If I said it suggested smuggling, he would think I was involved. If I said it didn’t suggest a damn thing, he’d know I was lying and be even more suspicious.
‘You don’t say anything?’
I shrugged, stretching my face into a smile. ‘Your guess is as good as mine.’
‘You have been to Bisley?’ The question took me by surprise. But of course, somebody would have told him about the cups. The inspector might have taken a note of them and reported. ‘You are a good shot I think.’ He was smiling again, the eyes bright like a bird that has seen a particularly succulent snail.
I nodded. ‘Why? What’s that got to do with it?’
He sat there, smiling still, and not answering, everything so quiet I could hear the distant chime of the cathedral clock. ‘Look, for God’s sake! I was there, right beside Jorge Martinez, sitting in front of a whole crowd of people. However good a shot I was at Bisley, there’s no way I could have done it.’
‘No. But there is somebody else. Antonio Barriago. You know him? A Spaniard who live in Algiers.’
Barriago! We stared at each other. Had he been the passenger that American yachtsman had said was on Thunderflash when she arrived in Mahon? Had Evans sailed the boat from a North African port, merely calling in at Marseilles on the way? ‘What about him?’ I asked. Barriago had been in the final shoot-off for the Oporto Cup, which was almost the last event I had taken part in.
‘You don’t know him?’ It was put subtly, an invitation to deny all knowledge.
‘No, I don’t know him,’ I said, ‘I’ve shot against him. That was three years ago and I haven’t seen him since. Why?’ And when he didn’t say anything, just sat there staring at me, I asked him why he was searching the boat.
For a moment I thought he wasn’t going to tell me that, but in the end he gave a little shrug and said, ‘Suppose it is Barriago who kill the Alcalde. And suppose – just suppose, Seóor Steele – he has been on board this boat –’
But I stopped him there. ‘I tell you, I haven’t seen the man for three years.’
‘All right then. Suppose he is on board when Señor Evans is the owner of it.’ He nodded at the engineer’s protruding feet. ‘That is why we are searching your boat. It has been in your possession since more than two weeks before the Alcalde is killed and we have been advised where is the most safe place for him to have hidden it.’
‘Who advised you?’ I asked him.
But he had turned away, watching the engineer again as he began to wriggle backwards. ‘Now I think we know whether you are involved or not. ‘Bueno?’ he asked.
The engineer grunted something unintelligible, and when he finally emerged, switching off his torch and standing there, wiping his hands and face on a bit of cotton waste, Menendez repeated his question, his voice sharp and urgent – ‘Bueno y bueno, qué has encontrado?’
‘Nada.’ The engineer pulled up the steps, slamming the engine compartment shut. It was clear he had had enough of clambering round in the confined space of the yacht’s engines.
Menendez turned to the inspector, checking the details of their earlier search. Then he gave a little shrug. ‘Eh bueno, it seems this boat is now clean.’ He was staring at me, a hard look in his eyes as he emphasised the word now.
‘Barriago,’ I said. ‘Why do you think he killed Jorge Martinez?’
‘You do not know?’ Still that hard stare as he waited for an answer. ‘A man answering his description, but with a different name, took an Aviaco flight out of here for Mallorca less than two hours after the shooting. At Palma he changed planes and flew on to Tunisia. The police in Tunis are endeavouring to trace him for us.’
I told him I didn’t see what this had to do with me, but all he said was, ‘He is a crack shot –’ He used the words tirador experto – ‘and you knew him. That is all. Nothing more.’ He reached for an ashtray and stubbed out his cigarette. ‘Eh bueno,’ he said again and got to his feet, the others following him. ‘When you wish to make a statement …’ Those sharp little eyes were fixed on mine. ‘A full statement, then you come to my office. Okay?’ He was suddenly smiling again.
‘You really think I had something to do with Martinez’s death?’
