Riley then noticed he was naked and sitting on—tied to—a wooden chair. His ankles were tied to the legs, his torso to the back, his hands behind it.
He swayed slightly and found the chair was not fixed to the ground and didn’t seem very sturdy. With some effort he could throw himself to the ground or against the wall and get one of his hands free. The rest would be easy. The problem was it’d be loud, and the move could only be made once. The unibrow would come back in seconds, pissed and with one of his buddies. They’d be happy to make him pay with pain for every penny the chair was worth.
The cold water they’d thrown on his face ran down his back and over his naked legs to the floor. Although they’d left his underwear on, everything else was off, even his socks. Riley knew from experience it was not a good sign. He was wearing the perfect outfit for a torture party.
He did a mental scan to make sure none of his bones were broken and all his fingers and toes were in the right place. He then tried to figure out what the hell had happened.
He immediately rejected the idea that the kidnapping had been by chance or the work of street thugs. Someone probably had figured out he and Marco were going to give the machine to March and tried to stop them. It probably hadn’t been March who orchestrated it. If he wanted to get out of paying a million dollars, he could’ve found a quieter and safer way, without the risk of damaging the machine. March aside, the list of suspects was very long, especially given what Kirchner had said about the machine. If it was as valuable as he’d claimed—and could change the course of the war—the Allies and Germans would do whatever it took to get it. If that were the case, the question was the same: Why do it that way? If they knew he had the Enigma, why not come up to the dock and make him a good offer? It made no sense, unless . . .
He shifted in his seat, solving the first piece of the puzzle.
Of course.
They didn’t try to buy the machine or worry about breaking it because it didn’t matter to them at all. They didn’t want to take it but destroy it so it wouldn’t end up in enemy hands.
That left one possibility—the Nazis.
It was all clear now. Maybe Högel’s sub had been spying on them before. Somehow, they figured out what the Pingarrón was doing there and had sent a message to notify others what happened. Maybe Högel wasn’t just trying to capture Kirchner and Elsa.
Either way, there were too many maybes, and his head hurt too much to keep thinking them over, so he let go of all the conjecture that led nowhere and focused on two much more urgent and basic questions: Where was he and how could he get out?
First of all, he was in a room. A room without furniture, ten feet long and as many wide. One door, layers of old paint peeling off the walls, floor crudely tiled, a naked bulb hanging from the ceiling, and a small lattice window near the ceiling, barely big enough for a mouse. So maybe he was in a basement, and there was no guarantee the window led to the outside. Since they hadn’t gagged him, he wasn’t in a busy area of Tangier—if he was still there at all. That, or the opening led to a courtyard where no one would hear him. Either way, he could still scream in the hope that someone heard him. But like the chair trick it could only be used once, and he’d better wait for the right time.
Then the bolt unlatched, and the heavy door groaned open. A tall man stood in the doorway. He was wearing a dark suit, trench coat, and hat, the textbook uniform for any self-respecting spy. Riley caught a glimpse of a room behind him where four men sat around a table playing cards. The man took a step forward and closed the door, dragging a chair behind him.
He looked like the perfect Aryan man from a Nazi propaganda movie, tall and strong with a sharp jaw, white skin, blond gelled hair, and cold blue eyes like a lake in Bavaria or wherever the hell the Germans got their damn metaphors from. Without a word, he put the chair in front of Riley and hung his hat and coat on the back, folding the latter carefully. Then he sat down very slowly as if he were taking his seat in the box at an opera.
“Excuse me for not standing,” Riley said, stretching his bonds.
The man offered a fake smile. “I’m glad you still have your sense of humor, Captain Riley. Maybe that means we can get this over with without having to use any unpleasant methods.”
Riley’s eyes narrowed, not because of what he said but how. His accent was far from German. “Are you Scottish?”
“Indeed,” he said proudly. “From a beautiful place called Johnstone, outside Glasgow.”
“I didn’t see that coming,” Riley said. “How’d you become a traitor? Is your mom happy you work for the SS?”
“Traitor? The SS? What are you talking about?” He shook his head in disbelief. “Obviously I’m not going to tell you my name, but you can call me Mr. Smith. I’m a loyal subject of Her Majesty the Queen and I’m here representing the British government.”
“What? British?” Riley said.
“Officer of the British Secret Intelligence Service, or MI6 for short. We’re on the same side, Captain.”
“What side is that, if you don’t mind my asking?”
“That of liberty and justice, of course.”
Riley looked at the ropes tying him down. “Doesn’t look like it.”
“That couldn’t be helped,” Smith replied. “You ran off before we could speak with you, and my agents had to pursue.”
“Did they have to shoot at me?”
“As far as I understand, you fired first and wounded two of my men, one of them gravely. What did you want them to do?” he said, shrugging. “In the end they brought you here alive, despite having the chance to kill you.”
He had to give it to the Scot there. If they wanted, he would’ve been dead by now. “Okay, in that case, there’s no need to keep me like this, right?” he said, looking and pulling at his bonds.
“I’m very sorry, Captain. But I can’t do that now. First I have to talk with you about something extremely important.”
“Something that requires me to be tied to a chair in my underwear?”
