A Five Year Plan

Chapter Seventeen

Guests arriving on board the Jade entered an atrium incorporating a life-size sculpture featuring a naked girl being penetrated from each end by two well-endowed men. The sculpture, which was also the logo of Jade Films, was executed in considerable anatomical detail; this, and the ‘organic’ staircase surrounding it, provided the yacht’s focal point. Greeted by Rachel Dana and her crew in the spectacular reception area in front of this atrium, the guests were each handed a glass of Cristal and told that movies were on continuous show in the special theater that was to be found at the top of the curving mahogany staircase.

As soon as Al saw the sculpture he felt sure this was a party he was going to enjoy. A wolfish grin spreading on his blunt features, he said to Dave, ‘Will you take a look at that fuckin’ artwork? Boy, I sure wish Tony was here to see this. He’s a real art lover. Buys quite a bit of sculpture himself. He’d love to have that in his collection.’

‘Sounds as if Tony’s a regular Solomon Guggenheim,’ said Dave. ‘I bet he’s got Norman Rockwells, Dali prints, Tretchikopfs, everything.’

‘He knows what he likes, y’know?’

‘When it comes to buying art, nearly everyone has the same problem,’ said Dave.

Others arriving at the party looked at the sculpture and seemed less certain of enjoying themselves, among them Kate and Captain Jellicoe.

‘It’s by Evelyn Bywater,’ explained Rachel. ‘An English artist.’

‘Don’t you mean proctologist?’ said Kate.

‘Her work is very well known throughout Europe and the Far East. She’s is something of an institution in Japan.’

‘Is that institution as in mental institution?’ said Kate and left Jellicoe’s side to go and talk to Sam Brockman.

‘Jesus. What’s wrong with her?’ said Rachel. ‘You’d think she’d never seen a naked human body before. What about you, Captain? Do you like our work of art?’

‘Well,’ he swallowed. ‘I know nothing about art. We see very little of that kind of thing in the Merchant Navy. But I do have some rather nice prints in my cabin. Old schooners, tea clippers and British warships. But nothing like that. No indeed.’ Jellicoe frowned. ‘What sort of films does your company make anyway?’

‘There’s one showing upstairs, if you’re interested.’

‘Seems hardly sociable to clear off upstairs,’ Jellicoe said stiffly. ‘Television killing the art of good conversation and all that sort of thing. I’ve only just got here.’

Rachel took his arm in hers, and said, ‘Come with me. I think you’ll find it interesting. Most people seem to think our films are actually an aid to conversation. Kind of a therapeutic thing, y’know? It’s not like television at all. And you wouldn’t have seen any of our films on TV. I can guarantee it. We’re much more video-oriented.’

She led Jellicoe up to the viewing theater under the envious eyes of Kent Bowen.

‘It’s OK,’ Kate told him. ‘She’s taking him up to the viewing theater, not her bedroom.’

‘They’re screening movies up there? Jade movies?’

‘I thought that would interest you.’

Sam Brockman raised his eyebrows and said, ‘What are they showing?’

Bowen laughed coarsely. ‘It’s not re-runs of The Brady Bunch, you can be sure of that.’

‘Jade Films are in the hard-core porno market,’ said Kate.

‘Is that so?’ Brockman sounded genuinely surprised. ‘You know, I’ve never seen a real porno movie.’

Bowen glanced at Kate, teetering on the edge of ridiculing the Coast Guard lieutenant before suddenly realizing that this could work as a strategy to circumvent Kate’s contempt. He said, ‘You know something, Sam? Neither have I. What do you say we go and take a look for ourselves?’

Kate fixed Bowen with a gimlet eye. While she could easily believe Sam, she found Bowen’s show of innocence harder to swallow.

‘Yeah, come on, Kate,’ said Brockman. ‘Chill out. It might be a blast.’

‘Maybe she’s already seen one,’ offered Bowen.

‘I have not.’ Kate was sufficiently well informed about what went on in real hard-core porno to know that Howard’s subscription to the Playboy Channel hardly qualified as the real thing. ‘What do you take me for?’

