‘When I saw it and he told me how much he’d paid, I was frightened. I mean, we’re only ordinary people and if we start behaving like we’re more, then . . .’ She struggled, but failed, to find the words to express her instinctive fear that the gods always punished pretensions. ‘Carlos laughed at me—sometimes Miguel went for him for doing that, but he didn’t care. He said . . .’ The baby began to grizzle and she jogged him up and down in her arms. ‘D’you think it could be more teeth coming through?’
‘I wouldn’t know.’
‘I don’t think it can be. But I’m sure he hasn’t eaten anything nasty . . ‘
‘What did Carlos say?’
‘The robe came floating down from heaven, so it was the luckiest robe any baby could possibly wear to a christening. He’s always teasing me. So sometimes I tease him back and ask him when he’s going to marry his novia . . .’ She suddenly remembered that he would never tease her again, never laugh at her again, and never buy her another fifty-thousand peseta robe. She began to cry and the tears slid down her cheeks and fell on to Pedro, who prodded the sudden dampness with inquiring fingers. She wept for her husband and for her brother-in-law, and because life could be kind one moment and yet so cruel the next.
Alvarez went through to the kitchen to find that Dolores was vigorously working a pestle in a mortar. She stopped, straightened up, rubbed the sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand. ‘Well?’
‘Elena has gone to care for Miguel and so I didn’t see her. I don’t think Ana knows where she’s gone.’
‘So what will happen now?’
‘I just don’t know.’ By which he meant that he couldn’t be certain enough that Miguel and Carlos had moved from traditional smuggling to drug-running and, being something of a coward who would face a moral dilemma when forced to, but who far preferred not to be so forced, he was very glad that that was so.
CHAPTER 13
Alvarez slowly climbed the stairs and went along to his office. He sat, breathing heavily and sweating profusely. He must, he decided, cut back on smoking and drinking. Then he thought about life and he reached down to the bottom right-hand drawer of the desk and brought out from this the bottle of brandy and a glass. He was in the middle of the drink when the phone rang.
‘Robert here. How are things your end? But please don’t tell me you’re so hot you don’t know what to do. Here the calendar may say it’s August, but it’s damn near freezing and if it doesn’t rain before the day’s out, I’ll eat my hat.’
‘My trouble is not the heat, it’s the amount of work.’
Ware laughed. ‘If I didn’t know you, I might sympathize . . . I’m phoning because I promised to keep you up to date with the news. Something odd’s happened. Serena Collins, sole beneficiary under Green’s will, has instructed solicitors to claim against his life insurance. As you know, I’d have given odds on that after she’d passed on my message they’d come to the conclusion they’d better forget the claim because if they didn’t he’d be for the high jump on a charge of attempted fraud.’
‘He cannot believe that your company is in as strong a position as you made out.’
‘Or he’s so desperate for money that he’s willing to take the gamble that he can successfully keep out of sight. His scenario must go like this. She puts in a claim, the company refuses to pay so she takes them to court and since nothing’s completely certain at law, maybe she wins, because her lawyers are clever, maybe she loses, because the company’s are cleverer. If she loses and it’s impossible legally to tie her up directly with the intended fraud, she avoids any criminal action against herself. . . But he’s got to be really desperate. After all, they can’t be certain how strong our case is and we may easily have dug up more evidence than I told her about. And once the court learns how closely she’s been associated with Green, to the extent that she was waiting for him in the flat in Changres, had rung up his hotel in Mallorca, knowing he was flying, isn’t it going to be very difficult for her to claim she had no knowledge of all that was going on? . . . I know, I’m going round in circles and arguing against myself, but frankly I can’t make sense of their action. And that’s got me worried that I’ve missed something or that something fresh has happened which had tipped the scales in their favour. I suppose you’ve nothing fresh to add?’
‘I’m afraid not.’
‘Then I’ll just have to go on worrying and grow ever bigger ulcers.’
When the call was over, Alvarez finished the drink, replaced bottle and glass in the drawer—enjoying a glow of congratulatory self-satisfaction as he did so because he had resisted the temptation to pour himself a second drink. He settled back in the chair and watched a fly walk across one of the folders which littered the desk. Greed, although not one of the deadly sins, was certainly one of the deadliest to those who suffered it. It was greed which had made Green try to double the sum insured, an act which had raised the suspicion of fraud; it was greed which was persuading him to pursue the claim, through the señorita, an act which might well prove fatal to them both . . .
He was on the point of falling asleep when a memory, which he couldn’t immediately identify, irritatingly jerked him awake. Had Dolores asked him to buy something on his way home? He couldn’t begin to remember her doing so. And in any case, this elusive memory seemed to be somehow connected with something Ware had said. He thought back to their conversation. Ware was afraid that he’d missed something or that something had happened which had tipped the scales in favour of Green. But how could either possibility be . . . Ana! She’d been given a fifty-thousand peseta christening robe and when she’d expressed her worry at such ostentatious munificence, Carlos had laughed at her fears and said that it had to be the luckiest of robes because it had floated down from heaven. It was an extraordinary thing for a man like him to say if it were mere persiflage; poetic images would never rush to his lips. So could it have been said with jeering irony; had he and Miguel been out on either a fishing trip or a smuggling run, seen a parachute descend, watched the parachutist board a motor-cruiser which had headed north, and then later learned that the pilot of the plane was supposed to have died in the crash? They’d recognize a smart fraud when they saw one. And they’d know that they could expect to make themselves a great deal of money by blackmail. But perhaps what they hadn’t realized was that they were moving out of their class. Green was never going to permit his elaborate fraud to be wrecked by two fishermen. He’d planted a bomb on their boat which had been intended to blast both of them into silence . . .
