Hall had time to buy a paper at the Havana airport before the Panair bus started out for the city. In the half-light of evening, he could read only the headlines, and the front page carried nothing about Tabio's condition. It meant only one thing, that Don Anibal was still alive. His death would have rated a banner headline in every paper published south of the United States borders.

He folded the paper under his sealed attachÉ case, sat wearily back in his seat as the half-empty bus rolled through the flat table lands between the airport and Havana. It was a run of fifteen miles from Rancho Boyeros to the Prado, a stretch long enough to give Hall another opportunity to review in his mind the nature of the tasks that lay ahead of him.

Physically, there were few details which could trap him. Duarte had been very thorough, even to the point of bringing Mexican labels for Jerry to sew into every item of apparel on Hall's body and in his Mexican leather grip. The credentials in his worn Mexican wallet had carried him through the control stations of four governments, including the station in San Juan (although the night in Puerto Rico had been a jittery twelve hours of sulking in his room like a caged animal). He wore a hat and a pair of soft ankle boots which belonged to Duarte, and a pair of broad-framed tortoise-shell reading glasses he had borrowed from Dr. Gonzales. The attachÉ case, protected by the Mexican seal, contained the pictures of Androtten, a letter from Duarte to a man named Figueroa in the Mexican Embassy, and the automatic Segador had given him the day after he was drugged.

It was too late to report to the Mexican Embassy and deliver the letter to Figueroa. But the Casa de la Cultura would be open (there were lectures and meetings of some sort going on every night at the Spanish Republican society), the boys on the staff of Ahora would be at their desks at the paper, and Colonel Lobo could always be reached within a few hours. The idea was to contact all three tonight; if the documentary bomb which would blow up Ansaldo was anywhere in Havana, it would be either at the Casa, the paper, or in the files of the Secret Police.

His heart quickened as the bus reached the narrow streets of Havana, honked its way to the Maceo, and then turned lazily down the Prado. He loved this city as he loved only two others, New York and Madrid. In the course of nearly four decades, Hall had spent a mere four months in Havana, but these were months in which he rarely got more than four hours' sleep a night. He had worked hard in this city, but for a hundred-odd nights he had also known the fantastic pleasures of merely walking the streets of the Cuban capital, talking to friends, stopping off to rest and have a tropical beer or a tall glass of mamey pulp, getting drunk only on the green softness of the Havana moon and the cool pleasures of the Gulf breeze. Here he had found old friends from Spain, and made new and life-long friendships with a host of Cubans. He knew, when he last left Havana, that the city had become one of his spiritual homes, that always he would think of it as a place to which he could return when he wanted the peace which comes to a man from being where he belongs.

As they approached the Panair office, Hall became apprehensive. He was afraid that he might be recognized by one of the clerks. He dug into his wallet for an American two-dollar bill and handed it to the driver. "Take me directly to the Jefferson Hotel, chico," he said. "It is only two streets out of your way."

"I won't get shot if I do, amigo."

He chose the Jefferson because it was a small, ancient and very unfashionable hotel, without a bar, and completely overlooked by the American colony. It was also very inexpensive, just the kind of a place a new courier, anxious to make a good record, would choose. It was on the Prado, it was clean, and the bills were modest enough to reflect to the credit of the government traveler who submitted them. Not the least of its charms for Hall was that the Jefferson was the one place where he stood not the slightest chance of being known by either the guests or the employees.

He signed the register with a modest flourish, insisted upon and obtained a reduced rate due to his standing as a courier, and then, spotting the large safe in the office behind the counter, he asked for the manager. "I am," he said, flourishing his identity papers, "a courier of the Mexican Government. Since I have arrived too late to present myself to my Embassy tonight, could I ask for the privilege of depositing my case in your safe for the night?"

The manager said he would be honored to oblige. He had, he said, traveled widely in Mexico, and admired the Mexican people, the Mexican Government, and most of all SeÑor Ortiz Tinoco's Department of Foreign Relations, and did the visitor expect to make frequent stops in Havana? The visitor assured the manager that he did.

The case was handed to the night clerk, who opened the safe, deposited it, and closed the heavy iron door. "It will be as safe," the manager said, "as the gold in the teeth of a Gallego."

"That," said Hall, "is security enough for me."

He got into the rickety elevator and went to his room. It was a large room overlooking the Prado. He opened the shutters, looked out at the star-drenched skies. He was home again. Outside, juke boxes in three different open cafÉs on one street were playing three records with maximum volume. A baby in the next room was lying alone and cooing at the ceiling. Near by, a light roused a rooster on some rooftop to let out a loud call.

