Алистер Маклин - River of Death

‘Oh, I hope so, I hope so. You said we’d be seeing him in two hours. Could you make it three?’ He looked disparagingly at his wrinkled khaki drills. ‘These look well enough in Romono, but I have to see a tailor before I go calling on multimillionaires. You say we’re being met when we arrive. You think you can drop me off at the Grand?’

‘Jesus!’ Hiller was clearly taken aback. ‘The Grand and a tailor. That’s expensive. How come? Last night in the bar you said you had no money.’

‘I came into some later on.’

Hiller and Serrano exchanged very peculiar looks. Hamilton continued to gaze placidly out of the window.

As promised a car met them at the private airport in Brasilia. ‘Car’ was really too mundane a word to describe it. It was an enormous maroon Rolls-Royce, big enough, one would have thought, to accommodate a football team. In the back it had television, a bar and even an ice-maker. Up front-very far up front – were two uniformed men in dark green livery. One drove the car: the other’s main function in life appeared to be opening doors when the back seat – seats – passengers entered or left. The engine, predictably, was soundless. If it were part of Smith’s pattern to awe visitors he most certainly succeeded in the case of Serrano. Hamilton appeared quite unimpressed, possibly because he was too busy inspecting the bar; Smith had somehow overlooked providing a stewardess for the rear of the Rolls.

They drove through the wide avenues of that futuristic city and pulled up outside the Grand Hotel. Hamilton dismounted – the door having magically been opened for him, of course – and passed swiftly through the revolving door. Once inside, he looked out through the glassed-in porch. The Rolls, already more than a hundred yards away, was turning a corner to the left. Hamilton waited until it had disappeared from sight, left by the revolving door by which he had entered and started to walk briskly back in the direction from which they had come. He gave the impression of one who knew the city, and he did: he knew Brasilia very well indeed.

Five minutes after dropping Hamilton the Rolls pulled up outside a photographer’s shop. Hiller went inside, approached a smiling and affable assistant and handed over the film that had been taken from Hamilton.

‘Have this developed and sent to Mr Joshua Smith, Haydn Villa.’ There was no need for Hiller to add the word ‘immediately’. Smith’s name guaranteed immediacy. Hiller went on: ‘No copy is to be made of this film and neither the person who develops it nor any other member of your staff is ever to discuss it. I hope that is clearly understood.’

‘Yes, sir. Of course, sir.’ The smile and the affability had vanished to be replaced by total obsequiousness. ‘Speed and secrecy. Those are guaranteed, sir.’

‘And a perfect print?’

‘If the negative is perfect so will the print be.’

Hiller couldn’t think of how else he could threaten the now thoroughly apprehensive assistant so he nodded and left.

Another ten minutes later and Hiller and Serrano were in the drawing-room of the Villa Haydn. Serrano was seated, as were Tracy, Maria and a fourth and as yet unidentified man. Smith talked somewhat apart with Hiller – ‘somewhat apart’ in that huge drawing-room meant a considerable distance – glancing occasionally in Serrano’s direction.

Hiller said: ‘Of course, I can’t vouch for him. But he knows an awful lot that we don’t and I can always see to it that he’ll make no trouble. Come to that, so would Hamilton. Hamilton has a rough way of dealing with people who step out of line.’ Hiller went on to tell the sad tale of Serrano’s mugging.

‘Well, if you say so, Hiller.’ Smith sounded doubtful and if there was one thing Smith didn’t like it was being doubtful about anything. ‘You certainly haven’t let me down so far.’ He paused. ‘But your friend Serrano seems to have no history, no past.’

‘Neither have most men in the Mato Grosso. Usually for the simple reason that they have too much of a past. But he knows his jungle – and he knows more Indian dialects than any man except maybe Hamilton. Certainly more than any man in the Indian Protection Service.’

‘All right.’ Smith had made up his mind and seemed relieved for that. ‘And he’s been close to the Lost City. Could be a useful back-up man.’

