historian. Hell, where do you want to start? Caesar’s Gaul? Rome’s
Ferrara? China in the thirties? The Koreas, the Vietnams, the
Cambodias? Half a dozen African countries? The words are there, over
and over again. Exploitation from the outside, inside revolt-insurgence
and counterinsurgence. Chaos, bloodbath, expulsion. Ultimately
reconstruction in so-called compromise. That’s the pattern. That’s
what Barak and Charley expect to play out. And each knows that while
he’s joining the other to kill a wolf, he’s got to entrench himself
further in the turf at the same time. Because when the compromise comes
… as it must … he wants it more his way than less.”
“What you’re saying-getting away from circles and straight lines-is that
you don’t approve of Barak’s ‘army’ being weakened. Is that it?”
“Not now. Not at this moment.”
“Then you are interfering. You’re an outsider taking an inside
position. It’s not your … turf, my darling.”
“But I brought Charley here. I gave him his respectability, his cover.
Charley’s a son of a bitch.”
“Is Barak Moore a saint?”
“Not for a second. He’s a son of a bitch, too. And it’s important that
he is.” McAuliff returned to the window. The morning sun was striking
the panes of glass, causing tiny nodules of condensation. It was going
to be a hot day.
“What are you going to do?” Alison sat forward, prepared to get up as
she looked over at Alex.
“Do?” he asked quietly, his eyes concentrating on something outside the
window. “What I was sent here to do; what I’m being paid two million
dollars to do. Complete the survey or find this Halidon. Whichever
comes first. Then get us out of here … on our terms.”
“That sounds reasonable,” said Alison, rising from the bed. “What is
that sickening odor?”
“Oh, I forgot to tell you. They were going to spray down your room, get
rid of the medicine smells.” McAuliff stepped closer to the window and
shaded his eyes from the rays of the morning sun.
“The ether or disinfectant or whatever it was was far more palatable. My
bathing suit’s in there. May I get it?”
“What?” Alex was not listening, his attention on the object of his gaze
outside.
“My bathing suit, darling. It’s in my room.”
McAuliff turned from the window, oblivious to her words. “Wait here.
I’ll be right back.” He walked rapidly to the terrace door, opened it,
and ran out.
Alison looked after him, bewildered. She crossed to the window to see
what Alex had seen. It took several seconds to understand; she was
helped by watching McAuliff run across the sand toward the water. In
the distance, down at the beach, was the lone figure of a large black
man staring out at the ocean. It was Lawrence.
Alex approached the tall Jamaican, wondering if he should call out.
Instinctively, he did not. Instead, he cleared his throat when he was
within ten yards; cleared it loud enough to be heard over the sound of
the lapping small waves.
Lawrence turned around. Tears were in his eyes, but he did not blink-
or change the muscles of his face. He was a child-man accepting the
agonies of a very personal torment.
“What happened?” asked McAuliff softly, walking up to the shirtless
boy-giant.
“I should have listened to you, mon. Not to him. He was wrong, trion.”
“Tell me what happened,” repeated Alex.
“Barak is dead. I did what he ordered me to do and he is dead. I
listened to him and he is dead, mon.”
“He knew the risk; he had to take it. I think he was probably right.”
“No. He was wrong because he is dead. That makes him wrong, mon.”
“Floyd’s gone … Barak. Who is there now?”
Lawrence’s eyes bored into McAuliff’s; they were red from silent
weeping, and beyond the pride and summoned strength, there was the
anguish of a child. And the pleading of a boy. “You and me, mon. There
is no one else…. You will help me, mon?”
Alex returned the rebel’s stare; he did not speak.
Welcome to the seat of revolution, McAuliff thought to himself
The Trelawny police made Floyd’s identification at 7:02 in the morning.
The delay was caused by the lack of any print facilities in Falmouth and
the further lack of cooperation on the part of several dozen residents
who were systematically routed from their beds during the night to
observe the corpse. The captain was convinced that any number of them
recognized the bullet-pierced body, but it was not until two minutes
past seven when one old mana gardener from Carrick Foyle-had reacted
sufficiently to the face of the bloody mess on the table for the captain
to decide to apply sterner methods. He held a lighted cigarette
millimeters in front of the old man’s left eye, which he stretched open
with his free hand. He told the trembling gardener that he would bum
the gelatin of his eyeball unless he told the truth.
The ancient gardener screamed and told the truth. The man who was the
corpse on the table had worked for Walter Piersall. Hls name was Floyd
Cotter.
The captain then telephoned several parish precincts for further
information on one Cotter, Floyd. There was nothing; they had never
heard of him. But the captain had persisted; Kingston’s interest in Dr.
Walter Piersall, before and after his death, was all-inclusive. Even to
the point of around-the-clock patrols at the house on the hill in
Carrick Foyle. The captain did not know why; it was not his province to
question, much less analyze, Kingston’s commands. That they were was
enough. Whatever the motives that resulted in the harassment of the
white scholar before his death, and the continued concern about his
residence after, was Kingston’s bailiwick, not his. He simply followed
orders. He followed them well, even enthusiastically. That was why he
was the prefect captain of the parish police in Falmouth.
And that was why he kept making telephone calls about one Floyd Cotter,
deceased, whose corpse lay on the table and whose blood would not stop
oozing out of the punctures on his face and in his chest and stomach and
legs; blood that dried on the pages of The Gleamer, hastily scattered
about the floor.
At five minutes to eight, as the captain was about to lift the receiver
off its base and call the precinct in Sherwood Content, the telephone
rang. It was his counterpart in Puerto Seco, near Discovery Bay, whom
he had contacted twenty minutes ago. The man said that after their
conversation, he had talked with his deputies on the early shift. One
of the men reported that there was a Floyd with a survey team, headed by
an American named McAuliff, who had begun work about ten days ago on the
shoreline. The survey had hired a carrier crew out of Ocho Rios. The
Government Employment Office had been involved.
The captain then woke up the director of the G.E.O. in Ochee. The man
was thoroughly awake by the time he got on the line, because he had no
telephone and consequently had had to leave his house and walk to a
Johnny Canoe store where he-and most of the neighborhood-took calls. The
employment chief recalled that among the crewmen hired by the American
named McAuliff, there had been a Floyd, but he did not remember the last
name. This Floyd had simply shown up with other applicants who had
heard of the available work from the Ochee grapevine. He had not been
listed in the employment files; neither had one or two others eventually
hired.
The captain listened to the director, thanked him, and said nothing to
contradict or enlighten him. But after hanging up the phone, he put in
a call to Gordon House in Kingston. To the inspector who headed the
search teams that had meticulously gone over Piersall’s house in Carrick
Foyle.
The inspector’s conclusion was the same as the captain’s: The deceased
Floyd Cotter-former employee of Walter Piersall-had returned with
friends to loot the house and been interrupted.
Was anything missing?
Digging in the cellar? In an old cistern out of use for years?
The inspector would fly back to Falmouth by noon. In the meantime, the
captain might discreetly interrogate Mr. McAuliff. If nothing else,
ascertain his whereabouts.
At twenty minutes past nine, the captain and his first deputy drove
through the gates of Bengal Court.
Alexander was convincingly agitated. He was appalledand naturally
sorry-that Floyd Cotter had lost his life, but goddammit, the episode
answered several questions. Some very expensive equipment was missing
from the supply truck, equipment that could bring high prices in a
thieves’ market. This Floyd Cotter obviously had been the perpetrator;
he was a thief, had been a thief.
Did the captain want a list of the missing items? There was a
geodometer, a water scope, half a dozen jeweled compasses, three
Polaroid filter screens, five brand-new medicine kits in Royal Society