Hall heard the sounds of the city as they blended into the tone pattern peculiarly Havana's own. He took a quick shower, changed into some fresh clothes, and went downstairs to the Prado. He stopped first at a cigar stand a few doors from the hotel, bought a handful of choice cigars, and lit a long and very dark Partagas, being careful to remember that only gringos removed the cigar band before lighting up.

He walked casually down the Prado, toward the Malecon, pausing in the course of the four blocks between the Casa de la Cultura and the Jefferson to study the stills in the lobby of a movie house showing an American film, to sip a leisurely pot of coffee, and to buy a box of wax matches and a lottery ticket from a street vendor. From the street, he could see that the windows of the Casa were well lighted. He walked another block, crossed the street, and then, very casually, he studied the signs on the street entrance to the organization's headquarters. Tonight: Lecture on History of Music by Professor A. Vasquez. Dance and ball for young people. And why shouldn't a bachelor courier on the loose in Havana attend a dance for the young refugiados? He went through the motions of a visiting blade debating with himself the propriety of attending such a ball.

Squaring his shoulders, the Mexican courier put the cigar in his mouth and started to climb the stairs to the headquarters of the Casa. He climbed slowly, afraid of receiving too enthusiastic a greeting when he reached the first-floor landing.

There was a light in the small meeting room at the end of the corridor. Hall stood near the door for a few minutes, listening for a familiar voice through the opened transom. Then, carefully, he knocked, and turned the handle of the door. It was open.

He stepped into a meeting of a small committee. Eight men were sitting around a long table. They were talking about the problems of getting help to the Spaniards in the French concentration camps in North Africa. All discussion stopped the moment the confreres saw Hall.

"I am looking," he said, "for Santiago Iglesias."

A tawny-haired Spaniard at the table looked up. "Viejo!" he shouted, springing from his chair and rushing over to confront Hall.

The right hand which rose to take the cigar from Hall's mouth also lingered long enough to hold an admonishing finger to his lips. "Hello, Rafael," he said. "I didn't know you were in Cuba."

Rafael was grinning like a Cheshire cat. "Neither did Franco," he laughed. "Last week I found out for the first time that the fascists had jailed you and that you got out after the war. I thought you were dead, M..."

The look in Hall's eyes stopped him from pronouncing the rest of the American's name.

"Let's go outside," Hall said, softly. "I do not have much time."

They stepped into the corridor. "Where can we talk?" Hall asked. "Is anyone using Santiago's office?"

"No. We can sit there."

They found the office unoccupied. "Don't turn the light on," Hall said. "The window faces the street."

Rafael locked the door, pulled two seats close to the big desk in the corner. "We can sit here and talk quietly," he said.

"It's wonderful to see you, Rafael. I'd heard you were captured in a hospital during the Ebro retreat."

"Mierda! That's what the fascists boasted. No. I came out of the retreat in good order. I started with thirty men, but, instead of taking to the roads like the Lincolns, I started to cross the mountains. I went up with thirty men, and I came down on the other side with a battalion. Most of them got through alive after that."

"Good boy! Where have you been since then?"

"In hell!" Rafael spat, angrily. "Rotting in a French concentration camp, mostly. I organized an escape. We killed six guards, and more than twenty prisoners got away. I got to Casablanca through the underground, and they put me on a Chilean ship. Two weeks ago we reached Havana. I'm to eat and rest for a month. Then I go back to Spain for more fighting. With the guerrillas. When did you get here?"

"An hour ago. Listen, I want to talk to you. But it is important that we find Santiago. Is he in town?"

"Yes. He is supposed to be at our meeting. He'll be here."

"Can you go back and leave word for him to join you in here the minute he comes? It's very important."

Rafael jumped from his chair, struck an absurd caricature of military posture, and made a limp French salute, his hand resting languidly against his ear. "Mais oui, mon gÉnÉral," he said. "Mais oui, oui, oui." He marched stiffly out of the room, posing at the door to make an obscene gesture meant for the men of Vichy.

He glided noiselessly back to the dark office in a few minutes, waved Hall's proffered cigar away. "I can't smoke any more. We had nothing to smoke the last year in Spain, and Monsieur Daladier and Company never sent us any tobacco. Now I just can't stand it. I walk around Havana and everyone offers me cigars, but I've lost my taste for it."

"It will come back, Rafael."

"Why are you in Havana, Mateo?"

"It is a long story, chico. I'd rather tell you in front of Santiago. It's about Anibal Tabio. I left San Hermano two nights ago. Things are serious, there. Falange."

"Is Tabio really so ill?"

"He is dying, chico. He may be dead by now. I think he was killed by the Falange. I came here for the proof. Santiago knows. We've exchanged letters."

