by Lex Lander
Then Baker was between us, right hand inside his jacket, left hand pressing me down.
‘Cool it, Warner. Nobody’s blamin’ you for screwin’ the kid. She’s a juicy little chick, that’s for sure. Did you get a load of that sweet little ass, Giorgy?’ He gurgled appreciatively. ‘And we saw you feelin’ it.’
I went from hot to cold and back to hot. He was just baiting me, I told myself. Don’t be a sucker, don’t rise to it. I wasn’t looking for a fight. All I sought was a lead on Rik de Bruin. Taking an innuendo or two on the chin was a small enough price.
‘I might make you a present of her when I’ve finished,’ I said, faking a grin. This was the kind of language Baker would understand.
He whistled. ‘Gee, that’s pretty white of you, André. Hey …’ He inclined towards me conspiratorially, ‘she give head?’
I shrugged, as if to imply it was a foregone conclusion.
‘She swallow?’ he persisted, almost panting.
‘Cut it out,’ I snarled. My tolerance had its limits.
‘Enough of this,’ Giorgy intervened, his voice icy. ‘On the subject of de Bruin I will speak frankly, André. It is true we are aware of what is happening. However, he is, as I have said, under my protection. I cannot intrude. I can only advise you.’
His predatory features relaxed somewhat, liberating some of the compassion I knew was in him, though it was buried deep and only ever exhumed in private.
‘Advise me then.’
‘Leave him alone. Whatever he does, let him be. When he has what he wants he will leave you in peace.’
‘So what exactly does he want? Maybe I can give it to him.’
‘I think not. Just do not stand in his way. He is a businessman, not a gangster. He will only act against you if you … obstruct him.’
‘Obstruct him? From snatching Lizzy? If you think I’m going to stand back and let him do it, you’re living in Wonderland.’
‘André …’ Giorgy stretched out a hand. ‘You should go away. I can give you a new contract, here and now. In Brazil.’
I shook my head. Both of them were regarding me with an intense curiosity, as if I had just stepped off a flying saucer.
‘Not only that,’ Giorgy went on. ‘We will pay more. How does five hundred thousand sound? And not just for this contract but in the future too. It is agreed?’ He was pathetically eager. ‘I have with me a down payment, in good faith.’
I didn’t react. I was content to let him make the running, to see how far he and the Syndicate would stick out their financial necks for the mighty Rik de Bruin.
He reached inside his neatly-folded jacket and withdrew a fat envelope.
‘One hundred and twenty-five thousand. If you take the contract now, you will receive the balance of the usual fifty per cent tomorrow. Here.’ He shook the envelope under my nose, as if inviting me to smell it.
First de Bruin, now Giorgy. Everybody offering me money to be a good boy and not stick my nose in where it wasn’t welcome. What was I to deduce from this generosity but that de Bruin was invaluable to Giorgy’s principals. Deals were being done, and very big deals at that, to judge from the amount of hush money swilling around. Let him be, was Giorgy’s entreaty, take an inflation-busting pay rise. Likely as not he’d have given even more, had I demanded it.
But this wasn’t a matter of money. For once in my professional life, I wasn’t to be bought.
No good would come of further debate. I did a swift recce. The fortified island was now well to the rear and the town itself was a fusion of pinks and beiges and pale greens. We were the only craft this far from the shore, other than the big stuff plodding along the sea’s periphery. Circumstances were as favourable as they would ever be.
‘We’re drifting. Anchor must have dragged.’ I drew their attention to the island, now a good mile astern.
‘Let it drift,’ Baker grunted, expansive with beer. Only two cans remained of the original twelve. As I sized him up, assessing his ability to function with so much booze inside him, he shook a cigarette from a flip-top pack of Camels and lit up with a Zippo lighter. His hand was steady enough.
‘No!’ Giorgy said sharply. ‘Please return to the harbour, André.’ He was still clutching the envelope. Probably in a sweat about being dunked in the Med with it. ‘Please, André. I cannot swim.’
‘You won’t have to swim.’ I vacated the seat and lifted the locker lid trying to keep my movements natural, yet sensing they were wooden and theatrical, telegraphing my intentions.
