White Cargo

25

Cat stood with his back against the elevator wall and looked at the two women opposite him. Maribel wore pale makeup and lipstick, and her hair had been drawn severely back into a knot, so tightly that Cat wondered how she could blink. She wore a heavily rimmed pair of tortoise-shell glasses, sensible shoes, and her spectacular figure was hidden under a demure raincoat. Meg had come up with enough accoutrements to transform her into a not-very-interesting-looking woman, no small feat, as far as Cat was concerned.

Meg, on the other hand, resembled Carmen Miranda, without the fruit. Her makeup was florid, her hair wild, her dress tight, and her sunglasses extravagant. She didn’t really look like Maribel, but the effect was riveting.

The elevator reached the ground floor. Cat took a deep breath, and preceded the women out of the car. He walked quickly to the corner of the elevator bank and peered into the lobby. He picked out the three Cuban policemen quickly. While they were not actually standing in the main entrance of the hotel, they were positioned so that they could be in a flash. He found the fourth of the group lounging near the second entrance, near the airline office.

Cat turned and nodded to Meg, who took a deep breath and started across the lobby, toward the main entrance, hurrying, nearly at a trot. The effect on the Cubans was galvanizing. As Meg rushed toward the revolving door, they converged on her from all sides. Meg let out a shriek and hit one of them with her heavy purse, staggering him.

The fourth Cuban abandoned his post and rushed to the aid of his compatriots, no doubt fearful of missing out on the action and on the credit for recapturing a defector.

Cat, with Maribel on his arm, emerged from the hallway containing the elevators and walked casually, arm in arm, toward the second entrance. As they passed the middle of the lobby, both of them, as planned, gawked at the commotion made by Meg and the four policemen. They would have looked very odd, indeed, if they had not. In a moment they were out of the hotel, climbing into a taxicab.

“The American Embassy,” Cat said to the driver, and Maribel immediately said the same in Spanish.

Maribel clutched Cat’s arm, and laid her head on his shoulder. “Thank you, thank you,” she kept repeating.

Cat patted her hand. “It’s all right,” he said, “we’ll be at the embassy soon.”

“Thank you, thank you,” she said again, and before he could react, she threw an arm around his neck and planted an enormous kiss on his lips.

Cat did his best to calm her, wiping the lipstick on the back of his hand. Shortly, the taxi pulled up to the same rear gate through which Cat’s ambulance had driven not long before. Candis Leigh, accompanied by a Marine guard and another man, was waiting to let them in. Cat gratefully turned over Maribel to Candis and the consular official and followed them into the embassy.

In Buzz Bergman’s office, he immediately telephoned the Tequendama and asked for his suite. Meg, to his relief, answered. “Are you all right?” he asked.

“Oh, yes! I haven’t had so much fun in years! We had the manager, the local police, the doorman — everybody got into it. You’ve never seen Latinos turn the shade of red those guys did! Is Maribel safe?”

“Yes, she’s in the Consul’s office now, getting some paperwork done. I think she has already talked to her father.”

“Good. Now listen, when do we leave for Leticia?”

“I want to take off tomorrow morning at eight, sharp, okay?”

“Okay, but I may not see you until then. I’ve got some things to do, but I won’t miss the plane, believe me.”

“I’ll see you then,” Cat said, and hung up.

Barry Hedger swept into the office carrying a briefcase. “Morning,” he said. “You ready for some cloak-and-dagger stuff?”

“Sure, why not?” said Cat.

Hedger opened the briefcase and took out a fairly large Sony portable radio. “Okay,” he said, “what we got here is an ordinary, multiband radio, you see?” He switched it on and twiddled the tuning dial. A mixture of voices and static came out of the set. “But,” Hedger said, raising a finger, “if, instead of turning the knob the usual way, you pull the knob out and turn it counterclockwise” — he demonstrated — “then you got a transmitter that puts out a signal that can be picked up on the automatic-direction-finding equipment on every airplane.”

Cat tried turning the radio on as instructed. “That’s it, just turn it on?”

“Not quite,” Hedger said. “You want to be outdoors, away from any large structures that might interfere with the signal, and you want to extend the antenna to its maximum, got it?”

“Got it. What sort of range does it have?”