"Hola!" Santiago Iglesias was at the door. "Then you got my letters?" He was ten years older than Rafael, tall and powerfully built. He crossed the room in long, athlete's strides, his head thrown back as if to announce to the world that the white hairs which outnumbered the black of his head were merely an accident of the war.

"I knew you would understand," Hall said.

"What happens?"

"Don Anibal is dying. I think Ansaldo did it."

"He is a fascist, Mateo. You were absolutely right."

"How do you know? I need the proof immediately."

"There is a man in town who was trapped behind Franco's lines for two years. He knew Ansaldo well."

"That is good—for you and me. But it is not enough. There is too much at stake."

"I guessed as much, Mateo. General Mogrado sent a message from Mexico City a few days ago. He wanted the information also. I took this man in Havana and we went to a lawyer and he made a long affidavit about Ansaldo. Mogrado has the affidavit by this time."

"Who is this man? Is he well known?"

"No, Mateo. He was a minor official of the Ministry of Commerce. I have a copy of his affidavit, and you can meet him tomorrow if you wish. He is staying with relatives in Marianao."

"Let us try to see him tomorrow. But I need much more than his affidavit. I need more than anything else a picture of Ansaldo in Falange uniform, a picture that shows him with officers of Germany and Italy. I was in Burgos when the picture was taken—and I have a feeling that the picture is right here in Havana."

"Here? In Havana?"

"Listen, compaÑeros. I saw the Arriba man take that picture. I was standing a hundred feet away. It was in the spring or summer of 1938," Hall said. "I know you have the complete file of Arriba here."

"No, Mateo. We do not."

The blood left Hall's head. "You don't?" he said. "But when I was here we ..."

"It is the complete file of Arriba of Madrid since April of 1939, Mateo. Since Franco entered Madrid, amigo."

"And before that?"

"There are some, but not a complete file. They have many fascist papers at Ahora, and at the University there is Dr. Nazario with his personal collection of fascist publications. It is very large, and it goes back to 1935 in some cases, but it has many empty places."

"And the Secret Police? What has Colonel Lobo got?"

"Dossiers and documents. But papers—who knows?"

"I'll be back in Madrid in a month," Rafael said. "I can go back sooner if it will help the cause, Mateo. There is surely a complete file there."

"No, thank you, Rafael, but I need the picture in a few hours." He told them why the pictures were needed, and how they would be used if he could find them.

"Don't worry," Santiago said. "There are three collections to examine, and in the meanwhile we might get some further clues from de Sola. He is a very intelligent fellow. I'll put him to work on Dr. Nazario's collection in the morning. Rafael, tonight you go to Ahora. Go through their Spanish collection, and then examine their files of Arriba of Havana. The local Arriba used more pictures than an American magazine, and most of them came from Franco Spain. You'd better go right now."

"I'll be there in ten minutes. Shall I tell them what it's about, Mateo?"

"No, I'll tell them myself. I'm here on false papers. Just warn them that if they see me on the street I'm not to be recognized. But I'll see them before I leave."

"I'm going to call Lobo," Hall said. "At the very least his dossiers are more official than de Sola's affidavit."

Santiago shoved the phone toward Hall. "I was going to suggest it myself. Do you remember the number?"

"Of course."

There was no answer at Lobo's house. Hall called the headquarters of the National Police. "I want to reach Colonel Lobo," he said to the man who answered his call.

"We no longer have a Colonel Lobo."

"What?"

"We have a General Lobo, seÑor."

"Where is he?"

"Who is this speaking?"

"Who am I?" Hall hesitated. "If he's there, just tell him it's Johnny Verde Luna. He'll know who it is." Lobo called all Americans Johnny; Verde Luna was a horse he and Hall had played for three straight weeks at the Hipodromo until it romped home in front at the longest odds in ten years.

"I will, Mr. Johnny Green Moon," the other man said, in English. "When I see him tomorrow."

"I don't understand you, seÑor. I ..."

"He is not here, seÑor."

"I know. Don't tell me where he is. But do you know?"

"That depends."

"Listen to me, my friend," Hall said, his voice rising angrily, "I have no time to play games. If you know where he is, find him and give him my message. I'll call you every fifteen minutes until you get word from him."

"Yes, seÑor. I will do what I can. Where can I call you?"

"Never mind. I will call you." Hall hung up. "A clown!" he muttered.

"I forgot to tell you that Lobo is now a general."

"When did it happen?"

"Last week. It came as a reward for breaking up the Pinar del Rio Nazi-Falange ring. You know, the one that was in radio contact with the German submarines."

"I remember it well." Hall had worked with Lobo in rooting the spy ring out. "I wonder where the hell he is?"

"Who knows? But listen, Mateo, I know a man who knows all of Lobo's hangouts. Suppose I send him out to look?"

