JACK HIGGINS

The Khufra Run

In memory of George Robert Limón

Contents

The Khufra Run

Chapter 1 - Night Flight

Chapter 2 - The Love Goddess

Chapter 3 - The Jesus Reredos

Chapter 4 - The Gate of Fear

Chapter 5 - Action by Night

Chapter 6 - The Children of Light

Chapter 7 - Dark Passage

Chapter 8 - Coast of Danger

Chapter 9 - The Pot of Gold

Chapter 10 - The Wild Horsemen

Chapter 11 - Zarza

Chapter 12 - A Sound of Thunder

Chapter 13 - Rough Weather

Chapter 14 - A Dying Fall

About the Author

Also by Jack Higgins

Copyright

About the Publisher

THE KHUFRA RUN

Jack Higgins lived in Belfast till the age of twelve. Leaving school at fifteen, he spent three years with the Royal Horse Guards, serving on the East German border during the Cold War. His subsequent employment included occupations as diverse as circus roustabout, truck driver, clerk and, after taking an honours degree in sociology and social psychology, teacher and university lecturer.

The Eagle Has Landed turned him into an international bestselling author, and his novels have since sold over 250 million copies and have been translated into fifty-five languages. Many of them have also been made into successful films. His recent bestselling novels include, Bad Company, A Fine Night for Dying, Dark Justice, Toll for the Brave, Without Mercy and The Valhalla Exchange.

In 1995 Jack Higgins was awarded an honorary doctorate by Leeds Metropolitan University. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and an expert scuba diver and marksman. He lives on Jersey.

1 Night Flight

It was late evening when they brought the coffin down to the lower quay in Cartagena’s outer harbour. There were no family mourners as far as I could see, just four men from the undertakers in the hearse, a customs officer in a Land-Rover bringing up the rear.

One useful extra that comes with an Otter Amphibian is the fact that you can drop wheels beneath the floats and taxi out of the water on to dry land if it suits your purpose. This was exactly what I’d done now, running up on to the concrete slipway at the bottom of the steps which would certainly make loading the coffin easier.

Two or three seamen leaned against the sea wall watching, attracted by the novelty of the floatplane as much as anything else, an exotic enough item to find down there among the fishing boats and yachts.

The hearse braked to a halt, three of the men inside got out and went round to the rear to deal with the coffin. The fourth moved to join me.

Undertakers are the same the world over and Jiminez was no exception, a tall, cadaverous creature in a double-breasted black overcoat who seemed to exist in a permanent state of mourning. He raised his Homburg briefly and held out two fingers for the good and sufficient reason that this was all he had left on his right hand. ‘Ah, Senor Nelson, we meet again. A melancholy business.’

He produced a small silver box, inhaled a pinch of snuff vigorously then shook his head, an expression of settled gloom on his face so that one might have been excused for imagining the deceased to have been a very old and dear friend.

‘I know,’ I said, ‘but the rest of us just have to keep on going somehow.’

‘True,’ he said, ‘very true,’ and he took a sheaf of documents from his inside breast pocket as the customs officer got out of his Land-Rover and joined us.

‘Senor Nelson.’ He held out his hand with the usual Spanish courtesy. ‘At your orders.’

‘At yours, Senor,’ I replied.

‘And how is Ibiza these days?’

‘Fine,’ I said, ‘or otherwise, depending on how the charters go.’

He examined the papers briefly. ‘Juan Pasco, aged eighteen. So young?’

He glanced at Jiminez who shrugged. ‘Killed in a car crash. A university student. You know how it is. The parents wish him to be laid to rest in the family vault back home in Ibiza.’

‘Naturally’ The customs man nodded. The other three men shuffled by with the coffin on a trestle and he held out a hand to arrest them. ‘Gentlemen, it pains me to have to ask, but I must look inside, simply to see that all is as it should be. I have my orders, you understand?’

It was a ritual we had gone through on the four previous occasions I’d been engaged in the same line of work, and to be expected. Coffins had, after all, been known to contain other things than bodies and with Ibiza a part of metropolitan Spain, the flight from Cartagena counted as an internal one with no customs inspection at the other end.

