think of this: each man killed represented a different branch of crime. There weren’t two smugglers, or two blackmailers, or two gamblers, or two—”
“You mean, the thing wasn’t organized by Noah? We don’t have to worry about a flood?”
“Shut up! I’m serious. Don’t you see? The men who were killed were probably tops in their fields. If this new group — which I’ll call the Mafia for the time being for want of a better name — began by taking over those organizations, then they could grow from there.” He leaned back triumphantly. “Now, give me an answer to that!”
“I’ll trade you two answers for a cigarette,” Da Silva said with a smile and picked another one from Wilson’s pack. He lit up and considered his friend across the table. “Well, for answer number one, your theory makes mine look as if I’d borrowed it from Einstein. Take the example of Torres, our blackmailer, for a moment. As far as I know, the Mafia avoids blackmail like the plague, probably because it’s really not a very organizable thing. Either you have something on somebody or you don’t; it’s not something you can depend upon day after day, like the desire to gamble, or to take dope, or the itch for a girl...”
His eyes were faintly mocking as he looked at Wilson. Wilson’s face was without expression. “Go on.”
“All right,” Da Silva said. “Answer number two: What about Chaney?”
“What about him?”
“Do you have an indication he was involved in any funny business here in Brazil? Any criminal activity? If he was, it never came to our attention. Did it to yours? After all, you had him under some sort of surveillance.”
“Well, no...”
“So there you are. If these killings were done by some Mafia-type bunch, for whatever benefits they hoped to gain, they’re certainly going about it in a slipshod manner; and if they ever go public, I, for one, will not buy stock.” He shook his head. “That’s not the answer.”
“You wouldn’t believe anything was the answer except your hardheaded death squad theory,” Wilson said resentfully, and brushed the matter aside. “But, no matter. Where do we go from here?”
“Well,” Da Silva said slowly, “whether these killings are being done by a death squad or a Mafia-type gang — or just some college kids as part of an initiation — we can be sure of one thing—”
“And what is that, oh great all-seeing guru?”
“That, my disciple, is this: They don’t like nasty people, right? In fact, they kill them. Right?”
“Right.”
“So what would strike you as a good way to get next to them?”
Wilson considered the question and then nodded as if the answer had finally struck him.
“Of course! Since you look like a thug to begin with, and since you have the necessary papers to prove you’re a cop of sorts, your idea is to get in touch with these people — how, I haven’t figured out yet — and apply for membership in their little family, probably as the representative of Copacabana. You point out to them how you can also contribute to their laudable goals by nominating for extinction a wayward American, now disguising himself as the security officer of the Rio consulate. This way you worm your way into their confidence and bring them all to justice, preferably in time for the final reel. Right?” He looked at Da Silva a moment and then shook his head sadly. “You mean I’m wrong? I don’t win the free all-expense one-way ticket to Peoria for the annual corn dance?”
“I’m afraid you pay your own way,” Da Silva said. He looked around for their waiter. Now that his mind was made up and his plans were beginning to fall neatly into place, he wanted to move to the dining room, eat his filet as quickly as possible, and get moving. The evening still had activity to be gotten through. At the bar their waiter saw the turn of head, correctly interpreted it, and disappeared into the dining room to make the necessary arrangements. Da Silva, satisfied, turned back to Wilson. “That wasn’t a bad scenario, but I like mine better. I think I’d like to be invited to go up there, by persons unknown. And to get that invitation, it seems to me, one only has to have a bad enough reputation.”
Wilson sighed, but there was a twinkle in his eye.
“That’s what I was afraid was your idea,” he said. “Still, if nastiness is what it takes to bring our prey to the surface, I must say that you’re the perfect bait...”
Chapter 10
“Instant notoriety. That’s what I said,” Da Silva said over his shoulder and continued to prepare drinks for his guests. He handed Wilson a pony of brandy, crossed the living room to hand his other guest Luis Rangel, a gin and tonic, and took his own after-dinner brandy to his chair and sank into it, looking across the room. “Well?”
Rangel, managing editor of the newspaper Correio de Manha, sipped his gin and tonic and stared back equably. It sounded as if his old friend and usually reliable news source, Captain Da Silva, had changed in character. This pushing for publicity was not like him at all.
“What do you want with instant notoriety?” he asked curiously, his newsman’s nose sensing a story. “Don’t we give you enough play in the papers as it is? In fact, our board at its last meeting decided we should reduce personal coverage in favor of—”
“Not for me!” Da Silva was irritated that his friend should misunderstand his motives so completely.
“Oh? Then for whom?”
“For a man named José Maria Carvalho.”
“I see.” Rangel nodded; on his small body the movement was similar to a bird bobbing its beak. He sipped his drink again, placed his glass on the small table beside him, removed a handkerchief from his top jacket pocket and lightly patted his lips, but his eyes never left the face of his host. The eyes were pitch black and quite alert. “I don’t suppose this José Maria Carvalho could possibly be any relation to Captain José Maria Carvalho Santos Da Silva?”
“Heaven forbid!”
“And you said ‘notoriety’ and not just ‘publicity’?”
“Exactly,” Da Silva said, pleased that he had been so clear, and lit a cigarette.
“I see.” Rangel drank again and again patted his lips delicately with his handkerchief. It appeared to be an effeminate gesture as he did it, but Da Silva knew very well that the small Rangel, while still a reporter, had taken on the most desperate of Rio’s underworld without fear where a story would result. Rangel tucked his handkerchief away, straightening the corners, and then brought his attention back to his host. “Just what did this José Maria Carvalho do to deserve the attention of our newspaper? I gather, from your use of the word ‘notoriety,’ that whatever it was he did was not particularly nice?”
“He’s an extremely unworthy character,” Da Silva assured him, “and one any country, including ours, would be better off without.”
“Unworthy in exactly what way?”
“He steals,” Da Silva said solemnly. “Worst, he doesn’t even steal, himself; he has a gang that steals for him. He’s the main force behind the pilferage from the Santos docks, among other things.” He paused to think a moment and then shook his head. “No, let’s leave it at that. He’s guilty of a hundred other things, but—”
“He smokes too much, he drinks too much, and he can’t be trusted within a block of a woman,” Wilson interposed, his face expressionless.