He was staring straight up at a single white cloud. It was pear-shaped and reminded him of the cowled Franciscan priest who had administered el Conejo Grande's childhood church in San Juan de Gracia. Now, out of the past, the padre floated over the turquoise mirror-like water surrounding Spanish Galleon Cay.

It was infernally hot. He was sweating from the heat of the sun, the engine idling only a few feet from his head, and unadulterated fear.

For courage, Flores clung to the cloud drifting high above. It was a divine manifestation, he was certain, of Padre Juan Pedro, dead for forty years. Under the cowl the padre's bulbous nose was running, just as in real life.

Flores, as a clumsy adolescent, had once tried to be an altar boy. The padre had dismissed him the first Sunday: He had burned a hole in the altar cloth trying to light the tapers. The priest above seemed to be scowling, as if he remembered this.

Bless me, Padre, for I have sinned.... It has been forty years since my last Confession....

Rico Lomas, in the briefest of orange swimming trunks, prodded him with a toe. "El Conejo Grande," he said in warning, "don't you die of fear!" He turned. "Alejandro!"

Alejandro moved aft, bent down, grabbed Flores's arms, and hoisted him to a seat.

With glazed eyes el Conejo Grande looked around. To his amazement he found that they were floating fifty feet off a white-sand beach, bordered with swinging palms. A rubber life raft bobbed astern.

The beach was crowded with coqueros and traficantes he had known for years. When he appeared from below the gunwales, they began to cheer and laugh.

A barbecue was flaming, with frajitos on the fire. In a hole filled with ice rested a keg of Carta Blanca beer. The band was playing a folk song he remembered from the llanos, of unrequited love between a campesino and the daughter of a landowner. Smoke from the brutos everyone was smoking drifted on the breeze.

"What is this, don Señor Lomas?" Flores demanded shakily. "What are you going to do?"

"We are having a court-martial"—Lomas beamed—"like on a Navy ship." He beckoned, and a half dozen traficantes waded to the boat.

As they lined the gunwale, looking in, Lomas cut his bonds. Flores recognized the knife with its jaguar-tooth handle; el Viejo had carried it in long gone, better days.

Lomas spoke to them. "El Conejo Grande cannot shoot straight from a motor scooter. He cannot shoot straight from a boat. He says Alejandro moved the Vespa, he says Alejandro rocked the boat."

"Es verdad!" croaked Flores. "He jerked the scooter, he rocked the boat! Also, it is rough in the ocean, outside of Masthead Cay!"

"Alejandro?" asked Rico pleasantly. "It was rough?"

Alejandro dragged on a bruto and exhaled a cloud of smoke. "Smooth as the cheek of a child, señor. Smooth as a virgin's ass."