The Damsel

One

When they went around the first curve and could no longer see the red glow of the burning automobile back there, when there was unrelieved blackness all around them except for the light thrown off by their own car, Elly turned around in the seat, stared at Grofield’s profile, and said, “What in God’s name did you do back there?”

“Guerrilla tactics. I unhorsed them.”

Grofield was feeling very good, very pleased with himself. He’d stranded that crowd so they were pretty much out of the picture for good. There would be another crowd waiting at the Acapulco end, but Grofield was feeling cocky now, certain he’d be able to take care of them, too, when the time came.

He also had a strong Richard Conte or George Raft feeling right now. Having wrecked the heavy’s vehicle, he was bringing the load of oranges into Frisco on time after all, which meant the shipping contract would go to his infant company, which in turn meant Martha could get that operation on her foot. Crouched over the wheel, Grofield heard the kind of staccato background music this scene always got, and he knew the only thing missing was the cigarette dangling from a corner of his mouth.

The left corner.

He said, “Gimme a butt.”

“What?”

“A cigarette. Please.”

“Oh. I didn’t hear you.”

Grofield chuckled and settled back more comfortably in the seat, letting the bit go. There was no point keeping your shoulders tense all the time. The background music faded, and he said, “You get some sleep if you can. Maybe I’ll have you drive later on.”

She handed him a lit cigarette and said, “Don’t look now, but you’re being noble and clever at the same time. You won’t want me to drive later on and you know it.”

Grofield looked at her, and back at the curving, climbing roadway. “All right,” he said. “But when we get to Acapulco, you’re the one in charge, you’re the one who finds this General and gets us in to see him. You ought to be bright and alert for it.”

“I ought to stay awake,” she said, “to keep you company. You didn’t have much sleep either.”

“I’m doing fine,” he told her. “I’m a natural driver, I could drive all night, I’ve done it lots of times.”

“Besides,” she said, “I couldn’t possibly go to sleep, I’m too keyed up.”

Grofield shrugged and said, “Fine by me. It’s up to you.”

But then she didn’t say anything else, and when Grofield glanced at her again five minutes later she was sleeping, her head tilted to the side and resting against the window.

He had told her the truth about being a natural driver, about enjoying time spent at the wheel, but this highway was a strain on anyone. It curved and climbed and dipped and reversed itself, all poorly marked with signs and all in total darkness and all two lanes wide. The only item on the plus side was that there was absolutely no traffic, in either direction. Grofield kept the high beams on constantly, picking his way with wearying caution over the road, rarely able to get above thirty miles an hour. His shoulders kept tensing up despite him, until the first twinge of ache would call his attention, beginning in the area of the wound. Then he’d force himself to relax again, to sit easily and comfortably, holding the steering wheel with moderate grip. The wound had been all right the last day or so, he didn’t want it to start acting up again. But soon he’d be hunched forward once more, squinting into the darkness ahead, fingers clamped around the wheel, body tense and shoulders rigid.

A man’s best friend when driving alone at night is his car radio, but in these mountains there was no radio reception, and no nearby stations. Grofield tried it every once in a while and got only rasping static, which made Elly moan and shift position.

Dawn came around five-thirty, after he’d been driving two hours and had covered forty-seven miles. He was getting weary, as worn as if he’d driven ten hours, and his left shoulder ached constantly now, around the wound. He was also getting hungry, and visions of coffee danced in his head.

Driving was a bit easier in daylight, and he made better time. Half an hour later, having covered another twenty-one miles, he came to a flat section and a town, Chilpancingo. There was a big Pemex gas station on the right, with a restaurant on the second floor. Grofield pulled the car off the road and stopped next to the station.

Elly woke up as soon as the car stopped moving. She sat up bleary-eyed, saying, “Are we here?”

“No. This is a place called Chilpancingo. Rest stop.”

“Oh.” Rubbing her eyes with her knuckles she said, “I fell asleep.”

“Sure. That’s what I wanted.”

“What time is it?”

“Little after six.”

“My God! I slept almost three hours.”

“Come on, let’s go get some coffee.”

They went into the rest rooms first and washed their faces, then went upstairs to the restaurant. There were no other customers this early, but three employees were already on the job. A short and serious young man perched on a stool at the cashier’s desk, a heavy-set woman mopped the floor with a red rag which she pushed back and forth with a stick, and a waitress in a white uniform worked at a table in the corner, filling sugar jars.

The waitress came over as soon as Grofield and Elly settled at a table. She brought with her a smile, two glasses of water, and a pair of menus.

Grofield said, “We can’t take much time, you know.”

Elly nodded. “I know.” She ordered melon and black coffee, and Grofield said he’d have the same.

Grofield lit a cigarette while waiting, but saw Elly’s wrinkled look of distaste and put it out again. She said, “I’m sorry, it’s just when I first get up.”

“It’s okay. It tasted bad anyway.”

“I’ll drive for a while, if you want.”

“No. All I need is a few minutes’ rest and a cup of coffee.”

When the waitress came back with their order, Grofield asked her how much farther it was to Acapulco and she said, “One hundred forty kilometers.”

He worked that out in his head and it came to eighty-seven and a half miles. At least another two hours at the rate they were going, and probably more. He said, “There’s just the one road to Acapulco, isn’t there?”

“Oh, yes.”

“No other way to get there.”

“Fly,” she said, and smiled broadly, and pointed out the window.

Frowning, Grofield looked where she pointed and saw a couple of small airplanes in a field out there. And a runway, extending away to the right.

For just a second he considered it. Honner and the others expected them to arrive by car, so if they showed up instead by airplane...

