Chapter 18
Santa Pola, Spain, August 1999
The flight the next morning was the first of the day out of Gatwick and in the incredible size of the giant terminal the hundred odd passengers looked lost. It was like being in a deserted city. Few of the shops or cafes in the main Terminus were open at that hour so Jack Ropell did what the numerous data screens were telling him to do and took the monorail out to the satellite. Here, there were even less people, but there was a small cafeteria open. He bought what was advertised as freshly ground, freshly made coffee, but after one sip put it down and left it on the table. The British version of fresh coffee was something he had never been able to come to terms with.
The majority of his fellow passengers were families with young children or couples in their fifties or sixties, with very few of the younger, single element normally found heading for Benidorm. He guessed they were mainly those lucky enough to have a second home in the sun, or friends who had one. The air conditioning was making him dry and as the coffee had been a none starter he went over to a machine next to the exit from the monorail platform, which promised pure, fresh, orange juice. He decided to risk it and found it was surprisingly good.
Holding the empty carton he turned to look for a litterbin and accidentally bumped into a petite and very well dressed, elderly, grey haired woman, who had just entered the terminus from the monorail platform. The collision caused her to drop her handbag and several travel documents spilled across the floor. Putting his carton on one of the low tables he knelt to retrieve them and handed them up to her. She had the largest blue eyes and the most angelic smile he had ever seen.
"Thank you very much." She said, her voice matching the eyes and smile, "most kind of you."
He smiled back in reaction and stood up.
"Not at all. It was my fault and my pleasure."
She gave him a second chance at the smile and then turned away. She appeared to be with a younger couple. From the girls excited face and bright eyes and the way she clung to the man’s arm and his nervous manner, he would have taken them for honeymooners except the presence of the older woman seemed to deny that. At the same time his professional self said that the man had all the nervous mannerisms of a smuggler. Given the fact they were leaving the country, not entering it, he decided it was not worth his time and as he did not want to attract any attention to himself on this trip, he went back to his seat and the paper he had brought with him from the hotel.
The flight was smooth and to his surprise the breakfast was fairly good. At just after nine thirty Alicante time, the Boeing 737 made a copy book three point landing and the stewardess went into her, "Best wishes for a wonderful holiday and please fly Britannia again", routine. On the short walk from the plane into the terminus he wondered who would be meeting him.
Once inside the terminus at passport control, he noticed that only his passport was examined carefully. His fellow passengers were streaming past him on both sides and he was sure that his face was being compared with a photograph held out of his line of vision. When they finally returned his passport he walked on through to the baggage hall and inside ten minutes had gathered up his bag and was walking towards the exit. Several other planes had landed by now and unloaded their passengers and the airport was quite busy so the two officers from the Guardia Civil manning the customs post did no more than glance at him as he walked out into the main concourse. Here, Thompson girls along with other couriers were busy trying to catch their flocks and get them aboard the right coaches to their resort. He stared around. Several people were displaying name boards, but his was not among them. He felt a little annoyed at this and decided he would be better off outside than lost in the middle of this muddle, so he walked through the automatic doors and out into the heat of an August Mediterranean morning. He was stood there trying to decide if there had been a cock up, and should he take a taxi to the Guardia Civil offices, when he felt a hand on his arm. He turned.
“Señor Ropell? Por favor Señor, but will you come with me. Your car is over here, Señor.”
A slim, short and swarthy complexioned man led the way to a black Audi A8, parked illegally on the other side of the waiting line of white taxis. He opened the boot and held out his hand for Jack's suitcase, while indicating the open rear door of the car. Jack relinquished the bag and slid into the rear seat of the car, realising as he did so that it was air conditioned and already occupied.
"Hola, Soy Ramon Garcia-Garcia."
Ramon Garcia-Garcia had a smile on his face that split his sun-tanned features and showed a row an even white teeth. He switched to heavily accented English.
"All very cloak and dagger I'm afraid, but we thought it best that we did not draw attention to your arrival, just in case. You do understand?"
"Hello, yes I understand, Jack Ropell." They shook hands.