‘It’ll be an experience,’ urged Brockman.

Kate thought poor Sam was looking more and more like some horny high-school kid. His glasses were a tad foggy, and by now it was obvious that he really hadn’t ever seen a porno movie and badly wanted to remedy this omission.

‘An experience?’ Kate snorted. ‘An experience is generally what you learn to call an error in judgment.’

Brockman raised his glass of champagne.

‘Then here’s to errors in judgment,’ he said. ‘Things would be Dullsville, Arizona without a few of them. Which, so far, has been my own life’s story. Sam Brockman, they’ll say. Exemplary career. No mistakes. But the CEO of Bromide Incorporated.’

Kate smiled sympathetically. She had much the same opinion of her own life, with Howard Parmenter being her only major aberration. Filing for divorce had been the most interesting thing that had happened to her in ages. That, and setting up her undercover operation aboard the Duke. Seeing Dave coming toward her she suddenly perceived an extra dimension to what Sam was talking about. Life was about taking risks. And not always calculated risks either. Maybe even a risk like Dave. Sure, making a mistake was always unfortunate. But not to have the opportunity of making a mistake was a catastrophe.

‘OK,’ she said. ‘Why not?’

‘Attagirl,’ said Brockman. ‘You only live once.’

‘That’s been the prevailing theory,’ said Kate and indicated the staircase. ‘You guys go on ahead. I’ll catch you up.’ She watched them go up the stairs and then turned to face Dave.

‘Hi.’

‘Hi.’

For a moment neither of them spoke. Then Kate said, ‘I’ve been thinking, about what you said.’

‘Come to any decisions?’

‘I haven’t ruled anything out.’

‘The sea’s a pretty good place to float an idea,’ he said. ‘It’s all to do with the freshwater allowance.’

To Kate’s keen perception, Dave looked and sounded just a little distracted.

‘Don’t tell me you have to pay duty on water as well?’

‘Freshwater has a lower density than sea water,’ he explained. ‘Things float deeper in fresh water. There’s an F-mark on the ship’s Plimsoll line. Difference between S and F is known as the freshwater allowance. You and I are nearer S than F. I’m surprised you didn’t know that, you being a boat captain.’

Kate lit a cigarette.

‘What’s this? The Master Mariner’s Certificate? Maybe you’d like to put me through my paces? See if I can fit new impellers in the dark, that kind of thing.’

When Dave made no reply, she smiled and said, ‘Don’t tell me you’ve never heard of impellers?’

Dave looked ready to admit defeat.

‘It’s like a propeller,’ she said mischievously.

‘Oh yeah, I think I know—’

‘Only spelt different. More ‘im’ than ‘pro’. Matter of fact that’s really only as far as the similarity goes.’ She smiled triumphantly. ‘If the impeller packs up, so does your fuel pump and so does your diesel, so it’s important to be able to get it out and fit a new one. Even at sea, in the dark, in a storm. Can be kind of tricky if you don’t know how.’ She blew some smoke across his shoulder and watched the grin spread on his face.

Dave jerked his head toward the top of the stairs.

‘What were you guys talking about?’

‘They’d just finished persuading me to go and take a look at the hard-core action.’

‘That’s where Al is,’ said Dave. ‘He’s a real movie fan. Sees everything.’

‘That’s what’s on show,’ said Kate. ‘Everything. You want to take a look?’

‘Sure.’

Kate was a little disappointed. She had hoped he’d be the type to shake his head at the very idea of watching porno. Instead here he was, taking her by the elbow and steering her toward the movie theater upstairs. He could at least have pretended to disapprove, for a minute or two anyway. She was swiftly coming to the conclusion that all men were probably interested in this kind of shit.

She said, ‘Beats me why more guys just don’t become gynecologists.’

‘Relaxation becomes harder to find when a man’s hobby becomes his work,’ said Dave.

‘Is that an observation based on personal experience?’

‘That and a lot of wishful thinking.’

‘You’re no gay bachelor, I’ll say that much for you, Van.’

She felt his hand in the small of her back as they mounted the stairs. Near the top he stopped and took a step down again.

