Ratlines

by Stuart Neville

  The ruins of the amphitheatre clung to the edge of a cliff not far from the hotel where Franco’s guests stayed, a sheer drop to the sea beyond its eastern walls.

  The mayor stopped his lecture on the sins and virtues of the Romans, pointed, and cried, “You! Yes, you!”

  A young woman, petite and full-bosomed, bare-legged in shorts, turned to his voice. “Me?”

  “Yes, you,” the mayor called to her. “Who let you in? This area is not open to the public.”

  A frown broke on her face. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know.”

  She spoke her Spanish with an accent that might have been French.

  “Well, now you do,” the mayor said. “Out you go.”

  Skorzeny watched as she descended the rows of stone seats, dropping from one to the next, her arms held out for balance. As she passed Luca Impelliteri, she slipped. He caught her before she could fall into the gladiatorial pit below, his hands at her slender waist, pushing up beneath her breasts.

  She smiled up at him, said thank you, brought her hands to his.

  “My pleasure,” he said.

  Skorzeny turned his attention back to the mayor, whose lecture droned on.

  At that night’s dinner, the girl with the French accent replaced the young Spanish woman at Impelliteri’s side. She laughed at his jokes, let her hands wander beneath the table, and made no eye contact with Skorzeny.

  As midnight passed, Skorzeny stood on the small balcony of his hotel room, his shirt open, enjoying the breeze on his bare chest and belly. He drew on his cigarette, wondering if Luca Impelliteri still lived. A crash and a scream from the floor above stopped his thoughts dead.

  He remained still and listened.

  Shouting, glass breaking. A door slamming.

  More voices. Alarm, cries for help, calls for someone to stop her, she’s escaping.

  Skorzeny’s throat tightened. He flicked the cigarette over the balcony and buttoned his shirt before going to the door. Opening it, he found other guests peering into the corridor, drink and sleep clouding their eyes.

  “What’s going on?” a man asked in English.

  “I don’t know,” Skorzeny said. “Perhaps someone had too much champagne.”

  The Englishman smiled and nodded.

  Then the voices from the stairwell at the end of the corridor, and the gunfire, and the girl’s dying cry.

  CHAPTER FORTY SEVEN

  “BACK AGAINST THE wall,” Wallace said.

  Ryan obeyed, taking careful steps, his innards seeming to writhe with each one. He kept his genitals, still tender, cupped in his hand.

  The ladder touched the floor.

  Ryan waited, ready to strike at any man who came near him. None did.

  Carter appeared in the doorway.

  “Up you come,” he said.

  Ryan blinked at him.

  “Come on, let’s have you.”

  Ryan shook his head. “No.”

  Carter nodded to Wallace. Wallace raised the Browning and took aim. The pistol spat, the report deadened by the suppressor. The earth by Ryan’s toes exploded. By reflex, he hopped aside. Wallace giggled.

  “No messing about,” Carter said. “Up here. Now.”

  Ryan shuffled towards the ladder. He gripped the stiles with his hands, placed a foot on the second rung, and hauled upwards. Another rung, and another, and more until he had to stop, the effort tearing through his body. His head lightened, and he hugged the ladder close to keep from falling back to the floor.

  Carter leaned out from the doorway. “Move it.”

  Ryan climbed until he could crawl out into the hall. He stayed there, hands and knees on the wooden floorboards, as he recovered his breath.

  Wallace stayed back, the Browning up and ready.

  Carter grabbed Ryan’s hair and pulled. Ryan hissed at the stinging of his scalp. He followed it up until his feet were under him, reached out to the walls to steady himself.

  Something cold and hard pressed against the skin beneath his ear. Slowly, he turned his head and saw the tall man, a pistol in his hand.

  “Come on.” Carter walked through a doorway into a small room. The tall man jabbed the suppressor against Ryan’s ear, telling him to follow.

  The room dripped with damp, the wallpaper long rotted and blackened. Through the tiny square of a window, Ryan saw overgrown hedges and shrubs, heard the singing of birds. A cottage somewhere out of the city.

  A wooden chair had been fixed to the floor with nails.

  “Sit down,” Carter said.

