by Lex Lander
‘Right, sir.’
‘The Point?’ I queried. ‘What is it and why are we going there?’
‘A place where no eavesdroppers lurk, dear boy. For your final briefing.’
So we went to ‘the Point,’ or to accord it its full title, Europa Point, the European mainland equivalent to England’s Land’s End.
‘Your lady love phoned me just before I came to collect you,’ Toby said as we settled on a bench with an outlook across the Strait of Gibraltar.
‘Linda? Why was that?’
‘Heard about you on local radio. She was quite worried. Panicky almost.’ He nipped his nostrils thoughtfully. ‘Seems … fond of you. Doesn’t say much for her taste.’
I crossed my legs, contemplated the rumpled pants of my rented monkey suit. My night in a police cell had been hard on them.
‘Linda Pridham is the most independent-minded representative of her sex I’ve ever come across. If she’s fond of me it’s because I’m her meal ticket at the moment. As soon as she’s brought Irazola’s brat into the world she’ll latch onto a new sugar daddy. A billionaire at least.’
Tony was amused. ‘How cynical you’ve become of late.’
We were alone with the lighthouse and a pair of twelve-pounder guns mutely rusting away on their circular emplacements. Across the strait was Africa, rising from the horizon on a bed of haze, brooding and mysterious, the higher peaks lost in a halo of cloud. Nearer, a white-hulled ferry was sliding across the sparkling water, heading into the Spanish port of Algeciras.
Toby, with his customary foresight, had thought to bring binoculars.
‘You can see Ceuta,’ he announced after sweeping the panorama.
‘Ceuta? You mean that itty-bitty piece of Spain over in Morocco?’
‘Spain’s equivalent to Gibraltar. No sign of them ever giving that up.’
‘You want me to go over there and see what I can do?’
He grinned without taking the glasses from his eyes. The strong breeze coming off the sea whipped his thinning locks into a frenzy and he brushed at them impatiently, tutting with annoyance.
‘Coming to the point of coming to the Point,’ he said, chuckling discreetly at his own whimsy and undeterred by my sigh. ‘Let’s work out your next step.’
‘Before we do, you’ll be pleased to learn that I’m meeting Vella and his cronies this evening, at his home.’
Toby lowered the binoculars. ‘Good. And to further give credit, by taking Vella’s side in last night’s rumpus you’ll have established your credentials with him. You’ll see – from now on you’ll be able to do no wrong.’
‘Do you imagine,’ I said, ‘I didn’t think of that?’
He gave me a slow stare before breaking into a guffaw. ‘Oh, André, when will I stop underestimating you? There I was, deluding myself you’re acting out of conscience or a sense of fair play, when all the time you’re simply calculating the odds. You’re better versed in the art of guile than I gave you credit for.’
Let him go on thinking so. It might even be true. The real truth was that I even didn’t know myself half the time.
‘Tell me, what did you do after leaving MI6? Before you bought the bar.’
It was a question I was often asked. My replies varied, but were never truthful.
‘I was in the waste disposal business.’
‘Is there money in it?’
‘Sure. Millions to be made.’
‘Really.’ More nods, contemplative now, as if he were weighing up a career move. ‘I would never have guessed it.’
Before he started digging I reminded him why we were here.
‘Quite so. So you’re to meet up with Vella tonight. By then I shall be gone, of course. Any questions on the reporting procedure?’
‘No, all is clear. All communications through Major Ribble at the Governor’s office, for his and the Governor’s ears only. All reports to be verbal, unless the amount of detail necessitates an using the overnight bag, in which case coded to OM/G4 with a priority sticker. No emails. No faxes. No pigeons. Routine check-in every Wednesday night and Saturday night at 22.00 hours.
‘The same Major Ribble will act as my personal quartermaster,’ I continued. ‘Notably for the supply of the … er … explosives. They’ll come from the Base, I suppose. I report to him tomorrow morning, eight am. sharp, for my bomb-making tutorial. So far, so correct?’
‘Go on.’