‘But of course, Senor,’ Jiminez told him gravely. ‘You must do your duty’

He waved a hand, the coffin was set down, the gilt handles unscrewed quickly, the lid removed.

Some people appear to shrink in death. Certainly the boy in the coffin seemed no more than thirteen, although the face had been so heavily made up with cosmetics that he resembled a waxworks dummy. Nothing human about him at all. I presumed that most of the damage was covered by the stiff blue suit.

Jiminez took another pinch of snuff. ‘The skull was crushed and the flesh completely removed from the left cheek by the impact. One would never guess now, of course.’

The customs officer crossed himself. ‘Amazing. You are a true artist, Senor Jiminez, nothing less.’

‘One must think of the parents,’ Jiminez nodded to his underlings who replaced the lid, raised the coffin once more on the trestle and took it down the steps to the Otter.

The customs officer handed me the documents. ‘All would appear to be in order, Senor Nelson. I wish you a safe flight.’

He saluted and moved away and Jiminez glanced up at the sky. ‘A perfect night for it if the weather forecast is anything to go by’

‘Let’s hope so.’ I zipped up my flying jacket. ‘I wouldn’t like my passenger to have an uncomfortable ride.’

He permitted himself one of those brief graveyard smiles of his. ‘You know, I like you, my friend. You have a sense of humour where death is concerned. Not many people do.’

‘It takes practice,’ I said. ‘Lots of practice. I’ll be in touch.’

I went down the steps to the Otter where his men had just finished stowing the coffin. I climbed into the cockpit, did the usual routine check, started the engine and ran her down into the water. I took up the wheels and taxied down-wind, leaning out of the side window, checking the channel for boats before making my run.

When the moment came, she lifted like a bird as usual, everything suddenly light and effortless and as I stamped on the right rudder bar and swung out across the quay, Jiminez was still standing down there in the fading light staring up at me. I’d first flown the Otter for a film company who were doing all their location work in Almeria on the Spanish Mediterranean coast for the good and sufficient reason that it’s a hell of a sight cheaper than Hollywood these days.

When the film was completed they decided it wasn’t worth the expense of having the Otter shipped back to the States. As it became reasonably obvious that no one in the Mediterranean area seemed particularly anxious to buy a floatplane specifically designed to stand the rigours of the Canadian north, they let me have her cheap.

Most people thought I was crazy, but there was money to be made island-hopping in the Balearics. Ibiza, Majorca, Minorca, Formentera. At least I got by, especially in the season and there were always the extras to help things along, like this present trip, for instance.

It was a fine night, as Jiminez had predicted, with very little cloud and a full moon, stars strung away to the horizon. All very pleasant, but I had more pressing matters on my mind, switched over to automatic pilot and took another look at the chart.

There was no wind to speak of, certainly not more than five knots and I’d allowed for that in my original calculation. There was really very little to be done except to check my figures, which I did, then poured a cup of coffee from a flask and smoked a cigarette.

Thirty-eight minutes out of Cartagena, I took over manual control and went down to two thousand feet. Exactly three minutes later I got my signal right on the button, a blue light followed by a red, flashed half-a-dozen times, some private joke of Turk’s who swore it was taken from the old China Coast signal book and meant I have women on board.

I went down fast and banked across the boat, a forty-foot diesel yacht from Oran to the best of my knowledge, although the background details were not really my affair. The red light flashed again and I turned away into the wind, eased back on the throttle and started down.

The sea was calm enough and visibility excellent thanks to that full moon. A final burst of power to level out in the descent and I splashed down. I kept the engine ticking over and opened the side door. The motor yacht was already moving towards me. When it was twenty or thirty yards away, it slowed appreciably. I counted four men on deck as usual with another in the wheelhouse. I could see them quite clearly in the moonlight. A rubber dinghy was already in the water by the starboard rail, two of them dropped into it and paddled across.

They drifted in under the port wing and a tall, bearded man in yellow oilskins stepped on to the float, clutching a bulky package against his chest with both hands. He steadied himself for a moment then passed it up to me. As I took it from him, he dropped back into the dinghy without a word and they paddled back to the boat.

I took off again immediately and as I drifted into the air, the boat was already moving away in the general direction of the North African coast. Five minutes later and I was back at three thousand feet and dead on course for Ibiza.