If he were right, then the newfound wealth of the brothers didn’t mean they’d moved into drugs. Which in turn meant he would not have to arrest Miguel and subsequently face Elena’s and Ana’s stunned incomprehension and Dolores’s anger . . . For the moment he chose to ignore the fact that if Miguel had been party to an attempted blackmail, then he had been guilty of a serious crime, even if the man being blackmailed was a criminal . . .
Alvarez braked the car to a halt in front of the elaborate wrought-iron gates and as he climbed out of the car he wondered how much just this gateway had cost? Ca’n Feut represented a degree of wealth that he’d not met before and he found it impossible to visualize the kind of life that Bennett must lead. Did he think like an ordinary person? Could he, if he was in a position to buy virtually anything he wanted without a second’s thought? Did he ever look beyond his wealth and see a world in which there was so much want? Did he ever stop to wonder if eventually he would be called upon to pay a price for all the privileges he had enjoyed?
He pressed the red button on the speaker box and when the call was answered he identified himself and asked if señor Bennett was at home. Just before he returned to the car, he looked up at the TV camera and suffered a childish desire to stick out his tongue . . .
The gates opened and he drove up the winding road to the crown of the hill. The lawn was the same shade of dark green—a minimum of a lorry-load of water a day. And yet he knew farmers in the are
a who could no longer irrigate their land and grow crops in the summer because in order to maintain the tourist trade the extraction of water had become so great that the water-table had fallen to the point where their wells ran dry. He was the least vindictive of men, but he knew he would not be dismayed if one day there were no water lorries to climb the hill and the flowers withered and the grass died back and Bennett discovered that all the wealth in the world could never divorce a man from that world.
He stepped out of the car and then turned back and leaned over to pick up from the passenger seat the small folded yachting chart which he’d borrowed from the harbourmaster. He crossed to the front door and rang the bell. The door was opened by a young woman and he politely wished her good-morning.
‘You don’t remember me?’
She was the second person in a short time whom he’d failed to recognize. They said that loss of memory was the first sign of approaching senility . . .
Tm Cristina.’
‘Not Julian’s daughter?’
That’s right.’
‘Well, I’m damned!’ He was reassured that senility had not yet crept all that close. The last time he’d seen her, she’d worn glasses, her face had been spotty, and she’d been very shy. He recalled the old Mallorquin proverb: Time works miracles for the young and tragedies for the old. ‘How can you expect me to recognize you when you’ve grown so beautiful since I last saw you?’
She simpered at the compliment.
‘What exactly are you doing here?’
‘Working about the house, cleaning and that sort of thing, and helping Juana in the kitchen.’
‘I met her last time I was here.’
‘She told me. It was my day off.’
‘Is it a good job?’
‘Not so bad except when it’s Juana’s day off and I have to do everything. Still, at least I don’t have to do the cooking now—just take something out of the deep-freeze and warm it up for the señor.’ She laughed gaily. ‘At the start, he said I was to do the cooking on her day off, but when I did, he soon changed his mind!’
‘Clever! . . . I suppose I’d better go and have a word with the señor. Is he on his own?’
‘At the moment, but he’s expecting a señorita.’
‘Then I’d better be brief if I’m not to spoil his pleasures.’
She giggled, then led the way through the hall and the sitting-room on to the pool patio.
Bennett, wearing a costume, sat by a table in the centre of which was fixed a sun umbrella, but his chair was set clear of the shade. On the table was an ice-bucket in which was a bottle of champagne and by its side a half-filled flute.
‘Good morning, señor.’
‘More questions?’
‘I’m afraid I have to ask a few more.’
‘Then as quickly as you can. I have a guest due soon.’
There were three other chairs around the table; since Bennett said nothing, he moved one of them into the shade and sat. The bottle of champagne was close and when he spoke he was conscious of how dry was his throat. ‘señor, on the thirteenth of last month you sailed from the port in your boat.’
‘I answered the last time you were here that I have no idea.’
‘And you sailed at four-thirty in the afternoon.’
‘Why this absurd—’
‘Señor, I hope you will understand my questions in a moment and begin to remember.’
Bennett’s expression tightened.
‘How fast is your boat?’
‘I’m tempted to answer, how long is a piece of string? . . . Do you mean maximum, cruising, or manoeuvring speed?’
‘The speed at which you sail on a long journey.’
‘Cruising. Twelve knots.’
‘Why did you sail for Stivas in the afternoon, which meant that you had to spend the night at sea?’
He no longer denied remembering. ‘I wanted to.’
‘Because you needed the dark?’