No. Honner and his men must know themselves about this airfield, and in any case they wouldn’t be easing up their watch anywhere, because how could they be sure Grofield wasn’t working some sort of fake to throw them off guard? Besides, if he and Elly took a plane, they’d have to leave the car here, and Honner would be coming along in a while and would surely see the car and know what it meant.

So that was that. Grofield thanked the waitress and reached for his coffee.

Talking around a mouthful of melon, Elly said, “I’ve been thinking.”

“About what?”

“The men in Acapulco. You know.”

“Honner’s friends.”

“Yes. They won’t just wait there for us, you know, at the city line. They’ll come looking for us on the road, that’s the best place to capture us. They’ll be coming up and Honner’ll be coming down, and we’re in the middle drinking coffee and eating melon.”

“I know,” Grofield admitted. “I’ve been avoiding the thought, but I know that’s what they’ll do, they’ll come for us.”

“So what will we do?”

“You got me, honey.” Grofield glanced at the planes again, standing out there with morning dew on them, and felt a longing.

“It’s daytime now,” she said. “You won’t be able to sneak up on them this time, or crash by them. Or outrace them.”

“I know, I know. Don’t nag.”

“Nag? That’s a funny word.”

“It’s a funny life. You finished with the melon?”

“What are we going to do, Alan?”

“Think. But we’ll travel while we think, it’ll save time.”

They paid for their breakfast and went back downstairs to the car, where Elly said, “I really ought to drive for a while. That way, you can think without being distracted.”

Grofield felt it was cheating to allow himself to be talked into it this way, but his shoulder was still aching and he truly didn’t want to drive, so he merely said, “It’s a hell of a road, you know.”

“I can drive. Give me the keys.”

“Okay.” He gave her the keys. They got into the car, Elly behind the wheel, and headed south again. Just past town, the road began to climb once more and to wind like a snake amid the mountains.

Grofield, on the passenger side, gazed moodily out the windshield, watching the sky turn a lighter and lighter blue, watching the cream-white hood of the Datsun turn this way and that, nosing along the corkscrew road. He wasn’t getting much thinking done, but he was relaxing, and the pain in the shoulder was lessening.

All at once Elly hit the brakes hard, startling Grofield out of a reverie that was at least half nap. He looked up, expecting to see the road blocked by men with guns, and saw a whole lot of black goats instead. They were coming down a steep, overgrown hill on the left, crossing the road, and disappearing down another steep slope on the right. Two young men on horseback, wearing white shirts and trousers and dark-colored serapes and straw hats, like sombreros but with narrower brims, moved restlessly back and forth on the roadway to either side of the herd of goats, keeping them together, preventing strays.

Grofield looked at them, looked at the goats, looked at the almost invisible path the goats were following, and snapped his fingers. “Elly,” he said, “if you speak Spanish, we’re saved.”

“High school Spanish,” she said. “Why?”

“Ask them how much money they want for the horses.”

“What?”

“The horses, the horses. Hurry, before they leave us here.”

“But what do we want with—”

“All in good time, my darling. First, por favor, ask them how much for the horses.”

“Well...”

They both got out of the car, and Elly started speaking in halting Spanish to the horseman on the near side of the herd. There was confusion for a while, and then the horseman announced that the horses were not for sale.

Grofield said, “Tell them it’s American currency. One hundred dollars each for the horses, in excellent ten dollar bills.”

She said it. The horseman seemed dubious, so Grofield went back to the car, opened the suitcase, got the money, and returned to show it.

The horseman was probably no more than twenty, and his partner across the road was even younger. The sight of the greenbacks impressed him, made him waver, but it wasn’t enough. When Grofield saw it wasn’t enough, he went back and got a hundred dollars more, and through Elly told them the price had gone up to one hundred and fifty dollars each.

The goats had stopped moving now, were baaing and bleating, stepping daintily around in the roadway. The horsemen spoke together over the goats’ heads in rapid Spanish that was obviously over Elly’s head as well, and then made a counter-offer. They would sell one horse, for one hundred and fifty dollars.

But Grofield shook his head. “Two horses or nothing. Tell them.”

Elly told them. There was more rapid talking, some heavy thinking, and when Grofield saw that they were looking at him sidelong to see if he would go back to the car for more money, he knew the deal was set. Ostentatiously he stuffed the wad of tens back in his pocket and said loudly to Elly, “Well, it’s no good. Never mind.” And gestured in a way that clearly meant he was changing his mind, giving up.

Now the nearer horseman spoke to Elly again, and she reported what he had to say: “He says the saddles and blankets will have to be extra.”

“Fifty dollars extra for everything.”

She passed the word on, and suddenly the world was all smiles and nodding. Grofield got the rest of the money, the horsemen climbed down from their horses, and everyone shook hands all around. The horsemen, now pedestrians, got their goat herd moving again, and disappeared with the end of it over the side and down the trail and out of sight, leaving Grofield and Elly each holding a rope attached to a horse.

“Well,” said Elly. “Now we own two horses. Just what I’ve always wanted.”

Grofield swung up into the saddle while a cigarette commercial boomed about his ears. The horse was uneasy with the stranger on his back, but Grofield said, “Whoa, boy,” and other appropriate things from western movies, and the animal settled down.

Grofield said, “Give me the reins of yours. Then you follow us in the car.”

“And to think,” she said, “I left my camera in Philadelphia.”

Two

The point was, people lived here. They lived all their days and all their nights in these mountains, through which civilization had barely managed to push a single two-lane highway that squirmed and twisted and strained, threatening any moment to disappear entirely. A man in an automobile on that highway could get sloppy in his thinking, could assume that the mountains surrounding him were as inaccessible and inhospitable to everyone else as they were to him. But the truth was far different.

