'So much for your relaxing day off.'
'I guess your men are better at keeping themselves out of the way than his are,' Thorne said. But even as he spoke, he was thinking about Langford's reaction to the suggestion that he was having Thorne followed.
If Langford hadn't hired the man with the newspaper, who had?
'So, what did you talk about?'
'His retirement,' Thorne said. 'The people he's had killed, that kind of thing. It was all very friendly.'
'No nice, easy confession, then?'
'Most of it seems to have slipped his mind.'
'Of course.'
'At least he's not denying who he is, so we're halfway there.'
'You knew that anyway,' Samarez said.
Knowing was not proof, though, and an unverifiable conversation would not count for a great deal either. But the fingerprint evidence, if and when it came through, would do the job, and until then they had the phone records. The calls to the key number on a crucial date. There was something on paper.
'This trick with the dates and the phone numbers is something I need to remember,' Samarez said. 'You have tried it before?'
'No, but I'll certainly try it again.'
Thorne was grateful that in an uncertain and mostly unfair world, there were some things you could rely on. Politicians lied, British trains broke down and Germany won penalty shoot-outs.
And an old-fashioned London villain would always call his mother on her birthday.
He had little choice but to take the drive down slowly. Negotiating the sharp corners and perilous drops that were now only a few feet away on his near-side, his mind was not where it needed to be. His knuckles whitened on the wheel during some of the steeper sections as he fought to concentrate, to forget Langford's mock-innocent smirk when Thorne had mentioned Anna's name.
Some idiot in a Mercedes was on his bumper for a mile or two. Thorne feathered the brake at every opportunity, ignored each blast on the horn and gave the driver a good, hard stare when the Merc finally took the chance to overtake.
She's not that tennis player, is she?
He was still several miles up from the coast when his mobile rang on the seat next to him. On any other road, at any other time, he would not have thought twice about taking the call. Now he let it ring, listened to the alert as a message came through and waited five minutes until he had the chance to pull over.
He saw that the call was from Dave Holland and called him straight back without bothering to listen to the message. Glancing down into the valley as he waited for the call to connect, Thorne could see the lush fairways of a golf course highlighted against the surrounding browns and greys; splashes of green in an otherwise arid landscape.
Kitson answered Holland's phone. 'Dave's just nipped out, Tom.'
'I hope this is good news, Yvonne. It's not been a great day so far.'
'Dipped below seventy degrees, has it?'
'Put it this way, I'm about ready to twat the next poor sod who so much as looks at me funny.'
'You should do it, if it makes you feel better.'
'So, what's happening?'
'Chris Talbot,' Kitson said. 'Thirty-five years old, reported missing about four months before the body was found in Epping Forest. Right height, give or take the same build. His wife - ex-wife, whatever - lives up in Nottingham, so Dave and I are driving up there first thing in the morning. It looks good, Tom.'
From where Thorne was standing, it looked better than good. 'Can't you get up there tonight?'
'We tried, but she's not around until tomorrow.'
'Well, call me as soon as you've seen her.'
'Listen, I haven't got to the best bit yet. You know we talked about the victim being someone Langford wanted out of the way. The whole two-birds-with-one-stone thing?'
'I'm listening . . .'
'Chris Talbot was a copper,' Kitson said. 'Serious and Organised.'
THIRTY-EIGHT
By the time it had begun to get dark, the rush of optimism that Thorne had felt after speaking to Kitson had faded. Sitting in his hotel room, with the now familiar sound of trumpets and applause drifting up from the town square, he felt restless and oddly disconnected. He couldn't decide whether he needed reassurance or company.
He flicked through the TV channels, but it was too early for the easy distraction of porn. He picked up the thriller from his bedside table, read the first few pages then put it down again.
The fictional detective was way too bloody miserable.
He called Samarez and asked him if he wanted to have dinner. Samarez lived a good hour away on the far side of Malaga and said that it would be difficult for him to get there. He said that his wife was cooking and Thorne told him that sounded like a far more attractive proposition.
He called Phil Hendricks.
'Have you bought my sombrero yet?' Hendricks asked. 'I want a great big, fuck-off one, OK? I also want one of those bullfighting posters with my name on it.'
'No problem at all. It's not like I'm busy or anything.'
'Just put "El Magnifico".'
'I was thinking "El Poofo",' Thorne said.
'Yeah, that'll work.'
The conversation cheered Thorne up, but only slightly. 'I'm out of my bloody depth here, Phil.'
'They're only Spaniards, for God's sake.'
'I don't mean Spain, you tosser. The case. Langford . . .'
