Death in the Sun

by Adam Creed

  He stands back from the bookshelves, looking not at the titles, but for something which might stick out; anything not ordinary about a bookshelf. He lets his eye be drawn, then return. Drawn again. This time, to a foreign cipher. ‘Did Manolo speak German?’

  Consuela crinkles her eyebrows. ‘I heard him talk to a tourist once. But they were English, I think. I’m sure of it.’ She laughs. ‘He wore black socks with shorts. They were English, all right.’

  Staffe takes down the volume of Siddhartha. It is in German and published by Suhrkamp. He carefully opens Hermann Hesse’s novel. It is a first edition and the frontispiece is signed, ‘For my wonderful grandson, From Hermann.’ Beneath, a different hand has written, ‘And mine, also. From Gustav.’ Staffe opens his hands, the way in which a priest might hold something holy. The pages fall open, reveal a loose leaf. Staffe reads it quickly, tells Consuela it is nothing, and carefully pockets the Last Will and Testament of Gustav Hesse. Except, it is not the last. It is a prior version to the one which he had found in Raul’s study and which he had translated. In this document‚ secreted by Manolo‚ all his worldly wealth is left to his grandsons, Manolo and Agustín.

  With the will in his pocket‚ against his heart‚ Staffe feels the full force of the loss of his friend‚ Manolo – an utterly decent and proper man. He says, ‘How did Manolo and Agustín get on?’

  ‘He never spoke of Agustín.’

  ‘But Agustín was here, a few weeks ago.’

  Consuela shakes her head. She sits down on the edge of a chair and her shoulders shake. ‘He couldn’t hurt him. I can assure you of that.’

  ‘I know Manolo didn’t kill Agustín.’ Staffe kneels in front of Consuela.

  ‘But you said he did. That’s what Quesada and the guardia have been saying.’

  He takes her gently by the shoulders and says, softly, ‘But I have to know the truth – to get to the truth.’

  Consuela nods. ‘Agustín and Manolo had an argument. A terrible, terrible argument. They said such awful things to each other.’

  ‘What did they say?’

  ‘I was upstairs, cleaning. I didn’t hear it all, but Manolo said Agustín couldn’t love anybody. He said he was only interested in money.’

  ‘And Agustín?’

  ‘He said he had seen things Manolo hadn’t, that they were so different they didn’t even have the same blood. He said he was going to dig up the past and prove it to the world. I remember it exactly. It made my blood cold. I knew something terrible would happen.’

  ‘And what did Manolo say?’

  ‘He said Agustín was only saying it for the money. And then he said the strangest thing.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Manolo told Agustín that he loved him. It went quiet and I think they must have embraced. I came to the top of the stairs.’ She looks up, over her shoulder. ‘And Manolo said, “Leave the past alone. They will kill you – to keep it the way it is.” And then Agustín left. I never saw him again.’

  *

  Staffe follows Consuela out of Manolo’s house, sees Quesada’s Guardia Civil Land Rover outside Bar Fuente. As Consuela walks off through the plazeta to find Harry and Gracia, he goes in the bar, where Quesada is in the comedor in a cloud of cigar smoke. But it smells richer today. Comisario Sanchez is opposite Quesada, pulling on his Cohiba. Two black and gold bands sit on the table.

  Quesada looks glum, but forces a smile when Staffe sits down with them.

  ‘This is like a police canteen,’ says Staffe.

  ‘More like the United Nations,’ says Quesada. He nods at Sanchez. ‘And we have good news.’

  ‘I got Cortes to run full tests on the body from the woods,’ says Sanchez. ‘It’s no ghost from the war.’

  ‘What made you change your mind?’ says Staffe.

  ‘It’s an old man. Between seventy and eighty years old,’ says Sanchez.

  ‘A man? Did he run the DNA test?’

  Sanchez shakes his head. ‘It’s not Astrid Cano. You’ll have to abandon that theory and look elsewhere for her body. If there is a body.’

  ‘Her father died and she didn’t go to the funeral. Explain that.’

  ‘She’s in some hippy commune somewhere? Maybe she doesn’t know about Gustav Hesse passing away.’

  ‘What does it matter? We can prove Edu killed Manolo,’ says Quesada. ‘And Manolo must have killed Agustín. Like you say.’