There were the shepherds, for instance, like the ones Grofield had bought the horses from. They lived from their small herds of goats or cattle, penning them at night in the valleys and grazing them by day in the upper slopes, now and again crossing the slender gray ribbon of tomorrow’s world. And there were farmers, too; slopes that seemed too steep to walk on were under cultivation, mostly beans, the hills plowed in smooth and curving rows, exposing the black earth, so that at times the surroundings looked like a landscape in a book of children’s stories, green and black, the round hills all farms.

Grofield, riding easy on one horse and leading the other while Elly followed in the Datsun, thought about how lucky he’d been to meet that goat herd and the two shepherds. Not so much because of the horses, though that was good, too, but mainly because seeing them had opened up his thinking, had made it possible for him to think of a way to avoid the people surely on their way north from Acapulco to intercept them.

But unless he found a good spot soon, they’d be intercepted after all. They were on their way uphill now, which was promising; Grofield thudded his mount with his heels and urged him into a faster trot. Neither horse liked the pavement underfoot, so he had to keep pushing them.

At the top of this incline, where the road curved left around a bulging mass of rock, a gravel parking area had been cleared on the right, overlooking a first-rate view. Grofield didn’t have time for the view right now, but the parking area pleased him. He rode past it, not wanting hoofprints on the gravel, then stopped and dismounted.

Elly had stopped behind him. She stuck her head out the window and called, “Now what?”

“Take it in on the gravel. Park it facing the rail there, and leave the motor running. No, come to think of it, turn the motor off.”

“Fine.” She backed up, swung around, and put the car where he’d said.

Meantime, he’d led both horses to the other side of the road and tied the reins to a bush growing out of a tiny triangle of earth between the edge of the road and the beginning of the wall of rock. Making sure they were secure, he walked back over to the car.

Elly had the door open, and said, “Should I get out?”

“You might as well, since it’s going over the edge.”

“It’s doing what? Listen, I only rented this car.”

“They’ll take a check, don’t worry. Come along.”

He went over and inspected the railing at the edge. It was made of crossed posts stuck into the ground and tied together in an X shape, with a single, long, rough log lying between each pair of X’s. Grofield managed to lift the end of one log out of its X, swing it outward, and drop it over the edge. The other end slid away from the X down there, and the log went bumping and rolling out of sight.

Looking over the edge, Grofield saw a long and nearly perpendicular drop, punctuated here and there by groups of trees, all leading to an indistinguishable green mass at the bottom. It was a long way down, but the cream color should show up well. Unless the car burned, of course, but with the engine off, there was less likelihood of that.

Going back to the car, he said, “In neutral, emergency brake off.”

“You’re really going to do it?”

“Really. We want the luggage out, too.”

“I should hope so.”

“We’re only taking one bag each, that’s all we can carry.”

They spent the next few minutes rearranging their luggage. Grofield’s money suitcase was barely half full of bills, so there was room for everything he wanted from the other bag. Elly, predictably, had more trouble deciding what to give up, but finally she too was ready. Grofield put the extra bags back in the car while Elly released the emergency brake and shifted into neutral, then climbed out and slammed the door, saying, “Now what?”

“Now we push.”

It was just slightly uphill to the edge. They both had to lean their total weight on the back of the car before it would start rolling, and then they had a tough time keeping it in motion. But finally the front wheels rolled off the edge, and now the car was sloped somewhat downward instead.

But there were still problems. The front half of the car was no longer resting on the wheels; the body itself rested on the ground at the edge of the drop. They pushed, and pushed, and the car slid reluctantly forward, until all at once its balance shifted, they stepped hurriedly back, and the car tilted leisurely forward, like a toy. It showed its underside, like a cancan dancer, and abruptly dropped out of sight.

Grofield stepped forward, leaned over, and watched the Datsun take its last trip. The cliff was nearly vertical, but not exactly so, and the Datsun seemed almost to be running down it, one or more of its wheels touching the earth at all times. It crashed through groups of trees that Grofield had hoped might stop it and leave it more visible to eyes searching for it from above, and finally came to rest way down below, an indistinct bit of brightness in the midst of the green. Still, if Honner was looking for it, he’d surely be able to find it. Satisfied, Grofield stepped away from the edge again.

Elly, standing with arms folded, said, “Now what? We disguise ourselves as Mexicans?”

“Not a bit of it. Come here.”

“You throw me over the edge.”

“Exactly. Come here, you’ve got work to do.”

She came over, and they both leaned on one of the remaining rails while he pointed out and ahead and slightly to the left and somewhat down and said, “Do you see the road down there? Running along, do you see it?”

“Wait. Oh, I see that stretch of rock.”

“Where they blasted to let the road through. But do you see the road itself? See it? The gray, and that reddish dirt sort of stuff on each side?”

She nodded. “Yes. I see it.”

“Well, you watch it. Don’t take your eyes off it. That’s a bit of road we haven’t reached yet, and your friends from Acapulco will be coming along there very soon now, if I’m not mistaken. So if you see any sort of vehicle along there at all, you give a holler.”

“Why? Where are you going to be?”

“Just down the road a bit, I’ll be right back. Oh, if there is a car, it’ll go from right to left.”

“Of course,” she said. “I’m not stupid.”

“You’re a dear girl.”

He patted her rump, winked at her, and moved away. He crossed the road, mounted his new horse, and went riding on around the curve to see what the road did next.

What it did was head down for a fairly longish straight stretch, and then curve away and out of sight to the right. The right side of the road was a cliff all the way down, and the left side — after the mass of rock at the peak — was a steep slope upward, full of trees and underbrush.

It was this left side that Grofield watched, keeping his mount moving at a walk, and about a hundred feet down from the peak he found what he wanted; a narrow and nearly invisible trail that led in and up and out of sight. He turned the horse that way, and the animal left the highway with small, dainty steps, then stretched his legs for the first upward climb of the trail away from the road.

