by Robert Moss
“Then you’ll have a lot to talk about to Alcibiades. He’s one of Brazil’s leading naturalists.”
He said this straight-faced, and Bailey was pleased to note, once again, that the younger man was quick. He had confided in Harry, to a degree, after the affair in Lisbon, without specifying either the exact nature of his employment or the reason he had come to Rio. He was confident that Maitland would do nothing to cause an embarrassment.
6
Doctor Alcibiades’ house was a red-tiled villa in Flamengo, about equidistant from the British embassy and the presidential palace. They drove there in the open car Harry called the Beast. It was a Hispano-Suiza touring car. When Harry had to brake for a streetcar, there was a low growl from under the hood, as if the Beast were trying to slip the leash.
The streetcar was jammed. The conductor clambered over the passengers contending for space on the running board like a referee trying to pull apart a rugby scrum.
“See the tram?” Maitland said to Bailey. “The trams give you the key to what Rio society is like. Everybody uses them, even the millionaire who built your hotel. So naturally, they reflect every nuance of the class structure. On the first-class trams, a male passenger is admitted only if he is wearing a jacket and tie — preferably, of course, a linen suit worn only once before it is laundered and pressed and perhaps a boater. A man of humble means will give up his seat on the tram to a man of a higher station, regardless of age. The English colony over in Niteroi has its own tram. Naturally, Brazilians — your old-style Englishman still calls them Portuguese — are not allowed on, any more than they are admitted to the British Club.”
The streetcar jangled past, and the Beast leaped over the intersection.
“By and large,” Bailey observed, “the great talent of the English abroad is for not going native.”
They were received at Doctor Alcibiades’ house by a black butler with enough fruit salad on his splendid white uniform to equip an admiral. The party spilled out of the house, across a wide terrace and gardens bordered with bougainvillea. All the Brazilians seemed to be drinking scotch whisky. Their host was sleekly handsome. His shin-ing black hair capped his skull like moleskin. He had the longest eyelashes Bailey had ever seen on a man.
Maitland squired Bailey around the terrace, making introductions — a newspaper publisher, a popular artist, a very anglicized Canadian with a monocle who had something to do with the power company. Bailey’s eye fell on a woman who was by herself in a circle of men. She was dressed conservatively in comparison to the other beauties at the party, who were flaunting the most daring of the Paris fashions. Her jewels were discreet. Her dress was basic black, and the neckline was high, though it failed to conceal the boldness of her figure.
Bailey thought she looked the way Emma Bovary ought to have looked, just after the fall.
“She’s quite a knockout, isn’t she?” Maitland murmured, following Harry’s glance. “She’s the publisher’s mistress. I believe her name is Ariana. I expect her presence is causing quite a stir. All the wealthy Brazilians keep mistresses, but they’re not supposed to show them at affairs like this.”
Bailey noted that a very fair-skinned woman in red presumably the wife of one of Ariana’s admirers — kept glaring menacingly in her direction. A small, lively figure detached itself from the circle around the woman in black.
“Good evening, Harry,” he greeted Maitland. “Do you suppose Rio Light could arrange a blackout tonight? It might spare some of our friends the wrath of their wives.”
“I wonder if that’s all that would happen. Colin, I am honoured to present Colonel Plinio Nogueira. Colonel Plinio is the man who makes it possible for us to sleep safe in our beds.”
“Or someone else’s,” the colonel said pleasantly.
Colin Bailey inspected him more closely. Plinio was immaculately turned out in a dark, tailored suit whose quality was discreetly advertised by the fact that the last button on each cuff was left unfastened. The arch of the eyebrows and the silky moustache curling up slightly at either end suggested a capacity for humour. His high colour indicated not only a pleasing variety of ancestors but that — in one of the biblical tags he liked to recall from his Catholic education — the colonel had looked at the wine-cup when it was red.
“Colonel Plinio is the chief of the Department of Political and Social Order,” Harry explained.
The colonel clicked his heels and made a little bow. “You are also English, Mr. Bailey?”
“Very much so, I’m afraid.”
