Last Resort Read online

  ‘In that case,’ Valencia said, ‘if Sureda is as smart as your friend Señor Aislado thinks he is, he should walk into a police station and give himself up. A police cell might be the safest place for him right now.’

  ‘Could be,’ I agreed.

  ‘I’ll suggest that in my next public statement,’ he continued, ‘but now I must call my opposite number in the Policia Nacional and pass on your message. I’ll keep your name out of it.’

  ‘No, don’t do that,’ I said. ‘You should be upfront with him. If you’re not, then very early in the investigation his officers will waste time trying to find two mystery men – one of them very large – who were asking questions last night in the restaurant below Ireland’s apartment.’

  ‘Were you given any answers?’

  ‘Yes. The two guys, Hector and Jacob, and a woman, ate there together, a couple of nights ago.’

  ‘I’ll pass that on. For sure, he’ll want formal statements from you both. Where are you staying in Madrid?’

  I told him. ‘We’re booked in for tonight also, but . . . if we get a lead to Hector, we’re liable to take off after him.’

  ‘No, Bob, we are at the stage where, if you have such information, you must pass it on to us.’

  ‘Okay,’ I conceded, grudgingly, ‘we’ll share what firm information we have, but we may also act upon it ourselves.’

  I heard a soft laugh in my ear. ‘In Scotland were you also as unruly?’

  ‘In Scotland, Julien, I made the rules, more often than not. You and your colleagues can contact us on this phone if we’re needed.’

  I ended the call and handed the mobile back to Xavi. He laid down the paper and took it from me.

  ‘I heard some of that,’ he said. ‘We don’t have anywhere else to go, do we? When we came here we were hoping that we’d find Hector with his pal, or at least get a steer to where he was. No chance of either of those now.’

  I couldn’t deny that. The man we were trying to find was out in the jungle with a hunter on his trail, someone who probably had a better idea of where to find him than we had, after his interrogation of Jacob Ireland.

  ‘We might as well talk to the police here,’ my friend sighed, ‘and then go home. Unless you’d like to spend a couple of hours here, like bloody tourists, then maybe visit the Real Madrid stadium.’

  ‘Only if there’s a game on,’ I retorted.

  I picked up my coffee; it was cold but I drank it regardless. I frowned. Xavi was right. We were stalled, helpless. There had to be a reason for Battaglia’s killer to leave Hector unscathed on the previous Friday, but I couldn’t see it. We knew all there was to know about the circumstances: the killing, Hector’s slow journey to Madrid, his sighting with the ill-fated Ireland, everything, except one thing.

  ‘Who was the woman?’ I whispered.

  I was still wondering when my eye fell on Xavi’s discarded El Pais. All I could see was a headline, ‘Barcelona Asesinato: Magnate de la Prensa Italiana’, but I didn’t need a translation to know that it was the Battaglia murder, writ large.

  I reached for it and unfolded it, so I could see the report. It covered half the front page. I scanned through it as best I could, focusing on the words whose translation was obvious, and on the quotes in the story. Some were attributed to Valencia, but most of the limelight seemed to have been grabbed by Miguel-Angel Gonzalez. There was a very small contribution at the end, by Intendant Reyes, in which he said that the forensic team had made important discoveries, but no detail was offered.

  There was nothing remarkable that I could see, until my attention shifted to the photo that accompanied the piece, fighting with it for domination of the page. It was a full-face portrait of a woman; she was more than attractive, she was beautiful, in her mid-thirties, with compelling brown eyes, full lips beneath a strong but not over-large nose, and dark hair shaped around an oval face.

  I stared at her as if I was hypnotised, my head spinning as I tried to grasp a significance that I knew was there, but couldn’t quite see . . . until it hit me, like a sledgehammer, and everything made sense.

  Xavi was staring too, at me and at my reaction. I turned the page towards him, showing him the image. ‘This is Battaglia?’ I murmured.

  ‘Of course,’ he replied. ‘Why the surprise? I told you she was a looker.’

  He’d met her before; clearly she’d made something of the same impression on him that she seemed to have on Hector. No wonder he’d bought her roses.