As Turk had said, easy as falling off a log, and each time I repeated the performance we shared two thousand good tax free American dollars.

When I first met Harry Turk he was tied hand and foot to a tree on the edge of a small clearing in the jungle which was being used as a base camp by North Vietnamese regular troops operating behind the American lines. It was raining at the time, which was hardly surprising, as it was the middle of the monsoon season, but in spite of his incredibly filthy condition, I was able to make out that he was a Marine Corps sergeant, as they trussed me up beside him.

Before walking away one of the guards booted me in the side with enough force to crack two ribs, as I later discovered and I writhed around in the mud for a while. I had thought Turk asleep, but now he opened one eye and stared at me unwinkingly.

‘What’s your story, General?’

I said, ‘You’ve got it wrong. Squadron Leader. What you’d call a major.’

He opened the other eye at that. ‘Heh, since when have the British been in this war?’

‘They haven’t,’ I said. ‘I did pilot training on a short service commission with the R.A.F. then transferred to the Royal Australian Air Force a couple of years back. This is my second tour out here.’

‘What happened?’

‘I was hitching a lift on a Medivac helicopter to Saigon out of Din To when we came across a wrecked Huey in the corner of a paddy field with what looked like a survivor waving beside it.’

‘So you went down on your errand of mercy and discovered you’d made a big mistake.’

‘We were caught in the crossfire of two heavy machine guns. I was the only one who got out in one piece.’

He nodded gravely. ‘Well, as my old grannie used to say, you’ve got to look on the bright side, General, and thank the good Lord. If you’d been taken by the Viet Cong instead of these regular troops they’d have strung you up by your ankles and cut your throat.’

I think it was that remarkable composure of his which impressed me most from the start, for when he closed his eye and went back to sleep, his face, which I could see clearly pillowed on his right arm against the tree trunk, was as serene and untroubled as any child’s.

I fell asleep myself in the end in spite of the torrential rain and the cold and awakened again at around three o’clock in the morning to find a hand over my mouth, Turk whispering in my ear as he cut through my bonds. By some means known only to himself, he had managed to break free and had used his belt to garotte the sentry, which gave us an AK assault rifle and a machete between us when we made a run for it.

They were hot on our heels within a matter of hours which was only to be expected and in a brush with a fourman patrol, I took a bullet through the right leg, making me something of a liability from then on. Not that Turk would leave me, even when I did the gallant thing and ordered him to. Not then nor during the five days of hide and seek that followed, until the afternoon we were spotted in a clearing by a Medivac helicopter and winched to safety.

He visited me a couple of times in hospital, but then I was flown back to Australia for treatment. I took my discharge six months later when it became obvious to all concerned that I was going to be left with a permanent limp.

As for Turk, there was a brief period when his face seemed to stare out at me from every magazine and newspaper I bought which was right after he’d been awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for leading a party of frogmen into Haiphong harbour to blow up four torpedo boats. I wrote, care of Corps Headquarters in San Diego, but after a while, my letter came back with a note to say he’d taken his discharge and they didn’t have any forwarding address.

So that was very much that, until the night I was driving along the Avenida Andenes on the Ibizan waterfront and almost ran over a drunk lying in the middle of the road. Or at least I thought he was drunk until I got out and turned him over and found he was just another hippie, stoned to the eyes.

He had the usual Jesus haircut, a scarlet headband holding it in place, giving him the look of some Apache Indian, an impression reinforced by the lean, ravaged face, deeply tanned by the Ibizan sun.

He wore a linen kaftan and a silver chain belt at his waist, jeans and open sandals. You could have seen dozens like him any day of the week sitting at the tables of the open-air cafes along the waterfront, but in this case there was a significant difference. The Medal of Honor on the end of the silver chain about his neck.

Even then I didn’t recognise Turk in this gaunt, ravaged man, until he opened his eyes, gazed up at me unwinkingly in the light of the headlamps and without any kind of surprise at all said gravely, ‘And how’s every little thing with you, General?’

I didn’t live in Ibiza town myself at that time. I was operating out of a tiny fishing village called Tijola on a creek near Port Roig a few miles further along the coast. I didn’t need to take Turk home with me as it turned out. He had a boat moored down by the breakwater in Ibiza harbour, a thirty-foot seagoing launch, the Mary Grant, from which he operated as a freelance skin-diver, although he seldom ventured beyond the Botafoc lighthouse, preferring to earn his bread in more devious ways.

