The Verge Practice

by Barry Maitland

  ‘You know I’m a police officer, don’t you?’ she tried.

  ‘Captain Alvarez will be very angry if anything happens to me.’

  They ignored her, Lizancos unpeeling the syringe and filling it from the brown bottle. He came to her side, bending to wipe her arm with cotton wool, and as he did so he hissed in her ear, ‘I don’t think so.’ Then he jabbed the needle in.

  Kathy began to protest. ‘That is the most stupid . . .’

  But no more words came.

  28

  Agust of cool air on her left cheek. She didn’t want to get out of bed and tried to turn over, but found she couldn’t. Something was holding her down. There was a roar of noise, then silence. She opened her eyes, saw pale light and immediately felt a wave of nausea swell inside her.

  She closed her eyes quickly and it gradually subsided.

  Someone was speaking, a man, insistent. Something touched her shoulder and she tried opening her eyes again.

  This time she made out a circle. She realised she was sitting, not lying, and simultaneously registered a steering wheel in front of her face. Struggling to free herself, whatever was holding her released abruptly, and she found herself rolling to her left. The nausea lurched in her stomach again, and she saw a polished black boot looming in front of her face.

  It began to move, but not fast enough. She vomited over it and a man cursed. Her vision blurred and she fell forward onto the ground.

  After a while, she opened her eyes and saw that she was lying on bare earth by the side of a highway. Occasional cars and trucks were passing, engines roaring, headlights ablaze under a sky the pale grey of dawn or dusk. She sat up slowly and took in the flashing blue light on the car parked behind her Seat. One cop was crouching over his shoes, wiping them with a piece of newspaper, while the other looked inside her car. She noticed with a groan that the front of the Seat was caved in against a concrete post.

  The cop straightened out of the car and replaced his cap. He said something to the other man and held up her passport in one hand; in the other was an empty bottle.

  Brandy, Kathy guessed. They both looked down at her with disgust on their faces.

  It was late morning before Captain Alvarez and Lieutenant Mozas made an appearance at the district police station where she had been taken. By that stage she had been given a breath test, a blood test, a medical examination, water, coffee and a bread roll. The young doctor had offered to pump out her stomach, but she had declined, although she still felt dazed and horribly sick. This wasn’t surprising, he had suggested, with a blood alcohol reading of that magnitude. A woman officer had taken her to a washroom, where Kathy had tried clumsily to clean up her clothes. She had examined the arm where Lizancos had injected her and found only a faint red mark. Apart from that and the hangover, she seemed to be untouched.

  Alvarez looked stiff and proper in a black double-breasted suit, hair brushed hard against his skull, as if he’d come straight from mass. Mozas, in jeans and sweater, might have been taking the family on a Sunday outing.

  Neither man seemed pleased to be there. Alvarez sat opposite her across the table, Mozas, disconcertingly out of her cone of vision, somewhere to her right.

  ‘Why are you here, Sergeant Kolla?’ Alvarez asked. He had the same look of distaste on his face as the highway patrol officers, and Kathy wondered if there was some particular taboo in Spain against drunk women. She thought they must have had enough British tourists pass through to get used to the idea by now. Probably the whole building despised her.

  ‘I . . .’ Her throat felt dry and clogged, and her first attempt to speak ended in a coughing fit that brought back the nausea. They waited with exaggerated patience while she took a sip of water and tried again. ‘I had a free weekend,’ she said hoarsely, ‘so I thought I’d come back to Barcelona, as a tourist.’

  ‘Are the drinks in London so expensive?’ Alvarez sneered.

  ‘It was a very cheap flight.’

  ‘Who did you come with?’

  ‘I came alone.’

  ‘Where is your luggage?’

  ‘In the car?’

  The policeman lifted her backpack onto the table and emptied it in front of her. Towel, wash bag, sunglasses, change of shirt and underwear, and The Complete Works of Luis Domènech i Montaner. There was no sign of her tools.

  ‘What is your hotel?’

  ‘I never got around to finding one.’

  ‘Where did you go last night?’

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t remember.’

  ‘Yesterday afternoon?’

