Another point. I could not help her and any enquiries – for example, as a Spaniard looking for a job as a groom – might very well lead Heredia’s police to her. It was not for nothing that Felipe had refused to tell me where she was until it was too late. For all I knew, she might be thankful that I was dead.
I could add that cheerful thought to all the others. I was without food and without a friend, in much the same position as I had been in London except that I still had some money, but it could not buy my life or hers. I was at the end of the road which had started with a black bag in Harrods.
There was only one course open to me: to forget the lot of them and go home. Not so easy as it had been. My clothes were filthy rags and I should have to buy more before entering the National Bank to draw out the remainder of my money and then to buy a ticket from Malpelo to London. Passport? I still had it but I reckoned that its validity would be about five minutes. The protection of the British Consul-General? Not very likely for a man notorious for having fought against the legal government. No, my only hope was with the Retadores if I could find a commander who knew enough of my story to believe me.
I set off for Santa Maria, approaching the capital by the main road after fording the river. In the suburbs I saw occasional faces which I recognised but none gave me more than a glance, so I reckoned that I could safely order breakfast if the place was sufficiently grubby. The sole proprietor, when presenting the bill, asked me if I were a Spaniard and I answered that I had come from Spain four years ago and stayed on because I liked Malpelo. Yes, there were not so many police about then, he said – a perfectly casual remark, but I took it as a kindly warning that even in this simplest of joints a derelict such as I might be asked to show his papers. Back on the street, I cursed Heredia again for turning this little heaven into a hell.
I slunk down to the port and its car-park and after some delay was admitted. I was shocked to find that I was not easily identified without Felipe to vouch for me, and kept apart until someone who had been present at the council of war recognised me from my Spanish accent in spite of my filthy, matted beard and torn clothes. When I told them the manner of Felipe’s death some of them wept. He had been a natural leader and much loved.
I insisted on leaving them as soon as possible, for the rest of our party had not returned. I do not know whether they ever did or had been captured and shot. Meanwhile, I was given a luxurious bath which went a long way to restoring morale. My shirt and trousers were roughly mended, enough to preserve decency, and my beard trimmed so far as to remain in keeping with my rags. Then I ate enormously and slept the sleep of the half-drunk till late in the morning.
They begged me to stay with them, but I refused for fear of being recognised and compromising the safety of their hide-out. So I left the car-park when the coast was clear with enough food to keep me going until I was far enough from Santa Maria to enter a shop with comparative safety and spend some of the money which they lent me. They told me to aim for the wild south-eastern tip of Malpelo where the Retadores were in some force carrying on a mild tip-and-run guerrilla warfare too harmless to call for a full punitive expedition, though probably next on Heredia’s list.
I was soon clear of the docks and their suburbs and set out for the east in good heart with my forged papers. They were inspected at the last post outside the town while I tried to hide my anxiety. It was needless, giving me confidence that the experts at the car-park knew their jobs. Then came the long trudge to the east. Faces on the road and in the little villages turned from the deep sunburn of the tropical Spaniard to the reddish brown of the Indian and the greyish black of the mestizos. All wished me good luck and good day, knowing that a poor man walking alone, had need of both, and preserving the good manners which Spain had left behind.
When night fell I found a little ruin of a shed and slept. Twenty-five miles were behind me and I had completely recovered from my depression. Central America had charm. To judge by Malpelo, it had been a happier little state under the presidents whose portraits filled Heredia’s ante-room. The Spaniard was and remained the conquerer, but a Christian and therefore cordial conquerer. What had democracy and its politicians added to the general tolerance? Nothing until the arrival of industry had given birth to a proletariat.
In the morning I set out again for the east. The country had become primeval and I could see that it would be a base for a formidable guerrilla stronghold though there was little sign of it beyond the police posts which seemed to have been recently and lightly fortified. I thought it perfectly safe to eat and drink at a fonda just outside the last houses and so preserve my bag of supplies for an emergency. Another traveller joined me on the bench and began to question me. I had given him my usual story of being a Spaniard who had settled down in Malpelo, saying, to avoid giving a definite address, that I was a fisherman working out of Santa Maria and on my way home. He led me into details of where I lived and only then did I realise that his questions were more than friendly curiosity; so I paid my bill, walked out of the fonda and made the appalling mistake of walking briskly and purposefully east instead of west to Santa Maria which I had given as my destination.
‘Come with me!’ he said, catching me up. ‘We have a cart going to Santa Maria this afternoon and it can give you a lift if you have a chat with my officer first.’
I thanked him enthusiastically. I think he had no idea that I had spotted him as a plain-clothes cop. His patter was good, but he wasn’t very bright.
The cart was standing outside the police station. The horse – well, it was a horse and that was about all one could say for it. The plain-clothes cop, who had now smilingly given up the pretence of being anything else, went inside to telephone. I cut the traces and galloped away. He had not been telephoning at all, for he jumped out of the office and fired a couple of shots from an antique revolver. I left the road for open fields and was relieved to find that the horse could at any rate jump a ditch on the way back to its pasture and that, on the whole, it preferred the open to pulling a trap. I was now beyond overtaking but a marked man wherever I rode.