But much of this I was to discover later and on that first night, I only knew that he had changed almost beyond recognition. That he was a sick man was obvious and when I got him down to the saloon he was barely able to stand.

He sank into a chair, head in hands for a moment, then stood up slowly and leaned on the table. ‘You’ll have to excuse me for a minute, General, I need an aspirin or something.’

He went into the aft cabin leaving the door slightly ajar, enough for me to see his reflection in a mirror on the cabin wall when I peered in. He had rolled up his left sleeve and was tying a cord around the forearm. As he took a hypodermic from a drawer, I turned away.

He came into the saloon rubbing his hands together briskly, an entirely different person just like the after man in the patent medicine adverts. He took a bottle of brandy from a cupboard and found a couple of reasonably clean glasses.

He pushed one across to me and raised the other in a kind of mock toast. ‘To you and me, General,’ he said. ‘Together again - the old firm.’

And then he started to laugh uproariously.

For a year now he had been going downhill a little bit more each day, slowly being eaten alive by some worm within him. Whatever it was, he never discussed it. He lived entirely in the present moment, blotting out past and future with either a second bottle of whatever came to hand or another fix, involving himself in one vaguely crooked scheme after another.

Like this present affair, for example. When he’d first come to me with the offer I’d turned it down flat thinking it must be drugs, had to be, and that was something I wouldn’t have touched if I’d been starving.

But I was wrong for he had got permission from his principals, whoever they were, to open the first package to prove to me that it consisted of dozens of neatly wrapped packets of good American dollar bills. So that was all right. I was just a middle-man, helping to move large sums of money illegally between countries, part of some complicated exchange process by which someone, somewhere, finally made a fortune.

I was still thinking about it all when I made my landfall. I called up the control tower at the airport which was something the authorities insisted I do, in spite of the fact that I didn’t use their facilities. There was the usual interminable delay before I was given the all clear to land and turned in to make my final run.

The island looked fantastic in the light of the full moon, the rugged, hilly landscape of the interior like a black paper cut-out against the night sky and a white band of surf showed clearly at the base of the massive south coast cliffs.

I came in off the sea at three hundred feet, Port Roig to the left of me and beyond, between the two great natural granite breakwaters which enclosed the mouth of the creek, I saw the lights of Tijola. A green flare soared into the night giving me the all clear and as I passed between the two headlands, I put the Otter down into calm water and taxied towards the shore.

It wasn’t much of a place. A couple of dozen small houses, a jetty, a few fishing boats, but it had everything I needed. Calm water to land in because of the enclosed nature of the creek, and lots of peace and quiet which suited me just fine.

There was a small bar on the beach. I could hear a guitar playing in spite of the Otter’s engine, and someone was singing. I dropped the wheels as I moved in towards the beach, and taxied up on to a broad concrete ramp which I’d constructed myself earlier that year with the aid of a couple of locals.

The three men who waited beside the hearse looked exactly the same as the ones I’d left in Cartagena. I switched off the engine, climbed down and they moved past me without a word and started to get the coffin out.

‘Heh, General, how did it go?’

I turned round as Turk moved out of the darkness from the general direction of the beach bar. ‘Fine. Just fine.’

The three men shuffled past me with the coffin and I reached into the cabin for the package. I hefted it in my hands for a moment. ‘Why don’t we just run for the hills with one of these?’

‘Don’t even think of it.’ Turk took the package from me. ‘No place to run. Not from these people. They’d leave you with a penny for each eye, that’s all.’

‘So what is it? Mafia money?’

‘Would that bother you?’

‘Not particularly. When do we get paid?’

‘Thursday. I’ll be in touch.’ He got into the passenger seat of the hearse and leaned out of the window as the driver started the engine. ‘You seeing Lillie tonight?’

‘I expect so.’

‘You’ll find something for her on the table in your kitchen. Give her my love.’

The hearse moved away into the night and I went across the beach to the small flat-roofed cottage I called home. There wasn’t much to it. A bedroom, living room and kitchen, with a shower and toilet in the yard at the rear, but it sufficed, at least for the present.