  Kathy shrugged. ‘Sorry, my mind’s a blank. I don’t even know where you found me.’

  Alvarez’s eyes and lips narrowed with irritation. ‘Did Scotland Yard send you?’

  ‘Absolutely not. They have no idea.’

  Alvarez snorted, half turned in his chair and lit a cigarette. Mozas took this as his cue to edge his seat closer to Kathy’s right side and say quietly, ‘This is no good, Kathy, this “I don’t remember” business.’

  ‘But it’s the truth, Jeez. I honestly cannot remember taking a single drink last night.’

  ‘You think someone gave you something?’ he offered sympathetically. ‘It happens. An attractive young woman on her own, a man slips something in her coffee and she wakes up twelve hours later remembering nothing . . .’

  ‘Well, I suppose it’s possible.’

  ‘But you weren’t raped.’ His tone hardened abruptly.

  ‘What would be the point, if your phantom did nothing?’

  ‘He’s your phantom, Jeez. I can’t remember a thing.’

  ‘Did you come here to meet someone, perhaps?

  Someone you met the last time you were here?’

  ‘No. I just thought I’d take a stroll down La Rambla.’

  ‘So you went to La Rambla?’

  ‘I can’t remember.’

  Alvarez snapped something and both men got to their feet. Kathy was taken out to a cell. Her belt and shoelaces were removed and the door was locked. She examined the plastic cover on the mattress of the single bunk, then stretched out on it and tried to sleep.

  She woke to the clang of the steel door. A uniformed man gave her a tray with a sandwich and cup of water, and left again. She found she was hungry.

  When they took her back to the interview room she saw from the clock on the wall that it was now two-fifteen.

  Three hours had passed since the two detectives had spoken to her, and now here they were again. Kathy wondered what they’d been doing. They seemed to have accumulated some files of paperwork.

  The younger man, with the better command of English, sat opposite her this time, with Alvarez, glowering, to the side.

  ‘Do you feel a little better, Kathy?’ Mozas inquired sympathetically.

  ‘A bit, yes, thanks.’

  ‘Good. And perhaps your memory has come back?’

  ‘I’m afraid not.’

  ‘Well, let’s try to help it. Yesterday you got off the plane at El Prat and went to the Hertz desk. Do you remember that?’

  ‘Vaguely.’

  ‘It was five past one when you signed for the car. You got behind the wheel of a red Seat Cordo, and you drove out of the airport. Where did you go?’

  Kathy shrugged.

  ‘Into Barcelona?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘I don’t think so, Kathy!’ The detective gave a grin of triumph, and Kathy felt a little chill, wondering what they could know.

  Mozas consulted his notes. ‘You went to Sitges.’

  ‘Did I?’

  ‘Oh yes. And please don’t say you can’t remember.’

  Kathy said nothing. She saw that Mozas was dying to tell her how he knew.

  ‘How do you know that, Jeez?’

  ‘You drove down on the A-16 autopista to Sitges. Your vehicle was filmed going through the Castelldefels toll booth at one twenty-two p.m.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Did you go to Sitges the last t
ime you were here, Kathy?’ Mozas asked. ‘You must remember that!’ He grinned again, and Kathy recognised a trap.

  ‘Well, yes, I did,’ she said carefully. ‘I drove down the coast one afternoon. It was very pleasant.’

  ‘Any particular points of attraction? Places of interest?’

  ‘I did a bit of sightseeing . . .’

  ‘And you went to a fitness club, yes?’

  ‘I believe I did, yes.’

  Alvarez suddenly unleashed a stream of angry prose at Mozas, who stiffened, his playful manner evaporating. ‘The captain says that you are full of shit, Kathy. He wants you to tell us the truth now, or he will hand this over to our bosses to take to the highest levels in Scotland Yard. We know you broke into the Apollo-Sitges Fitness Club yesterday evening . . .’

  ‘No.’

  ‘The alarm was recorded at eight twenty-three p.m., and your car was photographed again on the autopista at eight fifty-four p.m., returning to Barcelona.’

  They’ve had help, Kathy thought. Lizancos has told them exactly where to look. What else has he told them?

