John and Dieter looked at each other.
'Don't sell my mother short, Dieter,' John said. 'She knows a lot about this end
of things. She kept us both alive and out of jail… well, mostly out of jail… for a long time.'
Von Rossbach nodded. 'I know she has her own resources, John.' He smiled.
'This is going to be a learning experience for me.'
'Not too painful, I hope,' John said with a grin.
Dieter smiled slowly. 'I think that will depend on your mother.'
BRAZIL, ON THE ROAD: THE PRESENT
It was exhausting—over twelve hundred miles over some very rough road to Sao Paulo, without stopping for anything but bathroom breaks and an occasional meal. Sarah insisted that they push themselves. As far as she was concerned they were already playing catch-up.
They could see the smudge of polluted air that announced the city's presence from miles away across the pastures and coffee fields. Sao Paulo was an enormous city, bigger than New York, in fact, with a dirty collar of poverty around its outer edge. But when they saw its towers rising above the horizon they couldn't help but smile.
Once they entered the bustling city they searched for a mid-price hotel with parking and crashed for twelve hours straight.
Next day they shopped for business-type clothing and resort wear— nothing they would ordinarily put on— and went to visit an old acquaintance of Dieter's in the older section of town. Quiet low-slung buildings in the pastels and wrought iron
that Brazilians had used to announce prosperity in the balmy days of the first coffee boom a hundred and twenty years ago.
'Gilberto,' Dieter said, when a maid had shown them into a room dim and cluttered and cool, 'meet my friends Suzanne and John. John, Suzanne, this is Gilberto Salbidrez, one of the best forgers in South America.'
'You're too kind,' Gilberto said, smiling around his cigarette. He was almost von Rossbach's height, but rail thin and wrinkled beyond his sixty years. 'Come in, sit down, tell me what you need.'
'What makes you think we need something?' Dieter asked, grinning.
'
Sarah grinned at Dieter's well-hidden surprise.
'Hello, Senor Salbidrez,' she said, holding out her hand.
'You come with a friend,' he said. Taking her hand, he leaned over and kissed her cheek. 'You can call me Gilberto.' He turned back to von Rossbach. 'So?'
'We need passports that will get us into the United States, and health certificates that say we've had all our shots—'
'And you want them the day before yesterday,' Gilberto said with a weary wave
of one tobacco-stained hand. 'So, are you a family?'
'Better not,' Sarah said. 'We might need the flexibility of being strangers or business partners.'
Salbidrez tugged down the corners of his mouth and shrugged. 'Up to mischief, then,' he said. 'Okay, let's get started. I can have them for you in twenty-four hours.'
'Good,' von Rossbach said. 'I also need someplace safe to stow my car.'
Gilberto grimaced.
'Okay. I have a friend who owns a parking garage. He'll let you park it there and it will be safe.' He looked up at Dieter. 'But it will cost you,' he warned.
Dieter snorted. 'Everything costs,' he said. 'How much?'
'For my friend,' Salbidrez shrugged, 'Say a thousand a month. For me,' he gave von Rossbach a straight look, 'I want ten thousand each for the passports.' He looked thoughtful for a moment. 'Two thousand for the health certificates.'
'A thousand for the health certificates,' Dieter countered. 'We're buying three so you'll give an old friend a discount?' Gilberto made a pained face. 'Besides, I happen to know an old friend gave you a lifetime supply of blank ones, so all you have to do is fill in the spaces.'
The forger grinned and laughed until he coughed.
'What about my starving children?' he asked.
'I'll give you five thousand for the passports if they're Canadian,' von Rossbach said. 'And if your children are starving you should give up cane-brandy and cigarettes so you can feed them.'
Gilberto chuckled, careful not to set himself coughing again.
'Five thousand isn't enough for Canadian,' he said. 'They're very expensive.
Canadian is very hard to get. Very easy to use. Canada is respectable.'
'That's why we came to you,' Sarah said.
He smiled. 'Well, I am the best,' he said modestly. 'And you want them fast, which means my other clients must wait… Seventy-five hundred is more in line with what a Canadian passport costs.'
Dead silence met that remark and Salbidrez's eyes shifted rapidly between his three visitors. The moment stretched.
'Fifty five hundred, you said,' Sarah said at last.
Gilberto winced. 'You are robbing an old man,' he said.
'If you weren't an old man,' Dieter rumbled, 'I might be insulted at how you want to rob me.'
The forger took the cigarette out of his mouth and stubbed it out. 'And this is a one-off job,' he went on.
'You'd give a lower rate if it were six sets?' Dieter asked.
'Of course—in that case, I could come down as low as thirty-five hundred. But as it is, six thousand for one set each for each of you.'
'Excellent. Two sets—thirty-five hundred each. Both Canadian, but completely different backup. Different dates, provinces, the whole thing.'
The old man gave a wheezing laugh. 'Ah, you want to switch once you are in the U.S.,' he said. 'So that your documents don't match the ones in the customs computers.'
'Yes,' Dieter said, conscious of thoughtful, respectful looks from John… and Sarah. 'And you are a pirate.'
'A man must try,' he said and gave them all an impish grin. 'So, who's first?'
'Let's go out,' Dieter suggested as they stood outside Gilberto's workshop.
'Paint the town red.'
Sarah just looked at him. 'Are you crazy?' she asked. 'Under the circumstances…'
'The circumstances are the best reason I can think of for going a little crazy,'
von Rossbach said taking her arm and walked her down the street. 'We may never get another chance to do this.' He looked down at her. 'I'm not suggesting that we shoot off guns in a public park, Sarah.'
'What about John?' she said, glancing behind her at her son.
'He's eighteen,' Dieter said with a shrug. 'Or will be when his passport is ready.' He looked over his shoulder and caught John's quick grin. 'It's time he had a blowout night. We'll get a really good meal, then we'll go clubbing. How's that sound, John?'
'Cool!' the hope of the human race replied. 'Like the man says, Mom, we may never get another chance.'
BOGOTA, COLOMBIA: THE PRESENT
It had been a long flight to Bogota and they stumbled off the plane with swollen ankles and numb butts. All they'd brought with them was carry-on luggage with a few changes of underwear and a couple of changes of clothes apiece. The high-altitude air would have been cool and refreshing if Colombia's capital hadn't been in a mountain basin that trapped the diesel fumes that came with rapid growth and no public transport.