The butt of the gun, a German Korth.357 magnum revolver, reputedly the world’s most expensive mass-produced handgun, protruded from the staysail bag. I grasped it, almost lovingly and tugged the three inches of barrel free. In that same instant my shoulder was grasped and I was spun sideways to smash into the wheel, its rim gouging my spine and forcing a shout of pain from my lips. Baker, who else. Now he was closing in, hands balled into fists, cigarette still drooping incongruously. I had managed to hang on to the Korth, but he seemed not to notice it. Maybe he was made of bulletproof steel.
So I let him look down the muzzle, let him take note of the long cylinder that spelled magnum and a bullet capable of dismemberment. Yet anger, not fear, flared in the piggy eyes. The massive frame bunched, ready to launch. He was too committed, or maybe too smashed, to back down. He was paid to protect. Behind him Giorgy was rising. In him was fear enough for both of them. I could smell it on him.
‘Be sensible, Baker.’ I prodded him with the Korth so hard that he gasped and stumbled backwards. Still no fear there. Frustration, yes, and fury, now boiling over into madness, goaded at last to the ultimate folly. His hand dived inside his jacket and he was fast all right. The signals to my brain were a succession of freeze-frame movements, my vision acting as a viewfinder, the shutter opening and closing, click-clack, click-clack, and my own responses seeming sluggish, reluctant. My finger was squeezing the trigger, it felt stiff, resistant to the pressure. Baker’s gun was clearing his jacket, a compact square automatic, sure to be double-action, sure to have a round already chambered.
Impressions came fast: of the spurt of orange from the Korth’s muzzle, a darting mayfly of flame that bloomed and died within a heartbeat, and of the report, thankfully emasculated by the open space of the sea. Of the slap the 150-grain cartridge made as it penetrated flesh and sinew; of the spurt of blood, a gory mist, momentarily speckling the blue beehive of the sky. Of Baker, hurled towards the gunwale, his head snapping back, the cigarette spinning one way, his gun another, skating across the cabin roof. Of Giorgy ducking instinctively, then trying too late to prevent Baker from going over the side, and almost being dragged with him.
Baker hit the water, raising a crescendo of spray, soaking Giorgy, who was left slumped across the gunwale, half-out of the boat. I moved in on him and he wrenched round to ward me off.
‘No … no!’
He needn’t have worried. A dead Giorgy would be no use to me. Floundering noises from under the stern were overlaid with American-twanged cursing. Likewise a dead Baker would have been an embarrassment. I had aimed for his right shoulder and my aim had been true.
‘Give him a hand,’ I ordered Giorgy, who was so manifestly relieved not to be in the drink too, that he obeyed at once and was soon straining to haul his failed watchdog back on board. Retrieving a man overboard without proper gear is no picnic, especially if that man has a useless arm and a waterlogged suit. But I wasn’t about to join in.
While this was going on I checked for indications that the gunshot had not been heard by others. All was as normal. No busybodies racing to investigate.
My hat had come off during the skirmish. I reclaimed it and sat down at the very stern, putting the steering binnacle between me and the struggling pair. Baker had managed to hook a foot over the gunwale. Giorgy had a double fistful of his jacket lapels and was braced against the side of the binnacle, grunting with the effort.
‘No hurry,’ I said, resting the Korth along my
thigh.
Baker’s white face rose over the cockpit rim, like the moon coming up. A last Herculean heave from Giorgy and the pair of them crashed into the well together. Pure slapstick.
Baker was tough. Ignoring Giorgy, he got to his feet and stripped off his jacket, exposing the empty pocket of the shoulder holster. The bullet had gone in an inch below his collar bone and hadn’t exited. The blood that stained his cream shirt had been diluted by the water to rosé. Fresh outflow was already darkening it anew.
He unstuck his shirt from the wound. Didn’t so much as wince. An authentic hard case.
‘Bastard,’ he said, his voice unsteady.
‘Next time it’ll be your head.’
He looked searchingly at me, perhaps remembering that killing was my daily bread too.
‘Do nothing, Baker,’ a damp, dishevelled Giorgy, crawling onto the seat, croaked.
And what could he do? But glower – and he did plenty of that.