‘Suddenly I need to visit the head,’ he admitted.

‘I thought that was after you’d seen the movie.’

‘You go on in. I’ll be there in one minute,’ he said.

‘One minute? In a movie like this? You could miss the whole story.’

‘As long as it’s got a happy end, I don’t mind.’

Kate started upstairs again. ‘Happy endings are what this crap’s all about. Lots of them. In slippery close-up.’

Dave thought he had about ten minutes before Kate started to get suspicious. He left the Jade from her stern, climbing straight onto the Juarista and then onto the Carrera. A minute after leaving Kate at the party he was down the circular stair mat connected the Carrera’s salon and dining room with the midship accommodations deck.

The master suite was the full width of the boat and featured a sitting area, a large walk-in closet, and a generous bathroom with a Jacuzzi. Dave guessed this was the cabin occupied by Kent Bowen. Lying on the floor of the closet were some garishly colored sports shirts he thought he had seen Bowen wearing. And there was no mistaking the sweet antiseptic smell of Brut aftershave that always signalled Bowen’s presence. Quickly, Dave opened some of the drawers and almost immediately found what he was looking for: a medium-frame .357 Magnum in a ProPak undercover shoulder holster, and a wallet containing business cards. Dave thumbed one out and read it quickly. The embossed gold roundel in the top left-hand corner of the card was easily recognizable. It identified the Department of Justice just as surely as the printed information alongside. Kent Bowen was an Assistant Special Agent in Charge at Miami’s FBI HQ on Second Avenue.

‘Jesus Christ,’ he exclaimed.

Dave replaced the card, closed the drawer carefully and then went next door to search Kate’s stateroom. This was tidier than Bowen’s. The bed was made, with cushions scattered across the silk brocade spread. Clothes were neatly hung in the closet, but there was nothing in the built-in drawers to interest Dave. Apart from some very sexy underwear.

‘Just the facts, ma’am,’ he muttered and, closing the drawer, he backed out of the closet.

His heel struck something hard underneath the spread. Guessing that there was probably a linen drawer under the bed just like the one in his own stateroom, Dave dropped to his knees, threw back the spread, and grabbed hold of the drawer handle. Hauling it open he found everything he would have expected to find in a linen drawer. He had to reach right to the back to put his hand on the familiar shape he’d been half expecting. The next second he was looking at a Smith & Wesson Airweight .38, holstered in a nice leather Vega, although the gun’s shrouded hammer made it about perfect for a handbag. Attached to the holster’s strap was an ID wallet containing an FBI badge and card identifying Kate, not as Kate Parmenter, but as Kate Furey, Special Agent. She looked younger in the photograph and her hair was different. But there was no mistaking that launch-a-thousand-ships face.

Dave nodded with bitter satisfaction. He didn’t know whether to whoop or to wail.

‘A Fed,’ he mumbled. ‘She’s a goddamn lousy Fed.’

The only question was what she and Bowen and the other guy, who was probably a Fed too, were doing on the Duke. There was no way they could know about Dave’s score. Unless it was the money they were onto.

‘Fucking Feds.’

He dived back into the drawer in search of something that might tell him what this was all about, but found nothing. He shut the drawer and went into the head. His eyes noted the brand of her perfume for future reference, a small bottle of Murine eye-drops, some suntan lotion, and an impressive array of mouthwash, dental floss, toothpicks and plaque-disclosing tablets that helped explain Kate’s Ford model smile. The drawers were empty, but in a closet under the basin he found a TEAC reel-to-reel tape machine. The kind of tape that wasn’t meant to play Handel’s Water Music when you were lying in the tub. Dave knew it was set up to record from some kind of listening device. But planted where? On whose boat?

Twisting a knob he rewound the tape for a couple of seconds. The least he could do in the time available was verify that the Feds weren’t interested in him, or in the Russkie money.

The tape began to play.

He was listening to the voices of a man and a woman. The man was American but the woman sounded as if she was from Australia. The accent would help to narrow it down. Not that it really mattered. None of the Russian boats had any female supernumos. And these two weren’t saying anything interesting. Just some shit about this and that. Dave switched the tape off and started to grin. The Feds were watching someone else’s boat. Someone Dave didn’t even know about. Everything was fine. His five year plan could go ahead more or less as scheduled. Submarine permitting. And seeing those FBI shields and ID cards had given him an idea.

