Not With a Whimper Read online

  I dropped back on my heels below the height of the vines. I listened to my heartbeat and my rasping lungs and waited. I had a fifty-fifty chance.

  At the main road they had to turn either left or right. Right, they would see my Simca. Left …

  It was a quiet car, whatever it was, and reached the main road while my breathing was beginning to get back under control, without making more noise than a harsh whisper of tyres. I chanced a look over the vines. It looked like a Mercedes shape behind its headlights.

  It stopped.

  I waited.

  It turned left.

  I was on my feet and did the last two hundred yards in a time a Cuban sprinter wouldn’t have sneered at. I vaulted the fence one-handed, had the car door open and the keys in the ignition in practically one movement. It fired first time.

  I never saw the other car. I was pumped full of adrenalin and I pushed the Simca to its limits back to Rota. It didn’t do the car any good over those potholes but that’s one of the hazards of the car hire business.

  I drifted wide round the bend into the Calle Santa Isabel and stood on the brake. A SEAT 850 was parked a hundred yards from the house, facing away from me. The man behind the wheel was slumped back, hat over his eyes. He seemed to be asleep. Like hell he was. I rubbed my forehead and wondered what to do.

  I slipped the Simca into gear and drove past. The man didn’t move. I parked round the corner and walked back. He still hadn’t moved. But he didn’t fool me. Of course they would be watching the house. I rubbed my knuckles in my mouth and hoped I would think of something.

  A door beside the SEAT opened and a man in chef’s trousers came out yawning and stretching his shoulders. He opened the passenger door and the driver moved and grumbled something about being late. A couple of hotel workers. I watched them drive off and then looked down the street, carefully, I until I was sure it was empty, surveying all the windows, balconies, doorways. It was as empty as the far side of the moon.

  I walked back to the house, leaving the car where it was. No point in advertising I was home. A light still burned in the Byrds’ house.

  I hardly had the strength to turn the key. If they were waiting for me inside, that was it. I hadn’t the snap to fight off a wet fly.

  Thankfully, the house was empty. My footsteps echoed on the tiles, the noise banging off the walls and hurting my head. I took off my shoes and hauled myself upstairs. Slowly. Every step was a yard high. I made it.

  I was asleep before I could pull up the sheet.

  I was in the dark solitary sleep of exhaustion when María woke me. She was hammering on the door. I was lying on my back and I still had all my clothes on.

  “What is it?” The words were thick and furry on my tongue.

  Her voice was clear, precise and urgent. “Señor Christian, it is Captain Legra.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Captain Legra? To hell with Captain Legra. “What time is it?” I had to know how much sleep I’d had.

  “He wants to see you.”

  “Now?”

  “He is downstairs.”

  “What time is it?”

  “Please, señor. He has two men with him.”

  Alright, he has two men with him. He can have the whole Guardia Civil with him if he likes. And a couple of army brigades. Throw in a tank division and a bomber squadron or two. He can have who he likes. All I want to know is what the time is. So I finally remembered I was wearing my watch. Seven fifty-five. Not even three hours’ sleep. That meant I was tired. Quite justifiably and legitimately tired. That accounted for the headache. It wasn’t a big one but it was grade A, just over the right eye. María snuffled outside the door and I snapped at her to go away and tell Legra I was coming.

  To hell with them. I was coming when I was ready.

  My clothes felt stiff with sweat and grime as I unpeeled them and every movement did things to my blood pressure which didn’t feel too healthy. A cold shower did nothing for me.

  I crunched my shoulders about trying to loosen the neck muscles. My head still hurt. I looked out my beige flares and a soft cream shirt, beige safari jacket and canvas shoes. I wanted my clothing soft and my shoes quiet.

  A Guardia Civil stood by the front door. He had the government issue grey-green eyes with the standard mixture of stupidity and cunning.

  Legra was standing by the window in the front room. He was as sharply dressed as before, but in uniform, and a lot less polite. “You hired an Avis SEAT 124 in Seville?” He blinked rapidly but the rest of him was still.

