ALVES BEGAN HIS PREPARATIONS the evening of the day after the welcome-home party. He had wandered wearily, happily back from the Castle of San Jorge with the sun at his back, watching and listening as the streets came alive and the sounds of the fishermen floated up from the docks on the morning’s first breezes. He napped the day away while Maria took the children to market and then to play in the park. Hyperactive, he romped on the floor with the two oldest boys while Maria bathed the youngest, then took the sweet-smelling, freshly powdered bundle in his arms and crooned a medley of the previous night’s favorites, concluding with an up-tempo rendition of “Does the Spearmint Lose Its Flavor on the Bedpost Overnight?” Which he understood was very big in America.

Eventually the children were all tucked away and Maria was soaking in the tub surrounded by the children’s tiny wooden sailboats bumping against her soft breasts, nestling among the soapsuds. He gazed at her fondly, kissed her moist, thick hair and went to the kitchen table, which was cleared and wiped clean. He set out at once to pull his plans into workable form. It had been a fine first day of freedom, and there would be time to savor that later.

Systematically he composed a series of newspaper vindications, a curiously Portuguese custom that would rehabilitate him in the eyes of others and particularly in the eyes of foreigners. In the newspapers there was no simple way to differentiate between columns of news stories and paid columns of advertisements. He knew that doctors, for instance, commonly paid for the columns used by patients who were willing to sign letters singing the doctors’ praises in the matter of curing one’s great uncle of gout, saving someone else’s life at the last moment. Alves composed a series of “news” stories revealing the truth behind his imprisonment—namely, that he had been railroaded, victim of a public and financial cabal set on destroying him.

By the second evening’s work at the kitchen table he had most determinedly set about the outlining of a plan based on the researches he’d conducted in jail.

The aim was to produce a great deal of money for himself.

The means grew out of what he’d learned while in Oporto. And the keys to the plan, at least on paper, were twofold: first, the Bank of Portugal was entrusted by the government with the power to print money, and, second, the Bank of Portugal was unable to check on the existence of duplicate banknote numbers. Forgery leaped to the mind like the fleet-footed hare. Which was where Alves Reis and the common criminal parted company. Sleeves rolled up, eyes burning from the incessant cigarette smoke, he savored the details, unable to force himself to sleep.

He had turned the procedures of the underworld over and over in his mind, analyzing, evaluating, fitting them against the requirements he’d formed. Large-scale crime, as opposed to the sort carried out by men with pistols in the dark of night, related primarily to the moving of large sums of money from the people or institutions to whom it belonged to the people or institutions with the best conceived schemes to acquire it for themselves. The former approaches were referred to legalistically, more often than not, as embezzlements or frauds. Such enterprises, he learned, were almost always accomplished by individuals who operated from within the organizations being looted, men who had achieved positions of responsibility and therefore opportunities to loot that were based on trust. The forging of banknotes, currency, money was performed by individuals lumped together under the name of counterfeiters. Alves’ reading about the art of counterfeiting led him irrevocably to the conclusion that successful counterfeiting was quite possibly the most difficult and demanding of all criminal endeavors.

Counterfeiters, it seemed, unlike embezzlers and fraud merchants, operated from outside the system they intended to plunder. They must also possess the most sophisticated technical abilities and usually required large amounts of capital to invest in just the right paper, enormously skilled artists and plate engravers, printers, front men. … The very thought of the effort and expertise involved in counterfeiting would, quite understandably, be enough to deter the most zealous of criminals.

Alves had quickly grasped the fact that he was neither an insider nor a professional outsider. At precisely this point in his researches he had felt stymied. He was, he feared, about to see his dreams of beating the system go glimmering, out the window. … He saw himself and he did not spare himself or flinch from what he saw. He was virtually without funds. He had no connections of any significance in Lisbon.

But he also accurately evaluated his resourcefulness. He was not simply a little man with nothing more than a cracked coffee cup and an oilcloth-covered wooden table. Circumstances could be overcome. … Angola had taught him that. Oh, yes, the disadvantages he faced were staggering, apocalyptic—but, he heard himself whispering, I am Alves Reis and that makes the difference.

Eventually, after thinking about the entire business night after night for such a long time, he reached certain conclusions that reinforced his belief in the plan. Now that he was free again, in the embrace of his family, in his home with more time to go over his plan again, he was increasingly sure of those conclusions. Standing at the window, wiping his forehead with a towel, listening to the quiet Lisbon night, he felt confidence in his break with the past. He was a new man—that was the center of everything.

Unlike most criminals he was not governed by tradition. He was unencumbered with the old ways of doing things; he could fire his imagination into the air like a holiday rocket at Cascais and let it explode, trailing peculiar and wonderful options. The criminal, he decided, was by nature an imitator. There seemed to be precious little new in the universe of crime but merely the next generation of criminals who were convinced that by doing things the old way, but better, they could master the world.

At the thought of his own plan Alves’ eyes would sparkle, the exhaustion would fade away, the energy would flow. … Its beauty, he knew, lay in the fact that it had never been done before and could never, ever be done again. The absolutely unique crime. Unique! The great crime, the dazzling, absurd, coruscating crystal chandelier of crime. … He had come upon the foolproof scheme.

During the first week at home Alves was as loving and attentive as Maria could have hoped for. But his mind was far away. He overheard Maria telling her mother just that, going on about how her husband was planning his return to “the workaday world.”

He paced the apartment, walked the banks of the Tagus, sat staring on benches in one park after another, retraced the streets of his boyhood where he had played with his brother. He passed the building, which now stood empty with broken windows and rotted doorframes, where the undertaker’s parlor had stood. Alfonso had taken over the business and moved to another location, where prosperity seemed just a bit more likely. All the time, as the past moved fleetingly before his eyes, he was turning the plan over and over in his mind. Was there a flaw he hadn’t detected, some obvious connection too weak to support his basic concept?

The plan concerned money.

By the end of the week he was convinced it was the perfect plan. He stood alone. He knew that whatever he had the power to imagine he also had the power to accomplish. …

There was, however, one condition.

So daring, so perfect was his plan that he realized a less cunning, less nimble mind could not possibly be asked to cope with it. Therefore the road ahead would be a lonely one. Only he could know the truth. He was entering a world of absolute secrecy. The others, the men he needed to reach his destiny, could be allowed to see only the façade he would construct.

It was then that he telephoned José Bandeira.

He was waiting for them as Alves and Arnaldo stepped away from the ever-present crush of pedestrians in Rossio Square and made their way down the narrow, shadowy street of the goldsmiths with its prettily tiled sidewalks and gleaming, opulent shop windows. José was nattily turned out in a fitted pale-blue suit with wide lapels, a crimson flower pinched into his buttonhole, a cigarette in an amber holder, a Panama hat, patent-leather two-tone shoes with a glassy finish and purple bags under his eyes, this last splash of color the result of a week-long mano a mano with his fetching fadista. He smiled wearily, drawn by curiosity, and the three men took the short walk to the noble street lift that would transport them up to Largo do Carmo, the next level of the city. It was a masterpiece of baroque ironwork, reminiscent of a large Meccano set much like the Eiffel Tower in construction, not overly surprising since Eiffel himself had designed and built the elevator. Somehow it captured perfectly the nineteenth-century quality that made Lisbon so comfortable, so steadfastly picturesque. Slowly the wheels ground on, lifting them into the sunshine well above the square. On the observation deck Alves insisted on spending several moments looking out across the city, at the undulating hills surrounding its core, at the ruins of the castle through a faint haze, at the broad surface of the Tagus to the south, at the acres of rusty orange tiles laid on top of the white buildings and the thick greenery of the hillsides. … He was beginning again. How many times had he begun? How many great chances had he taken? Now he was beginning again. For the last time.

With José popping questions, they walked the narrow cobbled streets winding in the direction of the river but far above it. Finally they came to a beer garden, the outside decorated with blue and white tiles of angels, cherubs and gods. They walked through the jumble of tables and out the back door onto a layered terrace where the sun shone and the breeze fluttered the awnings and pigeons took their ease. Ships moved slowly far below, riding deep in the water. Alves ordered shrimp omelets and beer for their lunch and hunched forward, elbows on the table, white hat on the seat of the fourth chair. He plucked the handkerchief from the breast pocket of his newly pressed white linen suit and began polishing his spectacles, squinting in the sun against the smoke rising from his cigarette. Arnaldo munched on a handful of pale-lavender grapes from a wooden bowl in the center of the table.

José impatiently stubbed his cigarette out and looked frustratedly from one to the other. “All right,” he said, “enough of this shilly-shallying. Let’s get down to what we’re here for. And you’d better be buying this lunch. … I should still be in bed. Asleep, I mean. Now what is this business opportunity I couldn’t afford to pass up?” He yawned involuntarily behind a hand bearing two large diamond rings. Alves remembered the five thousand dollars he’d once wired to Mozambique.

“I’ve been a very busy man since I last saw you,” Alves said with conscious deliberation. “Whatever you or others may have thought, I still have weighty connections throughout—”

“Wait a minute,” José piped. “I never thought for a minute that you were finished, you’re too resourceful … always have been.” He nodded affirmatively. “Not Alves Reis, no sir!”

“Connections throughout Lisbon’s business and financial community,” Alves continued, staring at José, the dandy, who seemed to have been tailored by life to serve as a front man while somebody else exercised the brain power. “You would be amazed if I could actually reveal the names of the men in positions of great power with whom I have had discussions this week. …”

“I’m sure.” José nodded humbly. “Say, does Arnaldo know what you’re leading up to?”

Arnaldo swallowed a mouthful of grapes. “I haven’t seen Alves since the party. I’ve been putting up with my mother all week. ‘Why aren’t you looking for work, Arnaldo? Why don’t you forget this deadbeat crook Reis?’ ” He shrugged helplessly, opened his mouth for another comment.

“Both of you, shut up and listen to me.” Alves lost his composure. “This is your entire future I’m talking about, and I’m going to have more to do with it than your whores, José, and your idiotic senile mother, Arnaldo!”

“Be calm, Alves,” Arnaldo said softly. “We’re listening.”

Alves dropped his voice to a whisper, licking his lips, rolling a grape between his fingertips. He jerked a look over his shoulder to see if any waiters were near enough to overhear.

“Now this is absolutely secret—got it?” They nodded. “To begin with I can’t even give you the names of the men … but—are you listening?”

“For God’s sake, yes,” José whispered loudly. “Go on.” Arnaldo gave him a pitying look and told him to calm himself, people were beginning to look.

“I have been dealing with governors of … the Bank of Portugal!” He eased back in his chair as the omelets and pitchers of beer arrived. His listeners froze at their places until the waiter had fussed and arranged and gone away.

“What do you mean, governors of the Bank of Portugal? Where would you meet such men? Like meeting one of the Pope’s cardinals … like meeting the Pope!” José poked at a shrimp as if it had told him a lie. Arnaldo stared at him.

“True nevertheless,” Alves said. “As well as conducting business with them! In their offices, right down there.” He gestured casually over the edge of the terrace where, far below, the long, dull gray building sat impassively at the center of the nation’s finances. He speared a triangle of omelet and chewed it slowly, while wishing that eating didn’t interfere with smoking. He washed omelet down with cold, cutting beer. “No, you underestimate me—I suppose you haven’t read the papers either. Full of the true story of my unjust imprisonment.”

“You paid for those,” Arnaldo said. “We aren’t fools, you know.”

“So what?” Alves patted his mouth, licked a morsel of shrimp from the tendrils of his mustache. “To the men at the Bank of Portugal—the governors—I am Senhor Angola. I have distinguished myself in Angola’s highest technical post, I have aided the royal railway, I have been selfless at every turn. …”

“Senhor Angola?” José wondered solemnly.

“And what is this business they have in mind?” Arnaldo said, cautiously.

“Remember, utter secrecy. No fadistas, no curious mothers! Understand? Well, here we are, the fall of nineteen twenty-four, and all over the world one nation after another is facing the problems of inflation—and Angola is far worse off than almost any other. Four hundred years a colony and now the bottom has fallen out. …” He squeezed Arnaldo’s arm, a crack of sorrow on his lips. “Our beloved Angola, my friend. Trade is down to nothing and bankruptcy an epidemic. Old families with old money, all gone. One catastrophe after another, people we know. … Angolan currency is no longer convertible into any other European currency—not even Portuguese escudos. Which means that Portuguese settlers out there are trapped. No one will buy their farms or their businesses or even their houses. There’s no gold there, no other valuable resources … as we have reason to know there is, ahem, no oil.” Alves turned his attention to his rapidly cooling lunch, finished half of the omelet and carefully placed the plate on the terrace near his chair. Within seconds the tame pigeons were pecking at the pink-veined shrimps.

“I’ve heard a joke, come to think of it,” José said, remembering with some difficulty. “Let’s see … if Portugal is the Vatican’s poor farm, then Angola is Portugal’s poor farm. Good, eh?”

“Fabulous,” Arnaldo said grimly.

“The problem is that Angola badly needs bailing out. And I, Alves Reis, am the man the governors have chosen to do it!”

Arnaldo and José turned expectant faces toward him, then followed him toward the railing. An awkward double-winged seaplane skimmed low over the Tagus, past the masts and smokestacks, ever lower, wobbly, the pontoons knifed into the gentle waves, disappeared for an instant into furling foam. Alves shook his head. “We live in an amazing age. Machines drop out of the sky into the water and, lo and behold, they don’t sink. … What do you say to that, Arnaldo?”

“I say, how are you supposed to save Angola?”

“First there is a little something José may be able to help us with.”

“Anything,” José said. “Name it.”

“Antonio …”

José looked blank.

“Antonio,” Alves repeated, “your brother—surely the name rings a bell, José.”

“Oh, yes.” José nodded enthusiastically. “Of course, Antonio. What about him?”

“He engages in commercial enterprises in The Hague, does he not? And he must have connections, men he knows who are involved in financial matters. … I need an absolutely trustworthy man, someone your brother will vouch for, someone experienced in international finance. Someone who is infinitely discreet … and won’t turn up his nose at a handsome profit.” Alves cupped his hands around a match and lit a cigarette. The wind moved high up in the palm trees.

“I know such a man,” José said, turning back to the cliff, holding onto his Panama hat with its gaily colored band. “A Dutchman, very experienced, respectable, discreet. … Sophisticated. The man makes a religion of respectability. Perfect.”

“José,” Alves said solemnly, “I’m going to trust you in this. Be sure you have the right man.”

“Yes,” Arnaldo said, frowning. “For God’s sake, be sure.”

“Trust me,” José said. He smiled. “I’ll get in touch with him today. By wire.”

“And I want a complete dossier, everything you know about him. Use all your sources, Antonio, any of your man’s friends or enemies. And call me this evening, tomorrow, as soon as you have the dossier and his answer.”

“To what?” José looked at Alves in confusion.

Alves took a small leather notebook from his coat pocket and a stub of wooden pencil from his trouser pocket, carefully printed the message. Pigeons clucked at his feet, a woman laughed as she leaned over the railing and the breeze lifted her skirt.

When José had departed Alves turned to Arnaldo.

“Well, what do you think?”

Arnaldo shrugged. “Too bad he’s such an idiot, though. Still, he’ll probably find you a good man. …”

“Us,” Alves corrected him. “Find us a good man.”

They were walking back toward the elevator. A beggar approached them on all fours, the side of his face eaten away. Alves dropped a coin into the tin cup, hurried past.

“Bad omen,” he said, remembering his grandmother, who would surely have had an antidote. Peel a lizard, make soup from the skin, pour it on the dog. Something useful.

“Alves, what did the Bank of Portugal want with you? Did you really meet with the governors?”

“Of course I did. But I cannot disclose their plan yet. More meetings, one tomorrow as a matter of fact, at the bank. But I have a special job for you. Do you remember the German we met at Maria’s dinner party in Luanda that night, the man who set me thinking about coming back to Europe?”

“Hennies? That was it, wasn’t it? Adolf Hennies. … I thought he was supposed to be Swiss.”

“German or Swiss, the same.” They stopped in front of a small church. “I want you to find him. And build a dossier. You can investigate him, contact our legations, hire a detective if you must. I want to know what kind of man he is, a spy, a soldier of fortune. …”

Arnaldo nodded. “I can trace him easily enough. But what should I tell him?”

“Tell him that it is imperative that he meet us at the Palace Hotel in Biarritz one week from today. Tell him that I wouldn’t ask him to make the trip unless he’d realize a good profit. And if he doesn’t agree with me when we’ve talked, we’ll pick up all of his expenses. That ought to appeal to his German sense of efficiency.”

As they descended inside the cage Arnaldo began to chuckle behind a fist.

“Alves,” he whispered conspiratorially, “we could pay his expenses in Angolan money!”

“Ah, you’re a brilliant man, Arnaldo, a brilliant man.” Alves smiled and slapped his friend’s back.

As the wood-burning engine jostled its way northward, leaving Portugal and pushing on through Spain’s Basque country toward Biarritz, Arnaldo and José, their missions accomplished, played cards in the nearly empty coach. Alves, in a compartment of his own, lost himself in the dossiers the two had collected. The air was thick with heavy smoke, and he perspired freely in the dense, humid enclosure, his tie pulled loose and collar undone. Warm rain spattered the windows, smudged the countryside beyond.

Arnaldo had done well in his search for Hennies, turning to a detective in Munich and to a woman called Greta Nordlund, who was, after a dashing series of beaux, newly installed as Josh’s lady. Apparently José had met her in The Hague where he had dined, through Antonio’s diplomatic connections, at a dinner honoring her. A woman of the world, a rather famous actress, though Alves knew nothing of such matters, she had attracted José without half trying. His dandy’s good looks had been enough to interest her, and much to their mutual surprise a satisfying liaison had ensued. When Arnaldo had mentioned Herr Hennies, José replied that Alves should have asked him since his mistress had once been romantically involved with Herr Hennies, though she had said that their relationship had been short-lived. No, Antonio had never met the man, but José was sure that Greta would prove a font of information. Which, by cable and letter, was indeed the case. By combining her researches with those of the detective in Munich a broad yet remarkably clear picture of Hennies emerged—clearer, by far, than its subject might have wished.

Adolf Gustav Hennies, the entrepreneur who had urged Reis to consider that the real future lay in Europe rather than in an African backwater. Now, scouring the dossier, Alves wondered at fate’s intervention, placing Hennies before him as it had. Hennies … Neither Miss Nordlund nor the detective knew the man’s real name, which was precisely the way Hennies wanted it. He had gone to a great deal of trouble to bury his real name, and by the time he found himself in Senhor Reis’s courtyard in Luanda he was well into his third complete incarnation. He never talked about the first, which had been almost entirely unsatisfactory, and the second, though shed like a tree’s leaves in the autumn, was still fresh in his mind when he encountered Greta and a source of some pleasant if not rapturous reflection.

