Last Resort Read online

  ‘Glasgow. We’re having lunch.’

  ‘You sound as if you’re enjoying it. You watch yourself, girl.’

  ‘Pot. Kettle. Black.’

  ‘Stop winding me up. That’s all good news, though. It could be that Mr Baillie is on some kind of fishing trip. Maybe he’s put some random numbers together and come up with the right total, only he isn’t sure, so he’s dropping hints to see how we react. Even so, I don’t like him phoning Mia, and on an ex-directory number at that.’

  ‘Yes,’ I agreed, ‘she was pretty angry about it when we spoke.’

  ‘She’s not the only one. But don’t worry. Once I’ve sorted out some other business here in Spain, I’ll take care of the fucker myself.’

  ‘That’s what worries me more than anything else. What other business, by the way?’

  ‘Nothing you need bother about. A favour for a friend, that’s all. Thanks, love. Keep Mia calm, if you can.’

  ‘Your father?’ Roger asked, as I pocketed the mobile.

  ‘Yes. He’s supposed to be on a mind-sorting mission in Spain, but he’s a magnet for crisis, wherever he goes.’

  ‘While you were speaking,’ he said, ‘I remembered something, about the second time he visited me. When we’d done our business I showed him out. I expected to see a police car at the door, but there wasn’t, he’d come on foot. That’s understandable if he wanted the exercise. The headquarters building in Pitt Street isn’t very far from here.

  ‘I watched him from the window as he walked down the steps, and then I saw the strangest thing. A little way along the road there were two people in a car, a man and a woman. I took them for police, for she had a camera and I’ll swear she was photographing your father.

  ‘I couldn’t work it out and I still can’t. If I was right in my assumption about them, why would two cops be photographing their own chief constable?’

  Ten

  Xavi’s place isn’t very far inland from L’Escala, or more than a few hundred feet above sea level, but when I opened the window to clear the stuffiness in the well-heated bedroom they’d given me, I felt a crispness in the air that was instantly refreshing.

  It was welcome, for I was a shade beyond grumpy at the time. I’d been woken from the best sleep I’d had in a week by Mia, on my mobile, which I’d left charging by my bedside. She was raging because she’d had a call from the man Linton Baillie, on her ex-directory landline.

  I was pretty angry myself after Mia had given me a word-for-word account of the guy’s message, and frustrated because there was nothing I could do myself, other than tell her to call Alex and let her know.

  I put the annoyance out of my mind, as best I could, and got ready to face a day that I had not expected at all less than twenty-four hours before. The weather helped improve my mood. The sun was only just over the horizon, but the sky was a clear blue and the few clouds were wispy. My room was at the back of the house, giving me my first daytime view of the bulk of the Aislado estate. I could see the place properly for the first time, and was impressed.

  It was set on what might have been a volcanic plain, below a huge, layered escarpment that made me think of the Grand Canyon. Xavi had told me that it covered just over eighty hectares; that’s big enough for a golf course. More than half of it was woodland, not a wild forest but tall trees that had been planted in straight lines by the previous owner, half a century before, as an investment.

  Closer to the big house I saw an olive grove, and to its right a citrus orchard. Even from that distance I could tell that it was heavy with oranges, reminding me of a February break that Sarah and I had enjoyed in Seville, with our then infant son. James Andrew was unimpressed, but we loved the place.

  The rest of it was devoted to vegetables: potatoes, carrots and calçots, a type of winter onion that’s a Catalan delicacy, and, by the way, one of the messiest dishes I have ever encountered.

  Three buildings stood beyond by the stone wall that enclosed the masia gardens; one was either a barn, or it was a garage for the vehicles needed to manage and cultivate the place. The second was a white-painted cottage, where Carmen lived, I’d been told, and just beyond, there stood an older building that I guessed was the studio she had mentioned when we’d spoken at the dinner table.

  She and Xavi were the only people in the kitchen when I got there. I’d found them by following their voices. ‘Ben’s in deep shit,’ the big man said, as I joined them. ‘Sheila was expecting him to do the school run with Paloma this morning, but he didn’t come home. She’s taken her instead. Normally I’d do it, but with our business . . .’