  ‘You’re right, beyond a doubt,’ I said. ‘There aren’t too many like her to the pound. And yet why am I thinking I’ve seen the woman before, when I know that I haven’t? Come on, Xavi, tell me.’

  He shook his great big head, looking like a bloodhound with a blocked-up nose. ‘Sorry. I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ Then he paused, to peer more closely at the page. ‘But then again . . .’ He kept looking at it, frowning, until his eyes switched back to me. ‘No,’ he sighed. ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Think back to Hector’s attic,’ I challenged, ‘in Begur. The photograph. His girlfriend, Valentina, the one he chucked. Maybe I’m kidding myself but I don’t think so. I’m not saying they’re twins, but is there not a significant resemblance between Battaglia and her?’

  He frowned as he considered my question. ‘I suppose . . . yes, now that you mention it and now that I consider it, I suppose there is. But so what, Bob, so what?’

  ‘So what?’ I laughed. ‘So what? You are definitely going back to being a journalist after this. Your brain’s fried if you can’t see it. Look at the sequence. Battaglia was shot, in Barcelona, last Friday; and she lay there for five days, and nothing else happened. Then she was found, and yesterday, her death was reported, in all the news media in Spain and, you can bet, all across Europe. That’s the sequence, agreed?’

  ‘Yes. So?’

  ‘So, following that, before yesterday was out, her killer shows up at Hector’s hidey-hole in Madrid, and shoots holes in his mate. It’s fucking obvious, man! Battaglia was never the target. It was her resemblance to Valentina that got her killed. Hector’s girlfriend, the one he’s supposed to have chucked, was the target all along . . . and she still is.’

  ‘Are you certain about this?’ he asked

  ‘As sure as I can be.’

  ‘Then you should tell Valencia.’

  ‘Maybe, but not yet. There’s something I want to do first. I’m sorry about the walk around this place, and the Real stadium tour, but we need to be somewhere else. Come on.’

  ‘Okay,’ he agreed, ‘after we’ve done one thing. Come with me.’

  He led the way out of the cafeteria, heading for a doorway. The Prado is quite a complex building with many galleries, but Xavi seemed to know exactly where he was headed. He made three or four turns, through a couple of galleries then into one that was busier than all the others. The reason was a large exhibit on an end wall; it was a triptych, a painting in three parts. A couple of dozen people stood staring at it; many of them had audio guides pressed to an ear, and a glance told me that they were listening to the commentary in Japanese.

  I was taller than any of them and Xavi towers over me, so we were able to stand behind them and have a clear view.

  ‘I never visit the Prado without coming here,’ my guide told me. ‘Every time I look at this thing, I see something new.’

  ‘What is it?’ I asked, although I felt that I should know.

  ‘The Garden of Earthly Delights, by Hieronymus Bosch; here they call him El Bosco, mainly because it’s a bloody sight easier to say.’

  It was a big piece, seven feet high, and around twelve feet wide in total. ‘The panel on the left is Eden,’ Xavi continued, ‘and it shows God introducing Eve to her date, Adam, who’s short of one rib by that time. The centre painting shows the same place, well after nature had taken its course.’

  Further explanation was unnecessary. Adam and Eve had gone forth and multiplied, and the nature of the delights in the garden was pret
ty clear. There was a whole lot of cavorting going on, and mankind seemed to have been too busy up to then to have got round to inventing clothes.

  The third panel, the one on the right, told a different story; it was El Bosco’s grim vision of Hell, presumably the final destination of all those revellers in God’s garden. He had spared his public some of the detail, but the message was clear enough.

  ‘What do you like about this?’ I asked my friend.

  ‘Like is the wrong word,’ he replied. ‘I’m fascinated by the power of its imagery, maybe most of all by its age. It’s over five hundred years old, in one of the greatest galleries in the world, and yet it’s still the most visited piece here. What do you see when you look at it?’ he threw back at me, abruptly.

  By that time, I had been seized by that dark panel on the right; I shuddered, involuntarily. ‘I see my fucking life, mate,’ I muttered. ‘Let’s go.’

  Outside, the rain had eased, the crowds had diminished and there were taxis waiting at the rank. We took the first; I told the driver Puerta de la Sol. I should have added ‘pronto’, because he took us for something of a scenic tour by comparison with our earlier trip.