That second life had begun in 1909 when he was twenty-eight years old. For a raft of delicate personal reasons he had left Germany, changed his name and lit out for the New World. His formal, erect bearing made him much taller than his five feet eight inches, and his somber mien, his orderliness testified to his Germanic efficiency. He went to the famous Singer Sewing Machine Company in New York City and convinced them of his worthiness to acquire a small agency. Of course, the entire contents of his bank account helped persuade these knights of capitalism that he was indeed the man to carry their gospel to yet another outpost in the battle against handstitching. The outpost in Manaos, Brazil, was well up the Amazon and not a location for which they had a deluge of applicants. He felt reasonably certain that no one would come quite so far to find him.

For five years he prospered as something like the sewing-machine god, building a fair amount of capital, particularly for Manaos, which was not, he admitted realistically, a financial hotbed.

Just as he had begun to grow restless in the land of the python and the poison dart, the Portuguese National Assembly declared their intention to join England and France in the war against Germany. Quite naturally he assumed that Brazil, since it was still essentially a Portuguese nation although official colonial status had been renounced almost a century before, might also leap into the war against his homeland. His name at the time wasn’t Hennies, but he was known to be a German, his second identity having been based on his first—that is, whoever the hell he claimed to be, he was a German in a country he believed to be on the verge of war with Germany. Time to fly.

As it happened, Brazil held off until 1917, but by then Hennies was long gone. He had scouted out an obliging crook in Rio de Janeiro who fitted him out with a lovely Swiss passport and a third persona—that of Adolf Hennies, an international trader of thirty-three with a Swiss father and a Brazilian mother. In November 1914 he sailed on the ancient S. S. Principessa Mafalda, made certain he didn’t give his nationality away by uttering even a word of German, and by January he’d made a useful contact in Berlin, secured a position as a member of the wartime German Purchasing Commission and was on his way to his new duties in Amsterdam.

While his position was an official one, Hennies dealt primarily in smuggling through Switzerland items prohibited by the Dutch and Danish governments for export to Germany. At the same time he ingratiated himself with Berlin by operating as an agent for the German Secret Service. Holland was an ideal place to be a spy, since secret agents from all combatant governments chummed about a good deal, lived very nicely on their expense vouchers and fed one another enough information to keep the entire international boondoggle going.

Hennies was wonderfully at home. His close-cropped black hair was already touched with gray, his eyes had a piercing, almost Latin quality, he dressed the part of an impeccable businessman. Due to the fact that he had been born with his right leg shorter than the left, he wore a prosthetic corrective shoe with a built-up sole and walked with a slight limp. At his best he was both extremely dignified and quite sinister. He was frequently at his best in those days, a man of the world, a realist.

By 1917 his realistic approach to life’s vagaries told him that Germany was bound to come out of the Great War the biggest loser. He wisely went to a Dutch businessman with whom he had had certain slightly irregular, highly profitable dealings and arranged to have his Deutsche marks converted into Dutch gulden—no less than one hundred thousand dollars’ worth.

In the shambles of postwar Europe, while Alves was dealing in phony jute bags and rusty German tractors, Herr Hennies was putting the remains of his Berlin connections into effect, getting himself appointed Abwicklungskommissar for East Prussia. It was an enviable post for an enterprising man; he was in charge of German reparations and arms deliveries to Poland, as provided in the Treaty of Versailles. What made the position so attractive was the fact that Poland was in the midst of struggling with Lithuania over the city of Vilna, with the Czechs over Teschen and with the Soviets in general. Hungry for weaponry, Poland had become, in the words of one sagacious observer, “the great arms sink of Europe.”

Hennies’ greed coincided wonderfully with that of the Poles. He pocketed bribes for hastening shipments of machine guns and grenades, for enlarging shipments and hiding the changes in the tide of paperwork; he arranged private deals with certain privately bankrolled Polish factions; he accepted trainloads of Polish-bound American Quaker relief foodstuffs in exchange for what he knew to be slightly substandard hand grenades. When the grenades turned out to lack the requisite fuses the Polish generals who had arranged the deal were trotted out and shot. Hennies made a profit of more than fifty thousand dollars when he sold the Quakers’ food to starving Germans on the black market.

Secure in private business, he made trips abroad, including the journey to Angola, where he also did a couple of small jobs for the German Secret Service, which, undaunted, still had designs on the Portuguese colony. Back in Berlin in 1923, he found a way to beat the disastrous inflation that would find the meaningless paper replaced by new gold-backed Rentenmarks. While it would literally take a basketful of the paper marks to get a new gold one, the German Railway’s own gold notes already in circulation would be convertible on a one-to-one basis. Hennies’ railway pals cut him in on a deal worth more than a million dollars, a deal to exchange uncirculated, and therefore illegal in terms of their convertibility, Railway notes. He was given a diplomatic passport, always useful, and sent to London, where he converted the uncirculated notes into Swiss francs and pounds, a simple operation that netted him another hundred thousand. A sixth sense told him not to try it again a month later. In the event, the substitute courier was caught and the entire gang of more or less highly placed officials went to jail, where the ringleader, Postmaster General Dr. Anton Hofle, killed himself. Hennies was merely questioned and released, leaving only a small blot on his copy book.

Which brought Alves up to date. Hennies was perfect for Alves Reis’s plan. …

As he began to go through the second dossier, he stretched, arched his stiff back, took off his glasses, rubbed his bloodshot eyes. His neck ached with accumulated tension, worry that the next day’s meeting might not go well. He wondered at the coincidences that were leaping at him from the collected information. Greta Nordlund, for example. Out of the blue, she turns up not only as José’s “true love” but as the main source of information about Adolf Hennies, one of her previous conquests. She was an actress, of course, and that explained her deplorable lack of constancy. But was she a good omen for his scheme? Would there be trouble between José and Hennies? He was not overjoyed when José told him happily that Greta was coming to Biarritz from Paris to sneak a few days’ holiday with him. … Alves sighed, wishing he had a dossier on her.

Then there was the matter of the Dutchman José had come up with. Antonio Bandeira vouched for him in glowing terms, and José described him as just the man for any serious financial dealings, sober and experienced and extremely ambitious. While those were exactly the qualities required, Alves had his doubts. A prostitute in Paris—a friend of José’s—had been one of the major contributors to Karel Marang’s dossier, having quite recently given Marang aid and comfort following a particularly severe reversal. The man confided in a Parisian tart! Alves had been mortified at such behavior. José’s reassurances that the woman was an old friend of both men and the benchmark of discretion had only partially eased Alves’ doubts. …

Topping it all was the fact that Marang and Hennies were old business associates! Too many coincidences. It gave him an uneasy stomach. Either they would all work well together or there was too much inbreeding for anyone’s good health. … But which was it going to be? Replacing his spectacles, he returned to the second dossier.

While Adolf Hennies was privately congratulating himself that he hadn’t been caught with his hand in the national till on the Railway note matter and was at the same time restlessly casting about for new opportunities, his old Dutch colleague, Karel Marang, who had helped him change his marks into gulden, was concerned with a particularly intimate matter. Like a social disease, it could not be discussed with anyone, not even so liberal-minded a friend as José Bandeira, the younger brother of the Portuguese Minister to the Netherlands and a dashing fellow whom Marang knew to have been in and out of a scrape or two in his time. On the other hand, had he somehow contracted a social disease, José would have been the first person to whom Marang would have turned.

But the sober Dutchman, a reasonably good-looking man with a tidy little mustache and a tendency toward mousiness as well as a command of proper, academic French, had not come to Paris to sate himself at the Sphinx and other such bagnias de luxe, normally the haunts of Bandeira. He was newly arrived from The Hague in search of much headier stuff. Still, it was passion that brought him here, a passion that served as one of the obsessive engines of his life. He was calling on a baron. …

Marang’s greatest attribute was an advanced degree in practical survival and manipulation. So far as education went, he had but little and that ill-taught. His family background was the sort he chose not to acknowledge, but Antonio had dug it out. Born in 1884 in a tiny suburb of Amsterdam called Dordrecht, he was the son of a strong-arm debt collector. Forever trying to divorce himself from the crumminess of his birthright, he was quick to learn how to make money. Among other lessons he learned was one that La Rochefoucauld put into admirable words—“To establish oneself in the world, one does all one can to seem established there already.” It was a postulate that appealed to Alves’ own sense of striving.

By 1914 he had put aside enough money to become a war profiteer, selling such items as Dutch chocolate, ham, wheat and oils to the Germans, who were, in his view, sure to win the war. Since Holland was neutral and since the Netherlands Overseas Trust made sure that businessmen sent nothing to the Germans that was on the Allies’ prohibited list, Marang came face to face with the world of bribery, crooked customs officials and German agents. He found that he was at home in such improvisational interactions. And his foremost contact with the German Purchasing Commission was, of course, that helpful Swiss with the Brazilian mother, Adolf Hennies, who did well out of their business relationship, receiving a 10 percent rake-off on the gross value of all Marang’s shipments to Germany.

But in 1917 the 50 percent profits he’d grown accustomed to were reduced to a maximum of 5 percent by the Netherlands Export Company, which regulated all imports and exports. Until the United States entered the war Marang had been doing a huge business in shipping American coal to Holland and then on to Germany, a scheme that came to grief with the arrival of the American Expeditionary Force and the new profit laws.

By 1920 he was prospering again, supplying coffee to Persia and the Middle East and African vegetable oils to Germany. By 1922 he bought out his partner, used the first floor of his four-story home in The Hague for offices and kept the top three floors as living quarters for his family—a wife and two sons—and several servants.

By 1924, when Alves was verging on his trip to the Oporto jail, the wheel had turned again: Marang had come upon hard times once more. The price of coffee had fallen sharply. He was substantially overextended. The day before he went to Paris, where José had reached him, his bookkeeper told him that, in baldest terms, he was more than a hundred thousand dollars in the hole and the banks holding his notes were growing restless.

His mission was not entirely unrelated to his economic future. For one thing it made him feel good just to stand outside the elegant apartment of Baron Rudolf August Louis Lehman, Minister Plenipotentiary of Liberia to the Third French Republic on the Bois de Boulogne, the most fashionable address in Paris, with a pair of Rothschild mansions nearby.

On the face of it, Marang’s errand was simple: he wanted his Liberian diplomatic passport, ten years out of date, renewed. But beneath that simple application lay a tangled, desperate mass of motivations that struck directly to the heart of the man’s life. Status, titles, money: an inseparable triumvirate composing all that made his life worth living. In the present instance, having little money, he counted on status—whether in the form of a diplomatic passport or a title or both—to confer that appearance of being well off, which could then lead to the fact itself.

Marang had come by the diplomatic passport in 1914, having paid Count Matzenauer de Matzenau, a Serbian who happened at the time to be Liberian Minister to Imperial Russia, eleven hundred dollars for it. Even then its value was much in doubt, since the count himself had been fired by the Liberian government the year before for abuses of his diplomatic privileges. The mere fact that a Serbian count held a Liberian diplomatic post reflected the confusing nature of international relations carried out in the period by marginally significant and almost always impoverished nations. Liberia, for example, qualified on both these counts. Even by 1923 Liberia’s entire annual budget, derived solely from customs duties, totaled three hundred and eighty thousand dollars.

But human nature being what it was, there were always those who would gladly pay their own expenses as a Liberian diplomat in, say, Paris, in return for membership in the international community. The privileges were mainly social, but the quick thinker could also turn them into ready cash. Smuggling was a common activity, and so was discreet spying, as was the selling of various nonexistent diplomatic posts to whoever might pay for them—and thereby receive such privileges, on a small scale of course, for himself.

Marang had bought such a nonexistent position, which carried with it the legally useless document naming him representative to a government that Liberia did not even recognize—the Soviet Union. Still, the passport was occasionally useful, and, in any case, the count was supposed to carry out another chore included in the price—that is, he had guaranteed Marang that he would get Marang’s name into the Almanach de Gotha, the standard and acknowledged listing of nobility.

It was all terribly complicated. In 1915 Marang had gone so far as to buy the title of the Manor of d’Ysselveere-les-Krimpen, which entitled him to call himself Karel Marang van Ysselveere if he thought it would do him any good. Which he not infrequently did; his Dutch passport, however, was still made out to plain old Karel Marang. The Liberian diplomatic passport was to be renewed with the noble van Ysselveere appended, exactly as it was written on his other somewhat unusual diplomatic documents, none of which included a passport—he was, oddly, the Consul General of the Central American republic of San Salvador and Consul General of Persia to The Hague.

Thus, according to the report of the grand horizontal Françoise, who comforted him several hours later, he found himself in the baron’s anteroom taking in the apparent tons of ormolu, silk, marble and gilt, which made him all the more aware of his penurious arrival by Métro, the dust on his dark suit, the sweat on his forehead. He was counting on the renewal of the passport and the addition of van Ysselveere to work certain arcane wonders in terms of attracting new business opportunities, which would enable him to stave off the beastly bankers.

Alas, it was not to be.

The baron—who had himself paid dearly for his post as Liberian Minister to France and was a countryman of Marang’s, who was himself as bogus as they came and certainly did not appear in the Almanach de Gotha—saw Marang for less than ten minutes. He most rudely told him to get the hell out; he was a busy man!

The joyless walk back to the small hotel just off the Champs-Elysées was an agony of despair for Marang. How to recover from this grievous, unexpected low blow? The automobiles, long and low-slung and elegant, exactly the sort of thing he’d always lusted for, with his initials and crest on the door, seemed to mock him as they swirled about the Arc de Triomphe. … Where was he to turn next? Which was when he remembered José’s beautiful courtesan, Françoise. Whatever he decided to do with his life, he deserved a final splurge. He would lose himself inside her. …

When he returned to his hotel, deliverance was waiting for him at the concierge’s desk.

A message had arrived from his friend José, who had traced him through his office in The Hague. There was a big deal in the wind, and dear old José requested his attendance at a meeting in Biarritz. …

The Bay of Biscay had a grayish-green look to Alves, altogether inhospitable, with breakers smashing against the huge boulders in wading reach of the shoreline. There was a brisk wind lacing the windows of the hotel room, shaking them in their frames, and the sun was only a gray blur above long, bleak, deserted beach. Earlier in the morning, rain had sprayed the tilting streets and the paving-brick sidewalks, had darkened the sand, rattled on the window glass. There was something about Biarritz that frightened him. The hotel was flung elegantly out on the end of an arm of land with thousands of miles of ocean beyond. In another week the establishment would be shuttered for the winter; as it was now, the Reis party was alone in the long, silent corridors, the echoing dining room, the gleaming mirrored bar.

The waiter had brought trays of brioches and croissants with butter and preserves, hot coffee and hot milk. The men in the tapestried suite gathered about the table. Alves sucked his cigarette, watched them buttering the rolls, sipping the light-brown coffee. Arnaldo stood talking to Hennies, who wore a black suit, white shirt with a stiff detached collar and a severe black tie, stood stiffly, spoke loudly and formally. José chatted with the Dutchman, Karel Marang, who seemed subdued, remote, cautious, though not precisely timid. His fingernails were bitten down to pink flesh. Everyone was evaluating everyone else, and Alves wanted to get past that opening stage as quickly as possible. These men constituted his team, but they must never be overly aware of their subordinate positions. He wanted a confident team. They would know what he wanted them to know, and they would have no worries.

He looked back out the window. A tall woman in a trenchcoat and broad-brimmed rain hat was walking in the street below, looking out at the sea, at the gnarled windswept trees on the huge rock formations. A lavender scarf ruffled in the wind. He watched until she moved on along the seawall. She had arrived alone the night before: Josh’s mistress, Greta Nordlund. But more than a mistress, quite obviously: she did as she pleased. A very attractive woman, fair, Scandinavian. Like Biarritz, she rather frightened him. He nervously wished she had not come. This was business, after all.

“If you please, gentlemen? Perhaps we should begin.” Arnaldo got everyone settled. Marang fidgeted in his chair, fussing with the creases of his flannel trousers. He seemed ill at ease, disconcerted by his blazer and ascot, a fling at resort wear that seemed at odds with his personality. His black shoes ruined the ensemble, unpolished and growing cracks. Hennies sat rigidly, licked marmalade from a thick finger.

“In the first place,” Alves began, trying to shake the quaver from his voice, “let me thank you again for coming. I know how very busy you are. Before I begin let me place one very solemn stricture on all of us in this room. … Nothing said here must go beyond these walls.” He cleared his throat and pushed his sweating palms into the pockets of his jacket, hoping his nerves weren’t communicating themselves. Was that a sneer playing at Hennies’ mouth? “The government of Portugal and the Bank of Portugal are depending on us, trusting to our discretion and absolute silence.”

Hennies grunted abruptly. “We are not children here, you know.” He glanced at Marang with a broad wink that caused his monocle to drop from his eye, dangle from the black ribbon. “We have kept secrets before, eh, Marang?” Marang nodded, motioned to Reis to continue.

Quickly he ran through what he had told José and Arnaldo a week before.

“Angola desperately needs an injection of money—that’s what it comes down to—if it is to survive. Otherwise, anarchy, inevitably war, foreign mercenaries, factions of all kinds, grabbing for power …” He shrugged. “The works. … And the government in Lisbon has tried everything. Banks all across Europe have been approached for loans in the sum of one million pounds sterling—five million American dollars! And do you know what they said?”

Hennies guffawed. “I know what I’d say. … I might buy Angola for a million pounds! My God, it’s twice the size of Texas. But I wouldn’t loan a ha’penny.”

“You are indeed well informed, Herr Hennies,” Alves said.

“Germany has found Angola of interest for some time. As you Portuguese know.” Hennies’ voice had gone suddenly cold.

Alves hurried on. “That is precisely what the bankers said. Purchase, yes … loan, no. There are no external sources of financing for Angola. None.” Alves lit another cigarette and went to the table, where he poured himself coffee and cream.

“You brought us all this way to tell us that?” Hennies sighed heavily. “What have we got to do with Angola’s troubles? I thought you were through with Africa, Senhor Reis.”

“Portugal has faced financial difficulties before, as has every nation in Europe,” Alves said firmly. “As you may or may not know, the Bank of Portugal, which is for the most part in private hands, is empowered to issue banknotes—that is, the bank rather than the government. Such an enormous power—privilege if you will—can make the state the slave, as it were, of the bank. In the end it all comes down to money, doesn’t it? And the bank has the power in Portugal.

“Years ago when the government turned the power over to the bank the license allowed for the issuing of currency in the amount of twice the bank’s paid-up capital.”

Marang smiled cynically; José looked blank, as if his mind were frolicking with the actress. Hennies snorted. “Twice, ha!”

“Hennies has a point,” Alves continued. “As of this past summer the bank, to back up the government in variety of crises, has issued notes equivalent to more than one hundred times the bank’s capital. The fact is, secret issues of currency have become habitual, though they have not been convertible to either gold or silver for more than thirty years. However, with each issue, the need for secrecy has increased. Since 1918 the total number of escudos issued by the bank has increased six times, accounting for the present low value of the escudo. …

“Which brings us to the point of our meeting. My close friends at the Bank of Portugal, who must for obvious reasons of security remain nameless, have agreed to a further secret issuance of banknotes, this time for Angola.”

