“Mind some company?” Bell asked as they neared.
“Isaac. Hello. Sit down, please.” He then noticed Marion and quickly wiped his mouth with a cloth napkin and sprang to his feet. “Ma’am.”
“Court, this is my wife, Marion. Marion, this is Court Talbot, expert on the Panamanian insurgency known as the Red Vipers.”
“Viboras Rojas,” Marion said.
Talbot said something in Spanish, and Marion replied in kind. They conversed for a moment more and ended with a little laughter.
“Your accent is more Madrid than Central America, Mrs. Bell, but you speak Spanish very well,” Talbot said as they all sat down.
A moment later, a waiter in a white jacket with a red sash around his waist poured coffee as black as ink into their cups. Marion added milk and some sugar while Bell drank the potent brew as is.
“We didn’t get a chance to see the Senator this morning,” Bell told Talbot. “How did it end up between you two?”
“He sent a telegram to Goethals right from the hotel and penned a more detailed letter for me to present to the Canal Administrator once I’m back in Panama. Hopefully, it will be enough to persuade him to let me and my men try to stop this thing before it gets out of hand.”
“That’s good,” Bell said.
Marion asked, “How is it you even have troops in Panama, Major Talbot?”
“Please call me Court, Mrs. Bell.”
“Of course, and I’m Marion.”
“It goes back to the founding of the Panamanian Republic and the people’s revolt against Colombia. There was talk of coups and counter-coups at the time. Everyone suspected everyone else’s loyalty. U.S. Marines were sent in. Sharpshooters arrived from Colombia. It was a chaotic and very precarious situation, and nobody knew how it would turn out. The first President of Panama was Manuel Amador Guerrero, a friend of mine who knew of my military background. He asked that I establish a small force loyal only to his office. Not him, mind you, but to the Office of the President. I was honored to do so, though we were never called to arms.
“Since then, I have kept regular contact with my men. We drill a few weekends each month for the fun of it. Really, it was more social than anything else. But when Viboras Rojas began to make their presence known, we knew we were in the best position to help. Panama has no army to speak of and can’t operate within the Canal Zone anyway while Colonel Goethals purposely keeps the number of American troops to a minimum so the local politicians don’t think they are militarizing the canal.”
“And you believe you and your men are enough?”
“I do currently, but if the insurgency isn’t crushed soon, it will attract more recruits, and then we’ll have a slow-boil war on America’s doorstep with the most ambitious project in human history caught in the cross fire.”
After breakfast, Marion excused herself and headed back to the cabin. Bell and Talbot moved off to one of the liner’s lounges. Talbot produced a well-used pack of playing cards, and he and Bell settled into the new, faster version of rummy, called gin.
After dealing the first hand and going through a couple pickups and discards, Talbot said, “If you don’t mind my asking, what are you hoping to accomplish in Panama?”
Bell grabbed the queen Talbot had put down. He now had all four and only needed either the four or seven of clubs. “I have no interest in tramping about in the jungle with you and your men, if that’s what you’re thinking. I guess I want to get a sense of the situation. There are aspects of the assassination attempt that bother me, and I believe the answers are in Panama.”
“‘Aspects’? What aspects?”
Bell pulled the seven. “Gin.”
“That was fast.”
“You dealt me three queens, so . . .” Bell scooped up the cards and began shuffling. “It’s too big of a leap for the Red Vipers being a small-scale indigenous insurgency to attempting an international assassination without some sort of outside influence.”
“I believe I mentioned they’re inspired by Lenin and his Bolsheviks.”
“Inspiration doesn’t explain it. There’s something else at play.”
“I hate to disagree, but if there was some international plot under way in Panama, the local police or the Authority’s security squad would have picked up on it.”
“I’m sure Panama City has a fine police force, and the Authority have plenty of capable guards, but I’m betting that neither has much in the way of investigators.”
“You’re barking up the wrong tree, Bell. The Red Vipers are a nest of snakes, but they are a local nest of snakes. I will grant you that they almost got lucky against Senator Densmore. Consider this, though. You alone held off and ultimately killed all six gunmen. You’re pretty good in a fight, but are you that good? Or were they in over their heads?”
Bell looked him in the eye. “They pulled off the first successful invasion of American territory since the War of 1812. That means something.”
With the exception of one eight-hour storm, the trip southward was pleasant. The food was decent enough, and staff were all first-rate. Marion found several ladies to socialize with during the day. Bell and Talbot spent a great deal of time together over countless hands of gin. And when the ship rounded the newly constructed breakwater at the Pacific terminus of the canal, they had developed a mutual respect, though both were too restrained to call it a friendship just yet.
Isaac and Marion got their first taste of Panama’s notorious rain while the ship was coming into its berth along a pier as busy as any they’d seen in New York City. Cranes were unloading massive