“Don’t take it the wrong way, please. I promise you that as soon as I clarify a couple of things, I’ll be happy to untie you and give you your clothes back.”
Riley was sure that wouldn’t happen either way, but he also knew he had to play along. “Fine,” he said. “What’s it about?”
“That’s good,” Smith said with a nod. He took a cigarette case from his inside pocket, put one in his mouth, and offered another to Riley, who despite having his hands behind his back, accepted in hopes it would warm him up.
“Tell me, Captain Riley,” he continued after using a matching lighter to light up. “What can you tell me about Operation Apokalypse?”
“Excuse me?”
“Operation Apokalypse,” he repeated, exhaling a cloud of smoke. “And before you answer me, keep in mind there’s a lot riding on what you say.”
Riley was speechless. He was prepared to lie about a host of things, from the Enigma machine, to the sinking of a German sub off the coast of Tangier, to the flight of a nuclear physicist and the daughter of another . . . but not that.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said, moving the cigarette to the corner of his mouth. “It’s the first I’ve heard of it.”
Smith sighed and looked down. “Captain Riley, please . . .” he murmured. “Don’t make this harder than it has to be. I assure you it would be better if you told me all you know.”
Riley spat out his cigarette, breathed in, and tilted his head back. Apparently old Jack had been unable to keep them from following him the day before. Smith seemed to know what he was talking about, but the problem was that Riley knew little more. Worse, the little information he did have was all that was keeping him from being turned into a nice cadaver. As soon as he told what he knew about the Phobos and the Wunderwaffe, Smith would execute him. The less he told, the longer he’d live.
“All the information we have is the single page that mentions Operation Apokalypse, which we ha
nded in to your consulate yesterday,” Riley said. “I didn’t expect you to thank me,” he added sharply, “but I didn’t expect to end up like this either.”
Smith rubbed his chin with thoughtful indifference. “And that’s it? You don’t have more documentation?”
“If I knew something I’d tell you. Believe me, I have better things to do than be here with you.”
Smith leaned over, bringing his face close to Riley’s. His blue eyes looked suspicious, and after a long silence, he shook his head, tutting as if Riley’s answer had deeply disappointed him.
“I thought you were a reasonable man, Captain,” he whispered. “You’re going to force me to do things I hate, and believe me, you’ll hate them worse.”
“Then it’s going to be a bad night”—Riley smiled bitterly—“because I told you all I know.”
“Captain Riley,” he said, standing up, “we know exactly who you are and what type of business you engage in, and that you’re in possession of some valuable files we’d like you to hand over immediately.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t play dumb, Captain. One of your men appeared in our consulate with part of a much longer document. I want you to give me the rest.”
Riley shook his head. “There is no more, I already told you. That’s all we have.”
Smith smiled strangely. “Captain Riley, we have our own—ahem—sources of information, so there’s no reason to try to fool me or fake ignorance. You’ll see,” he said quietly. “I admit when we opened your backpack, we expected to find the Enigma machine and the documents for Juan March, and were surprised to find nothing but some old newspaper and a piece of broken machinery.”
“The compressor piston.”
“Excuse me?”
“The piece of machinery you’re talking about is part of an air compressor we were taking to repair. You can imagine how hard it is to find a new one.”
“Yes, of course . . . We were counting on getting you, the documents, and the Enigma all at once, but although it’s a slight setback, the machine isn’t my principal objective nor a major problem. Your ship is still docked, and we can deal with it when the time comes. What matters most now,” he added, “is that you tell us all you know about Operation Apokalypse, and if you’ve made the information known to anyone else.”
“I’ll say it again. All I know about Operation Apokalypse was on that sheet of paper we took to the consulate . . . which, to be honest, I’m starting to regret.”
“Please, Captain. Be reasonable.”
“If you don’t believe me, why don’t you ask your—ahem—sources? I’m sure they’d confirm it.”
Smith raised his hands in defeat. “Okay . . .” he muttered, throwing his cigarette down and crushing it with his feet. “For the record, I tried to avoid it, but you’re forcing me to do something I don’t want to.”
“Of course. I’m sure of it.”
Smith put the hat and coat back on carefully and looked at him one last time before approaching the door. He knocked, and it opened with a squeal. In the next room, Riley saw him exchange a few words in Arabic with the four henchmen. Three stood up immediately and started walking toward him with malicious smiles.
He didn’t need much imagination to picture what was coming next. The unibrowed Arab—flanked by two others that looked very much alike, one with a mouthful of gold teeth, the other completely toothless—came over to Riley and whispered in his ear with breath stinking of onion and parsley.
“Cousin Abdullah dies in the hospital with your bullet in his stomach,” he hissed like a snake. “Mr. Smith said to help you remember while he eat dinner. If you remember, good, because he pay more. But if you no remember, I happy . . . because we can give you a lot, a lot of pain.”
31
Unattractive and peculiar as those three Moroccans were, they were quite skilled in the art of pain.
