Chahda pulled off the road into a patch of nipa palms, went through the palms, and parked behind a feathery thicket of bamboo. "We walk to shack," he said. He took a bolo from under the rear seat of the jeep and tucked it into his belt.
The Hindu boy led them a hundred yards down the road, then turned off onto a path. In a moment he pointed.
Ahead, alone in a clearing, was a typical nipa hut. It was built on stilts in the traditional Filipino way, and there was room underneath the supporting posts for a tall man to stand upright. The house itself was square, with walls of woven thatch made from the nipa palm. The roof was pyramidal, heavily thatched with layer after layer of straw. The floor was of split bamboo, a single layer of springy bamboo strips as wide as a man's thumb laid across a framing of whole bamboo supports.
Except that it allowed mosquitoes to roam in and out and gave no bar to lizards or snakes, it was ideal for the climate. The openwork floor allowed the breezes to circulate through the whole house. Also, housekeeping was simple. Dust couldn't gather. It just fell through the floor.
Filipinos had lived in houses like this for centuries, but the influence of Western civilization was visible in the form of electric lights. It was visible in another way at this particular nipa hut, too. Next to it was a shiny limousine, the property of Irineo Lazada.
Chahda whispered, "We get close. Be very quiet and follow me."
It was dark enough. Chahda led the way, and Rick and Scotty followed. There was little cover, but there was no guard outside the house. Apparently Lazada and Nast felt quite safe. They did not know how effectively Chahda had shadowed them.
Chahda made his way slowly until they were beside the big limousine. There was a murmur of voices from above, Lazada's predominating.
Rick swallowed hard as Chahda left the limousine and and walked right under the hut, but he and Scotty followed, scarcely daring to breathe. It was dark and he almost knocked over a stack of wooden boxes. Then, under the hut, there was light.
Rick had not realized that the bamboo floor was nothing more than a latticework of bamboo strips. He could look right up between them and see the occupants of the room!