Alex undressed quickly and got into bed, but suddenly he wasn’t tired. He lay in the darkness, listening to the waves breaking against the sand. He could see thousands of stars through the open window. He had never realized there were so many of them, nor that they could shine so bright. Turner and Troy returned to their room about half an hour later. He heard them talking in low voices but couldn’t make out what they said. He pulled the sheet over his head and forced himself to sleep.
The first thing he saw when he woke up the next morning was a note pushed under his door. He got out of bed and picked it up. It was written in block capitals.
GONE FOR A WALK. THOUGHT YOU NEEDED A REST. WE’LL CATCH UP WITH YOU LATER. MOM XXX.
Alex tore the note in half-and then in half again. He scattered the pieces in the wastepaper basket and went out to breakfast. It occurred to him that it was a strange set of parents who would walk off, leaving their son behind, but he supposed there were probably plenty of families, with nannies and au pairs, who often did the same. He spent the morning on the beach, reading. There were some other boys of about his own age playing in the sea and he thought of joining them. But they didn’t speak English and seemed too self-contained. At eleven o’clock, his “parents” still hadn’t returned. Suddenly Alex was fed up, sitting there on his own in the grounds of the hotel. He was on an island on the other side of the world. He might as well see some of it! He got dressed and set off into town.
The heat struck him the moment he stepped outside the grounds of the hotel. The road curved inland, away from the sea, following a line of scrubland on one side and what looked like a tobacco plantation-a mass of fat, green leaves rising to chest height-on the other. The landscape was flat but there was no breeze coming in from the sea. The air was heavy and still. Alex was soon sweating and had to swat at the flies that seemed determined to follow him every step of the way. A few buildings, sun-bleached wood and corrugated iron, sprang up around him. A fly buzzed in his ear. He beat it away.
It took him twenty minutes to reach Puerto Madre, a fishing village that had grown into a dense and cluttered town. The buildings were an amazing jumble of different styles; rickety wooden shops, marble and brick houses, huge stone churches. Everything had been beaten down and baked by the sun-and sunlight was everywhere; in the dust, in the vivid colours, in the smells of spice and overripe fruit.
The noise was deafening. Radio music-jazz and salsa-blasted out of open windows. Extraordinary American cars, vintage Chevrolets and Studebakers like brilliantly coloured toys, jammed the streets, their horns blaring as they tried to make their way past horses and carts, motorized rickshaws, cigarette sellers and shoe-shine boys. Old men in vests sat outside the cafes blinking in the sunlight. Women in tight-fitting dresses stood languidly in the doorways. Alex had never been anywhere louder or dirtier or more alive.
Somehow he found himself in the main square with a great statue at the centre; a revolutionary soldier with a rifle at his side and a grenade hanging from his belt. There must have been at least a hundred market stalls jammed into the square, selling fruit and vegetables, coffee beans, souvenirs, old books and T-shirts. And everywhere there were crowds, strolling in and out of the dollar shops and the ice-cream parlours, sitting at tables beneath sweeping colonnades, queuing up in the fast food restaurants and the paladares-tiny restaurants located inside private houses.
There was a street sign bolted to a wall. It read: PLAZA DE FRATERNIDAD. Alex had enough Spanish to translate that. Brotherhood Square. He somehow doubted that he would find much brotherhood here. A fat man in an old and dirty linen suit suddenly lurched up to him.
“You want cigars? The best Havana cigars. But at cheap, cheap price.”
“Hey, amigo. I sell you a T-shirt…”
“Muchacho! You bring your parents to my bar…”
Before he knew it, he was surrounded. Alex realized how much he must stand out in this crowd of dark, tropical people milling about in their brightly coloured shirts and straw hats. He was hot and thirsty. He looked around him for somewhere to get a drink.
And that was when he saw Turner and Troy. The two special agents were sitting at a wrought iron table in front of one of the smarter restaurants, shaded by a great vine that sprawled and tumbled over the pockmarked wall. A neon sign hung over them, advertising Montecristo cigars. They were with a man, an islander, obviously deep in conversation. All three of them had drinks. Alex moved towards them, wondering if it would be possible to hear what they were saying.
The man they were talking to looked about seventy years old and was dressed in a dark shirt, loose trousers and a beret. He was smoking a cigarette which seemed to have been pushed through his lips dragging the skin with it. His face, arms and neck were sun-beaten and withered. But as he drew closer, Alex saw the light and the strength in his eyes. Troy said something and the man laughed, picked up his glass with a hand that was all bone and threw back the contents in one. He wiped the back of his hand across his mouth, said something and walked away. Alex had arrived just too late to eavesdrop on the conversation. He decided to make himself known.
“Alex!” As ever, Troy didn’t look glad to see him.
“Hi, Mom.” Alex sat down without being invited. “Any chance of a drink?”
“What are you doing here?” Turner asked. Once again his mouth was a straight line. His eyes were empty. “We told you to stay at the hotel.”
“I thought this was meant to be a family holiday,” Alex said. “And anyway, I finished searching the hotel this morning. There aren’t any nuclear weapons there, in case you were wondering…”
Turner stared. Troy looked around nervously. “Keep your voice down!” she snapped, as if anyone could hear him in the din of the square.
“You lied to me,” Alex said. “Whatever the reason you’re here, you’re not just spying on General Sarov. Why don’t you tell me what this is really about?”
There was a long silence.
“What do you want to drink?” Troy asked.
Alex glanced down at Troy ’s glass. It contained a pale yellow liquid that looked good. “What have you got?” he asked.
“A mojito. It’s a local speciality. A mixture of rum, fresh lemon juice, crushed ice, soda and mint leaves.”
“That sounds fine. I’ll have the same. Without the rum.”
Turner called a waiter over and spoke briefly in Spanish. The waiter nodded and hurried away.
Meanwhile, Troy had come to a decision. “All right, Alex,” she said. “We’ll tell you what you want to know-”
“That’s against orders!” Turner interrupted.
Troy looked angrily at him. “What choice do we have? Alex obviously knows about the Game Boy.”
“The Geiger counter,” Alex said.
Troy nodded. “Yes, Alex, that’s what it is. And it’s the reason why we’re here.” She lifted her own drink and took a sip. “We didn’t want you to know this because we didn’t want to frighten you.”
“That’s very kind of you.”
“We were ordered not to!” She scowled. “But… all right, since you know so much, you might as well know the rest of it. We believe there’s a nuclear device hidden on this island.”
“General Sarov…? You think he’s got a nuclear bomb?”
“We shouldn’t be doing this,” Turner muttered.
But this time Troy ignored him. “Something is happening, here, on Skeleton Key,” she went on. “We don’t know what it is, but if you want the truth, it actually frightens us. In a few days’ time, Boris Kiriyenko, the Russian president, is arriving for a two-week vacation. That’s not such a big deal. He knew Sarov a long time ago. They were kids together. And it’s not as if the Russians are our enemies any more.”