“That’s not necessary. He wouldn’t try to cheat me.”
“Hey, come on, Fergy! It’s my ass that’ll be in a sling!
Count it, mark it; what’s the difference?”
Ferguson opened the bulky envelope. The denominations were all fives,
tens, and twenties. He had not asked for small denominations; it was
convenient, though, he had to admit that. Less suspicious than hundreds
or fifties.
He started counting the bills.
Twice Craft’s man interrupted him with insignificant questions, causing
James to lose his count. He had to start over again both times.
When he had finished, the driver suddenly handed him a wrapped package.
“Oh, because our friend wants to show there’s no bad feeling-he’s a
sport, you know what I mean?-he, sent you one of those new Yashica
thirty-five millimeters. He remembered you’re crazy about photography.”
Ferguson saw the Yashica label on top of the package. A
seven-hundred-dollar instrument! One of the very best!
Craft the Younger was indeed a frightened man. “Thank … Arthur for
me. But tell him this isn’t deductible from any future payments.”
“Oh, I’ll tell him…. Now, I’m going to tell you something, Fergy
baby. You’re on fuckin’ Candid Camera.” The driver spoke quietly.
“What are you talking about?”
“Right behind you, Fergy baby.”
Ferguson whipped around toward the high linked fence and the deserted
area beyond. There were two men in the shadows of a doorway. They came
out slowly, perhaps thirty yards away from him. And one of the men
carried a camcorder. “What have you done?”
“Just a little insurance, Fergy baby. Our friend is contractconscious,
you know what I mean? Infrared tape, babe. I think you know what that
is. And you just gave a terrific performance counting out money and
taking Christ knows what from a guy who hasn’t been seen in public north
of Caracas for over six months. You see, our friend flew me out of Rio
just to get my picture taken … with you.”
:,You can’t do this! Nobody would believe this!”
“Why not, babe? You’re a hungry little prick, you know what I mean?
Hungry little pricks like you get hung easyNow, you listen to me,
asshole. You and Arthur, you’re one on one. Only his one is a little
heavier. That tape would raise a lot of questions you couldn’t find any
answers for.
I’m a very unpopular man, Fergy. You’d get thrown off the island …
but probably you’d get thrown into the can first. You wouldn’t last
fifteen minutes with those social rejects, you know what I mean? They’d
peel your white skin, babe, layer by layer…. Now, you be a good boy,
Fergy. Arthur says for you to keep the three thousand.
You’ll probably earn it.” The man held up the empty envelope. “Two set
of prints on this. Yours and mine. Ciao, baby. I’ve got to get out of
here and back to nonextradition country.”
The driver gunned the engine twice and slapped the gearshift
effortlessly. He swung the Triumph expertly in a semicircle and roared
off into the darkness of Harbour Street.
Julian Warfield was in Kingston now. He had flown in three days ago and
used all of Dunstone’s resources to uncover the strange activities of
Alexander McAuliff. Peter Jensen had followed instructions to the
letter; he had kept McAuliff under the closest scrutiny, paying desk
clerks and doormen and taxi drivers to keep him informed of the
American’s every move.
And always he and his wife were out of sight, in no way associated with
that scrutiny.
It was the least he could do for Julian Warfield. He would anyt ing
Julian asked, anything Dunstone, Limited, demanded. He would deliver
nothing but his best to the man and the organization that had taken him
and his wife out of the valley of despair and given them a world with
which they could cope and in which they could function.
Work they loved, money and security beyond the reach of most academic
couples. Enough to forget.
Julian had found them years ago, beaten, finished, destroyed by events
… impoverished, with nowhere and no one to turn to. He and Ruth had
been caught; it was a time of madness, MI-5’s Fourth Man and two Soviet
moles in the Foreign Office, convictions born of misplaced zeal. He and
his wife had supplemented their academic income by working for the
government on covert geological operations—-oil, gold, minerals of
value. And they had willingly turned over everything in the classified
files to a contact at the Soviet Embassy.