They had been thoroughly torturing Riley for over half an hour. They gagged him before they started, then hit every inch of his body, using a board, their feet, and brass knuckles. They stuck needles under his fingernails. They made fine cuts on his body with a razor blade and rubbed vinegar and salt in them. They ripped out the fingernail on his left middle finger. His little and ring fingers on the same hand were twisted at a strange angle, dislocated. They’d paid particular attention to his face, which made him look like an amateur boxer who’d been through twelve rounds with Joe Louis. Somehow he hadn’t lost any teeth yet, but his lips were swollen and bloody. The right side of his face was so swollen that he could barely see through the little slit between his eyelids.
By that point, they even took the gag out, because he didn’t have the strength to speak, let alone scream. Riley had long since passed the point of unbearable pain, and each time he was hit again was like adding a drop of water to an overflowing barrel. There’s a limit to the amount of torture a person can take before they lose consciousness or bleed to death. The three Moroccans, who claimed to have fought for the fascists in the Spanish Civil War, which meant they would’ve been well trained in torture methods, knew Riley was reaching that limit and decided to stop and wait for Smith to get back to finish the interrogation. There’d be plenty of time later, if Smith agreed, to avenge the death of their cousin Abdullah—who, to make matters worse, ended up being related to all of them—by following through on their last threat, slowly cutting off Riley’s balls with the knife, seasoning them, and making him eat them.
When they left him alone in the room again, he barely had the strength to breathe. He felt some ribs were broken, and each breath was like a stab from a sharp knife. His wounds full of salt and vinegar—that little detail was really in bad taste—burned like crazy, and he would’ve happily traded the Pingarrón for a dose of morphine. It was just the start of what those three sadists might do if Smith left him in their hands. The deck was stacked for that outcome, regardless of what he said. The bastards hadn’t asked him a single question, and Riley was afraid Smith would decide he didn’t know anything else, or was hiding what he did know, and then kill him and do the same to the rest of the Pingarrón’s crew—if he hadn’t already.
That dark thought filled him with desperation as he tilted his head back and stared at the dirty bulb on the ceiling and prayed to God—which he only did when things had gotten really bad—to keep his friends from suffering the same fate.
Just then, an angel attending to his prayers spoke to him from the courtyard overhead. “Your face look bad, man.”
It took a while for him to realize a divine being hadn’t come to mock him. It was a real human voice, that of a Moroccan child with his hands on the bars of the small lattice window, looking wide-eyed at the ecce homo tied to the chair.
“Hey, little guy,” Riley called in a whisper as soon as he could focus his vision. “Can you hear me?”
“I hear you, little.”
“What’s your name?” Riley asked, trying to keep the pain from distorting his voice.
“Abdul.”
“Hi, Abdul. Can you tell me . . . where we are?”
The kid gave him a strange look before answering. “In Tangier, man.”
“Got it . . . My name’s Alex . . . Alex Riley, and I’m the captain of a boat . . . You like boats?”
“Abdul no like boats. Abdul not know how to swim.”
“Of course, of course . . .” Riley answered, spitting blood. “Abdul . . . do you want to make money? Lots of money?”
The boy widened his eyes even more. “How much?”
“I’ll pay you a hundred dollars . . . if you do me a small favor.”
“Where you have money? You naked.”
“I don’t have it here, but I’ll give it to you later. I swear.”
“I don’t believe.”
“A thousand dollars.”
“You have no clothes, man,” Abdul said. “You have a thousand dollars?”
“On my ship. I promise I’ll pay you, Abdul . .
. But you have to help me first.”
The boy looked from left to right, making sure no one was around. “If you no pay, you go to hell.”
“May the Devil take me . . . if I don’t pay you,” Riley said, quickly devising a plan. “But now I need you to do something for me . . . Do you know the city well?”
“I know.”
“Great. Listen to me closely, Abdul, because I need you to do exactly as I say . . .”
Riley gave the boy precise instructions and made him repeat them back to him twice.
“You got it?” he asked.
“Abdul not stupid,” he said proudly, “or deaf.”
“Okay, okay . . . but I need you to run . . . as fast as you can. If you don’t get back before the bad men return,” he warned, “you get no money.”
“Abdul run a lot and get back fast.”
Then he disappeared with the sound of his sandals slapping the ground, leaving Riley to look at the empty window and ponder how his and his crew’s lives were in the hands of a kid he’d barely gotten a good look at.
It’s hard to measure time when you’re handcuffed, suffering excruciating pain, and awaiting a horrible death that could come at any moment. Every minute feels like an eternity, so Riley couldn’t say if it’d been half an hour or half the night when the door opened again and Agent Smith appeared in his spy trench coat and hat.
“Good Lord,” Smith said, stopping in the doorway. “What . . . what have those savages done to you?”
Riley looked at him with his good eye. “I believe,” he said, blood trickling from his mouth, “what you told them to do.”
“Good God, no,” he said, bending over and wiping the blood with his own handkerchief. “I just asked them to soften you a little. This is . . . it’s intolerable.”
“That’s what I’d say”—Riley coughed painfully—“but who asked me?”
“You have no idea how sorry I am,” he said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “I assure you I didn’t want this to happen. Please allow me to offer my sincerest apologies.”
Captain Riley (The Captain Riley Adventures Book 1) Page 20