  Ryan did so. Carter set about binding his wrists and ankles to the chair’s arms and legs with rope. Ryan smelled his sweat. The hard base of the seat chilled Ryan’s thighs and testicles.

  Wallace and the tall man took up their positions, one at each side of the room, weapons held loose at their sides. Carter walked to another door, exited through it, and re-emerged a moment later carrying a metallic block and something that looked like a wand made from aluminium and bright orange rubber. Two cables joined the wand to the block.

  Ryan’s heart raced. He steadied his breathing.

  Carter set the block on the floor. Ryan felt the impact of its weight on the floorboards through the soles of his feet. He saw the terminals, and the wires wrapped around them, and knew it was a car battery. A small black box with a knurled dial was fixed to the battery with sturdy tape. The wires joined the box to the terminals, and two more wires led from the box to the wand in Carter’s hand.

  “Tell me what you want,” Ryan said.

  The wand consisted of a rubber handle, a metallic shaft, and a rubber tip that bore two copper-coloured prongs. Carter set it on the floor. He went back to the other room then returned carrying a bucket of water in one hand, and a packet of table salt in the other. He placed them both next to the battery.

  Ryan asked, “What do you want?”

  Carter crouched and poured salt from the packet into the water. He lifted an enamel mug from the bucket and used it to stir the solution. When he was satisfied, he stood and splashed salted water across Ryan’s torso. He dipped the mug into the bucket once more, and again threw the liquid over Ryan’s body.

  That done, he returned the mug to the bucket. He reached for the dial on the small black box and turned it.

  Ryan’s bladder ached. His chest rose and fell in a rhythm he could not master. “Please tell me what—”

  Carter lifted the wand and touched its tip to Ryan’s chest. It sparked like a cap gun and felt like a fist rammed into Ryan’s ribcage. His jaw muscles bunched and ached as he held back the cry that tried to escape him.

  Carter smiled. “Hurts, doesn’t it?”

  Ryan closed his eyes tight. He growled deep in his throat then fought his lungs, slow breaths, even breaths.

  Carter touched the prong to Ryan’s belly.

  His abdominal muscles flexed of their own accord, a spasm that might have been a knife piercing the flesh. Ryan cried out.

  Carter nodded. “That’s more like it. You’ll answer me when I ask you a question. Is that clear?”

  Ryan would have answered had there been enough air in the world. Instead he coughed out what little he had left, a string of bile and saliva spilling from his lip.

  Carter brought the tip to the billow of hair above Ryan’s groin. Ryan doubled over, his chin almost to his knees, as the pain swelled in his abdomen. He smelled the singed hair as his bladder let go.

  Carter stepped back to avoid the weak trickle as it pattered on the floor. Wallace sniggered.

  “Now, the question I asked was: It hurts, doesn’t it?”

  Ryan forced himself upright in the chair, pushing against the sickening torrents that thundered through his head. Carter tapped his shin with the toe of his boot.

  “Answer me.”

  “Yes,” Ryan said, the word seeping out through his lips.

  “That’s better.” Carter held the wand up before Ryan’s eyes. “You seen one of these before?”

  Ryan could no
t answer.

  Carter brought the pronged tip close to Ryan’s face.

  Ryan jerked his head back. “No.”

  “Didn’t think you would have.” Carter withdrew the wand, took a step away. “First time I saw one was in Korea. The bastards strung me upside down from the pipes in the ceiling. It was a bigger one than this, more power. They didn’t mess about, went straight for my goolies. I lasted twenty minutes before I told them everything. Not that I knew much. I didn’t find out till after it was called a picana eléctrica. They’re popular in South America, places like Argentina and Paraguay, the kinds of places your friend Otto Skorzeny and his sort like to hang out.”

  Ryan spat a glob of reddened sputum on the floor. “Skorzeny is not my friend.”

  “Really? So you were just sneaking around my house for the good of your health?”

  “I was given a job to do.”

  “By who?”

  Ryan scrambled through his thoughts. They had guessed he worked for Skorzeny, but what else did they know?

  “By Skorzeny.”

  Carter smiled. “So he just put an ad in a shop window, help wanted, something like that?”