For about ten minutes Kate was too shocked to notice Dave’s prolonged absence. Her imagination was abruptly ordered somewhere else, as not the smallest aspect of human anatomy escaped the attention of the camera: every mucous tract, subcutaneous fold and sebaceous follicle. But what was most surprising to her was not the explicit intimacy of what was depicted, but that there should be any women who were still willing to have unprotected anal intercourse. Just where had these women been for the last ten virally preoccupied years? Did they imagine that just because they were doing it in a movie they would be protected by the special effects department?

Almost as fascinating to Kate as what was happening on the screen were the faces of the audience. Bowen grinning like an ape. Sam Brockman cleaning his glasses every few minutes and making a silent whistling noise from time to time. Rachel Dana watching Jellicoe and enjoying his thunderstruck demeanor. Two of the targets from the Britannia, Nicky Vallbona and Webb Garwood, laughing loudly and cracking the most tasteless jokes. Kate wondered if Bowen had even registered that they were there.

She’d heard men — Howard was one such — claim that porno was boring, but somehow she’d never quite believed it. Bowen looked anything but bored. Even in the half-darkness of the Jade’s viewing theater, she could see a light sheen of sweat glistening on his upper lip which he wiped periodically with the back of his hand. But after a while she realized she really was bored. It wasn’t so much the lack of story she found tedious as the monotonous serial continuity, as if what was being enacted was a precise ritual. The girl always sucked the man before he licked her; then, always, he penetrated her vagina as a prelude to sodomy, before finally he came all over her face as if by this final act of degradation the reality of what was happening was there revealed. To Kate this last act in the ritual pointed up the lie of porno: no man had ever come in her face, and if it ever did happen — woe betide the guy who thought he could get away with that shit — she would hardly have been disposed to treat his load as if it had been the choicest Beluga.

Dave sat down beside her and said, ‘Aren’t you grossed out yet?’

‘Where have you been?’ she demanded.

‘I got detained. Did you know Calgary Stanford is on this ship?’

‘The movie actor?’

‘I’ve just been talking to him.’

‘What’s he like?’

‘Kind of ordinary, really.’

Dave glanced around the little theater and caught sight of Al, and then one of the guys from the Baby Doc. Al’s face was something by Goya; grotesque. Kate was shaking her head.

She said, ‘People just do not behave like this. Even in movies. They don’t go around fucking each other like rabbits. It’s just not feasible.’

Dave looked sideways at her and said, ‘Feasible? You sound like you’ve got the latest Nielsen figures on this one, Kate.’ He looked back up at the screen and then grimaced. ‘Anyway, these aren’t movies. Not the ones I go to.’

‘Hey, I’m the one who’s supposed to say that. C’mon,’ she said. ‘Let’s get out of here before the next money shot. While I’ve still got an appetite.’

Going downstairs, Dave said, ‘Why don’t you come back to my boat and let me make you a sandwich?’

‘Sounds good. Besides, I need a little air. The breathing’s getting kind of noticeable in there. Like a locker room in winter. Now I know what it’s like to sit in a car with a hosepipe attached to the exhaust. I guess that’s why it’s called a blue movie.’

Kate watched Dave make the sandwiches. He did it carefully, and with a touch of panache, as if he enjoyed cooking and preparing food. In some ways he was quite the new man. In others he was reassuringly like all the old ones. She liked the way he wasn’t always speaking, as if he was used to his own company and didn’t mind it. Self-contained, she thought.

‘You can be quiet if you want, Van,’ she said. ‘I don’t mind. I like a bit of Dolby in my men. The thing that cuts down on noise, y’know? Like an electronic blue pencil. I bet you’re the kind to let a girl talk herself into bed.’

‘Could be.’ Dave returned to the sofa with a plate of neatly cut sandwiches.