“Another Germany,” Hennies barked, running a finger inside his collar, which had left a red mark against the solid rolls of fat. “They have had plenty of practice at printing money!”

Marang chuckled behind his hand. José yawned. Arnaldo filled his coffee cup. Alves went on, hearing the wind racketing outside.

“But it is a most delicate matter, as you can see. I have been asked by my friends at the bank to consider their predicament and this proposition. They are willing to pay a two percent commission to those who can arrange such a loan for Angola—a loan of one million pounds sterling, five million dollars.” He paused and looked at the four faces. “The commission figures out to one hundred thousand dollars.”

“Senhor Reis, excuse me,” Marang said quietly. “But I am confused. You speak of a new issue of currency in one breath, a mysterious loan in the next. Which is it to be?”

“Both. In reality we are talking about an injection of a million pounds’ worth of escudos into Angola to tide the colony over. On the surface of things, we are to present ourselves as a financial syndicate willing to loan the million pounds to the colony—present ourselves to the firm we deal with to print the banknotes, that is. In return for our most substantial ‘loan,’ we—the financial syndicate—will of course be repaid over a period of five years, plus customary interest, by the Angolan treasury. In addition, we are empowered to print, or cause to be printed, up to one million pounds of Angolan currency. … That is how we present ourselves. Do you follow me, gentlemen?”

Blank stares, wheels going around behind vacant eyes. Greed, Alves thought, I am watching greed come to life.

“That is the surface of the matter, then. As far as the printer can see, we stand—possibly—to make back our million-pound investment plus interest; but what matters is the fact that we have been empowered by a sovereign nation to print colonial banknotes … to print money. More than payment enough, surely, for such a loan. Thus, the surface of things. …” He paused for the description of their task to sink in. He lit another cigarette, coughed.

“Now to reality. If you are with me, that is—and I invite your questions later, of course. We are not, obviously, lending a million pounds to anyone. The Bank of Portugal, at the request of the government, is pumping a million pounds into the colony, in escudos of course. We are merely arranging with the greatest possible discretion the actual printing of the money. We will take delivery of the new notes. The High Commissioner to Angola will actually see to the transshipment to Luanda. What could be simpler, really? Our primary responsibility is to find the printer and collect our twenty thousand pounds.

“What are your thoughts, gentlemen?”

Alves finally sat down behind a gold-and-white desk, made a bridge of his fingers. Surprisingly Marang, his torso curling forward over his knees, spoke first.

“Tell me, please, what reputable printer will believe this fairy tale about our heading a syndicate that lends such sums to a colony well known to be nearly bankrupt? And who will believe that sane men would accept payment in worthless Angolan currency that is unwelcome anywhere else in the world?” He looked down at his feet, where a bit of white ankle flashed between a falling sock and a hiked-up flannel pants leg.

“The new Angolan banknotes are not payments,” Alves said. “They are a bonus, an added inducement to this syndicate. In addition to our interest and principal, we may be planning investments in Angola, we may know of mineral deposits, there may be any of a thousand reasons … because it doesn’t make any difference to the printer, it’s none of his business. We have the documents from my friends at the bank—that’s all any printer will care about. So we’re accepting a ton of what he believes to be worthless currency … so what? The printer doesn’t have to believe we’re genuises!”

Marang nodded, eyes hooded, a faint smile on his pale gray face.

“Well, what I don’t understand, Reis,” Hennies said, jumping to his feet and stumping back and forth beneath a gilt mirror, “is what the hell all this subterfuge is about. Why the hell doesn’t the bank just tell the printer the truth and forget about using you and your phony syndicate? The Bank of Portugal is well versed in dealing with printers—why not just go to the printers they’ve dealt with before and run off another batch of notes?”

Alves leaned back in his chair, tucked his thumbs into his vest pockets and sighed.

“Let’s think about that. Why is the Bank of Portugal going to all this trouble? Arnaldo?”

“Mystery to me,” Arnaldo said.

“José? José, for God’s sake, pay attention!”

“I am paying attention, Alves,” José said, hurt. “It’s just that I don’t know either. So don’t pick on me.”

Alves closed his eyes, took a deep breath. “In the first place, Portuguese money is worth considerably less than the great hard currencies, the British pound and the American dollar. In the second place, Angola would be best off with an injection of such a hard, gold- or silver-backed, currency. Well, then, say that news of this matter we’re conducting should leak out—such things happen, the Lisbon newspapers love it, as you know. So say the word leaks out—and the word is that a syndicate headed by a Dutch businessman, Herr Marang van Ysselveere here, has lent a million pounds sterling to poor Angola.” He caught Marang’s eye. Hennies was squinting intently through the glass disk.

“Such a controlled leak,” Alves said, “would produce a not entirely unhappy effect. It would appear that a vast amount of hard currency had found its way to Angola and therefore there must be something in Angola worth investing in. And more investments by other speculators might well be forthcoming. … Surely this is a clear and valid point. But suppose the same leak occurred and the printer had been told the truth—remember, truth or fabrication, it’s all the same to the printer. … Well, my friends, we’re back to the nub of the entire matter. Portugal does not want to be seen in the act of bailing Angola out yet again … and further inflating its own currency in the process. Thus, my friends at the bank have come up with their little fiction … which stands to make us twenty thousand pounds. A hundred thousand American.” Alves stood up. “If there are no more questions for the moment, I suggest we go downstairs for an early lunch. We’ve had a busy morning.”

Since the meeting was being held in his suite, Alves waited until everyone had left, whispering to Arnaldo to arrange for Hennies and Marang to have a table of their own at lunch. “Give them time to come up with any complaints. We can deal with them this afternoon—better to have them start doubting now instead of later.” Alone, he bathed his face with a cold towel, shaved for a second time. He’d been unable to sleep, had risen at five o’clock and gone over his presentation of the plans. He had a headache. He went to the window, pushed it open to air out the room. The tall woman with the trenchcoat had come back, was sitting on a bench facing the sea reading a book, some parcels beside her. Greta Nordlund. One look and you knew she’d cost her man a fortune. He hoped José had done very well indeed in The Hague for his own sake.

He was thinking about Hennies’ hefty bankroll and Marang’s well-bitten fingernails when he reached the street, which curved slowly past sidewalk cafés with locked doors, then sharply back above the beach toward the casino and the town center. He stood for a moment breathing deeply. The woman was still sitting on the bench, engrossed in her book. Her blond hair fell softly from beneath the rain hat, disappeared in the folds of lavender scarf. Finally, he turned and went right, looking down at the dark-brown, wet sand stretching in a slight curve all the way to a distant lighthouse.

The morning had gone well. He’d given them something to think about over lunch. The afternoon would be the test. As he walked along the seawall he recognized the fact that he had never felt such anxiety, not even waiting for the great train ride, not even in the middle of the High Bridge where he’d felt so alone. This … this was the most dangerous ride of all.

He felt it was important that his new colleagues be left to lunch alone. He did not want to be their friend, at least not at this early stage. They were businessmen, far more experienced than he, older and with more money. … All he had to offer was his plan, his friends at the Bank of Portugal, the commission they promised and the possibility, however vague, that there might be more where that came from.

At the tobacconist they spoke only French, and his was rudimentary at best. He pointed to the cigarettes he wanted, let the old woman with the bright henna rinse take what he hoped was the proper number of coins from his palm. He ripped open the pack and lit one, inhaling the vicious French tobacco with a vengeance of his own. It tasted fine. “Merci, madame,” he said. She nodded, puffed her cigar.

The wind shifted, he felt the spray on his face. What did he think about them? His dossiers were full: Hennies had been a spy. Marang had been a war profiteer, but, then, that was a charge that counted for little these days, not particularly impressive but conservative and sound. He should fit nicely as the head of the syndicate; surely he would stand up to investigation should that time come. And Hennies, too overt and most decidely too German to head the syndicate even if it existed in name only, had the money necessary to carry the scheme through to success. Arnaldo’s financial report, collected through Lisbon’s information-gathering services, had been optimistic, though vague questions had been raised about his private enterprises. Nobody was perfect. So far, he believed these men could do the jobs he had in mind for them.

He crossed the street to a large restaurant, where light gleamed from beyond a row of heavy colonnades. The streetside tables were located beneath an overhang, and he sat down in one of the wicker chairs. He ordered a ham-and-cheese sandwich, jambon et fromage, which he managed in schoolboy French, and a glass of beer. He was nibbling, not noticing the taste, when he saw the woman in the trenchcoat across the street watching the restaurant. Then she seemed to make up her mind, came toward him with long strides, packages in one hand, her book tucked under her arm. There was something about her, something frightening. She seemed so confident, so tall … so fair, so unlike Maria. …

“Excuse me, Senhor Reis,” she said, towering over him as he struggled out of the tight grip of the wicker chair, “may I join you?” She was already seated by the time he was replying that he found the thought enchanting. She whipped her hat off with a grand gesture, brushed her blond hair, caressing her pale cheek, and placed hat and parcels in another chair. The novel in English was The Green Hat. He’d read it in the Oporto jail—it was perfect for such a creature of the great world.

“Mademoiselle Nordlund,” the waiter whispered discreetly, “a pleasure to see you again. Pernod?”

“If you please,” she said with a smile of practiced condescension. “And the escargot. And following that the sautéed veal and perhaps a beggar’s cake to finish. And café au lait.” She looked up at the beetle-browed man who seemed about to tilt into Senhor Reis’s beer. “Thank you, Maurice, for remembering Pernod. …” Maurice sped contentedly away, and she turned lavender eyes behind heavily painted lashes on Alves. “I’m famished—such a huge appetite you’re thinking, aren’t you? Not at all ladylike. I’ve been walking for hours, shopping, reading.” She had a powerful voice that seemed to come from deep within her chest. When she spoke softly, as she was now, there was a catch in it, a hoarseness, as if she’d strained it shouting.

“I know,” he said. “That you’ve been walking, I mean. I’ve been watching you this morning.”

“I beg your pardon?” Mock surprise. “Spying? Senhor Reis, shame on you!”

“From the window where we’re meeting, my suite actually. It looks down on the sea road. Every time I looked out, there you were, walking or reading or looking at the ocean. …”

“Well, I hope I didn’t distract you from your great business deal. And, please, tell me if I’m intruding on your thoughts. Deep thoughts, I presume. International finance, intrigue.” Caprice danced on every word. Was she making sport of him?

He fidgeted in the chair, aware of the way she was smiling at him. Her smiles conveyed a confusing range of attitudes. Alves was disconcerted by her presence. “I’m very glad you’re here. A most welcome change from Herr Hennies’ monocle and Marang’s chewed fingernails, I assure you.”

She smiled a new way. “Aha, a wit! José’s circle is not known for wit. But you’re so clever for a Portuguese. José has told me about your many feats!”

“You’ve discovered a new side to Alves Reis.” He sipped the beer, ignoring the sandwich. He wasn’t hungry anymore. He watched her drink the Pernod. She drank like a man, enjoying it. “José tells me that you are an actress.”

The escargot arrived in their shells, and she tweezed one free, dipped it in garlic butter, savored it with eyes closed. “I’m a good deal more than ‘an actress.’ I am a star, Senhor Reis, in four languages, as a matter of fact. The Scandinavian Bernhardt, according to the critics of France, Germany, the Netherlands and Norway. …” She winked over another escargot, slid it daintily onto her tongue. “You, Senhor Reis, Portuguese financier—that’s how José refers to you—are lunching in fashionable Biarritz with the Scandinavian Bernhardt, Greta Nordlund—an item for the press, don’t you think? Portuguese mystery man and so on?”

“You are teasing me,” he said anxiously, fumbling for one of his French cigarettes. He wasn’t sure he was enjoying this. It was like playing a game.

“Flirting,” she said. “Boring you too, no doubt.” It was she who sounded suddenly bored.

“Certainly not,” he said, added: “I’ve never met an actress before. I’ve been in Africa. There weren’t many actresses there. I saw Camille once … on stage.” He shrugged. “I am not a sophisticated man. Flirting … that is beyond me. I am sorry. Truly, I am.” He lit the cigarette. The breeze leaped up, blew out the match.

“You have lied to me. You are obviously an outrageous flirt. I must warn José about you.” She admired the newly arrived veal. “He fancies himself the ladies’ man in your little group, you know.”

“Oh, I wish you wouldn’t do that—”

“For heaven’s sake, relax,” she interrupted impatiently. “I am teasing you.”

Alves had begun to perspire. He watched her carve a large bite of veal. He’d never seen a woman with such a determined appetite.

“I should have known you were the serious, thoughtful fellow … but Adolf says you’re an Oxford man. I’ve known Oxford men. What a bunch. They talk too much about Oxford.”

Oh God, he thought. This woman was definitely more than he cared to handle.

“Oxford,” he said, “was such a long time ago.”

“And it happened in another country, I know, I know. Well, you’re to be congratulated on refusing to turn every chance remark to cricket, the High Street, your favorite porter, walnuts and a hearty port by the crackling fire. …” She took a deep breath. Alves had not the foggiest notion of what she was talking about. Wisely he remained silent, wondering what time it was.

“I’ve just finished doing Ibsen in Berlin, can you imagine anything more depressing? Well, let me tell you there is nothing more depressing, unless you should fall prey to a madman and do Strindberg and Ibsen in repertory in Berlin. I’m raving, aren’t I? Well, that’s what happens to actresses who are recovering from a run.” She thoughtfully dispatched another morsel of veal. Her cheekbones were high, her mouth wide and especially sensual. She seemed to wear no makeup other than that which adhered to her lashes. There was the faintest suggestion of pale down on her jawline.

“Soon I begin a run in Paris,” she continued after patting her mouth with the pristine napkin. “Cleopatra in Shaw’s Caesar and Cleopatra, a wonderful role for which I am much too tall and fair. So an absolute giant must be found to do Julius Caesar, and I shall spend the entire run in long black wigs of rope and dark, dark makeup. …” She looked into Alves’ eyes. “And I can’t wait to go into rehearsal.”

He knowingly nodded. She might as well have been speaking Chinese for all he knew about the theater. He resolved to read this Cleopatra play. After all, now he knew an actress.

“So I wait,” she said hoarsely, a sound a man could grow fond of. “And I come to Biarritz with José. Are you curious about José and me?”

“It’s none of my business.”

“Well, yes and no, but I sense that you are curious. Let me tell you this, since we may be seeing something of each other in the course of your new project with José. He is not a great love, do you understand? We met in The Hague last year. We get on well, we please each other. Something of a dalliance. It won’t interfere with your work.” She pushed the plate away, and Maurice materialized with the beggar’s cake and coffee. “Now, you must return to your associates and leave me to my novel.” She smiled, dazzling this time, eyes wide and innocent, her slim fingers on Alves’ sleeve. He bowed slightly.

“It has been enchanting.” He added, catching her eye quite bravely, “I shall hope we meet again.”

“Moi aussi,” she said, gently dismissing him.

Mind reeling, Alves Reis, newly anointed wit, walked slowly back to business.

Adolf Hennies greeted him with a hearty belch and a slap on the back. He was unwrapping an Upmann cigar. Marang was seated quietly in the same chair he’d adorned in the morning. José was massaging his temples, trying to dispel the effects of too much luncheon burgundy. Arnaldo was standing at Alves’ table, holding Alves’ briefcase, waiting patiently. Alves took him by the arm and drew him to the window, where they stood with their backs to the others.

“And what mood are they in?” he asked.

Arnaldo shrugged. “They have some questions about you. I reassured them, but it will come up. They are committed in their minds—it remains to clinch the deal. Don’t worry.”

“Oh, that’s easy for you to say.”

“Did you have a pleasant lunch?”

“Why, yes,” Alves said. “Yes, I did have quite a pleasant lunch.”

“That’s good. You didn’t drink wine, did you?”

“Arnaldo, am I a child that you ask such questions?”

“You didn’t, did you? Look at José.”

“No, no, I did not drink wine! My God, call the meeting to order.”

“Gentlemen, if you please.” Arnaldo waited until they were quiet—no great problem in the case of José—then nodded to Reis and sat.

“I hope you have given the propostion some thought,” Alves said, trying to sound remote, unconcerned. “Let me make it clear that I have not reached a final decision myself. I am presenting the possibility for your consideration. Does it seem a favorable position for us, gentlemen?”

Marang spoke first in his shy voice, carefully choosing his words, looking into his lap rather than at Reis.

“There is merit in what you suggest. I speak for myself, but I feel sure that Herr Hennies shares my evaluation. However, there is a point upon which we must be satisfied. I hope you accept our concern and curiosity in a purely business sense—”

“Nothing personal,” Hennies interrupted. “A simple question—namely, what is this business about your going to jail in Oporto? We have been led to believe by our sources that you were up on a charge of fraud and embezzlement. …” The only sound in the room was José breathing heavily through his mouth. “Now if this is so, why in hell does the Bank of Portugal choose you?”

Arnaldo stood and cleared his throat, fists tightly clenched at his sides.

“There is no need for Senhor Reis to defend himself against such implications. Whatever fraud there may have been, I assure you, was on the side of those who made the accusations against him. Small men motivated by jealousy and heaven only knows what intrigues of their own. As you see, he is here among us today, utterly free and trusted by the Bank in the most delicate matter imaginable.” He stopped long enough to flip open the briefcase and extract several sheets of newsprint, which he handed around to José, who didn’t really give a damn, and to Hennies and Marang, who did. “These are reprints from the major Lisbon newspapers. Vindicating Senhor Reis. In fact, at this very moment, our attorneys in Lisbon are contemplating lawsuits naming the men who brought this contemptible action. Please, read them.”

Alves leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, a faint smile of surprise on his face. Could this be Arnaldo, the faithful aide who always stayed in the background, sought the shadows? The fictional attorneys, that was a lovely touch.

“And while you are reading let me remind you of Senhor Reis’ remarkable career.” Arnaldo was off again, gathering steam. “He is a graduate of Oxford, a master engineer. He has held two of the highest posts in the colony of Angola, chief engineer of the Royal Angola Railways and Inspector of Public Works. He has been honored by both the railway and the government. In effect, by introducing the most modern American locomotives to Angola, he has delivered the colony into the twentieth century—he is a part of African history, gentlemen. And he has also established himself as a businessman of note, both in Luanda and Lisbon. And while still a young man, not yet thirty! I suggest that you consider your great good fortune at having the opportunity to be associated with him in this venture rather than sitting here carping about his misfortunes, which were demonstrably part of a nefarious plot against him.” Arnaldo came up for air, decided that he had said enough and sat down, concluding: “This is not a productive line of inquiry. We might better spend our limited time on substantive matters.” Feeling a flood of pride, Alves removed his spectacles, turned to watch the rain on the window. Was she still out there?

Marang, struggling to control his chagrin and smooth matters over, said, “I have no reason to pursue the matter further. Hennies?”

Hennies put the paper aside and puffed the cigar, shook his head without speaking.