He shrugged. ‘That is between you and your conscience. When you are ready to talk …’ He said this over his shoulder as he went up the steps to the cockpit, his two officers behind him. ‘The truth, that is all I am interested in.’ He was standing like a cut-out against the blueness of the sky, his hair very black in the sunlight.
‘I wonder you don’t ask for my passport?’ It was a silly thing to say, but he could have arrested me if he had been sure enough to charge me with anything.
He turned as he reached the quay. ‘I already have your passport,’ he said. ‘It was the main reason I sent my officers to search your premises. In fact, your wife was kind enough to give it to them.’ He raised his hand, a little gesture of farewell. ‘Adiós.’ His driver was holding the car door open and he stepped in and was driven off. The other two lingered for a moment, staring at the boat as though trying to remember everything about her. Then they, too, drove away and I was left alone with Carp, his craggy features more puckered than usual. He didn’t speak Spanish, but he understood enough to know I was in trouble. ‘Come the next few days reck’n you’ll find out who your real friends are,’ he said, his Suffolk accent broader than ever. That was all and he turned away. That spi rope’s rove, but Luis an’ I gotter coil down the port anchor warp. Be for’ard if you want me.’ And then, as he crossed the coachroof, heading for the port bow, he said over his shoulder, ‘I’ll be ready whenever you say – just in case you’re coming too.’
I went back into the saloon then, standing there alone and trying to think things out. Antonio Barriago. That was three years back, the thousand-yard range and the two of us lying side by side shooting it out, a crowd gathered behind us, the smell of gun oil and cordite hanging on the still air and the targets shimmering in the haze. And afterwards, in one of the messes – I couldn’t remember which – the two of us professing our friendship and promising to meet again. We never had, and the next I heard of him he was a mercenary captured by SWAPO on the Zaire border.
That was all I knew about him. He might well be Basque and a member of Eta, but why risk a terrorist attack so far from the political centre of Spain? In any case, a mercenary was hardly likely to be a committed political activist.
Either his departure from Menorca so soon after the shooting was purely coincidental, or else, if he really had killed Martinez, then he had been hired to do the job. In which case, hired by whom, and for what purpose? Did the Chief Inspector really think I had hired him? In that case, he must think I had a reason. What? What possible reason could I have for wanting Jorge Martinez killed? And Wade, where did he fit in? Or Lloyd Jones, or Evans? If the police were tapping my phone …
I got myself a glass of iced coffee from the ship’s fridge and sat there thinking about it, conscious all the time of Carp and Luis moving about the deck. I should be up there with them, helping prepare the boat for sea, not sitting alone at the saloon table wondering what the hell to do. Ring the lawyer, check about the exchange documents, contact some of the people who might know where Evans was. But what I was really thinking about was Soo giving them my passport. She might at least have told me. And Wade phoning me again this evening.
I finished my coffee, then drove back to the office. Soo was out. She had left a note to say she would be back around four. I phoned Martin Lopez, catching him just as he was going to lunch. He confirmed that the catamaran’s certificate of registration had been sent to England for alteration. And yes, there had been a little problem with the exchange contracts, nothing serious, just a matter of dating it. Evans had signed it all right, but he had dated it the previous month. Intentionally? No, just a mistake, it happened quite often.
Like hell it did! Not if you knew the purpose behind it. For a moment I was tempted to take him into my confidence, t
ell him about the Kalashnikov. But that meant telling him what I had done with it, and anyway a lawyer who handled the affairs of some of the most prominent people in Menorca would hardly relish the thought that he might be acting for a foreigner who had got himself involved in the murder of a politician so universally popular as Jorge Martinez. I kept my mouth shut, and in doing so made myself not only accessory to an act of terrorism, but also to all that followed.
How was I, yachtsman, charterer, small-time businessman, an escapee if you like into the lotus life of the Mediterranean, to know, or even to understand, the machinations of those far removed from the little Balearic island of Menorca? There was Wade, of course, and Gareth Lloyd Jones, Patrick Evans with his two toughies and a lovely catamaran with which to tempt me. I should have known. At any rate, I should have guessed. But that is hindsight. God almighty! I couldn’t possibly have known, not then, sitting at my desk with a gin and tonic and staring out of the open window, not a breath of air stirring, the water mirror-calm and the shimmering hulk of the hospital riding to its upside-down reflection like one of those great floating batteries the French and Spanish navies had used against Gibraltar at the end of the eighteenth century.
