‘But I can’t just sit here,’ she protested.
‘No, you can’t. There are a few things we’re going to do. First and foremost, I’m going to put strong bolts on the inside of the front and back doors. They can pick all the locks they like, but they won’t get past those silently.
‘After that, I’m going to talk to a pal of mine,’ I felt myself slipping into Action Man mode. I should have been even more worried by that, but I wasn’t. ‘Susie, this development must be run through some sort of company, set up and registered in Spain. Do you remember what it’s called?’
‘No …’ she said slowly. ‘I left my file back in the office, all I brought was a note of the location of the place. But Brian Murphy’ll know. I’ll ask him.’
‘That’s the last thing you’ll do. Phone your secretary, and ask her to look at your file for the name of the company and the address of the bank.’
‘We’re closed till Monday.’
‘Phone her at home. Get her into the office. You got a mobile?’
‘Not here. It isn’t enabled for Europe.’
I grabbed a pen and pad from the coffee table and wrote down my number. ‘Give her that. Tell her to call us on it. Meantime, let’s get going.’ I jumped up from the couch.
‘Where?’
‘To the bricolage in L’Escala. We need to buy bolts, remember?’
22
Susie’s secretary must live close to the office, because we had only just left the ironmonger on the Passeig Maritim in L’Escala when she called back on my mobile. I answered it as I climbed in behind the driver’s seat of the Voyager, then handed it across.
‘Yes, thanks, Clara. Hold on till I get a pen. Right. Spell it again. Yes, I’ve got that. And the bank? Spell that too. Got it. The weather, it’s nice and sunny here, and quite warm for the time of year. Is it? Oh, too bad. Yes, see you soon; week after next.’
Susie handed me back the phone. ‘She says it’s pissing down in Glasgow right now.’
‘I wish you were there. Don’t you?’
She scowled at me. ‘You mean rather than here making your life a misery?’
‘Aye, put it that way if you like. But I really meant that you’d be safe in Glasgow.’
‘Sure you did. Anyway, the answer’s no. I told you, I’m a selfish, devious wee bitch.’
‘Manipulative.’
‘What?’
‘You’re a selfish, manipulative wee bitch, remember?’
‘Maybe so, but I prefer devious. And it’s still no. Apart from the falling down stairs bit, I like being here taking shameless advantage of you.’
‘Susan, chuck it, please.’
‘Making you uncomfortable, am I? Am I making you feel guilty because you don’t feel guilty enough?’
I looked away from her; I’m uncomfortable when someone can see right to the heart of me.
‘Come on. What have you got there?’
She looked at the diary in which she had scribbled her notes. ‘The company is called Castelgolf SA. The Banco Provincial is in Placa Catalunya in Barcelona.’
I started the car. ‘Where are we going now?’ she asked, glancing at the bag with the bolts and the new power drill, which lay on the back seat. ‘Are you going to do your boy-joiner act?’
‘Not yet. We’re going home, yes, but I’m going to make a phone call, and then we’re going to Barcelona. It’s barely gone ten; we’ll be there by one o’clock, easy.’
If I had thought to programme Ramon Fortunato’s direct number into my mobile, we needn’t have gone home at all. Since I hadn’t, I had to look it up on the card that he’d given me, the one which I’d left lying in the kitchen. Happily, he was in his office. He even answered the phone himself.
‘Hola Oz,’ he said, cheerily. ‘Good party the other night. Thanks again. What is it? I don’t have anything new on Capulet, if that’s what you were wondering.’
I had debated with myself whether to tell him about Susie’s non-accident, but had decided to keep it to myself for a while, mainly because I wasn’t sure I could trust him not to tell Prim about it. If anyone was going to do that, it had to be me.
‘No, it’s not that,’ I answered. ‘I need a favour. A friend of mine from Scotland has put a fair chunk of money into a leisure development here, and she’s concerned about lack of progress. I wonder if you could check whether your people know anything about the company involved, or the people behind it.’
He sighed, heavily and wearily.
