Spike checked the booths on the far wall. In one sat a blond man with a freckled American face.
One of the Scandinavians nudged her friend as Spike passed, but he ignored her, slipping onto the banquette beside John, who had his bulky white trainers up on the table, frowning at a mobile phone as he composed what looked like a lengthy text message.
Spike tapped John hard on the shoulder. The protest died on his lips as he recognised Spike. He managed an unwilling smile. ‘Hey, bud,’ he shouted above the music. ‘I thought you were going home.’
‘I’m looking for Zahra.’
He screwed up his face. ‘You’re what?’
‘You heard.’
John removed his feet from the table, then slipped his phone into the pocket of his loose, low-hanging jeans. ‘You guys had a thing once. Right?’
In the next-door booth, two of the Germans had broken away from the main group and were kissing greedily, balloon sticks discarded on the floor.
‘I get it,’ John said, clapping a hand onto Spike’s shoulder. ‘I’d be the same.’
‘Where is she, John?’
They both looked up as the waitress appeared. She mouthed something in Maltese, and John nodded back. ‘We need to get you a drink,’ he said, rising to his feet. ‘I’ll grab us both one.’
Spike stood and watched him walk to the bar. The waitress decapitated a first bottle of beer as John reached for his wallet.
‘Abend!’ Spike heard above the music. He glanced round and saw that the rest of the German group had appeared. The kissing couple shrank down in their seats. ‘Erwischt!’ someone yelled gleefully.
When Spike looked back, the waitress was tonging wedges of lime into bottle necks. John Petrovic had gone.
Spike plunged forward into the crowd, knocking into a German with a rat’s tail, who muttered an incomprehensible insult. ‘Your drinks!’ the waitress called, but Spike pushed past her into the corridor. Ladies to the left, Gents to the right, security door marked Fire Exit . . . Spike tried the Gents first, seeing one of the tequila boys praying on his hands and knees to the urinal as his friends roared with laughter. The cubicle doors were all open.
The waitress was standing in the corridor. ‘Oi!’ she shouted as Spike put his shoulder to the back door and burst outside. On the far pavement stood a figure. ‘John!’ Spike called out.
The figure turned, then vaulted the barrier to the beach.
7
Spike set off across the road. A souped-up muscle car was coming the other way; it braked in front of him, a hairy bejewelled fist holding down the horn as Spike scrambled over the flame-licked bonnet and hurdled the railings to the beach.
To the left rose sand dunes, to the right a promontory with a few parked cars. The figure was running between them along the edge of the water.
Spike sprinted down the beach, glimpsing a half-naked couple clamped together in a depression in the sand. They froze as he passed, faces fused.
The figure was thirty yards ahead; as Spike reached the furthest extent of the waves, the harder-packed sand allowed him to increase his speed. He was gaining; he heard the regular splash of his feet as they pounded the thin film of tepid water below. ‘Petrovic!’ he called out.
John glanced round, then stumbled, and Spike picked up his knees higher. A low sea wall flanked the promontory – the car park was part of a spit used to hold the beach in place. John moved diagonally into the softer sand, heading towards a set of steps, but Spike kept along the fringes of the water, cutting in at the last moment and propelling himself into the air. His outstretched hand clipped one of John’s oversized trainers, sending him crashing chin first into the sand.
Spike landed painfully on his hands, then sprung to his feet. John was sitting up now, rubbing wet sand from his hair and eyes. Spike took a step towards him.
‘What is your problem?’ John yelled, clambering up awkwardly. ‘Are you retarded?’ Tendons appeared in his neck and his jaw jutted, as though he were readying himself for the last charge of a football game.
‘I asked you a question, Petrovic. Where’s Zahra?’
John thrust out his arms in frustration and moved forward, then seemed to take Spike’s measure and stop. ‘For Christ’s sake . . .’ He lowered his gaze. ‘She was asking me about some girl. OK?’
‘Dinah?’ Spike said.
‘Yeah. Dinah. That’s it.’ His eyes switched left: at the far end of the beach, the courting couple were hurrying back hand in hand towards the road.