At five feet nine inches Ramon Garcia was not a tall man although he had the shoulders of a young bull and the black hair, thin moustache and dark liquid eyes of a gigolo. Nothing could have been further from the truth. He was a captain in the Guardia Civil and like Ropell, was attached permanently to the narcotics squad. As such he was the co-ordinating officer for the whole of the Costa Blanca and halfway to Valencia, which meant he was a powerful man. Under his direct command were thirty Guardia officers and ten Coast Guard officers. The latter running two, forty-five foot, twin engined, interception vessels. It was to prove a little different from what Ropell was used to as these craft were armed with thirty millimetre twin machine guns, which would be used, given the right circumstances.
Away from work Garcia was just another Spanish family man who liked nothing better than Sunday at home with the family, preparing and eating a giant lunch before going off to the local football match in the late afternoon. He had a keen sense of humour and if he liked you could be a wonderful companion and guide to all things Spanish. As his job usually required casual dress, most of the time he was dressed in a black leather jacket, white shirt and dark trousers, along with several million other Spanish men. Today, as a concession to the heat, the jacket was missing. Garcia was in fact, really pissed of that the Spanish authorities were having to get their information in this way and that the Americanos would not deal with them directly, but he hid it well. He really needed the information this Englishman would bring him. Consequently he was at his most charming and Ropell sat back in his seat and relaxed.
"Where are we going?"
"My home, Jack. In case you had forgotten today is Saturday and for once I have a weekend off. That was until you decided to visit us. You will be staying with me while you are here." He paused. "I understand that you speak Spanish, Jack."
Ropell switched to Spanish.
"Not as fluently as I would like as I rarely get to use it. My maternal grandmother was Spanish so I learnt a lot from her and my Dad." He paused. " I rarely speak it these days which is a shame. Your English is good."
Garcia nodded. He spoke better than average English his accent was not the Mexicano type so beloved by Hollywood film directors when casting English speaking Spaniards. He made no attempt to explain where he had learned his English, but as they travelled he pointed out the various features of the landscape and the orchards of orange, lemon and almond trees as they passed. Ropell was impressed by the variety of plant life that thrived in this hot and dusty region. He was also impressed with the dark skinned man sat next to him and was relieved that it was going so well. When they reached their destination Garcia's wife, Mari-Carmen, came smilingly out to greet them and after kissing Ropell on both cheeks in welcome, led him off to his room.
The Garcia home was what any Briton would have described as a luxury bungalow. It had four bedrooms and Garcia's two sons had temporarily moved in together to free one of these for Ropell. It was a small room by British and American standards, but cooler than he had expected as the shutters were kept firmly down against the heat of the day. He dropped his case onto the chair by the side of the bed and went to join his
host. He noticed that he lounge was a fair size and the dining room was huge, reflecting the Spanish habit of frequently inviting the whole family around to eat. Outside there was a deep, shaded veranda and small swimming pool set close to the house. The whole place was set in a garden of about an acre, in which fruit trees and tropical plants abounded. Coffee arrived with Garcia's twelve-year-old daughter and then the rest of the family vanished to leave them to talk.
Ropell put Garcia in the picture as fully as he could, only missing out what he knew about their informant as requested by Mark Taylor. It took him no time at all to realise that Garcia did not like being spoon fed information in this manner and tried hard to act as though what he was telling him was something he would have probably found out for himself. Sprinkling the conversation with phrases such as, " As you probably know, and "As I am sure you have guessed" in order not to appear to be much better informed than Garcia. As he talked Garcia's eyes took on a hard glitter and it was obvious that he could hardly believe what he was hearing.
"What you are saying, Jack is that this man is going to give us the exact time and the place of the drop, so that we can catch them with, as you would say, their hands red."
Ropell grinned.
"That's right, but I need some equipment. I don't want to cast aspersions on the Spanish telephone system, but I don't think we can trust this to a landline. Not if Spanish Telecom is still as overburdened as I remember it from my last visit. Can you get a satellite phone so that I can stay here and wait for the contact to come through? It has to be either of these two models as it’s much easier to connect the scrambler with one of these."
He passed Garcia a piece of paper with the details on it and sipped at another cold beer while the other went off to phone his unit.
To his surprise, just two hours after Garcia had phoned, a Guardia Civil, Citroen arrived and the phone was delivered. They set it up with the scrambler and Ropell rang Peter Romsey's office at Southampton to give them the number. Romsey's daughter, Janet, answered and she confirmed that the scrambler was effective and then rang off. In the meantime Garcia was pacing about like a caged bear until he stopped in front of Ropell's chair.