“I have always liked the English,” Colonel Plinio announced. “Even if they do not invite us to their club. I was in London some years ago, and I visited a haberdashery on Savile Row. I have a penchant for ties, you know. It is one of my serious vices.”
Bailey examined his neckwear, a burgundy silk foulard with a subdued equestrian pattern.
“I had selected half a dozen ties — my collection fills a whole wardrobe — and when the time came to pay the bill, I found, to my embarrassment, that I had no money on me. The sales attendant, one of that superior breed that can pass for housemasters at Eton, was perfectly charming. He asked if I had some means of identification. I had not so much as a visiting card. You see, I had changed my clothes and left my hotel in rather a hurry to keep a rendezvous — a somewhat delicate story I mustn’t bore you with here. I told the attendant that I would return to collect the ties later. Still unperturbed, he said, ‘That’s perfectly all right, sir. May I examine the label in your suit?’ I was too astonished to refuse.
“Can you guess what happened? The attendant glanced at the label on my inside breast pocket. Fortunately, it was the label of a well-known tailor, also on Savile Row. The attendant said, ‘That will do admirably, sir.’ They wrapped up my purchases and let me walk out with them, just like that.”
“A man with the right tailor could never belong to the criminal classes,” Bailey remarked.
“There it is!” Colonel Plinio exclaimed in triumph. “The quintessence of English social philosophy. To the Raj!”
“I see that your Colonel Plinio is something of a humourist,” Bailey remarked to Maitland after the policeman moved on. “And something of a ladies’ man to boot,” he added, noting that Plinio had returned to the assault on the tantalizing woman in black.
“I’m rather surprised to find him here,” Maitland observed. “His chief and Doctor Alcibiades can’t stand each other.”
“And what are Plinio’s relations with his chief?”
“Ambiguous. Like Plinio’s relations with most people.”
“I see that you’ve brought me into the middle of some intrigue.”
“I thought it might be the kind of entertainment that agreed with you.”
Bailey’s eyes twinkled. He was sure now he was going to enjoy Brazil.
“What can you tell me about Plinio’s chief?”
“Well, of course Plinio heads the political police. Filinto Muller, the chief of police for the federal district, is his boss.”
“Milner? Is he German?”
“Of German descent. There’s quite a large German community here. I’m sure the German embassy must be cultivating Milner. So are the Greenshirts, our local storm troopers. They turned out an honour guard to help him celebrate his birthday. But Mailer is an ambiguous character, too. He was one of the tenentes, the revolutionary lieutenants. He even marched with the Prestes Column, though when he bailed out they started calling him a coward and a traitor. Things are never black and white in Brazil.”
Bailey nodded, surveying the two or three brown faces among the guests.
“You seem to be remarkably well informed,” he told Maitland.
“Well, it’s a small society here. Much like anywhere else, I expect. If you can sit a horse properly, you’re already halfway there.”
Dinner included some of the heady delicacies of Bahia — vatapci, acaraje — washed down with Chilean wines. The wife of the Canadian monocle was seated on Bailey’s
left. She was called Stella, and she talked about life with a robust vulgarity that didn’t go with her husband’s aroma of mothballs.
“Oh, there’s no colour problem in Brazil,” she announced, in response to a question. She leaned closer and whispered in Bailey’s ear, “Because the Portuguese will do it with anything on two legs.” Then, in a more normal voice, “You don’t see many blacks here, of course. You won’t see them in the Jockey Club enclosure either. But the Brazilians don’t exclude people because they’re black. They exclude them because they’re poor. If you’ve got money, you’re as white as alabaster, whatever your grannie happened to be.”
A band played tangoes on the terrace after dinner. When the band paused after its first set, Bailey could hear the drums talking again from the hillsides. Doctor Alcibiades made the round of his guests, puffing on his cigar.
“I am told you are something of a naturalist, Mister Bailey,” the mayor addressed him.
“Just an amateur.”
“I’m sure you’re too modest. Would it amuse you to see my collection?”
“I’d be delighted. Does it have any special focus?”
