François ‘Papa Doc’ Duvalier, the leader of Haiti, who had made himself President For Life two years ago, had never had a good relationship with the Dominican Republic or the United States, who he thought lavished an unfair amount of attention—and financial aid—on his next-door neighbour.

‘I meant Castro. We still owe Papa Doc for supporting the trade embargo,’ Warren said, adding ‘even if he is a nutjob tinpot’ under his breath.

There was another rustle in the trees. This time Bennett’s torch lit up a string of hard faces stepping out of the jungle. Six men, all in the green khaki uniforms of the Tonton Macoute—Duvalier’s secret police and personal death squad. Five of the men carried Kalashnikovs, their hands tight round the grips and barrels of their rifles. The sixth man held a thick rope that pulled another prisoner behind him. This man was white, covered in roughly twice as many bruises as Bennett had seen on the Haitian being guarded in the cave, and filthy with dirt. He looked like he’d been dragged all the way from Port-au-Prince.

The Macoutes walked straight past Bennett and Warren, not even bothering to give them the most cursory of glances.

Inside the cave the atmosphere immediately changed from hot and anxious to hot and tense. The CIA agents kept their eyes on the Macoutes, and they kept theirs on the man kneeling on the floor. Even in his drugged state he seemed to sense the men around him stiffen, and recognised the new arrivals as they came to a halt in the glow of the torches. His eyes bulged with fear and he tried to scrabble away from them, but his body was too weak.

Bennett wasn’t supposed to know who the CIA’s prisoner was, but she did. He was Guillaume Asselin, a minor deputy of Clément Barbot, the ex-head of the Tonton Macoute. Barbot had briefly assumed power in Haiti after Duvalier suffered a massive heart attack in 1959. When Duvalier had recovered and reclaimed the presidency, he accused Barbot of plotting to overthrow him, and had the Macoutes execute their leader. Duvalier’s memory was long and murderous, and seven years later he was still hunting down Barbot’s associates.

One of the Americans broke from the semicircle that had formed around Asselin and stepped forward towards the Macoutes. He was Jay Gibson, currently the most senior US intelligence officer on Hispaniola. Like the other agents, he was struggling with the heat the cave had trapped from the day, but he refused to wipe the sweat off his forehead or pull at the shirt that was stuck to his chest and back.