Thorne told him about the meeting in Ronda. He was used to villains fronting it out. Sometimes it was the only option they had left. But Langford had seemed genuinely confident and relaxed, even when Thorne had made his feelings about Anna Carpenter's murder abundantly clear.
Thorne was the one who had walked away shaken.
'Cocky's good,' Hendricks said. 'It's the cocky ones that fuck up.'
'As long as I don't fuck up first.'
'There's nothing wrong with being a bit . . . jumpy, all right?'
'Even if this missing copper does turn out to be our mystery body, I'm not sure where that leaves us.'
'Don't worry, it'll pan out, mate.'
'I hope so.'
'I reckon you're owed one anyway.'
'After Adam Chambers, you mean?'
'Listen, Tom. Langford's the one who's out of his depth, because he doesn't know you. If he did, there's no way he'd think he could wind you up and walk away.'
Thorne just grunted, non-committal. Praying his friend was right.
'You listening?'
'Yeah . . .'
'It's not just the case, is it?'
The music was getting louder, and there was a bell ringing, sombre and sudden, every few minutes.
'It's ridiculous,' Thorne said. 'I'm three hours from home, but it feels like the other side of the world. Like I'm thousands of miles away.'
'It must be heartbreaking, being away from me,' Hendricks said. 'I understand that.'
'Yeah, I don't know how I'm getting through the day.'
'I was sorry to hear about Elvis, by the way.'
'You spoke to Lou . . . ?'
'Not that the furry little bastard ever wanted much to do with me.'
Thorne swallowed hard, smiled at the memory of the cat assiduously avoiding Hendricks at every opportunity. 'She was a good judge of character.'
'Lou was upset, so I went round.'
'Thanks, Phil.'
'Not a problem.'
'Was she OK?'
'I don't think it was just about the cat. You know?'
Thorne grunted again and this time Hendricks didn't press it. 'How did Spurs get on last night?'
'Lost two - one at home to Villa,' Hendricks said, gleefully. 'Now they really are out of their depth.' There was a blare of trumpets as if to acknowledge the joke that Thorne had just ignored. 'What's that racket?'
Thorne told him about the feria, the celebrations on the village's big night.
'So, why the hell are you sitting there and moaning at me?'
When he and Hendricks had finished, Thorne t
ried to call Louise. There was no reply from either Kentish Town or Pimlico and her mobile went straight to voicemail. Thorne left a brief message, told Louise that he missed her.
Then he grabbed his jacket, left the hotel and walked towards the noise.
THIRTY-NINE
It did not take her long to pack.
Candela Bernal felt a little depressed that she had so little to take, so few possessions she could not leave behind, but she knew she needed to move fast and that this was not the time for sentiment. She took clothes mostly - shoved roughly into a pair of Louis Vuitton suitcases - some silly knick-knacks she had kept since childhood and half a dozen family photographs. She would also take the jewellery David had given her, of course. She was many things, but she was not stupid. She had earned it, after all. Besides, she knew that the time might come when she would need to sell some of it. Bracelets and fancy wristwatches were only things at the end of the day, to be admired rather than cared about. Staying safe was far more important; safe and well, assuming she could finally kick the cocaine habit.
Another thing David had given her. Another good reason to get as far away as possible.
They had talked about protecting her - that animal Samarez and the English cop - but Candela knew that it was just talk. They said she would be looked after in return for her cooperation, but she could see very well what they thought of her, that they had more important things to worry about than some mobster's girlfriend. Some druggie slut. They were like most of the men she had known, David Mackenzie included. Happy to promise you anything, to tell you whatever you needed to hear until they had got what they wanted.
When she had finished packing, she stood waiting at the window with a cigarette and her third glass of wine. She blew smoke against the glass and stared through it at the lights of the marina far below. She would not miss much about the place, certainly not the richer-than-you-are bullshit, but she would be sorry not to see the ocean every day, and the girls in the office. She had told them that she would need to skip the usual drink after work today. She had given each one an extra-long hug when she had left, and told them hay fever was making her eyes water.
She looked at her watch: the taxi was a few minutes late.
She had worked out the schedule to allow for traffic, leaving at least fifteen minutes to catch the train from Malaga to Cordoba, where she would be spending the night with an old school friend she had called the night before. Just one night, to be safe, then north from there - to Toledo or Madrid. She would decide later, once she was on her way, although perhaps somewhere smaller would be a better idea. In the cities, where David Mackenzie did so much business, where there were so many people keen to get into his good books, someone always knew someone.
And she knew he would be looking.
When the bell went, Candela turned from the window and walked to the intercom. She spoke briefly to the taxi driver, then buzzed him up to collect the cases. She took a last look around the apartment. Thought that, once she felt a little less terrified, it might even be fun to start again.