I gave up any idea of searching for Teresa if – doubtful anyway – she had taken refuge with some scattered band of Retadores. For the first time, I realised that it was her I wanted rather than safety. I dismissed the thought. But what else was there? I was in the midst of a country of which I knew only a very limited strip where every man would be against me or afraid to contact me unless he was above suspicion. Above suspicion – well, that suggested Hector. Undoubtedly he could help, but how? The most he could do was to hand over the Punchao to his father-in-law in return for my life. Forget Teresa!
Now this policeman? What would he report? That I had said I was bound for Santa Maria and yet had turned the other way as if to join the guerrillas of the Retadores. An obvious case for investigation that was, made more obvious still by stealing the horse standing ready to convey the local chief constable to the capital. The whole pack of hounds would be after me with strict orders to bring me before Heredia in person. Well then, I would return to the capital – a very faint hope. They did not seem to make much use of horses any longer, using cars on the road and their feet on the rough stuff. But this was mere guesswork.
Under cover of the first hillock with a good view of the road, I spotted a man lying comfortably on the grass in a sort of nest formed by long and frequent use. He was smoking a pipe. It was the first I had seen in Malpelo where the populace smoked cigars if poor and cigarettes if poorer. By his side was a .303 rifle of old vintage but spotlessly clean. He had evidently been there for some time.
‘And where are you off to?’ he asked in English with no sign of surprise at my sudden appearance.
‘No comprendo.’
‘Well, now – he doesn’t understand English! Yet he is wearing a suit which was once made in London. Much patched, of course. It looks to me as if you need some help. Where are you going?’
‘The sea,’ I told him, giving up the useless p
retence, ‘or as near as I can get.’
‘Ah, that explains the horse. He doesn’t look the kind which could possibly break his traces. I was just out for my usual evening stroll when I saw some excitement at the police station. I gathered that a horse had broken away from the chief’s buggy. I also heard two shots. So putting two and two together I gathered that someone had been in danger of arrest. It’s surprising how much one can pick up in an hour’s watching of the traffic and a few questions afterwards. By the way, do you really need that horse or can you lend it to me?’
‘Lend it or give it?’ I replied with my eye on the rifle.
‘As you like. You seem to have stirred up the ants around here. I have stayed too long to satisfy my curiosity about you, and now I should like to get away while the going is good. Do you think it would carry us both?’
‘Over this ground?’
‘If you come up a bit, you will see that there is a track. Or rather you won’t see there is a track because it is only twenty inches wide.’
I mounted behind him without any objection from the horse which asked nothing better than to take the narrow, worn path which he was expected to follow.
‘This is the only direct road to the rest of Malpelo,’ he told me. ‘It is seldom used, only if we need some reliable chap to get the news in an emergency.’
‘May I know your name?’
‘Mayne. Joseph Mayne. And yours?’
I told him and he said that he had heard of me.
‘Our link with civilisation,’ he explained, ‘runs to the Atlantic and three different systems of government – imitation Russian, imitation USA and perfectly good democracy, all quite easy to accept so long as you know what the next one is going to be and pay your taxes without bothering about corruption. All politicians have to live.’
The sun was already low and we could now see in the distance miniature colonies of little white houses straggling over the lowlands, interspersed with small warehouses and factories. Lights began to twinkle. Obviously there was no electricity.
‘But who did this?’
‘I did, and called it Jumilla.’
‘Why don’t you build on?’
‘Because it is more profitable not to. The House of Representatives voted the money and then – shall we say – forgot about it.’
‘You are not tempted to be – well, up to date?’
‘We are up to date. Say, 1850. I chose the site. I knew as soon as I saw it that this was where I wanted to live. The old game. My father made the money and I spent it.’
‘You are not lonely?’
Three quite adorable little Indians were hovering in welcome outside the door of a long, low white house a little bigger than the rest.
‘My daughters,’ he announced, rather to my surprise for their manners were perfect in Spanish and English. I said that he had made his house a palace.
‘How did you ever find a governess?’
‘The Presidenta Juana has been good enough to take an interest in them. No, not what you think. All different mothers. But she often telephones them when the boss is away.’
He kissed all three and led me into the house, telling me with Spanish courtesy that it was mine.
‘Wine or our local shot-in-the-arm?’ he asked.
‘Whichever you recommend after a hard day. And the horse? He needs a drink too.’
‘Poor old police horse! He can’t show his face until I have changed his colour. He now belongs to the people as you don’t want him.’
‘You are communists?’
‘Yes, I suppose so. On a very small scale the system works. So if I must have a name, that’s about it. You are talking to the ghost of Uncle Stalin himself.’
‘Don’t the police ever come here?’
‘Yes. After giving me notice.’
‘Are they reasonable?’