“Oh, yes.” Alcibiades smiled. “I am especially interested in reptiles.” His liquid brown eyes shifted to Colonel Plinio. “Perhaps this might amuse you, too, my dear Colonel?”
“I wouldn’t miss it for anything.”
Doctor Alcibiades led them down a dimly lit corridor that made a right angle bend and along a covered walk smelling of palm oil, where servant boys were sleeping in hammocks. Bailey calculated that the villa must contain at least thirty rooms.
A guard dog rushed out of the shadows, teeth bared, pawing at the air when it reached the end of its tether. A man rose out of the darkness behind it with a rifle under his arm. He spoke to the dog, and it lay down.
“I see you are well protected, Doctor,” Bailey remarked to his host.
“More than is necessary, I think. We Brazilians are a pacifistic people. But my friends in the police insist.”
They came to a large greenhouse, and Alcibiades un-locked the door with a key that was fastened to his watch fob. Bailey noticed that some kind of talisman was also attached, a small gold fist with the tip of the thumb pushing up between the index and middle fingers.
The mayor turned on the lights, and Bailey saw that both sides of the greenhouse were occupied by large glass cases with wooden hutches and miniature rock gardens inside. In one of the nearer cases, a jet-black reptile advanced on the glass in a series of sudden, whiplike movements and raised up, flicking its tongue. The thing was as long as Bailey.
Doctor Alcibiades picked up an odd implement — a pole with a piece of thick, bent wire on the end, like one tine of a fork — unlatched the case, caught the black snake under its middle, and tossed it straight at Harry Maitland.
“Just hold that for a minute, will you?”
Bailey looked round for something heavy and picked up a rock. Colonel Plinio, who had been hovering at Maitland’s right elbow, staged a lightning retreat. He was now by the door, clutching a Smith & Wesson. Harry had managed to catch the heavy, squirming reptile. Its tail thwacked against his thigh. Sweating lightly, he maneuverer till he had a hand round its neck, just below the head. Its jaws opened and closed. It was as cold as a tombstone.
Doctor Alcibiades surveyed the disruption he had caused and burst out laughing.
“I see you really are a novice, Mister Bailey. Otherwise you would have been able to reassure our young friend Harry. That little beauty is a mussurama, a cousin of the North American king snake. He’s harmless to men. He even enjoys human company. Here, put him on the table.”
Harry dropped the snake onto a surface the size of a billiard table, with a slightly curved, glassy rim.
“Snakes are highly specialized,” Alcibiades went on. “Especially in their eating habits. There are some that live exclusively on birds, others on frogs or lizards or even spiders. A very few species are cannibals. This fellow is one of them. He dines exclusively on his fellow snakes. In your honour, gentlemen, I will provide a demonstration.”
He opened another of the glass cases and fished around with his hook among a pile of rocks and dead branches. A smaller snake lunged out of its hiding place towards the open door. Alcibiades caught it at the last instant, pinned its head and dropped it on to the table at the opposite end from the mussurama.
It reared up, threw back its pointed head, and opened its jaw to reveal huge fangs dripping with yellow venom.
“The ace of spades, to perfection,” Bailey said. “She’s a pit viper, isn’t she?”
“Very good, Mr. Bailey. We call her a jararaca. She is related to the fer-de-lance. Men can sometimes survive her bite for many hours, even a whole day. But not pleasurably. Now watch, please.”
The bigger snake was not intimidated by the viper’s display. It rippled gently across the table, till it was brushing the viper’s side, as if seeking to make friends. For a moment the viper was perfectly still. Then it struck with such speed that it was merely a blur before Bailey’s eyes, until he saw its fangs drive deep into the back of the larger snake.
The mussurama seemed utterly oblivious to what had just happened. In a slower but decisive movement, it rounded on its assailant, prisoning the viper’s lower jaw inside its mouth. It swung the viper aloft, then brought its body slamming down against the hard surface. After several minutes, the viper seemed to have been thrashed into insensibility.
The bigger snake opened its jaws to their fullest extent. In a series of prodigious gulps, it began to swallow its victim whole.
