Medusa

We went below and I offered him a drink. He shook his head, taking the inspector's place on the banquette and waving me to a position opposite him. The engineer was already slipping into a pair of white overalls. I watched him as he folded back the steps to the starb'd hull accommodation and probed the interior of the engine compartment with his torch. I felt slightly sick, knowing that somebody must have told them where to look. 'Some questions please,' the Jefesaid. 'Matters that have arisen in the course of our investigation. First, the ownership of this yacht which arrive here from Marseilles. There is a passenger on board. You know him?'

'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 I

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 Espagnol 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 Senor 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 otherengine,' 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 Senor Lopez was unable to contact this man Evans.'

'He is away fishing. That's why he wanted the Santa Mariain a hurry, so that he could earn some money fishing.'

The Jefenodded. 'Of course. He is apescador.'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, Senor 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?'

He shook his head. 'No. I don't think we ever will. They are not Menorquin and we think they almost certainly leave the island very soon after.' And he added, 'Unless they go to the mainland of Spain, it is very difficult for us to trace their movements. Even in Barcelona, if they take the ferry, it is simple for them to disappear across the French border. No,' he said again, 'we do not know anything about them. What we do know, however, is that the night before there is a boat in Cales Coves and it is tied up against the rocks below the cave you were in that night. We have a description of that boat, a description that is indicative of a single mast and two hulls. We have checked with the harbour authorities and there is no boat of such description in either Mahon or Ciudadela, not in Fornells either — only this one.'

'So,' I said. 'What is the significance of that?' But I knew bloody well what was in his mind.

He was smiling now. 'Did you know there is a landward exit from that cave?' And when I explained we had been solely concerned with the two men who had rushed out from that passage, he nodded. 'Of course. And it is unfortunate about the father of Senorita Callis, that she is not here to answer some questions.'

'You're checking, I suppose, that her father really does exist, that his car accident did happen?'

'Of course. It takes time, and meanwhile you are here to answer all our questions. Let us suppose,' he said, his eyes almost closed. 'It is just a thought, eh? Suppose it is this yacht that is in Gales Coves the night before she take you to that cave. What do you think it might be doing there?'

'Sheltering, I suppose.'

'Why? Why Cales Coves and not Mahon or Ciudadela?'

'If they'd had a longish passage, from Mallorca or Corsica '

'Or Tunis,' he said softly. 'Somewhere along the shores of North Africa.'

'If there'd been a passage like that,' I told him, 'with poor weather conditions you can get awfully tired, even in a stable boat like this. Then you just put in to the first shelter you find, head down and lights out.'

He nodded, still with that little smile. 'Of course. I understand. But no navigation lights when coming in. Also there is a light in that cave mouth for a full hour before the boat appear. That is what attracted the attention of this witness we interview.' He paused, watching me. 'The boat has no lights all the time it was tied up under the cliffs, and there is no light any longer in the cave mouth. But there is the occasional flash of torches. There was a moon, you see, and some cloud in the sky.' He sat back, suddenly relaxed. 'Well now, you are a businessman, Senor Steele, you have a position in Menorca, Spanish friends. But it was not always like that, eh? Before you come to Menorca, before your marriage. So, what does the description I have given you of what our witness saw suggest to you?'