"Excellent. Just tell him to give Lobo this message—that he is the only man who can save the life of Don Anibal Tabio. Eh?"

"We'll try it. Wait here for me. I'll be right back."

Hall started to tell Santiago the whole story of his experiences in San Hermano when the Spaniard returned to the office. As soon as he mentioned the fact that Ansaldo's assistant Marina was a morphine addict, Santiago interrupted him.

"Hijo de la gran puta! I think I know him. Wait, I'll describe him. I know him, all right, Mateo. Wait, I'll close the shutters. Then we can turn on the light. I think I have his picture in this room."

"Who is he, Santiago?"

"Just a second. That's better." He turned on the small desk light. "Let's go to the files."

The Spaniard took a set of keys from his pocket, opened a heavy door behind the desk and snapped on the light in a small store room. He stepped in front of a row of steel filing cabinets, opened one with another key. "He used another name in Spain—and in Paris. I know it's the same man. Called himself Marcelino Gassau in 1937. Wait. Here it is."

"It's the maricÓn!" Hall cried when he saw the picture Santiago drew from the file.

"I knew it."

Hall glanced at his watch. "Just a second. I'm going to call Lobo back. It's time. Let's bring the whole file on the bastard out to the desk."

The man at police headquarters had no news of Lobo. "I'll call you back," Hall said. "Keep trying him."

"So Gassau is your Marina," Santiago laughed. "We knew him well, the cabrÓn. He was working in Portugal and Berlin as a liaison between Sanjurjo and von Faupel in 1935 and 1936. Then, when the war started, he went to Paris, the coward, spying on the German anti-fascists who were on their way to fight with the Thaelmanns in Spain. He posed as a contact man for the U.G.T., and then he'd lead the Germans straight to the French police and notify the German Embassy. Then the Nazis would start to complain that they were criminals who escaped from German prisons and claim them back. Not one of the poor devils ever got to Spain, but some of them were ultimately turned over to the German Government and killed. It's all in this file."

"What else can I find here?"

"Not too much. He made a trip to Barcelona in 1937. The authorities arrested him, but his friends got the British consulate to make a special plea for his release, and the damned fools gave in and let him go. After that he went to Argentina, but he returned to Madrid in May of 1939."

The papers contained a detailed record of the fascist agent's crimes against the Republic, and ended with a clipping from Informaciones of Madrid which revealed that Gassau-Marina was one of ten men to be decorated by the Falangist Government for distinguished service during the three years of the war. A footnote to this list said that Gassau-Marina was one of the three men decorated that day who had previously been awarded the Order of the German Eagle, Second Class, by German Ambassador to Spain, General Wilhelm von Faupel.

"This will help," Hall said. "It's a good start."

"There's my phone. Just a minute." It was Rafael. He was calling from the offices of Ahora, and he suggested that Santiago join him there.

"Let's go," Hall said. "Do we use separate cabs?"

"Don't be a child, Mateo. You're in Havana."

"I'd better check with police headquarters on Lobo before we leave."

They found Rafael in a tile-lined office on the second floor of the newspaper building. He was sitting at a large table, three large piles of fascist publications before him, and an opened copy of the Havana Arriba in his hands. "No luck yet," he said. "But Eduardo Sanchez had an idea where the picture can be found."

"Where is he?"

"He's in there," Rafael pointed to a door. "He's digging out some more magazines."

Sanchez walked in with an armload of bright-colored Havana Arribas. "It's good to see you again, Mateo," he said. "What passes?"

"Trouble. How are you making out?"

"Who knows? Are you going to stay long?"

"I'm leaving tomorrow if I can get what I need."

"You say the picture would be in Arriba for 1938?"

"If at all, Eduardo."

"That's serious. There is only one place in town where I know definitely there is a complete file of Arriba. It might be a little hard to get into."

"Where is it?"

"The third floor of the Spanish Embassy."

"That's bad," Hall said.

"Bad, yes," Santiago said. He put his arms over the shoulders of Rafael and Eduardo. "But not hopeless, eh, compaÑeros?"

Eduardo smiled, grimly. Rafael grinned, a sudden glint in his blue eyes.

"What do you think, Rafael?"

"I think we should shoot our way in, mi coronel."

"And you, Eduardo?"

"I don't know. If we shoot our way in, we have to shoot our way out again too. Maybe we'll kill a few fascists, but will we be able to get at their files?"

"It would do us good," Rafael said, "to kill ourselves a few fascists. I think we are getting out of practice."

"Sit down," Santiago said. "This takes some planning. Mateo, you had better tell Eduardo what is at stake."

"In a minute. I want some water. And I'd better phone Lobo's headquarters again."

