Café Maritimo is a bright, vibrant, espresso temple. Cups clatter, machines hiss and the young waiters move with ease across the white marble floor. A young English couple with a baby, argue about why he stayed out all night partying. The large television screen inside is showing a football match, young men and women stand around drinking, suddenly jumping up excitedly and cheering when a goal is scored. From the supermercado along the street there is a continual flash of red neon and an advertisement for San Miguel beer floats in mid air above the door.
I sat near the front of the café, outside, where I could see the street and the harbour. I ordered some hot chocolate, and watched a tall African man in his late twenties, dressed in a shabby dinner suit, perform magic tricks for the passers-by. I sipped the sweet cinnamon chocolate for which the café is famous. The magician man’s box of props had stickers all over it from many different countries; presumably places he had performed in.
He delved amongst the silk scarves and playing cards and offered the crowd that had gathered one last trick, which was to conjure up half a dozen white doves from apparently nowhere. The children who were sat in a small half circle at the front of the crowd clapped with zealous amazement, and sheer joy as the birds appeared and fluttered above their heads. At the end of the show, their parents were press-ganged into digging deep into their pockets for some coins to throw into the magician’s top hat.
A young officer of the Spanish Navy wearing an immaculate white uniform, got up from his table to the side of me, and went over to the magician. After some haggling, payment was given in advance and then the tall slim African sauntered over to where the officer and his girlfriend were sitting. He started to perform card tricks, much to the amusement of the officer, and somewhat to the embarrassment of the young raven-haired woman. It was 7.30pm. I looked at the menu. I was worried in case something might have gone wrong. With the stakes this high, it would be a disaster if anything went astray.
After their private show, the magician bowed to the young couple and left them and moved amongst the other people in the Café, showing off his talent.
And then came to sit opposite me at my table. Smiling, he politely asked, in perfect English, if I’d like to see a trick or two. “Why not?” I said.
He sifted through his box again, pulling out three plain brown envelopes.
He placed them on the shiny metallic surface in front of me. “What you’ve got to do is simply pick the correct envelope. Inside one of them is a ten Euro note,” he said in a deep, cultured voice, gesturing with a sweep of his up turned palm over the envelopes.
“How do I know which is the correct one?” I asked.
“You don’t,” he replied. “But if you choose wisely you will be a richer man,” he added.
I could easily have said no to this childish challenge, but instead I said, “OK,” and after a moment tapped the middle envelope with my forefinger.
The magician put the other two envelopes back into his box.
I picked up the envelope and tore it open. Inside was a ten Euro note and with it a small piece of paper folded in two. I left the paper inside and pulled out the money.
“You have chosen wisely, my friend, use your new found wealth carefully,” he said, beaming a dazzling white smile at me. He closed his box of tricks, and was gone, as quickly as he had arrived. I went to the toilet and read the note. On the small folded piece of paper it simply read, “Calle de Jaime and Avenida del Pinar. Corner 8.20pm.” Both the arguing couple and the navy officer and his girlfriend were gone by the time I returned to my table.
The on shore wind coming off the bay whistled down the Avenida del Pinar and the night was suddenly cold, the way it sometimes goes in the Balearics.
A new Toyota land cruiser 4x4 rolled down on me like the day of judgement, all headlights and chrome bull bars. I got in and sank into the black leather upholstery; the seat wrapped around me as the large vehicle wound its way south through small streets towards the residential area overlooking the harbour and the Bay of Pollensa.
Cats sat around with nothing to do and stared insolently back into the headlight beams. The driver parked the 4x4 with meticulous care and killed the lights. He opened a wrought iron gate for me and took me up to a first floor room overlooking the front of the villa. Someone was already in the room, silhouetted in the narrow rectangle of window studying the harbour berths opposite with an enormous pair of binoculars fixed onto a tripod. The black clothed-figure moved to one side.
On the far side of the marina a party was in full flow on board a large yacht.
Men in swim shorts and girls in bikini bottoms were lounging around on the top and rear decks drinking and laughing, while others were diving and jumping into the water. A small group of men were singing lewd rugby songs, smoking, drinking and then singing loudly again. I applied my eyes to the soft rubber eyepieces of the binoculars. They were trained on the main cabin windows of a seventy five-foot luxury cruiser berthed next to the party boat.
The small Armourlite logo in the bottom left hand corner of each window, denoting that one-inch thick blast proof glass surrounded the main cabin area, was just discernible with the powerful lenses. The scene beyond was bright and clear. The 4x4 had been parked carefully with good reason. The Toyota had more spotlights, fog lights and lens work than a fly’s eye.
Now I realised that the three large spotlights on the chrome bull bar at the front were still switched on. Through the night sight infrared binoculars I saw three men opening a number of wooden crates and taking out what looked like aluminium boxes about the size of a suitcase. Polyfoam packing littered the floor. Into my ear a feminine and familiar voice said, “They must be nearly finished. They’ve been at it for nearly an hour.” It was Fiona Price. Working with the crime squad on the island.
“They’re not going to leave those in there,” I said. It wasn’t feasible on board the cruiser, or was it? I moved aside for Fiona to resume her observation.
“What brings you to Mallorca, stud, I thought you had been warned off big time?”
“I have, and between you and me, I’ll probably get the sack when the Partners find out. But what the hell, this son of a bitch Flackyard has got to be stopped. Otherwise he’s going to walk away, and start up all over again somewhere else,” I replied. “So tell me, who does this villa belong to?” I asked.
“A friend of my father owns it; he’s in Australia for six months.”
“When did you get here,” I asked her casually.
“About ten hours ago I was sent out here after Interpol emailed my boss with a positive identity match for Robert Flackyard. Would you believe it, he was caught on a CCTV when he arrogantly went into a bank to change some traveller’s cheques? We liased with the local police department in Palma who sent out an internal bulletin to local officers all over the Island with Flackyard and Caplin’s photographs on the front page. The next thing we get is another email, this time from the police here in Pollensa, giving us the address of Flackyard’s private villa. Like your Vince Sharp, we’ve been tracking Flackyard’s yacht all the way from England until it docked in the early hours of yesterday morning right over there.”
“Who are the hired help?” I asked.
“Two along for the ride, Jason Stewart, he’s a DC with the Met and an absolute genius with the surveillance stuff. As well as Antonio Carreras he’s with the local plain clothes squad here on the island…” She nodded her head towards the boat, which held Flackyard and his aluminium suitcases.