When its meal was over, its body was unevenly distended, like a string of sausages.
Alcibiades contemplated his cannibal snake with proprietorial affection.
“Doesn’t that remind you of our distinguished colonel of police?” the doctor addressed his English guests. “Courtly, a friend to all mankind — and especially, to all womankind — and yet capable of consuming any of us. My dear Plinio. I do hope I haven’t offended you.”
“On the contrary. I am flattered, of course.” Plinio rose to the occasion with a smile and a little bow. “But, being a simple policeman, I lack the subtlety to grasp your analogy completely. If I am not mistaken, this little pet of yours — the mussurama — devours only snakes that are dangerous to other species, such as man.”
“That is so.”
“Then tell me, my good Alcibiades—” Plinio patted the cold skin of the mussurama, stretched taut over the undigested body of its victim “—would you compare yourself to this useful animal — or his supper?”
7
Johnny’s Rio was very different from the city of lights that Harry Maitland was showing off to Colin Bailey.
At the hour when the R.M.S. Arthurian was steaming into the Bay of Guanabara, Johnny was at a deserted beach, hidden in a fork of the mountains a few miles west along the coast. He was teaching four skinny Brazilian boys, and a skinnier Basque who was old enough to be their father, how to make bombs.
The scene looked more like a cooking lesson. Each man had an empty jam tin and a supply of phosphorus and other chemicals.
Johnny’s simplest instructions took time to convey. His Portuguese was still rudimentary, although he had been going twice a week to the home of a language teacher on a shady street in Botafogo. The man was a positivist who made Johnny practice excerpts from the writings of the master, Auguste Comte. This was less than adequate for explaining street fighting tactics or the handling of explosives.
Vasco, the Spaniard, knew some English. So Johnny would call out orders to him, and he would translate for the others.
“The proportions must be exact,” Johnny lectured. “Once you have prepared the bomb—”
“Las proporciones deberan ser exactas.” Vasco piped across him. In his excitement, he was using his native Spanish instead of Portuguese.
“—don’t sit around twiddling your thumbs. Lose it fast. It’s like a grenade without a pin, so don
’t go knocking it over by accident. The mixture will detonate on impact. Does everybody understand?”
After the pause for translation, the response was five sets of grinning teeth.
“All right. Go to it!”
Johnny walked up and down the white sand, watching them. They were one of the cells selected for special training by Nilo, the party organizer in Rio. Two of them had been in the army, though you wouldn’t guess it from the way they handled explosives. At the end of Johnny’s week-long course — which ranged from the Leninist theory of imperialism to secret communications and homemade bombs — each man was supposed to be ready to teach others.
It was going to take a damn sight longer than a week, Johnny thought. Still, he could not fault their enthusiasm, even if it was slightly unorthodox. In the midst of one of his minitutorials on scientific Marxism-Leninism, the Spaniard — a painter and a former anarchist — had gotten carried away and started spouting Bakunin. “I suffer because I am a man and wish to be a god!” Vasco quoted with trembling passion. The Brazilians had applauded, not knowing exactly who Bakunin was. The Brazilians seemed to have been nurtured on Les Misérables rather than Das Kapital. Some of their notions came from even less scientific places. Zé Sampaio, the slim mulatto at the end of the beach, had brought Johnny photographs of his friends. Johnny was surprised to learn that all of them were dead. “They are my spirit friends,” Zé amplified. “They visit me every week.”
Johnny found that all of this made it easier for him to play the role of ideological mentor.
I teach them one mythology, he told himself, and they blend it into their own, the way the Roman army borrowed Mithra from the East.
There were moments when he actually enjoyed himself. He noticed that Vasco was shovelling phosphorus into his jam tin.
“Go easy on that!” he called out to his interpreter.
Vasco nodded and grinned and threw in an extra scoop of saltpeter.
All of the bombs were ready. They were primitive devices, but they could be produced quickly, cheaply and in bulk, and Nilo claimed that in Rio alone there would be five thousand civilians willing to use them.