Inhuman Remains

by Quintin Jardine

  ‘Maybe he’s hiding out in a gay club,’ Frank said bitterly.

  I was about to scold him for being flippant, but stopped myself. ‘That’s not as crazy as it sounds. There are plenty of gay-friendly hotels in Barcelona, and just down the coast there’s Sitges; that has the most famous gay community in Spain.’ I paused. ‘Hey, Sebastian and Willie told me they were heading north for a spell, to a place they’d heard of near Girona; a retreat, was what they called it. Could it be that they let a bit of the truth slip out?’

  ‘It’s worth checking out, I suppose. But how?’

  ‘Leave that to me. We’re in my territory now.’

  I reached for my phone. ‘Hey!’ Frank exclaimed.

  I held up a hand to cut him off. ‘I’ve used it already this morning, and I don’t see any bad guys around. Besides, we’re in the middle of a big city and we’ll be on the move soon. When we do, we need somewhere to go. I’m going to try to take care of that. You want to do something useful, check your phone for messages.’

  Among my circle of friends in St Martí is a lady named Shirley Gash. She and I go back at least ten years, to my first visit to the area with Oz. You either hit it off with her or forget it, but Shirl and I clicked. Her life hasn’t been plain sailing since then; she had family and business trouble all at the same time, but she’s back in calm waters now, and in virtual retirement. She adores Tom and Charlie, so I see quite a lot of her. Mind you, there’s quite a lot of her to see: she’s a large and elegant lady, tall, blonde and buxom. I called her home number. It rang a few times, and I was about to give up when she answered. ‘Hello.’ She’s lived in Spain, mostly, for decades now, but she still speaks English when she picks up the phone.

  ‘Shirley, it’s Prim.’

  ‘Hi, gal,’ she said breezily. ‘What you up to? You at home? I was just heading up to St Martí, for coffee in Can Coll. You and your small tribe want to join me?’

  ‘Love to, but we’re not at home. Tom and the dog are in Monaco, with the other family . . .’

  ‘Fuckin’ little tart,’ she growled. Shirley does not approve of Susie for the way she and Oz got together, and for all I tell her we’re fine now, she never will.

  I let it pass, as I always do. ‘I’m out of town too,’ I told her, ‘but I’m planning to head back today. Thing is, there’s a small problem with my place just now. I was wondering, have you got anybody in your summer-house just now?’

  ‘No, it’s empty. Do you want to stop there?’

  ‘Please. And I’ve got someone with me, my cousin, Frank McGowan.’

  ‘What? The one you told me about, the Japanese sailor’s spawn, the one who was in the nick?’

  ‘Yes. You don’t mind, do you?’

  ‘Hell, no. I’d love to meet him. I’ll do you one of my champagne risottos . . . bread and butter pudding too, if you fancy.’

  ‘Stop it! I’m getting fat just thinking about it.’ A little extra and unexpected sunshine had come into my day: that’s her special-friends supper, and it’s memorable. ‘Shirley,’ I continued, ‘it’s pick-your-brains time. Am I getting this right, when I recall you mentioning to me a place for gays that’s opened up somewhere near us, in an old country house?’

  ‘Masia Josanto, it’s called,’ she replied. ‘It’s on the other side of Gualta. Turn off the main road just past the golf course and go through the village. Got me?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It’s run by a couple of blokes, and that’s where the name comes from. Lovely boys. José’s from Mexico City and Antonio’s from Málaga. Gay-friendly, they prefer to call themselves. That means they don’t turn straight people away, but they don’t pitch for their business either. I’ve eaten there. Damn good. The place is beautiful, very old: José’s wealthy and he spent a lot of his fortune doing it up. They showed me round. It’s all suites and such, very comfortable.’

  ‘They would take a man-woman couple, though? Mother and son?’

  She laughed. ‘You thinking about taking your Frank there?’

  ‘Less of it.’ I chuckled. ‘He’s not that much younger. No, I was thinking of his mum.’

  ‘No problem there. Here,’ her tone changed, became suddenly mischievous, ‘how many beds will I make up in the summer-house?’

  ‘Shirley!’

  ‘Do I take that as one, or two?’

  ‘Two,’ I said, maybe a little too defensively.