“Well,” Alves said with the smile still clinging, “let me suggest that you exercise your option to withdraw now. You are my first choices in this matter, but I will understand if you feel you are not prepared to continue. In? Or out?”

“In,” Marang whispered so discreetly that Alves barely heard.

“Ja, ja, in, in,” Hennies barked impatiently. His monocle caught the lamplight, flashed like a jewel. He reached across the table and clapped Arnaldo’s knee. Arnaldo nodded self-consciously.

“In any case,” Alves said, “the contracts are being prepared in Lisbon now and that is all that matters, isn’t it? Now, there are certain other matters to go over if we’ve put this behind us. … There is the matter of finances. My legal defense was ruinously expensive and my enemies have caused certain business reversals. It is nothing I make a secret of. Which is where our associate Herr Hennies comes in, I’m afraid. … There are expenses involved in obtaining such a lucrative contract, a contract for which there is bound to be very high bidding within certain very private circles. My close friendships with those in power gives us the inside track, the first chance—if, however, we fail to satisfy their requirements, well, friendship goes only so far.” Alves delivered a worldly shrug, palms up. The wind whistled outside.

“Bribes” Hennies cried, slapping a heavy fist on the arm of the couch. “This is more like it! Money makes friends, I always say. Buy a friend, keep up the payments, and he is yours forever. …”

“There is much in what you say,” Alves said.

“I’m not sure I like your close friends at the Bank of Portugal.” Marang, inexplicably to Alves, seemed vaguely shocked at such goings-on. “Such things are unthinkable in a Dutch bank … but, of course—”

“Portugal is another country,” Hennies said.

“Full of happy, simple peasants,” Marang said sarcastically, nibbling on a moist fingertip.

“How much do they want?” Hennies asked abruptly.

“Initially a thousand pounds,” Alves said.

“Good gracious.” Marang sighed. “Initially?”

“We are dealing in large figures,” Alves said. “And there may well be more opportunities once we have completed this one. There are several people involved. I see no point in making rash promises to you I can’t keep—a thousand pounds it is. You, Marang, will serve as the head of our syndicate—a fiction, of course, but your demeanor, your style are perfect. Have you any objections?”

“No, I suppose not.”

The afternoon wore on. The rain began again. José yawned. Finally there was nothing more to be said.

“Two weeks from today,” Alves said, “I will expect you all to meet with me in Lisbon. I will have all the documents at that time. And I promise better weather.” He crushed his last cigarette. “Thank you for your attention and wisdom. Arnaldo, wake José.”

Hennies and Marang took the night train to Paris. José and Greta went off together. Arnaldo and Alves dined quietly at a small restaurant overlooking a narrow set of steps that led down to the beach. “Thank God, that’s over,” Arnaldo said. “We have begun.”

Alves was keyed up, and once Arnaldo had padded off yawning to his room he decided to take the night air. The rain had stopped again, but the breeze was heavy, ever moving. His steps echoed as he walked the narrow streets. The same restaurant where he’d lunched was still open. A recording was playing somewhere in its recesses. Several regulars at the bar were drinking silently. He sat down at his same table and ordered a Pernod. He looked at the empty chair where the actress had sat. He could see her face before him, the slender hands, the lavender scarf. The Scandinavian Bernhardt, she’d said. He would have to look into that. He drank the Pernod slowly. Well, if nothing else came of it, at least Hennies’ check for a thousand pounds was in his wallet. That would stave off his own bankruptcy for a bit. … He thought about José and Greta, doubtless entwined at this moment in the aftermath of passion. He was a handsome fellow, but he seemed hardly a match for such a woman. …

In two weeks more bribes would certainly be required. Those bankers were a greedy lot. He smiled to himself. He wondered if Greta would come to Lisbon. … He was of two minds about that prospect. What an unusual woman! …

Maria’s pregnancy had progressed more rapidly than expected, and the latest addition to the family seemed imminent when Alves got off the train at Rossio Station. He was met by his father-in-law, who conveyed him somewhat anxiously to the flat, which seemed to be seething with people. There were the children, in various stages of undress, overseen by a very fat woman who was serving as nurse/housekeeper. There were two neighbor women, whose aprons were covered with food, sweating in the heat generated by the spaghetti bubbling in the kitchen. There was a gray-haired, efficient midwife Alves had never met before. There was a youngish doctor who was more concerned with a plate of spaghetti that had been pressed on him by the perspiring twosome. Maria’s mother hovered like a tent that had blown loose from its moorings. Maria was propped up in a large chair in the bedroom, oblivious to the buzz around her. “Alves!” she cried, holding out her arms. “You’re home, my darling—and I thought the baby might come while you were away!” He knelt beside her chair, taking her hands in his, placing his ear against her belly. “So strong,” she sighed. “He’ll be a soccer player, he’s such a mighty kicker.”

Alves whispered, “I love you, little wife.” She stroked his black hair, mussing it, cooing to him. “When will it happen?” he whispered.

“Soon, very soon. They come faster each time, easier. …” She leaned forward to kiss the top of his head.

The imminence of the birth proved to be somewhat overstated. The day after his return it became apparent that it might be another week. The neighbor ladies relaxed, the midwife went on to other clients. The nurse remained during the days and Maria’s mother slept on a couch in the living room. Alves tried to stay well out of the way, play with the children and appear the doting family man. But his mind was racing ahead, fitting the next pieces of his plan into place, and Arnaldo kept dropping by to ask if Alves had yet seen his friends at the bank about the crucial documents.

“What do you think I am?” Alves would say. The conversations were always carried on in tense whispers in the hallway. “Can’t you see this madhouse I’m living in? How can I get on with anything? My mother-in-law has turned me into an errand boy! The children cry when I leave. … Listen to them, there’s never any quiet!”

“You need an office,” Arnaldo said. “Leave it to me. Remember, you are Alves Reis.”

“Yes, I must not forget who I am and what my mission is. Find the office, somewhere in the Baixa. Near the bank, nothing lavish. But a place where I can be alone.”

On his fourth day at home he dressed for business, told Maria he had an important appointment and went to his own bank, the Ultramarino, to deposit Hennies’ check. He then visited two particularly anxious creditors and thereby averted being taken to court. And finally he went to the small second-story office Arnaldo had found within a matter of hours.

“Less than five minutes from the bank itself,” Arnaldo said proudly. The two desks, the old wooden filing cabinet, the gooseneck lamp, the straight-backed chairs, the two windows encrusted with thick dust, the beat-up 1918 Smith typewriter: indeed, it was all he could have wanted for the exceedingly low price. A return to more luxurious quarters would come later.

“It’s exactly right,” he said. From his window he could look across the street to the display window of a large stationer, a window bearing the almost unnoticeable official seal. Perfect, absolutely perfect. Before Arnaldo left, Alves gave him a hundred pounds in cash—five hundred dollars American. “For your expenses … and your first paycheck from our new enterprise. Treat yourself. You’ve earned it—and say nothing to José.” Impulsively he hugged Arnaldo. “I’ll be in touch when I’ve something to report.”

From the fly-specked window he watched Arnaldo stride jauntily down the street. Now it was time for business. He began by making a list of what he needed, laboriously batting it out on the rickety Smith.

It was dark outside by the time he had outlined his requirements.

In the first place, he did not know a single soul at the Bank of Portugal. He’d almost begun believing the story he’d told his new associates in Biarritz.

In the second place, he did know that the Bank of Portugal had the power to issue printing orders for new currency … the power to issue contracts for the printing of new money. Whoever carried such a contract carried the power of the Bank of Portugal.

Such a contract was merely a piece of paper, a special kind of paper—papel selado, which bore the Portuguese seal and by so doing acquired a solemn dignity and validity that went unchallenged. Papel selado automatically transformed all business contracts and all written documents passing between the public and the government into official sanction.

The stamped paper could be purchased by anyone but only at specially licensed outlets, such as the nearby stationer. Applications for a job or a passport, a birth certificate, a death notice or a deed of sale—all required papel selado. A simple folded sheet with four lined sides, the words Imposta do Selo printed at the top of the first and fourth pages. The tax was less than a dime. Alves bought several sheets the next morning, in addition to sealing wax, and at the goldsmith’s a few blocks away a ring bearing the Portuguese seal. He then returned to the office, locked the door, forced one of the windows for ventilation and sat down at the typewriter.

He had already composed several drafts of the contract granted to him by the Bank of Portugal for the printing of money. It was simple, not overly specific, granting him the power. Now he carefully rolled the paper into the Smith and began typing. He worked well into the evening with a brief stop back at the flat for dinner—noise, crying children, Maria in discomfort, her mother irritated by his lengthy absence—before returning to his nonstop “meeting.”

By midnight he sat back with a sense of satisfaction, peeled off his spectacles, rubbed his eyes. He thought for a moment of the night he’d spent with the Oxford diploma, how Arnaldo had dropped by to see his handiwork. But not even Arnaldo could see this yet. … Circles of sweat stained the armpits of his striped shirt. He unsnapped the collar and laid it beside his glasses, yawned, poured coffee from the tin pot on the electric ring. Two ashtrays overflowed with cigarette butts. His shoulders ached from nervous tension and the hours hunched over the typewriter.

He sipped the coffee, stared at the result of his long day. With the contract so close to final form he could very nearly smell and taste the power that would soon be his. Just a piece of paper, just the appearance of reality … He remembered the old story of the captain from Koepenich who had been nothing but a beggar until he had clothed himself in the uniform of a Prussian army officer. Magic! Nothing less. Now Alves Reis was the magician.

He was tired and there was a chill in the air with the wind scurrying up the dark, empty streets from the Tagus. He turned the collar of his raincoat up and shivered. He walked past the gray, faceless expanses of the Bank of Portugal. Casually, he blew it a kiss. Passing Eiffel’s elevator, he heard the cry of an army sentry from the barracks above: “Twelve o’clock and all is well!” The call came floating in English, a remembrance of Wellington’s presence. He smiled in the night as he scuffed along. On the whole he agreed with the sentry.

The children were asleep. His mother-in-law snored on the couch. Maria sighed, turning in her sleep, her bulk in the center of the bed. He took off his shoes, which were small and too tight in the Portuguese fashion, and slid them quietly under the bed, lit the day’s last bedraggled cigarette, yawned from his honest labors. He dreamed of Biarritz, sitting among the colonnades. …

The morning arrived much too soon, with the shouts of the children and the smells of breakfast. Maria’s condition seemed static; he kissed her goodbye and set off for another round of business meetings. The fact was he needed to have his papel selado notarized, a government requirement.

Every Portuguese contract, every use of a businessman’s signature on a legal document, required by law a notarial seal. When going into business, a Portuguese “opened a signature” with a notary by simply placing his signature on file. Thereafter each contract entered into by the businessman would bear that notary’s seal, having been applied once the signature on the contract was checked against the one on file. In return for this simple service the notary was paid a small fee and, more lucratively, 1 percent of the value of the contract—except in the case of government contracts. The notary was charged with reading the contract with great care, ferreting out any illegalities. Being a notary was a gold mine.

That morning Alves went to see his notary, Dr. Avelino de Faria, who was out and thereby missed the chance of playing a part in such a remarkable scheme. His assistant was young and always awed by Senhor Reis’ exploits, anxious to help with the hope of hearing more stories of Africa. Certainly in the case of Senhor Reis there was no need to waste time with reading the contract—after all, everyone knew who Reis was. He quickly applied the notary’s stamp and signature. Then he wondered, with an excess of courage, if Reis might like to join him later for lunch. But, Alves explained, that would be impossible since he had an important appointment at the British consulate.

Each foreign consulate kept on file signatures of all qualified notaries and could therefore verify the notarized application on any papel selado. It was not a necessary addition to the document, but Alves wasn’t concerned about the necessities: he liked the majestic, overwhelming appearance of the consular stamps. At the British consul a quick check was made of the records and the handsome stamp affixed. From there he went from one consulate to another, French and German and Spanish and Italian and Swedish and Dutch, having one glorious stamp after another added to his contract. By evening he was carrying a document of startling magnificence, though it was still incomplete. Exhausted, tie askew, stomach growling, he arrived back at the flat. Spaghetti, for God’s sake! Apparently that was all the nurse/housekeeper/cook could cook. … Maria was perspiring heavily in the bedroom, having gone through another false labor alarm. The doctor had seen that it was false and gone away. The midwife hovered. Maria slept fitfully. He tried to find a place to nap but finally gave up. There were hundreds, no, thousands of women milling about the flat. With Maria asleep, he left, sucking in the cool night air, and walked to his tiny, quiet office.

As he’d made his rounds during the day he had gone from good humor to a queasy anxiety now that the fog had rolled up through the commercial district, floating in the street beyond his window. The loneliness of his situation was making itself felt in an unpleasant, stomach-wrenching way. He could confide in no one, not José, not even Arnaldo. He was bound in silence to his plan, and there would be no confidants, no one to discuss his feats with, no one to gain strength from when he doubted his own ability. … He shook his head glumly at the empty street below. He sat down at the desk and began his night’s work. First he retyped the contract on another sheet of papel selado, improving as he went, adding a flourish here and there, bits of official jargon he’d forgotten on the earlier versions. He typed very slowly, made sure there were no badly registered keys. Could this self-doubting wreck, he reflected ruefully, possibly be the same man of affairs who had conducted business only last week in Biarritz?

The next step—acquiring the official signatures. Not so difficult as it might first appear. The signatures appeared on many official documents and proclamations. Painstakingly, he simply traced them onto the papel selado.

Francisco da Cunha Rego Chaves, the High Commissioner of Angola.

Daniel Rodriguez, the Minister of Finance.

Delfim Costa, a Representative of the Portuguese Government.

With a straight razor he cut off the two full pages of notarizations from the first document, attaching them with tape to the second signed contract. Then he struck a match and melted a large crimson drop of sealing wax at the bottom of the last page. From his vest pocket he took the signet ring bearing the Portuguese coat of arms and pressed it firmly into the congealing wax. To complete the document he taped two brand-new Portuguese banknotes above the wax—a one-thousand-escudo note, then worth about fifty dollars, and a five-hundred-escudo note. He assumed that these would be the best notes for the syndicate to have the right to print in return for the five-million-dollar loan to impoverished Angola.

On the whole it looked just fine.

The next day Maria was delivered of her fourth son. Caught up in the events surrounding the birth and the beloved mother’s recuperation, he found the days flying past. He cabled Hennies and Marang that accommodations had been arranged for them at Lisbon’s finest hotel, the Avenida Palace.

That evening he sat beside Maria, holding her hand.

“I am so proud of you, my love,” he whispered. “Such a fine new son. …”

“I do so wish we had more room, Alves. A nursery, separate bedrooms for the boys … room for the nurse to stay with us.” She lowered her dark, thick lashes. “I am so weak, Alves … and the past month have been so … hard. For both of us, I know, but for me here alone without you. …” A tiny tear escaped from behind the lashes. “Selling everything, all my little jewels, the silver, the runabout … watching as they took it all away. …” There was a sob stifled in her throat, and Alves kissed her mouth gently.

“Soon you will have more than you have ever dreamed of, my darling. You will forget what you have been through. My beloved, there are wonders ahead.”

“But how, my darling?” It was the first time she had ever asked about his public life.

“All I ask is that you believe me. … Have I ever failed you?” When he gazed up into her glistening eyes all that he saw was a certain understandable confusion. He hugged her, cooing and rocking her in his arms.

The Avenida Palace, not long before known as The International, had always intimidated Alves on previous visits, which had been confined to the brightly lit, sumptuous public rooms. Now he strode briskly across the gilded lobby, through a bevy of lavishly uniformed attendants, stood waiting for the cagelike lift to hoist him upward to his meeting. The music of the celebrated string band, playing their tea-dancing repertoire, floated toward him, summoning up the memory of a Sunday afternoon years before when he had danced to the same band with Maria’s mother and seen across the room Maria gazing adoringly at him as she turned slowly in her father’s arms. Now, catching sight of himself in a long mirror, he could not help but reflect on time, the changes it had wrought. He had thickened somewhat but hardened as well, and his face was lined with the years in Africa. There was the marked difference in bearing, the bulk of confidence across his shoulders, the absence of hesitancy. He smiled a trifle grimly at his image, patted the briefcase he carried. Becoming a man was quite a remarkable process.

Hennies opened the door of the suite he and Marang shared. The German smiled, shook his hand. Marang bowed. The large room with the gold brocade fittings glowed from the afternoon sunlight. Greta Nordlund stood with her back to the window, feet apart, tall and imposing in a long white skirt and blue overblouse. She smiled, said nothing, shook his hand like a man. José lounged in a deep chair, legs extended and crossed at the ankles, smoking a pencil-shaped cigar. Arnaldo was arranging chairs at a table. Alves wished the actress hadn’t come. She distracted him.

Quickly she made clear her intention of leaving them alone. She turned to Alves, spoke softly with the deep husky voice: “Senhor, might it be possible for your wife to join us for dinner? I would so enjoy meeting her. …” She teased him: “The woman who caught such an important man! I’ve heard so much about your exploits since we met—your famous train ride! What a woman Senhora Reis must be! I am intrigued. …”

“On the contrary,” he said, surprised, “it was I who caught her and was exceedingly lucky to do so. And dinner, yes, of course, unless she has made other arrangements.”

“I’m so glad.” She touched his sleeve. He watched her walk down the carpeted hallway. With her long legs she took big strides.

Meticulously, slowly, as the room grew hazy with smoke, he explained his negotiations of the past two weeks and the document given him by the Bank of Portugal’s directors. “Nothing,” he concluded, surveying the four heads nodding with satisfaction, “could be more simple and straightforward. We are empowered to have the money printed—we being the syndicate headed by Marang van Ysselveere. Our arrangements are exactly as I described them to you in Biarritz. No changes of any kind. So …” He sighed and sat down.

“We Portuguese have a name for such an opportunity.” José’s eyes moved from face to face behind the drooping lids. “It comes from our old interests in the East. … When we ruled most of the world. This is a prime example, gentlemen, of a negocio da China—a Chinese deal. Which is one in which you can’t lose, something for nothing.”

Hennies laughed. “The Americans used to say it in New York—it’s like taking candy from a baby. Easy money.”

“This dates, I take it, from your days as a purveyor of sewing machines?”

Hennies stopped chuckling abruptly, turned to stare at Alves.

“Perhaps,” he said.

“Marang, as head of our syndicate, have you any further thoughts?”

“All seems in order. Normally I distrust this kind of thing. Hard work equals money in my experience.” He looked sactimoniously along the length of his nose.

“Oh, come, come,” Alves said, tapping a cigarette on the table. “Let us leave our platitudes behind us for the moment. We are men of the world … hard work is whatever a particular situation demands. I am quite sure that our friend Marang would look back on his trade with the Germans during the recent hostilities—the chocolate, the ham, the wheat—as relatively easy work, but because a job does not require physical labor does not mean that it is easy. …” Marang had paled slightly; a fingertip flew to his lip. “Believe me, we have all done our share of hard work and in this case it was I who did it—hours of negotiations with the bank’s directors, convincing them that we were the perfectly discreet men for the job. …”

“All that remains is to decide on the printer, is that not correct?” Marang looked around the room.

