It all happened so quickly that McAuliff threw away his cigarette and
climbed in, bewildered; he had not adjusted to the swift change of
plans. Julian Warfield sat in the far right corner of the huge rear
seat, his tiny frame dwarfed by the vehicle’s expansive interior.
“I’m sorry to have kept you waiting until the last minute, Mr. McAuliff.
I was detained.”
“Do you always do business with one eye on secrecy, the other on shock
effect?” asked Alex, settling back in the seat, relieved to feel he
could speak with confidence.
Warfeld replied by laughing his hard, old-man’s laugh.
“Compared to Ross Perot, I’m a used-car salesman.”
“You’re still damned unsettling.”
“Would you care for a drink? Preston has a bar built in right there.”
Warfield pointed to the felt back of the front seat. “Just pull on that
strap.”
“No, thank you. I may do a little drinking later, not now.”
Easy. Easy, McAuliff, he thought to himself. For Christ’s sake, don’t
be obvious. Hammond can wait all night. TWO minutes ago, you were
going to let him d6just that!
The old man took an envelope from his jacket pocket “I’ll give you the
good news straight off. There’s no one we Emon objected to strenuously,
subject to minor questions. On the contrary, we think you finalized
your selections rather ingeniously……
According to Warfield, the initial reaction at Dunstone to his list of
first choices was negative. Not because of security-subject to those
minor questions-nor quality. McAuliff had done his homework. But from
a conceptual viewpoint. The idea of female members of a geological
survey expedition was rejected out of hand, the central issue being that
of less strength, not necessarily weakness. Any project entailing
travel had, by tradition, a masculine identification; the intrusion of
the female was a disquieting component. It could only lead to
complications-any number of them.
“So we crossed off two of your first choices, realizing that by
eliminating the Wells woman, you would also lose her husband, Jensen….
Three out of the first five rejected; knew you’d be unhappy, but then,
you did understand….
Later, it came to me. By George, you’d outthought the lot of us!”
“I wasn’t concerned with any strategies, Warfield. I was putting
together the best team I could.” McAuliff felt he had to interject the
statement.
“Perhaps not consciously, and qualitatively you have a splendid group.
But the inclusion of the two ladies, one a wife and both superior in
their fields, was a profound improvement.”
“Why?”@ “It provides-they provide-a unique ingredient of innocence. A
patina of scholarship, actually; an aspect we had overlooked. A
dedicated team of men and women-on a grant from the Royal Society-so
different somehow from an all-male survey expedition. Really, most
remarkable.”
“That wasn’t my intention. I hate to disabuse you.”
“No disabusement whatsoever. The result is the same.
Needlessly said, I pointed out this consideration to the others, and
they agreed instantly.”
“I have an idea that whatever you might ‘point out’ would be instantly
agreed to. What are the minor questions?”
” ‘Incidental information you might wish to consider’ is a better
description.” The old man reached up and snapped on a reading lamp. He
then removed several pages from his overcoat, unfolded them, and placed
them in front of the envelope. He adjusted his glasses and scanned the
top paper. “The husband and wife, this Jensen and Wells.
They’re quite active in leftish political circles. Peace marches,
ban-the-bombing, that sort of thing.”
“That doesn’t have any bearing on their work. I doubt they’ll be
organizing the natives.” McAuliff spoke wearily, on purpose. If
Warfield intended to raise such “questions,” he wanted the financier to
know he thought them irrelevant.
“There is a great deal of political instability in Jamaica; unrest, to
be precise. It would not be in our interests for any of your people to
be outspoken on such matters.”
McAuliff shifted in his seat and looked at the little old man-tiny lips
pursed, the papers held in his thin, bony fingers under the pin spot of
yellow light, giving his ancient flesh a sallow color. “Should the
occasion arise-and I can’t conceive of it-when the Jensens make
political noises, I’ll quiet them. On the other hand, the inclusion of
such people might be an asset to you. They’d hardly, knowingly, work
for Dunstone.”
“Yes,” said Warfield quietly. “That, too, occurred to us.
This chap Ferguson. He ran into trouble with the Craft Foundation.”
“He ran into a potentially vital discovery concerning baracoa fibers,
that’s what he ran into. It scared the hell out of Craft and Craft’s
fundin resources.”