  “Yes.”

  “Can you tell me where it is now?”

  Yes – no.” I couldn’t. “Why?”

  “Yes, no. Which is it?” he asked abruptly. That annoyed me and being annoyed helped. I began to wake up.

  “Both.” My brain was slipping into gear now. “Yes, I left it at the estancia of Don Carlos de Medina y Ortega yesterday. Lunchtime. And no.” I paused. Legra looked steadily at me, the eyelids going like a wasp’s wing. “And no, I presume that it is not there now or you would not be here now to ask me about it. So what has happened to it?”

  “Why did you leave it at Don Carlos’s?”

  “I got a lift.”

  “I see.” He used the neutral voice which the police use when they don’t see. He sat on the table and waited. I waited too. Pretty standard technique. Not too many people can stand silence. They have got to fill it and when they do, they very often say what they shouldn’t. After a time he lifted his head and said, “Who gave you the lift?”

  “Carol Byrd. An American girl.”

  “Señorita Byrd.”

  “She is staying with her parents next door. You can ask her if you want.”

  “Were her parents with you?”

  I shook my head. That wasn’t a good idea but I didn’t wince. I wasn’t giving anything away. “No, just Carol.”

  “Carol.” There was another silence and I waited this one out as well. He was going to ask me why. I had two answers I could use. I still hadn’t made up my mind which one to use when Legra asked me.

  I used both. “I had drunk too much and she is a pretty girl.”

  Legra swung himself neatly onto his feet. “We found your car this morning outside the town. Would you like us to take you to it?”

  “I have not had my breakfast yet.”

  “We shall not be long. Come.” He put on his hat without fussing with it and walked past me. I followed. We picked up the Guardia Civil in the hall and we marched out to the car Legra had waiting. It had a civilian driver with another guard leaning on it who snapped erect when we came out of the house.

  Legra got in the front and I was sandwiched between the two Guardias in the back. Legra sat leaning against the door so he could see me.

  “You are not looking well,” he said.

  “I told you, I’ve not had my breakfast yet.”

  The civilian was cautious, driving slowly, changing down too soon and staying too long in low gear. That made it a noisy engine and it didn’t help my head any. Or my temper.

  “We shall not be long. You are having an unfortunate time in Rota. So much is happening to you.”

  Unfortunate wasn’t how I would have put it. Calamitous. Something like that. “It has been unusual,” I grunted.

  “Sí, muy extraño.” He looked at the driver and then said again, “A lot has happened since you first arrived in Rota.”

  “Do not tell me this is your first stolen car.” He was going to a lot of trouble for something.

  “Did you have a pleasant time at Don Carlos’s?”

  “It was like all those affairs.” Legra still smelled his clean antiseptic smell. The Guardia on my left did not. He had yesterday’s sweat on his uniform and yesterday’s garlic on his breath. He pulled his cheek with thick fingers. There was a scar across his knuckles.

  “And you spent the afternoon with Señorita Byrd?”

  “She gave me a lift to the house, that is all.”

&nbs
p; “You were disappointed?”

  “Not really.” Legra was after something. He wasn’t just making conversation. The top brass don’t bother with stolen cars and he was watching and listening to me very carefully. The Guardia on my right moved to lift his buttocks off his holster. His uniform had been fitted when he was two stones lighter, and sitting squashed in the back seat wasn’t doing him any favours. His face was the colour of a ripe plum and just as round.

  “So what did you do with the rest of yesterday? You do not look as if you have slept much.”

  It was feeble but it was all I could think of. “I went out, had a few drinks, talked to people in a couple of bars, you know.”

  “And you had to walk everywhere.”

  “It wasn’t far.”

  The car turned off onto a track. The driver edged it past a clump of gorse and stopped. He switched off, sighed and leant back. And there was a SEAT 124 and it was maroon, just like the one I had hired.

