Alice smiled, in astonishment rather than humor. “You’ve got to be kidding.” He looked at her, making a show of being confused by her interruption. “Joel, it’s a cocaine factory.”

“That’s kind of a leap, Alice.”

“No, it isn’t. I’ve seen it on TV. The cocaine’s grown and harvested in the jungle, then they fly it out from illegal airstrips. That open-sided building is where they process it. And that’s probably a shipment going out.”

He stared at her, as if trying but failing to find an argument, and finally said, “Okay, maybe you’re right. But that doesn’t mean they won’t help us.” Her mouth dropped open in disbelief. “Look, we’ll let them finish what they’re doing, let things calm down. Once the shipment’s gone, if it really is a shipment, then we’ll see how it looks.”

Both Chris and Nick nodded in agreement.

Alice looked at Tom. He checked his watch and said, “We’re already cutting it close if we still want to get back to the camp in daylight, but we can wait half an hour, see what happens.”

Joel looked pleased and said, “So you agree it’s worth a shot?”

“No, I think you’re insane.”

“So why are you willing to wait?”

Tom shrugged. “In the unlikely event they all clear out and leave a radio or something behind. Unlikely, but worth another half hour.”

“You’re both wrong, but we’ll retreat a little way for half an hour, then see how the ground lies.”

Alice didn’t respond but also didn’t wait, heading back into deeper cover away from the camp. They all followed, but even where they settled, they could still hear the noise of the generator and the shouts and talk and very occasional laughter in the camp.

The half hour was almost up when quite abruptly the camp seemed to fall silent. Even the generator shut off, but the talking stopped so suddenly that Tom became nervous, fearing they’d been spotted and were about to be ambushed.

Joel apparently didn’t share his worries because he said, “Come on, Chris, we’ll go and check out what’s going on.”

Chris nodded and looked at Tom as he said, “We’re gonna get out of here. Fortune favors the brave.”

They set off, and once the three of them were left, Nick shook his head and said to Tom, “You think you have all the answers, don’t you? You think you’re so cool.”

Tom didn’t like his tone, nor the suggestion that maybe Tom had been the topic of conversation among Joel and his cronies, and his voice had a challenge in it as he said, “Do we know each other?”

Nick, who seemed combative most of the time, looked unsure how to deal with Tom’s hostility, and in the end he only said, “He’ll prove you wrong.”