A few yards in, the trail angled away to the right and proceeded almost at the level, going across the prevailing slope. Already Grofield could barely see the road through the trees, and a minute later the highway had disappeared entirely. He was in a dark, silent, chilly rain forest, the trees crowded close together and the small spaces between them choked with dark green underbrush. There was practically no sunlight in here, and a moist and musky cool smell to the air. The trail Grofield rode was just wide enough for one man on horseback; if cattle were driven through here they must move one at a time.

Grofield had to keep going until he found a spot wide enough to turn around in, then headed back for the highway and up to where Elly was waiting. He dismounted and said, “Nothing showed?”

“No. Where were you?”

“In another part of the forest. Keep watching that road.”

He tied the horse back with the other one, then got the two suitcases, bringing them across the road. The saddles he’d paid fifty dollars for were basic and primitive things, but they did boast extra thongs at the back. Grofield tied the suitcases on, and then went back over to where Elly was leaning on the rail and joined her there. “The way I figure it,” he said, “they wouldn’t have started out before sunrise, there wouldn’t be any point in it. So we shouldn’t expect them to show up for about half an hour yet. Still, you never know.”

“What do we do when they show up? You watch the road for a while, my eyes are tired.”

“Right. We hide.”

“Where?”

“In the forest. In a place where no car can go. You know, those guys aren’t coming to intercept two people, they’re coming to intercept a car. Maybe the Datsun, maybe some other car we’ve switched to, maybe a truck we hitched a ride on, but in any case, an automotive vehicle of some sort. And it may occur to them that we’ll try to hide and let them go by us, so they’ll look everywhere along the way that a car can be taken off the road, which is almost nowhere, but they won’t think to look in places where a car can’t go.”

“That’s why we threw a perfectly good automobile off a cliff?”

“That’s one reason. The other reason is, Honner and the people coming the other way are going to meet, somewhere along this road, and—”

Elly suddenly laughed aloud. “I’d love to see their faces!”

“No, you wouldn’t. Anyway, they’re going to want to know where we are. They’ll look, and they’ll look, and with any luck they’ll see the rail missing here, and they’ll look over the edge, and guess what.”

She said, “We didn’t make the curve?”

“That’s what I’d like them to believe. Maybe they will, maybe they won’t, but it’s worth a try. Particularly since we don’t dare leave the car up here in plain view because then they’d know something was up, and one of them might even all of a sudden figure it out.”

“Ah. Well, good luck to us.”

Grofield straightened up and stretched. After pushing the car off the edge, his back had started aching again, like a charley horse. “You watch,” he said. “I’ve got to rest a while.”

“Well, sure! I’m sorry, I should have realized—”

“Yeah yeah, but watch the road down there. I’ll just sit down...”

Watching the road, she said, “Take a nap, if you want. I’ll wake you in plenty of time.”

“I don’t need to nap,” he said, closing his eyes against the glare. “It’s just rest, a minute’s rest.” He leaned the good side of his back against a fencepost, and let himself relax.

All at once she was shaking his bad shoulder and saying, “Wake up! Wake up!”

The realization that he’d been asleep was the shock that woke him. He sat up, his back twinging, and said, “What? What?” He couldn’t get his eyes to focus, or his mind.

“I saw a car,” she said.

“Help me... help me on my feet, I’m stiff again.” She helped him up, and he said, “What kind of car?”

“American, I think, I don’t know what make. White.”

“Could be them. Come on.”

He was sore all over; it had been a mistake to stop moving, to fall asleep. Still, he made himself move, trotting across the highway to where the horses were still placidly waiting. Pulling himself with an effort into the saddle, he said, “How long was I asleep?”

“About an hour. It’s almost seven-thirty now.”

He led the way down the road and in along the trail he’d found before. Once they were well inside, he dismounted, none of his limbs wanting to move, and pushed past her, still mounted, heading back toward the road. “I’ll see if it’s them or not. Wait here, watch the horses.”

He went as close to the road as he dared, and lay on his stomach there. The cool ground felt good, the cool air soothed him. He knew it wouldn’t be good for long, that coolness and dampness would ultimately make his stiffness much worse, but as first aid it was fine.

He had to wait about two minutes, and then he heard the car coming up the hill. He raised up a bit, still hidden behind the screen of bushes, and got a good look at the three men in the car as it went by. The faces were all new to him, but they were in the style; they were Honner’s friends, without a doubt.

As soon as they went by, he got to his feet again and hurried back to Elly. He hardly minded the stiffness, and besides, it would go away as he moved around.

“Okay, Tonto,” he said, swinging back up into the saddle. “Let’s ride.”

Three

The sun was high and bright, but here in the mountains the air was pleasant, even cool. Grofield and Elly rode along the highway at an easy lope, side by side, most of the time in silence. After nine o’clock they began to meet some morning traffic coming out of Acapulco, headed for Mexico City; mostly buses and trucks giving off black, stinking exhaust, much worse than anything in the States, but now and then some tourists in their cars, some with American license plates. California. Texas. Louisiana. One gray Chevrolet had come all the way from Maine.

The truckers and the tourists ignored the couple southbound on horseback, but the bus passengers invariably stuck their heads and arms out the windows to wave and shout and grin, probably because they had nothing to do and bus rides are so boring. Grofield, wishing he had a moustache to curl, returned the bus travelers’ greeting with debonair half-salutes, feeling like a Confederate officer returning to the old plantation after the war. The background music was straight out of Stephen Foster.

Around ten-thirty, Elly said, “Slow down a minute. I want to talk to you. Before we get there.”