‘What’s up?’
‘It’s not the first time I am asked a question like this, Oz. I’ve been asked it in French, in German, in Italian, and yes, in English too. Gimme some names.’
I looked at Susie’s note. ‘The company is called Castelgolf SA. The two guys who own it are Jeffrey Chandler and William Hickok; there might be someone called Brian Murphy involved as well.’
Fortunato chortled at the other end of the line. ‘Those are good ones, amigo. Like in the movies. Jeff Chandler and Wild Bill Hickok, yes? A couple of cowboys.’
Jesus! I almost said it out loud, but caught myself in time; I didn’t want to alert Susie right then.
‘In cases like this, if they are not straight, the names are never genuine. If those are real, I will bring out my old Guardia Civil hat and eat it. Where is this development supposed to be?’
‘Ullastret.’
‘You’re joking with me again, yes? There’s nothing near Ullastret. Leave this with me; I’ll get back to you.’
I sat there, on my kitchen bar stool, pondering. Eventually, I picked up the phone again and called a London number. ‘This is Mark Kravitz,’ the answerphone told me. ‘Leave a message.’
‘Mark,’ I told it, ‘this is Oz Blackstone. Can you call me back on …’
‘Oz,’ said Kravitz, bursting in on me, ‘it’s you. Sorry about the machine; I screen all my calls. What’s up, mate?’
I kept my voice low; Susie was hovering around in the living room, waiting for me to finish. ‘I’ve got a problem,’ I told him. ‘No details, but someone’s trying to harm a friend of mine. I have a couple of aliases I need checked. All my Special Branch contacts are used up; I wondered if you had access.
‘I’ll pay you, of course. Usual rate, whatever that is, no matter how much time you have to spend on it.’
‘Fair enough. Shouldn’t take too long, hopefully. What are the names?’
I told him; Mark obviously isn’t as big a film buff as Fortunato, because he didn’t react. ‘It’s a property scam,’ I added, ‘out here in Spain.’ I gave him my home and mobile numbers.
‘I’ll get back to you. I might have to grease someone. That okay?’
‘If it’s not actually illegal, sure.’
‘Fine. I’ll be in touch.’
As I was finishing the call, Susie appeared in the doorway. She had changed into a beautifully tailored, very expensive business suit; suddenly she looked very high-powered indeed. ‘You about ready?’ she asked, impatiently.
‘Yeah. Let’s take the Mercedes, eh. You look as if you’re dressed for it.’
23
I always take the autopista when I go down to Barcelona. The drive along the Costa Brava is nice, but neither one of us was in tourist mode. We both had an interest in nailing the so-and-so who had broken into my house and attacked Susie, while the girl herself was brimming with suspicion that her golf investment might be a two-million-pound pig in a poke.
‘You think I’ve been swindled, Oz, don’t you?’ she asked as we picked up our ticket at the Orriols motorway entry.
‘I hope not. But I know Ullastret; I was there last week in fact. There are some old Iberian ruins there, complete with museum. I took my nephews to see them. Okay, I wasn’t looking for a new leisure complex, but I don’t remember seeing anything remotely like it, nor any billboards advertising it.
‘On the other hand, it could just be well away from the road. The story about tripping over some relics during excavation is certainly plau
sible enough. You’re walking on layer upon layer of history in this part of the world, and they’re keen on preserving it.’
‘Maybe I should have invested in a museum instead,’ Susie snorted.
‘That would probably have been a better bet; less risky, that’s for sure.’
She reached across and thumped me lightly on the shoulder ‘Go on, you; cheer me up.’
‘That’s what I’m here for. Tell me, have you met these guys, Chandler and Hickok?’
She frowned at me, so hard that I almost felt it. ‘Of course I have. I’m not so stupid that I’d entrust that sort of money to someone I’ve never met.
‘They gave a presentation of the project to the three investors before we signed up. Brian Murphy arranged it; he was there, together with various architects, brokers and financial advisers, and the guys themselves.’