Another blow for equality and justice. And they were caught.
But Julian Warfield came to see them.
Julian Warfield offered them their lives again … in exchange for
certain assignments he might find for them.
Inside the government and out; on the temporary staffs of companies …
within England and without; always in the highest professional
capacities, pursuing their professional labors.
All charges were dropped by the Crown. Terrible mistakes had been made
against the most respected members of the academic community. Scotland
Yard had apologized.
Actually apologized.
Peter and Ruth never refused Julian; their loyalty was unquestioned.
Which was why Peter was now on his stomach in the cold, damp sand while
the light of a Caribbean dawn broke over the eastern horizon. He was
behind a mound of coral rock with a perfect view of McAuliff s Oceanside
terrace. Julian’s last instructions had been specific.
Find out who comes to see him. Who’s important to him.
Get identities, if you can. But for God’s sake, stay in the background.
We’ll needyou both in the interior.
Julian had agreed that McAuliffs disappearances-into Kingston, into
taxis, into an unknown car at the.gates of Courtleigh Manor-all meant
that he had interests in Jamaica other than Dunstone, Limited.
It had to be assumed that he had broken the primary article of faith.
Secrecy.
If so, McAuliff could be transferred … forgotten without difficulty.
But before that happened, it was essential to discover the identity of
Dunstone’s island enemy. Or enemies.
In a very real sense, the survey itself was secondary to that objective.
Definitely secondary. If it came down to it, the survey could be
sacrificed if, by that sacrifice, identities were revealed.
And Peter Jensen knew he was nearer those identities now … in this
early dawn on the beach of Bengal Court. It had begun three hours ago.
Peter and Ruth had retired a little past midnight. Their room was in
the east wing of the motel, along with Ferguson’s and Charles
Whitehall’s. McAuliff, Alison, and Sam Tucker were in the west wing,
the division signifying only old friends, new lovers, and late drinkers.
They heard it around one o’clock: an automobile swerving into the front
drive, its wheels screeching, then silent, as if the driver had heard
the noise and suddenly become alarmed by it.
It had been strange. Bengal Court was no kind of nightclub, no
“drum-drum” watering hole that catered to the swinging and/or younger
tourist crowds. It was quiet, with very little to recommend it to the
image of fast drivers. As a matter of fact, Peter Jensen could not
remember having heard any automobiles drive into Bengal Court after nine
o’clock in the evening since they had been there.
He had risen from the bed and walked out on the terrace, and had seen
nothing. He had walked around the east end of the motel to the edge of
the front parking lot, where he did see something; something extremely
alarming, barely visible.
In the far section of the lot, in shadows, a large black man-he believed
he was black-was lifting the unconscious figure of another man out of
the rear seat of an automobile. Then, farther beyond, a white man ran
across the lawn from around the corner of the west wing. It was Sam
Tucker. He approached the black man carrying the unconscious form, gave
instructions-pointing to the direction from which he had come-and
continued to the automobis ilently closing the rear door.
Sam Tucker was supposed to be in Ocho Rios with McAuliff. It seemed
unlikely that he would have returned to Bengal Court alone.
And as Jensen pondered this, there was the outline of another figure on
the west lawn. It was Alison Booth. She gestured to the black man; she
was obviously excited, trying to remain in control of herself. She led
the large black man into the darkness around the far corner.
Peter Jensen suddenly had a sinking feeling. Was the unconscious figure
Alexander McAuliff? Then he rethought the immediate visual picture. He
could not be sure-he could barely see, and everything was happening so
rapidly-but as the black man passed under the spill of a parking light,
the bobbing head of his charge extended beyond his arms. Peter had been
struck by the oddness of it.
The head appeared to be completely bald … asifshaved.
Sam Tucker looked inside the automobile, seemed satisfied, then raced
back across the west lawn after the others.