CHAPTER 13

From the gardened patio surrounding Fasano’s, on the balcony of the Prédio Nacional located on the Avenida Paulista, high on a hill in the center of the city, the lights of the vast metropolis spread to the horizon. Da Silva and Isabela, arm in arm, leaned on the broad stone railing and drank in the night in silence. Far beneath them, the tunnel of the Avenida 9 de Julho ingested and discharged an endless stream of automobiles, their headlights white trails illuminating the snakelike curves leading to the Anhangabaú. The city sparkled before them as far as they could see, an awe-inspiring sight, throwing a warm glow of light against the low-hanging clouds. Behind them, in the dim restaurant, soft music pulsed. Isabela tightened her arm in his almost convulsively.

“It’s lovely.”

“It is.”

He took his packet of cigarettes from his pocket, shook one loose for Isabela and took one himself. He managed to locate his lighter without releasing his arm, lit the two cigarettes, put away the lighter, and then pointed with his glowing cigarette.

“A long time ago,” he said, speaking reminiscently, “before this Prédio Nacional was built, and when this part of Sao Paulo was all old mansions and shade trees instead of concrete and apartment houses, Fasano’s was down there, in the penthouse of an old office building in the center of town. I remember all the elevators to the building were closed at night, except one that went up to Fasano’s on the roof. I knew the place very well. It had a narrow balcony—nothing like this patio—but it did allow one to go outside on a summer’s night and look out over the city, although there wasn’t anything like the city we have now to look over.” He smiled. “I remember they had a maître d’ who could make the world’s best crepes suzette from the world’s cheapest and rawest cognac. The management loved him because of the economy, and the clientele forgave him because of the taste. He was an artist. A Hungarian.” He shook his head almost sadly. “That was a long time ago. It makes me feel old just to remember it.”

“You’ll never be old,” she said impulsively, and then clamped her jaws tight as the import of her words came to her. She took a deep breath and then found to her surprise that she was speaking thoughts she had meant to keep concealed. “What made you become what you are?”

“What I am? What am I?”

In for a cruziero, in for a conto, Isabela thought, and faced him.

“You know what I mean. What made you decide to make your living the way you do?”

Da Silva looked at her quizzically. “You mean, stealing from the docks? You can say it; I don’t mind. Although it’s only fair to point out that nobody has proved it, yet.” He shrugged. “What makes anyone earn his living the way he does? What’s the story about the prostitute? Just luck, I suppose.”

“I’m serious!”

“So am I. What made you decide to be an insurance agent?”

“Let’s stay with you. What makes you steal for a living? You’re—you’re educated, intelligent.…” She almost said “handsome” but bit it back. “You’re interesting to be with. You’re just a nice guy. Why? You could make a living more-more—”

“More legitimately? I suppose I could. Why?”

“I mean—don’t you have any ambition?”

“It depends upon what you mean by ambition,” Da Silva said. “I certainly make more money than—well, let’s say a run-of-the-mill insurance man, for example.”

“That’s not what I mean by ambition!”

“You mean, don’t I want to get ahead in my chosen profession? Move to bigger docks, larger ports—?”

“Damn you, I’m serious!”

Da Silva looked down at her, his face a mask. “Why?”

For a moment she stared back at him; then she turned her head, staring down at the city. She took a deep breath. “Who did you take to Fasano’s when it was down there?” she asked. “Who did you take there, that long time ago?”

“Girls,” he said, and smiled a bit sadly. “Girls unfortunately now long forgotten.” He looked down at her turned-away profile, noting the smooth skin of her cheek, the sharp patrician outline of her nose, the broad brow, the firm chin. “Why do we forget people we like?”

“I don’t know. Because it’s safer than remembering them, I suppose.” There was a strange bitterness in her voice.

Da Silva raised an eyebrow. “Is there someone in particular you’re trying not to remember at the moment?”

“No. Yes.…” She loosened her arm suddenly and crushed out her cigarette. “It’s getting late. We should go.”

“Not yet. It’s early.”

“It’s late and you haven’t arranged a hotel for me, yet.”

“Ah, yes—that hotel! Well, let’s have one last dance, and then we’ll go out for that nightcap I promised you. At the Captain’s Bar—best piano in town. Or it was fifteen years ago.” He smiled at her. “There’s no rush; we’re not going until the last plane tomorrow. That means we can sleep as late as we like. But not too late, because I know a restaurant in Santo Amaro for lunch that you’ll enjoy. And another nice place for dinner. After which I’ll let you get me into that night flight to whatever-the-town-is.” His smile broadened. “Greater love hath no man but he alloweth himself to be strapped into one of those box kites pilotedeth—if there is such a word—by the ex-taxi drivers they use for night runs.”