“We have no fight with Craft. We don’t want one. The fact that he’s
with you could raise eyebrows. Craft’s well thought of in Jamaica.”
“There’s no one as good as Ferguson, certainly not the alternate, and he
was the best of those remaining. I’ll keep Ferguson away from Craft.”
“That is essential. We cannot permit him otherwise.”
Charles Whitehall, the black scholar-dandy, was a psychological mess,
according to Dunstone’s data banks. Politically he was a conservative,
a black conservative who might have led the Kingston reactionaries had
he remained on the island. But his future was not in Jamaica, and he
had recognized it early. He was bitter over the fact. Warfield
hastened to add, however, that his negative information. was
balanced-and more-by Whitehall’s academic standing. His interest in the
survey was ultimately a positive factor; his inclusion tended to remove
any commercial stain from the project. To compound the complications of
this very complex man, Whitehall was a Class Triple A Black Belt
practitioner of jukato, a more intricate and deadly development of judo.
“Our contacts in Kingston are quite impressed with his being with you. I
suspect they’ll offer him a chair at the West Indies University. I
think he’ll probably accept, if they pay him enough. Now, we come to
the last submission.”
Warfield removed his glasses, placed them on his lap with the papers,
and rubbed the bridge of his thin bony nose.
“Mrs. Booth … Mrs. Alison Gerrard Booth.”
Alex felt the stirring of resentment. Warfield had already told him
that Alison was acceptable; he did not want to hear intimate, private
information dredged up by Dunstone’s faceless men or whirring machines.
“What about her?” asked McAuliff, his voice careful.
“Her record speaks for itself.”
“Unquestionably. She’s extremely qualified … and extremely anxious
to leave England.”
“She’s explained that. I buy it. She’s just been divorced, and the
circumstances, I gather, are not too pleasant …
socially.”
“Is that what she told you?”
“Yes. I believe her.”
Warfield replaced his glasses and flipped the page in front of him. “I’m
afraid there’s a bit more to it than that, Mr. McAuliff. Did she tell
you who her husband was? What he did for a living?”
“No. And I didn’t ask her.”
“Yes … well, I think you should know. David Booth is from a socially
prominent family-viscount status, actually-that hasn’t had the cash flow
of a pound sterling for a generation. He is a partner in an
export-import firm whose books indicate a barely passable subsistence.
Yet Mr. Booth lives extremely well. Several homes-here and on the
Continent–drives expensive cars, belongs to the better clubs.
Contradictory, isn’t it?”
“I’d say so. How does he do it?”
“Narcotics,” said Julian Warfield, as if he had just given the time of
day. “David Booth is a courier for FrancoAmerican interests operating
out of Corsica and Marseilles.”
For the next few moments both men were silent. McAuliff understood the
implication, and finally spoke. “Mrs. Booth was on surveys in Corsica,
Zaire, and Turkey. You’re suggesting that she’s involved.”
” Possibly; not likely. If so, unwittingly. After all, she did divorce
the chap. What we are saying is that she undoubtedly learned of her
husband’s involvement; she’s afraid to remain in England. We don’t
think she plans to return.”
Again, there was silence, until McAuliff broke it.
” When you say ‘afraid,’ I presume you mean she’s been threatened.”
“Quite possibly. Whatever she knows could be damaging. Booth didn’t
take the divorce action very well. Not from the point of view of
affection-he’s quite a womanizer-but, we suspect, for reasons related to
his travels.”
Warfield refolded the pages and put them back into his overcoat pocket.
“Well,” said Alex, “that’s quite a … minor explosion.
I, m not sure I’m ready for it.”
“I gave you this information on Mrs. Booth because we thought you’d
find out for yourself. We wanted to prepare you, not to dissuade you.”
McAuliff turned sharply and looked at Warfield. “You want her along
because she might … might possibly be valuable to you. And not for
geological reasons.” Easy, McAuliff. Easy!
:’Anything is conceivable in these complicated times.”
“I don’t like it!”
You haven’t thought about it. It is our opinion that she’s infinitely
safer in Jamaica than in London. You are con OEM_ cerned, aren’t you?
You’ve seen her frequently during the past week.”