by Paul Kenyon
An organization, in fact, that masqueraded as an international modeling agency?
Hewitt harrumphed. He denied being connected with CIA or any of the other alphabetical agencies. She had misinterpreted the chores he had asked her to do. They were just ordinary favors for the State Department.
Penelope smiled sweetly and waited.
Hewitt harrumphed again. Even if he did work for the intelligence community, a proposal such as she had outlined was quite beyond his scope.
Penelope went on smiling.
Besides, Hewitt said, things like that simply were not done. To work for CIA or NSA, for example, you had to undergo strenuous periodic security checks, undergo special training, work within accepted organizational lines. Much of the U.S. intelligence establishment was under control of the military, under military discipline, in fact. There was a segment under civilian control, but it operated under specified review procedures…
Penelope said, "Cal, when John was alive, he once said, 'Everyone at the top of the pyramid knows everybody else at the top of the pyramid. And sleeps with 'em, or knows someone who has. Cal, my dinner guests and acquaintances include senators, admirals, White House advisors. John was related by marriage to the Du Ponts and I'm related by blood to two families that control a good percentage of Eastern money. Among all those people whom I know and who know me, there must be one or two who can make the kind of decision we're talking about. And isn't that better than any old security check?" She gave him a dazzling smile.
Hewitt smiled uncertainly. "I'm flying to Washington at the end of the week, Penny. I make no promises, but I'll sec what I can do. It isn't that easy."
It wasn't that easy. It took almost a year for her and an amazing man named John Farnsworth to set up a company called International Models, Inc., and make it look plausible; — make it a working proposition that would pay. There must have been a similar scramble at the government end, setting up hidden budgets, setting up the liaisons that gave Farnsworth access to government computers and plugged him into NSA's traffic routine without anybody but the director and a certain Presidential advisor being aware of his identity. There was an organization to build from scratch, starting with Joe Skytop and a former Green Beret sergeant named Dan Wharton who had served with him. There was a grueling year in the CIA Special Forces school and the special schools run by DIA. To her instructors, she was one of a herd of would-be minor operatives, like the INR people sent over by the State Department, or the foreigners sent over by friendly governments. She moved from school to school so that no instructor or supervisor would realize there was anything special about her. She learned to shoot, use a knife. They taught her judo, kendo, karate, savate, Kung-Fu. They taught her to pick locks, kill a man with a hairpin or a rolled-up newspaper, use explosives. They taught her how to resist interrogation, pass out under torture, kill herself with both hands tied.
And here she was, tooling along in a red Porsche, her long black hair streaming behind her like a banner. There wasn't a line or shadow on that lovely face to show the deadly secrets that lay behind it.
She lurched to a stop in front of her apartment building. The garage attendant was already hurrying toward her, his face eager to please. She handed him the keys and went upstairs.
There was an envelope under the door. Wharton had been there while she was gone, his usual efficient self. She didn't bother to open the envelope. She knew what it contained: her ticket on the evening flight to Rio.
Chapter 5
The big Varig 707 jet tilted on its approach and the FASTEN SEATBELTS sign came on in three languages. Penelope put her magazine down and looked out the window. There was a big orange sun rising over extravagant mountains, a glimpse of impossibly blue ocean, dazzling white buildings crowding the sand in a long sweep like sugar cubes spilled there by a careless giant. The 707 wheeled, and she could see a gigantic statue, its arms outstretched — the hundred-foot Christ of Corcovado. Beyond the statue, looking southward, was Rio's most famous landmark, Sugar Loaf Mountain, rising out of the bay, looking to Penelope's eyes Like a colossal sphinx seen from the rear.
Beside her, Wharton yawned and came awake. "Here already? Did I miss breakfast?"
Around them the cabin of the jetliner was stirring into life as stewards collected the remaining breakfast trays, passengers started to get their possessions together, sleepers came awake.
