“Did you read last Friday’s Jeune Afrique?”

He shook his head. “I don’t read French. Just German and Portuguese.”

I said: “The Sudanese have put out a call for help. They want some mercenaries.”

He was a commander carefully examining each side of a problem, testing it for possible loopholes. He said: “What’s the rights and wrongs of it, I don’t know about the Sudan, not at the moment.”

I said: “You should, that’s also common knowledge. It used to be the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. When the British pulled out, it became the Egyptian Sudan. Now it’s trying to be the Sudanese Sudan. They want autonomy, and the easiest way for the Egyptians to put a stop to that is just to wipe them all out, and that’s what’s going on there at this moment; genocide. It is casually reported once in a while in all the newspapers, so how come you don’t know about it? You want Jeune Afrique’s latest figures? A hundred and thirty-five thousand Sudanese slaughtered in the last three weeks, and it’s been going on now for almost a year. Interested?”

He said: “Weapons?”

“The Egyptians have sophisticated modern weapons, the Sudanese have spears. Their army, such as it was, was practically wiped out in the first few weeks, only nobody in the civilized world bothered to notice that. Now they’re just about down to bows and arrows and spears.”

“And who’s got all the money?”

“The Egyptians, of course.”

“So I’m expected to fight for the poor bloody Sudanese and get paid off in cotton, is that it? That’s about all the Sudan is good for.”

I said: “And peanuts. They grow a lot of peanuts.”

He was angry now. “You’re not out of the woods yet, Cain.” (I was, for the moment at least, obviously). He said: “And I don’t like men who make jokes, life and death’s a serious matter. Who’s going to pay me?”

I didn’t want to offer him too plausible a possibility. I sort of shrugged, and said: “According to Jeune Afrique, they can raise the money. But more important, they’re offering concessions.”

“For cotton? Let them rot.”

“For gold.”

“Gold? In the Sudan?”

“Three fairly productive mines, two very good ones, and six or seven that might turn out very well indeed.”

“Who’s working them now?”

“A bunch of Frenchmen and Belgians, but they’re mostly in Egyptian-held territory now.” Time for the clincher. I said: “The upper Nile Valley, an ideal place for bacteriological warfare, wouldn’t you say?”

Now he took a long, long time to think about it. More on principle than anything else, he asked idly, trying to mask the urgency: “Who else knows you’re here, Cain?”

I said promptly: “Nobody.”

He shook his head irritably: “I don’t believe that. I won’t believe it: It doesn’t make sense. No sense at all!” He threw his head back and peered at me. “Just who are you, Cain?”

“An adventurer. Just as you are. Only perhaps I’m better at it.”

“And what do you expect to get out of this?”

“Money, what else?”

“There’s easier ways to make money. Lots of them.”

I said with just the right amount of eagerness: “And maybe I’d like to be a sort of king too. You know the fear of plague in Africa, and man with a few vials of that stuff in his pocket can rule the whole goddamn continent. How much toxin have you got?”

“Four ounces.” Check.

“Any man with four ounces of that stuff, in the Nubian desert, is a king, an emperor, with all the power in the world.”

“You’re pushing me, Cain.”

“Sorry. I guess I’m just eager.”

The irritation was coming back again. He said, his eyes angry: “I know better than to trust anybody! Particularly someone with as smooth a tongue as yours.”

I said: “You trust Van Reck, don’t you? And Histermann?”

He said coldly: “No. They’d either of them sell me out if you made it worth their while.”

“I doubt it. Histermann held back a few things even when he thought he was about to die, horribly.”

“Yes, yes, I guess he’s all right, really.” It was a grudging admission.

I looked up at Van Reck. He was still sitting there as immobile as a statue, his bow ready still. I said: “Does he really find that thing more efficient than a gun?”

Loveless shrugged. “Every man to his own favorite weapon, it’s one of my rules” He laughed. “That’s what started all this, really. Do you realize that’s the oldest form of chemical warfare there is? The poisoned arrow? All I’m doing is refining a process that Africa’s known about, and used, for three thousand years. They used strychnine—I use botulin.”

“Ironic, isn’t it?”

He said grumpily: “If that’s all you’ve got to think about...”

“I was thinking it’s about time you made up your mind. I don’t want to stay here all night.”

He looked surprised, “All night? Till we pull out of here tomorrow, Cain. Till then, I’m not letting you out of my sight, or Van Reck’s either. I’ve got a lot of thinking to do, about you, and until I make up my mind you stay right there, where you are.”

I shrugged. “All right with me.”

Maybe it was a little too casual. He came quite close to me (with a quick, reassuring glance up at Van Reck), and said carefully:

“Just know this. If Histermann says there’s no one up there watching this place, then I know that’s how it is. It’d take more than a Portuguese cop to hide from him, I can tell you.”

It had to be constantly difficult, all the way down the line.

I said: “Not police, Fenrek’s men from Interpol. Only there aren’t any of them up there, not a single one. I told you.”

He said smoothly: “I keep telling you, Cain, don’t try to be too bright. Interpol only has one man here, and he’s a banker or something. Now there’s that Colonel Fenrek from Paris and nobody else. If they want a dozen men to prowl around the beaches in the dark, they have to use the local talent. Flatfoots.”

But not too constantly difficult. I gave way.

I sighed. “Yes, you’re right there, I suppose.”