  ‘What would you like for breakfast?’ Carmen asked, in Spanish. She started to repeat in English, but I headed her off by replying, ‘Scrambled eggs and orange juice would do it for me; but let me make them, please, for all of us. More often than not I fix my own in Scotland.’

  She protested, but I insisted. The eggs were fresh from the chicken run behind the studio. Way back, even before Joe’s time, Carmen’s parents had been the masia’s caretaker and gardener. The old studio had been their home until Joe had built the cottage, and she had looked after the hens even then.

  I scrambled nine of them, and fried a few mushrooms, with some sliced potatoes left over from the night before. I’d assumed that Joe would be joining us, but Carmen explained that these days he goes to bed late and rises late, and that his daily breakfast is bread, olive oil, and coffee.

  ‘The same as Grandma Paloma,’ Xavi said. ‘She baked the bread herself even when we lived in Scotland, as I do here. She taught me.’

  She taught him bloody well, because the bread was excellent.

  Our breakfast conversation was mostly about Joe, and the influence he’d exercised over everyone’s life, Xavi included. ‘He made me a businessman,’ he said. ‘Without him, the Saltire would have gone down the pan years ago, and I’d still be a journalist in Edinburgh, squeezing out a living in a declining market.’

  He was being hard on himself. If Joe hadn’t been around to save his paper, Xavi would have taken one of the many offers that came his way from rival titles, and would have been a major player wherever he’d gone.

  ‘He made my career too,’ Carmen added. ‘There are many, many very good artists in Catalunya. It is very difficult to be successful nationally. Joe helped me to break through by paying for exhibition space, first in Barcelona, then in major cities around Spain . . . Valencia, Bilbao, Cordoba . . . and finally in Madrid. Everything was planned by him, I had a new collection everywhere I showed and of course his newspapers and radio stations gave me lots of publicity.’

  She smiled. ‘At every exhibition, Joe ensured that the local mayor did the opening ceremony; and of course, having done that, they all had to be seen to buy a picture, and after them, all their friends and hangers-on.

  ‘I did mostly still life in those days, but with one or two portraits included. These alcaldes and businessmen, they are vain people; several of them commissioned portraits.

  ‘When the president of the government, what you would call the prime minister, Bob, commissioned one of his wife, that was it: everyone had to have a Carmen Mali portrait over their fireplace.’

  She rose from the table. ‘And now I must take breakfast to the man who made it all happen.’

  She looked down at me. ‘He told me to go away, you know. Fifteen years ago he said to me, “Carmen, it’s time for you to leave me. Find a young guy, make yourself happy, get a life.” I told him, “Joe, I have the life I want.” And I have.’

  As she left the kitchen carrying a tray laden with a cut loaf, a bowl of olive oil and a cafetière, Xavi gazed at her back. ‘That’s him,’ he murmured. ‘And to think, Bob, for the first twenty years of my life I thought he was an arsehole.’

  How many people in the world feel about me the way Carmen does about Joe? I wondered. Their numbers must be in single figures, and for sure, far more think that I’m an arsehole . . . the good news being that many of those are in jail or even l
ower down the scale of social acceptability, in politics.

  ‘So,’ the big fellow continued, ‘what’s the plan for today?’

  ‘Pilar Roca,’ I replied, ‘Hector’s mother. I want to go to Begur, see her and see where he lived.’

  ‘What about Battaglia?’ he asked.

  ‘What about her?’ I replied. ‘I know what you think, that she’s behind Hector’s disappearance, but we can only do one thing at a time. Let’s find the man himself first, alive or dead; after that, if we have to, we’ll look at her.

  ‘Go on, phone Pilar, tell her we’re on our way. Christ, man, you never know, Hector may have phoned her by now to tell her he’s holed up with a chick in the Caribbean.’

  Xavi laughed softly. ‘You don’t know Hector. His relationships all collapse because he won’t take his chicks any further than the Palau de Musica.’

  ‘Where’s that?’

  ‘Two streets away from his apartment in Barcelona.’

  Eleven

  While I cleared away the breakfast dishes, Xavi made the call to Señora Roca.