Penelope craned her neck and saw Skytop, clad in a hideous sport shirt with palm trees and flamingos, rubbing his eyes and stretching mightily. Beside him, the picture of a Japanese tourist, Tom Sumo sat in a neat linen suit, a Nikon slung over his shoulder and a guidebook sticking out of his pocket. Eric and Inga were a few seats forward, holding hands and talking in low, earnest tones. In the seat ahead of them, Penelope caught sight of Fiona's startling red hair. Paul was keeping her company on the aisle side, very elegant in an expensive silk sport jacket and open-necked peach shirt, his dark skin a contrast to Fiona's milky complexion. Yvette's seat was empty, and as Penelope leaned across Wharton, she saw her coming out of the lavatory, tall and straight, her milk chocolate skin looking smooth and cool in a crisp rayon print dress.
They looked the way they were supposed to look: fun people, international nomads, in Rio for Carnival and a working vacation. Penelope knew she looked the way she was supposed to look, too: expensive, frivolous, striking in her white sharkskin pants suit and polka dot dickey by Scott Barrie, the big floppy hat, the Givenchy shoulder bag. She took out a mirror and applied lipstick, smoothed the sweep of black hair that framed her face under the hat brim.
Wharton consulted a notebook he pulled out of the pocket of his rumpled seersucker suit. "I gave the steward a pretty good tip to get us off the plane first. There'll be two limousines waiting for us at Aeroporto Internacional Galeao. We should be at the hotel in an hour."
Wharton was optimistic. An hour later they were still waiting in customs, their luggage piled untidily around them.
The cause of the delay pawed for the third time through one of Penelope's suitcases. He was a muddy-complexioned little man with a fuzzy mustache, wearing a uniform shirt whose collar was a size too big for his neck.
"And how long do you intend to stay in Brazil?" he asked for the fourth time, unscrewing the top of a jar of cold cream he had found in the suitcase. He sniffed suspiciously at the cold cream, then stuck a finger into the jar. He helped himself to a piece of Penelope's Kleenex and wiped off the finger.
"The lady told you a few weeks," said Skytop impatiently, leaning over the counter. "What's the problem, amigo?"
The customs man stared coldly at Skytop, then continued his rummaging through Penelope's clothing and toiletries. He had opened every piece of baggage, examined their passports minutely, consulted his list of regulations at every opportunity. And there still was no sign that he was going to stamp their entry visas.
Penelope was getting worried. She continued to show nothing but modish impatience, but beneath her casual pose she was tense. Was the customs man simply being pigheaded, causing difficulties for the sake of being stubborn? It sometimes was that way at Brazilian ports of entry. Or had he been bribed or tipped off to probe her luggage, delay her?
The customs man was examining one of Penelope's brassieres now, holding it at either end and turning it this way and that. Just to the side of the left cup, a thread protruded — the long-chain polymer bowstring that Sumo had sewn into it. It hadn't caught the inspector's eye yet.
"There's nothing in that, amigo," Skytop said nastily. "Not at the moment anyhow."
The customs man flushed and dropped the bra. He closed the suitcase, chalked it and went on to the next piece of baggage. It was a metal case containing Skytop's photographic supplies.
The inspector's eyes widened with anticipation when he saw the film. "Ah," he said triumphantly, "why so much film?"
"I'm a photographer," Skytop said. "O fotografo. I explained that before. We're not tourists. We're here to take pictures for a magazin
e. Uma revista."
The customs inspector got a stubborn glint in his eye. He pondered for a moment. Then he said, "Senhor, I must examine the film. There is too much. Please to unwind each roll."
Skytop stared unbelievingly. "Unwind the film? I can't do that. It hasn't been exposed yet."
"Unwind it, please," the inspector said, tapping his fingers on the counter.
"But if I unwind it, it'll be useless. I won't be able to use it." He turned helplessly to Penelope. "Tell him, Baroness."
"May I be of assistance?"
The man who had spoken was tall, wide-shouldered and narrow-waisted, dressed in a conservative and expensive dark suit He was about thirty, with lively dark eyes in a handsome, aquiline face that carried the unmistakable stamp of centuries of breeding.