‘What were they like?’
‘Impressive. Both about forty, one of them, Hickok, had quite a strong Manchester accent; the other one was smoother, bit of the public school about him. The presentation was very professional; they ran through their CVs, then the architect ran through the project, explained how it would be phased and how it would be sold. It made sense to me as a builder. They needed a lot of money up front, they said, because the Spanish insist on developers building the golf course first, then the housing which will have paid for it ultimately.’
‘Did they tell you how you were going to get your money out?’
‘The plan was that when the course was built and the first housing was sold, they’d float the company on the Spanish Stock Exchange, with a market value of not less than fifteen million sterling. The backers would double their investment and the executive directors would split the other three million in shares, plus they’d continue to manage the business.’
‘What’s Murphy’s take?’
‘Ten per cent of the investors’ profit: six hundred thousand.’
‘What is he investing?’
‘Nothing that I know of.’
‘Good deal for Mr Murphy.’
There was nothing but silence from the passenger seat.
We drove on down the road in the whisper-quiet sports car, and soon hit the peaje north of Barcelona. As we drove on, having paid with a card at one of the auto-booths, Susie pointed to a huge walled building off to the left of the road. ‘What’s that?’ she asked.
‘That’s a rest home for retired property developers.’ She gave me a blank look. ‘They call it Barcelona Prison.’
Most cities these days are nightmares for motorists, and normally Barcelona is well up among them. However it was still the holiday season, and so the traffic was well short of gridlock. One thing that the city does have in its favour is plenty of off-street parking, much of it below ground. I knew of a well-guarded subterranean multi-level garage on the edge of Placa de Catalunya, and headed straight for it.
The sun had disappeared behind heavy clouds when we stepped out of the car park, and the temperature had fallen by several degrees. I had brought a heavy leather jacket, but Susie was cold, so we made a beeline for El Cort Ingles, where she bought a nice designer overcoat. While she was doing that, I asked a floor manager if he knew where we could find the Banco Provincial. He gave me precise directions. Without them, we’d probably never have found it before it closed, for it wasn’t actually on the square itself, but in a small passageway which led off it.
Susie walked up to the door and pushed it. ‘Damn!’ she swore. ‘They’re shut.’
I shoved again and heard a buzz as a cashier inside released the lock. ‘Security conscious,’ I told her. ‘Not unusual though.’
We stepped inside and I looked around. It looked like a pretty typical Spanish bank, not the kind you’d expect to be handling a significant corporate account. None of the staff wore uniforms; the women were smartly dressed in the same style as Susie, if less expensively, while most of the men wore slacks and sweaters. The counter was open, without security glass. I walked up to the first available teller and asked, in Spanish, if we could see the manager.
The girl, for she was no more, looked doubtful and replied in Catalan; I’m not much good at that but I worked out that she had said that he wasn’t available without an appointment. ‘No, en Castellano,’ I told her, trying to look business-like. ‘El jefe, por favor.’
She gave in and left her position; I watched her as she approached, a shade nervously, a man at the back of the staff area. He gave her a black look, but came towards us, unsmiling. ‘Si senor, yo soy el jefe aqui. Que pasa?’
I nodded towards Susie. ‘Por mi amiga, hablar Ingles?’
‘A little,’ he said. ‘You wish to open an account with us?’
‘No, thank you. But we do wish to enquire about an account here.’
As I’ve mentioned, no one shrugs better than a Catalan. They use the gesture so often and so well that it is almost a language of its own. The manager’s was a classic; it said, Piss off.
He emphasised it. ‘Sir, if it is not your account then I cannot tell you anything about it. It is not your business.’
‘Listen,’ Susie snapped at him. ‘It’s got a big chunk of my money in it, so that makes it my business.’
I put a hand on her shoulder to quiet her down. I could read the guy; there was a chance that he’d talk to me, but he’d never back down to a woman in front of his staff. ‘Let me explain, senor,’ I said. ‘My friend is a substantial investor in a company which, we are told, maintains its account at this branch. She has become nervous about her money. . it is a lot, as she says. . and so wants to make sure that the account actually exists.’
