The Night Manager полностью

"The Canal's a one-way street. Down in the mornings. Up in the afternoons. Or is it t'other way round?"

A tall girl with long brown hair walked in and without a word to anybody swept her skirts under her and sat herself primly before a computer screen as if she were about to play the harpsichord.

"It varies," Eccles said.

"Nothing to stop her turning tail and pissing off to Caracas, I suppose," Denham continued as his finger prodded the Lombardy into the Canal. "Sorry, Priscilla. Or up the road to Costa Rica or wherever. Or down this way and hit Colombia from the western side, long as the cartels can guarantee a safe harbour. They can guarantee most things. But we're still thinking Buenaventura, because you told us to. Hence the lines on my nice map."

"There's a fleet of army lorries lined up in Buenaventura to receive them," Burr said.

"Not confirmed," said Eccles.

"It bloody well is," said Burr, without lifting his voice in the least. "We had it from Strelski's late source via Moranti, plus there's independent corroboration from satellite photographs of lorries moving down the road."

"Lorries move up and down that road all the time," said Eccles. And stretched both arms above his head as if Burr's presence were draining him of energy. "Anyway, Strelski's late source is discredited. There's a serious school of thought says he was full of shit from the start. All these snitches fabricate. They think it'll earn them more remission."

"Nicky," Burr said to Denham's back.

Denham was pushing the Lombardy into the Gulf of Panama.

"Leonard," he said.

"Are we boarding her? Are we pulling her in?"

"You mean, are the Americans?"

"Whoever. Yes or no?"

Shaking his head at Burr's obduracy, Eccles posted yet another telegram ostentatiously into a tray. The girl at the computer had tucked her hair behind her ears and was pressing keys. Burr could not see her screen. The tip of her tongue had appeared between her teeth.

"Yes, well, that's the bugger, you see, Leonard," said Denham, all enthusiasm again. "Sorry, Priscilla. For the Americans ― thank God ― not for us. If the Lombardy hugs the coast" ― his striped arm made a bowler's arc until it reached a route that followed the complex coastline between the Gulf of Panama and Buenaventura ― "then, so far as we can see, she's got the Americans by the proverbial short-and-curlies. The Lombardy will then be sailing straight from Panamanian national waters into Colombian national waters, you see, so the poor old Americans won't get a look in."

"Why not arrest her in Panamanian waters? The Americans are all over Panama. They own the bloody place, or think they do."

"Not so at all, I'm afraid. If they're going to pounce on the Lombardy with all guns blazing, they'll need to sail in behind the Panamanian Navy. Don't laugh."

"It was Eccles laughing, not me."

"And in order to get the Panamanians to the starting line, they’ve got to prove that the Lombardy has committed a crime under Panamanian law. She hasn't. She's in transit from Curaçao and on her way to Colombia."

"But she's stuffed with illegal bloody guns!"

"So you say. Or your source does. And of course one terribly hopes you're right. Or he, she or it is, rather. But the Lombardy wishes the Pans no ill and she also happens to be Pan registered. And the Pans are frightfully reluctant to be seen providing flags of convenience and then inviting the Americans to tear them down. Very hard, in fact, to persuade them to do anything at the moment. Post-Noriega tristis, I'm afraid. Sorry, Priscilla. Sullen hatred is more like it. Nursing one very wounded national pride."

Burr was standing. Eccles was watching him dangerously, Like a policeman who has spotted trouble. Denham must have bade him stand, but he had taken refuge in the map. The girl Priscilla had stopped pressing keys.

"All right, hit her in Colombian waters!" Burr almost shouted, jabbing a finger at the coastline north of Buenaventura. "Lean on the Colombian government. We're helping them clean up their shop, aren't we? Rid themselves of curse of the cocaine cartels? Busting their dope laboratories for them?" His voice slipped a little. Or perhaps it had slipped a lot and he only heard a little. "The Colombian government is not going to be exactly overjoyed to see weapons pouring into Buenaventura to equip the cartels' new army. I mean, have we forgotten everything we talked about, Nicky? Has yesterday been declared a top-secret area or something? Tell me there's some logic in this somewhere."

"If you think you can separate the Colombian government from the cartels, you're living in cloud-cuckoo-land," Denham retorted, with more steel than he seemed to possess. "If you think you can separate the cocaine economy from the economies of Latin America, you're barking."

"Wanking," Eccles corrected him, with no apology to Priscilla.