"Use this phone," Eduardo said. "I'll bring you water." He took three sheets of gray copy paper from his desk and fashioned a water cup. "We can't get paper cups since Pearl Harbor."

"Listen to me," Santiago said. "There is a way we can kill two birds with one stone. Eduardo, if Hall gets the picture, it kills Gamburdo and the Falange in San Hermano. That's one bird."

"And the other?"

"The other, compaÑeros, is Fernando Rivas."

"Rivas?" Eduardo's dark, good-looking face grew puzzled. "Is he in this too?"

"Wait. I should bring CompaÑero Hall up to date. You don't know Rivas, Mateo. He is a queer bird. He comes from a good Republican family in Madrid. A very good family. Republican since before the First Republic. This Rivas, this Fernando, he was good. Under Alfonso, he got a job in the Foreign Office. They sent him to Havana as an attachÉ in the legation. Even then he was a good Republican. But something happened to the man when the war started. He didn't fight for the fascists, but ..."

"Tell him about his wife," Rafael said.

"That's what I think did it. He had a British wife, and she had high-life aspirations."

"I think I understand," Hall said.

"I don't have to go into the details. There is no time for that, anyway. The point is that he had to go to Spain last year, and he came back filled with loathing for everything he saw. This I know for a fact. First, he started to sit home alone every night and get drunk, and then he began to write a memoir about what he saw. He didn't think anyone would ever see it. He still doesn't know that anyone but himself has ever seen it. I got it from his servant one morning a few weeks ago. She is one of ours. We photographed it and she put it back before he got home that night."

Eduardo passed a box of inexpensive cigars around. "The week before that," he said, "I ran into Rivas at a cafÉ in Matanzas. He was sobering up after a drinking bout. I tried to avoid him but he followed me out of the place. He was crying. He called himself a son of a whore mother and a traitor to his honor and his people and carried on like a fool. Then he started to tell me about his wife's lover—we've known all about that for months, but Rivas had just found out—and I became filled with disgust for the creature. I shook him off and left him standing in the street crying like a whipped dog. I hate weaklings."

"I get it," Hall said. "But when you saw his diary, you started to change your mind, eh?"

"I still don't trust him. I introduced him to Santiago because Santiago wanted to meet him."

"I wouldn't trust him with Franco's daughter," Rafael said.

Santiago Iglesias sighed heavily. "No one asks you to sleep with him, Rafael," he said. "It isn't that. But you remember what happened in the early days of the war. We had to take any officer who swore loyalty to the Republic. We had no choice in the matter, did we, chico?"

"But we also put in commissars to keep an eye on them."

"It's true, chico. But some of them proved to be really loyal, eh?"

"A handful."

"All right, even a handful. But the point is that they were useful. Here is the situation as of tonight: if the pictures which will kill the Falange in San Hermano are anywhere within our reach at all, they are in the Spanish Embassy. We have no contact we can trust inside the Embassy. The nearest thing to such a contact is Rivas. He is a weakling and he was a traitor. We know that. What we don't know is whether his repentance is sincere. The only way to really find out is to test the man. This is the time to test him. I've spoken with him three times in the past week. He begs for a chance to prove that he has the right to serve the Republic again."

"He can serve the Republic best," Rafael insisted, "by blowing his brains out."

"Rafael!"

"I'm sorry, Colonel Iglesias. I hate traitors."

"I don't love them, chico. But it is not for us to put our personal likes and dislikes before our greater duties, Major. And please remember," he added, smiling, "you still are a major in the People's Army. Neither your commission nor your Army has expired yet."

"What do you want me to do?" Rafael asked, softly. "I will respect your commands as my superior—and my friend."

Santiago toyed with a thick copy pencil. "I am going to put it to a vote right here. Who is for getting Fernando Rivas to let us into the Spanish Embassy and removing what we need from the files? Understand, we won't tell him what we want in the files—that would be trusting him too much before he proves himself. Who is for raiding the Embassy with the help of Rivas? On this, Mateo, you will have to vote also."

Hall and Eduardo Sanchez raised their hands.

"Against?"

The three men looked at Rafael. He folded his hands in his lap, ostentatiously studied the ceiling.

"Are you against the idea, Rafael?"

"I think it is crazy, Santiago. I am not afraid. I just think it is crazy. Can't we get in without the traitor?"

"I don't know how," Santiago said. "I guess we'll have to try it without you, Rafael."

"Over my dead body, my friend. I'm going with you. I've been wrong before, but I've never avoided a battle. I'm not ducking this one, Santiago."

Eduardo winked at Hall. "Listen to the strategist," he laughed, but there was pride and real affection in his words. "Rafael," he said, "if you didn't shoot so straight I'd say that you talk too damned much."