“A German firm occurs to me,” Alves said. “Good quality, long traditions, sober—”

“Out of the question!” Hennies barked, leaping up. He began to pace, limping slightly with the built-up shoe. Alves had never really noticed the limp before.

“Good Lord, why not?” José asked. “You yourself said how much experience the Huns have had since Versailles. …”

“There’s no need to use that word,” Hennies growled.

“Versailles?”

“No, you fool, Hun!”

“Gentlemen, please!” Arnaldo held out his hands to quiet them. Bandeira bared his teeth, eyes squinting in an imitation of laughter.

“I take it that your concern,” Alves remarked slowly, “stems from your near disaster in the railway banknote imbroglio?”

“How do you …” Hennies stopped, stock-still, leaning forward toward Alves, menacing. The monocle dropped like a coin from his flat, cold eye.

“Calm yourself, my friend. Surely you don’t believe that I would invite anyone into such a delicate operation without the most detailed private inquiries? Surely not—and the fact that you are here at all indicates at least my understanding of your previous activities.” He smiled reassuringly.

“Can’t be too careful, Adolf,” Marang said maliciously.

“You’re quite a little bastard, aren’t you, Reis.”

“You disappoint me, Hennies,” José said. He chuckled.

“Now,” Alves said, moving resolutely on, ignoring Hennies, who sat down sulkily by the window. “I do see Hennies’ point. … I should have seen it myself. Herr Hennies’ contribution to our endeavors is financial, not, shall we say, moral. He has undoubtedly been badly wronged in Germany, and any reputable German printer of banknotes would not look with unalloyed favor on his participation … so, what remains? Suggestions?”

“Perhaps a Dutch firm,” Marang said, having recovered his own composure, apparently by observing Hennies lose his. Alves watched it all closely. Never had he felt quite so completely the master of a difficult, complex situation. “Enschede en Zonen have been the exclusive printers of Dutch banknotes for more than a century.”

“They can print these notes? These exact notes?” Alves held up the document.

“Well, I don’t know as to exactness—”

“They must be the same notes … there must be no room for discovery by an outsider of any differences. The notes must be duplicates—the point of the entire process, if you recall, was to hide the fact that new money is being printed. Thus, there must be no differences of any kind. … None.” Fighting against his impatience, Alves tweezed his lower lip between two fingers and pulled a lengthy, thoughtful face.

“Only the original printer,” Hennies said sourly, “can possibly produce the same banknotes. Are you telling us, Reis, that your great chums at the Bank of Portugal didn’t tell you that? Incredible!” He snorted. “Did you think these firms just pass the plates around among themselves, like some bloody great club? My God, use your heads, gentlemen.” He turned back to gaze out at Rossio Square. The constant rumble of traffic filtered into the room.

In the silence that followed, Alves’ mind raced, smashing against the walls of his sudden confidence, demolishing them. Damn … God damn … Master of the situation, he felt sickness growing in his belly. He lit a cigarette. Any printer, any printer at all, but the same one … only the same printer, who customarily printed the notes, who had the long standing personal relationship with the bank, might destroy his perfect plan—might purposely, or even casually, check with the bank and expose the entire scheme. … What in the name of God to do?

Hennis broke the silence. “Well,” he intoned imperiously, “well?”

“Well what, Adolf?” Marang wet his lips, peered at his moist fingertips.

“Well, who in hell printed the bleeding notes?” He stood up, plucked a flower from a vase on the credenza, inserted it in his buttonhole. “Reis?”

“The bank stipulated I must not go to the same printer.” His mouth was dry. He felt his heart jump.

“That makes no sense,” Hennies said. “They want the same note, they must know that only one printer can do it.”

But who was the printer? Alves shrugged, cleared his throat.

“I agree … there is obviously some mistake.”

“Well, there is nothing to do but go to Waterlow in England. The largest printers in the world. Surely, I have heard that they do some Portuguese notes.” Marang was full of surprises, Alves reflected, and now he was rescuing the project, like a messenger from a benevolent deity. “I beg to differ with Hennies here, but I expect that Waterlow and Sons, Limited, does indeed have the facilities and resources to literally duplicate these notes. … They are a most remarkable firm, so terribly English, so thorough, absolutely dependable and unimpeachable in every way. And they do a large banknote business. Very aggressive, men in every capital, always looking for the new piece of business.”

“How is it you are so well informed?” Arnaldo was jotting down notes on his pad.

“My interests are very diversified. More information than you can imagine passes through The Hague.”

“Waterlow it is, then,” Alves said.

“What else is there?” José asked brightly. “Looks to me like we’re off to London. … I was right, negocio da China!” He clapped his hands and stood. “Agreed?”

“There is one more point,” Alves said. “A small financial consideration. Herr Hennies …”

“Another thousand pounds.”

“You are joking!”

“No, as it happens, I am not. And it is a very great bargain—after all, your contribution, as we agreed, was to be financial.”

“Corrupt! Corrupt and greedy, your friends at the bank. …” Hennies stuffed his hands in his pockets, stumped back to the window. “This could never happen in Germany.”

Marang laughed. José caught Alves’ eye, grinned.

“Don’t be absurd,” Marang said. “As you perfectly well know, bribes are the lubricant of all great business deals.”

“Ja, ja,” Hennies groaned. He reached for his checkbook.

Alves slumped back in his chair, removed his spectacles, rubbed his tired eyes. He folded the document and returned it to his briefcase. Hard work was an understatement.

By evening his spirits had recovered from the unexpected shock of the afternoon. All would be well: luck had been with him, as it had so often in the past. At such times you could almost believe you were especially blessed. With Maria, abroad socially for the first time since the birth of the most recent son, he arrived at Silva’s for dinner in high spirits, which began to ebb the moment he saw Greta Nordlund at the large table, laughing close to José’s ear, candlelight casting shadows across the wall behind them. She was all in white, ghostly with her pale skin and pale hair, breasts low and pointed beneath the clinging gown. Her nipples caught the material, stretched it as she moved. Why did José have to constantly combine business and pleasure?

Arnaldo and José fussed over Maria with countless inquiries as to her health, the new baby’s health, the health of her parents.

Alves watched Greta’s wide thin mouth as she talked, her eyes flickering across his wife’s face, her jewelry, the style of her dress, the color of her nails. She was asking Maria about the children, and Maria immediately began to recount the day’s events, animatedly, her smile open and genuine. He watched his little wife from the corner of his eye, loving her, wanting to protect her, somehow, from this curiously unsettling Northern woman.

Hennies provided champagne, and the dinner of cosido and roast pork moved slowly ahead. Greta ate ravenously while Maria talked, picked at her food. “I must watch my figure,” Alves heard her say, and Greta joked, “I’m sure the men in your life do all the figure watching that is necessary.” Maria laughed happily, replied that there were no men in her life, only one man. Greta nodded. “Of course, I understand. This is no place for confidences, is it?” Maria smiled, not understanding. Inexplicably, Greta caught his eye. Did she wink, or was it his imagination?

Later José leaned across the table toward him, the candle guttering between them. “Lovely, isn’t she?” He chortled, blowing the candle out. “Delicious, seductive, worldly. A tigress, she claws me. …”

“Don’t be obscene, José,” Alves whispered. “They might hear you.”

José leaned sideways, nibbled at Greta’s earlobe. She shivered, put her cheek against his. “Behave, my darling.” Maria looked away self-consciously. “You see, you are embarrassing Senhora Reis. … You should be ashamed.” She gently pushed him away.

Marang plucked at his sleeve.

“Yes,” Alves said. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t listening.”

“I was merely telling Arnaldo and Adolf some of what I know about the Waterlow firm. Perhaps you would enjoy hearing it.”

When he drank, Marang developed a kind of lisp. It was vaguely amusing. Alves listened attentively for the next hour as the dinner moved sluggishly to a close. Maria was still talking about the children, then he heard Greta ask about the great adventure at the High Bridge and that story was told in elaborate detail.

The night outside was unusually balmy. When the taxis arrived back at the Avenida Palace the intention to have a nightcap was replaced by the idea for a stroll along the Avenida da Liberdade. Alves resisted: “Surely, my love, you are tired from such a long evening. Perhaps we should say good night …”

“Oh, no. Alves, please,” she said, taking his hand. “I don’t want it to end yet. I’m fine and Greta is a good friend … let’s walk with her. Please.”

He shrugged. “Whatever you wish, of course.”

“What a lovely avenue,” Greta cried as she thrust her arm through his. Four abreast, with Maria holding Alves’ other arm and José on the far side of Greta, they marched along beneath the moon and the swaying palms.

“A mile long, a hundred yards wide,” José said, gesturing expansively, “Palms, Judas trees … Originally the entire avenue was built with walls sealing it off from the rest of the city. So the shy ladies of Lisbon could promenade and take the air and not be seen. Can you believe it?” He cackled, stomping his feet.

“José is drunk,” Alves said to no one in particular.

“How times change,” José cried, gasping. “And the ladies! How they have changed. …”

Alves felt Greta squeeze his arm. Maria hummed happily to herself. His head ached.

In bed that night, long after they had left the merrymakers at the Avenida Palace and taken a taxi back to their tight-fitting flat, Alves lay awake, his eyes blinking against the darkness. Maria had drifted off to sleep, smiling in his arms, leaving him keyed up, trying to organize his thoughts and marshal the events of the day. He still shuddered from the mixup over the printing companies. … How could he have left such a gap, after all the care he’d taken with the documents, the plan as a whole? He grimaced, swung his legs out of the bed, straightened his nightshirt and padded out to the kitchen. He heated the remnants of the coffee, lit a cigarette and sat down at the table. The printing company—what an insane mistake! But, still, Marang had saved the day and the crisis had passed.

Marang had proved most informative on the subject of the printing firm. He had, Alves supposed, that kind of mind, encyclopedic, orderly. Over the dinner, even with José’s shenanigans and the attention he’d paid to Greta and Maria, Alves had absorbed what Marang had been saying.

Waterlow and Sons was the largest single printing company in the world. Central to its existence was the banknote division, which supplied money, meeting the most exacting standards imaginable, to governments of many nations. The first Waterlow—Walran had been his name—had come to Canterbury early in the seventeenth century, a silk weaver. Two centuries later James Waterlow, a scrivener, had revolutionized his trade: a man with a new idea, which involved using lithography and printing to produce the legal documents that had always in the past been copied, laboriously, by hand. James founded the firm in 1811, taking his sons in as partners. Alfred, Walter, Sydney and Albert. Business grew dramatically with the growth of the vast railway system, which required millions of timetables, millions of tickets, millions of stock certificates. …

Marang’s natural tendency toward gossip exhibited itself when he turned to the personalities that emerged with the firm’s prominence among printers.

“The English,” he had said, meticulously licking champagne from his mustache, “are even more obsessed with appearances than our good Dutch elders. Just look beneath the smooth surface of the English aristocracy, look past Cambridge and Ascot and the City and cricket at Lords … and you find something else, something that gives the lie to that carefully nurtured look of things. The Waterlow family, for example, always had its factions, its rivalries, brother against brother, cousin against cousin. …”

The company split into two printing firms, at first dividing the available business, then competing bitterly for it.

“Both firms were doing wonderfully well,” Marang continued, malice darting across the words, a smile of ironic observation on his narrow face, “at which time greed appeared on the scene. In this case it was Alfred’s grandson William Alfred Waterlow who came to the conclusion that the printing of currency—or banknotes, paper money—was too lucrative to be left to the other Waterlow firm.

“It was nineteen-fourteen, which would have made William about forty-two, forty-three. … And that was when he remarked to my friend that, by God, why should the other Waterlows be printing all the money? Of course he couldn’t have known what a quagmire he was venturing upon. …”

1914. He had been meeting Maria at the beach, a mere boy with boyhood ending. José was back from his escapades, about to set out on the road to more. … Hennies had just become a Swiss and set sail from Rio on the S.S. Principessa Mafaldo, embarking on his third identity. Arnaldo, like himself, had been a child with little notion of the world beyond school, home, the neighborhood in Lisbon.

And Sir William, by then the new president of the Federation of Master Printers of Great Britain, one of the eighty-one ancient guilds of the City of London, was bulling his way into the enormously competitive banknote business.

Sir William began by raiding Waterlow and Sons, Ltd., and came away with a substantial prize—an order for one hundred million British Treasury one-pound notes: Waterlow Brothers and Layton was on its way in the banknote business.

By 1919 it had become apparent to Waterlow and Sons that Waterlow Brothers and Layton had become a major force in the field of banknote printing, with their sights set on acquiring even more international business what with all the new countries created by the war’s end. Therefore Waterlow and Sons suggested a merger with Waterlow Brothers and Layton, bringing the family together again and ending ruinous price-cutting competition. The merger was announced in January 1921. Sir Philip Waterlow, Sydney’s son, became chairman of the new firm, with his son Edgar and Sir William named managing directors.

The word in the City was that Sir William was outgunned on a stock-ownership basis and accepted the subordinate position—with much private bad grace—with the bleak assumption that his second cousin Edgar was bound to succeed his father, Sir Philip, in the top spot. “Stiff upper lip, one of those very, very English things,” Marang said, shaking his head disdainfully. “A bitter and nasty pill that the right kind of Englishman swallows and ignores. Such absurd pretense! They are more enwrapped in vengeance than any race of people since the Borgias. You know what an English financier once said to me over whisky and soda in his club? I’ve never forgotten it. He said, ‘A gentleman never gets angry. He gets even.’ Now that, my friends, is why the sun never sets on the Union Jack!”

But, Marang went on, winding slyly on through the complexities of his story, the slimy underside of the banknote business eventually changed all that, saved Sir William’s future.

The facts were that Thomas de la Rue and Waterlow and Son had been in secret agreement to share British government printing projects. To keep the price at a comfortably profitable level, bidding for the jobs had become perfunctory, markedly unenthusiastic. Regardless of the printer, the profits were split two ways.

“The problem arose, you see,” Marang said, eyes shining at the small but intrigued audience, “when Sir Philip welshed on his part of the deal—just once. Thomas de la Rue did not receive their cut. And they sued because they didn’t get their share of a deal that was utterly unethical in the first place! So English! Righteous indignation among thieves, nothing more nor less!”

Marang leaned forward, eyes glittering. “There was,” he whispered eagerly, “more to come. …”

Sir William snooped around and discovered two interesting facets of the situation that had not yet come to light. First, many of Sir Philips’ directors had had no knowledge of the arrangement, and, second, Sir Philip had been keeping the shared profits for himself personally instead of putting them back into the firm. “These discoveries made for some animated discussions in the board room—legendary in the City,” Marang clucked. “Laughter behind their backs … but the Waterlow clan is reported to be most decidely thick when it comes to poking fun at themselves. The results were typically upper class: Sir Philip was allowed to get off by merely retiring to the country, chastened, yes, but very well off. The de la Rue lads were bought off for thirty thousand pounds—and the suit never went to court.” He peered at their faces, one by one, enjoying the spotlight. What a mind! Alves reflected. What a resource this Dutchman was!

“Edgar, the heir presumptive, was passed over for the simple reason that he had known of his father’s misconduct … and had not reported it to his fellow directors. And Sir William, back from beyond, was reborn as chairman and, with Edgar, joint managing director.”

Inevitably, the great firm was split, both emotionally and strategically, at the top levels. Sir William knew that Edgar would be ever alert to an opportunity to bring him down. Since he realized he could not trust his cousin, Sir William accepted the inadvisability of confiding in him certain key aspects of the firm’s business. The important thing was to keep the other nine Waterlow directors on his side.

Toward the end Sir William acquired the entirety of the Crown’s postage-stamp printing business. Shortly thereafter he secured the rights to print all of Latvia’s currency. The word in the city was that Waterlow’s profits were doubling as 1924 entered its last month.

With his various successes in tow Sir William’s ambition had taken wings. Once he’d gained his knighthood, he wanted very badly to become Lord Mayor of London. He had laid the groundwork with considerable care. He served as chairman of the City of London School Committee, then as alderman for the Cornhill Ward of the London Corporation, which made him a Magistrate of the City of London, a post that had traditionally been a steppingstone to the Lord Mayoralty.

The rise of Sir William caused Edgar more irritation than he could rationally describe, though he was reported to have tried to do it justice in the upstairs rooms at the Cheddar Cheese on more than a few occasions. The problem was, as he admitted from behind dark scowls, that there was no arguing with the insufferable, self-righteous prig’s success. …

Before breakfast Maria saw to it that Alves’ bag, old and with a broken belt that commemorated his travels through Africa, was packed for the long train trip to The Hague. Although he’d managed only a couple hours of sleep, he was buoyant. It was all coming together. Today. He fought the excitement in his breast. But it was there; he couldn’t resist it. He had been waiting all these months, all that time in the Oporto jail. And now his plans had gone right. Men more experienced with sophisticated financial dealings than he had seen the documents and been convinced. It was a wonderful morning. …

The children, with their nurse, had already kissed their father goodbye and gone off for the morning. The baby lay in Maria’s arms and sucked, gurgling happily, on her dark, swollen nipple. Milk dribbled down his tiny array of chins. “Quite gay, wasn’t it?” Her eyes sparkled at him. “And such impressive men—all working for you. Well, I was so proud!”

“Quite gay,” Alves said, his smile fading slowly, leaning down to kiss the baby’s hair. “José particularly was most gay. …”

He sat down to coffee and hot bread. He filled the cup with cream and sugar, sipped slowly, watching his wife quizzically. “What did you think of Greta Nordlund?”

“Oh!” Maria exclaimed. “I adored her. So exciting, yet so interested in the children. … Alves, I think she’s had a very sad life, working so hard in the theater, never having a husband or children.”

“You approve of her relationship with José, then?”

“Oh, Alves, don’t be so old-fashioned. This is nineteen twenty-five. Some women behave very differently nowadays. … She’s a woman of the world, a femme fatale. Not like your little wife who stays at home and has babies.”

“You object, my darling? To staying at home and bearing our children?” He buttered the bread, ladled jam onto it.

“Alves, I love you, I love my life with you.” She adjusted her nipple in the baby’s mouth and took a dainty bite of Alves’ bread. “You shouldn’t hold Greta’s way of life against her—she’s a dear, sweet person. Give her a chance, my darling.” She closed her eyes in thought. Alves took the bread back and crammed most of it into his mouth.

“She’s much too tall,” he said.

Maria laughed. “Too tall for what?”

“Maria, you’re as bad as José!”

“And such a beautiful dress. Parisian. She told me the name of her dressmaker. How I would love visiting Paris! The fashions there …”

“But, my darling, do you think such a dress as hers last evening would suit you? She does not dress in happy colors, as you do. Her clothing strikes me as quite somber, almost melancholy.”

