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River of Death

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'I have. I am.'

Smith's impassive air deserted him. He looked every inch the bulti-millionaire he was reputed to be.

'I repeat, Hamilton, I'm the paymaster.'

'The ship-owner pays his captain. Who's in charge at sea? Even more importantly, who's in charge in the jungle? You wouldn't last a day without me.'

There was a sudden silence in the room. The tension between the two men was all too obvious. Heffner rose from the arm of the chair, lurched once and then crossed to where the two men were standing. The light of battle was in his truculent and bloodshot eyes.

'But, boss! You don't seem to understand.' Heffner didn't speak the words, he sneered them. 'This is the intrepid explorer himself. The one and only Hamilton. Haven't you heard? Hamilton is always in charge.'

Hamilton glanced briefly at Heffner then at Smith. 'This is the kind of irritant I mean. Born to give trouble, bound to give rise to friction. What function does he perform?'

'My chief staff photographer.'

'Looks the artistic type. He coming along?'

'Of course he is.' Smith's tone was glacial. 'Why on earth do you think Mr Tracy and I brought him down here?'

'I thought maybe he had to leave some place in a hurry.'

Heffner took a step closer. 'What does that mean, Hamilton?'

'Nothing, really. I just thought that maybe your friends in the New York police department were beginning to take too close an interest in you.'

Heffner was momentarily taken aback, then he took another menacing step forward. 'I don't know what the hell you mean. You wouldn't think of stopping me, would you, Hamilton?'

'Stopping you from coming along, dear me, no.'

Ramon looked at Navarro. Both men winced.

'Amazing,' Heffner said. 'All you require is twenty pounds over a man to make him see it your way.'

'Provided, of course, that you're half-way sober by that time.'

Heffner gazed at him in alcoholic disbelief then swung a round-house right at Hamilton's head. Hamilton moved inside it and brought up his own right in a wicked jab as Heffner's fist swept harmlessly by his head. Grey-faced and doubled over, Heffner sank to his knees, his hands clutching his midriff.

Ramon said thoughtfully: 'I do believe, Senor Hamilton, that he's half-way sober already.'

'A short way with mutineers, eh?' Smith was unmoved by the plight of his trusty chief photographer, and his irritation had given way to curiosity. 'You seem to know something about Heffner?'

'I read the occasional New York paper,' Hamilton said. 'Bit late when I get them, mind you, but that hardly matters as Heffner's activities covet a fair period. What the Americans call a scoff-law Suspected involvement in various crimes of violence, even gangland killings. He's cleverer than he looks, which I don't believe, or he has a clever lawyer. Anyway, he's always beaten the rap so far. It is impossible, Mr Smith, that you had no inkling of this.'

'I confess that there have been stories, rumours. I discount them. Two things. He knows his job and a man is innocent until proved guilty.' Smith paused and went on: 'You know anything to my detriment?'

'Nothing. Everybody knows your life is an open book. A man in your position can't afford to have it otherwise.'

'Me?' said Tracy.

'I don't want to hurt your feelings but I never heard of you until today.'

Smith glanced down casually at a still prostrate Heffner, as if seeing him for the first time, and rang a bell. The butler entered. His face remained expressionless at the sight of the man on the floor: it was not difficult to imagine that he had seen such things before.

'Mr Heffner is unwell,' Smith said. 'Have him taken to his quarters. Dinner is ready?'

'Yes, sir.'

As they left the drawing-room Maria took Hamilton's arm. In a quiet voice she said: 'I wish you hadn't done that.'

'Don't tell me I've unwittingly clobbered your fiancé?'

'My fiancé! I can't stand him. But he has a long memory — and a bad reputation.'

Hamilton patted her hand. 'Next time I'll turn the other cheek.'

She snatched her hand away and walked quickly ahead of him.

Dinner over, Hamilton and the twins left in the black Cadillac. Navarro said admiringly: 'So now Heffner is labelled in their minds as your bad apple in the barrel while Smith, Tracy, Hiller and for all I know Serrano think that they are the driven snow. You really are a fearful liar, Senor Hamilton.'

'One really has to be modest about such things. As in all else practice makes perfect.'