  ‘Why would I want to break into a fitness club? Are you accusing me of a robbery?’

  ‘No, Kathy. In a way it’s much more serious than that.

  The building is owned by Dr Javier Lizancos, as you well know. You’ve met Dr Lizancos, of course. You went to his home on the eighteenth of September, the day before you went to Sitges to visit his premises there.’ Kathy noticed that Captain Alvarez had picked up The Complete Works of Luis Domènech i Montaner and was pointedly turning the pages, studying the illustrations. Mozas leaned towards Kathy across the table and lowered his voice. ‘Is there someone you are in contact with here in Spain, Kathy? Another arm of the police services, perhaps? The Guàrdia Civil? It would be so much simpler if you would tell us. It would avoid misunderstandings.’

  ‘No, really.’

  Mozas looked put out. ‘But you cannot even speak Spanish! You don’t have Linda with you. What did you expect to achieve?’

  ‘I just wanted a change of scenery for the weekend.’

  Alvarez got to his feet and reached towards her, brandishing the book. For a moment Kathy thought he was going to hit her with it. Instead, he slammed it down on the table, open at the page illustrating the house of the superintendent of Sant Pau, and glared at her.

  Mozas said, ‘Dr Lizancos has reported an intruder in the grounds of his house in the Eixample district last night.

  This house, that you have the plans for in your bag. Fortunately he had a guest staying with him, the manager of his Sitges building, who had come to report on the break-in there. This man scared off the intruder, but he did take note of a car parked outside in the street. A red Cordo, with the same number as yours.’

  Kathy felt thoroughly outclassed by the lizard doctor.

  She wondered what he had done with her tools. Was he holding them back, like a careful boxer reserving the big punch, or had he already planted them somewhere?

  ‘Look, Jeez, I can’t help you with this. There’s obviously been an unfortunate series of coincidences, but I’m sure you don’t have time to waste where no real harm has been done, and I don’t think either of us would want an embarrassing international incident.’

  ‘I’m not sure that can be avoided, Kathy. You see, from where we are sitting, it looks as if a member of the British police has been caught carrying out illegal acts against a Spanish citizen on Spanish soil. Dr Lizancos is a very distinguished man, highly regarded. He holds the police medal as well as many other honours. He is a personal friend of Captain Alvarez, who, incidentally, is very pissed off that you and Linda passed yourselves off as acting on his orders when you went to visit the doctor the first time.’ Mozas paused, his stern expression softening a little. ‘Is there someone you would like to contact for help, Kathy? Your superior? It doesn’t seem fair that you should have to deal with this all alone.’

  Kathy imagined Brock at the end of a pleasant Sunday lunch with Suzanne, and felt a sharp pang of longing for home. But ringing him would only seem to implicate him.

  As if reading her thoughts, Mozas said, ‘Mr Brock is your immediate boss, isn’t he? But he’s only a chief inspector.

  I think Captain Alvarez will want to go higher than that.

  Much higher. Do you really want to be crucified alone?’

  Kathy felt sick.

  They took her back to the cell and left her there for several more hours. Finally, Lieutenant Mozas came for her with a uniformed cop. The two of them chatted amiably in Catalan while Kathy was led out to the front counter of the police station. One by one her possessions were produced and signed for. Mozas looked at his watch and said something to the desk officer, who muttered and sped up the process, then they were leading her to a patrol car in the street outside. It was a balmy evening, with the glow of sunset on the tiled roofs.

  ‘What’s going on, Jeez?’

  ‘You’ve got a plane to catch,’ he said. ‘You know, I never saw big guns move so fast, Kathy.’ He laughed and consulted his notebook. ‘Commander . . . Deputy Assistant Commissioner . . . Assistant Commissioner . . . Deputy Commissioner . . . back to Commander. Is that right?

  Such odd names. I thought commissioners were the people who check your ticket at the movies. Here’s your orders, by the way.’

  He handed her a copy of a fax with the Metropolitan Police letterhead. It read, ‘DS K. Kolla is ordered to report for interview at the office of Commander D. Sharpe, Room 632, New Scotland Yard, at 0900 hrs on Monday 1 October.’