  “That is your car?”

  “It looks like it.” It was all I could say.

  “We had better be certain.”

  “I’m sure you’re certain,” I snapped.

  Both the Guardias and Legra got out and Legra held the door open for me. He looked steadily at me. “I think you ought to look inside the car to be certain that it does indeed belong to you.”

  I eased along the seat and the two Guardias walked either side of me. Accused and escort. I opened the door of the SEAT.

  It was Agustín. He was lying along the front seats. He’d never had a chance to tell Don Carlos. Someone had put his twelve bore up against his chest and blown a hole big enough to put your head in. His face looked smooth and peaceful. It didn’t belong with the destroyed body.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  The prison cell was fifteen by twelve. The walls were unplastered grey stone and the window was set too high to look out of and too high to clean. There were two cots in the cell, each with a thin cotton ticking mattress. That was all, apart from me sitting on the right hand one and pretending I was thinking. There was nothing to distract your thoughts. You could listen to them bouncing off the walls if you did have any thoughts but I was too tired and too cold.

  Finally, I had an idea. What does one of Her Majesty’s subjects do when he gets into trouble in foreign parts? He sends for the consul, that’s what he does.

  That got me off the cot and to the door. The noise of my banging faded down the corridor and disappeared into silence. I kept on banging until I heard footsteps.

  I sat back on the bed, picked a few flakes of rust off my hand. A key was rammed in the lock. The bolt was slammed back. The door opened smoothly and a Guardia said, “Shut your mouth. “ He had grey hair, a thick jaw, a pockmarked face and he was swinging a truncheon in his right hand.

  “I want to contact the British Consul in Seville.”

  The door started to shut.

  “I said –”

  The door stopped. The truncheon pointed at me and his meaning was clear. He didn’t think the British Consul was a good idea. I let him go.

  I looked at my watch and wondered how long before the Nazi attack, how long before I could see the consul, how long before anything. It was ten five.

  The thoughts idled sluggishly through my brain and the morning drifted past. I wasn’t just tired and cold. I was hungry, too.

  It was after twelve when I heard footsteps again, two sets this time. It was the same guard but he had Carol with him.

  She was wearing tooled leather boots, a three-inch leather belt with what looked like a genuine silver buckle a Gaucho would have sold his mother for, a scarlet blouse with a high peaked collar and a denim waistcoat and jeans. Jeans and waistcoat were carefully frayed round the hems. She looked pale, serious and worried.

  “Captain Legra said I could see you.”

  The guard shut the door and left us alone. He didn’t lock the door and there was no sound of him going away.

  She stood just inside the door and played with a ring on her left forefinger, looking down at it and said through her hair. “What have you done, Alan? He said they found a dead man in your car.”

  “I left my car at Don Carlos’s. You gave me a lift, remember?”

  She swung her head up and her hair swung with it. It was well cut, settling down into place as though it had never been disturbed. “That’s why Legra came to see me.” She laughed nervously. “You looked bad then. You look even worse now.”

  “I feel even worse now.”

  “You didn’t kill him?”

  “Ten days ago an Englishman was killed in a shooting accident. Then an American sailor called Hoggart. Two days ago, a man who worked for me was killed. There have been two attempts to kill me and last night Agustín was shot and put in my car. He was shot because I tricked him into letting me into El Toro Negro and put in my car because I know too much and they want me out of the way.”

  “Jesus, Alan, what –”

  “The less you know the better.”

  She came to me in a rush. “I believe you.” She sat on the cot beside me and took my hand in both of hers. “You want me to help.” Her hands were warm and smooth.

  The guard was squinting through the window. Framed by the door, it looked like part of a Dali sketch.

  “Two things; first phone the British consul in Seville. Tell him to get here immediately. Then find a taxi driver called Félix Benítez – Félix Benítez. Drives a red and black SEAT 1500. Tell him where I am and why.”

  “Is he one of your men?”

  “You’ll do that for me?”