‘Only quite a small subvention monthly if the Treasury hasn’t spent it. But there are limits. They would not disobey if there is a direct order from the President. Is he likely to give it?’
‘I am afraid he is.’
‘Then I shall have to set you on your way in the morning. I will let Juana know.’
‘For God’s sake, no!’
‘Well, if you think so. But she finds me very romantic. We’ll keep that in reserve then.’
I started my story with the raid of the Retadores on the capital and the capture of the Punchao from the watchmaker, for I was still too ashamed of London and my theft of the black bag. I told him how I had rescued it and had intended to carry it to the commander of the Retadores in the second battle. After the defeat I escaped with it and I would, I said, show it to him when the time came. It was the property of the people, not Heredia.
‘What are you doing in Malpelo anyway?’
‘I came over as a friend of Sir Hector McMurtrie.’
‘And of Carlota?’
‘I think she would gladly see me stuck up against a wall.’
‘And where does Teresa Molinos come in? I have three stories about her: (1) she brought the Punchao up from the bottom of the sea; (2) she nearly caused a revolution by walking with it into the rearguard of the Heredistas; (3) she is protected by an enormous witch dog.’
I told him that Rumour No. 2 was correct and the other two were fairy stories – but important since they showed the legends which attached themselves to the Punchao.
‘Do you know where she is now?’
‘I wish I did.’
‘Yes. If it had been a man who held up the Punchao they would have rallied round it. Evidence of power without cruelty is what they want to see.’
Chapter Nine
I left him on foot early in the morning, heading for the Atlantic coast, a long way to walk but the road was good. The colony was part of Malpelo, but so isolated that there was no through traffic. After a rather nervous march I was stopped by a lorry with a load of bananas on its way to the port. The driver told me to get in quickly and promptly hid me in an empty crate of Canary bananas, left over from some experimental shipment. I had nothing to fear, he said, when he nailed me down.
We bumped along the gravelled road for about an hour and a half until I could hear the distant hoot of a ship. Soon afterwards another crate – rather to my alarm – was stacked on top of me. Then the driver appeared to be counting the shipment in the presence of some official, and the side of my crate dropped down, leaving just enough space for me to crawl out.
‘There you are!’ the driver said. ‘Don’t move until the ship is well out to sea. Then ask for the third officer! Good luck, comrade!’
I moved too early and only realised it when I tried to get back into hiding and couldn’t. That left my backside wide open to a hearty kick.
‘Damn communist! Out you go!’
‘Hi, there! I am British.’
‘You should be ashamed of yourself with that nice queen of yours. Chuck him out!’
At least they did me the honour of lowering the gangplank. I had just time to tell them what they could do with their bananas before I was manhandled to the immigration office.
‘Pasaporte, por favor.’
I showed it.
‘Here’s the chap you want,’ the officer shouted over his shoulder.
Two military policemen jumped from a lightly armoured van behind him, flung me down on the floor and set off on the long way round to the capital through Nueva Beria avoiding Jumilla altogether. They unloaded me at the central police station, from which I had been delivered by the raid of the Retadores.
‘The President will see your prisoner immediately,’ the duty officer said.
So I was taken at once to the palace and locked into a sound-proof room. There were a couple of unfamiliar machines in it which I did not like. I was left alone for half an hour, probably to soften me for questioning. It did. I had heard enough of Heredia’s methods.
The President at last came in accompanied by a silent assistant. He appeared to be as cordial as the first time that
I had been summoned to his presence.
‘Well, well, Mr Hawkins, and what were you running away from?’
‘I want to go home, Your Excellency.’
‘You believed I would not let you?’
‘Well, there have been misunderstandings. I admit I have been mixed up with some strange people against my will and in ignorance of Malpelo’s politics, Excellency.’
‘I am told you are a communist.’
‘I have no politics. I am an archaeologist.’
‘Ah, that would account for your interest in the Punchao. Then no doubt you can tell me where it has disappeared to since the Senorita Molinos paraded with it through Ramales.’
‘I do not know, Excellency.’
I was not going to give him the obvious answer that she had it when I could not know whether she was safely out of reach.
‘You mean that you do not remember, I think. I wonder if I can restore your memory.’
He gave a nod to his silent companion who stepped forward, bent back my arms and pinioned them behind my head.
‘A cigar?’ Heredia invited – a gratuitous touch of cruelty.
His torturer set up one of those unfamiliar machines which I had seen, and attached rings to my wrists and ankles. He then wound a wheel so that I was suspended in mid-air. I let out a squeal at the savage pain and fiercely determined not to do so again. I flatter myself that I kept the vow but I cannot be sure.
The companion answered my silence by a touch more on the wheel, leaving my body in a straight line of agony which increased from moment to moment.
‘And how is the memory now?’ Heredia asked.
‘I cannot remember what I do not know.’
‘Perhaps another centimetre will improve his knowledge,’ Heredia suggested to the professional.
I heard my shoulder crack as it was dislocated. I was thankful for the cooling sweat which burst out all over me.
Face to the Sun Page 12