Although Giorgy’s chest was going like a bellows from his recent labours, he found enough lung space to fling an assortment of Italian expletives at me. At least they sounded like expletives.
‘You are skating on very thin ice, André,’ he said, reverting to English to make sure I received him loud and clear.
‘Giorgy,’ I said, patiently, as to a recalcitrant child, ‘don’t threaten me. I never wanted to make an enemy of you, but I have to know what game de Bruin is playing. He’s already taken my woman …’
‘You say,’ Giorgy interrupted.
‘You think I’m doing this for fun?’ I said, stung to anger.
Giorgy produced the red handkerchief and mopped seawater from his face and hair. ‘It will do you no good. I don’t know myself why de Bruin is to be left alone. All I can say is that he has influential connections in the Middle East. Oil money.’
‘Giorgy!’ Baker growled. ‘You got a big mouth.’
‘What does it matter?’ Giorgy retorted. ‘He knows what is going on. It is useless to pretend.’ He turned back to me. ‘I am only acting under instructions. You must believe this, André. In this matter I am little more than a message-carrier, and the message to you is keep away from de Bruin.’
Oddly, I was inclined to believe him. Tactically though, I wasn’t quite finished with him yet.
‘You’re lying, Giorgy.’ I hooked back the hammer of the Korth. Giorgy shrank away from me; Baker, ashen-faced, made a feeble gesture of restraint, then sagged against the cabin wall, clutching his smashed shoulder, his fingers red-dyed.
‘André … I swear.’ Giorgy spread his arms, a wordless appeal.
The gun barrel was centred on his left kneecap.
‘Do you know what happens to the kneecap when a bullet goes through it?’
He just stared.
‘It shatters like glass,’ I said. ‘Into tiny, tiny fragments. The pain is excruciating. Indescribable. The reconstruction job is complicated and painful. They may have to bond a metal casing to whatever bone is left, or even replace it with an artificial joint, or even amputate your leg. Sometimes they can’t ever repair the damage, and even if they can you’ll always have a limp. Always walk slowly. Always have pain.’
Sweat trickled from his hairline. His mouth writhed, no speech issued from it. The veneer of prestige and persuasion was finally stripped away.
‘Bad enough to lose one knee,’ I went on, twisting the knife. ‘Imagine losing both.’
‘All right, all right! You have made your point.’
The buzz of an outboard cut through our discussion. A dinghy crewed by two men or youths scudded by, off Seaspray’s port bow, indifferent to our presence. No salvation there for Giorgy. His hopeful look faded.
‘I’m waiting,’ I said. ‘But not for much longer.’
‘He is providing a … a service for my principals.’ His voice was a tremolo, his eyes averted from mine. Baker kept his counsel; he didn’t relish a kneecap job either. ‘My principals have taken a major share in de Bruin’s business interests. They have much invested in him, so they will not be pleased if you … harm him. That is it. That is all I know.’
‘This business of de Bruin’s,’ I mused aloud. ‘Pornography – is that right?’
A dispirited nod.
‘Porn barons are ten a cent. What’s special about his set-up that makes it so attractive to your crowd?’
This time a shake.
‘This I truly cannot tell you. It is for a specialised market.’
Specialised. De Bruin had used the same word.
I questioned him for another ten minutes. Around in circles we went, always to arrive back at our original starting point. Every route led to a wall of ignorance that couldn’t be bulldozed down. I was tempted to make a demonstration – shoot off an ear lobe or the tip of a little finger. But it wouldn’t have advanced my cause. As things were, he was just the right amount of scared. Physical damage might even have encouraged him to invent something.
As the sun dipped towards the west and its fire dimmed, and Baker grew grey from loss of blood, I had to conclude that the well of Giorgy’s knowledge was dry. Such as it was, I had it all.
‘If you want to dress his wound,’ I said to Giorgy, ‘you’ll find a first aid kit in the saloon, above the seat.’
Playing Florence Nightingale wasn’t his style, but he could hardly sit by and let Baker bleed to death. He stumbled off down the companionway while I went forward, gun in belt, to haul in the anchor.
I made for Rochelongue, a tiny hamlet of rundown vacation homes along the coast, where a natural jetty was formed by a finger of black rocks.
