After two passes around the block, Goodman slowed as they approached the back door of the restaurant and said to Stone, “Check your radio.”
Stone keyed his device by depressing the send button. The signal crackled over the car’s radio.
“Listen, and don’t tell anybody I told you this.” Goodman looked at him in the rearview mirror. “If you have to use your gun, don’t hesitate. Life’s cheap here and yours is cheaper.”
Sandra turned around. “We’ll be close. Yell if you need help.” As the SUV came to a halt, she said, “Out now! Don’t stay longer than necessary.”
Stone leaped from the car, took three long strides to the door, found it unlocked, and slipped into restaurant and darkness. As he closed the door behind him, he heard the SUV drive off. He slipped the safety off his semiautomatic and inched across the room toward leaking light from behind a door hanging from one hinge.
Footsteps shuffled from the other side, and the door opened slowly. A black man in an ironed white shirt, age forty to sixty with graying hair and red-veined eyes, motioned for him to enter. Dust hung in the air. Even in peaceful days the restaurant couldn’t accommodate more than ten customers. The man pointed to a solitary figure across the room wearing a khaki safari jacket, sitting with his back to the wall.
Jacob looked hard at Stone, then shot a glance out the dirty window toward the street.
“You came alone.” Jacob said, not so much a question than a statement.
“No.”
Jacob looked older than the last time Stone had seen him. Thinner, and with a sallow complexion. Stone figured that during Jacob’s travels in Africa he had caught a dose of malaria, or maybe dengue fever. Nevertheless, he still broadcasted a defiant look.
He pushed out a wooden chair with his foot. “Have a seat.”
“You look good, Jacob.” Stone didn’t bother to offer a handshake, knowing it wouldn’t be returned.
“Cut the bullshit. You have any idea why I wanted to talk with you?”
Stone considered giving him a New York City smart-ass response, but instead answered straight. “My boss said to come here and find out.”
“I believe you.” Jacob hunched his shoulders and waved to the old man standing by the counter. “A Club beer for my friend.”
“It’s a bit early for me. I usually wait ’till five. I’ll have a glass of water.” Stone tried to sense whether Jacob believed he didn’t know the reason behind the meet. Knowing this old operative, Stone withheld judgment for the time being.
“They refill plastic water bottles from the town sewer. Hold them up to the light and you can see the bacteria swimming. Beer’s the only safe drink in town.”
Stone nodded. When the Club beer came, he told the old man to forget the glass. He’d drink from the bottle. “So, what’s up?”
“Before we start, who do you work for? I heard you retired.”
“I was at home gardening when a friend called. He asked me to take a short trip for him and write a travel story.” Stone smiled. “I understand you’re here dealing in diamonds.”
Jacob’s face, his whole countenance, remained motionless. As if on cue, a slight smile appeared. “Diamonds. Yes, I understand you may need one for an engagement ring.” He gave his head a little shake. “Since your recent divorce and, of course, your friendship with that contessa in Villefranche.”
Stone took a long swig of beer, smiled, and took another swallow. The bastard was good. Jacob’s people had made some serious inquiries about him and learned about his marital status — a train wreck — and about his dalliance three months ago with Contessa Lucinda Avoscani. Mossad and Jacob may or may not know about Stone’s involvement in the deaths of a number of terrorists along the Côte d’Azur. Chances were they did.
Stone asked, “Why are we here?”
“You’re here because the last time I had dealings with your new masters, I met with an unfortunate circumstance.” He turned his head and brushed back his hair. Most of his right ear was missing. “With your veterans assigned to Afghanistan, you have some very inexperienced officers working the backwater countries. Mistakes are not forgiven in this region.”
Stone stared at the ear and knew Jacob had reason to be pissed at the CIA. He would be, but was Jacob’s tradecraft up to snuff? Had he let his guard down?
Remembering Sandra’s words about not lingering, he looked at his watch. “We should get to the point.”
They looked out the window. Birds, black with white blotches on their breasts, waddled on piles of garbage. The gloom from an overcast sky blended with the deteriorating setting.
Jacob spoke. “There are some disturbing rumors. As you know, many people from the Middle East ply this region. For years, they have come, lived here, and traded goods. Some of these people now trade weapons.”
Stone nodded, thinking what he had just heard sounded like some factoid from a news documentary. Anyone who flew on the regional airlines in Africa recognized the Lebanese, Indians, and Israelis sharing the cabin. “And now the jihadists have descended,” Stone offered.
“Yes, but this time, a group is here, not to sell, but to purchase.”
“Buy what?” Stone asked.
Jacob shrugged with his upper body.
“Let’s see, my boss advised that you,” Stone pointed, “suggested I travel to Sierra Leone.”
Nodding, eyes closed, Jacob pushed a white index card across the table on which appeared a name, a company, and a telephone number in heavy marker ink. “Memorize,” he ordered.
Stone studied the card, looked away, and mentally repeated the words. Pushing it back, he planned to write the information down in code and slip it somewhere secure.
“He is an Afrikaner. You must see him very soon,” Jacob said. “He is taking a big risk.”
“Understood.” Stone watched the man pull back and again look out the window as if looking for someone.
Pulling the radio partially out of his pocket, Stone keyed the transmitter twice, signaling Goodman and Sandra to pick him up. He rose and made his way to the door.
Without looking, Jacob tossed a good-bye.
In the backseat of the SUV, Stone asked if they had detected anything strange while they waited for him. “Nothing,” Sandra answered, and added, “You didn’t waste any time.”
“Got what I wanted.” He also learned that, as usual, his boss and mentor back at Langley, Colonel Gustave Frederick, had told him the bare minimum. Even Jacob realized Stone was in the dark, a professional embarrassment as it placed Stone on a lower rung in the operation.
Stone rubbed his forehead. A headache was coming on, not from job stress but from his anti-malaria pills. “When’s the next plane to Freetown, Sierra Leone?” he asked Goodman.
“One is scheduled at eight in the morning for Abidjan. From there you can get a connection to Freetown.”
Stone touched Sandra’s shoulder. “Do you have a pen?”
When she passed it back, he inked in his palm only the telephone number Jacob had given him. He was good at names; still, to be safe, he repeated to himself the name and the company: Dirk Lange, York Export Ltd.
Chapter Four
Above the horizon, through the haze and city smoke, the sun bubbled blood red. Al Goodman had gone to the airport to make arrangements for Stone and Sandra’s flight the next day to Freetown. The embassy’s cafeteria had closed, leaving the two on their own to find a place for dinner. Sandra suggested they stay in their quarters and combine what snacks they had brought with them.
“Let’s try the restaurant Goodman and I went to last night,” Stone suggested. “We can borrow that old car sitting on the embassy compound. The restaurant’s only a five-minute drive from here.”