  Staffe says nothing. He thinks about the poor Dane, and Raúl. He knows what Sanchez and Quesada would say. A junkie tied up in something he didn’t understand, and a drunk driver. Cases closed. He says, ‘Who is the man up in the woods?’

  ‘We don’t know,’ says Quesada. ‘But we are investigating, naturally.’

  Sanchez says to Quesada, ‘Perhaps you could leave us for a minute or two.’

  The brigada jumps to, picking up his cigar, popping on his cap.

  Sanchez watches him all the way out of the bar, says to Staffe, ‘I can see that there’s something on your mind.’

  ‘I know Jens Hansen was killed in Mojácar, not down in the plastic. And I know why he was killed – to provide a false ID for Agustín Cano’s corpse. And I can see that you can construct a plausible motive for Manolo killing his brother. And there is evidence for Manolo being killed by Edu, who needed to keep his name out of any investigations into the painting scam.’

  ‘You seem to know plenty.’

  ‘“Know” is the wrong word. I “understand” those theories.’

  ‘So what is your problem?’

  ‘Who is buried up in my sister’s woods? Where is Astrid Cano? And how did Santi Etxebatteria come to fit into this story, comisario?’

  ‘I don’t think everything needs to fit all the time, do you? If it did, we’d be left with nothing to do.’

  ‘Did you know Raúl Gutiérrez was looking into Etxebatteria?’

  ‘That is a question for another time, I’m afraid. You know about the peace with ETA. If you ask me, Raúl had his own story in mind and Etxebatteria was only ever a device. It’s time you dropped it.’ Sanchez regards his cigar. ‘Understand?’

  ‘I understand what you are saying.’

  ‘They tell me you have decided to stay on here in Almagen.’

  ‘I must apply myself to being a doubly good uncle now. And there is so much to discover in this country of yours.’

  ‘What, exactly, is there to discover?’

  ‘My first bullfight, for example.’

  ‘The Almería feria is the place to go. There’s a corrida every day for a week. Tomorrow, it’s Tomas. He’s the best. And one of our own.’

  ‘Tickets are an impossibility, they say.’

  ‘Nothing is impossible,’ says Sanchez. ‘Maybe we could help each other.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘Tell me why you are really staying on.’

  ‘There are more murders here.’

  ‘Astrid Cano?’

  ‘And Raúl Gutiérrez.’

  ‘And the dead have to speak.’

  ‘Exactly!’ says Staffe. He tries to evaluate the comisario, but Sanchez’s eyes are soft and unfocused. His breathing is even.

  ‘You should definitely go to a corrida. Give me your number and I’ll try to fix you up with some tickets.’

  Staffe scribbles his number on a paper serviette. As he hands it to Sanchez, it feels like a mistake.

  *

  The key swings down from the acotea and Staffe has to jump out of the way‚ but even so‚ it still catches him on the side of the head. He could swear that he hears Immaculada chuckle to herself as he lets himself in.

  He climbs the dark, dank stairwell, up into the fragrance and light of the top floor. She is dressed in a black Mao tunic and loose, black linen trousers; her thick grey hair is scooped up in a lavish bun. Her eyes are bright but her skin is loose and grey.

  Immaculada says, ‘This had better be good.’

  ‘It’s very kind of you to see me. I was a friend of Edu’s.’

>   ‘All my life, my brother was ashamed of me. And now, it’s my turn to be ashamed of him. A pity I don’t give a damn.’

  ‘I’m sorry you couldn’t make it to the funeral.’

  ‘He killed a good man. Why would I?’

  ‘Nothing has been proven.’

  ‘Ha! That will take years. It will see me out. Now, why are you here?’ Immaculada coughs, raises a handkerchief to her mouth. Her eyes water. ‘The young journalist assured me I would be pleased with the outcome.’

  Staffe holds out the rolled-up rug.

  ‘You’ve not come selling me rugs, have you? I had enough of that in damned Tangier.’

  ‘Barrington took you to Tangier?’

  ‘Only once.’

  ‘Just the two of you?’

  ‘The German woman came. But I didn’t let you in to talk about her.’