Hiller nodded towards the unidentified person, a tall, very heavily built, darkly handsome man in his mid-thirties.

‘Who’s that, Mr Smith?’

‘Heffner. My chief staff photographer.’

Hiller said: ‘Mr Smith!’

‘Hamilton would think it extremely strange if I didn’t take a staff photographer along on this historic trip,’ Smith said reasonably. He smiled slightly. ‘I will confess, though, that he can use one or two instruments other than his cameras.’

‘I’ll bet he can.’ Hiller looked at Heffner with even closer interest. ‘Another with or without a past?’

Smith smiled again but made no answer. A phone rang. Tracy, who was nearest to it, picked it up, listened briefly and replaced the receiver.

‘Well, well. Surprise, surprise. The Grand Hotel has no one registered there under the name of Hamilton. Not only that, no member of the staff can recall ever seeing a man answering to the description.’

Hamilton, at that moment, was in a lavishly furnished suite in the Hotel Imperial.

Ramon and Navarro, seated on a couch, were admiring Hamilton, who was admiring himself in front of a full-length mirror.

‘Always did fancy myself in a fawn seersucker,’ Hamilton said complacently. ‘Don’t you agree? This should knock Smith for six.’

‘I don’t know about Smith,’ Ramon said, ‘but in that outfit you’d terrify even the Muscias. So no trouble with getting the invitation?’

‘None. When he saw me flashing those gold coins in public he must have panicked in case someone else would step in fast. Now, I’m pleased to say, he’s convinced he’s got me hooked.’

‘You still think that gold hoard exists?’ Navarro said.

‘I’m convinced it did exist. Not that it does.’

‘Then why did you want those coins?’

‘When this is over they will be returned and the money reimbursed – all except the two that are now in the possession of Curly, the head barman at the Hotel de Paris. But those were necessary: the shark, as we know, took the bait.’

‘So, no hoard, huh?’ Ramon said. ‘Disappointing.’

‘There is a hoard and a huge one. But not of those coins. Perhaps melted down, although that’s unlikely. What is likely is that it’s been split up into private collectors’ hands. If you want to dispose of an art treasure, be it a stolen Tintoretto or a Penny Black, then Brazil is the place in the world. The number of Brazilian millionaires who spend hours in their air-conditioned, humidity-controlled, burglar-proof deep underground cellars gloating over stolen Old Masters boggles the imagination. Ramon, there’s a wet bar right behind you, and I’m developing a sore and thirsty throat from lecturing callow youngsters on the facts of criminal life.’

Ramon grinned, rose and brought a large whisky and soda to Hamilton and a soda each for himself and his brother – the twins never drank anything stronger.

Having eased his throat, Hamilton said: ‘What did you get on Smith?’

‘Nothing more than you expected,’ Ramon said. ‘The number of companies he controls is beyond counting. He’s a financial genius, charming and courteous, totally ruthless in his business dealings and must by any reckoning be the richest man in the Southern hemisphere. A sort of Howard Hughes in reverse. About Hughes’s early days everything was known in detail but the latter part of his life was so wrapped in mystery that many people who should have been in a position to know could scarcely believe that he had died on that flight from Mexico to the States, having been firmly convinced that he had died many years previously. Smith? Dead opposite. His past is a closed book and he never talks about it: neither do any of his colleagues, friends or supposed intimates – no-one really knows whether he has any intimates – for the good reason that none of them was around in his early days. Today, his life is an open book. He conceals nothing and operates in a totally straightforward fashion. Any one of the shareholders in his forty-odd companies can inspect the firm’s books whenever they wish. He appears to have absolutely nothing to hide and I would suppose when you are as brilliant as he unquestionably is there’s just no point in being dishonest. After all, what’s the point in it if you can make more money being honest? Today he knows everybody’s business and lets anyone who wishes know all about his businesses.’