I won’t say that he softened, but at least he stopped to think about what I had told him. I watched him rub his chin for about thirty seconds until finally he shrugged again. This one said, I’ll go along with this guy for a while.
‘Come into my office.’ He pointed to a door to the left of the counter, then turned and walked away. A few seconds later the door opened and we were shown into a dull, sparsely furnished private room, and offered seats on the punter side of his desk. A nameplate faced us; Josep Lluis Peyra i Nunes.
‘Okay,’ Sr Peyra said briskly, ‘What is the name of this company?’
‘Castelgolf SA,’ Susie told him, then spelled it out for him.
Like everyone under the sun these days, me included, he had a computer on his desk. He clicked its mouse a couple of times, then played with the keyboard. As he was doing this, I watched his face, not his hands. I thought I saw a slight twitch of his right eyebrow.
Finally he swung his chair round, to look at Susie, not at me. ‘No, senora,’ he pronounced. ‘That company does not have an account here.’
She went noticeably pale. ‘How about the directors? Could it have been in their names; Chandler and Hickok?’
‘Senora, I cannot look through all my customer files …’
‘Wait a minute,’ I said, fairly heavily, forcing him to turn his attention back to me. ‘Did that company ever have an account here?’
When he broke eye contact, he gave me my answer. He confirmed it with the tiniest shrug. This one said, Okay, you got me.
‘Yes, it did. But it is closed now.’
‘How much was in it, who were the signatories and when was the money moved out?’
He tried to look at me as if I had asked him something preposterous. ‘Senor, I cannot tell you any of those things,’ he laughed.
‘Would you rather tell my other friend?’ I asked. I produced Fortunato’s business card from my pocket and handed it to him. ‘Be sure that if you don’t give us some answers, he will be here to ask you.’
The manager studied the card for a long time. ‘Listen,’ I said. ‘I understand that you might be concerned about the effect on your bank of the publicity attached to an incident like this. But we are talking about a lot of money, and we are not just going to walk away. We are going to find out what we want to know. Please, let’s do it the easy way.’
&
nbsp; He gave one last shrug to himself as much as to us. This was his What the hell! model. Then he looked at the screen once more. ‘The account was opened in June and closed in November. The opening balance was one billion, six hundred and fifty-six million pesetas, and it was almost the same when it was closed; it gathered twelve million pesetas in interest during the time it was open. There was one large payment made from it, of ten million pesetas, and a couple of smaller ones.
‘The money was transferred electronically to a bank in Nassau, in the Bahamas. The authorised signatories on the account were the people you mentioned, Senor Chandler and Senor Hickok. There was also a third signatory, Senor Josep Toldo; he has an office where we send all the account details.’
‘What’s his address?’
‘I cannot give you that; that I can only tell your policeman friend, if he ask. This man, Senor Toldo, he is a lawyer, and if you go to see him he may think that I sent you. He could make a lot of trouble for me.’
I understood that, so I didn’t press it. I was well chuffed with what we had got out of him as it was, and tracing the lawyer wouldn’t be hard. My elation lasted till we stepped back out into the narrow street and I saw the expression on Susie’s face. It looked like a stone mask. She might not have blown the entire Gantry fortune, but being taken for two million is going to hurt anyone.
‘Do you know what happened to me last month?’ she asked me, tugging her new designer overcoat closed tight against the cold. ‘A magazine in Edinburgh voted me Scottish Businesswoman of the Year. A fat bloody lot they knew, eh?
‘Business failure of the year; that’s more like it.’
I slipped my arm around her waist and headed her back towards El Cort Ingles. ‘Come on, wee one,’ I said, in what I hoped was my best ‘cheer up’ voice. ‘There are other people involved in this too, and they were supposed to be pretty smart. Are you bankrupt? No you’re not. . Not by a long shot. Are your shareholders going to demand your resignation? You are your shareholders.
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