They slowed their mounts to a trot and Grofield said, “We’ve got a story to get straight, is that it?”

“That’s exactly it.”

“With whom?”

“With everybody. And with you, too. There’s one thing I haven’t mentioned up till now.”

He turned and looked at her, and her expression was both sheepish and defiant. He said, “There’s a boyfriend, you mean.”

“Well, yes.”

“Honey, you don’t have to worry about me hanging around. Like I told you at the beginning, I’m married.”

“That isn’t the point,” she said. She smiled a little, with a twist on it, and said, “I’m not so sure I wouldn’t like you to hang around. But I know you won’t, and what I want to say is something else.”

“We never slept together.”

“Yes.”

“Who’s going to believe that, honeybunch?”

“The important people will, if we say it right. You can say it right, I know you can. I hope you will.”

“Who gets the performance?”

“Well, my father for one.”

Grofield grinned. “I have the feeling that was just preamble. Number two is what counts.”

“It isn’t all that definite,” she said. “We aren’t married, we aren’t even engaged, not really.”

“Who?”

“It’s just been kind of an, an understanding, that’s all. For years, since we were both kids.”

“Oh,” said Grofield. “The Governor’s son.”

“Bob Harrison, yes, that’s right.”

“Got it,” Grofield assured her. “I’ll do it beautifully, you can rely implicitly on me.”

“I hope so. Not that I’m completely sure in my own mind, it isn’t that at all. Bob’s been away so much, I hardly know him really. But he’s always been sort of a stickler for propriety, so it would be better...”

“Don’t say another word,” Grofield told her. “Your secret is safe with me.”

She smiled. “Thank you.”

“But I want you to know,” he said, leaning over to the right and squeezing her knee, “that I will never let the memory fade from my heart, of those few precious moments of bliss—”

She slapped his hand away and cried, “Don’t be a stinker!” And, laughing, heeled her horse and rode on ahead.

It was just noon when they came around the last curve and saw Acapulco spread out below them like a travel poster come true. Acapulco is shaped like a huge letter C lying on its back, the letter curving around the placid water of the harbor, broad, pale, sandy beaches all along the shore, big new motels around to the left, smaller older hotels around to the right, and the tropical mumbo-jumbo white and orange calypso town in the center.

Elly pointed, crying, “That’s his yacht, General Pozos’ yacht! That big one, the white one, see it?”

He saw it, and as he looked at it he saw a launch move away from the yacht and slice through the water toward shore. “Here comes somebody,” he said.

“Come on!!”

They were still a long way off, most of it curving and twisting and backtracking down the southern slope of this final mountain. It was another five minutes before they reached the edge of the city itself, and then there was still a long, winding descent through Acapulco’s native slum, with the brown faces looking up in surprise at the gringos on horseback clattering by.

They didn’t try to push their mounts faster than a trot, both because of the long four hours they’d already been ridden and because of the harsh city footing underneath.

The shaking and agitation of traveling on horseback had bothered Grofield more than he’d anticipated, making the area around his wound act up more and more. He’d finally discovered that it helped to ease the strain if he kept his left hand tucked inside his shirt, in a kind of makeshift splint arrangement, and he was riding this way now, holding the reins lightly in his right hand, lifting up and back to the rhythm of the horse’s movements, the suitcase securely tied on behind.

Five minutes more and they were at the bottom of the slope, the ocean ten or twelve blocks ahead of them. There were more cars on the streets now, they were coming into an area of normal city traffic, so they went single-file down the center of the street, Grofield in the lead.

“I saw where the launch landed!” Elly called at one point. “It’s to the right, to the right!”

He nodded and waved his right hand, so she’d know he’d heard her. At the end of this street there was a broad avenue going to left and right, with a grassy center divider, the avenue flanking the beaches and forming the basic C pattern of the city. Grofield turned right on this, and he and Elly rode along through all the traffic, cars and trucks and bright-colored beach buggies, approaching the dock where the launch had landed.

All at once there was a shouting to the left, and Grofield looked over there to see a bunch of them piling out of a pale blue Chrysler, all of them shouting and pointing at Grofield and Elly. And then not just pointing, but pointing guns. Shouting, “Stop! Stop!”

Grofield yelled at Elly, “Take off!” and ground his heels into his animal’s rib cage. The horse leaped forward, and Elly stayed beside him, and they galloped down the center of the avenue with the sounds of shouting and shooting behind them. Grofield, twisting around to look back over his bad shoulder, saw them running along back there, saw the Chrysler making a wild U turn, thumping over the divider and heading this way.

“Yaaaaah! Yaaaaaah!” Grofield yelled into his mount’s ear, lying forward so his head was almost even with the horse’s, so he could see its staring eye and hear its snorting breath. “Yaaaaah! Yaaaaaaah!”

Ahead and on the left there was a line of limousines, black and pretentious, which Grofield knew had to be the place. He aimed for it, cutting across the traffic, making a beach buggy slam on its brakes with a squeal.

People were about to get into the limousines, a lot of people in uniforms or formal dress, all now turning their heads this way, staring openmouthed, while behind them men ran and the Chrysler came rushing forward and bullets were sailing through the air.

Grofield never reined in till he’d reached the first limousine, and then he yanked hard, forcing his mount to pull up short, and leaped to the ground before the animal had fully stopped. He landed off-balance, and his left hand was still stuck inside his shirt and unavailable to help, so he fell heavily, and rolled, and came up against a lot of legs. He staggered to his feet, shouting, “Elly! Elly!” and looked up to see her flying through the air toward him, openmouthed and flailing. They collided, and he went down again, and all at once he seemed to be in the middle of a forest of black-trousered legs, no opening left anywhere, and Elly was lying on top of him like a sack of wheat.

