Free Mambo by Campbell Armstrong Page B

Enrico. If Ruhr blows it again, you’ll offer your resignation. We want that promise.”
    So that was it. Caporelli wasn’t entirely surprised. Perry lusted after the Director’s chair, which he’d missed by only two votes last time.
    â€œI give it gladly,” Caporelli said. The Directorship didn’t enthrall him. It had some advantages. It gave one a certain freedom to make a decision on one’s own. But that same freedom was also a heavy responsibility and he wasn’t intrigued by titles these days anyway. All he really wanted was what was owed him – with interest. Accounts had to be balanced before they could be closed, and his Cuban account had gone unsettled for far too long.
    Caporelli solicited the other members around the table. A vote was taken: the plan would proceed. If the first stage wasn’t completed, the scheme would be aborted. The Director’s promise of resignation was noted.
    Caporelli, who felt he’d won a tiny victory, looked at Hurt. “Let’s go on to the next item of business – Harry’s report on the situation in Central America.”
    Harry Hurt had jogged all round Kinnaird’s estate earlier. Then he’d showered, and meditated for twenty minutes, and now he exuded the glow of sheer good health. He sat at the table like a human lamp. “There are no problems. Everything’s primed. Officially, the Hondurans accept the story we’re constructing a resort fifty miles from Cabo Gracias a Dios. Unofficially, they know we’re doing something else. It’s costly to bridge that gap between the official and unofficial perception in Central America. Everybody’s schizophrenic down there. We forge ahead, greasing palms as we go. The airstrip’s finished. We’re rolling.”
    â€œHow many men are assembled now?” Chapotin asked.
    â€œTwelve hundred,” Hurt said.
    â€œAnd what will the total commitment be?” Magiwara asked.
    â€œFifteen. But we could go with twelve.” Hurt smiled his jogger’s angular grin. “In point of fact, we could take the whole goddam Caribbean first thing in the morning and still have time for ham and eggs in Key West. If we wanted.”
    The room was silent. Caporelli looked at the faces, waiting for further questions or comments. Harry Hurt always spoke with such authority that he left no doors open. When it came to military matters, he was the resident expert. It was known that he had friends in high places in Washington who had assisted, if only indirectly, in the creation of the military force in Honduras.
    Caporelli stood up slowly. He declared the meeting adjourned.
    He left the room as drinks were being poured and chairs pushed back. The formality of the meeting diminished in more relaxed small talk. What Freddie Kinnaird had called “the holocaust in London” had already been assimilated by the members and subjugated to the prospect of profit, as if it were nothing more than a delayed cargo or an adverse stock market or a foreign currency plummeting, just another item of business. The Society of Friends had absorbed many shocks in its history. It had always survived them.
    Freddie Kinnaird, a gracious host, had placed a bedroom at Caporelli’s disposal. Perched at the top of a tower, it was round with slit-like windows. Caporelli removed his suit and silk underwear and lay down naked, listening to the relentless rush of wind and rain on the tower. He closed his eyes.
    He remembered Cuba.
    He remembered that April morning in 1959 when the three barbudos had come to his house in the Vedado. They wore green fatigues. With their beards they might have been cloned from a sliver of Fidel’s flesh. They carried revolvers and their boots thudded on the Italian marble entrance. They’d been drinking, still celebrating Fidel’s success. It was a twilight time, Caporelli recalled, between hope and fear of disappointment. Soon the