He shrugged. He could not take his eyes off the money. “The one they wanted was the European woman.”
“Well, I’ll find out about that later on. Do you know where they took her?”
He nodded eagerly: “A storehouse, Senhor, on the Rua Querenta, where they used to keep fireworks. There is a cellar there, and the Senhora is there now with three men and some geese to guard her.”
I knew all about the geese, but Bonelli said: “A hungry goose is the best watchdog there is, a very popular system in Macao.” He said to Melindo: “A fireworks storehouse...number eighty-five? There are no others, I think...?”
“The same, Senhor. On the south side of the street.”
“I know it.” Bonelli turned to me and said: “I know it well. I used to own it.”
“How well?”
“Well enough for your purpose, and more.”
“Good. Can I get in there?”
“Yes. A skylight, if you can reach it. It won’t be easy.”
“I’ll reach it. I’ll need some of your grain.”
“My grain?”
“Sour mash from your distillery, a handful or two.”
“Ah, that is good.”
It was a question I had to ask. I said: “Has she been hurt?”
There was a terribly tight feeling in my stomach.
Melindo said: “She has been hurt, Senhor.”
“And Ming? Alexander Ming?”
He shrugged. “There is never any word of Alexander Ming, Senhor. No one ever sees him, or hears him, or knows where he is. It is even said that he is not in Macao at this moment, but in Tangier.”
“And how good is that last bit of information?”
“Not good. A rumor, no more. The kind of rumor a man would spread if he wanted it thought that he was not here.”
“And is she likely to be moved? From the cellar?”
“You mean, no doubt, before dark, Senhor?”
“Don’t try to read my mind, Melindo. Just tell.”
“They will move her if they find out that I have learned that she is there. But they will not find this out.”
“You sound pretty sure of yourself, and that’s the whole crux of the matter.”
“My source of information is very secure.”
Bonelli said: “Tell me who it is, Melindo.” He was sitting alone in a dark corner, Bonelli, detached from us and listening, his pointed fingers touching each other in an attitude of prayer.
The lieutenant wriggled hesitantly, shuffling his feet and looking at the ground, but he said at last: “Hu-san, the blind one.”
Bonelli said: “An old, old man who begs on the corner of Rua Figueroa Magalaes. A man who knows everything and says nothing.” He looked at Melindo and said, more curiously than anything else: “How did you get him to talk?”
Melindo smiled slowly: “He owes me a favor. Many favors. I helped him once to bring his family over the border.”
“And they go back if he doesn’t help you once in a while? You’re an evil man, Melindo.”
Melindo said: “We are all evil men, Senhor Bonelli. It is only a question of degree, is it not?” And I said: “Let’s leave it at that. Thank God for the evil. We’d get nowhere without it.”
I said: “And now?” Melindo looked at me, and I said impatiently: “They won’t just let her sit there.”
“No, Senhor, they will not. But they will not kill her either, not yet.” It was a straw to seize on. I looked at him, and he went on: “She told them that it was you who persuaded her to do what she did, and they think that she is a weapon they can use against you if they have to.”
“In other words, I’ll go looking for her, and then...But in that case, they expect me to find out where she is. Is this o jeito, Melindo?” The jeito is a game the Portuguese play; it means, simply, trickery, the outsmarting of one man by another for the sheer exhilaration that knavery can provide when it’s used as a game of skill. If I was supposed to go looking for Bettina, then they would have to let me know where she was being held, one way or another. They’d guess I’d try to find out for myself; could they so quickly guess I’d find a man like Melindo and use him? Perhaps they would: they knew I was with Bonelli, and Melindo was Bonelli’s man. On the other hand, perhaps it would be safer for them to let me know some other way, in which case I could expect a message of some sort. Or could I? Would they be so straightforward as to send a simple messenger saying: Come and get her. She’s here or there. Could they have told Hu-san, the blind man: Make sure that Cain learns this or that. Or was Melindo also one of Ming’s men?
O jeito, the game of trickery.
But Melindo shook his head. “Nao e o jeito, Senhor. It’s not the game.”
Somehow, I believed him; and trust was all I had working for me at the moment. But the message was drilling itself into my mind: if Melindo is telling the truth, there’s got to be a message coming from another source. Please God it comes in time, or I’m dead too, and then Bettina, whom I threw to the wolves.
And then, there was a commotion in the anteroom that led to the office. It was the sound of a shuffle, and a shriek of pain, and the sound of running feet, and Bonelli was on his feet in an instant, heading for the door, white-faced all of a sudden. But the door flew open before he got there, and there was Mai, her dress torn, her eyes dark with fury. Behind her, one of the guards who worked out there was getting to his feet, clutching his shoulder and grimacing with pain, and another was running forward towards Mai with a look of shocked surprise on his face, and a gun in his hand. Mai thrust Bonelli aside like a wilted flower and burst into the room. The guard was aiming the gun, and I yelled: “No! For God’s sake no, it’s all right!” I was physically stopping the sentry from shooting, and I swung round to Bonelli and said. quickly: “It’s all right, Bonelli. I know her. More, I was half-expecting her.”