Kate waited until he had picked one up and was teeing up his first mouthful. She said, ‘Take me to bed, Van. Right now. No more hard-boiled. From now on, I’m zip-lipped.’

Dave looked at her and then back at his sandwich which stayed about an inch away from his mouth. He said, ‘You mean right now?’

‘Before I think about it some more and change my mind.’

Kate had no intention of changing her mind. Maybe she did have one or two reservations about what he had told her: her best guess was that he had fed her this story in order to find out if it was him or his money she was really interested in. She would probably have done the same thing herself. She understood about money, even if she was not much interested in it herself. For Howard, money had been the major motivation of nearly everything he did. He was driven by money, as if it turned up at the start of every day with a peaked cap and a mobile phone. For Kate it was merely the means to an end, and right now it had little or no relevance to what she wanted most, which was to go to bed with Dave. But she enjoyed making him choose between having a sandwich and having her. She leaned toward him and nuzzled his ear with the tip of her nose.

‘Where I’m taking you now,’ she said, ‘the cooking’s wonderful, painstakingly prepared, and the service is excellent. So don’t even think about eating anything else. Not if you ever want to be welcome back to this restaurant.’

Dave put down his sandwich. He was hungry but there were some things better done on an empty stomach.

‘Did you sleep OK?’

Dave stretched on his king-sized bed and rolled toward her.

‘Weird,’ he said. ‘I dreamed I had Alzheimer’s disease. Only trouble is I’ve forgotten what happened.’

Kate glanced at her watch.

‘Still joking at six o’clock in the morning, I see.’

Dave grinned and rolled on top of her.

‘Can you think of anything else to do?’

‘I could make you breakfast,’ she offered. ‘I feel kind of guilty about making you sacrifice that sandwich.’

‘I’ve forgotten about that too. Breakfast sounds good, though. I could eat a horse.’

As he slipped out of bed, Kate said, ‘I already did.’

Dave grinned again. ‘You haven’t forgotten about my proposition, have you?’ he asked.

‘What proposition is that, lover?’

‘You know? Living with the famous Phantom, in the South of France?’

‘Oh yeah, that. The Pink Panther thing. No, I hadn’t forgotten about it. I’m like an elephant. I never forget a name or a face.’

Dave nodded. A good memory for names and faces was probably a job requirement for a Fed.

‘And?’

‘This is some kind of test, right? Like the three caskets in The Merchant of Venice. Gold, silver and lead.’ Kate searched Dave’s face for some sign that he recognized she knew what he was up to. ‘All that glisters is not gold?’

‘So which is it to be?’

She rolled across the crumpled sheets toward him and sat up. ‘With you? I don’t know. If I said I chose lead, you’d probably shoot me.’ Kate wagged her finger at him. ‘Come on, Dave. I’m not interested in the money.’

Dave flinched. ‘What money?’

‘Your money. The Dulanotov family fortune.’

‘Oh, that.’ He lit a cigarette. ‘Maybe I didn’t make myself clear. But it’s like I told you. The money’s based on crime. There’s no family fortune. I’m a thief, Kate. I steal for a living. Like old Cary Grant.’

She shrugged. ‘OK. If you say so. Well then I haven’t ruled out becoming Grace. Not yet.’

Like hell she hasn’t, thought Dave, and went to take a shower.

Kate frowned. He really was serious about this test of his. Couldn’t he see she wasn’t remotely interested in his money? As soon as she heard the water running Kate started to search the room. It wasn’t that she shared Kent Bowen’s suspicions of him. That was just stupid jealousy. But Dave volunteered so little about himself and she wanted to know more than the crumbs she had gleaned from the few questions he had honored with straight answers. She didn’t think for a moment he was a thief. How many thieves knew Shakespeare and Pushkin? But there was something he wasn’t telling her, of that she was sure. Something that she needed to find out. At the FBI training academy she had learned to recognize when someone was hiding something. For a brief period in her early career she had entertained notions of joining the Behavioral Science Unit. But after The Silence of the Lambs came along it seemed that everyone wanted to be Jack Crawford or Clarice Starling, and she had ended up in General Investigations and Narcotics. Now, looking over the room, she had no idea what she was searching for. The large number of books only seemed to underline what she already knew — that Dave was widely read. Most of the clothes in his closet were predictably new and came from expensive shops, as she had expected. There was no cash lying around. Nor any travellers’ cheques, credit cards; not even a driver’s license. Most infuriating of all, she could not find Dave’s passport. The explanation was inside Dave’s walk-in closet. A combination wall safe. Just what any self-respecting millionaire would have had. You didn’t stay rich by leaving money lying around.

