They were in their room. Parker looked at his watch and said, “Five to eight.”
“Are you going to call?”
“You want me to do it,” he said.
She nodded. “Yes, I do.”
“We don’t need the money.”
“I know. But we will in six months, and what you’re offered in six months probably won’t be as good.”
He shook his head and walked around the room trying to think. “Good?” he said. “What do you mean, good? We don’t know whether it’s good or bad yet, we don’t know where the diamonds are, what the security is”
“You know what I mean,” she said.
“You think it’s a good cause,” he said.
“Yes.”
“I don’t do things for good causes.”
“I know,” she said. “So you do it because of the money, and I’ll be glad you’re doing it because it’s a good cause.”
“I couldn’t say yes for sure at this point,” Parker said. “All I could say is I’d look at it.”
“I know. You have to be interested, too; it’s never just the money.”
He knew she was wrong about that, that at times he’d gone into jobs for the money and nothing else, but it was true that it helped to have work he could take an interest in. And it would be interesting to plan a job for amateurs, to take the specifics of the situation and make them work in his favor. The part of him that took pleasure in professionalism, in craft, was already half involved in this project, anxious to find out the rest of the details.
But there were things against it too. They wereamateurs, no matter how tough or how willing. And they hadspread the news around a little too much, so that the job was complicated with Hoskins and General Goma and the ex-colonists and who knew how many others.
There was a silence as he paced, thinking about it, until Claire said, “And I’d like to come along.”
He stopped and frowned at her. “What do you mean, come along?”
“It’s in New York, isn’t it? That’s where you’ll have to be while they’re getting ready.”
“You don’t want to be part of it.”
“No. But we could live together during it. It wouldn’t be like the times when you’re doing it yourself.”
“I might have to,” he said.
Sharply she said, “Why? That isn’t what they want to hire you for.”
“It might be necessary, it might not.”
“What, lead your troops into battle? All they want is a teacher and a planner.”
“I’m telling you it’s a possibility.”
She bit her lip, hesitated, then made a half-angry shrug of dismissal. “All right. Even so.”
“I wouldn’t want you part of it,” he said. “Not present during the meetings, not anything.”
“Neither would I,” she said. “But we could be together in between times.” She smiled, saying, “Besides, my shopping trip was interrupted. It’ll give me something to do.”
Parker walked over to the window. The hotel’s shadow stretched across the sea, and the sky at the far horizon was already black with night. Behind him, Claire said, “It’s eight o’clock.”
“I know.”
39
“You want me to look up their number?”
What could he lose? He’d look at their situation. “Sunrise Motel,” he said.
Two
1
“Come in,” said Gonor. “This way.”
Parker followed him through the apartment. The furnishings were new, discreet, anonymous and expensive, with all the earmarks of things purchased by a hired decorator at stores with the notice in their windows: TO THE TRADE ONLY. As they went through, on one wall Parker saw a rough-textured painting of Negro dancers in front of some kind of yellowish hut, and on another wall there was a carved ebony mask, but aside from these there was no indication that the occupants of this apartment were Africans or had ever heard of Africa, so that finally the painting and the mask blended in with the rest, looking like just two more items that had caught the decorator’s eye.
The sitting-room they wound up in was done in quiet shades of green and gray and had windows overlooking Fifth Avenue and Central Park. Formutesca and the third man from Miami were sitting on the green sofa to the right. An older man, very black and with thick white hair, was standing at the window looking thoughtfully at the park as though seeing something else. He and Gonor were in Western dress, Formutesca and the other man in the red robes of their first meeting.
Gonor said, speaking to the older man, “This is Parker.”
The older man turned his head and studied Parker tiredly and suspiciously. His manner was that of a sage that people don’t come to any more.