  ‘We’re on,’ he announced as he came back into the kitchen.

  He said that he would drive to Begur. That was sensible on two grounds: he knew where we were going and he’s so damn tall he wouldn’t have been comfortable in my car.

  I insisted on packing my overnight bag before we left, as I had to go home that evening, whatever happened during the day, but I had another reason for wanting a little privacy.

  Back in my room, I took out my phone and called a number that was listed simply as ‘Amanda’. Mrs Dennis is an old friend of mine; she’s a middle-aged divorcee who is listed in public files as a Grade Two civil servant. In fact, she’s the head of the security service, and I’m one of the very few people outside her circle in Whitehall to have her mobile number.

  It was ten minutes to nine in London when I called her, but I knew she’d be at work.

  ‘Bob,’ she greeted me brightly. ‘This is a surprise; I didn’t expect you to call me back so soon. You said you wanted some time to think about my offer . . . or have you decided to say “no” already?’

  As I’ve said, I had a few career options to consider, and one of them was a role that she had offered me, with her beloved service. ‘Think about the principle,’ Amanda had said when we had lunch during what was ostensibly a routine visit to the Glasgow out-station. ‘If the idea of working in Five is attractive to you, we can work out a precise role later . . . or possibly an imprecise role.’

  ‘I haven’t decided anything yet, Amanda,’ I told her. ‘I’m calling because I’m helping a pal in Spain with a situation that he has in his business, and a name’s come up.’

  ‘British?’

  ‘No, but I know that you talk to your counterparts in other countries so I thought I’d try it on you. Ever heard of Bernicia Battaglia?’

  ‘The Italian media person, the one they call the “Warrior”? Not quite in the Berlusconi class yet, but with ambitions of getting there?’

  ‘That’s the lady. She has her sights on my friend’s business; he doesn’t want to sell, but “No, thank you” isn’t a phrase she’s used to hearing, or understands when she does. There have been rumours about her ruthless way of dealing with people who oppose her. I’d like to test the strength of them, if possible.’

  ‘I’ll see what I can discover. Mind, if I do come up with something useful, I’ll be looking for something in return.’

  I laughed. ‘I thought I had a credit balance in favours between the two of us.’

  ‘This one might wipe it out; my opposite number in Rome doesn’t give things away either. Somewhere along the line there’s always a trade involved. We’ll speak again, when I have something for you . . . or when you have some good news for me.’

  I went downstairs and slung my bag into the boot of the Suzuki, just as Sheila arrived back from her school run. Xavi was waiting as she parked beside his car. She looked around as she stepped out of her Evoque.

  ‘Is that son of mine not home yet?’ I heard her say as she reached up to kiss him. ‘Dirty little stop-out; wait till I see him.’

  ‘Come on,’ her husband laughed. ‘He’s a grown man.’

  ‘So what? Wait till your daughter’s grown up, and see how you feel about her.’

  ‘D’you hear that, Bob?’ he called to me. ‘You’ve got a daughter Ben’s age. How am I gonna feel?’

  ‘Do you want the flip answer or the honest answer?’ I asked.

  ‘Let’s try honest.’

  ‘You’re going to feel the same way you feel now, but you’ll realise she’s what you made her, so you’ll stand back and let her get on with her life, however she wants to live it . . . up to a point, that point being, if you know that she’s making a huge mistake or worse, being abused or exploited, you will do something about it.’

  ‘And that something being?’

  I thought back to a very dangerous time in Alex’s young life and how I’d handled that. ‘Whatever’s necessary.’

  ‘Hey,’ Sheila exclaimed, gazing at me, ‘you look as though someone’s walked over your grave.’

  Actually it was the other way around, but I didn’t tell her that. Instead I told her, ‘Nobody’s exploiting or abusing your Ben, and he’s not doing anything unseemly under your roof. In fact, he sounds a lot like me when I was his age.

  ‘The best thing you can do for him is dig out a couple of cans of Red Bull. He’ll probably need them when he gets home.’

  I climbed into Xavi’s Range Rover and we set off for Begur. His chosen route wasn’t the one I’d have taken, south towards the port of Palamos, then veering north past Palafrugell, but the highway was good and it was quick.