‘And where is she now?’ Spike said.
‘I have no fuckin’ idea.’ John shook another clod of sand from his baggy denims. ‘Are we done?’ Flexing his neck, he turned and started walking towards the promontory.
‘I know about the girls,’ Spike called after.
John hesitated, then continued walking.
‘The underage girls.’
John slowed. Spike watched his shoulders move up and down as he tried to catch his breath.
‘I’m sure the US embassy will be fascinated to hear about a charity worker with a penchant for child abuse.’
John turned to the left, towards the sea. A moment passed. ‘It isn’t what you think,’ he said as Spike moved towards him, fists tucked beneath biceps.
‘The girl came onto me, right?’ John resumed. ‘I’d only just got to Malta. No more Peace Corps; I was lonely. She told me she was legal, but then the texts started coming. Photos of us together.’ John paused, the only sound now the steady rhythmic whisper of the Mediterranean. ‘I changed cell but they kept on coming. I’ve got a girl back in the States, you know?’ His voice took on a whining, childlike quality. ‘Then another text arrived. He told me he could make it stop.’
‘Who could?’
‘The man sending the pictures.’
‘What was his name?’
‘We never met.’
‘His name?’
John turned his head a fraction. In the moonlight, his bright green eyes were wide and afraid. ‘Salib.’
‘Salib who?’
‘Just Salib.’ John looked away.
‘What did he want?’
‘Nothing . . . Just for me to hook him up with any migrants looking for a way into Italy.’
Spike’s chest suddenly felt tight. ‘Did you hook Zahra up with Salib?’
‘Zahra told me Dinah had a kid or something; she wanted to ask Salib some questions, check they were both OK.’ He swept aside his blond fringe defensively. ‘She knew the migrants were skipping to Italy as well as I did. I don’t see why it’s such a big deal.’
‘Because she’s missing, John.’
John glanced down at his wristwatch. ‘Can I go now?’
‘How many men did you send to Salib?’ Spike said, stepping towards him. ‘How many old people?’
John gave an amused snort.
‘Because he only wanted the girls, right?’ Spike shifted his weight from foot to foot. His joints felt lacquered now, his muscles sharp and precise. ‘Did he tell you only to approach the pretty ones? Pay you a bonus if you cherry-picked a real beauty?’
John raised his eyes. This time he held Spike’s gaze.
‘Where did you send her, John?’
‘Eat me.’
Slowly, Spike tilted back his head, then brought his brow crashing down on the bridge of John Petrovic’s nose. There was a crack, like a fist crushing a walnut, followed by the reeling pain of having walked into a low-hanging beam.
Spike staggered backwards. When he opened his eyes, John was kneeling before him, blood pattering into the sand from between his cupped hands.
‘Where did you send her, John?’
John groaned into his palms, rocking back and forth.
‘Where?’
‘Racecourse Street.’ His voice was reedy and nasal.
‘Where’s Racecourse Street?’
‘In Marsa. By the Sporting Club. That’s all I know.’
Spike was already walking back towards the road.
8
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The taxi drew to a halt. ‘Here is Marsa.’
‘I need Racecourse Street.’
‘I told you, mister, I don’t know any Racecourse Street.’
The cabbie kept his hands on the wheel, refusing to drive further. Spike paid what was on the meter and got out.
Half a mile earlier, they’d passed an industrial dockland, with the entrance to the original migrant camp opposite. After that they’d wound through the narrow streets of a residential working-class district: hardware stores, launderettes, rotting window frames contrasting with the ornate balconies of Valletta. The taxi had stopped at the mouth of a road, beside a wall with the words ‘Marsa Sports Club’ daubed in bull-blood red. Spike watched it reverse quickly away, then drive back in the direction of the docks.
He turned and headed along the wall. Poorly lit alleys sloped down to meet it; he checked the street names but they were all in Maltese.
A squat woman bustled towards him with a shopping bag. ‘Racecourse Street?’ Spike said, but she lowered her whiskered chin and increased her speed.
He took out the Mifsud address book and made a call. A female voice answered in Maltese.