She had been pretending to be someone she was not for far too long anyway.
It took Thorne fifteen minutes to squeeze around the edge of the square until he found a space on some steps leading up to a bar. But he still had trouble seeing much, and had never been particularly happy crammed up against other people. He put his hands in his pockets, wary of thieves.
The crowd had left a corridor that was just wide enough for each of the marching bands to pass through. They came, with no more than a minute or two between them, the music of each fading into the next as the bands moved on to another part of the village. The uniforms were even more spectacular than the ones Thorne had seen before, but tonight the music was far less celebratory. The drummers beat out a rhythm that was almost funereal, and Thorne began to feel more than a little out of place. As if he were trespassing. Though every face he could see was open and happy, with the onlookers straining to get their first glimpse of the Virgin, Thorne started to find the whole thing positively spooky. He felt the same way about almost every religious ceremony, the tribute paid to anything that was outside simple human experience. He had once been unnerved watching a small group of Morris men in a Cotswold village. Their dancing had seemed aggressive, frenzied; the leader black-faced and sweating, glaring at the spectators, his hat shaped like a slab of rotting cheese.
When the crowd suddenly began applauding, Thorne looked to his left and saw the effigy swing into view and start its slow journey down the hill towards the square. This was way beyond clattering sticks and waving hankies.
Thorne had not got a good look at the statue up at the cave, but from where he was standing now, it seemed as though the entire shrine had been removed. The scale was breathtaking - twenty feet by ten, at a conservative estimate - and the weight evidenced by the fifty or so men needed to bear it upon their shoulders.
Thorne caught sight of a hand waving just a few feet away and watched as the Liverpudlian he had met the previous afternoon pushed his way towards him. The man seemed pleased to see Thorne and began raving about how lucky they were to be there.
'Has to be seen to be believed . . . Once in a lifetime . . . Real privilege.' All that.
Keen as ever to pass on information, he told Thorne that the men carrying the effigy - each dressed in immaculate white trousers and shirt - were all local police officers. He carried on talking while Thorne watched the enormous display moving down the hill and imagined every crime in the village over the next few days being investigated by distinctly lop-sided coppers.
'Do you fancy a pint?' The Scouser was now pressed up against Thorne, shouting in his ear. Then, as though his invitation were not clear enough, he made the universally understood drinking gesture.
Thorne fancied a pint very much, but he was less keen on having his ear talked off, or spat in, any more. He said, 'No, but thanks,' and edged his way through the crowd until he was at the corner of the square, at the bottom of the hill.
After twenty minutes, when the effigy and the hundred or so villagers who were following it had passed him, Thorne stepped into the street and joined the back of the procession.
Candela stubbed out her cigarette and finished her wine. She carried her luggage to the door and opened it.
'Just two bags,' she said.
Then she looked up and stepped back fast, tripping over one of the cases as she moved away from the door.
'Going somewhere, love?'
Directly behind the platform on which the effigy was mounted, a group of middle-aged men were carrying staffs topped with elaborate crosses. They were followed by the penitents, some barefoot or blindfolded, with candles stuffed into makeshift, tin-foil holders to prevent the hot wax falling on to their hands. Thorne moved along slowly with everyone else, the sense that he was intruding heightened when he was nudged gently but firmly to one side by someone clearly more deserving of a place ahead of him in the procession. Yet he felt compelled to follow, if only to see what would happen next.
He still felt uncomfortable, but the spectacle was hypnotic, the devotion oddly moving. The Scouser nodded to him from the steps of the bar and Thorne nodded back.
The huge platform swayed from side to side as it was carried, the bearers moving in a choreographed rocking motion that Thorne presumed made their progress easier. Every few minutes a man would turn to ring a bell on the front of the platform and it would be set down. It was not clear if this was part of the ritual or simply a way of giving those carrying it a break, but it gave Thorne the chance to move through the crowd and get close to the effigy itself.
He took out his phone and tried to get into a good position to take a few pictures. He thought Louise might like to see them.
The platform was thick with flowers: garlands of pink roses arranged around the ornate silver candelabra which twisted up towards the statue. The effigy stood beneath a silver canopy, with more flowers twisting around the struts and arranged on the top.
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The Virgin was smiling.
She was five feet or so tall and had a doll's face. Her lips were bright red, as though freshly painted, but the pale flesh of her cheek was peeling a little in places and there were cracks on the hands that gripped a sceptre and cradled an even more doll-like infant. Her long, brown hair seemed too modern, though, falling in curls across her shoulders and Thorne thought the wig looked a little out of place beneath the sunburst of a huge golden crown.
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