  Like many old Catalan towns, Begur is built on a hill. Normally the church will be the highest point, but Begur is dominated by the ruins of a castle. I’d been there before with Alex, in her childhood, and been impressed by the views from the old battlements. No enemy was ever going to take its occupants by surprise, unless they were brave enough to climb steep and stony slopes on a very dark night.

  ‘We’ll leave the car here,’ Xavi announced, pulling into a parking area beside a road junction. ‘The village roads are too narrow for this thing.’

  He wasn’t kidding, I realised, as we left the main drag and turned into a street called Carrer de Santa Reparada. (I’ve researched the saint’s story since then: I don’t believe a word of it.) Not very far up, Xavi stopped at what looked at first like no more than a big yellow stone wall with a few slit windows and a double garage entrance, until I saw, slightly inset, a polished oak door, with a buzzer beside it and a name tag, ‘Sureda/Roca’.

  We had to wait for a full minute before the call was answered. No one asked who we were but that’s what video cameras are for. ‘Xavi, cariño,’ a woman said, as the door swung open, squeaking slightly as it caught on a raised tile beneath.

  I knew that Pilar Roca was pushing seventy, but no way did she look it. She’s a tall, grand lady who managed that morning to maintain her elegance in a housecoat that might have been bought in the Palafrugfell market . . . and probably was, given the famous thriftiness of the Catalan people.

  She greeted me with a polite smile and an appraising look. If I’d been sold as the man who’d find her son, as I was sure I had been, that was something she wanted to decide for herself.

  ‘Bienvenido, señor,’ she said, and I thought, Oh shit, a translation job, but mercifully she switched to English. ‘Welcome. It’s fitting that the two words mean exactly the same in each language, Castellano and English. You will be even more welcome if you can help find our son.’

  Her anxiety was written all over her face, in lines and in the dark bags under her eyes.

  ‘If I can, I will,’ I replied. ‘That’s all I can offer, or say.’

  ‘How is Simon?’ Xavi asked.

  ‘He’s asleep. He’s turning night into day; even with his sedatives, he is always awake in the madrugada hours
, even though he hates the darkness. It has got to the stage when he does not try to go back to sleep any more. Instead he gets up and he watches television; anything, movies or yesterday’s sport on Canal Plus, even the rolling bulletins on the twenty-four-hour news channel, the same stories over and over again. As soon as the sun rises he goes back to bed and sleeps until midday at least. I tell you, his operation cannot be soon enough, for either of us.’

  ‘Is it possible, señora,’ I asked, ‘that Hector’s having difficulty dealing with his father’s condition?’

  I knew that I was taking a chance with the question, so I wasn’t surprised when she flared up.

  ‘Are you suggesting that my son is a pollo?’ she snapped. ‘That’s he’s too chicken to support his father. It’s the opposite that is the truth. When Simon began to be ill we were both ignoring it, he and I. It was Hector who said, “Papa, something is wrong here and you must deal with it.” He made all the appointments with the doctors and he went with Simon to every one. I didn’t have the cojones to do that; he did.’

  I smiled. ‘I’ll take that as a “no”, then,’ I said. ‘I apologise for upsetting you. I wasn’t implying anything, only asking what any investigator would.’

  She softened immediately. ‘No, I say sorry to you. A good journalist would ask the same question also.’

  ‘Xavi says that Hector has his own rooms in this house. Can I see them?’

  ‘Of course.’

  She led the way up a flight of stairs that opened into a hallway, on what seemed to be the ground floor of the house, and then another. On that level, there was a door with a barrel lock which she opened.

  ‘More steps,’ she said. ‘They are bad for Simon; he can’t take them any more. He sleeps on the garden level, the first one that we came to. Hector’s place is in the atico.’

  When finally we reached it, Hector’s place was pretty damn impressive. It had only one bedroom, with an en suite bathroom, but the rest of the living area covered the whole width of the house below. It was open-plan, with a terrace that had a view across the neighbouring beachfront town of Sa Riera, and all the way up to the Islas Medas.