“About forty miles, to an aircraft at two thousand feet, more at a higher altitude.”

“That doesn’t sound like much.”

“It’s enough to do the trick. We’ll be overflying the Trapezoid on a regular basis from the moment you leave Leticia for Prince’s base. The Colombian force will be in place tonight at a Brazilian army base just across the border, on the Amazon, here.” He pointed at a spot on the map, downstream from Leticia. “The radio’s batteries are good for an hour’s transmission, if you don’t spend too much time listening to rock and roll.” He paused and switched off the radio. “Take care of this thing; otherwise you’ll just have to find a phone booth.”

“Right,” Cat said.

Johnny Gomez came into the room. “Hi, Cat. I wanted to tell you that you’ll have a friendly face on the ground at Leticia. My man, the one with the pockmarks who was in the nightclub last night, is already on his way down there. He’ll be staying at Parador Ticuña, playing the tourist, registered under the name of Conroy. He’ll be in the bar when you have your meet. If you want to bail out of this thing, he’ll help, and that’ll be your last chance. You understand?”

“I understand, but I won’t be bailing out.”

Buzz Bergman spoke up. “Cat, your best chance is to find your daughter, get her away somewhere, then turn on the radio and hide. When these troops hit the ground, they’re liable to shoot anything that moves. Don’t come out until the shooting is over. Be very, very careful that you don’t get waxed by one of the good guys, okay?”

“I’ll do my best,” Cat said.

Bergman and Gomez shook Cat’s hand and wished him luck, then Hedger escorted him out of the room and down the hall to his own office.

“How long since you fired a handgun?” he asked, taking Cat’s H&K automatic and its holster out of his desk drawer.

“Not since I got out of the Corps,” Cat replied, a little sheepishly.

Hedger beckoned him down the hall to the elevators, then down to a subbasement. He opened a door and switched on a light.

Cat could immediately smell raw earth. He followed Hedger into a rough room, one wall of which was earthen. Hedger switched on another set of lights, revealing a long, tunnel-like extension. At the end was a target with a human figure drawn on it.

“The Marine guards use it,” Hedger said. He handed Cat the pistol. “Be my guest.”

Cat checked the clip, worked the action, switched off the safety, and assumed the stance. He fired five rounds, then Hedger stopped him and pulled the target toward them on a long cord. Cat had missed it twice, and the other three shots were all over the target.

“Forget the military stance,” Hedger said, taking the weapon from Cat. He crouched and held the pistol out with both hands. “Do it the police way.” He changed the target and pulled it back into place.

Cat crouched and fired five more rounds.

Hedger peered through binoculars. “Better. That’s a fair grouping, but they’re all in the upper right-hand corner of the target. Squeeze, don’t pull, remember?”

Cat fired five more rounds and began reloading the clip from a box of cartridges furnished by Hedger from a cupboard while Hedger pulled the target back.

“Much better,” Hedger said. “In the middle of the target. Now you have to get the grouping smaller.”

Cat shot for nearly an hour, becoming more and more comfortable with the pistol, accepting Hedger’s pointers.

Finally, Hedger seemed satisfied. He took a leather and canvas grip from the ammunition cupboard. “Here’s something that will be of use,” he said, opening the grip. Pressing at the sides of the bottom panel, he lifted the panel out and exposed a shallow compartment. “There’s room here for your weapon and ammo. Don’t carry it through airport security, though.”

“Thanks,” Cat said. “I’ll try and remember that.”

Hedger walked over to a counter and found some cleaning equipment behind it. As Cat watched he effortlessly fieldstripped the weapon and began carefully cleaning it.

“You know,” Hedger said, looking only at the pistol, “I hated your guts for a long time.”

Cat said nothing.

“You whipped my ass more ways than one at Quantico, and I didn’t like it.”

“I’m afraid I liked it more than I should have,” Cat said, apologetically. “I’m sorry.”

“No need to be,” Hedger said. “It made me tougher, later, when I needed to be tougher.” He went on cleaning the weapon in silence, then reassembled it and handed it to Cat. “I admire what you’re doing down here, what you’re about to do. I’d like to think if I were in your place, I’d do the same. I wish you luck, Cat.”

It was the first time Hedger had ever called him by his first name, Cat reflected. He took the offered hand and shook it.