  She nodded and squeezed my hand. “Trust me, Alan.”

  “Apart from that, you mustn’t tell anyone.” She shook her head convincingly. “I don’t know who the hell I can trust,” I went on. “I’m not asking you to do anything illegal, so you –”

  “I don’t give a shit about that.”

  “I do.”

  She gave my hand a terrier-like shake. “Don’t be so goddam old-fashioned.”

  “I am goddam old-fashioned.” I disengaged my hand. “Just one more thing.” I had had another idea.

  “Yes, anything.”

  “I could do with a drink.”

  She smacked her lips in mock annoyance. “No file or anything?”

  “A bottle of Scotch would do me more good.”

  The door opened and Legra appeared. I hadn’t heard him coming. “I am sorry, Miss Byrd, but that is all the time which it can be allowed to you.” He spoke in English and it was from a pretty formal textbook.

  “Thank you, captain.” She stood, smoothed her jeans down her thigh, gave him a tight little smile and me a screwed up significant look.

  “Perdone, capitán,” I said in Spanish. “Can the señorita be permitted to bring me a bottle of whisky?”

  Legra looked at us both in turn and then said gravely, “It is permitted.”

  “Thank you, captain.” She gave him her full smile.

  He didn’t smile, just stepped back to let her past. “One moment, Miss Byrd. We shall go up together. Señor Christian and I are going to my office to talk.” He looked at me and I got up and followed her to the door.

  We walked along the corridor and up a stone flight of steps and Legra asked Carol several polite questions about how she liked Rota and she answered equally politely. Just like old friends. Very civilised. I didn’t feel civilised. I was cold, tired, hungry, dirty. And I felt as civilised as ‘Peking Man’. And just as advanced.

  On the ground floor, Legra escorted Carol to the exit, chatting smoothly and getting smooth answers. I watched her and she looked like a kid I could trust. The guard didn’t trust me. He clamped his fingers on my arm while Legra was away. Maybe he thought I was going to bolt. Ten-year-olds in a three-legged race could have caught me. Besides, there were several guards in the corridor, standing about doing nothing very much except try to look smart as Legra passed. I let him hold my arm until Legra came back and we drummed our way up to his
office.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Legra sat down behind his desk, told me to sit down and the Guardia to wait outside. We both did what we were told. Franco still hadn’t shot anything since I had last seen him.

  The captain leaned back and looked thoughtful. He spent some time being quite and looking pensive. I remained silent. I don’t know what I looked like.

  Finally he put both hands parallel on the desk and asked the first question of the afternoon. “Why did you kill Agustín Mingote?” His fingers barely moved.

  “Why do you think I did?”

  He spread his fingers wide and pressed down on the desk. “Señor Christian, I am 27 years old and already I am a captain. Normally it takes twenty years to reach that rank.”

  “Not with the right connections.”

  “I come from Bilbao. My father is a docker. My mother died when I was born.” He carried on leaning on both hands and perhaps his eyes glittered. “I have no connections.”

  I clapped silently.

  Legra took his weight off his hands. “I have two outstanding qualities, señor.” It was the first time I had seen him completely still. “Dedication and intelligence. I intend to be a commander by the time I am thirty and I shall be in the government by the time I have reached forty.”

  “And a third quality, captain. Ambition.”

  “I am also an honest man. They know I am to be trusted.”

  “You can always trust a poodle.”

  He went completely still for the second time. Especially his eyes. Like sharp hot slate. “I have not time to waste,” he said through stiff lips. “Will you tell me why you broke into the hacienda of Don Carlos de Medina y Ortega last night?”

  “Did I?”

  “It is of no matter.” He relaxed and ran a thoughtful look over me.

  “If you will not tell me, I shall not waste any more of my time. Last night you entered the house of Don Carlos. Mingote disturbed you and you shot him with his own gun. Your car was in the courtyard and you were seen to put the body in the car. Unfortunately, you got away before anyone could stop you.”