‘How’d he take it?’
‘ “Harry boy,” he said. “I’ve got to level with you. It’s the money that talks to me at this moment because I’m running on empty. It’s not the casinos have ruined me or what I give to my beloved students and the people who live the other side of the bridge. It’s my trusted sources, it’s the bribes I pay them, it’s my out-of-pocket. Not just in Panama but Kuala Lumpur, Taipei, Tokyo and I don’t know where else. I’m skint and that’s the bare-cheeked truth.”‘
‘Who does he have to bribe? Hell’s he buying? Don’t get it.’
‘He didn’t tell me, Andy, and I didn’t ask. He went off at a tangent, which is his way. Gave me a lot of stuff about me carpetbaggers at the back door and the politicians filling their pockets with the Panamanian people’s birthright.’
‘How about Rafi Domingo?’ Osnard asked with the belated petulance that comes over people when they offer money, then find their offer is accepted. ‘Thought Domingo was staking him.’
‘No longer, Andy.’
‘Hell not?’
Truth once more came cautiously to Pendel’s aid.
‘As of a few days ago, Señor Domingo has ceased to be what you might call a welcome guest at Mickie’s table. What was evident to all has finally become evident to Mickie too.’
‘You mean he’s rumbled his old lady and Rafi?’
‘Correct, Andy.’
Osnard digested this. ‘Buggers wear me out,’ he complained. ‘Plots here, plots there, talk o’ the big sell-out, putsches round the corner, silent oppositions, students on the march. Hell are they opposing, Christ’s sakes? What for? Why can’t they come clean?’
‘That’s exactly what I said to him, Andy. “Mickie,” I said, “my friend will not invest in an enigma. For as long as there’s a very big secret out there which you know and my friend doesn’t,” I said, “his money’s going to stay in his wallet.” I was firm, Andy. With Mickie you have to be. He’s iron. “You deliver your plot, Mickie,” I said, “and we’ll deliver our philanthropy.” My words,’ he added while Osnard puffed and wrote and the sweat went tap-tap on the table.
‘How’d he take it?’
‘He druckened himself, Andy.’
‘He what!’
‘Went all dark and nobody. I had to force the words out of him the same as an interrogator. “Harry boy,” he says to me, “we’re men of honour, you and me, so I won’t mince my words either.” He was fired up. “If you ask me when, I shall answer you never. Never never!”‘ The heat in Pendel’s voice was very lifelike. You knew at once that he had been there, felt the Abraxas passion. ‘ “Because never will I divulge the single slightest detail passed to me by my highly secret sources until I have cleared it with each and every one of them down the line.”‘ His voice fell and became a solemn promise. ‘ “I shall then furnish your friend with an order of battle of my Movement, plus a statement of its aims and dreams, plus a manifesto of intent should we ever win first prize in the great lottery of life, plus all requisite facts and figures regarding the secret machinations of this government which are in my view diabolical, subject to certain copper-bottomed assurances.”‘
‘Like what?’
‘ “Like treating my organisation with a high degree of circumspection and respect, such as clearing in advance via Harry Pendel all details however slight that bear upon my security or the security of those I am responsible for without exception.” Period.’
There was silence. There was Osnard’s fixed, dark stare. And there was muddled Harry Pendel’s scowl, while he struggled to shield Mickie from the consequences of his miscalculated gift of love.
Osnard spoke first.
‘Harry, ol’ boy.’
‘What is it, Andy?’
‘You holding out on me by any chance?’
‘I’m telling you what transpired, Mickie’s words and mine.’
‘This is the big one, Harry.’
‘Thank you, I’m aware of that, Andy.’
‘This is mega. This is what we were put on earth for, you and me. This is what London dreams of: a rampant middle-class radical freedom movement in place, up and running, ready to blaze away for democracy as soon as the balloon goes up.’