‘In case of emergency my contact will be Chief Superintendent Mascarenhas at Irish Town Police Headquarters. In all cases my bogus passport is the recognised form of identification coupled with the codeword “Sideshow”. If I have to go to ground in a hurry and can’t make contact with Mascarenhas, I go to 35, Lime Kiln Terrace and ask for Tommy. Show my passport for identification, quote codeword “Sideshow blown.”’ I flicked a glance at the inscrutable profile beside me. ‘Have I left anything out?’
‘You have not,’ he said, without looking at me. ‘I don’t suppose you’re willing to give me a preview of the method.’
‘You suppose correctly, Toby, old pal.’
Fact was, I hadn’t firmed up any ideas yet, though a germ of one was already scurrying around inside my head, like a hamster on a treadmill.
‘Toby … about my masquerade as a bomber. You and the bigwigs back home do realise that I may actually have to plant a bomb or two in the course of duty. Have you thought about that?
‘Then plant with discretion, dear boy.’
‘My God,’ I said, drawing the words out. ‘You lot really don’t care a bent cent, do you?’
‘Do you?’
Oddly, I did a bit, though I would never be able to convince him of it.
The ferry slipped from sight behind the curve of the headland, leaving the sea empty, molten silver where the sun struck it. A man and a woman, casually dressed in bulky sweaters and jeans were wandering past us down the slope towards the cliff edge. Something about the man’s loping gait and angular frame was familiar. He was on the thin side for his height, with near-white hair, whereas the woman was small and plump with a bottom that wobbled. In physique they were exact opposites.
‘Someone you know?’ Toby didn’t miss much.
‘That man …’ I shook my head. ‘Have a feeling I’ve seen him before.’
Toby studied the descending couple. They had their backs to us. ‘Here in Gib, you mean?’
‘I think so. It doesn’t matter anyway.’
But it nagged at me. All the way to the airport, on the other side of the peninsula, where I saw Toby onto his flight. All the way to The Rock Hotel, to lay Linda’s worries to rest. All the way through lunch and afternoon, until, in the aftermath of lovemaking, with the pink sunlight of early evening crawling over our naked bodies, I remembered. Remembered the man with the Slavic looks, who had been so interested in me at the charity ball.
That he should be out at Europa Point with his girlfriend the same time as Toby and me brought out the suspicious side of my nature. Gib wasn’t so vast that coming across the same people more than once wasn’t a believable coincidence. Yet …
Linda, snuggling into my armpit, her skin lightly chilled as the temperature fell, sensed my preoccupation.
‘You’re not being your usual attentive self, Warner,’ she complained, stroking my chest. ‘Things on your mind?’
‘No. Nothing at all. Except … this.’
‘Oh!’ And a few moments later: ‘Mmm, ye-e-es, I like that.’ Her loins squirmed against mine. As always she sat astride me.
‘More comfortable for a gal my size,’ she explained unnecessarily.
‘Fine for you. But the two of you are a lot to support.’
‘Weakling,’ she said, laughing. Often when she laughed she tossed her head and her soft, peat-brown hair rippled sinuously. She bounced more energetically still.
Later, in the darkness and afterglow of contentment, I asked, ‘Do you feel okay?’
‘Sure,’ came the drowsy reply. Then, coming alert: ‘
What do you mean – okay?’
‘The baby. Have you seen a doctor at all?’
Silence.
‘You should. Go tomorrow.’
‘Sucks to you, Warner. Don’t go giving me orders.’
‘Suit yourself.’ I rolled onto my side, away from her.
For a while the only sound in the room was of our breathing. Now and again a car buzzed past on Engineer Road, its headlights briefly chasing a white square across the wall.
A hand slithered over my shoulder, squeezed lightly.
‘I’ll go tomorrow. Promise.’
I turned and hugged her. She sighed, her cheek nuzzling my neck, like a puppy seeking attention. She wasn’t as tough as she would have people think.
‘Got to go home soon,’ I reminded her.
‘Louse. I was hoping you’d forgotten. Will you come back here afterwards?’
I found the tip of her nose with my lips. ‘Better not. I’ll be round first thing in the morning though. We’ll have breakfast together. Go for a swim in the pool.’