He managed to say, “Up. Up.” But when she didn’t move, there was nothing he could do about it. He lay there, winded, aching all over now, and gasped for breath.

The whole thing was over in a matter of seconds. The forest of legs disbanded again, there was light, there were individual voices saying surprised things in a variety of languages, and then one voice crying, “Ellen Marie! Ellen Marie!”

Now she did move, raising herself up off him, and he saw there was a streak of red on the left shoulder of her white blouse. He said, “Hey.”

But the new voice was more insistent, crying her name over and over, and Grofield could see it was impossible to attract her attention. She was sitting beside him, oblivious, looking around as though hunting for something.

Grofield sat up, which cost him, and reached out to touch Elly’s shoulder just as the new man finally pushed his way through and dropped to his knees in front of her. He was gray-haired, heavyset, had the look of the well-bred about him; it must be her father. The father put his hands out to touch her face, then all at once pulled back, saying, “You’re hurt.”

In the sea of sound all around them, they existed in a little oasis of silence. Grofield could sense it, was himself on the fringe of it. He heard distinctly her low voice saying, “Yes.”

And the father again: “They shot you. They tried to kill you.”

And the daughter: “That’s what killing is. Don’t you know?”

And then the silence was total, as they looked at one another. Grofield, on the perimeter, sat cradling his left arm and waited to see what would happen next.

What would happen next was a new wave of shouting, with a repeated name in the middle of it all: “General Pozos! General Pozos!” And then a young guy stepping into the circle of silence, ignoring it, unaware of it, putting his hand on Elly’s father’s shoulder and saying, “Sir, it’s the General. He’s been shot. Would you look, he’s been shot.”

The father raised his head as though befuddled, saying, “What? What? Oh, oh, yes, of course. But Ellen Marie, she’s—”

She said, cold and correct, “It only cut the skin, it isn’t still in me, I’m all right.”

“If you—”

“I’m all right!”

The young guy — an American, in a gray business suit — said, “Sir, if you could hurry—”

“Yes. Yes, of course.”

The father got to his feet first, moving clumsily, like a man who’s recently had a stroke. Elly followed him, favoring her left arm but still getting up with supple grace. Grofield came last, not so gracefully, and would have lost his balance halfway up if a pop-eyed bystander hadn’t given him a hand.

He looked around and the little Honners were all gone. The blue Chrysler was gone. The horses, content to be let alone at last after their long run, were still standing where Grofield and Elly had hurriedly left them.

Several people standing around Grofield were asking him questions, some in Spanish and some in English and some in other languages, but he hardly heard them and didn’t acknowledge them at all. After a few seconds, in which he got himself oriented, and was sure he wouldn’t fall down again, he pushed through them and followed Elly.

Here was another group, this one silent, standing in a horseshoe shape, with Elly and her father the only ones at the open end. Grofield came up behind them and looked, and a fat man in a blue uniform was lying on his back in there. Fresh blood stained and smeared the chest of the blue uniform. The fat man’s eyes were closed, he was obviously unconscious, but his legs were twitching, like those of a dog who dreams of rabbits.

Grofield was the only one close enough to hear what Elly said to her father: “Save his life. Save it.”

“But—” The father looked troubled, confused, almost pained. He made vague motions; at the fat man lying on the ground, at himself, at the world in general. “Luke—” he started, and trailed off.

She shook her head. “No. This is what you’re for. You’re to save lives.”

A shudder went through him, and he looked panic-stricken for just an instant, like a sleepwalker awaking suddenly to foreign surroundings, and then, with an obvious effort, he regained control. “Yes,” he said, possibly to Elly, possibly to himself. He turned and went to his knees beside the fat man and reached down to unbutton the jacket of the fancy uniform.

Four

Somewhere, someone was knocking on a door. It must be Macbeth, thought Grofield, Macbeth does murder sleep.

Reluctantly he half-opened his eyes, and saw a room shrouded in semidarkness. In that first instant he had no idea where he was, but then he shifted position and felt a sharp twinge high on the left side of his back, and remembered everything. Of course. The bullet wound, the suitcase full of money in the closet; he was in the hotel room Parker had gotten him in Mexico City.

He closed his eyes again, remembering. He’d had some sort of a wild dream, girls climbing in his window, horseback riding through mountains...

The room was moving.

He opened his eyes again, quickly, and it was true, it wasn’t dizziness or anything like that, the room was really moving.

And the window was a porthole.

There was that knocking at the door again, but Grofield paid no attention to it. He was staring at the porthole, and loudly he said, “Hey!”

The door opened. A short steward in a white Eton jacket and black trousers came hesitantly in, saying in heavily accented English, “Good morning, sor. Is nine o’clock, sor.”

Now Grofield was really awake, and had the recent past sorted out in his mind. Elly, General Pozos, Honner, all the rest of it. And here he was on General Pozos’ yacht.

He sat up, aware of the fact that he was wearing yellow pajamas he couldn’t remember ever having seen before. They seemed to be made of silk, and in them he felt like Ronald Colman. He said, “It’s what time?”

“Nine o’clock, sor.”

“At night?” But there was light outside the porthole.

“No, sor. In the morning.”

“Don’t be silly, we didn’t get here till after noon.”

“Yes, sor.”

“I’ve taken a nap, I’ve...” He rubbed his head, trying to remember. The arrival, sailing off the horses, Elly crashing into him, General Pozos lying on the ground... And then the hours without sleep, and the constant activity, and the final letdown at the end, all had combined to make him suddenly sick with exhaustion. He could remember staggering to Elly, muttering something to her about the suitcase, take care of the suitcase, and then someone saying he should be in bed, and walking somewhere, and... and that was all.

The suitcase. He looked around the room, saying, “My — my luggage. Where’s my luggage?”