“It’s the woman you’re seeing, not her clothing. She is somber, melancholy. Clothing takes on the personality of the woman—every intelligent woman knows that. Believe me.” She patted his hand consolingly. “Anyway, I would very much enjoy visiting her couturier. …” A wistful quality colored her voice. Alves winced inwardly. Such moments almost always cost him money. At the moment he had only the little he had squeezed from Hennies. The wonderful morning was almost slipping away.

“You are surely right, my love,” he said. “And when the time comes, all your wishes will be granted. And about that you must believe me, you see? A new home! Dresses from Paris! Whatever you long for. …” He stood up, patted her hair. “Very soon now.”

“And do be kind to Greta. Please, for my sake.”

“I shall try. For your sake.”

With a tender embrace once the baby was fed, he took his bag and went down to the street. Arnaldo was waiting for him in a taxi.

The Sud Express, one of the great trains of Europe, fretted and fussed in its berth as harried travelers swarmed through the crowds of porters. The Lisbon-Paris run took thirty-six hours, and the carriages were appointed for maximum comfort. Sweet and brushed and perfumed, provided with fresh stiff linen, fresh flowers in the bud vases, the huge steaming engine seemed to be straining to be gone, like a mastiff on a leash.

José, Greta, Arnaldo, Hennies and Marang: the six of them met, eyes bright and voices brittle; the excitement was contagious.

Alves stood somewhat apart, watching, curiously calm within, at ease with the knowledge that only he possessed. The situation called for confidence on his part. He must almost believe the story himself—that was the key. He caught Arnaldo’s eye and smiled. Confidently. It was time to board. They were accommodated in three private compartments—José with Greta, Marang and Hennies together, he with Arnaldo.

By evening he had retired alone to his own compartment. Arnaldo, José, Hennies and Marang had gone off to the club car to play cards. Greta had, he assumed, retired for the evening. He smoked, went over the dossiers again and again, jotted down all that he remembered of Marang’s remarks about Sir William Waterlow, studied the forged documents minutely, critically, searching out any deviations from the normal. It was wearying and made him both hungry and thirsty. Finally he washed his face, brushed the cigarette ashes from his coat and made his way through the swaying corridors to the dining car.

He had just ordered a bit of sole and a half bottle of Chablis when she came in, saw him and made her way toward his table. She moved gracefully with the rolling motion of the train, then folded herself into the chair across from him. Her eyes wandered nervously, a smile died at birth, she fumbled with the menu.

“Insomnia … I only sleep well when I’m working. The rest of the time there’s too much energy. I can’t seem to exhaust myself. I make terrible demands on José at times.” She shrugged solemnly. “No wonder he plays cards with his friends.” She sighed, stared at her reflection in the dark, rushing night, stroked her hair. “On trains … it’s childish but I keep thinking the bed will fold up with me still in it.”

“I sympathize. I have the same affliction—my mind races, sleep won’t come. Not more than two hours last night.”

“You were excited by our night out. I felt the same way.”

“The beginning of a new adventure.”

“Like an opening night.” She caught his eye, seemed to soften. “I understand. You, your excitement, not the great deal you all seem so self-satisfied about.” The waiter appeared, and she ordered a chicken sandwich and tea. “We always seem to be eating together.”

“A beautiful woman is always welcome at my table.” He averted his eyes. This woman, so forward and daring—Maria had actually called her a femme fatale—this woman made him feel shy, boyish. He tried to compensate. “I once knew a man in Africa, a man called Chaves, who looked like a gorilla, who used to tell me, “Reis, give me my pipe, my slippers and a beautiful woman … and you can keep the pipe and slippers!”

“You are funny, Senhor, in addition to being a financial wizard.”

His sole arrived, followed at once by her sandwich. “Hardly a financial wizard. Just a Portuguese businessman struggling to get along in the jungles of Europe.”

“You have put a spell on these men. … You should hear them speak of you. Hushed tones, reverence.” Clearly she was teasing him. But he detected respect in her voice, manner.

“Please,” he said, returning to his sole, washing it down with the pleasant, chilled Chablis. They were alone in the car by now. The waiters were inconspicuously freshening the tables for the first breakfast traffic. It was almost eleven o’clock. An occasional light flared outside in the night, was swept away.

“I’m quite serious. Anyone who has business with Bill Waterlow is most assuredly playing with the grownups. So the poor little Portuguese doing the best he can is not a line that will work with me. I know Bill Waterlow. …” She sipped her tea.

“Personally? I had no idea?” Another coincidence. Again, he didn’t know whether he liked it or not. He kept thinking, the more complex the web—in this case the web of coincidence—the more likely one was to become ensnared. … “What sort of man is he?”

“Do you know the work of Shaw?”

“Shaw? No, I can’t say I do. What is Shaw to do with Waterlow?”

“Nothing, really. I consider Bernard Shaw the greatest English—I should say Irish, actually—playwright since Shakespeare. You know Shakes—”

“Although only a poor Portuguese, I am not wholly illiterate.”

“Forgive my teasing, Senhor.” She had relaxed. “Shaw is fond of including in his plays a certain kind of typical Englishman—the large, red-faced, blustering, pompous, self-important, God-was-an-Englishman type. Not overly intelligent, but that doesn’t matter—it’s a question of the right school, the right family and friends, what they call the ‘old boy network.’ That’s what great success requires, and it is the only thing that can make you truly successful. Although tradesmen, the Waterlows have been hanging about for a long time—money, the good schools, the mansions and summer homes and shooting grouse in Scotland.” She cast a slow look at him. “I needn’t tell you this. You’re an Oxford man, aren’t you?”

“I understand the English,” he said with quiet confidence. “I have been reading Sherlock Holmes and P. G. Wodehouse. Do you know what the P and the G stand for? Why do you laugh?”

“Holmes and Wodehouse,” she repeated. “A heightened realism, I suppose. Maybe not such a bad idea, even for an Oxford man—yes, yes, I do know. It’s Pelham for the P and Grenville for the G.”

“Pelham,” Alves said. “Strange name. I think of Dick and Bertie and Wooster and Nigel and Reggie, not this Pelham you speak of.”

“He’s called ‘Plum’ by his friends.”

“You are a friend of the immortal Wodehouse as well? You amaze me—but tell me, does Wodehouse make any sense in person? I read his books religiously, but I admit it is a rare day when I can say I understand what is going on. I confess it. …”

“I know him, yes. He writes sometimes for the stage. So I know him, though not well. Tall, terribly amiable fellow … Whereas Mr. Shaw is stocky and vigorous, full beard, once red and still rather red, wears knickerbocker suits. The knickerbocker suits must be the only thing he and Bill Waterlow have in common—they would naturally hate each other on sight, I’m quite sure. Because, as I was saying, this type of roast-beef-and-Yorkshire-pudding Englishman Shaw does so wonderfully well is precisely what Bill is. … And greedy to boot. I’ve never known anyone more involved in the pursuit of more—the word enough does not exist in his vocabulary.” She leaned back and took a great bite of sandwich.

“How did you come to know him?”

“In the theater you meet scads of people who want to take up actors and actresses, invite them for house parties, long weekends spent with wildly mismatched people. The English have a gift for it. You know, come to think of it, I have known people greedier than Bill … but they were Waterlows, too. And they got caught. It’s more or less de rigueur in the best English families, at least one or two really messy scandals. Money or women, it always comes down to that. And seldom does anyone ever get punished … after all, God is an Englishman and money and women were clearly meant to be acquired in God’s world. The means of doing so is not of great concern.”

“Am I to be frightened of this peculiar race? They are not, then, as Plum portrays them? Funny and silly?” He smiled. “Pretend I didn’t go to Oxford. …”

“Oh, yes, there are funny and silly ones, too. Bill Waterlow can be both funny and silly, when he plays tennis … on his private court, of course. He plays very hard and wheezes a great deal. At Whyte Ways I saw him cheat his vicar out of a half dozen sets one weekend by simply calling the vicar’s best serves out. …”

“Whyte Ways,” Alves said. “What is that?”

“Waterlow’s home. If you’re unlucky, he may invite you to visit. Still, you’re Portuguese—the Latin races, in Bill’s view, are to be plundered, not befriended.”

“You do frighten one,” Alves said slowly.

“Don’t be,” she said. “Think how much more you now know about him than he does about you. That’s an advantage, Senhor.”

It was nearly midnight when they passed the card players. They sat at the far end of the car, ordered a brandy nightcap and watched the game. Alves lit a cigarette.

“I feel much better,” she said. “Perhaps I can sleep now. Thank you for letting me talk. … Remember the day in Biarritz? I always seem to rattle on to you. … You’re very tolerant and understanding. Even though you don’t quite like me or approve of me.”

“It is merely that you are new in my experience. You are also very beautiful. That bothers me. May I be so frank?”

“Of course.” Slowly, deliberately, she placed her hand on his. He watched her hand with its immensely long, fragile fingers pressing against his. “It pleases me to have you think that of me. May I call you Alves?” She was smiling at him when he shifted his eyes to her face. “Try to forget what I look like and my disreputable profession. And, in any event, you should be accustomed to beautiful women. Look at your wife, Maria. She is lovely, unaffected. And she doesn’t frighten you, does she?”

“Not often.”

“Well, you see, inside I am no different from your Maria. We are both women, quite simple. …”

“You don’t believe that anymore than I do. Don’t pretend that you do.” He withdrew his hand and stood.

“Alves, are you angry with me? I’m very sorry, whatever I’ve done …” But she remained seated, calmly regarding him as if he were behaving like nothing so much as an Englishman. Funny and silly.

“I am not accustomed,” he said, feeling hot and stuffy, as if his collar were too tight, “to … to discussing my wife with … with actresses. Now, good night!”

As he turned and left the car he heard her laughter pealing like a tiny, fragile silver bell. Damn her! Who did she think she was, toying with him, teasing him, comparing herself to Maria, who was just a simple, decent Portuguese woman, a Portuguese wife and mother. Damn! He really must warn Maria about her. As he struggled to fall asleep, he thought he heard the woman panting and crying out like an animal in the next compartment, making her terrible demands on José! God, women …

The trouble with Greta was still bothering him when he awoke in the pink-and-gray of dawn in France. It made him self-conscious and ill-disposed to see her. Damn it, he knew it would come to this—trouble. He’d known since the first time he’d laid eyes on her. She was an unsettling woman, that was all, and that was enough.

He spent a sour, brooding day. Stepping alone out onto the platform at a brief stop, he was driven back inside by the wintry winds. There was the feel of snow and rain in the air, borne in from the Atlantic. Ducking back, he saw her buying a newspaper in a long black cape with fur at the collar. Her pale hair lay like a mantle of snow. She looked up, saw him, began to smile a greeting before he was gone. Silly ass, he cursed himself. Hide-and-seek with a woman.

Late that night, in the dull, damp station in Paris, with a slashing rain falling in the glow of street lamps beyond, he found himself standing beside her.

“I leave you now,” she said.

“I see.” He didn’t know quite where to look. “We’re going on to The Hague.”

“It’s very restful there. Very gentle.” She gestured, about to take his hand, stopped herself. “Look, Alves—whatever I said last night … I had no idea. …” She shrugged, looked away. “Oh, this is ridiculous. Do you want to make up?”

He stared at her, confused. What to say?

“Well, then,” she said quietly, “go ahead, be ridiculous. And childish. Merde!” She turned away, leaving him standing alone, feeling remarkably foolish. His head was aching.

Once they had left Paris and headed north for the Netherlands, the journey seemed to work wonders on Karel Marang. It was as if, with the smell of the Low Countries in his nostrils, he sensed the finish line and lengthened his stride.

Alves, fighting to rid his mind of the persistent images of Greta Nordlund, noticed Marang as they went into dinner, then adjourned to the bar car for cigars and brandy. He looked taller, as if he’d actually grown inches since they had entrained in Lisbon. His manner shucked any vestige of timidity, grew almost pompous. He was wearing a different suit, steamed and pressed: a dark-blue, virtually black, pinstripe, very subtle but redolent of power, command. More than anything else, he looked like a successful banker. Alves was delighted. Fate, he reflected, had sent him not merely an acceptable colleague but the perfect man for the job of front man.

After their second night on the train it was a relief to reach The Hague, which was shrouded in a thick yet refreshing fog. To cap his new persona Marang had wired ahead to have one of his office staff meet them with his black, somehow ominous Winton Six. In excellent spirits, Marang saw them all sumptuously provided for in the ornate Hotel des Indes, which squatted, newly painted in shades of green with rich orange trim, at the end of Embassy Row. The great trees were barren now, wet and black, ghostly, the gutters and streets full of the sodden auburn and rust-colored leaves. The city was quiet and, yes, as she had said, comfortable. Gentle. Immediately, he liked it, far more than he’d thought he would. The Winton had slid silently along the wide canals. Flowers still bloomed in window boxes like crimson and ocher explosions. He realized how tired he was. He had been on a train since time began.

After a nap he awoke, bathed and looked outside to find it dark. He threw open the window. The night smelled like cool, freshly turned earth, sweet, fit to clear your head.

He sat at the small writing desk, arranged the hotel’s thick paper with its watermark before him, filled his thick red Parker pen with ink and closed his eyes for a moment to compose his thoughts.

My dearest Maria, he began and went easily onward, telling her the assorted anecdotes of a long train ride. Menus, sights, weather, the change in Marang … Your femme fatale left us in Paris. I am sorry but I cannot warm to her as you did. I’m sure there is no harm in her, but she is—how to say it?—too much like a man for me, too hard and unyielding. I miss you so, my love! And I am so inadequate when I try to buy you presents. So why don’t you and one of your friends go shopping for some new dresses? For the holidays? And don’t worry about money. Very soon there will be more than you can imagine!

Smiling to himself, he inquired formally after the condition of the children—odd, he couldn’t imagine Greta Nordlund pregnant or mothering her tiny tots—with special good wishes for the newest one.

By writing to Maria about Greta he felt he had wiped that particular slate clean. Perhaps he had been too hard on the woman. Perhaps she had meant nothing with her remarks about Maria. But she made him nervous, made him feel as if even by chatting with her he was engaging in something strangely illicit. She was so easy to talk to, so straightforward, no demurely lowered eyes, no shyness, and her history—well, he knew enough of that to last a lifetime. Still, as Maria had said, it was possible that he was old-fashioned. … Ah, well, we are what we are, and there was no point in worrying about it.

Marang arranged the meeting with Sir William Waterlow for the sixth of December, three days hence, and in the meantime Alves retreated into a cocoon of sleep, resting for what seemed the first time in years. There was nothing more he could do to further the scheme, and the more he saw of his companions the greater the chance he might let slip something that would reveal a corner of the truth. He took long walks in the afternoons, bought a copy of Shaw’s Caesar and Cleopatra, which he began reading slowly, not more than two or three pages at a time. He wasn’t quite sure why he bothered. As often as possible he took his meals alone. When he felt the need to talk he turned to Arnaldo. He pleaded a headache when Marang had them all to dinner to meet his wife.

The day before they were to leave for London he put on his raincoat, knotted a scarf around his throat, pulled his hat low on his forehead and plunged off into the continuing mist for a long midafternoon walk. He chewed a digestive biscuit. Already his stomach was growing tense with anticipation. But the gentle, quiet city, with the water dripping so calmly from the eaves into the window boxes, the sounds of traffic muffled by the heavy mist—the city was already working its magic on him, giving him peace.

He walked aimlessly along a narrow canal, away from the shops and churches and large stores and restaurants glowing golden in the fog from the lighting within. Crossing a small bridge, he stopped to stare at a family of ducks, floating like corks on the glassy water that reflected the gray sky above. There were still late-falling golden leaves scattered about the canal like memories of autumn. How did the Dutch train their children not to fall into the canal? That struck him as a real problem, and he was thinking of his own children when he heard her voice behind him.

“I hope you are not still angry with me.”

He felt his heart leap. It couldn’t be … but, of course, he knew it was. She was wearing the Biarritz trenchcoat, lavender scarf, floppy hat. Her face was grave, eyes gray, drawing their color from the sky and the canal. She had the most remarkable eyes. Even as he watched they shaded toward the lavender of her scarf.

“I’m sorry for upsetting you. You must believe it was not my intention.” She stood stock-still, watching his face, as if waiting to be released.

“Your apology is accepted, it goes without saying. For the life of me, I can’t exactly remember what it was that bothered me.” The lie seemed harmless, in light of the long-term view, in light of her eyes. He watched her lean forward on the bridge railing beside him. “Let’s forget it. …”

“Good,” she said, looking like a young girl for the moment. Somehow he had always felt she was older than he, superior to him. “Good,” she said again, her shoulder touching his. “Do you like the canals?”

“I like it all.” They watched the water in silence. Mist drifted against his spectacles. “We left you in Paris. Now you are here. …”

“I had contracts to sign and then I sat in my apartment reading, putting logs on the fire, trying to read. … I wrapped myself up and walked in the Luxembourg Gardens, watched the women pushing the baby carriages, dropped in at the Deux Magots, drank coffee with my friends. I went home and I was lonely. I missed all of you, so I packed my bag and came here overnight. I’ll return tomorrow night, once you’ve all gone. Unless, of course, I decide to stay until you return.” She winked at him. “I lead a very carefree life when I’m between shows.”

“Impulses,” he said, nodding. “I never seem to have them. It seems to me I’m always planning.” Immediately he saw how foolish that was. He had plenty of impulses, plenty. The business on the High Bridge—that had been an impulse.

“My life is largely a matter of impulses. I trust them. Everything always works out, don’t you see? If I had a motto, a coat of arms, that’s what it would say—everything always works out.” She stood straight. “It’s chilly here. Shall we walk?”

“Writers, painters, actors,” he said. “I know nothing of such people.”

“Maybe you know their names. There’s a Canadian named Callaghan, several Americans, most of them writers. Man called Hemingway, very poor, but I think great things will happen to him, we all think so. A newspaperman called Jake Barnes, but I don’t suppose anybody will ever hear of him. You have heard of Chevalier, of course.”

“I have been in Africa,” he muttered.

“Ah, of course. Well, when you come to Paris I will take you around, introduce you.”

“But I have nothing to say to any of them.”

“Nonsense,” she insisted. “The Portuguese are a most romantic, artistic people. You would be much appreciated by these friends of mine—please, promise me when you come to Paris—”

“Yes, yes, of course.”

They were passing through a grassy park. Children’s swings hung limp; a teeter-totter lay at rest with one end jutting up like the prow of a sinking ship. Deep green moss grew thick on the side of a tree trunk. A squirrel foraged among the leaves. Alves watched her from the corner of his eye, wondering what to make of her.

“So you leave tomorrow,” she said.

“Yes, to see Waterlow.”

She smiled and he felt himself bristle.

“What amuses you?”

“You all seem to be having such a good time. It reminds me of children playing a game … or putting on a play for their parents. Oh, please, don’t be angry with me again. …” She made a fetching face and reached for his arm, took it. “Please, Alves, there’s nothing to insult your Portuguese honor in saying that you seem to be enjoying yourselves.”

“Like children? May I say that you have curious ideas of what is an insult?”