‘No, we won’t. It’s empty.’
* * * * *
Single detached dwellings standing on individual lots are scarce in Gibraltar. Despite a certain amount of land reclamation, space is at a premium, much of what there is being in the hands of the military and therefore unavailable for development. Consequently, like most of his fellow Rock dwellers, Vella had to make do with an apartment.
My iPad’s Google map pinpointed it on the lower side of the Alameda Gardens and almost directly opposite an open-air theatre. Comfortable walking distance from the Rock Hotel. All the better. Walking is the least obtrusive form of motion and hardest to tail.
The apartment block was three-floors high, manifestly upper echelon, and Apartment 6 was at the top. No security precautions, no electronically bolted gates or outer doors. I had heard tell Gibraltar’s crime levels are classed as very low, albeit on the rise like everywhere else.
Vella opened the door within seconds of my thumbing the buzzer. ‘Come in, Warner,’ he said, warmly. ‘I mean André. It is André, isn’t it?’
‘Most people call me that when they’re being polite.’
We crossed a plush-carpeted entrance hall, so ill-lit that the design of the sombre wallpaper was indistinguishable, to a door standing ajar at the far end. A vast living-cum-sitting room lay on the other side: low slung armchairs, mahogany table, buffet, geometric bookshelves. A shelving unit, also of mahogany, laden with more books, TV, music centre, etc. Pottery ornaments throughout. Michael Vella had conventional bourgeois tastes.
The table was spread with papers. Around it were four men.
‘We meet again,’ the man furthest from me said, with a small chuckle. He was in shadow so I moved forward, to see him better: it was the old man from Catalan Bay Village.
‘You remember me?’ he said. He was better dressed tonight in a finely checked suit, knitted silver-grey tie. A different person.
‘Sure do. El Jefe, right?’
‘And me?’ The voice belonged to a younger man, more casually dressed.
‘Peter, isn’t it? Good to see you again.’
Easy to tell he was pleased I had remembered.
‘How are you?’ he said, ‘I am glad we are to work together.’
‘That hasn’t been decided yet,’ Vella said sharply, a reprimand.
Peter looked resentful but held his tongue.
I was introduced to the two other members of what I gathered was the GIBESTÁ Inner Council: Benjamin and Maurice. No last names were given, would have been superfluous anyway – all the movement’s leading lights were on record, down to the maiden names of their mothers, in the intelligence report distributed at the committee meeting in London. Benjamin Levy – “Ben” – was somewhere in his thirties, eyes small and darting behind pebble-lensed glasses, bony features. Maurice Pilcher was older, of Vella’s generation, with a spare tyre that was putting pressure on his shirt buttons, and wild blond hair.
‘Drink, André?’ Vella asked, as I took my place at the table. Bottled Carlsberg lager was the only beer going, so I conformed.
‘Here’s to an independent Gibraltar,’ I proposed, sloshing lager into a chunky half-pint tankard.
They loved that.
‘To business then,’ Vella said decisively from the head of the table. Just below his left eye was a neat Band-Aid patch, legacy of a thrown glass at the charity gathering. His first scar of war.
‘For your information, André, we five constitute the decision-making body within GIBESTÁ; we’re the executive, you might say. There is a lower council, with voting rights, but for all practical purposes what we say goes.’ He smiled, a friendly, manly smile that relieved the severe jawline. ‘Whatever we agree here tonight will be official party policy within twenty-four hours.’
‘I believe you, believe me.’
‘You have been recommended by a … let us call him a Whitehall ally. Some of us are impatient for results, we feel we must force the hand of the British Government. Our first objective therefore is to have the Madrid Conference called off. Our second objective is greater autonomy, on a par say with Scotland. Our third and ultimate objective, complete independence. Also like Scotland would like to be.’
He squared the thin sheaf of papers before him.
‘All clear?’
‘Optimistic,’ I remarked, and five sets of eyes fixed on me, quizzing.
‘André …’ Vella hesitated. ‘I don’t wish to be discourteous but you are not here to comment on our strategies or offer advice. We don’t seek to recruit you to our cause, merely – possibly – to employ you. It is a mercenary we need, not a disciple.’