"Go to hell," Rafael said. "You're wasting good time. Let's finish examining these fascist papers. Maybe we'll find the filthy picture tonight in these piles, and then we won't have to risk three, no four," he looked at Hall, "four good Republican lives on the guts of a traitor. Come on, Eduardo, get to work."

Hall motioned Santiago to the door. "Let's go around the corner," he whispered, "and bring back a few bottles of Cristal."

They walked slowly to the cantinerÍa on the corner, had some beer, and bought a dozen bottles to take back with them. Santiago said that he hoped it would not be necessary to raid the Embassy without previously testing Rivas on less hazardous tasks.

"Personally," he said, "I think Rivas is honest about wanting to come back. I think he can be trusted if we have to do it with him. But it might mean shooting, and you cannot afford to get shot. Perhaps you had better not join us."

"No. Don't try to cut me out, viejo, or I'll do it alone with Rafael."

"All right. But I hope we find it before we have to raid the fascists."

They went upstairs. "Call Fabri at your office," Eduardo told Santiago. "He says he has some good news for you."

"He must have found Lobo." Santiago was right. His man had reached the General. "He says for you to meet him at headquarters in an hour. Fabri found him at a party in Vedado. If I know Jaime Lobo, that means he will actually be back in two hours. You've got plenty of time."

Eduardo took a bottle opener from his desk. "You'll get me in trouble," he said. "We're not allowed to drink in the office."

"Tell Escalante it was my fault," Hall laughed.

"You'd better sign a sworn statement."

"Tomorrow. Listen, Eduardo, there is something you must do for me. Santiago has a file on a man named Marcelino Gassau. I want the whole thing copied on microfilm, four negatives of everything in the file. Can you have it done in your dark room tomorrow morning?"

"Consider it done, Mateo."

Rafael drank his beer and cursed the magazines for not having the pictures of Ansaldo that Hall wanted. "Let's get back to work," he said, impatiently. "Let's find the damned pictures if they're here."

Hall and Santiago sat down at the desk and started to go through individual issues of various fascist publications for the year 1938. While they worked, Hall asked Santiago if he knew the Figueroa whom he had to see in the Mexican Embassy.

"He is a friend," the Spaniard said. "He is completely reliable. He will do anything you ask within reason—and nearly anything that is without reason at all."

None of the men found the photo Hall was seeking by the time he was ready to leave for General Lobo's headquarters. "I'll get you a taxi," Eduardo said. "You can take a look at the AP ticker in the wire room in the meanwhile. There might be some news on Tabio's condition."

The wires reported that Tabio still breathed.

It was nearly midnight when Hall crossed the threshold of the brooding stone building that was Secret Police Headquarters. Like all police headquarters the world over, this one also smelled faintly of carbolic and damp stone, a stench Hall had grown to detest in San Sebastian. He walked briskly down the dark corridor which led to Lobo's office.

A young lieutenant was sitting at the desk in the anteroom. "Mr. Johnny Green Moon?" he asked, grinning.

"Hello," Hall laughed. "You still here?"

"Just a second." The lieutenant pressed a button on his desk. There was a click in the electric door stop of the massive oak and iron door behind the desk. "Go right in, Mr. Green Moon."

Hall pushed the door open, stepped into the Spartan simplicity of Lobo's private office, and quickly shut out the smell of carbolic by slamming the door behind him. Lobo, who had equally good reasons for hating that odor, had installed an American air-cleaning system in his own office.

The young general—he was about three years younger than Hall—was sitting at his tremendous carved desk and studying some papers. "Johnny!" he shouted. "QuÉ tal?" He was wearing a very formal white dress uniform heavy with medals and gold braid.

"Hello, Jaime," Hall said. "You look like an American Christmas tree."

"Johnny, you dog! You took me away from a most beautiful reception."

"Beautiful?"

"A dream. Unbelievable! Four and twenty blonde Vassar girls dancing around Lobo and wondering out loud if the handsome spik speaks English. Sensational!"

Hall had to laugh with the general. He could easily picture the effect of Jaime Lobo's towering dark attractiveness—more than once in the United States Hollywood talent scouts had begged him to sign contracts—in the eyes of the American women one could find at a lavish reception in Havana. "An American sugar king's party?"

"No. The British business colony. It was stupendous." Lobo had lived in the United States for five years, got a great kick out of scattering the superlatives of Hollywood in his speech when he spoke English.

"O.K.," Hall said, dryly. "It was super-colossal." He sat down in the large armchair at the side of the desk, helped himself to one of Lobo's cigars.

"So you don't want to play," Lobo said, sobering and taking his own seat.

"Some other time, Jaime."

"Sounds bad, keed. But tell me, Johnny, is it true that Don Anibal is dying?"

"He may be dead by now."