If he expected his whimsy to get a similar response from the girl, he was doomed to disappointment. She took a deep breath and pulled away from him abruptly.

“I want to leave,” she said evenly. “Now.”

“Fine,” Da Silva said agreeably. “Where do you want to go?”

“To your apartment.”

His air of levity disappeared. He looked at her steadily. “Do you mean that?”

“Yes.” She gestured toward the restaurant. “Pay the bill. I’ll meet you at the elevator.”

He looked at her a moment more and then turned away, going toward the restaurant proper. Isabela looked out over the lighted city as if seeing it for the first time, and then walked slowly toward the bank of elevators around the corner of the gardened patio.

They rode down in silence, his hand touching her elbow lightly, trying to demonstrate protectiveness without assuming any degree of possessiveness. The doorman sprang to attention.

“Taxi, sir?”

“No,” Isabela said before Da Silva could speak. She turned to him. “I want to walk for a while.”

Da Silva nodded, slipped a bill into the doorman’s hand, and took her arm. They turned down the wide sidewalk of the Avenida Paulista, under the few spreading trees that had managed to survive the inroads of civilization. Their footsteps were the only sounds in the night, other than the occasional whine of a taxi rushing past, its headlights dimmed, or the quieter whisper of the traffic on the busier streets of the city down below. Street lights angled down, lighting each face a brief moment and then leaving them in shadow as they walked beyond the scope of each lamp; they walked on, arm in arm, each busy with his own thoughts. Above them, stars came out as the rain clouds moved farther away. So intent was Da Silva on his own thoughts that for a moment he did not realize that Isabela had spoken.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I was thinking.”

“That’s all right. I just said that you’re nothing like what I had imagined you’d be.”

“Oh? And what did you think I’d be like?”

“You know. Rough. Tough. Dressed in loud clothes. Uneducated. You know,” she said, quite out of nowhere, “you’re a very good dancer?”

Da Silva laughed; it was a welcome relief from the dour thoughts he had been thinking. “Is being able to dance the sign of the well-educated man?”

“I didn’t mean to say that,” Isabela said quietly.

“What did you mean to say?”

There was a long silence; then Isabela took a deep breath. “Nothing.”

They walked in silence for several more long moments, then Da Silva said quietly, “You said I’m nothing like what you imagined I’d be like. Well, you’re not what I imagined you’d be like, either. But you’re exactly what I hoped you’d be like.”

“You never knew I existed.”

“I knew somebody like you had to exist. But I never thought I’d be lucky enough to meet her.”

Isabela tightened her grip on his arm and drew him toward the curb.

“Let’s take the taxi now, please?”

Isabela stared at the wall, unable to distinguish it clearly in the darkness. At her side Da Silva was also awake, lying on his back, looking at the distant ceiling, thinking. Was it possible that there really was a branch office of this whatever-it-was-called insurance company in a place like Paraíso? Was it just a weird coincidence? That, of course, was as stupid a thought as one could possibly come up with. In any event, it would only take a simple phone call to verify or deny it. On the other hand, would a girl like Isabela be involved in murder? But it wasn’t would she be involved; the damnable fact was that she was involved! Well, possibly Wilson could dig something out in Rio that would shed some light on Isabela and her connection with the entire affair. Unless, of course, she had nothing to do with murder and there was a silly insurance company up there—and here we go back on the merry-go-round again! He became aware that Isabela had rolled over and was looking at him. He turned his head to face her. In the sliver of moonlight that edged between the drape and the sill, her face had the tinge of alabaster, smooth and lovely. She put her hand on his cheek tenderly. He took it and pressed it.

“You’re not sleeping,” she said softly.

“No.”

“I want to talk to you.”

He smiled at her without speaking, his silence inviting her to continue.

“Don’t go to Paraíso,” she said, raising her voice a trifle. She instantly lowered it. “Don’t go!”

Da Silva felt a strange dichotomy. The girl did not want harm to come to him. Still, she had led another man to his death; she was part of a murder ring. And his job was to break up that ring, see them punished. All of them … The masquerade had to continue.

“Why?” he said, sounding bewildered. “I don’t understand. You said your company was interested in a deal. I’m ready to deal. Why shouldn’t I go?”

