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I ever die during an op, it won’t be because I was too lazy to prepare properly.
    Manny showed up at dinnertime. I saw the black S-class round the corner on Eisenhower and pull up in front of the condo. The bodyguard got out first. He spent a moment scanning the street for trouble, but failed to spot it eating a cheeseburger behind the reflective plate glass of the Jollibee. When he was satisfied, he opened Manny’s door, his eyes still periodically roaming the street. Manny got out and the two of them walked inside. Two uniformed guards in front of the building nodded to Manny as he went past, and I realized he was well known to them. Getting to him inside, while offering certain advantages, would obviously pose a challenge. We would have to keep watching for a better opportunity.
    I left the Jollibee and entered the shopping mall. I called Dox from a prepaid cell phone I had bought with cash. Dox was also using a prepaid. He had his own GSM unit, but I’d told him to keep it switched off while we were operational. There are ways of tracking a cell phone, and I didn’t know who might have had Dox’s number.
    “He’s here,” I told him. “The condominium in Greenhills.”
    “I know. I’m watching the little arrow moving around the computer. I saw the car pull up ten minutes ago. Anything interesting?”
    “There’s a lot of security at the building. We’re going to need to watch him some more.”
    “Roger that.”
    “What’s the earliest he’s left the building so far?”
    “Hang on a minute.” I heard the sound of the keyboard. “Oh-seven-hundred. Seems like he’s typically on his way by oh-eight-hundred.”
    “All right. I’m leaving. I’ll come back in the morning. I’ve seen him arrive. Maybe I’ll learn something watching him go out.”
    I returned at just before seven the next morning. It was Sunday. I ate at the Jollibee again. The morning crew was new. Even if they’d been the same as the previous afternoon, I doubted that they would have noticed me. When I want to, I have a way of just being part of the scenery.
    Manny came out forty-five minutes later. He was with a pretty Filipina and a boy of about seven or eight who looked to be of mixed heritage. Manny was wearing dark trousers and a cream-colored silk shirt; the woman, dark-skinned, petite, showed a nice figure in a yellow floral dress. The little boy was wearing a blue blazer and khaki pants. He was holding Manny’s hand, and in the instant my mind put all the pieces together in some sort of preconscious shorthand, I realized, He’s just happy to be with his daddy, and was surprised at the acuteness of the pang that accompanied the thought.
    They got into the back of the Benz and I watched as it pulled away from the curb. My cell phone rang. It was Dox.
    “He’s moving,” he said.
    “I know. I’m watching.”
    “What do you see?”
    I paused, then said, “He’s not staying at the hotel because he’s got a family here in Greenhills. A woman and a son.”
    “How do you know?”
    “I just saw them all together. From the way they’re dressed on a Sunday morning, I’d say they’re on their way to church. And it makes sense. The file says Manny has a family back in Johannesburg. My guess is that somewhere along the line, say seven, eightyears ago from the apparent age of the boy, Manny knocked up a Filipina. That’s why he’s been coming out here so regularly and for so long. It’s not business, or at least it’s not just business. He keeps a room at the hotel so his Johannesburg wife doesn’t get wise, and he goes back there once or twice a day. Think about the times he shows up at the hotel—morning and afternoon in South Africa. Probably calls home from the room so she can see the caller ID readout.”
    “I thought old Manny was of the Israeli persuasion. When I was growing up, I didn’t go to church too often, but I don’t remember seeing a whole lot of Jews there at the time.”
    I thought for a moment, then