  Ryan nodded. “Something like that.”

  The smile on Carter’s lips flicked off like a light. He took a wallet from his pocket, let it flap open. Ryan recognised it as his own.

  Carter read the identity card aloud. “Lieutenant Albert Ryan, G2, Directorate of Intelligence.” He returned the wallet to his pocket. “So I can assume you were ordered by your superiors to intervene.”

  “Yes.”

  “How much have you learned?”

  “Your name. Captain John Carter. You were SAS. I know his name is Wallace.” Ryan nodded towards the tall man. “He’s either MacAuliffe or Gracey.”

  “Tommy MacAuliffe is no longer part of this team,” Carter said.

  “He was hurt. He needed a doctor.”

  “MacAuliffe was a good lad, but he was no more use to us.”

  Ryan looked up at Carter, saw the blank expression in his face. “What did you do with him?”

  Carter didn’t reply. He scooped another cupful of salt water from the bucket and splashed it onto Ryan’s groin. He brought the prongs to Ryan’s scrotum.

  Ryan screamed and writhed, twisting his body, pulling at the ropes that bound him to the chair. When the pain receded, he slumped, gasping for breath.

  Carter leaned over him. “Let’s be clear about one thing. I’m asking the questions, not you. Do you understand me?”

  When Ryan did not respond, Carter slapped him hard across the ear, rocking his head to the side.

  “Do you understand me?”

  “Yes,” Ryan said.

  Carter moved away. “Good. So you know who we are. What else?”

  “I know you’re after money. Gold. MacAuliffe told me.”

  Carter paced. “How much of this have you passed back to Skorzeny?”

  “None,” Ryan said. “I haven’t reported to him since I found your house. The rest I held back.”

  “Why?” Carter stopped.

  “I told you, Skorzeny is not my friend.”

  “But you’re working for him. What’s your angle?”

  “No angle. I don’t trust him. I wanted to know everything before I decided whether I’d tell him or not.”

  “I don’t believe you.” Carter watched him from across the room. “There’s something else. How did you find us?”

  Ryan did not hesitate. “Célestin Lainé. He told me where to find you.”

  The three men exchanged glances.

  “How did he know?” Carter asked.

  “He worked it out,” Ryan said. “The railway line and the stadium.”

  Carter nodded. “He’s smarter than he looks. So why did he talk to you?”

  “I said I’d tell Skorzeny he was the informant. He’s terrified of Skorzeny.”

  “With good reason. And how did you figure out it was Lainé?”

  Ryan searched for a lie. “Because you let him live. When you killed Elouan Groix and the other man. There was no other reason to let him go. It had to be him.”

  “All right,” Carter said. “I’ll accept that. But there’s more. You’re holding something back.”

  Ryan closed his eyes, thought of Goren Weiss. “There’s nothing.”

  Quick footsteps on the floorboards as Carter approached, then pain exploded in Ryan’s groin, and again before he could scream, and a third blast. The smell of burning skin reached his nostrils. He coughed and gagged, his stomach clenching tight. Pressure ballooned inside his head, pushing against the walls of his skull, the backs of his eyes.

  The world tilted, pitching Ryan to the side. The ropes held him to the chair, and the nails held the chair to the floor. A sharp slap to the cheek brought his mind back within reach.

  “Who put you in contact with Skorzeny?”

  Ryan let his chin sag down onto his chest.

  Carter grabbed his hair, pulled his head back up.

  “Who put you in contact with Skorzeny?”

  “Charles Haughey,” Ryan said.

  “The politician? How much does he know?”

  “Less than Skorzeny.”

  Carter hunkered down, looked into Ryan’s eyes. “Who are you protecting? There’s someone else, isn’t there?”

  All Ryan had to do was speak the Mossad agent’s name. Tell Carter about the talk they had, and the newspaper on the Vauxhall’s dashboard. And it would be over.

  Over.

  They would kill him once they had what they wanted. Ryan knew the only thing keeping him alive was the truth he hid from them. If he talked, he would die.

  “No one,” Ryan said.

  Carter sighed and took another scoop of water from the bucket and threw it in Ryan’s face.