"Look, Jack, I have to go into the office and get everyone ready and briefed. I don't want to blow a chance like this."
Ropell shook his head.
"I'd rather you didn't. Just contact the two patrol boats and get them into harbour on standby. All fuelled and serviced and waiting to go when we get the word."
"That's fine to say, but how much notice will we get?"
"Enough."
With a look of disbelief Garcia did as he was asked and rang through to get both boats into harbour and fully fuelled and serviced. Then the two of them joined the rest of the family for lunch. The three Garcia children enjoyed themselves throughout the meal, trying out their schoolchildren's English on him and generally helping to get his rusty Spanish back into working order. Then, at the end of the meal, at a word from their Mother they quietly vanished, leaving the two men alone with their coffee. Not for the first time Ropell marvelled at the way in which Spanish children, who seemed to be so spoilt by their parents in material things, were so well mannered and respectful to both their parents and elders. He supposed it came from the importance they placed on the family unit and hoped it would long continue. Garcia by now had recovered from his desire to leap into action and was in a reflective mood.
"You know, Jack, if we do not stop these bastards soon, the damage will be irreparable. The statistics for drug addiction in this country are up by twenty percent on two years ago. That's over half a million addicts or confirmed users and it’s growing daily."
"I know. It’s the same story in the UK. The police and the medical services can't keep up with it."
"Who are the bastards behind it, Jack? Lets exchange notes and see what we can come up with."
Ropell went through what Mark Taylor been telling them the day before, although that now seemed like a week ago. He went through the whole theory and then finished up with,
"So you see we have to do more than stop one shipment. We have to smash this organisation for good. The hope is that we can get enough from our informer to do just that before they get him, as in the end they must. The guy must have cast iron balls."
Garcia nodded his agreement, lost for a moment in his thoughts. If he wanted to know why it was necessary for Ropell to be here at all and why the information could not come straight to him, he wasn't asking. He paused for a moment gathering his thoughts.
"Right, my turn, ok. Let me start from two years ago, when we first realised that we were losing control of the situation. The first step was to start up the anti-drug programme. That covers everything from media coverage to supplying money for information leading to the arrest of major pushers. For instance, if a whisper leads to us catching someone with more than fifty grams of Cocaine or Heroin in their possession, we immediately prosecute them as a pusher and we pay out a one hundred thousand-peseta rewards to whoever shopped them, about five hundred pounds. That has put a lot of people away and had the effect of slowing it down a bit, but there is so much money in this there is always someone willing to take the risk. We should hang the bastards like the Malaysians do."
His outburst seemed to have surprised himself and he only carried on when he saw that Ropell wasn't shocked by his opinions.
"The second measure was to initiate the anti-drug squads of which mine is one of six covering different parts of the coastline, with four more spread over the internal regions." He smiled. " I have all the Costa Blanca, up to Valencia and down almost Cartajena which is big enough for me. I'm just glad I didn't get Barcelona or Malaga. The drugs overlords live in those cities and it is very easy to get killed in those areas."
He poured them both coffees.
"The squads are a combination of Guardia Civil, Coast Guard and regional police, with back up from Army and Navy if and when requested. However, like you we have so far failed to stop the escalation in the supply of drugs, especially Cocaine and Crack."
He sighed and looked up at Ropell.
"Now my friend let us talk about our suspicions. You say that you think that the whole thing is organised by businessmen who are already successful in other spheres. I think that makes sense. The main suspect here is one Roberto Crucero. We have nothing we can pin on him although we are sure that he is heavily involved in the Spanish drug scene and is probably the main importer. He is an industrialist specialising in plastics, but with fingers also in the construction and container businesses. As you can imagine, we have kept a very close eye on the container business, but so far we have nothing."
His face became hard and the glitter returned to his eyes.
"One week ago, a police sergeant who was part of a surveillance team that had been keeping watch on Crucero for several months, was killed in a tourist place quite close to here, a place called Guardalest. Someone slipped a stiletto into his heart from behind. He had followed Crucero there from Barcelona, but because of a malfunction with his radio he had been unable to call for back up or let us know where he was."