‘Good enough. I apologise. Tell me what you want from me.’
Vella drew his chair closer to the table, swallowed several times. ‘What we … what some of us want, is a campaign of violence against the authorities. In black and white terms, a series of bombings, directed against government and police property, spread over the next four to five weeks. For that we need outside expertise. Not only on the grounds of technical knowledge but because I …. I …’ He tapped his chest, glared a challenge around the table, ‘have decreed that no member of our movement shall have a direct hand in any violence.’
It was a form of self-delusion, even of hypocrisy, but having had my wrist smacked once for expressing an opinion I just bobbed my head in understanding.
‘GIBESTÁ must remain pure,’ Peter (surname Vitale) said sneeringly. ‘Pah! His daughter is killed in the streets and still he says we must not soil our hands.’
‘That’s enough!’
‘We should have the courage …’
El Jefe (full name Eduardo Goncalves) rapped his knuckles on the table top. Peter immediately fell quiet.
‘Mr Warner is not concerned with our internal squabbles. For him this is a simple question of yes or no, do we wish to use him. If it is no, then he can leave with our apologies for wasting his time.’
Vella was nodding gently like a treetop in a gust of wind. Even he yielded to El Jefe’s authority.
‘Well, gentlemen?’ My gazed passed around the table. ‘Do you want to use me, yes or no?’
To do what I had been signed up to do, I badly needed a ‘yes’. Yet to try and persuade would be out of character for the mercenary I was supposed to be. Toby had led me to believe it was a foregone conclusion.
‘We vote,’ El Jefe declared, and Vella signalled his reluctant accord.
‘All in favour of the bombing campaign, as proposed by Peter,’ he said in a husky voice, ‘raise their hands.’
Peter’s shot up, as if he couldn’t wait. Ben and Maurice were only a beat behind. Vella and El Jefe sat motionless, eyeing each other from their opposite ends of the table. Then, with a kind of shudder, El Jefe lifted the lower part of his arm, his fingers spread and trembling slightly.
‘I vote to bomb,’ he said.
Vella’s face was expressionless.
‘All those agains
t the bombing campaign,’ he intoned, like a speaking computer, and with an air of weary surrender put up his hand. ‘The motion is carried by four votes to one. We bomb.’
‘Should we now vote on hiring André?’ Ben’s enquiry was of nobody in particular.
‘Let’s take it as understood, shall we?’ Vella said dully. ‘We don’t have a flood of applicants, and the more people we interview the greater the risk of a security breach.’
A grandmother clock on the wall behind Vella ding-donged the hour as he spoke. I kept my face bland, my relief damped down.
‘Good.’ Peter was animated, already thrilled at the prospect of demolishing City Hall and the Central Police Station. I suppose every successful political pressure group needs its hard-line fanatic but the breed frankly scares me. They’d blow up the world to further their cause.
‘Are you going to take me on trust?’ I asked, amazed that credentials had not been demanded at the outset.
‘We have to,’ Vella answered simply. ‘If you’re an impostor you’ll have proof and to spare that you are who you claim to be. If you’re genuine, you have no need of it.’
Such faith offended my sense of professionalism.
‘Now that we are all agreed, let us make a start.’ Peter was on the edge of his chair, flushed and twitchy with excitement. He shuffled through his papers. ‘I have a list somewhere –’
‘Not so fast,’ I said, an edge to my voice. ‘Before you raze the town we have to settle my terms. It takes two sides to make a bargain. How do you know you can afford me?’
Doubt replaced elation.
‘What will it cost us?’ Peter said with a show of pugnacity. He had taken my acceptance for granted, he hadn’t even considered the price tag.
‘Yes,’ Michael Vella said, perhaps entertaining a private hope that my rates of hire would be unaffordable. ‘What is your fee?’
Pitch it too high and they would go elsewhere; too low, and suspicions might be aroused. I had already given the subject careful thought.
‘Twenty thousand euros per job all in, materials included.’
Maurice looked shocked. His flabby cheeks wobbled as he gave a violent shake of the head.