‘Natalya?’ Spike said.
‘Is Clara. You want speak Natalya?’
‘Is Michael there?’
An old-fashioned click, then the Baron picked up. ‘Home safe?’
‘I decided to stay on for Carnival.’
‘How wonderful.’
‘I’m trying to look up an old friend. The trouble is, I have the street name in English but I need it in Maltese.’
‘What is it in English?’
‘Racecourse Street.’
There was a pause. The distant rev of a motorbike came from a passageway behind.
‘Are you sure that’s where your friend lives?’
‘Yes.’
‘It’s just . . . I’m not sure it’s a very good area.’
‘I can look after myself, Michael. Now do you have the name?’
‘Triq it-Tigrija,’ the Baron said in perfect Maltese. ‘But I really don’t –’
Spike thanked him and hung up.
9
Spike checked the name of each triq he passed. A barred gate appeared in the wall: he peered through and saw what looked like the concourse of a racetrack. He continued on until the street began to brighten. Lamp posts rose ahead on a crumbled-down pavement. Finally he saw a name painted in white along the top of the wall: ‘Triq it-Tigrija’.
A woman emerged from the shadows, whispering in Maltese. She wore red PVC trousers and a leather basque; judging by her height and jutting Adam’s apple, she had not been a woman for long.
Two heavy-set men stood beneath a street light, each holding a birdcage in one hand. They fell silent as Spike approached. Their birds cocked their heads, each staring at Spike with tiny ink-spot eyes.
‘I’m looking for Salib.’
One of the men raised his chin from a bed of neck fat and motioned up the street. Spike walked away, hearing the chaffinches chattering excitedly in their cages.
The street grew wider. Four women in stockings and bikini tops leaned against a parked car, overplucked eyebrows rippling like waves as Spike passed. He glanced into an alley and saw a girl in leopard-print leggings quietly unlocking a door.
A bar appeared on the pavement. Spike looked back at the men with their birdcages, and the same man motioned with a large hand towards it.
The bar had a row of plastic chairs with backs pressed to the facade. Two men occupied them, each with a birdcage at his feet. In Marsa, instead of walking a dog in the evening, apparently you walked the chaffinch.
Inside, an older man sat filling out a betting slip. The bar had a pinboard of currency notes behind it, beer on tap and a man rinsing pint glasses on a spray jet. Spike relaxed a little; this place would do OK in Gib.
He sat down on a stool. The barman rinsed another glass. He was tall and thin with a florid rash across his nose and cheeks.
‘Pint of lager, please,’ Spike said.
The barman cupped an ear, then brought his head closer. His breath smelled of pickled eggs. Spike pointed at the beer tap, and the man nodded, pulling a pint which was largely foam. Spike handed over a ten-euro note, which the barman slipped into the pocket of his cords before returning to washing glasses.
Spike rotated his stool. The man with the betting slip was gone. A white panel van rolled by outside. When Spike turned back to the bar, his pint had part liquefied; he took a sip and found it warm and flat. ‘I’m looking for Salib,’ he said.
The squirt of the drinks rinser wilted.
‘Do you know him?’
The barman shook his head, then fired up the fountain again. Spike looked past him to a rear door. Voices outside: some kind of beer garden, perhaps.
‘John Petrovic sent me.’
The barman swivelled his head. ‘American John?’
‘He told me to ask for Salib.’
A grin exposed a set of brown stumpy teeth. ‘You like girlies?’
Spike gave a wink, and the barman approached, reaching into his back pocket. ‘For friends of John,’ he said, returning Spike’s ten-euro note, ‘is on the house.’ His accent was heavily Maltese but the words were comprehensible.
Spike tucked the note back into his wallet, seeing a Gibraltar five-pound note inside, which he took out instead. ‘For your collection.’
The barman smiled and pinned the note to the board behind. ‘Come,’ he said, motioning to the back door.
Beer garden had been overstating things: a collapsed outhouse formed a rubble-strewn rear courtyard. In the only clear corner, a plank of wood had been stretched over two upturned flowerpots. A family of three sat eating what looked like rabbit stew; the woman and her son stared at Spike, while the man kept his back turned, stabbing at a chunk of meat with a knife.