Penelope gave him a wide impersonal smile. He reached for her hand and held it briefly.
"I am Silvio Azevido e Oliviera." He said it as if it ought to be familiar. "But please," he smiled, "call me Silvio."
He favored the other members of her party with a short, inclusive nod, then turned to the customs inspector. "What seems to be the difficulty?" he scolded gently. He plucked Penelope's passport from the startled man's grasp and leafed through it. "You are keeping the Baroness Penelope St. John-Orsini from enjoying the glories of Rio." He flashed a white smile. "And on such a beautiful morning, too." He handed the passport back to the little man. "Ja acabou?" he said in Portuguese. "Surely you are finished?"
"But…" the inspector began.
"You have heard the gentleman," Silvio said, indicating Skytop. "The film is a matter of business. E uma visita de negocios." He tapped the metal case, and his tone grew somewhat edged. "Cuidado com esta mala."
The customs inspector threw Penelope a sheepish grin. He closed Skytop's film case and chalked it. He stamped Penelope's passport with an entry visa and a ninety-day exit visa, and handed it back to her with a little salute.
While the others were having their passports stamped, Silvio took Penelope by the elbow and whispered in her ear, "Quick, let's get out of here before he changes his mind." He began walking her toward the terminal exit.
Outside, she blinked at the hot Rio sun. There were two black-uniformed chauffeurs standing by the limousines Wharton had ordered. They touched their caps when they saw her.
"I can't thank you enough, Senhor…?" Penelope began.
"Silvio," he prompted. "You must call me Silvio. And I shall call you Penelope." He turned her with gentle pressure on her arm to face him. "You are too beautiful for a baroness. I thought that all baronesses were leathery old women with too much pancake makeup and sagging bottoms that have been lifted by plastic surgery."
Penelope laughed; she recognized the baroness he was describing. "But why have you taken the trouble to help me? And how was it possible for you to change the mind of that pigheaded customs inspector?"
"I make it a practice to help beautiful women," he said, answering the first question and ignoring the second. "And now I claim my reward. Where are you staying?"
"The Leme Palace."
"But of course. A woman of such quality could stay nowhere else. I will call for you at six."
"What reward did you have in mind?"
"Dinner and a little sample of the Rio night life. Nothing too strenuous on your first night here. You must be suffering from the jet fatigue, yes? Your biological clock will be five hours fast."
She laughed. "You let me worry about my biological clock."
"Is that a yes?"
"It's a yes. Six o'clock."
The door to the terminal opened and Skytop burst out, followed by a procession of sweating porters wheeling her luggage. He headed toward her and Silvio.
"Very fine." Silvio turned his head and saw Skytop bearing down on them. "Até à vista," he said hastily and began walking quickly away.
"What did that character want?" Skytop said, nodding at Silvio's disappearing back.
"He wanted to have dinner with me."
"And he's picking you up, and he made a point of finding out what hotel you're staying at, right?"
"That's right. Actually, I think he's gorgeous."
Skytop's eyes narrowed. "I don't like it, Baroness. That trouble we had getting through customs, and then Playboy there straightens it all out for us without even raising a sweat. It looks like a set-up. He didn't get off a plane — I saw him come in the street door. And if he's having a date with you, he sure wasn't taking a plane out. How come he happened to be in the terminal?"
"We'd better find out, hadn't we? On your way, Joe."
"I'll see you at the hotel later." Skytop slipped away in the direction Silvio had taken, moving swiftly and silently for a man his size. The garish shirt was covered by a nondescript denim jacket. He melted from sight into the crowds milling around the terminal.
The porters had begun to load the luggage into the limousines under Wharton's direction. The last of the porters came through the door, leading the Borzois on their chains. Sumo was just behind him. When the Borzois saw Penelope, they set up a wild barking and began straining on their leads. They were upset and keyed up after their long flight. They pulled the porter along; he managed, just barely, to stay on his feet, skipping and sliding to stay upright. The Borzois flung themselves at Penelope, pawing at the white sharkskin suit, whining and sobbing. She crooned soothingly at them and let them lick her face. When she was able to look up, the first thing she noticed was that Sumo was gone.
