“I don’t drink at seven thirty in the morning,” refused Deaken.
“Anything you want, just call, Mr Deaken,” said the man.
They even knew his name, thought Deaken. So this was power. He wanted to despise it but couldn’t. He was flattered by it, he admitted to himself. Excited too. He ate a solicitously served breakfast and then, for politeness rather than because he wanted to, went onto the flight deck for the transit landing in Madrid. It enabled him to inquire about timing. They were on schedule, the captain told him: Lisbon arrival was 10:20.
They were ten minutes early and he was ushered off first. Deaken had travelled only with a briefcase, so there was no luggage reclaim delay and he went through customs unchecked. The arrangement with Azziz before Deaken had left the Scheherazade was to telephone Ortega’s office to learn the result of the Arab’s contact while he was en route. If Ortega was there, an appointment would have been arranged; if not, his secretary would pass on an alternative location. The response was quick when he dialled the number, the language conveniently moving into English when he identified himself. Mr Ortega was expecting him at eleven.
After the frustration of the previous forty-eight hours, it was proving remarkably easy, thought Deaken; almost too easy. He hoped it was not a bad omen.
He actually enjoyed the drive from the airport, locating the silver thread of the Tagus River looping out to the Atlantic as the taxi topped one of the enclosing hills of Lisbon. He had never been to the Portuguese capital. It had the slightly declining, faded atmosphere of a once great and important place shunted aside by circumstance, like a dowager of a lost fortune forced to wear the patched clothes of a previous age. Deaken liked it. He thought it was a nicely packaged, easily manageable city, with a lot of churches and black-shawled women, and statues of warriors on horseback looking into the distance for something to capture.
Ortega’s office was in an area of tightly packed streets, on the rua da Assunc, ao. After the opulence of the past two days. Deaken had expected it to be an impressive place, perhaps occupying an entire building, and to be at least as imposing as the smoked-glass, ground-floor suites which he hurried past every day on his way to the garret on the avenue Pictet de Rochemont in Geneva. It wasn’t. A second-floor warren of rooms was reached by a not particularly clean set of stairs, to a waiting area, a secretary’s annexe leading to Ortega’s sanctum at the end of a small corridor. The carpeting began here, dramatically improving in quality beyond Ortega’s door. There was a large desk, elaborately carved and brass inlaid, leather furniture, including a matching couch, and a side table supporting the model of a propeller-driven aircraft which Deaken couldn’t identify. One wall was occupied by a map of the world and another dominated by the photograph of a man in a grey lounge suit and a lapel full of medals.
Ortega stood but didn’t come forward to greet his visitor. The Portuguese was a small, dapper man; the white summer suit immaculate, the pink silk pocket handkerchief complementing the pink silk tie. He smiled when they shook hands and Deaken saw both the man’s eye-teeth were gold. It was a peculiar affectation-a rich vampire, thought Deaken.
“You’ll be with Grearson’s department?” said Ortega.
“In a manner of speaking,” said Deaken.
Ortega gestured Deaken to a chair in front of the desk and seated himself. Instead of increasing his stature, which Deaken guessed was the intention, the size of the desk made Ortega look more diminutive.
“There were no difficulties with the shipment leaving France?” Ortega raised an immaculate eyebrow.
“So I understand,” said Deaken. The man was presenting his references.
“Or at Madeira.”
Deaken concealed his lack of knowledge. “Sailed satisfactorily?”
“Five thirty this morning,” said Ortega. “As I knew it would; I’ve never had trouble there.”
“Mr Azziz is grateful; he asked me to tell you that.” He hadn’t but Deaken had never found flattery a drawback.
Ortega smiled his gold-tipped smile.
“It’s an important cargo,” he said, still bargaining.
“Aren’t they all?” said Deaken. For the first time he was on something like an even footing, although he hadn’t known about Madeira and wondered what else there was to learn.
“Africa’s a good market,” said Ortega. “More money available there than in South America and they’re prepared to spend it, for the right material.”
“My involvement usually begins after the deals have been struck,” lured Deaken. “And, as you said, I’m new.”
“Big enough for country agencies to get involved,” said Ortega, adopting the lecturer’s pose towards which Deaken had hoped he would move. “Great Britain is in there. France. So’s America. Russia is particularly active: once there’s a big sale, then there’s dependence for spares and ammunition and the purchaser becomes a client state.”
“With national agencies involved, it must make it all the more difficult for independents,” said Deaken.
“That’s where Azziz has the advantage over the rest of us,” said Ortega. “He’s independent but he’s understood to have Saudi Arabian backing, real or otherwise-he’s got the best of both worlds.”
And appears to enjoy it, thought Deaken. He wondered if Carole had slept with Azziz the previous night, and felt immediately irritated by himself. Why should it matter to him? “There should be no difficulty after Madeira,” he continued, still searching.
Ortega looked down at the papers in front of him again.
“Dakar by Saturday,” he said. The smile flashed again. “But then that’s nothing to do with me, is it?”
“As I said, Mr Azziz is extremely grateful.”
“Which is why you’re here.”
“A percentage was agreed, I believe?” said Deaken. Although there was no limit, he didn’t want to concede any more than he had to. Azziz had accused him of panic the previous day. Did Azziz’s opinion matter, any more than his bedmate? Why the hell couldn’t he dispel the inferiority complex?
“Two per cent for the risks involved!” said Ortega.
“You knew the risks before you entered the transaction.”
“There’s always time for reflection… reexamination,” said Ortega.
“I would have thought in your business… our business,” Deaken corrected, “that all the risks and examinations should be decided before commitment.”
“Conditions change.”
“They didn’t here: everything went exactly as planned.”
“Oh, no,” contradicted Ortega at once. “There were difficulties in Marseilles; people got greedy. I thought at one time the whole thing might get blocked.”
“Another two per cent,” offered Deaken. Six hundred thousand was a hell of a profit, whatever difficulties Ortega’s agent had encountered.
Ortega’s expression was smooth with apologetic refusal. ‘It’s an onward-going thing,” he said. “These people are in contact with each other, from port to port. By the time the Bellicose got to Madeira, the customs people knew the rate had gone up.”
“How much?”
“Five per cent.”
Two and a half million dollars for having his name on a piece of paper for four or five days. Bloody ridiculous. “Agreed,” said Deaken-the charade had gone on long enough. From his briefcase he took a signed but blank bankers’ order, made out against a holding account of a company named as Eklon and lodged in the Swiss Banking Corporation on Zurich’s Paradeplatz. He leaned forward against Ortega’s elaborate desk, hesitating before he filled it in.