Honey in His Mouth

El Presidente may seek sanctuary aboard her. He would be safest there. A mob might storm a church, or soldiers also. But a gunboat is diplomatically the home soil of its own nation, and no mob is going to tackle a gunboat, nor soldiers either.”

“Jesus! That is where he is now, then!” Doctor Englaster jerkily wiped his palms on a handkerchief. “Give me one of those drinks, Hassam. God, I need it. I was half drunk when I came over here, feeling something like this was going to fall on us.”

Mr. Hassam handed him one drink. “I suggest we get busy. I have a standby plane for an emergency, one I never use, and which nobody is aware I own.”

Doctor Englaster spilled some liquor on his chin. “How long do you think we have?”

Miss Muirz replied with the same unalterable calmness that was like an over-stretched still wire. “I doubt El Presidente can leave hiding in under two weeks. Particularly if he is aboard the Uruguayan gunboat, which I expect he is, it will require two weeks to unwind the diplomatic red tape surrounding such a thing.”

Mr. Hassam took a deep breath. “We may be able to get our plan in shape in two weeks.”

“I predict we have two weeks.” Miss Muirz’s breathing was very deep and regular. Too deep and regular, Mr. Hassam felt.

“God!” Doctor Englaster gulped down the last of his drink. “Why couldn’t the son of a bitch have waited a while to resign? He never did a decent thing for anybody in his whole life.”

SIXTEEN

On the morning of the third day after Mr. Hassam had departed in such haste for South America, Walter Harsh was awakened by someone banging on his bedroom door. The sun was not up and the room was in pale darkness. Harsh switched on the light and looked at the door to see if the two chairs he had wedged there were still in place. He had formed a habit of wedging chairs against the door when he retired in order to keep out anyone inclined to visit him while he was asleep, anyone who might be after the wall safe key. The knocking came from the door again. Harsh rolled out of bed, crossed silently to the wall safe, rested his cheek on the wall to get an eye as close to the surface as possible, and squinted to see if the match head was still in place between the oil painting and the wall. It was. The fist hammered the door. Harsh turned. “Who is it? What the hell, it’s the middle of the night!”

“It’s nearly daylight. Rise and shine, boy.” It was Mr. Hassam’s voice.

Harsh removed the chairs and opened the door. “Hiya, Hassam. You sure came back full of bubbles. Trip must have agreed with you.”

There were dark fatigue circles under Mr. Hassam’s eyes.

“You been running into a little trouble, Mr. Hassam?”

“Well, Harsh, we do not really know how serious it is. We cannot tell. But it is trouble, yes.”

“Is there anything I can do to help you out, Mr. Hassam?”

“Yes, there is, Harsh. You see, we do not have as much time as we thought we would have. I was wondering if you would mind helping speed it up?”

“I don’t mind anything reasonable. What did you have in mind?”

“If you will work very hard, Harsh, I can cram the necessary Spanish into you in a few days, I believe. Would you try it with me?”

“Sure, why not? Anything to break the monotony around here. You know it’s kind of dull, with Vera Sue down on me, the servants afraid to talk to me, and me afraid to talk to Brother.”

“I’m sure you can do it, Harsh.”

“Like I say, anything for a change. All I been able to find to do is sit on the beach and watch the airplanes go past overhead and the boats fool around on the ocean.”

Mr. Hassam glanced at his watch. “Let’s go down to breakfast. The morning news will be on the radio in a few minutes. I want you to listen to it with me.”

“Yeah? Something special on the radio?”

“There might be.”

They had breakfast on the dining terrace. It consisted of ham prepared with maple syrup and sausages so highly spiced they made Harsh’s tongue tingle. Mr. Hassam sent the servant for a radio and had it plugged in and placed on the table at his elbow. Mr. Hassam tuned in a station where the weather was on.

Harsh listened to the exaggerated version of the northern weather the Florida station was giving. Sleet, ice, snow, blizzards in New York, blizzards in Buffalo, worst cold wave of the year in Boston, St. Louis, and Los Angeles. Two deaths from freezing in Alturas, California.

“Hey, did you hear that, Hassam? In California—”

Mr. Hassam lifted a finger for silence.

The regular newscast had begun. They’d missed the beginning.

“—throughout South America today is one of tight lips and mystery, but there is no doubt of it, the most controversial political figure of the hemisphere has fallen. Known by his people as El Presidente, the dictator is believed to have fled for safety to a Uruguayan gunboat now at anchor in the harbor of the capitol he has ruled with an iron hand—many say a corrupt hand —for two decades. A provisionary government guided by a junta of the military has taken over. Censorship is limiting all news, but the pattern of events is clear. If El Presidente is on the gunboat, as rumor has it, his enemies will surely demand that he be turned over to them for trial. Representatives of the Uruguayan government have so far refused to comment on the matter, but if the history of close relations between the countries’ leaders is a guide, any demand to turn over the man under their protection will be refused. Predictions are that the gunboat will remain in harbor for as much as two weeks while diplomatic discussions are pursued, but sources say El Presidente is as safe within its bulkhead as he would be in a foreign country. As one former government official told us earlier this morning, ‘El Presidente has always been a man who could look after his own welfare.’ ”

Harsh watched Mr. Hassam take in a deep breath and let it out. “Well, Hassam? Is it bad news or good news?”

“If we could be sure he is on that gunboat, it would be just fair news.”

“He is on the gunboat, Mr. Hassam. The man just said he was.”

“He said it was rumored that he was. It does not mean a thing.”

“They sounded pretty certain to me.”

“Well, I do hope you are right.”

“Where do you think he might be, if he ain’t on the gunboat?”

“I wish I knew. Your guess would be as good as mine, Harsh. He is a clever devil, in spite of the mess he is in now. He might be anywhere, Switzerland, Spain, Panama. He might be right here in Florida keeping his eye on us.”

“Yeah? Watching us, huh? Why would he do that?”

“El Presidente has hidden a sizeable fortune in various foreign countries. We did the hiding for him, Harsh. We and El Presidente are the only ones who know where the money is. At a time like this, he might feel it well to watch us.”

“Yeah. I guess that’s what I would do if I was in his shoes, if I had been sucker enough to trust you people in the first place.”

Mr. Hassam smiled without much humor. “We spent years on it, Harsh. Building his confidence in us. Years, during which we never swindled him out of a cent.”

“I figured you had done something like that.”

“The reason I wanted you to hear the broadcast, Harsh, I wanted you to know we have no more than two weeks— if we even have that long.”

“Sure, I see that.”

“In no more than two weeks, you have to look, speak, think, act like El Presidente. You have to be him.”