made. I can assure you my government will do everything in its power . . .”
Again, the menacing lowering of the voice. “And I can assure you that not one additional Chinese worker, not one more Chinese soldier, will set foot in Haiti until your promise is fulfilled. It was by my show of good faith there are any here now. I should have waited until your part of the bargain was complete. Do you understand me?”
“Perfectly, Mr. President. But the, er, material already . . . ?”
“They can and will be removed!”
Without another word, duPaar stood, immediately flanked by the two uniformed bodyguards. He turned and stalked from the restaurant. It had definitely been one of the most bizarre evenings of Diem’s diplomatic life. But then, Diem had been spared dealings with North Korea’s Kim Jong Il, who certainly had a number of things in common with Haiti’s leader. Both lived sumptuously while their people starved. Both imagined they were well loved. They shared another trait: lunacy.
Port-au-Prince International Airport
(Formerly François Duvalier International Airport)
Thirty minutes later
Jerome Place had the specially modified cell phone hidden under the mangoes. Even at this hour at night, no one questioned the man in the ragged clothes who was wandering the airport’s perimeter road in an effort to sell his produce. Many such vendors had no homes, lived wherever they fell asleep.
Not Jerome. Six years ago, he had joined twenty-some other people in a voyage to America on a craft consisting of little more than boards tied across worn-out truck inner tubes and propelled by oars and a ragged sail. Few, if any, could swim.
The first day, before they even reached the Turks and Caicos Islands, two women and one of their infants had gone overboard. There had been nothing anyone could do as they sunk below the foaming waves. By the time the makeshift craft had reached the southern Bahamas, the slot between Great Exuma and Long Island, the fresh water had run out. The survivors argued: was it better to put ashore and be sent home by the Bahamian government or continue and risk death by thirst? A vote was taken.
Dehydration won over repatriation.
The third night three people died and two more simply were not present at dawn.
They were in the tongue of the ocean, that deep Atlantic trench off the eastern shore of Andros, when the high winds of a squall broke the makeshift craft apart. Fortunately for those few who had managed to somehow stay afloat, a cutter from the United States Navy Experimental Base on southern Andros happened to be in the area and fished the seven survivors from the water more dead than alive.
Refugees picked up at sea were routinely returned to their port of origin, particularly those obviously headed for illegal entry into the United States.
Not Jerome.
To his surprise, he was separated from his comrades and packed onto a helicopter that landed on a military base he guessed was somewhere in Florida. He also guessed, correctly, that this was because he was the only survivor who could both speak and read English, a language he had studied hard during the few years he had been allowed to attend the small Catholic school in his native village before his father determined work in the little family plot was more important.
Jerome’s new friends, the Americans, fitted him with new clothes, fed him and tutored him in basic computer skills, something Jerome doubted he could use in a country too poor to buy such equipment should he return home. He need not have worried. Two weeks later, he was in Port-au-Prince, equipped with a digital camera with night-vision lens, a small computer with a solar recharging unit and a thousand dollars American, more cash than a Haitian peasant would see in several lifetimes.
And promise of more. All he had to do was find a reason to hang around the airport, take and transmit pictures of arriving foreign passengers.
That was what he was doing tonight, taking
Again, the menacing lowering of the voice. “And I can assure you that not one additional Chinese worker, not one more Chinese soldier, will set foot in Haiti until your promise is fulfilled. It was by my show of good faith there are any here now. I should have waited until your part of the bargain was complete. Do you understand me?”
“Perfectly, Mr. President. But the, er, material already . . . ?”
“They can and will be removed!”
Without another word, duPaar stood, immediately flanked by the two uniformed bodyguards. He turned and stalked from the restaurant. It had definitely been one of the most bizarre evenings of Diem’s diplomatic life. But then, Diem had been spared dealings with North Korea’s Kim Jong Il, who certainly had a number of things in common with Haiti’s leader. Both lived sumptuously while their people starved. Both imagined they were well loved. They shared another trait: lunacy.
Port-au-Prince International Airport
(Formerly François Duvalier International Airport)
Thirty minutes later
Jerome Place had the specially modified cell phone hidden under the mangoes. Even at this hour at night, no one questioned the man in the ragged clothes who was wandering the airport’s perimeter road in an effort to sell his produce. Many such vendors had no homes, lived wherever they fell asleep.
Not Jerome. Six years ago, he had joined twenty-some other people in a voyage to America on a craft consisting of little more than boards tied across worn-out truck inner tubes and propelled by oars and a ragged sail. Few, if any, could swim.
The first day, before they even reached the Turks and Caicos Islands, two women and one of their infants had gone overboard. There had been nothing anyone could do as they sunk below the foaming waves. By the time the makeshift craft had reached the southern Bahamas, the slot between Great Exuma and Long Island, the fresh water had run out. The survivors argued: was it better to put ashore and be sent home by the Bahamian government or continue and risk death by thirst? A vote was taken.
Dehydration won over repatriation.
The third night three people died and two more simply were not present at dawn.
They were in the tongue of the ocean, that deep Atlantic trench off the eastern shore of Andros, when the high winds of a squall broke the makeshift craft apart. Fortunately for those few who had managed to somehow stay afloat, a cutter from the United States Navy Experimental Base on southern Andros happened to be in the area and fished the seven survivors from the water more dead than alive.
Refugees picked up at sea were routinely returned to their port of origin, particularly those obviously headed for illegal entry into the United States.
Not Jerome.
To his surprise, he was separated from his comrades and packed onto a helicopter that landed on a military base he guessed was somewhere in Florida. He also guessed, correctly, that this was because he was the only survivor who could both speak and read English, a language he had studied hard during the few years he had been allowed to attend the small Catholic school in his native village before his father determined work in the little family plot was more important.
Jerome’s new friends, the Americans, fitted him with new clothes, fed him and tutored him in basic computer skills, something Jerome doubted he could use in a country too poor to buy such equipment should he return home. He need not have worried. Two weeks later, he was in Port-au-Prince, equipped with a digital camera with night-vision lens, a small computer with a solar recharging unit and a thousand dollars American, more cash than a Haitian peasant would see in several lifetimes.
And promise of more. All he had to do was find a reason to hang around the airport, take and transmit pictures of arriving foreign passengers.
That was what he was doing tonight, taking
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