  Ryan spat salty water, said, “No,” but the lightning struck beneath his eye, throwing his head back to crack against the wood of the chair. Another bolt of pain in his groin, another in his belly.

  Consciousness shook and crumbled, dissolved, then reformed. Ryan saw the men as stretched figures, like a fairground hall of mirrors, colours bleeding together.

  “Who are you protecting?”

  “No one.”

  Another blast beneath Ryan’s naval, another to his chest, another beneath his eye. A slap across his cheek, more water thrown over his torso.

  “Who are you protecting?”

  Ryan’s tongue seemed to swell inside his mouth, blunting the words. “No … one.”

  Carter held the wand’s pronged tip against Ryan’s belly, kept it there, sparking, as Ryan’s abdominal muscles flexed and clenched through no will of his own, each spasm like a wild animal’s teeth sinking deep into his flesh, tearing at the meat.

  It came clear in his mind, a lion, a wolf, whatever it was, snarling and snapping at his midsection. Feasting on him, eating him alive, watched by men who seemed to tower up to the heavens, and then all was darkness, the sound of a hurricane in the distance, and someone screaming who could not possibly have been Albert Ryan.

  He stayed there, in the swirling black and greys, until he felt them dragging him down, deeper into the dark. Ryan fought his way up and out of it, dragging himself towards consciousness. And there, the pain, muscles still convulsing, his skin burning. He opened his eyes, strained for focus.

  Carter spoke to Wallace, said, “That’s all he’s got. Finish him off.”

  Wallace nodded, smirked, and stepped forwards. He raised the Browning.

  Ryan saw the suppressor’s mouth opening before his eye, seeming to suck all the air from his lungs and the light from the room. He saw Wallace’s finger on the trigger, the knuckle whitening.

  “Wait,” a voice said.

  Wallace looked somewhere behind Ryan. “Why? We’ve wasted enough time on him already.”

  “Step away,” the voice said. “Now.”

  Wallace hesitated for a moment, then exhaled and shook his head. He lowered the pistol and moved back
to his position across the room.

  The owner of the voice stepped into Ryan’s vision. One hand in his pocket, the other holding a newspaper.

  Goren Weiss said, “Hello, Albert.”

  III

  COLLABORATOR

  CHAPTER FORTY EIGHT

  GOREN WEISS WATCHED Ryan blink, his face contorted with confusion, his eyes unfocused. The Irishman shook his head as if trying to dislodge some veil.

  Weiss asked, “How are you holding up?”

  “I … I don’t …”

  Weiss raised a hand, silenced him. “Okay, save your energy.”

  Carter came to Weiss’s side, spoke in a low voice. “What are you doing? Let’s just finish him and get out of here.”

  “No,” Weiss said. “Bear with me just a little while. Let me have a word with him.”

  Carter looked from Weiss to Ryan and back again. “All right. Five minutes, then I’m putting him out of his misery.”

  Weiss nodded. Carter went to the window and sat on the sill, glowering like a wilful child who thought he’d got his way.

  Ryan’s eyelids rose and fell like heavy curtains. “What’s happening?” he asked.

  Weiss placed his free hand on Ryan’s shoulder. “It’s okay, Albert. I just want to have a talk with you. Take your time. Gather yourself. These gentlemen will wait.”

  Ryan closed his eyes. Weiss fetched the chair from the far side of the room, dragged it back and sat down in front of Ryan, the newspaper in his lap.

  “Seems like we’ve been here before,” Weiss said. “The last time wasn’t quite so trying, though, was it?”

  “What’s happening?” Ryan asked again.

  “Captain Carter insisted on questioning you in his own particular way. I regret allowing him to do so, Albert, but I had to know if you’d give me up or not. Please accept my apology.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “Making sure things don’t get out of hand. I probably should have stepped in sooner. But you conducted yourself well, Albert. I’m impressed.”

  “Tell me what’s going on. Please.”

  Weiss nodded. “Okay. So you know what all this is about by now. It’s a business enterprise. Otto Skorzeny is sitting on a great big pile of money, and we want some of it. Not all, not even most of it. Just a taste.”