  He dropped us in the middle of the semi-circular plaza, around a hundred metres from Calle de la Cruz. When we got there, and looked up the street, we saw two police cars parked at the top, and a third vehicle, a van, also with a blue light on top. The inevitable crime scene tape had been placed over the entrance to two hundred and forty-two, where a uniformed officer stood guard.

  ‘Valencia’s made his call,’ I said, ‘and the cavalry’s arrived.’

  ‘Shouldn’t we find the officer in charge,’ Xavi suggested ‘and volunteer our statements?’

  ‘Yes we should,’ I agreed, ‘but we’re not going to. I need to talk to our waiter pal before we decide our next move. I’d like to do that discreetly, which means, on my own. No offence, pal, but I’ve seen totem poles that are smaller than you.’

  ‘What do I do in the meantime? Just stand around like a spare?’

  ‘No, find another road that takes you up to Plaza Mayor, and I’ll meet you there.’

  Grudgingly, he agreed. As he walked back the way we had come, I headed uphill, towards the blue lights, and the knot of curious pedestrians who had stopped to watch the action.

  I hadn’t been certain that Fatigas del Querer was open, but I was in luck. I stepped inside, nodding, as I did, to the guardian cop in the adjacent doorway. He ignored me.

  My second stroke of luck was that the head waiter was on duty, morning and evening. He spotted me at once and came across. ‘Hola, señor. You see what happen above us?’ he asked, breathlessly. ‘The cops. You know what happen? The guy at the door, he no say.’

  ‘I think you’ll find you’ve lost a customer,’ I said. ‘Listen to me, I need to show you something, and ask you something.’

  He shrugged. ‘Si.’

  I showed him Battaglia on the front page of El Pais. ‘Think of the woman you spoke of last night, the woman who was here with Jacob and his friend. Forget her hair, and think of her only when she took off her gafas. Could that have been her?’

  He took it from me, and studied it, for a little while . . . then for a longer while. Finally he handed it back.

  ‘No,’ he declared, firmly.

  Bugger, I thought.

  ‘It could not have been her,’ he continued, ‘because here it says this woman was killed on Miercoles, la semana pasada.’ Then he looked at me, with a teasing grin. ‘But if there are such things as espectros, señor, this was definitely her.’

  Twenty-Three

  ‘It was Valentina. What Paco said makes me sure of it.’

  ‘Who the fuck’s Paco?’

  ‘The waiter from last night; that’s his name. When he looked at the paper he said that the woman he saw with Hector and Jacob could have been the ghost of Bernicia Battaglia.’

  I’d had no trouble catching up with Xavi. I’d spotted him, sitting at a table on a covered pavement, in a corner of Plaza Mayor, nursing a tall glass of orange juice and a half-litre bottle of carbonated water.

  ‘What’s her story, do you think?’

  ‘Dunno,’ I replied, ‘but she’s upset somebody, that’s for sure. Is your phone still charged?’ He nodded. ‘Then call Pilar for me, please. I’d like to speak to her.’

  He did as I asked. They spoke briefly, in Spanish, before he handed me the phone. ‘She’s at the hospital,’ he whispered. ‘Simon went into the operating theatre two hours ago. Be careful with her; she’s fragile.’

  I nodded. ‘Good morning, señora,’ I said, as I took it from him. ‘This is a nervous time for you, I know, but I’m sure that Simon will come through this strong and fit. In the talk I had with him I realised that he’s a very determined man, with a lot more to do in life.’

  ‘What he wants most of all is to see his son.’ She sounded very different from the woman I’d met in Begur. ‘Will he? That judge yesterday, he frightened me.’

  ‘From what Xavi tells me,’ I said, ‘that judge is an idiot. Don’t worry about anything he says. There have been developments in Madrid. We believe that Hector may be with his old girlfriend, Valentina, so we need to trace her. For that we have to know her family name; it’s essential. Can you recall it?’

  ‘No, I cannot, I am sorry. I only ever called her by her first name; I was never told the other. That may sound funny to you, being British, but it’s the way we are.’

  ‘How did you correspond, the two of you?’

  ‘We didn’t much. When we did it was by email.’