“You search out insults. That is the way I am. I say what I see.” She pulled her hand back. “Perhaps we were not meant to be friends.”

“Do I tell you that your relations with men are childish, irresponsible?”

“Oh, my, and what do you know of my men?”

“You have been Herr Hennies’ lover. And here you are now, in Hennies’ presence, but now you are the lover of José. That seems odd to me.”

She drew back in mock horror. “Immoral, would that satisfy Senhor Moraliste? And I think how many more there have been than just those two. Next you’ll be calling me a femme fatale. …”

“Aha,” he cried. “You take the words from my mouth.”

“Well, my darling Alves, you can see for yourself how angry I am.” She smiled widely and took his arm again, walking on. “Such names do not offend me. But you should beware of them, because they make you sound all the more childish. You should try to be more tolerant of others. And let your devilishly romantic Portuguese nature show through.”

“You are laughing at me.”

“I only laugh with someone I’m fond of. José said you were a bit stuffy. I merely decided to unstuff you. But I think there is great hope for you, if you only give me a chance. …”

Alves stopped beneath a huge, heavy-limbed tree.

“You confuse me, damn it, and you scare me, and I want to get a few things straight here and now. Just sit down and listen to me.” Obediently she sat. “I am a simple businessman. I am not one of your great sophisticates. I am not a childish person. I am at present engaged in serious business. … I am not romantic. I am very serious. I have a great deal at stake at the moment. I very much dislike being a source of amusement, to you or anyone else.” He paused for breath and stared off down the path, pushed his hands into the pockets of his raincoat. “I am not a great womanizer, undoubtedly the sort of man you are drawn to. José is unquestionably a womanizer in a class very nearly to himself. I am inexperienced with women, but still … I am as I am. You are exceedingly beautiful, you come from a world of which I know nothing, and I am not at all sure I am interested in finding out any more about it.” He licked his lips, glanced nervously about him, as if he were afraid of spies in the bushes. “You make me feel most unsure of myself. When you inquire about, or comment on, my wife, you increase my awareness of your beauty, your mysterious past, your extraordinary sexual behavior—and the result is that I feel as if I am betraying my wife by even being in your presence.”

“You are afraid I’ll seduce you,” she said with measured surprise. “You’ve got it the wrong way around, I assure you.”

Alves pushed on, not hearing, “When you call me a child, as frightened of your … instincts as I am, you are like a hunter, you know? Then calling me a child is too much, too much! I have nothing more to say. I have said what I had to say. That is all.”

She stood up and he trudged off after her, feeling half a fool, but glad he’d had his say. It was astounding, the way she brought out the worst in him. … Maria wouldn’t recognize him.

“I told you that Maria and I had more in common than you could imagine, that we were both just women. You became hysterical and walked out on me. You should have listened to me. I was right. It is silly and childish for you to be frightened of me any more than you are frightened of your lovely wife. Can’t you understand that we are the same, only our manners are different? I don’t want you to be frightened of me, Alves. I want to be friends … I want you to like me.” She was watching the grass ahead of her.

“Why? What difference does it make to you?”

She shook her head, walked on.

Later they stopped at a small bakery for coffee. She ordered a pastry. Alves sipped the scalding coffee. He had never before had such a conversation with a woman. Worn down, his emotions rubbed raw, he also felt as if a crisis had been passed. He had been uneasy about the woman all along. He remembered the day at the outdoor restaurant in Biarritz, with the rain falling out beyond the colonnades.

“Remember what I told you about Bill Waterlow. Whatever your business is with him, remember his greed, his ambition. And one other thing—he will do almost anything to show up the other side of his family. He and his cousin, Edgar, are at each other’s throats.” It was as if they were suddenly conspirators. He liked the feeling. Incredibly, his fear of her—for whatever reasons—was gone. It was like a pounding headache lifting, leaving him free.

“What you said about Hennies and José,” she said, almost whispering. “Do you really hold that against me? My way of life? Remember that such friendships are not great things. José passes the time pleasantly.”

“There is no more to be said, then,” he said.

This time he covered her hand with his.

“Friends?”

“Of course.”

Walking back past the various embassies with the colorful flags hanging wetly from angled poles, he reached into his pocket, took the book out and showed it to her. He said nothing. She took it.

“George Bernard Shaw,” she said. “Caesar and Cleopatra.”

She leaned toward him and kissed his lips, much to his surprise. He saw her face as she pulled away. She was pursing her lips for the instant, her eyes still closed.

A block farther on toward the Hotel des Indes they came upon José, Hennies and Arnaldo.

“Come with us to dinner,” José said. He kissed her cheek.

“We must keep up our strength,” Hennies said.

Greta nodded. “All right. …”

“Alves?” Arnaldo said.

“Perhaps I’ll meet you later,” he said.

“The Golden Head,” Hennies said. “We’ll save you a place.”

Alves watched them go. Then he turned around and set off for the hotel. He needed time to himself, a chance to think.

The bedroom was dark when he awoke, shaking his head, fumbling for his glasses. He must have dozed off, and now someone was pounding on the door. He opened it and saw Arnaldo anxiously about to rap again.

“What is the crisis?”

“No crisis. I thought I’d come back and talk you into joining us for dinner.” He stepped into the room, vaguely wringing his hands. “Last night before we set off for England …”

Alves nodded and retired to the washbasin in the bathroom. Arnaldo followed him, stood leaning behind him in the doorway. “I’m very anxious,” he said. “Excited. Yes, this is our most exciting adventure since the High Bridge. Of course, there’s no risk this time, what with our being emissaries from the Bank of Portugal. …”

“There was no risk the other time. You forget—but I knew the bridge would hold.” He spoke from behind a towel, rubbing his face dry.

“So you say!” Arnaldo muttered. “In any case, I am most excited. Have you ever been to England?”

“Dunce. I am a graduate of Oxford.”

“Ah, of course.” Arnaldo toured the room, nervously peering out the window, clasping and unclasping his hands behind his back, whistling tunelessly while Alves put on his shoes and tied his tie.

“What is wrong with you?” Alves was exasperated. “Stop your eternal jiggling and fussing. Do you have to use the bathroom? What is it?”

“The kiss,” Arnaldo blurted. “You and Greta Nordlund, we all saw you, right there on the street, not a block away. …” The words tumbled out in a rush. “What were you doing?”

“Kissing, as you saw for yourself.”

“Kissing! Listen to him so calm, the man says ‘kissing, as you saw for yourself.’ Why were you kissing?” He wiped perspiration from his forehead.

“Completely innocent, I assure you. We had just decided to be friends rather than enemies. Impulsively she kissed me. … I was as surprised as you are.”

“No more surprised than José, I expect.”

“You don’t mean to tell me that José was upset?”

“Indeed I do—most jealous. He has, in fact, been something of a trial about it the past two hours.”

“Ridiculous! The man is the greatest lecher in Europe! ‘Most jealous’! It is absurd, out of the question. An innocent peck!”

“On the mouth, as José pointed out.” Arnaldo flopped down in a chair, stared disconsolately at the pattern in the carpet.

“The man has actually offered me the free use of his women before this—urged me to spend the night with a singer, the fadista, you remember?” Alves tripped over an untied shoelace and hopped to the bed, cursed, kicked the shoe across the room. “Now he plays the jealous suitor. It is not a role that fits him!”

“The fact of the matter remains,” Arnaldo persevered. “He distrusts her … or you. Her, I think. I have the impression she can have any man she wants. It puts him off balance, makes him want to hold her tight. You see?”

“I suppose,” Alves nodded, slumping onto the bed. “Throw me my shoe, please.” He caught it, bent to tie it properly. “But I think he has a great problem with that one. She is not the sort of woman you can hold too tightly—not like Portuguese women. She says to hell with it, leads her own life. She knows all sorts of people. Barnes and Hemingway and Chevalier …” He recited the names as if he knew who they were.

“You’re joking!” Arnaldo perked up. “Maurice Chevalier? She knows Maurice Chevalier?”

“Of course, you fool, do you think she sits home alone at all times? And Barnes, too, of course, and Hemingway.”

“My God, Chevalier. … I know someone who knows Chevalier. Think of it. …”

“So, José cannot cage this little bird. Big bird. Eagle …”

“And think of your own little bird, Maria, at home, having your children, caring for them.” Arnaldo leaped up, began to pace. “And you, loose, dashing across the face of Europe, kissing actresses in Holland! How could you do this to her?”

“Who? Greta?”

“Maria! Your wife, idiot, your wife Maria!”

“I’ve done nothing to Maria.”

“I am serious, Alves. It is not only José who is bewitched by a woman he can’t handle. … It could also happen to you. And, thus, to Maria. Can you imagine how Maria would feel if she had seen you with that woman on the street?” He paused for theatrical emphases. “It would break Maria’s heart. …”

“Don’t cry, Arnaldo.” Alves felt exceedingly sour. “She didn’t see me. All is well.”

“All is well only if the kiss was as innocent as you say. This woman, this actress, she is more dangerous than anyone or anything in your past, more dangerous than …” He groped for the most imposing comparison: “More dangerous than the High Bridge. … Truly. She could destroy the foundations of your life, your marriage. …” He went to the door and opened it, the yellow light from the hallway wedging into the room. “I have nothing more to say about it. Are you coming to dinner?”

Suddenly Alves felt a chill, wanted more than anything not to be alone. Tomorrow Sir William Waterlow would examine the false documents and would look into Alves’ face. … And who would stand by him if worse came to worst? Not Greta … but Maria. And Arnaldo. There was much in what Arnaldo said. A momentary kiss, was that such a crisis? He really didn’t want to think about it. There was, at just this moment, almost nothing in his life that he did want to think about. He wanted it to happen.

The taxi drifted slowly through the clinging fog banks, Arnaldo and Alves quiet in the back, each staring out his own draped window. The restaurant presented a facade of multipaned windows. In the penumbra of street lamps, there was a golden bust, a head, in the cupola high above. Wisps of fog slid past, obscuring the head. Arnaldo paid the driver and held Alves back before entering; they could hear the sounds of a crowd as the door swung open and shut.

“Be prepared,” Arnaldo said. “José is, you understand, touchy.”

“No, I don’t understand, but I accept his state of mind. Come, let’s get it over with. …”

The restaurant spread off toward dim corners, huge and bustling and full of smoke, loud voices. Waiters pushed their way through the close-grouped tables, platters high. Alves followed Arnaldo, already feeling himself begin to sweat in the hot, stuffy room.

When they reached the table there was a flurry of activity. Greta, in a low-cut white dress he hadn’t seen before, was standing up, her face even paler than normal. Her mouth was clamped tight, deep carmine. Hennies was fighting back a smile, soup spoon halfway to his mouth. Marang was gazing off into space. José’s eyes were squinting, watching Greta.

“Where do you think you’re going?” José said loudly.

She said nothing, clutching her purse. A waiter brought her fur wrap, placed it around her white shoulders. She drew it around her, held it at her breasts.

“Answer me,” José said, standing abruptly, knocking over his chair. He grabbed at the fur, but she was gone. She moved past Arnaldo, paused beside Alves and inclined her head.

“I’m sorry, Alves. José is behaving stupidly. Don’t argue with him—he won’t listen.” He felt her hand touch his arm. “Good luck in London.” He watched her move away through the smoke. She seemed to glide.

“Arnaldo,” he said. “Go get her a taxi.” Alves turned to José. “Sit down and shut up. Sit down.” Marang looked up, surprised. Hennies watched José, who glared at Alves, his face visibly darkening. Slowly, while Alves stared at him, he sank into his chair, as if a heavy hand were pressing on him. “Now, what is going on here?” He took the chair next to José.

“A lovers’ quarrel,” José said, glowering.

“Can’t you keep your troubles out of public restaurants?”

“Can’t you refrain from kissing my mistress in the streets?”

José spit the words out, one at a time, a vein pulsing in his forehead.

“Are you so unsure of her? Or yourself? That an impulsive peck between friends can put you in such a disgusting state?” Alves softened, taking José by surprise. He smiled. “Is this the Bandeira I’ve known all my life? Shaken by a woman? Is this the Bandeira whose conquests are known over half the world?”

“I don’t know,” José sulked.

Alves leaned toward José, put a firm hand on his shoulder. “You have nothing to worry about, my friend.” Hennies leaned forward, trying to catch a word. “Trust me.”

“She likes you,” José said, looking at his plate. “She told me.”

Alves forced a chuckle. “Trust me. I am no ladies’ man. You’ll make up with her tonight.”

“Mmm. Possibly.” José shrugged, stroked his mustache. He was calming down.

“But you’re only human, Alves.”

“Stop worrying. Eat your dinner.”

José grudgingly nodded. Hennies and Marang began reminiscing about previous visits to London. Arnaldo returned, consulted the bill of fare. Alves sighed. If this kept on, he’d have a bad stomach. José sat morosely, sipped his wine, stared into space. Alves tried to clear Greta from his mind. He failed.

Morning came too quickly. In the bathroom mirror his burning eyes presented jagged red slashes. He dressed quickly, packed his bag and met Arnaldo for an early breakfast in the deserted dining room. Arnaldo was waiting, trying to decipher a morning paper, blowing on hot coffee. Alves nodded and sat down, trying to move his chair without scraping it.

“We leave for the Hook of Holland in an hour,” Arnaldo said matter-of-factly. “Perhaps I should warn you—the crossing may be rough. Marang tells me the Channel has a tendency to choppiness in the winter.”

“Always a treat to begin a gray day with a tidbit of good news. Should I wear a bib or lean over the side? Did you speak any more with José last night?”

“Ah, yes, most unfortunate, I must say.”

“Unfortunate in just what way?”

“Well, he slept on the couch in my room. She wouldn’t allow him in the room. He complained this morning of a crick in his back. Poor fellow. Mixing with a woman like that often produces explosive results.”

“Stop playing a Chinese sage.” The waiter left a tray of hot rolls, assorted meats, cheese and marmalade on the table, provided a silver coffee server and a cup for Alves, went away yawning. “It serves José right. He behaved like a savage. I admit, he surprised me. And disappointed me, too. I assumed he was above such antics.”

“You surprise him. He said he’d never heard you speak so sternly to anyone. I think he had, at least until now, a slightly frivolous view of you. He saw himself as the elder, the worldly one, and you as an amusing arriviste.”

“That’s why I spoke to him as I did.”

“Well, you made your point.” He carefully placed his cup in the saucer, wiped a crumb of bun from his mouth. “I must say, Alves, that you have handled yourself very well with these men. They all seem to be much aware of your dominance. Marang and Hennies were not prepared for the research you did into their past careers. … I’ve heard them talking. They’ve even asked me where you get your information.” Arnaldo flashed an impish grin. “I tell them that you have many sources known only to yourself. They frown and fall silent. I find it quite amusing.”

Alves chuckled. “Yes. Keep them confident of our enterprise but a little off balance.”

Old comrades, they chortled for the moment. As they fell silent, Arnaldo’s face went solemn.

“Did you take to heart what I said to you about Maria and Greta?”

“Of course. No one could supplant Maria in my affections. You know that.”

“Then I must carry out my trust. Greta was waiting for me when I came down this morning. She gave me this envelope for you. … I don’t like it, carrying notes to you from another woman, when little Maria sits patiently at home—”

“Don’t start, please,” Alves held out his hand. “Give me the envelope, not the moral lesson.”

Stifling his curiosity, Alves put the hotel envelope in his inside jacket pocket, casually munched on a thick crusty piece of toast, covered edge to edge with cold meat, a slab of cheese, marmalade. Finally, with the appearance of Marang and Hennies and a weary José, Alves rose, wished them all a good morning, suggested that Hennies settle the bill and went alone into the street and sat down on a black bench. He opened the envelope and read.

My dear Alves

Please forgive me for whatever inconvenience I have caused you. José’s behavior is atrocious, but I cannot but feel that I might have had the foresight to avoid the situation entirely. After all, you and I have just become friends. Let us give our friendship the opportunity to ripen.

Until we meet again, let me wish you Godspeed on your journey.

Affectionately

G. N.

4.12.24

The Channel crossing lived up to Arnaldo’s warnings. Alves and José arrived at Harwick with a touch of chartreuse around the gills and a conviction that only divine intervention could see them safely to London. The boat train rattled and banged through the gloom toward the great metroplitan sprawl on the Thames. It was dark, and Alves felt grease-covered by the time their cab deposited them at that squatting Victorian pile, the Great Eastern Hotel, deep in the bowels of the fabled City, near to the centers of finance. Alves’ first impression of England was of a cold, wet wind, dark, low buildings, cabs beetling past in the narrow streets, a sea of black umbrellas, intent wool-suited traveling salesmen clogging the Great Eastern’s dim, smoky public rooms. After a light dinner of mutton and warm stout, Alves retired with a packet of digestive biscuits.

Propped up in his bed, with a thousand stags peering down at him from the patterned beige wallpaper, he withdrew his documents again, gazed at them in an attempt to see them as Sir William Waterlow would see them in the morning. He read through the typed words, examined the handsome seals, the attached banknotes, the crucial forged signatures. … What more could he do? Nothing, obviously. He remembered the High Bridge, his mind slowing, dissolving at last into a restless sleep.

Midmorning brought a golden haze that hung like festive netting from the chimney tops and steeples of the city. There were those who said that England’s power was finally beginning to ebb, that America was the land of the future, but for Alves London was still the source of imperial might and financial weight. Finally, to see the streets he knew in his head—Poultry, Old Jewry, Cornhill, Threadneedle, Cheapside—to watch the black-suited, bowler-topped men whose lives revolved around the endless resources, to recognize from his reading the silk tophats of the stockjobbers, to simply be there sent his heart pounding. When he surveyed his team, he was not displeased. They all wore dark suits, shined shoes; only the mustaches and the gray Borsalinos might have given them a signal of foreigners … and, in any case, foreigners were common in London.

The Bank of England … the Stock Exchange … the ceaseless, relentless motion, the swinging of furled umbrellas, the absence of women in the streets. He’d read in Plum Wodehouse about the dependency of the typical Londoner on his club—he wondered if he might ask where, in fact, the Drones Club was—but he didn’t want to appear overly inquisitive, being an Oxford man and all. …

He would have drawn it to the attention of the others, this quite indescribable sensation he was feeling, but they most surely would not have understood. It was something in himself, a pilgrim at the shrine. This was the home ground of Money and Power. He felt more at home here than he did in Lisbon.

Great Winchester Street was a great disappointment. He could have thrown a stone its entire length. Waterlow’s was a grayish yellow four-story structure that curved around the sharp corner that formed the middle of the street. It was not an impressive sight. He cast a quizzical look at Marang, who nodded yes, this was it. Above the plain heavy street door was affixed the coat of arms of a Royal Purveyor. Now, he smiled to himself, that was more like it. Several Rolls-Royces and Daimlers were arrayed outside in the narrow street; that, too, reassured him.

