Formutesca said, “There was a rumor around for a while that he was building a mercenary army, going to take over anyway, but nothing came of it.”
Gonor said, “Nothing could come of it. Mercenary armies take money, and General Goma has none. His white supporters are former colonists, and of course most of their valuables stayed behind in Dhaba. Without money, General Goma is no threat.”
“So he’s after the diamonds too,” Formutesca said.
Parker said, “Diamonds?”
“The Dhaba unit of currency,” Gonor said, “is the basoko. It is not a hard currency, of course, and Colonel Lubudi naturally didn’t dare ship large amounts of it out of the country. In the first place, a great quantity of basoko in the world markets would attract attention to itself. In the second place, if his defection created a sufficiently large dislocation in his wake, the basoko could quickly become valueless.”
“You can’t retire on yesterday’s currency,” said Formutesca.
“So what he did,” Gonor said, “was convert basoko into real property and then reconvert that into diamonds, doing most of his conversions in South Africa.”
Parker said, “Who has the diamonds?”
“The Colonel’s brother-in-law, Patrick Kasempa. He is married to the Colonel’s sister, making him the one person in the world the Colonel can fully trust.”
“They’re here in New York,” Parker said, “and they have the diamonds.”
“Yes.”
“They have guards around the place?”
“They are well protected,” Gonor said.
Parker shook his head. “What you’ve got here,” he said, “is a very sloppy setup. The diamonds are well protected, there’s other groups also after them, and you’ve got people like Hoskins hanging around. You’ll never do it without making noise and trouble, and you probably won’t come out of it with the diamonds in your possession.”
“With a professional to lead us”
“No.”
Gonor looked at him. “You won’t help us?”
“You can’t behelped,” Parker told him. “There’s too many elements involved. The only thing for you to do is go to this Colonel and tell him you know what’s up and that he won’t get away with it.”
Gonor shook his head. “We couldn’t. If he knew we were aware of his plans, he would have no choice but to try to kill us or escape or both.”
Formutesca said, “With your help, we could get the diamonds.”
“No. Aside from everything else, you have a pigeon in with you.”
Gonor frowned. “A what?”
“A squealer, he means,” Formutesca said. “An informer. A traitor.”
Parker said, “The three that were here before, the ones you said are working with this General Goma, they got here beforeyou, which means they knew your plans; they didn’t just follow you to me.”
“Hoskins”
“Hoskins followed them,” Parker said. “They probably talked to him when he was working for you and found out he wasn’t any threat. But since then he’s kept tabs on them, which is how he got to me. Because the only name he knew for me was the one I’m registered under, but the other three knew me as Parker. That could only come from your crowd.”
Gonor said, “Yes. We must have someone in our group trying to safeguard himself in case Goma should win.”
“It looks that way. It also looks like they’ll get to the diamonds before you do.”
Gonor shook his head. “No. They’ll let us do the stealing and then try to take the diamonds away from us. Because I am the only one in the group, Mr Parker, who knows where Patrick Kasempa and the diamonds are.” He looked around at the others, then back at Parker. “There is no point in continuing this discussion,” he said, “until we have removed the traitor. If you will excuse us now, we will call on you again at a later time.”
“All right,” said Parker.
Gonor said something to the others and headed for the door. The others followed him, Formutesca stopping for a second in front of Parker to say, “It isn’t really as sloppy as it sounds. And we are not the total amateurs you take us for.”
“That’s good,” Parker said.
They went out. Parker shut the door after them, turned to Claire, and said, “Pack.”
6
“They’re back,” Claire said.
The Miami sun was straight overhead. They were having lunch in a glass-walled restaurant, the air inside cold and dry. Outside, pink and white cars with chrome slid by.
Parker looked at her. “Who’s back?”
She nodded at the street. Parker looked that way, and through the glass he saw three men, black, short, dressed in slacks and short-sleeved shirts, standing out there. They were in a little cluster and they seemed to be talking to one another, but the one in the middle was looking directly at Parker. It was Gonor.
Claire said, “I thought you talked to Handy.”
“I did.” He’d called Handy before leaving New York and told him not to give his address to the people from Dhaba any more. But here they were.
“What are you going to do?”
“I’ll be back,” he said, and got to his feet and went out of the restaurant. The air outside was like dirty dishcloths. Parker walked through it to the three men, Gonor in the middle. Formutesca on the left, one of the other two from the first meeting on the right.
Gonor was keeping most of the self-satisfaction from his smile. “Very hot today, Mr Parker.”
“You put a tail on me.”
“I’m afraid so, yes. Mr Formutesca here followed you when you left your hotel in New York.”
Formutesca was letting all his self-satisfaction show. “We thought we hadn’t made a good impression on you,” he said, “so you might decide to go away. And that’s what you did.”
“We were determined,” Gonor said, “to correct that impression. Keeping track of you was, you will admit, not sloppiness.”
Parker nodded. “So?”
“You will also notice,” Gonor said, “that we are one less than previously. We found our traitor.”
“You sure he was the one?”
Gonor’s smile contained a small hint of delicate savagery. “We’re sure,” he said.
Formutesca said, “He told us all about it before we were done.”
“Where is he now?”
“He isn’t,” Formutesca said.
Parker looked at him. Behind the humor Formutesca looked tough. Behind the impassivity Gonor also looked tough. The third man, younger, looked strong and willing.
Gonor said, “We had hoped to bring you news of Hoskins’ removal as well, but he seems to have disappeared for good this time.”
“He’ll be back,” Formutesca said. “But probably not for a while.”
Parker said, “That general and his colonist friends”
“General Goma.”
“They know you found out about their man.”
“That won’t make any difference,” Gonor said. “They won’t move against us until they believe we have the diamonds.”
Parker turned and looked at the restaurant. Claire was sitting in there on the cool side of the glass, watching. She nodded when their eyes met. He turned back to Gonor and said, “Why follow me? I gave you a no up in New York when I left.”
“Because you had the wrong impression of us,” Gonor said. “If you say no to us after we have corrected that impression, of course we will no longer bother you.”
“We want to give you the proposition first,” Formutesca said. “We never got to that in New York.”
“You want me to plan your heisting the diamonds.”
Gonor frowned. “Heisting?”
Formutesca grinned at him. “Stealing,” he explained, then said to Parker, “I went to M.I.T. Mr Gonor learned his English in school.”