Kate came out of the closet and sat on the edge of the bed. If only she had taken the safe-cracking course instead of psychology. Absently she stared at Dave’s bookshelf. It was like a reading list for a summer school. Many of the titles were classics. Tolstoy, Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Nabokov. Even a few published movie scripts. A nod to post modernism. Some philosophy too: Wittgenstein, Kierkegaard, Gilbert Ryle and George Steiner. But the more she stared at the books the more it started to seem that for all its apparent inclusiveness, there was something missing, like a piece from a cutlery set. Yes, that was it. And not just one piece. Maybe one whole item. Like a set of fish knives. Gradually she perceived what it was. There were no books on business. Not one. And this struck her as curious. Millionaires were interested in money, weren’t they? Especially if they worked in Miami’s Financial Center. Howard had been forever reading books about making money. Beating the Dow. One Up on Wall Street. The Midas Touch. The Three Minute Manager. He must have bought that one just around the time he was reading The Two Minute Lover.

Kate picked out Dave’s well-thumbed paperback edition of Crime and Punishment. She hadn’t read the novel since she’d been in Law School, when it really had seemed like one of those books that might change your life. Or, at the very least, the way you thought about criminals. Idly she was turning back the cover when something caught her eye. Something was printed there, on the inside cover, in bright blue ink.

Something was stamped on it.

She stared at it incredulously, as if she had been admiring some clever bookplate, reading the words printed inside the simple roundel with more care than if they had been a visa on the passport for which she had been searching.

But this was something much more revealing.

She whispered the words out loud, as if she needed to hear them spoken in order to absorb what was implied.

‘Property of the Miami Correctional Center at Homestead?’

Could it be that Dave really was a thief? And not just a thief, but an ex-con?

Hearing his shower end, she closed the book and returned it quickly to the shelf. Then, slipping into the spare dressing gown, she left the stateroom and went up to the galley. Maybe she could rustle up a relaxed, loving and laid-back sort of face along with some breakfast.

In the galley Kate put on the kettle to boil, and started to fry some ham and eggs, all the while considering the evidence that was before her: the new clothes; the bookshelf more typical of some jailhouse autodidact than a millionaire; and the five aces Cary Grant-style proposition he had made her. There seemed to be no other conclusion that she could form. Dave really was a thief, and a convicted one too. She realized that he had been perfectly serious, as indeed he had said he was.

Al, summoned upstairs to the galley by the smell of fresh coffee and frying sausage and ham, brought home to her this wasn’t a Cary Grant movie. Al was Luca Brazzi, Tony Montana and Jimmy Conway all squeezed into the one short-barrelled pump-action shotgun. Right down to the rifle sight, the hardwood stock attitude, and the blue metal jaw.

‘Time is it?’ he growled.

‘Just after six,’ she said, perky as an airline stewardess responding to a first-class passenger. You got all sorts going first class these days.

‘Six o’clock? Jesus, what are we doing, abandoning ship or something? Six o’clock.’

‘You want some breakfast?’

Al sighed uncomfortably and stooped to look out of the galley window, checking on the weather. He sniffed loudly, like he was hunched over a couple of lines of coke, and said, ‘I can’t make up my mind if it’s better to eat so that I got something to throw up or if it’s better not to eat so that I don’t throw up at all.’

Kate smiled sweetly, trying to overcome her nerves. Who were these guys? And what were they doing on the ship? Was it possible they had anything to do with Rocky Envigado?

‘Al?’ she said. ‘Have you heard the expression, the cook could use a hug? This particular cook only requires a "yes please" or a "no thank-you". The ultimate destination of this food I’m cooking, be it toilet bowl or ocean, is of absolutely no account to me.’