She peered in all directions, but there was no sign of him. In the thirty seconds she had been preoccupied with the dogs, he had vanished completely.
* * *
The drums were louder, here in the hills. The rhythm was samba, but there were so many of them, from so many directions, that it seemed like one great throbbing sound filling the heavy air. There were voices, too, and bursts of guitar, tambourine, whistles, tin cans — anything to produce a samba rhythm. Rio's poor were working up to the orgy of Carnival's final night.
Skytop paused to wipe the sweat from his forehead with a red bandanna. Rio was spread out dizzyingly below him, a gaudy expanse of high-rise buildings sparkling in the sun.
Heaven and hell were reversed. Heaven was down below, those clean avenues with the traffic moving like bright toys along them, the luxury apartments with balconies. Up here it was hell.
Hell was a jumble of the worst shanties he had ever seen — and Skytop thought he already had seen the worst, growing up on Indian land in Oklahoma. They were flimsy shacks, daylight showing through some of them, pieced together out of scraps of wood and tin and cardboard, perched impossibly on the almost vertical hillside. This was one of the favelas, the makeshift slums where almost one quarter of Rio's people lived. Around him, shrieking children played in the filth, dogs yapping at their heels. Nearby, a pig rooted in a pile of garbage and disturbed a cloud of flies.
Silvio had come up here on foot after paying off the taxi that had brought him to the base of the hillside. Skytop had made his driver keep going for another quarter mile past Silvio's taxi before getting out and doubling back. He was sure Silvio hadn't seen him.
What was a man like Silvio — obviously wealthy, well-bred — doing in a place like this? What business could he possibly have here? Skytop had seen him go into two of the shacks so far, staying for ten or fifteen minutes each time. A tough-looking cabloco with the straight black hair of the Indian and a tattered white shirt had just let Silvio into a third shanty. Skytop was sure he had seen Silvio pass something to the cabloco before the two went in together.
Skytop sauntered along the dusty footpaths, trying to be inconspicuous. With his broad Indian features, he might have belonged here. But his clothes were too expensive looking, particularly the shiny new cowboy boots he had bought for the trip. Surreptitiously, he kicked dust over them.
Silvio emerged from the shack and began to move along an upward path that took him deeper into the favela. Skytop gave him a head start and slipped after hi
m.
He worked his way upward, wrinkling his nose against the pervasive stench, picking his way past haphazard porches where gaunt silent women holding babies stared at him.
Then, somehow, he lost Silvio. It shouldn't have been possible unless Silvio were aware of being followed. Skytop hesitated, then started forward toward the last place he'd seen Silvio's dark suit: a narrow, garbage-strewn alley between two blind rows of wooden shacks.
He was in the middle of the dim passageway when he became aware of a whisper of movement behind him. He leaped straight to the side, and the weighted sap that had been meant for his skull whistled past his ear and thwacked into the hollow of his shoulder. His whole right arm went instantly numb.
Skytop whirled, using the leftover momentum of his leap, his good left hand extended rigidly. The man behind him was fast: he ducked, and the edge of Skytop's hand caught him on the bridge of the nose instead of the throat. Skytop could feel the bone and cartilage crunch flat. The man screamed and staggered backward.
There was another man coming at him fast from the end of the alley where Silvio had disappeared. There was a wicked-looking knife in his fist, and he held it low, pointed upward, like a man who was used to using it. He was a pock-faced Negro in a wide-brimmed hat and an oversize sport jacket — a malandro, Skytop had time to think, one of the criminal types bred by the favelas, for hire by any gang chief or heroin wholesaler with the money to pay them.
Skytop tried to raise his right arm in a block, but it hung limply. The malandro smiled and began swinging the knife up in a curve meant to open Skytop's guts from pelvis to ribs. At the same time, Skytop heard running footsteps behind him: a third malandro coming from the other end of the alley.