If only Petra were still here. I could have talked it over with her – practical, matter-of-fact, and that bouncing, vital body of hers. I had a sudden picture of her lying naked on top of me, that last time, the day after Soo had lost the baby. If only she’d been out there in that tent on the far side of the island. No breeze at all and the air outside almost as hot as midsummer.
I got suddenly to my feet, finished my drink and drove round to a little restaurant I often used near the Club Maritimo. I had gazpacho and gambas plancha with half a bottle of Campo Viejo, sitting there in the darkened interior, shocked to find myself eating alone as though I were some sort of pariah. In the old days I’d done that quite often. I’d had to. But since I had come to Menorca … since then, of course, there’d always been Soo and the host of friends we had made – people we knew, anyway. Never the need to be alone.
Back in the office I began ringing round to discover whether Evans had put in anywhere. I think if I had phoned Flórez he might have told me right away. But Flórez was the last person I wanted to contact in the circumstances. It took me three calls before I thought of Felipe Lopescado who ran a little taberna on the Ciudadela waterfront. ‘La Santa Marian? Si – un señor Inglés.’ He even knew the name. ‘Pat Eevanz.’ The boat had come in to the puerto at Ciudadela late the night before last. There had been three men on board and they had come ashore for a drink about ten-thirty. ‘Si, at the Taberna Felipe.’
‘Is the boat still there?’ I asked him.
‘Si.’
‘Was it there yesterday?’
‘Si, all day.’ And he assured me the men were still on board, all three of them.
‘Do you know where they were at midday yesterday?’ I had to ask him straight out like that, there was no alternative.
‘They were here in the taberna.’
‘For how long?’
‘About three hours. You have eat here, senor. You and the senora. You know how long it takes.’
‘They had lunch at your place then, all three of them?’
‘Si. They have mejillones. The mussels are fresh in that morning, very good, very beeg. Then the capitán have rabo de toro and there is one pollo and one escalope. Also my taberna Rioja and some Quinta with the coffee.’
‘And the captain’s name?’
‘I tell you, he is Pat Eevanz.’
I had him describe the man then, but it was Patrick Evans all right, and after leaving the taberna, Evans, with one of the others, had taken a taxi into the centro, while the third man returned on board. Felipe couldn’t tell me when Evans had returned, but he assured me the man had been there this morning, because he’d seen him talking to the harbour master on the quay, and the Santa Maria was still anchored in the same position. He thought it likely that their catch had been off-loaded at some other port. Certainly, no fish had been landed from the vessel in Ciudadela.
I was left wondering when Evans had planted that gun in the starb’d engine compartment, even whether he had.
I cleared my desk, then drove out to the airport just south of the San Clemente road. I thought Alejandro Suarez, the assistant manager and one of the few islanders who really enjoyed sailing, might be able to produce somebody on the airport staff, or at the Aviaco desk, who had actually spoken to Tony Barriago, somebody who could give me an idea of the man’s state of mind. It would have taken him no more than half an hour at the outside to clock in at the airport, which would mean perhaps half an hour of waiting before actually boarding the plane. Plenty of time for his nerves to become ragged.
But Alex said the police had already interrogated everyone who might have spoken to him and the only person who had been able to recall him was the Aviaco woman who had dealt with his ticket. She remembered him because he had come back afterwards to enquire whether the plane had arrived yet, and when she said it was due in almost immediately, he had thanked her and turned away, apparently quite satisfied. He had appeared relaxed, not in the least nervous or upset. ‘Do they think he is the killer of Don Martinez?’
