Julian Warfeld was helped down the steps, his head and body shielded by
the black aides. The second white man held the door of the Mercedes;
his large companion was in front of the automobile, scanning the
distance and the few passengers who had come out of the terminal.
When Warfield was enclosed in the backseat, the Jamaican driver stepped
out and the second white man got behind the wheel. He honked the horn
once; his companion turned and raced around to the left front door and
climbed in.
The Mercedes’s deep-throated engine roared as the limousine backed up
beyond the tail assembly of the Caravel, then belched forward and sped
through the gate.
With Julian Warfield in the backseat were Peter Jensen and his wife,
Ruth.
“We’ll drive to Peale Court, it’s not far from here,” said the small,
gaunt financier, his eyes alive and controlled.
“How long do you have? With reasonable caution.”
“We rented a car for a trip to Dunn’s Falls,” replied Peter.
“We left it in the lot and met the Mercedes outside. Several hours, at
least.”
“Did you make it clear you were going to the Falls?”
“Yes, I invited McAuliff.”
Warfield smiled. “Nicely done, Peter.”
The car raced over the Oracabessa road for several miles and turned into
a gravel drive flanked by two white stone posts. On both were identical
plaques reading PEALE COURT.
They were polished to a high gloss, a rich mixture of gold and black.
At the end of the drive was a long parking area in front of a longer,
one-story white stucco house with expensive wood in the doors, and many
windows. It was perched on top of a steep incline above the beach.
Warfield and the Jensens were admitted by a passive, elderly black woman
in a white uniform, and Julian led the way to a veranda overlooking the
waters of Golden Head Bay.
The three of them settled in chairs, and Warfield politely asked the
Jamaican servant to bring refreshments. Perhaps a light rum punch.
The rain was letting up; streaks of yellow and orange could be seen
beyond the gray sheets in the sky.
“I’ve always been fond of Peale Court,” said Warfield.
“It’s so peaceful.”
“The view is breathtaking,” added Ruth. “Do you own it, Julian?”
“No, my dear. But I don’t believe it would be difficult to acquire.
Look around, if you like. Perhaps you and Peter might be interested.”
Ruth smiled and, as if on cue, rose from her chair. “I think I shall.”
She walked back through the veranda doors into the larger living room
with the light brown marble floor. Peter watched her, then looked over
at Julian. “Are things that serious?”
“I don’t want her upset,” replied Warfield.
“Which, of course, gives me my answer.”
“Possibly. Not necessarily. We’ve come upon disturbing news. M.I.
Five, and over here its brother, M.I. Six.”
Peter reacted as though he’d been jolted unnecessarily. “I thought we
had that area covered. Completely. It was passive.”
“On the island, perhaps. Sufficient for our purposes. Not in London.
Obviously.” Warfield paused and took a deep breath, pursing his narrow,
wrinkled lips. “Naturally, we’ll take steps immediately to intercede,
but it may have gone too far. Ultimately, we can control the Service
… if we must, right out of the Foreign Office. What bothers me now
is the current activity.”
Peter Jensen looked out over the veranda railing. The afternoon sun was
breaking through the clouds. The rain had stopped.
“Then we have two adversaries. This Halidon-whatever in blazes it is.
And British Intelligence.”
“Precisely. What is of paramount importance, however, is to keep the
two separate. Do you see?”
Jensen returned his gaze to the old man. “Of course.
Assuming they haven’t already joined forces.”
:’They have not.”
,:You’re sure of that, Julian?”
Yes. Don’t forget, we first learned of this Halidon through M.I. Five
personnel-specialist level. Dunstone’s payrolls are diverse. If
contact had been made, we’d know it.”
Again Jensen looked out at the waters of the bay, his expression pensive
and questioning. “Why? Why? The man was offered two million
dollars…. There is nothing, nothing in his dossier that would give an
inkling of this.
McAuliff is suspicious of all governmental interferences …
quite rabid on the subject, actually. It was one of the reasons I
proposed him.”
“Yes,” said Warfield noncommittally. “McAuliff was your idea, Peter….