Al grunted biliously. Uncertainly he eyed the breakfast Kate was cooking. Rubbing his bare belly, for he was only wearing shorts, he said, ‘Maybe I’ll just have some Wheaties.’

‘Have you got a hangover or something?’

‘Naw. I’m feeling sick in anticipation of feeling sick, on account of the weather.’ Al poured out a bowlful of cereal, then some milk, and began to shovel the stuff into his mouth.

‘The weather? What about it?’

‘You don’t notice it, huh?’ he remarked with milk dribbling down his unshaven chin. ‘Must be another good sailor. Like the boss.’

Kate glanced out the window. What with making love and her shock discovery about Dave, she had hardly noticed the swell underneath the ship. Outside the sky was gray and threatening and a stiff breeze was whipping the flag on the stern of the Jade in front of them. It looked as if the storm was catching up to them after all.

‘Me, I ain’t much of a sailor,’ confessed Al. ‘I get sick looking at a glass of salt water.’

‘It does look kind of rough,’ Kate admitted.

Coming into the galley, Dave said, ‘Are you talking about Al, or the weather?’

Al sneered, dumped his empty bowl in the sink, and reached for the coffee jug. Kate stepped fastidiously out of his way as from a large and smelly dog.

Noticing her flinch from Al’s bare torso, Dave said, ‘Couldn’t you put a shirt or something on, Al? It’s like having a giant coconut rolling around in here.’

Al slurped some coffee and said, ‘Some women like hairy men.’

Dave said, ‘Dian Fossey and Fay Wray don’t happen to be sailing with us.’

‘Let me tell you about this gorilla thing,’ said Al. ‘Hairy guys have got more intelligence than smooth as shit ones like yourself, boss. Now that’s a fact. It was in the Herald. Scientists have done a survey and proved it. Smart guys have hairy chests. Lotta doctors. Lotta college professors. Not many lawyers. No cops. Lotta writers. And the really smart guys have hairy backs to match.’

‘Say anything about hairy brains in that survey, Al?’ laughed Dave. He looked at Kate, who smiled back at him faintly. ‘Well that’s a new one on me. It certainly puts a different spin on the story of Samson, I suppose. It’s not the guy’s relationship with God she screws when she cuts his hair, but his IQ.’

‘You can laugh all you like,’ said Al, marching out of the galley. ‘But that’s a fact.’

Kate cleared her throat nervously and kept on trying to get her smile right, even when Dave smiled apologetically. Now that she saw him again, he did look like he might be a high-class jewel thief. He probably relied on Al to drive his getaway car, or to provide muscle when it was required.

When Al had gone, Dave shook his head. ‘Al,’ he said simply. ‘Some guy, huh? I told you he was an animal.’

‘I think that’s the first time I’ve seen the two of you together,’ she said.

‘That’s easy to explain.’ Folding her up in his arms, Dave inspected the breakfast that Al had declined. ‘We’re like Jekyll and Hyde. Mmmm, that looks good.’

‘And which one of you is Mister Hyde?’

‘Well he is, of course. Didn’t you notice the hair on the backs of his hands? The guy’s like a goddamn doormat.’

Kate pulled away and started to serve Dave his breakfast.

‘Something the matter?’ he asked. ‘You still cool about last night?’

‘Everything’s fine,’ she said, and anxious to reassure him, she added, ‘You know what?’ she said. ‘If you were Mister Hyde? I’d be Missus Seek.’

‘That sounds promising.’

He wondered if there was anything at all in her show of prevarication. Was she just trying to amuse herself during an otherwise uneventful undercover surveillance? Or was there genuinely something more there? It seemed impossible to find out until the heist itself was out of the way. He sat down at the dinette table and began to eat what was put in front of him. He said, ‘I’m sure I’d rather share a divided consciousness with you than with Al. Think about it. A fifty-fifty partnership. Straight down the middle.’

Kate said, ‘Straight? You’ve hardly been that.’

His mouth full of food, Dave stretched his eyebrows back at her.