  ‘Whatever you say, but it’s a long time since you’ve had your bones jumped, and I won’t be telling anyone.’

  ‘Two,’ I repeated.

  She laughed again. ‘See you later. What time?’

  ‘Some time after six. So long for now.’

  I turned to Frank. He was staring at his phone. He held it out to me. ‘Take a look,’ he whispered. I did, and saw a frozen image of Auntie Ade, sitting in a chair, in a well-furnished room. ‘Press the green button.’

  I did, and she began to move; it was a video clip, taken by a mobile. ‘Son,’ she said, in an unwavering voice, ‘I imagine you know what this is all about. This man seems to be serious, so . . .’ her eyes blazed ‘. . . don’t do what he wants. Save yourselves and let them kill me if they’ve got the balls to do it.’ A muffled sound came from off-screen. She glared at the holder of the phone. ‘Fuck you!’ she shouted. ‘I’ll say what I ...’ And there the clip ended.

  I found myself smiling. ‘She’s a tough old bird, isn’t she just? I hope he tied her up good and tight before he went to sleep, otherwise he’d be likely to wake up with a pair of nail scissors in his throat.’

  ‘It’s ironic, Prim,’ Frank moaned. ‘She’s saying the same as Justin: accept the inevitable.’ His eyes misted over.

  ‘Which we won’t,’ I promised him. ‘We’ve got a possible lead to her, and a definite bolt-hole for ourselves.’ I told him about my call to Shirley. He looked less excited than I’d hoped. ‘Come on,’ I said. ‘It’s a long shot, but worth a try.’

  ‘And it’s all we’ve got.’ He sighed.

  ‘Hey,’ I laughed, although his mood worried me, ‘I thought you said the tiger was back.’

  He squared his shoulders and seemed to perk up. ‘You’re right. I’m sorry; I’m still disappointed by Justin, that’s all. How do we get there?’

  ‘I’ll show you.’ I led the way downstairs and back to the metro, stopping on the way to draw cash with my Caixa de Girona card. Frank didn’t protest that I was being reckless: he knew it would have been a waste of time. We took the underground to Gràcia, then caught the first train for the airport. I headed straight for the multistorey car park and paid the charges in the ticket machine. There was nobody lying in wait for us; not that I expected company, not there. It took me a little while to find the Jeep in the chock-a-block level two . . . I really should note down the row number every time . . . but I did, eventually. It was intact. Frank wanted to check underneath for a bomb, but I pointed out that it would have been impossible to fix anything without leaving tell-tale marks in the dust that, I am ashamed to say, usually cakes the vehicle.

  I fired it up and we headed out, into the daylight and into the stock-car-like traffic, air-con going full blast, and Del Amitri . . . a great, but underrated, Scottish band . . . full blast too, on the Boston Acoustics sound system. It felt great to be back behind the wheel, so great that I started to sing along. To my huge surprise Frank joined in; he liked the band too. I’ve got a decent voice, and he turned out to be not half bad either; I reckon we must have sounded pretty good, singing harmony with Justin Currie on ‘Don’t Come Home Too Soon’, which is, incidentally, in my humble, if biased, opinion, the best World Cup anthem ever written.

  We were still winding down the chorus when I took the Ronda Litoral through Barcelona . . . As we passed Hotel Arts I wondered if Mayfield’s meetings were still going on.

  By the time we hit the other side of the city, we were on to Graham Parker, more good road music, but not sing-along stuff. Soon we were past the Grand Prix racing circuit and pic
king up our autopista ticket. As I pulled it from the machine, it occurred to me that I had fulfilled my promise to Auntie Ade. I had gone to Sevilla and brought back her son. Now I had to find her for him.

  Twenty-five

  I didn’t put the hammer down, but the A7 is a three-lane highway up to the Palamós exit, and so we made decent time, even though it was busy. It was ten past two as we reached the next turn-off. ‘We’ll jump off here,’ I told Frank.

  ‘Are we there?’ he asked.

  ‘No, but we need to discuss what we do next, and there’s a good restaurant half a kilometre away.’