She took her hand from his cheek and turned, staring at the ceiling, blinding herself to the consequences of what she was saying, knowing she had to say it anyway. “There isn’t any insurance company,” she said in a dull voice. “Or, rather, the company exists but they don’t have any office in Paraíso, and anyway, I don’t work for them.”

“But—” He raised himself on an elbow, looking down at her shadowed face. “I don’t understand. What was it—some sort of practical joke? Did some of the boys down at the Parque Balneário in Santos think it would be funny to send me off on a wild-goose chase?”

“No—yes! That’s it. It was just a joke. Now you don’t have to go.”

“That’s not it and you know it,” Da Silva said evenly. The time to play games had ended, even though the masquerade had to go on. This was the time to get the information he needed. “Tell the truth, for once. Why don’t you want me to go to Paraíso?”

“Because—” She flung an arm across her face, covering her eyes from his gaze, muffling her words. Da Silva drew the arm gently from her face, hating himself for pressing her, knowing that in the end the information she gave could convict her as well as the others.

“Tell me the truth. Why?”

She refused to meet his eye, turning to face the wall instead.

“Isabela. Tell me. It’s important.”

“Because they’re going to kill you,” she said, and tears began to well in her eyes. Her voice was drained of emotion.

“Who?”

“I don’t know. Honestly.”

De Silva pressed on. “Why?”

“I don’t know.…”

“You must know! Is it because they think with me out of the way, my set-up at the docks would be an easy target for them to take over?”

“I don’t know. Honestly …”

“Why do they want to kill me, Isabela?” His voice was quiet but there was an insistence in it that was not to be denied. He put his hand on her chin, turning her head to face him. She looked at him with a look that asked for his pity even as it bestowed her pity on him. His steadiness seemed to reassure her; she touched the corner of the sheet to her eyes, drying the tears. Da Silva went on. “Or is it because they say I’m a criminal and they don’t like criminals?”

“I don’t know. I honestly don’t know.” Her voice was more controlled now. “Maybe it is. He said you were a criminal. The other one was a criminal. I know that.”

“Which other one?”

“I—I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Who wants to kill me? Who killed the other one?”

“I don’t know, I tell you. Honestly.” She saw the frown of doubt cross his forehead and gripped his hand again, squeezing it fiercely. “It’s the truth. I wouldn’t lie about that. He calls me on the telephone.…” Her voice trailed away.

Da Silva freed his hand, twisted in the bed, but only to reach to the night stand on his side of the bed. He took two cigarettes from the packet there, lit them both, and tucked one between her lips.

“Tell me about it,” he said, and waited.

The silence in the darkened room grew. Isabela smoked silently; the smoke rose in wavering trails, drifting idly across the angled shaft of moonlight. At last she reached out and brushed ash into the ashtray on her night stand, inhaled deeply, and crushed the cigarette out. She lay back on the bed.

“I wrote some letters,” she said, and stopped abruptly, as if she had already revealed too much.

Da Silva waited a moment and then asked quietly, “Love letters?”

She shrugged. “It doesn’t make any difference. He has them. I thought they’d all been destroyed a long time ago, but he has them.…”

“The man you wrote them to?”

“No, not him.”

“Who was the man you wrote them to?”

“It’s not important. He’s dead.”

“Then—”

“It was my brother-in-law,” she said suddenly. “I thought I was in love with him. I wrote letters. He’s dead, but my sister isn’t. The letters would hurt her, still. More, probably, now that Nilton is dead; it would scar her memories.”

“And who has these letters?”

“Him. The man on the telephone; he has them. I don’t know who he is. He called me that first time and said he had the letters, and he read some of them back to me to prove it, and he said I could get them back if I just did him a favor.” Her voice became bitter. “A little favor, he called it. He treated the whole thing lightly, as if it was just a joke. I asked him what he wanted and he said I was supposed to take this job as a manicurist in this barbershop; he said it would only be for a short time—a week at the most—and he said this man would come in and I was supposed to try and get him to pick me up. He said it wouldn’t be hard.…”

Silence fell again. “I imagine a lot of men tried to pick you up,” Da Silva said, more to fill the gap than for any other reason, and felt a touch of unreasoning jealousy at the thought. The brother-in-law at least was dead, but the others were alive. Her hand found his again and pressed it tightly, as if reading his mind and understanding.

“They did,” she said, “but this one had been described to me on the telephone, and his name was Valadares, and the barber, Armando, called him that. It all worked out just the way the man on the telephone said it would. He said if I did exactly what he told me to do, the man would go to Paraíso with me.…” She twisted her head in the darkness to look at him. “The same as you were supposed to do.”