“Suitcase here, sor.” The steward was crossing the room to a tall dresser, picking up the suitcase from beside it. “Shall I unpack for you, sor?”

“No. No. I’ll take care of it.”

“Miss Fitzgerald say she in dining room, sor. Down corridor... that way.”

“To the right.”

“Si. Yes, sor. To the right. All the way.” He opened a small door in the opposite wall, saying, “Washroom. If you want something, button here.”

“Thank you. What time did you say it was?”

“Nine o’clock, sor.”

“All right, then, what day is it?”

“Uhhhh... I don’t know, sor, not in English. Day before Sunday.”

“Saturday?”

The steward smiled brilliantly. “Si! Saturday!”

“Ah,” said Grofield. “It’s tomorrow. That explains everything.”

“Yes, sor.” Still smiling, the steward backed his way out of the room.

Grofield got out of bed and examined his suitcase, and all the money was still there. Good for Elly, good for her.

He took a hot shower, which helped work the stiffness out of his left shoulder, then dressed, locked the suitcase again, and went down the corridor to the right. At the end was the dining room, with large side windows through which sunlight poured blindingly. There were half a dozen tables covered with snowy cloths and sparkling plates and gleaming silver. The floor was waxed to high gloss, the metalwork around the windows had been polished till it shone, and the central light fixture in the ceiling was alive with cut glass glittering in all the light. It was something like a restaurant built inside a diamond, and Grofield didn’t care for it at all.

All the tables were empty save one in the middle of the room, at which Elly sat alone. Grofield pulled his sunglasses from his shirt pocket, put them on and threaded the tables, sitting down across from Elly, who was laughing at him. He said, “What’s so funny?”

“You look like a man with a hangover.”

“I feel like a man with a hangover.”

“I’m sorry, maybe I should have let you sleep, but I thought twenty hours was enough.”

“Is that how long it was?”

“One o’clock yesterday afternoon till nine o’clock this morning.”

“You always were good at math.”

She laughed again and said, “You want some orange juice?”

“God, no. Coffee.”

“We’ll get you both.” From somewhere she called up a waiter, gave him an order for a complete breakfast, and when he’d gone again, she said to Grofield, “Now, we’ve got to get our stories straight.”

“We never slept together, we never slept together.”

“I don’t mean that, I mean everything else.”

“What everything else?”

She leaned closer, saying, “Bob Harrison doesn’t know it was his father who caused all this.”

“Why not?”

“Because,” she said firmly, “there’s enough trouble in the world. Bob doesn’t know, and I don’t want him to know.”

The waiter came with Grofield’s coffee. When they were alone again, and Grofield had drunk half the cup, he said, “All right, it wasn’t Harrison’s father. What about your father? In or out?”

“Out. It’s simpler that way, and Dad—”

“He reformed.”

“Don’t make it sound like that,” she said. “It’s true. When he actually saw bloodshed—”

“Hot damn,” said Grofield. “I was there, I saw it, I believe it. What I don’t believe is that he would have gone through with Harrison’s plan in the first place.”

“Oh, yes he would. I know him, and he would. There wouldn’t have been any shooting, any obvious violence at all. It would have been a medical problem, an intricate medical problem. Dad would have dehumanized it. Isn’t that funny? When all is said and done, violence doesn’t dehumanize us but forces us to recognize the fact of our humanity.”

“Gee whiz,” said Grofield.

“Did anybody ever tell you you were a bastard in the morning?”

“In the morning? I don’t think so. I’ve had people tell me in the afternoon, and at night, but never in the morning.” He finished his coffee, and said, “All right, you’re right and I’m sorry. What’s the drill?”

“The what?”

“The new story.”

“Oh. Well, there were these mysterious people who were plotting to kill General Pozos. They’d heard that Dad was going to become his personal physician, so they thought if they kidnapped me they could force Dad to help them get past the General’s bodyguard.”

Grofield said, “A little shaky on detail, but what the hell.”

“Listen, now. They kidnapped me, and they were holding me in Mexico City. You rescued me, because I managed to throw a note out the hotel window and you found it.”

“Who am I?”

“Wait, we’ll get to that. Anyway, it was Thursday night when you rescued me. I had no idea how to get in touch with Dad by then, but I knew everyone would be here in Acapulco on Friday, so I asked you to help me get here, and you did. The rest of the story is exactly the way it really happened, except that we left from Mexico City on Thursday night, and never slept anywhere, separately or together.”

“I’m not sure I’d believe that story, if I were Bob Harrison,” Grofield told her. “On the other hand, I’ve heard your stories before.”

“Well, Bob believes it.”

“Good for him. If he’s a man you can deceive, I’m sure you’ll be very happy with him, forever and ever.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing, darling. Let’s get back to me. Who am I?”

“I’m not sure. You’re also mysterious. I do know you’ve had a recent bullet wound, and I know you’re in Mexico without papers.”

“Do you know my financial condition?”

“The money? No, of course not. The impression I’ve given Bob is that you’re some sort of adventurer, but basically a good man. He wants to talk to you later.”

“A lot more than I want to talk to him, I bet.”

“He’ll arrange some sort of — here he comes.”

“What?” Grofield looked up to see the waiter bringing his breakfast on a tray. From the opposite direction, Bob Harrison was coming across the room, smiling in a genial way. Arriving, he said, “Good morning. I’ll have a cup of coffee with you, if I may.”

“Sure. I’d like another myself.”

Harrison sat down, saying, “The General’s resting easy.” He reached out and put his hand on Elly’s, saying, “Your father’s been wonderful, Ellen, absolutely wonderful.”

“He’s the best there is.”

“He’s taking a nap now, maybe he’ll join us later.”