The huge first-floor room was spartan, crowded with dozens of clerks bent scribbling over their ledgers. He could actually smell the ink from the bookkeepers’ area, heard the hard-nibbed pens on the paper. And it was all devoted to money. … Marang stopped at a large wooden inquiry desk to the right of the door, announced himself to the uniformed commissionaires, who relayed the message to a runner, a youth who bolted up the narrow stairs. A minute later he was back, gulping his breath; he led the way back up the stairs.

“Dickens,” Hennies muttered. “Nothing ever changes in England. That’ll be their undoing, mark my words.”

The runner tapped on the door, waited ten seconds, then carefully opened it and motioned them all inside. It was a large, comfortable but simple office, globes and books and framed maps, leather club chairs, a heavy ornate couch, framed photographs of stern, solemn Waterlows, a palm in a large pot—a dry, stuffy room with sunlight streaming in the windows, motes of dust dancing slowly in the air. At the far end of the space, flanked by aspidistra, was a huge rolltop desk. Standing beside the desk, red-faced and very tall, immaculately turned out in striped trousers and a black coat, smiling thinly, was a man who spoke loudly, like a cannon. He came forward as he spoke, extending a huge pink hand to Alves, who realized that he was in the lead.

“Good morning,” boomed the man. “You must be the chap from Lisbon! I am Waterlow!”

Indeed he was Waterlow, Sir William. And that morning he had the feeling that he was at the top of his game. He was ruddy well fit as he’d ever been, and he proved it once today by mauling a broker neighbor of his on the tennis court he’d had installed at Whyte Ways. Fellow had a good bit of Italian blood in him, or so Waterlow suspected, and calling himself Reggie Laughton wasn’t going to fool anyone. Wops, Spies, Yids, Micks, it was all a matter of establishing the proper relationship at the beginning. They weren’t all bad fellows, and no one could convince him they were. Brave, many of them, die for their country—or rather his country, since they surely couldn’t claim to be Englishmen, regardless of the uniforms they wore in the trenches. Brave, yes; loyal, often. No morals, but then a damned fine pointer or jumper didn’t have much moral sense either. Straight from the start, one simple rule: you tell them what to do, they do it. Foundations of every great civilization. A class who gave the orders, a class who followed them. Made perfect sense, anyone could see that.

Once he’d left the tennis court, after leaping the net in a show of sportsmanship that left the broker paralyzed with fear and hope—both relating to the possibility that Sir William might trip and kill himself—once he’d left the broker with the order to buy him some additional railway stock, he had been reflecting on this perfect social contract that existed between the tellers and the told. On his way to the handsome mansion he’d stopped for a word with the mick gardener who was pruning the hedges.

“Good morning, Boylan,” he barked. “Lovely weather for early December, eh?”

“Aye, sir, very nice it is.” He took off his cap, ground out his fag so he might speak properly to Sir William.

He slapped Boylan on his narrow, bent back. “Well, then. Bushes are all right, are they? Hedges? Borders?”

“Oh, yes, sir.”

“Well, then, carry on, carry on. You’re a good man, Boylan. Reaffirms my faith in the Irish, eh?”

The problem was, as Sir William saw it, there was never anything to say, actually, to these people. They were all around you, of course, serving their small, wretched purposes, but once you’d told them to hop to it, well, what was there to say? Not great when it came to conversation. Give them a hoe or a shears, though, and they were quite as happy as clams.

The chauffeured black Daimler eased him gently toward the city. Consulting his schedule, pigskin with a fine gold pencil from Harrod’s, he relaxed against the cushions and saw that the morning, damn and blast, was given over to some sweaty little Portuguese … or were they? Marang? He was Dutch, of course … poor devil, Marang van Ysselveere! Did he think that fooled anyone? But the matter had something to do with the Portuguese, his clerk had told him that. Ah, what a lovely morning. His eyes roamed the green expanses of a park, huge trees, emerald carpets. … Ah, yes, what a perfect day for Cousin Edgar to be visited by a plague of boils. Rain of toads.

The morning ride was perfect for his happiest daydreams. Beyond Cousin Edgar’s immediate dismemberment by howling gypsies, the continuing increase of Waterlow’s new business made him most expansive. No one before him had ever done quite so well. Not only had he shepherded the firm through the scandals of the recent past, but he had pushed it to new heights. And enough new business—that might be the key to unseating Edgar. It would have to be a naked, unadorned power play, but it might just be possible. If his successes made him the one truly indispensable man, it was just possible that he could deliver an ultimatum—that is, Edgar or me.

And the Portuguese deal, whatever it was, might mean new business. There was, he admitted, something slightly out of the ordinary about this Marang thing. In the past, any communication regarding Waterlow’s work for Portugal had come directly from the Portuguese Embassy in London. Now there was a Dutchman with a bogus name bringing word … Still, the Portuguese were different, and they doubtless had their own colorful, childlike intrigues.

The only intrigues that held any fascination for him involved his determination to become Lord Mayor of London. And that was proceeding nicely. Orderly. This was England.

“Good morning,” he said heartily, the soul of welcoming aristocracy. “You must be the chaps about Portugal. I am Waterlow.”

“Sir William,” the first one said. He struck Sir William as being rather woplike, actually, which was no doubt simply Portuguese. “I am Artur Virgilio Alves Reis, representing the Bank of Portugal. These are my associates.” At which point he rattled off a confusing series of names and hands were shaken. “May I begin by saying that we are on a mission requiring the utmost secrecy and discretion. …”

Waterlow sat in a club chair and the others arranged themselves about the room. Marang, the Dutchman, headed the financial syndicate lending money sotto voce to Portugal—why, he reasoned, was none of his business, thank God—and Reis was the liaison between the bank and the syndicate. Slowly and with fiendish detail, all to the good, of course, they told him of the arrangement aimed at once again propping up Angola. Money down a rat’s hole, of course, but Portugal was an ally after all. Government was crooked, yes, but you expected that. Somebody getting rich on the deal—but that was nothing to him. Waterlow printed banknotes, not morality leaflets.

“Well, of course,” he said, “I am familiar with Portugal’s misfortunes with Angola. Never mind, the story has been told in detail in the financial pages of the Times. As you know, during the past two years we have been of some service to Lisbon, printing several low-denomination notes for Angola—a tribute to the continuing efforts of our man in Lisbon, late of Angola—our man Smythe-Hancock.” He heard a curious sound and turned to Reis. “I beg your pardon, sir? Did you speak?”

The Portuguese shook his head, covered his mouth with a bit of handkerchief, manfully struggled with the coughing impulse.

“You’re quite all right? Yes? Good. Well, as I was saying, we’ve done that work, but these orders came from the Portuguese Embassy and were verified by Smythe-Hancock, as well as by personal letter from Rodrigues himself. Governor Innocencio Camacho Rodrigues—nice ring to it, eh? This matter you bring me is very different, isn’t it?” He stroked his slablike pinkish chin, searched their faces with watery blue eyes.

“You grasp our point, then.” Reis had apparently recovered from his fit. “This is totally unlike any previous issue of notes. Of all the elements Camacho stressed in our conversations, utter secrecy was foremost. There must be no communications beyond ours with you … and the document we have in our possession at this moment. Smythe-Hancock, for instance, must play no part in this.”

“He is the soul of discretion, you know.”

“He’s human. His office could be burgled, his mail intercepted, under torture the man could break—”

“Oh, I say, old man,” Waterlow chuckled. Excitable Portuguese. Quite like children.

“This is most serious, most serious, Sir William. Believe me, the fate of Angola hangs in the balance. There is no question of overstatement, not when you listen to me. Through me, the Bank of Portugal speaks to you.”

Fiery Latins, no point in setting them off. “Well, then, let us see this document of yours.” Marang seemed to be leaving it all to this Reis fellow, deferring to him, you might say. He must amount to something. The contract was surely in order: not the normal thing but then this was, as they said—the man was an absolute bug about secrecy!—not the usual kind of matter. The notes appended to the contract were, however, not the work of Waterlow’s, which created a problem. They had been printed, he realized at once, by his great London competitor, Bradbury, Wilkinson. Staring at them, looking back through the document again, he camouflaged what was spinning urgently through his mind. The accepted thing to do was face up to it and send them packing off down the street to Bradbury, Wilkinson. But damn and blast! Why? This was new business and highly confidential business at that, brought to him on a silver salver. Why turn it away? New business, another step toward ridding himself of the unspeakable Edgar … Might this not force Bradbury, Wilkinson out of the Portuguese market altogether?

“These notes,” he said, waving them before him, “were printed by an American firm.” It was a technicality, rather than an outright lie. Bradbury, Wilkinson was a subsidiary of the American Bank Note Company.

“Could you duplicate the notes?” Marang asked. The one with the long drooping mustache lit a cheroot. He looked as though he belonged behind a blackjack table in a casino.

“Probably. But it would take months of engraving alone.”

“We must have the notes by February.”

“Impossible. But … had you brought us the note we have already printed for the bank, then there would be no difficulty meeting your schedule, the Vasco da Gama five-hundred-escudo note.” He took a large leather volume from the desk and dramatically threw it on the table, flipped it open to the Vasco da Gama note. “Our work, as you can see. Is it possible to substitute this note, gentlemen?”

Reis bolted from his chair and moved to the bank of windows giving onto a view of Great Winchester Street. He lit a cigarette; smoke billowed around him. “I don’t know if this is possible—”

“But, Senhor Reis, it is a simple enough change. It represents no problem at all to us at this end. And, as you say, time is of the essence. The less time required, the less risk of the truth leaking out … that new currency is being printed for Angola, eh? This is your best hope.”

Clearly it was this Reis fellow who was the decision maker. Sir William did not want to push too hard, but the instincts swelling in his breast were those of the hunter moving in for the kill.

“Really, my dear fellow, it’s simple as simple can be. Why, it doesn’t even require a change in the denomination of the notes—you have both the thousand and the five-hundred-escudo note attached here. We will merely do the entire issue in the smaller denomination, using the Vasco da Gama note.”

“As you say,” Reis said slowly, nervously polishing his spectacles for the second time since he’d arrived, “it is a simple change. Still, there are reasons for my hesitancy which I cannot explain.”

“But it is the only way.”

“Yes, well, if it is, it is.” Reis sighed melodramatically. “Use the Da Gama notes, then. But let me stress again the confidentiality of the entire matter. And let me make another point here.”

Good heavens, who did he think he was dealing with? A garrulous drunk?

“As you know,” Reis continued, “the Banco Ultramarino is normally the only agency that is allowed to issue banknotes for our colonies. Complicating matters is the fact that two brothers, the Ulrichs, serve as directors of both the Bank of Portugal and the Banco Ultramarino. For this very reason only a few directors of the Bank of Portugal have been informed of this secret arrangement to pump new capital into Angola. The fact is, only the governor of the bank and the deputy governor know the details. Consequently, there must be no risk of revelation … your past connection with the bank is another area where an information leak could develop. The contracts which you already have could be a problem … a seam in the fabric of this arrangement which might burst. That is why we would have preferred a new printing of notes with which you had had no previous involvement.” He sighed mightily, shoulders heaving. “But if it is impossible …” He shrugged. “We shall have to rely on your total discretion.”

Outside the Rolls-Royces came and went. Alves heard a boy hawking newspapers, recognized the banalities of great moments.

“Believe me, Senhor, we are businessmen well versed in the most delicate arrangements. Money is something we never—let me put it this way, our instructions are nothing less than Holy Writ. However, you understand that we will need the personal authorization of the governor of the Bank of Portugal to use the Da Gama plates for this new printing.”

“But why? Each time there is a communication, the risk of losing secrecy is increased.” Reis was sweating, pacing again, lighting another cigarette. “No, I really cannot understand why there must be further authorization. … You have in your hand the document containing all the authorization you need. I cannot go back to the bank and tell them, no, there is a further delay. They expect results.”

“But we cannot deviate from the notes attached to the document without instructions to do so,” Waterlow said.

“I am giving you the instructions.”

“I am sorry, Senhor, but you are not the governor of the bank. You are not an officer of the bank. I must have a written authorization. But, if you wish, I can undertake to acquire that myself, either through the embassy here or directly from the bank by wire. As you know, I am well acquainted with the governor—”

Reis interrupted: “No, you must not do that. It would undoubtedly result in both Waterlow and our syndicate losing the contract. That is precisely the kind of communication that I have been instructed to avoid at all costs.” He finally came to rest in a chair. “I will have to get the proper authorization myself. I will return to Lisbon at once.”

“Well then, gentlemen, we have a deal. Waterlow is completely at your service. If any help is needed in Lisbon, rest assured that our man Smythe-Hancock will be ready at a moment’s notice.”

“Very kind of you, Sir William,” Marang said.

“But I hardly think that will be necessary,” Reis added.

The arrangements concluded, Waterlow allowed a strict five minutes for conversation with the other members of the party and then determinedly saw them to the door. What a bunch, he reflected as they trooped down the stairway, and how could a fellow like the Dutchman get involved with a bunch of Portuguese? But business was business, he supposed, and someone might as easily have asked the same question about Waterlow himself. New business … He returned to his office and summoned his director of the foreign banknote division, Frederick Goodman, who had been with the firm since 1881 and a staunch supporter in the unending battle with Edgar. He outlined the arrangement to Goodman, who took it quickly, nodding agreement but making one suggestion. Secrecy, he pointed out, was all well and good, but we can hardly allow these Portuguese lads to run our business for us. Whatever they said, Smythe-Hancock, as our man in Lisbon, should be informed of what was going on. Sir William agreed.

The meat of the wire they sent to Smythe-Hancock, whose cable address was ENERGETIC LISBON and fitted him to a T, pointed out the details of the deal and the fact that further authorization was needed from the bank.

THE PRICE IS ALREADY ARRANGED: DO NOT REPEAT DO NOT DISCUSS PRICE. DO NOT INSTIGATE CONTACT EITHER WITH THE BANK OR WITH THE SYNDICATE. THIS IS BACKGROUND INFORMATION. DO NOTHING.

Sir William made it clear that Smythe-Hancock would realize that the wire had originated with him personally. Then he went to lunch at his club, satisfied that an excellent morning’s work had been done and he hadn’t had to treat his clients to so much as a cup of tea.

Marang herded them to the darkened corner of an ancient restaurant to celebrate. As their congratulations and high spirits swirled around him, Alves fought off a feeling of faintness. Hennies slapped him on the shoulder blade and he managed a weak smile. José insisted on shaking his hand, telling him how masterfully he had handled “that overgrown side of English mutton!” Arnaldo drank his warm stout, his bookish features lightened by what seemed, no doubt, a hurdle crossed.

“A simple authorization and the deal is final,” Marang said, licking foam from his tight little mouth. His eyes glittered behind his spectacles, almost threatening in a quiet, unobtrusive manner.

“My people at the bank aren’t going to like it,” Alves said, “not a bit, but with a little lubricant they’ll provide the authorization.”

Hennies’ face lost its glow.

“Lubricant be damned! This isn’t our fault. Why the hell should we have to grease any more of their greedy damned palms? They’ve gone this far. So who would they turn it over to now? By God, we’ve got them by the balls, I’d say.” He laughed roughly.

“We haven’t got anybody by anything,” Alves said. “In the eyes of the bank, we’re having the wrong people print the wrong notes. Now, while they may be too deeply into this deal to cancel it completely, if we try to throw our weight around we are damned well going to cut ourselves out of doing any further business with them. Do you see my point, Hennies? Use your thick German head, man. … Five hundred pounds properly placed will take the sting out of the bad news I’m bringing them. And it could mean more, and larger, commissions in the future. Understand?”

“He’s quite right,” Marang said.

“Listen to him,” José said. “He may need a better tailor, but he’s a smart little bastard. …” He winked at Alves, apparently pushing Greta out of his mind now that money was being discussed.

“Five hundred pounds?” Hennies said. “That means our commission is down to seventeen thousand five hundred pounds.”

José laughed. “Mind like an adding machine.” He cackled happily, looking from face to face.

Hennies nodded, frowning. “Ja, ja,” he said.

Alves’ mind wandered during the remainder of lunch. The stout and some hearty food—beef sliced from a rolling cart, hot Yorkshire pudding, a gooseberry tart—was reviving his equilibrium. God, what a morning! Smythe-Hancock … he’d nearly fainted when Waterlow had dropped that into the conversation. The abominable man he’d feared most in Luanda—possibly the only man in Angola who could have demolished his celebrated Oxford diploma! Fate had been with him, however. The two of them had met only at functions of an official nature. Alves had seen in the man’s eyes the supercilious Englishman at his worst. In Luanda he’d had the impression that Smythe-Hancock was a banker, or perhaps a broker. Now he turns up a trusted agent of the world’s largest printer of banknotes … who must surely know of Alves Reis’s business ventures in Lisbon, the Oporto jail. … Who might legitimately wonder at such a man representing the august Bank of Portugal in a convoluted issuance of banknotes. … Who might with great ease make inquiries at the bank. The more he though about it the worse it became. He pushed his gooseberry tart away. The heat and noise in the small, low-ceiling dining room was oppressive. Secrecy. The man simply must be kept in the dark. But could Waterlow be trusted? One word from Smythe-Hancock to the bank and the entire scheme would be ignited like nitro, blowing Alves and his dreams right back into a jail cell. … Could Waterlow be trusted to maintain absolute secrecy?

He didn’t know which was worse, Smythe-Hancock or the fact that Waterlow was insisting on printing notes they had printed before. The one thing he had sought to avoid was having men at Waterlow printing notes for men they knew at the bank. It was, at the moment, very much like finding himself locked into the locomotive halfway across the High Bridge and hearing the bridge supports starting to give way. …

There was nothing left but to forge another document. Yet surely each new forgery increased the odds of detection, either in Lisbon or London, at least tenfold. He had purchased a packet of digestive mints at breakfast; by the time he left the luncheon table the supply was exhausted.

With Hennies’ bank draft tucked in his briefcase he and Arnaldo checked out of the Great Eastern and entrained for Harwich. There was no way to manage the forgery anywhere but Lisbon. In any case, it was expected by the others. The single bright spot was the five hundred pounds for his own bank account.

Hennies and Marang decided to remain in London until Reis’ return. José chose to accompany Alves and Arnaldo as far as Paris.

“I’ll try to make it up with Greta,” José said by way of explanation, as they waited on the train platform. “Who knows what goes on in the woman’s mind? She baffles me. What do you really think of her, Alves? Forget my behavior in The Hague.”

“She would be more than a match for any man. I wish you luck with her.”

Arnaldo returned with the tickets. They were standing by a soot-blackened pillar. The train was building up steam, firing it in jets along the grim platform. “She’ll never give you any peace of mind,” he said, parceling out the tickets for the train and the boat.

“Peace of mind,” José cried scornfully. “We are too young to speak of that.”

Alves stared at him, his face a map of impatience and doleful resignation.

“Of course, José,” he said. “I am just tired. This traveling, it’s bad for my stomach. …”

“Listen to your Uncle José and relax. There’s nothing to worry about. …” He tilted his Borsalino jauntily and strolled toward the railway coach, Arnaldo and Alves in tow. “Nothing can go wrong now. …”