He lifted his hands palms upwards in a gesture seen throughout the Mediterranean.
"We think it was planned."
He frowned and getting up began to pace up and down the patio.
"Jose Madruga, that's the dead sergeant, was on duty watching Crucero's house. The officer with him had left the car for five minutes to go for a leak and buy a newspaper and that is when Crucero made a break for it. Madruga had no choice, but to follow them alone and when they couldn't shake him off they killed him. We believe that he followed them to a prearranged meeting and had managed to photograph Crucero with whoever the other person, or persons, were. But when his body was discovered his camera was not there, neither was it found in his car."
He wagged his index finger.
"It was also discovered that there was nothing wrong with his radio and we are left with the conclusion that it wa
s being jammed from inside Crucero's Mercedes. The effective range of those radios is less than ten kilometres, so it would not take a very powerful jammer to disrupt it." A look of sadness crossed his face. "He left a widow and three children."
"Haven't you pulled Crucero in for questioning?"
He received a withering look from the Spaniard.
"Of course we have, him and his pet shark of a bodyguard, Alfredo Romero who was driving that day. The story they gave us is that they were visiting the grave of a relative in Guardalest, to pay their respects."
He sighed.
"We checked of course and it holds up. Crucero's Mother's Cousin was buried there. He was killed in the Civil War. Of course Crucero had never met him, but it is a reasonable excuse in a country where we still pay our respects to the dead years after they have left us."
He dropped back into his chair.
"So we really know nothing for certain. Just a lot of suspicions that we cannot prove."
Ropell scratched his chin.
"I think we have a little more than that, Ramon. We have two prime suspects that we are sure are getting money from other means than their legitimate businesses."
He started to tick of the points on his fingers, details he and Anne Romsey had accumulated and sorted during his last six months in hospital.
"The first is an East German by the name of Gunther Hass. He escaped to the West with a large quantity of International Bearer Bonds some ten years ago, long before the wall was pulled down. He said he had made it on the black market and true enough, the East Germans had demanded his return as a known criminal. Of course at that time they said that about everybody who made it across the wall, so although it was suspected that the money was stolen, he was allowed to keep it. Converted to Deutchmarks at the then very favourable rate, it came to nearly a million dollars."
"Since then he has become a multi-millionaire in any currency you care to mention. He is very big in the food business and apart from his own giant chain of food stores has interests in a dozens of other companies through intermediaries and holding organisations, so that no one can guess his real worth. That's why we are not happy. It has all happened too fast to be really legitimate and too much about him is unknown."
He looked up at the still pacing Garcia.
"I believe that his original stake came from drug dealing and he just got out in time. If that's the case the East German police must have fallen about laughing when we gave him asylum. He is now in his mid sixties and never married, according to the only records we have, but to tell the truth no one is really sure. The complete records for his part of Germany were destroyed when the Russians carved through to Berlin."
He looked at the coffee pot and decided against any more of the potent black liquid.
"Can't you have him properly investigated by the German police?"
"We have. That's how we know as much as we do, but it wasn't at our request. They were already unhappy about his sudden climb to wealth and had carried out their own investigation. What we got through Interpol was the results of that investigation."
Jack shrugged.
"Those investigations were hampered by the fact that when the wall finally came down, a group of supposedly right minded citizens stormed the police headquarters in Eastern Germany and destroyed many of the records. I find it more than convenient that the destruction included the records of one Gunther Hass. Even so, the investigation caused problems. Hass supports a right wing, not Fascist you understand, but a right wing political group in Germany and their leaders made quite a stink about poor Herr Hass being persecuted because of his political beliefs."
He now stood up and began to pace slowly up and down the patio.
"The other person we are interested in at this point in time is almost a carbon copy in many ways."
He put his head back and staring at the slowly revolving ceiling fan, the only thing making the heat of the day bearable to his more northerly blood and recited from memory.
"Henri Parsouel, as he would be quick to tell you, is a self made millionaire. He is without question a millionaire and has half a dozen homes around the world including one not more than a few kilometres from here, at Santa Pola, where he keeps a large motor yacht."
Garcia straightened with a jerk, his eyebrows shooting up.
"Here?"
"Yes, I thought that would interest you."
Garcia chuckled.
