She picked up her own glass and clinked it against mine. "To that possibility."
We had just finished the toast when the young man arrived. I didn't even see him until he was standing beside us. He was a blocky, muscular fellow with very short, blond hair and a hard, square face. Part of his left ear was missing, but that defect didn't harm his masculine good looks. He wore a beige summer-weight suit that didn't completely conceal the bulge under his left arm.
"I did not see you at first, Erika," he said rather stiffly, eyeing me. "I did not expect you to be with someone."
The words were intended as a mild reproach. They had been spoken with a marked accent. I recalled a photo of this man in AXE's Israeli intelligence file. He was Zachariah Ghareb, an executioner of Shin Bet. My theory about his and Erika's presence in Rio seemed strengthened.
"This is an old friend, Zach," Erika said. "He worked with me in Israel."
Ghareb seated himself at the third place setting. "I know," he said. "Carter, I believe."
"That's right."
"Your reputation precedes you."
His manner was brittle, almost hostile. I sensed his jealousy about my knowing Erika. Before I could answer him, he turned to her. "Did you order the vichyssoise as I suggested?"
"Yes, Zach," Erika said, a little embarrassed by his lack of friendliness. "It will be here shortly."
"The vichyssoise is the only thing worth eating at this restaurant," Zach complained a bit too loudly.
"I'm sorry you've had bad luck," I replied smoothly. "I find most of the dishes here well prepared. Perhaps they've changed chefs since your last visit."
Zach turned and gave me a taut smile. "Perhaps."
I decided that the conversation was going to be something less than pleasant from this point on. I was finished with my meal, so I called the waiter to bring my check. I offered to pay for the whole party, but Zach quickly declined.
"Where are you staying?" I asked Erika.
"At the Corumba on the Avenida Rio Branco," she said.
Zach stared at her.
"Under what name?"
She hesitated. "Vargas."
"May I call you there?"
"You will have little time for socializing,"
Zach said quickly to her.
She ignored him and gave me a nice smile.
"Yes, you may call me. I hope we can get together again, Nick."
I rose. "The feeling is mutual." I touched my hand to hers and our eyes locked together for a brief moment. I knew Zach was jealous, and since I didn't like him, I was playing it up for his benefit He sat there glaring at me. "You'll hear from me."
"Good," Erika said.
I turned from them and left the restaurant I could almost feel the heat from Zach's hostility on my back as I walked out.
That afternoon I took the cable car up to spectacular Corcovado Mountain, which was crested with the enormous statue of Christ the Redeemer. When I got there, I went to the observation parapet, stood in a designated spot, and waited. In about fifteen minutes, a man joined me at the railing. He was about my height, but slimmer. Although he was not yet in middle age, his long face was deeply lined. He was Carl Thompson, and he worked for the CIA.
"Fine view, isn't it?" he said by way of introduction, waving a hand toward the city below which glistened white in the sun and was flanked by green hills and cobalt sea.
"Breathtaking," I said. "How's it going, Thompson?"
"About the same," he said. "It's been fairly quiet down here since the last change of administration at Brasilia. How's everything at AXE these days? For a while there you guys were shooting up more ammunition than the army in Asia."
I grinned. "Sometimes it does seem that way. I've kept busy, as I'm sure you have."
"And now they've put you onto Adrian Stavros."
"That's right." I watched a cruise ship, plying the blue water with its sleek bow, move slowly into the harbor. It looked like a toy boat down there. "When is the last time you saw him?"
He thought a moment. "We have the plantation under surveillance on a spot basis. He was seen leaving the place five or six weeks ago. We think he got on a plane going to Madrid."
"That flight could have continued to Athens."
"It probably did. Has he been seen there?"
"We think so. What goes on at the plantation?"
"The plantation is his real headquarters. He has the Apex Imports outfit here in Rio, and we think the smuggling is conducted through that company. But he doesn't visit its offices very much, even though his name is openly associated with it. The president of the company makes regular trips to Paracatu."
"And that's where the plantation is located?"
Thompson nodded. "It's near the village, out in the middle of nowhere. It's guarded by Stavros' own small army of ex-cons, political fanatics, and ex-Nazis. There's just a skeleton force there now, though."
"You haven't noticed anything unusual out there, anything out of the ordinary?" I asked.
"Well, if you mean a build-up of people or arms, the answer is no. But there has been a visitor whom none of us had seen before. We've had almost constant surveillance since his appearance with Stavros ninety days ago, and nobody has seen him leave the place. That in itself isn't particularly unusual, except that one of my two men insists that the new fellow, a middle-aged man, is a prisoner there. He's been hustled from one building to another by an armed guard."
"What did this man look like?"
Thompson shrugged. "We have a photo of him, but it's from a distance. He's about fifty, I'd say, with short, dark hair that has become a little gray at the temples. He's a stocky man who always seems to wear silk shirts."
It sounded as if the man might be Minourkos, the Greek shipping magnate whose political pronouncements had recently shaken up Athens and at whose penthouse Adrian Stavros had been seen.
"Can I have a copy of the photograph?"
"That can be arranged," Thompson said. "Look, Carter, in the last week or so we've had to temporarily reduce our surveillance of the plantation to spot-checks again, and I may have to pull our people out of there completely in the next couple of days because there is another problem that has developed for us. Do you want me to get permission to put a man back on it with you?"
"No," I said. "Hawk has promised me help if I need it. When can I have the photograph?"
"How about tonight?"
"Fine."
"There's a drop site we use that's a bit different," Thompson said. "It's a city bus. You will get on at your hotel. My man will already have been on and off. You will go to the rear where nobody sits and take the last seat on your right. The photograph will be taped underneath that seat. The bus will be marked Estrada de Ferro and will take you downtown if you want to go that far."
"When does the bus go past the hotel?"
"At seven-fifteen. The bus will be marked number eleven."
"Okay," I said. "And thanks."
"Any time," Thompson said. A moment later he was gone.
In the late afternoon I made a brief visit to the offices of the Apex Import Company. It was located in one of the old renovated government buildings that had been left empty when the capital moved to Brasilia. The offices were three flights up, and the elevator wasn't working.
I entered a rather small reception office upstairs. There was perspiration on my brow from the climb, for the air-conditioning in the building seemed not to work much better than the elevator and it was a muggy day in Rio. A dark-haired girl sat at a metal desk and looked up at me suspiciously when I entered.
"May I help you?" she asked in Portuguese.
I responded in English. "I would like to see Mr. Stavros."
Her dark eyes narrowed even more. When she spoke again, it was in broken English. "I believe you come to wrong place, senhor."