  La Roca Petita is all that: it’s near the airport, but unknown to the travelling punters. Most of its clients are business people from Girona. We didn’t need or want much, just a selection . . . escalivada, anchovies, Jabugo ham and toasted bread, some Vichy Catalan to wash it down . . . and they were happy to provide it, with no sales pitch for the full menu.

  As we ate, Frank was fidgety, all the way through. I could understand why: indeed, I was as anxious as him to be getting Auntie Ade out of her captors’ hands. But I knew that we couldn’t just go charging into Masia Josanto like a SWAT team. If Willie was holding her there, and we spooked him, there was no telling what he might do. Our approach required just a little subtlety, and it was best made at a time when, on a hot Spanish day in July, even elderly ladies and their kidnappers were likely to be having a siesta. I persuaded my cousin of the sense in this, but that didn’t stop him squirming around in his chair as if his arse was hoaching with red ants.

  ‘What about the money?’ I asked, to distract him as much as anything else.

  ‘What money?’ He looked at me blankly.

  ‘The investors’ money, you idiot. A little over seventy-seven million euros at the last count.’

  He blinked. ‘Where did you get that figure?’

  ‘I told you. I did some research before I set off in search of you.’

  ‘What, all on your own, from St Martí?’

  ‘No, I had help, from one of those people I told you about, Oz’s people. So what about the money? Will it still be accessible in the Luxembourg bank, or will it have been transferred by now?’

  ‘If it hasn’t been,’ he told me soberly, ‘I suspect that’ll happen very soon. And that will make it all the more important that they get us out of the way, so they can disappear, free and clear.’

  I recalled something that Mark Kravitz had told me. ‘Alastair Rowland: he’ll have to surface.’

  ‘Come again?’

  ‘Funds can only be transferred out of the company’s account on the written instruction of the chairman, signed over the company’s seal. So he’ll have to surface in Luxembourg.’ A blinding possibility occurred. ‘Maybe we should be there. Adrienne’s going to be all right for another day at least. If we can intercept him, we could blow the whole operation.’

  As swiftly as the flame had arisen, Frank extinguished it. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘He doesn’t: the chairman can send a signed authority to the bank from anywhere in the world. The company seal is held by one of the directors, as an insurance against Rowland, or anyone else, bolting with all the swag. Gresch had it; no prizes for guessing who’s got it now.’

  ‘Bromberg,’ I concluded. ‘Yet she would still have to get it to him. And yesterday, if you remember, she was planning to meet me with a view to taking my money. Okay, now they’re cutting and running, but she’s had precious little time to get the seal to Rowland.’ I stopped, as the obvious dawned. ‘Unless . . .’ I whispered.

  ‘What?’

  ‘Unless, all along, Alastair Rowland and Emil Caballero have been one and the same person. You said yourself you’ve never met Rowland. Is it possible?’

  He nodded reluctantly. ‘It’s possible,’ he said. ‘In fact, now I think about it, it might even be likely.’ He looked at me. ‘But with respect, Prim, you’re taking your eye off the ball here. Fuck the money, all seventy-seven million of it. I’m not having my mum in that guy’s hands for a moment longer than necessary. That’s my only objective.’

  I felt guilty. ‘I’m sorry, Frank. You’re quite right. So let’s get on up the road and follow our only lead.’

  He paid the bill, from his roll of cash, and was waiting for me outside after I’d fitted in a pit stop. ‘Is it much further?’ he asked, as I popped the locks on the Jeep.

  ‘No,’ I replied. ‘We can stay off the motorway from here.’

  The car park led almost immediately on to a roundabout, which fed on to the N11, heading north. We stayed on it as it passed to the east of Girona, then into a complicated junction, which set us on course for Palafrugell and Palamós. We didn’t go that far, though. Just past Púbol, where Dalí created a castle for his Gala, we took a turn that set us on a long, straight road. I guessed that we were about twenty kilometres from our objective.

  As we crested a hill a broad horizon was revealed; I knew it well, but it always impresses first-time viewers. ‘What are those islands?’ Frank asked.

  ‘Isles Medes; they’re a marine conservation zone, and a haven for divers.’

  ‘And that building?’ He pointed to a structure that from that distance showed as not much more than a dot on top of a perfectly rounded summit.