  ‘Do you have that address on your phone?’

  ‘Yes!’ She brightened up, instantly. ‘I can text it to you. I will do that as soon as we finish.’

  ‘In that case, do it now. Thank you, señora, we’ll be thinking of you and Simon, all day. Please call Xavi when he comes out of the operating theatre.’

  ‘I will, thank you.’

  The call ended; I held on to the phone and I waited, for less than a minute. Then it buzzed and a text appeared in the window: ‘Valbar913@ Hotmail.com’.

  I handed it to Xavi. ‘There. Send her a message; say that you’re Hector’s boss and you need to contact him urgently.’

  ‘In what language? She’s Russian, remember.’

  ‘Does Hector speak Russian?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘So, unless their relationship was conducted by sign language . . .’

  ‘My brain’s still mush from last night,’ he muttered, and began to key in a message.

  The reply came instantly. Xavi held the mobile up so I could see the screen. ‘Delivery failure.’

  ‘Doesn’t surprise me. Somebody wants to kill the woman; she’s a fugitive. She’ll have changed more than her hairstyle. Everything will have gone, name, home, phone, email; we’re not looking for Valentina, but for somebody else.’

  ‘In that case, why is it so important to know her surname?’

  I frowned at him. ‘Keep up, Xavi. Her danger doesn’t come from who she is now. We need to know who she was.’

  ‘Could her given name be Thais?’ he asked.

  ‘It’s possible,’ I conceded. ‘But if she’s still around, and Jacob left that note for her on his door last night, then where the hell is Hector? She did know both men, though, and Hector was always in contact with her. He headed here after Battaglia was killed, and they met up.’

  ‘Did Hector know why she was shot?’

  ‘He must have. If I worked it out, so did he.’ I tried to form pictures in my mind, to make a pattern of the things I knew. ‘He came to Jacob, his best friend,’ I said aloud, voicing my thoughts. ‘Did he have a relationship with the woman also?’

  ‘Or was he just a conduit, a go-between?’ Xavi suggested.

  ‘Hopefully time will tell. What we know for sure is that someone is after Valentina; there’s a kill contract out on her, and the person who placed it is patient.’

  I had a clear picture.

/>   ‘They’d lost her, so they watched Hector. And she must have been friendly with both of them, for they watched Jacob too. One killer . . . if ballistics confirm it . . . but more than one watcher, in Girona and in Madrid.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘It’s simple, Xavi. Until yesterday they thought she was killed last Friday. When they realised they’d shot the wrong woman, the killer came straight here, straight to Jacob’s place, and went to work on him. They must have been watching both men. You with me?’

  ‘Up to a point,’ Xavi replied. ‘They couldn’t have followed Hector round the clock.’

  ‘They wouldn’t have to,’ I retorted. ‘You know, as soon as I get home from here, I’m going to dig out my old Filofax and put it back into service. From what I’ve been told, Hector’s whole life is in his laptop and his iPad. My bet is they’ve hacked into his diary, probably into his voicemail and his email too; he’s been under electronic surveillance. Ring Pilar again,’ I instructed. ‘Ask her when Hector and Valentina broke up, as exactly as she can recall.’

  I finished off his fizzy water, straight from the bottle, as he made the call. I was feeling hungry again . . . the buzz of a hunt always does that to me . . . but there was no time to do anything about it.

  ‘February the twelfth,’ Xavi announced, once he was done. ‘Hector told his parents two days before Valentine’s Day that he had finished with her. He said that he’d be obliged if they never mentioned her name again. Pilar was struck by the timing . . . Valentine, Valentina, get it? . . . so the date stuck in her head. By the way,’ he added, ‘she’s just had word from the theatre that the surgery’s going fine.’

  ‘That’s good,’ I said, distracted momentarily from the main business at hand. ‘Fingers crossed for him. I liked Simon a lot, when I finally got to meet him.’

  Then I got back to business. ‘So we have a period of less than a year,’ I said. ‘In February, he said he never wanted to hear Valentina’s name again; now, less than ten months later, a lookalike woman is killed, and he goes running off to find her. Who is she, Xavi, and why does someone want her dead? Let’s say you really are a reporter again. Who are you going to ask?’