‘André, mon ami,’ Giorgy said, clutching my arm, as we edged up the rocks. ‘I understand why you did what you did this afternoon. Because we are friends, I am willing to overlook it. But that is all I can do. I cannot protect you.’ He pressed the envelope, now crumpled and splotched with damp, on me. ‘Take this. Go to Brazil.’
‘Can’t be done, Giorgy. Thanks all the same.’
‘That makes twice you have said “no”, André.’ His face twisted with genuine regret. ‘You are gambling with loaded dice. Forget de Bruin. If you do not, you are finished.’
‘Thanks for the advice.’
I had to man the wheel and throttle so as to keep station with the rocks, leaving Giorgy to make the transfer from deck to dry land all on his own. He managed it without mishap and helped the crudely bandaged Baker, now somewhat revived, thanks to liberal applications of First Aid cognac
‘If you really want to make a contribution,’ I called to Giorgy, ‘keep de Bruin away from me. If I don’t see him, I can’t hurt him. Pass the word along, huh?’
‘Forget him!’ he shouted. ‘Go to Brazil.’
‘Stuff Brazil!’ I waved and opened the throttle. Seaspray went astern, slipping away from the rocks.
My only true friend, was how Giorgy had described himself when we met in Marseilles. If that were true, I was now friendless.
On 26 August we sailed for home. The weather had cooled over the last few days, and the blue was now often blotted with cumulus. The wind was from the north-east, light, steady, benign.
26 August was also my fortieth birthday. A party was improvised. Lizzy, working with the most basic of ingredients, baked a cake at sea. It was a sunken disaster, but the three of us scoffed it anyway. Forty years old. I supposed it would hit me sooner or later that I was now in the fast track to my fifth decade on earth. Maybe I ought to acquire some of the trappings, like slippers and a pipe. Lizzy thought the idea hilarious.
Alfredo asked to be put ashore at Barcelona on the second morning, to visit his daughter. Since weather conditions were set fair and Sitges less than three hours sailing from Barcelona, I agreed we could dispense with his services.
‘I’m glad he’s gone,’ Lizzy said as we chugged out of the Eastacion Maritima around mid-day, passing a towering container ship with more rust on her plates than paint.
‘Alfredo? Don’t you like him?’
‘No, it’s not that. He’s a sweetie.’ She was on her back on the cabin roof, adding another layer to her already magnificent tan. Wearing a striped bikini that was only just short of indecent. ‘It’s just that I prefer it when there’s just you and me.’
Oh-oh, here we went again.
Sitting up and crossing her legs, she went on, ‘I had a hateful dream last night: I dreamed Mummy was with us.’
‘On the boat?’
‘At the house.’
‘What was so hateful? The waking up?’
‘You mean like when you still think it’s real?’ She shook her head, making her pony tail wag.
‘I wish it was that simple.’ She rested her elbows on her knees and her chin in her hands. Her gaze was as direct as ever, probing my soul. I smiled back at her and the response was instant sunshine.
We were clear of the port and amongst a host of other small craft. I would wait until we had sea room before hoisting sail.
‘Going to tell me about it?’ I asked. She had fallen quiet and was prostrate again, face to the sun.
‘It was hateful.’ From where I sat the rise and fall of her breasts was discernible. ‘You see, Mummy was at the house and … and we were all together. It ought to have been marvellous … perfect. I ought to have been happy.’
‘But you weren’t, I take it.’
‘No.’ Pause. She brushed a hand across her eyes. ‘I didn’t really want her to be there. I kept wishing she would go away. I even wished she was … well, dead. How could I have wished a thing like that?’
‘As you say, it was only a dream. It meant nothing. Forget it.’
Most of the other boats had dropped behind. It was time for some real sailing.
‘Let’s hoist some canvas,’ I said briskly. ‘Come on down and drive, will you, honey?’
‘Okay.’ She jumped up, wriggled her feet into a pair of flip-flops, and scrambled sure-footedly down into the cockpit.
I rotated the wheel until we were heading due north to the wind’s nor’-east, and cut the throttle.
‘Just hold her on that.’
‘Aye-aye, skipper.’