Grofield said, “He’s here? On the ship?”

Elly told him, “We’re all here. There’s a regular infirmary here. It was closer than anything else, so the General was brought here right away yesterday.”

Harrison said, “It was also more convenient. As soon as Ellen’s father says it’s safe, we’ll be returning to Guerrero so the General can recuperate in his own land.”

“He’ll be all right, then,” said Grofield.

“Yes.” Harrison’s smile, so affable and impersonal, faded all at once, and he seemed to be looking back at yesterday. “God, that was something,” he said. “When the General fell, I thought they’d — I thought he was dead.” He lifted a hand to his face; the hand was shaking. “I thought they’d killed him.”

Elly, looking concerned, reached out to touch his arm, saying, “Bob? What’s the matter? I’ve never seen you this way.”

Harrison’s hand covered his face now, and his voice was muffled by it when he spoke. “God, I love that man,” he said. “You don’t know what it did to me, when I thought he was dead.” Emotion made his voice fluttery and uncertain. He lowered his hand and turned toward Grofield a face reddened and puffed by the violence of his feeling. “All that vitality,” he said, “all that strength, all that great love of life, just lying there!”

Grofield couldn’t resist it, couldn’t keep himself from saying, “The way I hear it, there are people who’d like to see General Pozos just lying there, for good and all.”

“Peasants! Little people, nobodies, cowards, all the gray little people who never lived! They say he’s a dictator, he’s a tyrant, you’ll even hear atrocity stories if you go looking for them, but so what! Some men are just bigger than others, that’s all, more alive, more vital, more important! You can’t stop them, you can’t contain them, hold them in with rules! Ellen understands that, don’t you, darling, you risked your own life to try to save him, you sensed the drive in the man, the force, the power.”

Elly was startled out of any ready answer. “Well,” she said. “Well. I just did, I only did...”

“You know what I say?” Harrison turned to stare at Grofield, his hands clutching the edge of the table. “I say, if a hundred men starve themselves to death in darkness in order to produce one after-dinner cigar for General Pozos to enjoy on just one evening of his life, those hundred men have fulfilled their purpose! What else would they do with their lives, what more meaningful than devote themselves to the pleasure of one of the few men who are really and truly alive? The people of Guerrero should be proud to have General Pozos for their leader!”

Grofield said, “I understand your own father is a different kind of leader, has maybe a different attitude toward people.”

“Oh, all that. I grew up with that, I know about that. I think it’s all very praiseworthy, I’m sure my father did the people of Pennsylvania proud, I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with being an administrator. But General Pozos— He’s so far above that paperwork bureaucrat sort of thing, he’s so— He’s a lion in a jungle full of rabbits.”

Elly, straining to change the subject, said, “Your father went back north, didn’t he?”

“Oh, yes. He had appointments, he only stayed long enough to be sure the General was going to be all right, then he flew on home. He and Juan.” Turning to Grofield, he explained, “The General’s son.”

“Ah.”

“The oddest thing,” Harrison said. “Someone tried to kill Juan today, too. Some lunatic, I suppose. Just ran up to him at the hotel and tried to stab him.”

Grofield looked at Elly, but she shook her head, meaning it was news to her and didn’t have any connection with the rest of it that she knew about. Grofield said to Harrison, “Was it the same mob, you suppose? Trying to kill the father and the son both on the same day?”

“The Mexican police are looking into it,” Harrison said, “but it doesn’t seem likely. More probably a dope addict, something like that. The General’s the one the gang was after. I don’t want to say anything against Juan, I’m sure he’s a pleasant boy, but he has none of his father’s power, his electricity. No, it was the General they wanted.”

“I suppose so,” said Elly faintly.

“Everyone can sense that power in the General, that aura. My father, too, he can feel it, he missed his plane to stay here and be sure the General was going to be all right.”

“Good of him,” said Grofield, looking ironically at Elly.

All at once, Harrison sat back in his chair and offered them a sheepish smile, saying, “I’m sorry, I don’t usually carry on like this. But it was such a shock, I don’t think I’m over it yet.”

Elly said, “You were going to see about papers for Mister Grofield.”

“Oh, yes.” Harrison was making an obvious effort to settle down. Trying for his usual affable smile, he said to Grofield, “Ellen tells me you’re something of a mystery man, traveling around with bullet wounds instead of papers. Well, we can get you fixed up. I can have papers for you in an hour, good enough to get you safely back into the States. Or, if you like, you could come along on the rest of the cruise, be the General’s guest in Guerrero for a while, I’m sure he’d like to thank you personally for your aid in defeating the plot against him.”

“I think,” Grofield said, “I think I’d rather leave today. I’ve got people I’m supposed to see in the States.”

“Certainly. No problem at all.”

Elly said, “Mister Grofield, would you mind if I traveled with you? I have to go north right away myself.”

Harrison said, “I thought you were coming along with us.”

“No, I have all sorts of responsibilities back in Philadelphia. Until I was kidnapped, I didn’t know I was coming down here at all.”

“What a shame,” said Harrison. He smiled brightly at both of them and said, “Well, at least you’ll have a more pleasant travel companion on the way back.”

Elly smiled at Grofield. “Isn’t that lucky,” she said.

Getting to his feet, Harrison said, “Well, let me see about that paperwork for you. I’ll talk to you a little later.”

Grofield smiled back at him. “Fine,” he said. He kept smiling until Harrison was gone, then looked at Elly and said, “What’s up?”

“The balloon. All these years Bob’s been the strong, silent type, that’s what mostly attracted me about him. Thank God he finally opened his mouth before I married him.”

“Speaking of married,” Grofield reminded her, “I still am.”

She shook her head. “Not till we cross the border,” she said.