"Ansaldo killed him?"

Hall started. "What do you know about Ansaldo?"

"I know he's a fascist pig. Why?"

"Why? For the love of God, Jaime, if you can give me the proof, we can ..." He told Lobo about the plans of Lavandero and the anti-fascists in San Hermano.

"I understand," Lobo said. "I've already sent for the dossier on Ansaldo. It should be here in a few minutes. But while we're waiting, there are a few things I'd like to show you." He opened the drawer in his desk and took out an automatic wrapped in a brown-silk handkerchief. "Take a look at this gun," he said, "but don't touch. I want to save the fingerprints."

"What about it?" Hall asked.

"Oh, nothing. I thought you might know something about it. The hell with it. But tell me, Mateo, when did you get to town?"

"This evening."

"Panair?"

"Sure, why?"

"Then you're staying at the Jefferson, registered as Victor Ortiz Tinoco, eh?"

"My God," Hall laughed. "That's my gun!"

"That was your gun, chico. It is now Cuban Government Exhibit A in the case against your brains. So you had it all figured out, my boy. You'd come to Havana with fake papers, put up at an out-of-the-way hotel, check your gun with the hotel management, shoot the Spanish Ambassador, and then plant the gun in my back pocket and blow town on your diplomatic Mexican passport. But you reckoned without two suspicious and smart young second lieutenants from Oriente Province."

"What was my fatal mistake, chief?"

"Your accent and the cardinal stupidity of giving your attachÉ case to the desk clerk. He's a communist from Oriente. The weight made him suspicious, and he called his friends in my office. Only he guessed from your accent that you were a Spaniard, and that the gun was for the purpose of shooting up the Mexican Embassy."

"You know what Jefferson said about eternal vigilance being the price of liberty, Jaime."

"Sure. Jefferson and the natural shrewdness of a peasant from Oriente Province. Of course the minute I saw the report describing Ortiz Tinoco as a Spaniard with scars on the face, a broken nose, and big feet which took him directly to the Casa de la Cultura, I knew it was Matthew Hall in a beard."

"Yeah. Of course my phone calls every fifteen minutes didn't give you any idea."

"They helped, my boy. I'll admit that." He took the envelope bearing Androtten's pictures and fingerprints from his desk. "Who is this individual? He looks as if he is very seriously dead."

"I brought that envelope here for you, Jaime. He was shot three days ago in San Hermano, but I'm afraid I broke his nose before he died. That other picture of him with his family and the letter from the Dutch Government-in-Exile might be more interesting."

"Wilhelm Androtten? Sounds like a brand of gin. Why did you kill him?"

"He's a Nazi, Jaime. He was trying to kill me."

General Lobo took some notes as he listened to Hall's account of Androtten's role in the Ansaldo mission. "I guess the first thing to do is to find out if the letter from Queen Wilhelmina is genuine. But it still wouldn't prove anything. The Nazi, if he was an agent, could have picked the name Androtten from a casualty list and then written to the Dutch Government in the name of the soldier's father. I'll check the photos and the fingerprints here, and also with American F.B.I. and the British. The F.B.I. has been very good lately. They've helped out terrifically here with technical things."

A green light on Lobo's desk began to flicker. "It's the file room," he said. "I guess they have the Ansaldo dossier." He called the lieutenant on the inter-phone, told him to bring in the Ansaldo dossier.

The dossier was not very long. It told the story how, in the winter of 1938, a prominent Cuban Falangist in the best of health had suddenly taken to bed with a "serious complaint." His family announced to friends that they had sent to Spain for a great doctor, one Varela Ansaldo. They said Ansaldo cured the Cuban, to be sure, but he also had long private sessions with the leaders of the Falange at the Spanish Embassy and, before he returned to Franco Spain, the Falange in Cuba had undergone a complete shake-up of its leadership. There were pictures of Ansaldo, but alone and in plain clothes.

"Are these the only pictures?" Hall asked.

"Perhaps not. We took about three thousand feet of movie film from the Inspector General of the Falange for Latin America when he tried to escape to Spain on a C.T.E. ship two years ago. Let's look at them, old man." He pressed a key in his inter-phone box. "Pablo," he barked, "set up those Villanueva films in the machine. I'm coming in in ten minutes."

"I didn't think of that film," Hall confessed. "Every time you were supposed to show it to me, something came up, remember?"

Lobo was barking into the inter-phone again. "Teniente, scare up two cold bottles of champagne for the theater, will you? We have a thirst that is killing us."

"Are you screening the film in a theater?"

"No. It's a crime laboratory the F.B.I. installed for us. The whole works. Wait till you see it, Matt. It's just like Hollywood. Colossal!"

"And the champagne?"

