navigator pointed to a house set back from the road up the street.
“That’s the house.”
“Shall we?” the driver asked.
The navigator climbed out of the van and walked around to the front and waited while the driver reached under the seat, removed a leather bag, then met him in front of the van.
“You notice almost no one here has a dog?” the driver said.
“Sometimes,” the navigator said, “you just get lucky.”
Both men were dressed in dark clothing that blended into the night. Their shoes were rubber soled and their hands covered by dark vinyl surgical gloves. They moved with the certain sense of unhurried purpose that comes with competence, not arrogance. Slipping unseen to the front wall surrounding the home, they paused for a second at the gate. The driver reached into his pocket, removed a pick, and a second later sprung the lock. He opened the gate, allowed the navigator to pass inside, then closed the gate behind them.
There was little need to talk. Both men had memorized the plan.
Walking around to the rear of the house, where it was dark, they disabled the security system, jimmied the lock, and then crept silently into the house. Pausing at the foot of the stairs, the driver flipped open a small black plastic box and slipped an earpiece into place. Pointing the device at the floor above, he listened for a moment.
Then he smiled and nodded at his partner.
Placing his hands together, he tilted his head and placed his hands alongside his cheek, using the universal hand signal for sleep. With one finger, he pointed to the far end of the floor in the left corner. With the other, he pointed a distance away to where another bedroom was located on the second floor. Then he pointed a fist toward the spot on the left side. Primary target there, secondary target there.
Doing a kind of curtsy, he spread his hands apart.
Then he unsnapped a pouch clipped to his belt and handed an eight-inch leather case to the navigator and smiled. Taking the case the navigator slowly began to climb the stairs. Several minutes passed as the driver stood silently on the landing.
Then he heard the voice of his partner.
“I don’t know about you,” the navigator said as he began to walk down the steps, “but I’m hungry.”
The driver removed his earpiece, stuffed the cord inside, then folded the case back together.
“Then let’s eat,” the driver said.
The navigator reached the landing and flicked on a tiny flashlight. “We can’t ask our hosts what’s good,” he said. “They’re in sleepyville.”
“And by the time they wake up,” the driver said, “we’ll be long gone.”
The two men made their way to the kitchen, but nothing looked good. So they walked back to the van, drove through town to the casino and ordered a meal of ham and eggs.
15
SUNRISE on Good Friday, March 25, 2005, was at 6:11 A.M.
On the decks of the sampans in the inner harbor, the Chinese traders began to stir. Along Avenida da Amizade in front of the Hotel Lisboa, a dozen women dressed in cotton shifts with conical hats lashed around their necks began washing the sidewalk with soapy water splashed from tin buckets. Dipping straw brooms into the buckets, they erased the debris from both the winners and the losers from the night before. A few diehards stumbled from inside and squinted at the light from a sun just beginning her day.
A few small three-wheeled motorized rickshaws plied the avenue, their drivers stopping for strong black coffee served in small cups, then continuing on to deliver packages or people to their destinations. At a small restaurant two hundred yards northwest of the casino, the owner finished a cigarette then walked inside. On the stove in the rear was a pot of
Across the water, Hong Kong was hidden by a haze of humidity and smog, but the sound of the first highspeed ferry leaving port could be heard. The first few jets of the day, mainly cargo planes, streaked across the blue sky and made ready for landing at the airport. A Chinese naval vessel left its moorage below A-Ma Temple and started out for a patrol, while a large luxury yacht with a helicopter perched on her fantail called on the radio for the location of her slip.
A lone cargo ship, decades past her prime, started into port to deliver a cargo of bicycles from Taiwan. On another cargo ship, this one appearing old and decrepit, a man with a blond crew cut was sitting at the table in his stateroom reading.
Juan Cabrillo had been awake for hours.
He was running every possible scenario through his head.
A light knock came at the door, and Cabrillo stood up and walked over and opened the hatch.
“Somehow I knew you’d be awake,” Hanley said.
Hanley held a tray of plates covered by metal lids, steam escaping from under them.
“Breakfast,” he said as he walked inside.
Cabrillo cleared a space on the table and Hanley off loaded the contents. Next he pulled the lid off a dinner sized plate and smiled.