  ‘Castell del Montgri. The English ex-pats call it Tit Hill. I imagine that the Belgians and the Germans call it something similar. It’s an impressive landmark, and no mistake.’

  ‘I can see where the name comes from,’ he conceded. ‘Speaking of such things,’ he murmured, suddenly hesitant, ‘yours are very impressive too. I should have told you that last night. I’m sorry I wasn’t more gallant.’

  ‘Frank,’ I snapped. (I was pleased though: at forty-plus such comments are rare, and so all the more welcome.)

  ‘I’m sorry I wasn’t more impressive too.’

  ‘Frank,’ I said, more quietly, ‘let’s not talk about it any more. It shouldn’t have happened, but it did; my fault, not yours. You were fine, you were tender, and that impresses me more than anything else, so don’t worry about it. But it’s history now, and it stays between us. Okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ he agreed, and I was satisfied with that.

  ‘By the way,’ I added, ‘that means that if and when I meet Susannah, I certainly don’t breathe a word to her.’

  He smiled ruefully. ‘Thanks. I hope you get the chance to say nothing.’

  That sensitive subject dealt with, we drove on. Tit Hill grew larger and larger on our left, and the Isles Medes before us, until finally I spotted a sign advising me that Gualta Golf Course was coming up, but before it, the village itself. I turned right, drove the few hundred metres that led to it, then carried on through until I found myself on a road I didn’t know. It was a dirt track, literally, but that is still not unusual in Spain. I slipped the Jeep into four-by-four mode . . . it’s a politically correct SUV, using the facility only when necessary . . . and drove on through fields on either side.

  ‘What are those?’ Frank asked.

  I risked a glance. ‘Rice paddies, I think.’

  ‘Rice?’

  Newcomers always react that way. ‘It’s a big crop around here. Think paella; then think of its basic ingredient.’

  I had very little warning of the sign that read ‘Masia Josanto’: I took a curve and I was upon it, so close that I overshot and had to reverse. We found ourselves on an even narrower track, with room for nothing bigger than a single tractor but with passing places every so often. We couldn’t have gone more than half a klick, although it felt more, before it opened out and we found ourselves facing a high, wide gate. It was set in a formidable wall, between two stone pillars, on the right of which there was a sign confirming that we had reached our destination, and a box, with a buzzer, a speaker and a glass insert that I took to be a camera.

  The sun was as high as it was going to get, and it was baking hot outside, but there was no way I could manoeuvre the Jeep close enough to push the button. I’d have sent Frank, but
I reckoned I’d a better chance of getting that gate opened. I always keep a folding umbrella in the driver’s door pocket: I took it with me as I stepped out of the car and used it as a parasol.

  I pressed the buzzer, stood back to allow the camera a proper view, and waited. Just as I began to reckon that I’d have to sound the car horn as well, a male voice came from the speaker asking if its owner could help me.

  ‘My companion and I are looking for a place to stay for a couple of nights. Not necessarily right now, but soon. We need a little solitude.’

  ‘That might be possible,’ the disembodied man said cautiously. ‘But do you know we’re gay-friendly?’

  ‘Yes, I know that. Actually, I’m travelling with my half-brother.’ Since I was busking it, including the ‘half -’ was a stroke of genius. One look at Frank, and he’ll never pass for my full sibling. ‘He’s gay, and just coming off a failed relationship.’ I added what I hoped would be the clincher: ‘Shirley Gash told me about you.’

  It worked. ‘Ah,’ the voice exclaimed. ‘The lady Shirley. In that case, drive in and up to the house. Honk a couple of times when you’re inside. The car park’s at the side. My name’s Antonio; I’ll be waiting for you.’

  He was, a middle-aged man of medium height, wearing cream cargo pants and a T-shirt with a Gaudíesque illustration of a lizard on the front As I introduced us . . . real names, having played the Shirley card . . . there was nothing about him that said, ‘I’m gay,’ as he shook my hand, although his fingers may have lingered just a little longer with Frank, and he may have looked into his eyes a little more deeply. ‘I’m on my own today,’ he told us. ‘José, my partner, is in Figueras taking care of some legal business, but things are quiet after lunch, so I have time to show you round.’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘I mentioned Shirley just now, but we know someone else who’s a client of yours. His name’s Willie; he’s American.’