‘Possibly.’ We were standing in the airport lounge, which was packed with people. The PA system suddenly broke into life, the hubbub rising to a crescendo as friends and relatives said their goodbyes to passengers on a Barcelona flight.
‘Pardon. I have to go now. If there is anything else …’ Alex smiled at me apologetically and went through into the departure area where, in addition to immigration and customs officials, security officers were screening the passengers before embarkation. Would Tony Barriago have been sweating as he went through the last stage before boarding the plane? But the security officer on duty now might not be the same as yesterday, and anyway, it was such an obvious line of enquiry that the police would have covered it already.
The crowd in the main lounge had thinned to a few people sitting at tables drinking coffee or wine and waiting for another flight. I wandered out into the long passageway that led to the arrivals area. This was what Tony would have done, mingled with the crowd from an incoming flight, even taken a stroll outside, anything rather than sit in the main lounge, boxed in and too conspicuous until it had filled up. I had a word with Maria at the stand that sold magazines and postcards, and then it occurred to me that he might have had a taxi waiting for him outside, just in case.
I went out and began checking with the drivers. A British charter flight was due in and there was quite a line of taxis waiting. It was about the ninth or tenth I spoke to, a fat man with a Panama hat perched on his head, who said he’d been there the previous afternoon when the Guardia drove up to the airport, and yes, he had seen a taxi waiting in the car park opposite. He had noticed it because normally taxis waited in the line. They did not park with the private cars. And when the police arrived, a short, hook-nosed man, who had presumably hired the taxi, went across and spoke with the driver. He had stayed there talking to him for several minutes, right up until the time his flight was called. Then he had hurried back into the airport.
‘And the taxi?’ I asked him.
‘He come out of the car park and join us in the taxi line.’
‘He had paid him off then?’
‘Yes, the man pay him before going back into the airport.’
‘Did the taxi leave the car park immediately?’
‘No, he wait there until the plane take off. Then he join us.’
I asked him the driver’s name then and he said ‘Gonzalez.’ He did not know his other name, but he thought he came from Villa Carlos.
I thanked him and went back to my car, convinced now that Menendez had been right. The description fitted and Tony Barriago had got away with it. At the time he flew out to Palma, and then on to Tunis, the police had had no idea who they were looking for.
Soo had returned by the time I got back. She had been to see M
anuela Renato’s sister, Maria, who was married to Hernando Pons, the most successful of the local property developers. ‘They’re very worried,’ she said. ‘Jorge’s death leaves a vacuum and they’re now getting together with their friends to fill it. The problem is they don’t have any one man in mind, so that already there is a danger they’ll split up into factions, each advancing their own candidate. The effect may well be that a man nobody wants will be elected.’
‘Who?’ I asked.
‘Maria couldn’t say. Flórez perhaps since he has a garage in Mahon as well as in Alayór, and of course business friends in both towns. Even Ismail Fuxá’s name was mentioned. Those were the two worst possibilities, of course, but it shows what a problem this thing has created, and what she was saying to me was that it was time to be out of property in Menorca, at least until things have settled down. I saw Carmen, too. She was in one of her tense moods, a little scared I thought, and she had that wicked little woman, Mercedes, with her. Mercedes said we should leave now, go back to England, or wherever it was we came from, that it was all our fault – Thatcher, Reagan, bombs, new development … She was quite rude.’ And Soo added, as though it were all part of the gossip she’d picked up, ‘They took your passport, by the way.’
‘Menendez said you gave it to them.’
‘They asked where it was, so I told them.’ And she added, a little defensively, ‘They’d have found it anyway.’
‘Possibly.’
She flared up at that. ‘Not possibly – inevitably. You can’t pin the loss of your passport on me. They’d have turned the whole place inside out if I hadn’t told them.’
I went through into the kitchen, got some ice and mixed a strong dry martini. Damned if I was going to have a row with her over it, but just to give it to them without argument or even any sort of protest … ‘Do you want one?’ I asked her.
She nodded, standing by the window with Benjie in her arms.
Medusa Page 12