“Why did he want the man to go to Paraíso?”

“He—the man on the telephone—said it was to pay Valadares back for something. He said Valadares was a criminal and deserved what he got, but he was laughing when he said it.…”

“And what happened?”

“We went up there on the late plane. I was supposed to take this Valadares out on an old road near the lake there, a sort of lover’s lane. To make sure I’d know the place he told me to go up there a week before and take a taxi and ask for the lover’s lane near the lake; I was supposed to keep my eyes open and remember the way. It wasn’t hard; but I thought it was certainly a lot of trouble to go to just for a joke.”

It certainly was, Da Silva thought. “And?”

“I was supposed to go there with him and I was supposed to let him think I wanted him to make love to me, and then when he thought I was ready to give in to him, I was supposed to get out of the car. He said there would be another car out of sight off the road that would take me back to the Airport Hotel; he said there would be a reservation there for me and I could catch the first plane back in the morning. He sent me the tickets in the mail.” Her fingers closed on his convulsively. “But when I got out of the car, there were two men there and they—shot him.…” She closed her eyes a moment and then opened them, as if the sight of Valadares dying lay behind the closed lids. Then she added, almost as an aside, “I found the letters in my mailbox when I got back. But he made Xerox copies and he still has them.…”

Da Silva frowned. “Did you believe the man when he gave you that story?”

“You mean about the letters? I had no choice.”

“I mean about playing a joke on this Valadares?”

Isabela shrugged. “I don’t know. I suppose I really didn’t, but I didn’t want to think about anything except getting the letters back. I didn’t think they’d kill him.” Her face started to crumple; she brought herself under control with an effort. She went on, as if the telling might be a catharsis to the memory she had lived with since that terrible night. “They shot him. They brought him out and gave him one minute to say his prayers, and this one man kept watching his wrist watch, counting the seconds, and then they shot him. And then they shot him again.…” She turned to Da Silva impulsively. “That’s what they wanted to do to you.”

Da Silva stared down at her, thinking. “How did they know you’d be there, and when?”

“I called a number they gave me from the Miracopa before we left and told them the flight we were taking.”

“I see.” Da Silva frowned. Whoever was running the show was certainly going to a lot of trouble and unnecessary complicated maneuvers to kill his victims. For the first time, his faith in his death squad theory began to waver; even a national organization devoted to killing criminals would scarcely invent a charade of this nature to get a man to a certain town just to kill him; it was easy enough to kill a man in any city or town in the country without all this senseless complexity. Still, if it wasn’t a death squad, what was it? What else made sense?

“Isabela,” he said, “do you know—or did you know—a man named Torres? Manuel Torres? Or Valdir Limeira? Or Leopoldo Bethencourt? Or George Chaney?”

“No. Why?”

“Nothing,” Da Silva said, and went back to considering what the girl had told him. He tried to fit Isabela’s experience into a pattern that made sense, but the story was more or less what they had already assumed. Each person was brought to Paraíso by a different means, although Isabela had been used in two. He knew, at least, her motivation for leading Valadares to Paraíso, and he knew Wilson’s story of what had brought Chaney there; what was still damnably missing was the motivation of the man who had sent Isabela.

“One question,” he said suddenly. “Why Paraíso? Why did your man on the telephone want Valadares brought there? Did he say?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I asked him that question once and he just said ‘Why not Paraíso?’” The import of their discussion returned to her; her voice became almost frantic. “Where will you go? Where he won’t be able to find you.”

“Go?” Da Silva stared down at her. For a moment he had forgotten he was Jose Maria Carvalho, Criminal Stealer from Docks. “What would happen to you if we don’t appear in Paraíso on schedule?”

She stared at him. “I don’t care.”

“What about the letters? Or your sister?”

“I don’t care. They’re not important any more.”

He smiled at her. “They’re still important, but thanks for the sentiment.” He dropped back onto his pillow, thinking. The proper procedure would be to contact Ruy or Perreira—or even the Minister—and arrange sufficient men to surround that lover’s lane. Except that one slip and their quarry would be long gone. No; the best way was the simplest way, to do it alone. He turned to face the girl. “I know we have all day tomorrow to have fun, but we still ought to get some rest. I have to build up my courage for that flight tomorrow night, remember.”

She returned his look, a slightly puzzled frown on her face. “What flight tomorrow night?”