"You should have been a writer my friend. Leading me on with the German first. You knew that once I heard the other one was on my doorstep I would find it hard to concentrate on anything else".
Ropell grinned.
"Yes. You did come to life with a bit of a jump."
"All right, Jack. You have my undivided attention. Go on."
"OK. Henri Parsouel claims that he spent two years in France as a resistance fighter before the Gestapo smashed his organisation and he had to disappear up his own escape route as it were, closing it down behind him." He explained. "His Mother was French you see although his father was English. Like Gunther Hass there are no records of his birth as the Town Hall of the small French town in which he claims to have been born, before being taken to Paris to live at the age of three, was completely destroyed in the fighting after the Dunkirk landings."
Garcia sighed and nodded. Ropell continued.
"His initial fortune supposedly came from property development immediately after the war. He bought up a lot of what seemed like worthless bombed houses and was in the front line when the rebuilding started. That aside, there is suspicion that he made his original money on the black market. First in Paris and when that got too hot, London. He first came to real prominence in 1965 when he put together the syndicate to build one of London's most controversial office blocks, the Parsouel Tower. That has been voted both the most modern and the most ugly building in London at different times. Forgotten of course now that it has so much bigger and even uglier company."
He realised he had digressed and return to his narrative.
"He is currently married to his forth wife, Barbette, but they have been separated for at least two years and she now lives in the Bahamas. She is a decorative if not over bright, thirty two year old French model. It’s also interesting that his first and his third wives both died in tragic accidents, one in a house fire and the other in a car accident. Both deaths were investigated as a matter of course and each time the Coroner recorded a verdict of accidental death. Incidentally, the first wife carried life insurance of one hundred thousand pounds, which at that time was a great deal of money. He has only one child, Angelique, whom he idolises. She is usually known as Angel and by all accounts is a traffic stopper in the looks department if a little on the wild side. His main passion is yachting and he has them at several different places, including a thirty six metre gin palace here in Santa Pola."
He stopped pacing and returning to the table sat down.
"So there you have it. Like Gunther Hass, Henri Parsouel has a mysterious background and like Hass, nobody can be really sure who he is. Again, like Gunther Hass, he has made an incredible fortune and his business affairs are so convoluted that it is impossible to know what he does or doesn't own."
He paused before continuing.
"However, unlike Hass, who is almost a recluse, Henri Parsouel does not hide his light under a bushel. He dresses and acts like a millionaire. He belongs to all the right clubs throughout the world, has half a dozen homes and seems to live to the motto of, if you have it, flaunt it. There is also no known connection between them that we have been able to discover although if they are both in the drugs racket they must know each other quiet well." He shrugged. "End of information."
Garcia stood up and beckoned to him and they went into the lounge. There he indicated an armchair and sitting down in its twin, picked up the phone. He dialled and then spoke in rapid Spanish to whoever answered. Ropell caught the names of Angelique and Henri Parsouel, but it was too fast for him to understand the gis
t of it. Garcia listened in return to whoever was on the other end for a few minutes and then thanked them and put the phone down.
"That was my office. I have asked them to dig up all the dates that Henri Parsouel has been here in the last year. If he comes as often as you say he does then I would like to know if he was here when our police sergeant was killed. The airport will be useless as they cannot keep records on six million visitors, but the harbour officials and also the yacht club at Santa Pola, may be able to help us Nearly all these big yachts have a maintenance agreement with the club and they will know when he was on his boat last. Also, he will have some kind of maid service for his house and they could be useful." He sighed. "We have a permanent undercover man working in the harbour, but he concentrates more on the fishing boats than the yachts. Perhaps we have been looking in the wrong place. In the meantime all we can do is wait."
At that moment the satellite phone gave its distinctive bleat and both men jumped. Ropell picked it up and switched in the scrambler. He listened for some thirty seconds while writing in the small leather backed notebook he had taken from his trousers pocket. Then he put down the phone and turned to Garcia.
"You had better get in touch with the boats. It’s set for Friday night and here are the co-ordinates."
His eyes were bright and he had a fierce smile on his face that showed his teeth. It was not a particularly attractive look, but Garcia knew that if he could see in a mirror at this time, his face would look the same. He nodded slowly.
"All right my friend. That gives us four days to prepare and on Friday night we will hurt these bastards."
He picked up the telephone again.
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