Medusa

‘No.’ And I explained about the deal Evans and I had agreed on, all the time conscious of the engineer working his way into the afterpart of the engine compartment. Like so many engineers he was not a small man and I could hear him grunting with the effort of squeezing his way to a point where he could check the whole length of the prop shaft and the bilge cavity below it. There was no doubt about it — they had been told exactly where to look. If I hadn’t got there before them … i would like to see the documents please.’ Menendez’s words, sharp and official, cut across my thoughts. ‘The documents of exchange,’ he added. ‘You have exchanged a fishing boat and an uncompleted villa on Punta Codolar, you say, for this big catamaran yacht. Who is your lawyer?’

‘Martin Lopez.’

‘Ah si. And he has the documents I suppose?’

‘He is drawing them up,’ I told him. ‘It was all done in rather a hurry.’

‘The ship’s papers then. I would like to see the Certificate of Registry. Or are they also being prepared by your lawyer?’

That was when I realised how complete the trap had been, how cleverly prepared, for I couldn’t produce the ship’s papers, and all I could tell him was that I had seen them, but Evans had told me he had had to lodge them with the Banca Espagñol as security for a small overdraft he had requested after opening an account with them. ‘He is arranging for a copy to be sent to my lawyer.’

‘I have already spoken to Señor Lopez and he does not have it. He has sent it to England for the boat to be registered in your name.’

The engineer had emerged from the engine compartment, his overalls no longer white. He was breathing heavily and reported he had found nothing. ‘Then it is in the other engine,’ Menendez said. The engineer nodded and crossed to the port side of the saloon beyond the chart table and lifted the steps that covered that engine. Menendez watched me, waiting for some sign of panic. ‘Also,’ he said, speaking slowly, ‘there is some problem about the exchange document.’

‘What problem?’ I asked him. It was the first I’d heard that there was any difficulty over the paperwork and from what he was saying it was obvious he had known every detail of the arrangement between Evans and myself before coming on board and asking me questions. But then in a place like Mahon, where everyone of importance knew everyone else, I suppose it is inevitable, particularly as I was an extranjero. ‘That’s the first I’ve heard that there’s any difficulty over the papers,’ I told him. ‘Did you gather what the trouble was?’

‘Only that Señor Lopez was unable to contact this man Evans.’

‘He is away fishing. That’s why he wanted the Santa Maria in a hurry, so that he could earn some money fishing.’

The Jefe nodded. ‘Of course. He is a pescador.’ And then looking straight at me — ‘Do you think he is a good one?’ The thick lips under the hooked nose gave me a little crooked smile.

‘I’ve no idea.’

‘But you let him go off with your boat, the Santa Maria, and with no proper security. You are a businessman, Seóor Steele. Does it surprise you that I find that a little strange?’ He stared at me a moment, then switched his gaze to the torch-lit cavity of the open engine compartment, waiting for his engineer to report that he had found what they were looking for. ‘It is a question of dates,’ he added, his eyes still fixed on the starb’d side, the fingers of his right hand tapping impatiently at the table top. ‘The precise date when you take over this boat.’

I sat there, feeling numb, the trap springing shut, and seeing the way they had planned it, the devilish simplicity of it. He was watching me again now, pulling out a packet of cigarettes. He offered me one, and when I said I only smoked a pipe, he laughed, and then in the act of lighting his own, quite casually, he said, ‘The Cruz Rojo. You remember? And after, when the fireworks are over, where do you go then?’ And when I didn’t say anything, wondering what his question was leading up to, he went on, ‘It was the night of the gala Manuela Renato arrange in the Quarries above Figuera. We were both there. Remember?’

I nodded, wondering what Petra had said, or Soo, talking to the sisters, babbling under anaesthetic? Had they dreamed up a scenario in which I was involved in running contraband into the island?

‘No,’ he said. ‘You don’t forget because in the early hours of the morning your wife gives birth prematurely and your baby is dead.’

‘Have you found the men?’ I asked him. ‘The two men who pushed her down the slope in their haste to get out of that cave?’