‘Is better you go through,’ the barman said, sensitively indicating the child. He unlatched the gate in the wall. It gave onto a dusty track, with a broad single-storey building opposite.
‘Wait here,’ the barman said. ‘Five minutes.’
10
Spike eased his way through the cockeyed gate. The building on the other side of the track housed a series of stables. The upper halves of the doors were open but the horses had the sense to be grazing elsewhere. The smell of manure and damp hay was sharp and pungent.
Adjoining the stables was an open-ended shack: tools, inner tyres, leather saddles on walls. Spike crouched down and found a smooth spar of wood loose on the ground.
From inside the beer garden came a click as the inner door closed: must be the family, going back into the bar.
The moon was almost full, casting a pale light on the dusty track. Spike stooped down further as the sound of an engine approached. A few seconds later, a motorcycle appeared. As it drew closer, Spike saw that its rider wore a black helmet. He gripped the handle of his cudgel more tightly.
The motorcycle stopped, the rider kicking down the footstand, then swinging his legs off the bike. The man’s hands went to his head; as soon as Spike saw his helmet start to rise, he set off at a sprint towards him.
The man must have heard Spike approach, turning at the last moment, so that Spike’s cudgel made contact with his temple rather than the back of his head. A smack of wood on bone echoed through the backstreet.
The man sank to his knees, helmet still gripped between his hands. Then he fell forward into the dust.
11
The man was lying face down, helmet just beyond his outstretched arms. Spike looked round: the motorcycle was parked a few yards behind. A throb of music pulsed from the street on the other side of the wall. The moon shone.
‘Shit,’ Spike said out loud.
He heaved the man onto his back. His lank dark hair receded to a widow’s peak on a high forehead. His jaw was wide, an unexpected home for pink girlish lips, his blue canvas trousers fastened with what looked like fisherman’s string. It was hard to te
ll if he was breathing or not.
Reaching forward, Spike held the back of his hand under the man’s nose. A faint warmth tickled the skin. He patted him down, hoping to find a wallet. Nothing but a small set of padlock keys. Digging his hands beneath the man’s muscled flanks, he rolled him onto his side, ready to check the back pockets. As the man turned over, his white T-shirt rucked up his back, revealing the base of a tattoo. Spike pushed the material higher and saw half of a Maltese cross, thickly inked.
Something moved in front: the man’s hands were clasping the sides of his motorcycle helmet. Spike made a grab for the cudgel but the man was too quick, swivelling on one hip and swinging his helmet up with both arms so that it collided with Spike’s forehead.
Spike stumbled backwards and fell heavily onto his coccyx. The man was already on his feet; he stepped to the left and kicked Spike neatly under the chin with the point of his toes. Spike felt his neck snap back and a sharp heat in his throat. Then he was lying on the ground, staring up at the moon, unable to hear anything except a swirling seashell sound in his ears.
12
Spike sensed a shadow move above. The noise in his ears had stopped; he realised he was still lying on the track, head tilted back in the dust, staring up at the night sky.
He tried to stand but his arms were jammed in the pockets of his trousers. He moved his eyes downwards and saw a rubber bicycle tyre squeezed around his hips.
The man reappeared. With his left hand, he swept his thin black hair into its peak. Then he reached down and picked up a plastic canister.
Spike tried to force his arms out but the tyre was too tight around his midriff. He kicked with his feet to push himself away. The rubber tread gripped the ground, holding him in place. His face was hot, sweat soaking his T-shirt.
The man stared down. One of his cheeks was shiny with blood.
‘I have money,’ Spike said. ‘Five thousand euros.’
The man seemed to hesitate. Then he started unscrewing the lid of the canister.
‘Ten thousand,’ Spike said as the man dropped the cap onto the ground.
It was then that Spike started to shout. A moment later, his cries became retches as the man sloshed petrol into his face. His eyes burned, vomit mixing with saliva, heaving from the depths of his stomach, making him gag and convulse so much that he managed to flip over onto his side.
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