‘That question suggests you’re continuing to make the same absurd accusations as last time.’ He picked the bottle out of the ice-bucket and topped up his drink.
The champagne was Krug. Nothing so common as Codorniu’s Non Plus Ultra, thought Alvarez, as he tried very hard not to imagine the velvety pleasure of ice-cold champagne slipping down his parched throat. He stood, put the chart on the table, and unfolded it. ‘I would like to show you something, señor.’ He brought a pair of dividers out of his pocket, removed the cork with which he had protected the points, measured from the latitude scale twelve minutes. A course from Puerto Llueso, rounding Cabo Parelona, to Stivas had been laid off and along this he measured six and a half hours’ run with the dividers. He marked the spot with a small cross in pencil. ‘This is where your boat was at eleven o’clock that night.’
‘Really.’
‘Do you see this other mark, señor?’
Bennett briefly stared down at the chart. ‘Yes.’
‘That is where the plane was when the last radio message was sent. The two positions are close together.’
‘Before you try to draw the slightest significance from that fact, let me point out something. If I steered even a slightly different course from the one you have decided that I did—on no evidence at all, as far as I’m aware—if my speed over the ground was slightly more or less than twelve knots because of a current or engine revs, or a dozen other variables were in operation, my position was many miles distant from where you’ve plotted it.’
‘All that is possible, but what is fact is that you were in a position to pick up the pilot after he had parachuted from the plane.’
‘I wonder if anything I can say will ever bring home to you the stupidity of the accusation?’
Alvarez placed his finger on the chart. ‘When you were there, were there any other craft around?’
‘Wherever I was at eleven that night, there were no other vessels in sight.’
‘Can you be certain, since it was dark?’
‘All vessels at sea carry steaming lights. And you have, perhaps, heard of radar?’
‘Of course, señor, and I believe your boat has a set. Would this have picked up a fishing-boat?’
‘If you were at all conversant with the subject, you’d again know that I’d need more information before I could answer. At what range was such boat, what was her size and shape, of what was she constructed, were there any cliffs behind her to mask the blip or obscure it with reflected scatter?’
‘Then what you’re really saying is that a fishing-boat might have observed you even though you had no idea it was there?’
‘I still can’t answer. If someone aboard this mythical craft could see my steaming lights (and how else would that person have known of my presence?) I would have expected to pick her up on my radar unless she lay very low in the water and had a very poor radar profile.’
‘I imagine that the lights you had to burn to guide the parachuting pilot down and to show him exactly where the surface of the sea lay would have been visible at a greater distance than any normal lights?’
Bennett lifted his glass and drained it, then checked his gold Audemars-Piguet. ‘Without wishing to appear rude, I do hope you’ve nearly reached the end of all these absurd questions since, as I said, I’m expecting a guest?’
‘I’ve only a few more, señor, and I’ll ask those as quickly as possible. Did Green parachute from his plane into the sea and did you pick him up?’
‘If you haven’t already gathered what my answer is to that ridiculous question, I think you must find your present job an onerous one.’
‘What do you say when I tell you that two fishermen saw you pick up a parachutist?’
‘That they were probably tight.’
‘We have traced the hotel in Stivas where señor Green stayed on the Sunday night under the name of Thomas Grieves. And I think that now he has returned to the island.’
‘In view of the fact that he’s dead, I can only applaud your imagination; it’s not g
iven to everyone easily to envisage a second coming.’
‘You do realize something, do you, señor?’
‘If you are postulating it, I doubt that I do.’
‘When you sailed señor Green to the Peninsula, you became an accomplice to attempted fraud; if you know he is back on this island, but deny the fact, you may well become an accessory after the fact to murder.’
Bennett refilled his glass. Alvarez carefully stared out at the magnificent view, but for once failed to gain any sense of pleasure from it.
Bennett said, as he replaced the bottle in the ice-bucket: ‘I do wonder if something has occurred to you. If Green faked the crash and I sailed him to the mainland, his objective must have been to get as far away from here as possible. He’s hardly likely, then, to have returned.’ He drank.
‘There are times when the best hiding-place is where a person is known to have fled from, since no one will believe he could be so stupid as to return.’
‘You are clearly a man of great ingenuity as well as imagination.’
Alvarez stood. ‘Thank you for your help, señor.’
Bennett nodded. He could have been smiling slightly, but it was impossible to be certain.
Alvarez was halfway to the house when the sitting-room door opened and a woman stepped out. She was neatly dressed, but not stylishly, certainly not in her youth, and pleasant-looking rather than pretty. He was surprised. He’d have thought that only an exotic woman would have attracted Bennett. As she drew level with him she smiled a greeting and he inclined his head.
‘Hullo, Serena,’ Bennett called out.
“Morning, Pat. It’s even hotter than ever, isn’t it?’
She’d a warm voice, thought Alvarez; the kind a man liked to hear when he returned home after a hard day’s work. He went to open the door into the sitting-room, but it was opened for him by Cristina. He stepped into the cool room. ‘I meant to ask you how your mother is? The last time I saw her, she was having a lot of trouble with her back.’
Dead Clever Page 9