  Staffe sinks to his knees, carefully unrolling the rug. The canvas is protected by tissue and is further sandwiched by two thick sheets of cartridge paper. Staffe slowly reveals the image and stands, takes a step back, saying, ‘We have called it La Sernata.’

  ‘After the song?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘It’s a good painting.’

  ‘Maybe his finest?’

  ‘His? It might have Hugo’s signature, but this isn’t his. You’re here under false pretences.’

  ‘His later works . . .’

  ‘Take it away!’

  ‘They say it’s worth a fortune.’

  ‘It’s worth nothing to me.’

  ‘Do you know who painted this?’

  ‘There’s nothing of Hugo in that painting. Can’t you see? Hugo was loose. This brushwork is stiff, too controlled.’

  Staffe kneels in front of her, meticulously rolls the painting back up, and wraps the rug around it.

  ‘I like the rug, though,’ says Immaculada.

  ‘Did you buy rugs in Tangier?’

  ‘We have our own rugs, here in the Alpujarras. But the rest of them did.’

  ‘Astrid and Jackson?’

  She nods.

  ‘Aah. Was Rubio there?’

  ‘Yes. And his primo. That fellow with the bar down in Almería.’

  ‘Angel who has the Quinta Toro?’

  ‘That’s him. Thick as thieves, him and Rubio – more like brothers than cousins.’

  ‘Did Angel ever come up here?’

  ‘All the time. Sundays and Mondays, as I recall – when he didn’t open his bar. He’d be shooting partridge up at his cortijo.’

  ‘He has a cortijo up here?’

  ‘Next to his primo’s.

  ‘You mean Rubio?’ says Staffe.

  ‘They built it together.’

  ‘And when did he stop coming?’

  ‘A long time ago.’ Immaculada’s brow ruffles.

  ‘Around the time Hugo passed away?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe. Yes, yes, it would have been around then.’

  ‘Was that when Astrid went missing?’

  ‘I’ve said I don’t want to talk about her, if you don’t mind.’

  Staffe tucks the rolled rug under his arm. ‘You know, I spoke to Edu just a couple of days before he passed away.’

  ‘Passed away? He was murdered.’

  ‘He took his own life. He hanged himself.’

  ‘Ha! I can assure you he didn’t. He wouldn’t dare.’

  ‘Dare?’

  ‘It would condemn him to an eternity of damnation. That’s what he believed. It’s the only thing we have in common – our belief in the Church.’

  ‘Is that why he carried Hugo’s coffin?’

  Immaculada looks puzzled, as if trying to resurrect a distant memory.

  ‘He did that for you, didn’t he? Was it his way of saying sorry, for the way he was with Hugo?’

  ‘I don’t know where you get your nonsense from. I didn’t want him there, but Edu insisted. And he was well in with the priest. I didn’t want to make a scene, but if I’d had my way, my brother would have been banished from the village for the funeral.’

  ‘You’re sure? Edu insisted on being there; insisted on carrying the coffin?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘I saw a photograph. There was Jackson Roberts and Rubio, and Edu bearing Hugo’s coffin.’

  ‘I wouldn’t have had any of them there, but Hugo was his own man. And I was ill. Ill with it all, so I let them do what they wanted.’

  ‘And the fourth man?’

  Immaculada frowns. ‘You should know. You’ve been talking about him.’

  ‘Angel?’

  ‘What a bunch of rogues.’ She laughs. ‘But that’s probably what Hugo would have wanted – to plant him for the next life.’

  Staffe says goodbye to Immaculada, asks if he can use the bathroom on his way out. He runs the tap and in a hand-crafted medicine cabinet built into a nook in the thick wall, he finds an ivory-backed pair of gentlemen’s brushes, picks out a handful of hair. Hugo’s hair. He places it carefully in the empty stamp-pocket of his wallet. Something for Cortes to identify.

  *

  Staffe pulls off the carretera onto a verge, just beyond the seven-eye bridge and above Orgiva. Down below, on the banks of the river, smoke rises from a tepee village, which is scattered like litter with tents and benders, caravans and transits. Today, they are holding a memorial service for Jackson Roberts, but it won’t be in the twin-towered church.