"That's my own contribution. I'll be damned if I can stop drinking champagne in the middle of a party just because Johnny Green Moon drags me out. Come on, let me show you the joint." He led Hall on a ten-minute Cook's tour of the crime laboratory, his patter a slightly off-color imitation of an American tourist guide's spiel. A small beaded screen had been pulled down from the ceiling, facing two chromium-and-leather lounge chairs. When the lieutenant brought in the champagne in two ice buckets, General Lobo signaled the soldier in the tiny projection booth to start the film.

There was everything but a shot of Ansaldo.

"He was too smart, the cabrÓn," Lobo said. "Let's go back to my office and think it over." He poured what remained of the champagne into Hall's glass.

On the way back to his office, he asked the lieutenant to join Hall and himself. "Lieutenant," he said, "here are some pictures and data on a man named Wilhelm Androtten, and some notes I made. Put them all through the mill—our own files, F.B.I., the British. Check the papers and letters of Villanueva and Alvarez Garcia for any reference to Varela Ansaldo. And give me a report by noon tomorrow. Anything else you can think of for the moment, Mateo?"

"One thing. Those pictures of Gamburdo at the secret Falange dinner in San Hermano. Remember it? I want about six microfilm negatives of each shot."

"Give them to me with your report, Lieutenant."

The young officer accepted the papers, saluted smartly, and left.

"There's one place in Havana where I can get that picture, Jaime," Hall said. "The Spanish Embassy has a complete file of the Spanish Arriba, and I'll stake my life on that picture of Ansaldo's being in that file."

"So?"

"Listen, Jaime, I don't know if I'll have to examine that file. I won't know until some time tomorrow morning. There's an outside chance that old man Nazario has the Arriba we need in his collection at the University. But please, Jaime, if I do have to go through the files on Oficios Street, I don't want any of your excellent boys from Oriente Province giving me a nice case of Cuban lead poisoning."

Lobo, who had opened his collar and draped his long feet over his desk, stopped smiling. He put his feet on the floor, buttoned the tunic collar. "You don't understand," he said, speaking to Hall in Spanish for the first time that evening. "In there, with the foolish movies, I make foolish sayings. At the circus Lobo becomes the clown. But please remember, Mateo, that I am a Latin American. My own people were driven out of Spain by the spiritual forefathers of the Falange. I know what will happen to Latin America if the Falange crowd wins out anywhere."

"I know you do, Jaime."

"I'm not always the playboy, Mateo. I know what my chief means to the little nations of the Caribbean. I know what Don Anibal means to every country south of Miami. I love Don Anibal. I love you because you love my chief and my people and Don Anibal. Claro?"

"Thanks, Jaime. Then you'll tell your men I'm O.K.?"

"On the contrary, my friend. I must tell them much more than that."

"Thanks. I'll try not to make any trouble. No international incidents."

"If you don't have to shoot." Lobo became gay again. "Ay, SeÑor Ortiz Tinoco," he sighed, "you might want to shoot, but you are without a shooter to shoot with. My men are too good for you. They stole your gun."

"They are very good men, my general."

"They have a good chief. But look, friend, in this drawer. I have a treasure for you." He emptied the contents of a canvas bag on the desk. "Ay, SeÑor Ortiz Tinoco, when I relieved Jefe Villanueva of his super-production, I also took his gun. Such a wonderful little Swiss automatic, built to be carried in a lady's purse or a horse's—ear. And such a dainty Spanish leather shoulder holster. You would be a fool not to accept this outfit in return for your gigantic cannon."

Hall took off his jacket. "It's a deal," he said. "Help me get the holster on."

"Where are you going when you get the picture—if you get it, Mateo?"

"Caracas. Someone is meeting me there."

The General laughed. "Caracas? Ay, we'll get you back to Caracas in style, chico." He opened his cigar box, held it out in front of Hall. "By the way, Mateo," he said, "I never asked you before. Are you a Red?"

"No. I'm a Red, White and Blue Kid. Why?"

"Your government. Your embassy in San Hermano was sure that Pepe Stalin was paying for your rice and beans. They asked your Embassy here to check on you with me."

"What did you tell them?"

"Naturally, I told them that you were an agent. Si, seÑor! I told them that you were a triple agent: mornings for the Kuomintang, afternoons for the Grand Llama of Tibet, and evenings for the Protocols of Zion. You'd better be careful when you get back to New York."

"You bastard!"

"Where are you going now? Me, I'm going right back to that party. I promised a certain Vassar female, in my halting English, that I would be back. Can I drop you anywhere?"

"I'm going to the Casa de la Cultura."

"Good. But listen, Mateo, give me at least five hours' notice if you decide to do any scholarly research on Oficios Street, eh? VÁmonos."