“To Paraíso, of course. I don’t like nasty people blackmailing my friends. Not to mention trying to kill me.”

She sat erect in bed, the sheet sliding from her body revealingly. “Zé! You’re not going to Paraíso. They will kill you, you know!”

“My sweet Isabela,” Da Silva said patiently. “People keep trying to kill me constantly. It’s a normal hazard of my trade. And usually,” he added, thinking about it, “I’m not forewarned. It’s a lot easier to kill a man who walks into a trap unsuspectingly, than it is a man who’s expecting somebody to try.” He leaned over and kissed her. “Now, go to sleep.”

“No! Zé, I don’t want you to go.” A better argument came to her. “I won’t go with you. You’ll get yourself killed for nothing. He’ll still have my letters.”

“I wish you’d stop chattering,” Da Silva said with a smile. “You’re as bad as a wife.”

“Zé—”

“Go to sleep, darling.”

She lay back and then suddenly turned to him, putting her arms about him convulsively, almost fiercely, drawing him close and holding him tightly, molding her body to his.

“If we go tomorrow, I don’t want to go to sleep yet.…”

Da Silva came from sleep instantly, some sixth sense telling him there was an intruder in the apartment. At his side he could hear even breathing as Isabela slept. He opened his eyes a crack, listening intently, and then opened them further; the sound that had brought him from sleep was not in the room. He came to one elbow, listening carefully.

It came again, the sound of someone brushing against furniture, the faint sliding of shoe leather over the smooth wood floors. He judged the sound to be coming from the living room at the far end of the hallway. Da Silva frowned. Could it be that the assassins, disappointed at his failure to appear at Paraíso that evening as per the original schedule, had decided not to wait but to do away with him here in Sao Paulo? If so, his beautiful theory went down the drain, and if he wasn’t extremely careful, he could well go down the drain with it.

He swung from the bed, thankful—not for the first time that night—that the Correio de Manha, whatever their other parsimonious habits, did not stint where bedsprings were concerned. He slid his revolver from the night-stand drawer beside him, happy that the habit of keeping his weapon close to him followed him when he traveled. He moved stealthily toward the open doorway of the bedroom, his feet cool on the smooth wood. Suddenly he paused. It occurred to him that no man was quite as weaponless as one without pants; despite the seriousness of the situation, the picture of himself, armed but nude, brought a quirk to his grim lips. His jacket and top coat were in the front closet adjoining the room in which the intruder seemed to be, but fortunately his trousers, like his gun, were kept at his side. He retrieved them from their resting place on a chair, slid into them, and now, fully armed, edged from the room into the hallway, silently closing the bedroom door behind him.

The hall, lacking the benefit of windows or moonlight, was as black as the inside of a mine; he edged along it, his revolver at the ready, one hand brushing the wall, searching for the entrance to the living room. The sounds of the intruder increased slightly in volume; whoever he was, he seemed to be dragging something. Da Silva’s eyes narrowed as the many possibilities connected with that slithering sound came to him; his fingers encountered a light switch and then, inches beyond, the edge of the living room wall. The decision was made in an instant; he drew back his fingers until they encountered the switch once again. He pressed himself tightly against the wall, raised his weapon, and flipped up the switch.

Wilson, dragging a suitcase from the closet, blinked in the sudden brilliance. He straightened up, blinked again several times to get accustomed to the brilliance, and then considered Da Silva critically.

“Do you always sleep with lipstick?”

Da Silva took a deep breath. “One of these days, Wilson,” he said ominously, “you’re going to get shot breaking into houses. And what the devil are you doing here, anyway?”

Wilson looked hurt. “You didn’t expect me to leave Sao Paulo without my things, did you? I certainly couldn’t depend on you to bring them back to Rio. You might sell them to somebody on the docks, and I’d be out my favorite pajamas.” The thought brought to mind another thought. “I didn’t put on the light because I didn’t want to disturb you.” He glanced toward the bedroom. “I didn’t disturb you, did I?”

“No. But don’t be disappointed,” Da Silva said. “Instead you damn near scared me to death.” He tucked his revolver into the waistband of his trousers. “So you got your things. So good night.”

“I did disturb you,” Wilson said sadly. He sighed and moved to the outer door. “I’m sorry.”

Da Silva grinned. “You’re not sorry. You’re just jealous.”

“Jealous?” Wilson looked serious. “About some things, maybe. But not about your going to Paraíso tomorrow. I’m not jealous of your judgment.…” He shut the door behind him.