Carter took Julius at his word, paid him, and booked a room. He'd checked his weapons at the airport but wanted to go through them at more leisure. The room was an ideal place for it.
Armed and rigged for action, Carter set out to start bringing in useful information and find himself a rental car so that he could get going.
There were a number of adobe buildings, wooden sheds, and some attempts at stucco work in varying degrees, but when Carter found the Central Park, he began to see signs of ambitious building, major department stores, boutiques, old, colonial-style buildings, a movie theater, and several bars with a straightforward Caribbean ambience on the outside, a hybrid of reggae, Willie Nelson, and Billy Joel on the inside. A block away he saw a sign, Smith and Sons Auto Rental. After some negotiations he was given a car that sounded acceptable, but when he checked it out, he came back inside the rental office. "I want a car I can rely on," he said. "I'm willing to pay for it."
"Where you be going?" the frightened clerk asked.
"Belmopan, more or less."
"I do have a Toyota with some oomph to it."
"I'll take it," Carter said.
"Can't let you do that, not for three, four hours. It surely be back then, and we'll say you got it reserved."
Carter took himself to the Upstairs Café where he saw a number of posters and advertisements for the Belize Center for the Written and Performing Arts, some already dated, announcing that James Rogan was giving poetry readings or discussions of the classics.
He entered, looked around the well-lit room, and almost immediately the sound of a brief scuffle broke out at one of the rear tables. Carter was aware of someone leaving in a hurry. Someone who had not wanted to be seen? Carter wondered.
Carter was down the stairs immediately. The man wore a shirt with rolled-up sleeves. Running shoes. Olive drab pants. Out on the street, he started running toward the Swing Bridge, Carter not far behind. Seeing that Carter was getting close, the man angled across a small park where some old people had set up a vegetable and fruit stand. The quarry put on a burst of speed as Carter began gaining, then managed to vanish in a row of dilapidated shacks. But Carter had a good idea who hadn't wanted to be seen. Abdul Samadhi.
Carter returned to the Upstairs Cafe and looked carefully at the table where Samadhi had sat. A group of four men, possibly Arabs, sat glaring at him. Carter stood at the edge of the table. "Tell your friend," he said in Arabic, "that I will wring his scrawny neck when I catch him."
The four at the table made no response.
"Did you hear me?" Carter snapped.
Sullenly, the men began to eat.
Carter grabbed one of the men by the arm and twisted so that he was forced off his chair onto his knees. The other three were on their feet. "Did you hear me?" Carter demanded.
The one on the floor nodded.
"You have bad manners," Carter said. "All of you."
The men returned to their meal. No one else in the cafe responded, but Carter hadn't expected any of them to know Arabic. He chose a table by himself and looked at the menu. The Upstairs Café had two menus, the bean-and-fish-oriented dishes that went with the Caribbean culture, and a more traditional American menu of hamburgers, stews, fried chicken, pies, and soft drinks.
Carter settled on the chicken and began to notice groups of men at various tables, some of them Caucasian, possibly European from their dress, some blacks, and a few Latinos. From time to time the men at the table from which Samadhi had fled looked over at Carter with cold menace.
A noisy clatter erupted downstairs. Carter guessed it was a bus, trying to start.
By the time Carter's chicken was served, a rather shaggy-looking man, tall, slightly bent at the shoulders, some gray in his longish hair, came into the room and approached one of the tables of men. He wore khakis and field boots. Wire-rimmed glasses were perched on his nose. A name patch read Unkefer, D., but there were no other insignia to show a military or civilian affiliation. "Any of you turkeys know diesel engines?"
The men regarded him in a friendly enough manner, but no one spoke.
Unkefer went to the next table and spoke in German, adding a number of colloquialisms and regionalisms when he spoke.
One of the men told Unkefer he could handle a Mercedes. Unkefer actually took a piece of chicken from the man's plate and chewed it for a moment. "The only way a guy like you would get near a Mercedes is to steal it."
The others laughed, but once again, Unkefer was forced farther afield to find someone, even stopping at Carter's table and asking him. Carter noted that Unkefer addressed him in English, and he marveled at the newcomer's ability to choose the first language of so many of the men in the room.
Carter nodded and agreed to go downstairs with Unkefer. There was a bus parked below and two men were working at it with mounting frustration.
Carter peered in, familiarizing himself with the layout and condition of the large engine. "This isn't the original engine for this bus," he said.
A tall, swarthy man standing next to Unkefer snarled. "We aren't asking for a pedigree, just a hand in getting the mother to run."
Unkefer nudged him. "Easy, man," he said. "This guy's helping us, remember?"
"Yeah, well, he don't have to go nosing around."
"Actually, it's quite an imaginative job of cannibalized parts," Carter said. "I see some English parts, some German parts, some Brazilian, er, these parts over here are clearly Russian."
"Wiseguy," the swarthy one said. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Unkefer appeared to have lost his patient cool. "Will you can it?" He moved in front of the swarthy man and pushed him aside. To Carter he said, "No offense. Thanks for your efforts."
After ten minutes of fiddling, Carter settled on checking the water-to-fuel regulator and the spark coil. At a call from Carter, the driver turned over the engine, which lugged for a few turns, cranked precariously, then caught hold.
Unkefer was delighted. "Let me buy you a beer, man. Hell, let me pay for your lunch."
Carter waved away the gesture in a friendly manner, that would not offend. "Where are you headed?"
"Right outside Belmopan."
"Ah, the arts center?"
"You know it?" Unkefer asked.
"I heard Rogan give a big reading at the university in Mexico City."
"Yeah, well, if that stuff interests you, man, you should come out and visit. All kinds of classes and stuff out there."
Carter smiled.
He returned to the restaurant, washed, and ate his chicken. In another few minutes, Unkefer appeared, rounded up all the men who had been glaring at Carter, and sent a beer over to Carter's table.
There was a connection between these people and Samadhi and the Center for the Arts. Not only that, Carter's arrival in Belize was marked. People knew he was here now. The character of the restaurant changed immediately when the groups of men were gone and loaded into the bus below. A few Belizian postal employees lingered over their meals, and clusters of tourists consulted the menus or ate the large, savory portions set before them by agreeable Carib women who worked as waitresses.
The policy at the Upstairs Cafe was for second helpings of yams, beans, potatoes, and greens. Carter suspected there could be thirds as well for those who had the room.
Calling over his waitress, Carter asked, "Do you know anything about those men who you see before?"
She looked about nervously, and lowered her voice. "Dis part of the world, dere ain't as much to be particular about as in your part of the world. People come to get jobs as chicleros, milking them chicle trees. Sometimes they be a roundup to do some felling of the mahogany trees. I hear they pay good wages. And over to Belmopan, they be pavin' roads and puttin' up buildings to make the new capital. Lots of work a man could do — if he keep his eyes open."