Crobey said obliviously, “I didn’t have to be the world’s greatest pilot, you know. With a little education I could have been a gourmet.”
“Don’t be sickening,” Carole Marchand drawled; she turned mischievously to Rosalia. “Harry takes a mulish delight in pretending he’s an ape. Actually beneath that rough crude exterior beats the heart of the first man in Liverpool to climb down a tree without having had to climb up it first.”
Crobey’s smile was a bit strained. “The lady likes to turn on the fan and wait for something to hit it.”
Carole Marchand breathed in slowly and expressively through her nose; she tried to suck her mouth in with a tight look of disapproval but her lips began to quiver. “Keep it up, Crobey, keep it up.” She reached sternly for her glass but then began to laugh; Anders realized to his astonishment that she actually enjoyed bantering with Crobey. Finally she drank and held the glass away from her with critical suspicion. “What the devil is this?”
Crobey said, “I suspect it ain’t Dad’s Old Fashioned Root Beer, ducks. Beyond that it’s hard to say, in this dump. Could be horse piss.”
“Philistine. Infidel.”
The dinner that ensued was edible if not palatable; finally the bartender cleared the dishes away with a surly crashing of porcelain. Soiled espresso cups alighted on the table like moths; Crobey lifted his, peered dubiously into it and said, “Confusion to our enemies.”
“And I believe we’re here to discuss our enemies,” Carole Marchand said. Her voice had hardened — no longer the cool acerbic drawl.
“Right,” Crobey said, “we want to win the war and get home by Christmas, don’t we.”
Carole Marchand considered Rosalia; then her glance came around to Anders. “Not to be indelicate but—”
“Rosalia knows what I know.”
Crobey smiled at the girl, full of insincerity.
Carole Marchand said, “Let’s take the man’s word for it, shall we, Harry?” She looked down, then quickly up into Anders’ face — as if trying to catch him off guard. “How do you tote it up, Mr. Anders? Are we on the same side or not?”
“That would depend.”
“You sound like O’Hillary.”
“I try not to do that.” He smiled a bit.
“I intend to pin these terrorists to the board,” she said. “Just so there’s no misunderstanding of my position.”
“We understand your position.”
“Talking like that could get you elected to Congress,” she said. “My first objective is to goad your agency into doing the job it ought to have done without goading. If that fails I have every intention of doing it myself. And I ain’t whistlin’ ‘Dixie,’ Mr. Anders.”
Anders put his head down, thinking. The phone conversation with O’Hillary ran through his mind. Defiantly he made the decision. “Rodriguez — if that’s who he is — seems to be running under the code-name Cielo. He tried to buy ordnance from a broker in Fajardo. The broker wasn’t selling but that only means Cielo’s shopping somewhere else. Incidentally a couple of policemen spent most of the day today surveilling a car that turned out to be yours, Harry.”
“The two smokers? They were about as inconspicuous as two giraffes in a bathtub.”
“Anyway two days ago the subject, Cielo, was here in San Juan driving a Volkswagen. He spent a night in the Rio Piedras area. We don’t know which house but at least we’ve got it narrowed down to a neighborhood. He may have contacts there — maybe other terrorists, maybe a safe-house, maybe a girl friend. Whatever. He may never go back there again, of course, but it’s a sort of lead. We’ve checked the municipal directory but there’s no Rodriguez or Cielo listed at any address around there. He was spotted by a cop named Perez and we had him go through the pictures and he’s identified a photograph of Rodrigo Rodriguez taken in nineteen sixty-two.”
Carole Marchand said, “All right!”
“Take it easy, ducks. The man could’ve been wrong.”
Anders said, “Perez thinks it may be the same face. But nineteen sixty-two? The man was young then. Perez admits it’s not a positive make. We ran the old Rodriguez fingerprints through the computers and got no particular results — evidently he hasn’t been arrested or identified since before the Bay of Pigs.”
Crobey kept watching him, filled with reserve. “Why the cooperative candor, Glenn?”
He’d expected it. Now Crobey had put it to him — bluntly, so that Anders couldn’t evade it without exposing the evasiveness. He knew half truths wouldn’t convince Crobey. “I have to stonewall that. I’m not at liberty to break security. All I can tell you is I’ve got instructions to find Rodriguez. Beyond that I can only suggest you don’t look a gift horse too carefully in the teeth.”
Carole Marchand said, “It’s a matter of the national security.” She looked at Crobey. “If we find Rodriguez he expects us to report it to him — but if he finds Rodriguez before we do, why do I get the feeling he won’t tell us a damn thing?”
“Maybe I won’t,” Anders told her. “I won’t make promises I might not keep. But look at it this way: You know more now than you did before you came here tonight. It hasn’t hurt you to talk to me.”
“Then what do you want?”
“Co-operation. Quid pro quo.”
The woman scowled at Crobey. “How would you play it?”
“Under an assumed name.” Crobey smiled a little. “I know Glenn. He wasn’t born devious but he’s been playing these games a long time — I guess he knows how to finesse. He’s got something in his wallet he hasn’t put on the table. If we knew what it was we might change our minds.”
“Suppose I told you you’re wrong, Harry.”
“I doubt I’d believe you. I have to jump to that conclusion — you’ve laid on this fog of facts that don’t get me anywhere when I stop to think about them. A gift? Sure — but what’s it worth? Give us something worth trading for.”
Rosalia, flashing with anger, turned on him with low-voiced hissing savagery: “Glenn’s told you everything we know. If you think he’s lying I don’t see any point continuing this meeting.”
Carole Marchand said — ignoring Rosalia and addressing herself to Anders — “As soon as Harry began asking questions here he was given a warning by a police detective. Between the lines the policeman gave him to understand there were powerful interests in Puerto Rico who wanted him to leave. Does that suggest anything to you?”
“Such as what?”
“Clout. Local political clout. If it’s true the local police have no leads on Cielo-Rodriguez, if they don’t even know him, then obviously he’s not the one applying pressure. Someone else is. Someone known to the police. Someone who’s either fronting for Rodriguez or being fronted for by Rodriguez. Someone here in Puerto Rico.”
Anders was unimpressed. “You do stretch a point.”
“Humor me.”
O’Hillary’s instructions ragged him. He’d already disobeyed them tonight but if he started poking around San Juan police headquarters asking questions, it would get back to Langley in no time at all. That was no good. Then he turned to look at Rosalia. “It might be worth flirting with a cop or two.”
She made a face at him.
Crobey said, “I think our best shot’s still the arms merchants. If we find the dealer we might follow the shipment to Rodriguez.”
Anders said, “I doubt he’ll be that obliging. He doesn’t leave a lot of tracks — you said that yourself. I’d like to concentrate on looking for the connection in Rio Piedras. He spent the night there with somebody.”
“You go poking around down there,” Crobey warned, “you could get your guts handed to you.”