Don’t mistake me, I am not holding you responsible, I concurred with
your choice…. Describe what happened last night, This morning.”
Jensen did so, ending with the description of the fishing boat veering
off into open water and the removal of the medical equipment from the
motel room. “If it was an MI-6 operation, it was crude, Julian.
Intelligence has too many facilities available to be reduced to motels
and fishing boats. If we only knew what happened.”
“We do. At least, I think we do,” replied Warfield. “Late last night
the house of a dead white man, an anthropologist named Piersall, was
broken into, ten, twelve miles from the coast. There was a skirmish.
Two men were killed that we know of; others could have been wounded.
They officially called it a robbery, which, of course, it wasn’t really.
Not in the sense of larceny.”
“I know the name Piersall–2′ “You should. He was the university
radical who filed that insane letter of intent with the Department of
Territories.”
“Of course! He was going to purchase half of the Cock Pit! That was
months ago. He was a lunatic.” Jensen lighted his pipe; he gripped the
bowl as he did so, he did not merely hold it. “So there is a third
intruder,” he said, his words drifting off quietly, nervously.
“Or one of the first two, Peter.”
“How? What do you mean?”
“You ruled out M.I. Six. It could be the Halidon.”
Jensen stared at Warfield. “If so, it would mean McAuliff is working
with both camps. And if Intelligence has not made contact, it’s because
McAuliff has not permitted it.”
“A very complicated young man.” The old financier placed his glass down
carefully on a tiled table next to his chair. He turned slightly to
look through the veranda doors; the voice of Ruth Jensen could be heard
chatting with the Jamaican maid inside the house. Warfield looked back
at Peter. He pointed his thin, bony finger to a brown leather case on a
white wicker table across the porch. “That is for you, Peter. Please
get it.”
Jensen rose from his chair, walked to the table, and stood by the case.
It was smaller than the attache variety. And thicker. Its two hasps
were secure by combination locks.
“What are the numbers?”
“The left lock is three zeros. The right, three fives. You may alter
the combinations as you wish.” Peter bent down and began manipulating
the tiny vertical dials. Warfield continued. “Tomorrow you will start
into the interior. Learn everything you can. Find out who comes to see
him, for certainly he will have visitors. And the minute you establish
the fact that he is in actual contact, and with whom, send out Ruth on
some medical pretext with the information….
Then, Peter, you must kill him. McAuliff is a keystone. His death will
panic both camps, and we shall know all we need to know.”
Jensen lifted the top of the leather case. Inside, recessed in the
green felt, was a brand-new Luger pistol. Its steel glistened, except
for a dull space below the trigger housing where the serial number had
been removed. Below the weapon was a five-inch cylinder, one end
grooved.
A silencer.
“You’ve never asked this of me, Julian. Never … You mustn’t.”
Jensen turned and stared at Warfield.
I am not asking, Peter. I am demanding. Dunstone, Limited, has given
you everything. And now it needs you in a way it has not needed you
before. You must, you see.”
THE COCK PIT
They began at the midpoint of the western perimeter, two and a half
miles south of Weston Favel, on the edge of the Cock Pit range. They
made base camp on the bank of a narrow offshoot of the Martha Brae. All
but the runners, Marcus and Justice Hedrik, were stunned by the
seemingly impenetrable walls of jungle that surrounded them.
Strange, contradictory forests that were filled with the west verdance
of tropic growth and the cold massiveness of sky-reaching black and
green associated with northern climates. Dense macca-fat palms stood
next to silk-cotton, or ceiba, trees that soared out of sight, their
tops obscured by the midgrowth. Mountain cabbage and bull thatch,
orchid and moss, fungi and eucalyptus battled for their individual
rights to coexist in the Oz-like jungle primeval.
The ground was covered with ensnaring spreads of fern and pteridophyte,
soft, wet and treacherous. Pools of swamplike mud were hidden in the
thick, crowded sprays of underbrush. Sudden hills rose out of nowhere,
remembrances of Oligocene upheavals, never to be settled back into the