  ‘Tomorrow morning,’ Kathy murmured.

  ‘Yeah. Tough.’

  ‘What’s the story?’

  ‘You’ve been working too hard, and you’ve had some personal problems, yes? To do with a boyfriend? You’ve had a breakdown, something like that. Anything to keep that headline out of the paper.’

  ‘What headline?’

  ‘Drunk lady cop arrested in Spain.’ Mozas laughed again.

  He seemed to be enjoying himself. ‘Your drink-driving charge will stay on the record, in case you ever try to come back. You’ll have to sort out the damage to the car with the hire company.’

  Well, Kathy thought, at least I won’t be giving the speech to the police conference on Wednesday.

  ‘Boy, your clothes really stink of booze and stuff,’ Mozas said. ‘How’s your hangover, by the way?’

  ‘Terrible.’

  ‘Get yourself a drink in the airport. It’ll make you feel better. If there’s time, that is.’ He leaned forward and spoke to the driver, who flicked on the siren and pressed his foot to the floor. Mozas leaned closer to Kathy and lowered his voice. ‘I got rid of your burglar’s tools. I thought you’d want that.’

  Kathy looked at him with surprise. ‘Why did you do that?’

  He shrugged. ‘I thought you were in enough trouble without the physical evidence. Alvarez wouldn’t have agreed to let you go if he’d seen those.’

  ‘Thank you, Jeez. I appreciate it.’

  ‘Lizancos and his gorilla set you up, didn’t they?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You know, you should have come to me in the first place, Kathy. I could have helped you.’

  ‘I’d have got you into trouble, too.’

  He shrugged. ‘And now you’ve got yourself into a hole.

  I guess they’ll kick you out.’

  ‘Yes . . .’ She saw the terminal building ahead, and suddenly felt quite calm and settled, for the first time that day. ‘Unless I can come up with something really smart.’

  ‘Like a miracle?’ Mozas laughed. ‘Good luck!’

  29

  Kathy stared out the window at the baggage-handling trucks circling the parked aircraft. Rain was streaming across the glass, making the picture blur and streak as if she were weeping. She sighed and got to her feet, joining the queue of passengers shuffling towards the exit.

  There was a crowd waiting on the other side of the barrier. A group of children
were waving frantically at a Spanish girl in front of Kathy, limousine drivers held up placards with names. In the confusion Kathy didn’t immediately notice the dark figure standing off to the left, but when she was through the crush and into the open space of the arrivals hall, something made her turn to see Luz Diaz closing in on her.

  ‘Hello, Sergeant Kolla,’ the woman said. ‘Welcome home.’

  ‘Hello. You look as if you were expecting me.’

  ‘Dr Lizancos phoned to tell me about your adventures in Barcelona.’

  ‘You know him, of course.’

  The woman gave a little nod.

  ‘How did he know what plane I was on?’

  Luz smiled. ‘Captain Alvarez felt obliged to brief the doctor when they decided to let you go. I decided to come and meet you. There are some things we should discuss. My car is outside.’

  Kathy hesitated. She met the woman’s eyes and felt a She noticed Luz’s eyes shift to a spot beyond her right shoulder, and turned to find George Todd standing there. return of the nausea that had disappeared during the flight.

  ‘I don’t think so. It’s been a long day.’

  He had his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket, and he was regarding Kathy with the closest attention.

  ‘Even so, it’s important that we talk before you meet with your superiors tomorrow morning, Kathy,’ Luz said.

  ‘It concerns Charles Verge. I take it you believe he’s still alive?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Dr Lizancos said you were very persistent. He said you wouldn’t give up.’

  ‘Clever old Dr Lizancos.’

  ‘I can take you to Charles.’

  ‘Why would you do that?’

  ‘You do want to find him, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Come on, then.’ She linked her arm through Kathy’s and led her towards the doors.

  Later, as they headed north up the M25, Luz turned to Kathy in the passenger seat beside her and said, ‘You are a very determined young woman, aren’t you? Did you really do all that breaking and entering in Spain off your own bat, or did someone put you up to it? Chief Inspector Brock, perhaps? I always thought he might be hard to convince.’