‘What I mean to say,’ she explained hurriedly, ‘is that you’ve not exactly told me very much about what you do. I can’t just leave Kent’s employment without knowing a little more about you. About what you do. About where you live.’

‘I told you,’ said Dave. ‘I steal rocks. Same as old John Robie in To Catch a Thief. The Cat. Actually, I don’t bother with a handle. Or a white monogrammed glove. There’s no point in making it easy for the police to nail me for a lot of other scores in the unlikely eventuality that I get caught. Naturally I only steal from those who can afford it. Matter of fact I thought there might be some nice stones on this ship. Until I discovered the owners seldom travel with their boats. That was before the air traffic controllers heard about my predicament and decided to try and help out.’

‘It’s over,’ said Kate. "The strike. It was on the radio yesterday afternoon.’

‘Is that so? Well this trip has been very disappointing, at least from a professional POV. No jewels, no cash, not even a small Picasso. Makes you wonder what people are spending their money on these days. Security and porno, I guess. There’s not much of a margin in that for someone like me, Kate.’ He sighed. ‘I hope things are better on the Cote d’Azure.’

‘You’re really serious about this?’

‘I’m always serious about partnership, Kate. After last night you should know that. But for another reason too. I already have a partner. There’s Al to consider.’

Kate felt herself recovering some of her poise.

‘Replacing Al, well it’s very flattering,’ she said. ‘But you know, business could sound more promising. You could try selling me the terms of our agreement. What’s in it for me? What can I do? That kind of thing.’

‘I’ve told you, that’s not my style. Besides, you know the terms. Yesterday I heard you say them yourself. For richer for poorer, for better for worse. Fifty-fifty, Kate. With all my worldly goods I thee endow. What do you say?’

‘You’re really asking me to marry you?’

Dave forked some ham into his mouth and nodded.

Kate smiled. ‘But I don’t even know you.’

‘People who don’t know each other get married every day. I know. I read it in the paper.’

She sat down opposite him, flabbergasted. Would he be half as keen to marry her if he knew she was a Fed?

‘When does your divorce come through?’ he asked.

‘Couple of months.’

‘Get married then.’

He was enjoying her predicament. He sensed that she loved him as much as he loved her. Perhaps she even wanted to marry him and but for her being a special agent working undercover, she might have agreed. At the same time he was thinking how good it had been last night. And how comfortable he felt with her now. How reluctant he would be to leave her. Time was running out, fast. In eighteen hours he and Al were going to do the job. After that he might never see her again. The truth was that he meant what he said. If keeping her had been merely a matter of marrying her, he would have done it right away. About the only card he had left to play was that he knew what she was. A Fed. But he would only play that one when the time came to leave, when she knew more or less everything, but not before.

‘You like going fast, don’t you, Van?’

‘I’m going to the Monaco Grand Prix, remember?’

‘I thought it was the financial guy who was going, not John Robie.’

‘Grand Prix is good for cat burglars. Makes a lot of noise. People don’t hear much during and after a Formula One motor race. And Monte Carlo is always Monte Carlo. There’re always a lot of stones around. It’s like Tiffany’s with a roulette wheel and a nice beach.’ Dave straightened his knife and fork and reached across the table to curl a length of Kate’s hair around in his fingers. She hadn’t had a shower yet and she still smelt great. ‘Shouldn’t be too much of a problem for a girl from the Space Coast. The kind of girl who wears Allure.’

‘How did you know I wore that?’

‘I recognize it. It’s my favorite perfume. At least it is now.’

Kate cupped his hand to her cheek and sighed wistfully. Howard didn’t know one brand of perfume from cigar smoke. It was just her luck to find a guy who had fallen in love with her at first sight when she was pretending to be someone else. A guy who knew poetry. A guy who was not a selfish lover. A guy who knew perfume. A guy who was a thief and an ex-con. It was just another of the curved balls life was wont to pitch at you. She stood up.

‘I still need some more time,’ she said, glancing automatically at her watch. ‘And I’d better be getting back. Kent gets a little funny about this kind of thing.’

Dave was hardly surprised by this information. In his experience the Feds could get funny about all kinds of things.