'No!' Fletcher screamed-the absolute top volume of his voice.
Then Devereaux's.44 detonated in the doorway.
The astonished woman literally flew against the red velvet wall, the brass headrails of her bed. She gave out one small groan, and her green eyes rolled back. Then Betsy Port-Smithe -slowly slid down to the floor.
Young Fletcher frowned and shook his head.
'No questions. No answers.' The ambitious agent kicked over an end table. ' Shit. Shit, Devereaux Devereaux shrugged. He sniffed the air. A funny combination of Joy perfume and smoky cordite.
The deputy threw open a window on Rock Creek Park, then stood there going through the woman's suede pockethook. Inside he found letters from a man named Damian; he found cards and papers that identified Carrie Rose.... Inside the night table drawer he found a small.38 revolver.
'Better call them.' Devereaux'smiled. 'Tell them they can stop worrying about this shitty bastard Mrs. Rose. No scandals in the White House for today. '
Like Harold Hill, fifty-six-year-old John Devereaux was thinking that he was a hero, too. They'd told him not to bring her back alive.
The Season of the Machete was finally over.
EPILOGUE
The Summer Season
CHAPTERTWENTY-NINE
I am Superwoman... SuperRat... Superscuz... Damian trained me so that I was capable of anything-then he let me do nothing. Stagnate. He would have never even let me sell my diary. When his own obsessions became impossible-a liability to both of us-I had to kill him. No choice in the matter. Had to... now I'm all alone at the top of the heap. The first Public Enemy on the loose in decades.... My prices start at $1,000,000, and I'm worth it. I'm like a Paris original, a one-of-a-kind operation. Hiring me is like being able to hire Manson, Speck, Himmier, Bormann... I'll do anything you can think of, and I'll think of things you wouldn't. The Season of the Machete was a preamble-as primitive as its name. It was just a beginning. The Tool Age of violence and disruption... now comes the interesting part. We're just entering the Machine Age, I believe.
The Rose Diary
June 13, 1979; Coastown, San Dominica
Feeling like a national hero, Prime Minister Joseph Walthey paraded through large, enthusiastic crowds in Coastown's Horseshoe Beach District.
Paid admirers-civil servants, especially-circled him like birds. they patted his cream suede suit jacket, reached out for his curly, slicked-down hair, reached to touch his round, black Santa Claus face.
Thirty-five-nfillimeter news footage was shot for special release to San Dominica's thirteen movie theaters. Hundreds of publicity photographs were taken for the world's newspapers.
At a high, colorful dais built over the boardwalk, over the shimmering Caribbean, Walthey announced that an era of new prosperity was dawning for San Dominica. The smiling, affable prime minister didn't elaborate, however.
July 14, 1979; Coastown, San Dominica
In a special session of the San Dominican Assembly, Prime Minister Joseph Walthey was named president for life on the island. He made a long speech about nationalism, the economy, and tourism on San Dominica: he lied at length.
October 1, 1979; Turtle Bay, San Dominica
The first casino to open on San Dominica was in the Playboy Club-not five miles from the Plantation Inn.
The grand opening was marred by minor student demonstrations. Black boys and girls waved a psychedelic poster of Dassie Dred that was making the rounds at the University of the West Indies and other schools throughout Central and South America. they played loud reggae and soul music, and some cars and walls at the Playboy were spraypainted DRED! The students waved signs that read
JOE IS THE BLACK HITLER.
March 3, 1980; Zurich, Switzerland
Nearly ten months after Damian's death, on the afternoon of March 3, 1980; 4.5 million Swiss francs were deposited in the numbered account of Mrs. Susan Chaplin in the Schweizer Kreditverein in Zurich. The money represented nearly $2 million from the diary sale.
Curiously, three days after her withdrawal of $600,000 (American) in May of 1979 (a Damianstyle safeguard-what if he had eluded Hill at the Tryall Club?), the woman had redeposited her money in a new account.
Filling out the necessary tax forms for the 1980 deposit,,S. 0. Rogin found himself thinking once again of Mrs. Chaplin in terms of the actress Faye Dunaway. So many actors and actresses, the redfaced munchkin thought. All the world a stage for these Americans.
May 9, 198 1; Paris
Peter Macdonald had begun to wear the swne Harris Tweed jacket every day, the same green crew-neck sweater. His brown hair fell down over his white shirt collars now, and he had a thick, bushy mustache.
Each morning from ten to eleven he sat in the same St.-Germain-des-Pr6s cafes-Fiore, Deux Magots, occasionally Brasserie Lipp. He always drank cafe au lait, read the International HeraldTribune, watched the pretty women like any other
American in Paris. Occasionally he even read the obscene, arrogant diary.