  A circle of people have formed on the dusty meadow beside the river. They are holding hands. A guitar strums and someone gets on the bongos. Slowly a melody forms and a woman’s voice emerges, singing ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’. Staffe looks all around, to see if anybody else is paying respects from a distance, but it appears not. Guadalupe has not come. He hoped she might, but he waits a while, watching the hippies pay their respects, managing to enjoy themselves a little along the way. The smell of hashish drifts on the breeze and within an hour the dancing begins. It’s probably what Jackson would want.

  He telephones Pepa, asks her to get a message to Guadalupe, to come and collect what he has for her. And he drives away, checking that the last Barrington is safely rolled up in its Moroccan rug.

  Thirty-three

  The maître d’ shows Staffe to a table out front, beneath El Marisco’s bamboo canopy. The sea is across the road and the plastic greenhouses are to the right, with the small shanty where Yousef had fashioned his makeshift home just beyond.

  Guadalupe arrives in a newish hatchback and the maître d’ receives her as if she is not unfamiliar. As they are in conversation, he scans the road, but the road is empty. Today, and all this week, the great and the good, and the bad, are in Almería for the feria. Staffe’s room at the Hotel Catedral cost double for tonight. It seems so long since he was first there.

  ‘You found it all right,’ says Staffe as Guadalupe takes her seat. She smells fine, of jasmine, and her hair is up and done.

  ‘I’ve been before.’

  ‘I popped in to Jackson’s service in Orgiva yesterday. I thought you might have been there.’

  ‘Not my scene, really. I heard it was going to be a hippy affair.’

  ‘And your uncle Edu’s funeral?’

  ‘I can’t shed tears for that one, I’m afraid. I don’t know what that makes me.’

  ‘I saw your mother yesterday.’

  ‘She said.’

  ‘You’ve seen her?’

  ‘Of course. I was passing.’

  ‘Did she tell you about La Sernata?’

  ‘Is that what you’re calling it?’ She looks around, to see if he has brought it. The young journalist had said he would.

  ‘Your mother was sceptical as to its provenance.’

  ‘She has a very romantic notion of my father. You really shouldn’t have shown it to her.’ Guadalupe picks up the menu, looks down in a cursory way, saying, ‘The red shrimp is the thing to have.’

  ‘I fancy the turbot.’ Staffe thinks of the times he has had turbot. It takes him
back, not to a world of lapping sea or fishing villages, but to the wood-panelled world of the George and Vulture – the long City lunches he and Jessop would share when a case was dragged to its conclusion. ‘Yes, the turbot for me.’

  ‘Is this your treat?’

  ‘Maybe it could be yours. Let’s call it a finder’s fee.’

  Guadalupe looks anxious for an instant, quickly corrects herself. ‘For what?’

  ‘The last Barrington.’

  ‘Is there such a thing?’

  He takes out his phone, clicks through the commands. ‘If there is, it should be yours, wouldn’t you say? If your mother doesn’t want it.’ He turns his phone towards her, so she can see the screen. On it, an image of La Sernata.

  ‘You really have it?’

  ‘In my hotel room.’

  ‘If I’m buying lunch, I need more than a photograph,’ she laughs. ‘This could be a couple of hundred euros.’

  ‘They have some wonderful Ribera del Duero here, too.’

  ‘In that case, I definitely need more than a photograph.’

  ‘I have to go straight to the bullfight after this. Here.’ He shows her his key card for the Hotel Catedral. ‘Room seven.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  He nods, reaching further with his hand, proffering the key. ‘It’s rolled up in a rug.’

  ‘I can assure you, no matter what you might think, this will be staying in the family. It means more than money.’

  The maître d’ personally comes to take their order. He gives Staffe a suspicious look.

  Guadalupe says, ‘I’ll have the red shrimp, and my friend will have the turbot. And a bottle of your Ribera.’

  When the wine comes, Staffe toasts Jackson Roberts and they clink. ‘You’ll miss him. Good neighbours are hard to find.’

  ‘The fool. Fancy going over the Silla Montar on a bike. You know, I suppose in a way it’s good that he went like that. He used to say that once you’ve seen war, every peaceful day starts with a present being unwrapped.’

  ‘He unwrapped plenty of presents is my guess.’

  The maître d’ sidles up, recharges their glasses and a red Bultaco rattles by, struggling under the weight of two Moroccans, one of them the Bulls youth.