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THE GOVERNOR

conversation was being taped, I wanted my disagreement – and the governor's name – to be on record.

'With all due respect, Colonel Montesinos, you and I are friends and I respect you a lot, but you must look at it from my point of view. I am an inmate here and you are asking me to take drugs in front of you. You are the governor of the whole prison. I could get in a lot of trouble for that. If you are serious, then would you please go first?'

I tried to phrase this as politely as possible, bowing my head as I spoke, so as not to offend him, but it didn't work. The girls stared at me like I was crazy and the governor looked like he was ready to explode; however, not wanting to cause a scene in front of the company, he produced a note from his pocket and rolled it up, then bent forward over the table. Just as he was about to sniff one of the lines he stopped, sat back and said.

'What's this, Thomas? That's not how you make lines. Here, give me the stuff. And why are there only three lines when there are four of us?'

The governor pulled out an American Express card and scraped the cocaine from my table onto a plastic CD cover, then added more from the bag. In a matter of seconds, he had four massive, perfectly parallel lines of cocaine laid out on the smooth surface of the CD case. Not even Jack could have made them better; you had to go to university for that.

The governor bent forward and took one of the lines, half in each nostril, like a true professional, then sat down in the chair for a minute with his head tilted back, as though he was concentrating.

'Not bad. A bit too much acetone, maybe. But not bad, Thomas. Primera clase. Well done, my friend.' He handed the note to one of the girls and the CD case went around and finally came to me. As I sniffed back my line, I kept an eye on the door, half-expecting it to be knocked down by a tactical response team and the two girls to pull out undercover police badges. But nothing happened. I finally relaxed and even allowed a little laugh to escape. It had all been in my imagination.

'Thomas, you are acting very strangely tonight. What's wrong, my friend?'

'I'm just tired, I guess,' I said.

The girls tipped back their whiskies and made a few trilling noises as the coke hit home. I sighed. The danger had passed, but it was still going to be a long and interesting night.