CHAPTER FOUR

As dusk approached, a helicopter, equipped with both floats and skids, set down on a sandy stretch on the left bank of the River Parana. Both up-river and down, on the same bank, as far as the eye could see in the gloom, stretched the dense and virtually impenetrable rain forest of the region. The far side of the river, the right or western bank, was invisible in the gathering gloom: at this point, close to where the River Iquelmi flowed into the Parana, the parent river was more than five miles wide.

The helicopter cabin was dimly lit even although the precaution had been taken of pulling black drapes across the windows. Hamilton, Navarro and Ramon were having their evening meal of cold meat, bread, beer and soda — the beer for Hamilton, soda for the twins.

Ramon shivered theatrically. 'I don't think I much care for this place.'

'Not many people do,' Hamilton said. 'But it suits Brown — alias Mr Jones — and his friends well enough. Defensively speaking, it's probably the most impregnable place in South America. Years ago I traced Brown and his fellow-refugees to a place called San Carlos de Bariloche near Lake Ranco on the Argentine — Chilean border. God knows that was fortress enough, but he didn't feel secure even there so he moved to a hide-out in the Chilean Andes, then came here.'

Navarro said: 'He knew you were after him?'

'Yes. For years. Our wealthy friend in Brasilia has been after him for much, much longer. There may well be others.'

'And now he no longer feels secure even here?'

'I'm almost certain he doesn't. I know he was in the Lost City this year, and several times in the past few years. But he likes his comforts and there are none in that ruin. He may have taken a chance and returned. It's highly unlikely, but I have to check. Otherwise there's no point in going to the Lost City.'

'You have to have this confrontation between Brown and his friend.'

'Yes. I have no proof. This — ah — meeting will give me all the proof I ever require.'

'Remind me to take care of myself. I want to be alive to see it.' Navarro turned and gazed at the curtain facing down-stream. 'It will not be easy to get into this place?'

'It will not be easy. Brown's estate here — it's known as Kolonie Waldner 5 5 5 — is better guarded than the Presidential Palace. The estate is hotching with trained killers as guards — and when I say that I mean they're trained and proven killers. There's dense jungle to the north and south — Paraguay lies to the south and Brown is a close friend of the President there — there's this river to the east and a large number of German settlements, populated almost exclusively by ex-members of the S.S., lie astride the roads to Asuncion and Bella Vista. You won't even find a single river pilot here who is Brazilian born, they're all Germans from the River Elbe.'

Ramon said: 'In view of the fact of what you've just told us, a thought occurs to me. How do we get in?'

'I'll admit I've given the matter some thought myself. Not much option really. There's a road used by supply trucks, but it's too long, too dangerous and has to pass through an armed gatehouse with electrified fences stretching away on both sides. There's also a landing stage about ten miles downriver from here — about fifteen miles north of the Paraguayan border. The road up to the compound is about a mile long and usually heavily patrolled. But it's the only other way. At least there are no electrified fences along the right bank of the Parana — or there weren't the last time I was there. We'll wait two hours and move on in.'

'Would it be in order,' Navarrd said, 'if we gave you what is known as a couple of old-fashioned looks?'

'Help yourself,' Hamilton said agreeably. He opened a rucksack, brought out three silenced Lugers, three spare magazines and three sheathed hunting knives and distributed those. 'Sleep if you can. I'll watch.'

The helicopter, not under power, drifted with the current down the right bank of the Parana, keeping as close inshore as possible to avoid the bright light of a brilliant half moon riding high in a cloudless sky. A door in the fuselage opened, a figure appeared, stepped down on to one of the pontoons and lowered an anchor quietly to the bed of the river. A second figure appeared with a bulky package under his arm: there came a subdued hiss and within thirty seconds a rubberised dinghy was fully inflated. A third man emerged from the fuselage carrying a small outboard motor and a medium-sized battery. The first two men stepped gingerly into the dinghy and took those items from him: the engine was clamped on to the transom aft, the battery lowered to the duckboard floor and coupled up to the engine.

The engine, once started, was almost soundless and the south-east wind, the prevailing one in tHat area, carried what little noise there was upstream. The painter was unhitched from the helicopter and the dinghy moved downstream. The three occupants were crouched forward, listening intently and peering, not without some apprehension, into the gloom beneath the overhanging branches of the rain-forest trees.