Turk had left the light on in the kitchen. The something he had put on the table turned out to be a thousand American cigarettes, an item which often tends to be in short supply on the island, and a case of Bourbon. Lillie would be pleased. I stripped off quickly, went out to the yard and had a shower.

Lillie was Lillie St Claire. The Lillie St Claire, the Queen of the Metro lot for most of her career. Two Oscars and seventy-three movies in all, mostly entirely forgettable, maybe a dozen that had been really worth doing, two that ranked among the best ever.

She’d not made a picture in three or four years now as far as I knew, had dropped out completely and now lived in a kind of feudal splendour in a great white villa on the cliffs above Port Roig. I’d flown her to Majorca one afternoon about six months previously, when she’d missed the scheduled flight and was in a hurry to meet some film producer or other. The acquaintance had ripened into one of those quiet, steady, take-it-or-leave-it affairs which suited us both admirably.

But on a night like this, warm and soft and full of moonlight I looked forward to seeing her with some pleasure. I changed quickly into sweater and slacks, loaded the cigarettes and Bourbon into the rear of the old jeep I kept in the shed out back and drove away.

Lillie’s place was seven or eight miles away at the end of a promontory which could only be reached by one of those typically Ibizan dirt roads, twisting and turning between undulating hills, that were more like miniature mountains than anything else, and studded with pine trees.

The night air was heavy with their scent and beyond the cliffs, the sea flashed silver in the moonlight. It was all very spectacular with the Vedra two or three miles or so to my right, a great, solid hump of rock rearing more than a thousand feet out of the sea.

I paused on the brow of the road close to an old ruined mill, a well-known landmark, and got out to admire the view. I reached for a cigarette and somewhere close at hand, a woman screamed, high-pitched and full of terror.

A second later, a naked girl ran out of the darkness into the headlights of the jeep.

2 The Love Goddess

It was as if the camera had stopped turning, freezing the shot for a moment. Dark hair cut very close to the skull - unnaturally short - even the men were wearing it longer that year. Wide eyes above high cheekbones, filled with a kind of calm desperation rather than fear.

And the rest of her, as was to be expected, was calculated to take the breath away. Firm, round breasts, rather small but sharply pointed, the flat belly of a young girl, the hair dark between the thighs.

She came straight into my arms as if unable to stop that head-long flight, clutched at my sweater for a moment then pushed me away with a sudden, desperate cry. I grabbed hold of her by the wrists and held on tight.

‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘It’s all right,’ then repeated myself in Spanish for good measure.

She went very still, staring up at me, gasping for breath like the hunted animal she was, not saying a word, and a man ran out of the darkness.

Hippies, they will tell you, are God’s own chosen people. Flower folk. Gentle souls who only want to drop out of the hell that is modern industrial society. Maybe that was true once when they were content with marijuana, but things have changed since they got on to heroin and L.S.D., and most of the crowd who’d washed up on the shores of Ibiza had drifted up from the bottom of a cess pool in my estimation.

The character who crouched a yard or two away, chest heaving as he fought for breath, was a vintage specimen. His black hair hung well below his shoulders and he wore a plaited leather headband, a scarlet shirt secured by a broad leather belt with a round brass buckle, six inches across, that glowed in the headlights like a small moon. The one incongruous feature were the wire spectacles, the eyes glinting behind them like some malevolent fox, on finding the farmer between him and the chicken.

I didn’t need to hear his crazed laugh to know he was as high as a kite or the sight of his shaking hands. It was round about then that two more came crashing out of the pine trees, one of them losing his balance and arriving in an untidy heap in the middle of the road. He got to his feet as the other joined him and they ranged themselves behind Redshirt.

They really were quite something. Identical twins from the look of them and barefooted. Filthy, ragged creatures with tangled beards and long, matted hair, like something out of a child’s nightmare about wild men from the woods coming to get you.

Redshirt spread his arms wide and said in a surprisingly soft voice, ‘Plenty for everyone, man. You wait your turn is all.’

I said to the girl, ‘Get in the jeep. You’ll find a reefer jacket in the back.’

As I opened the door for her he came in fast and when he was close enough, I gave him a good, old-fashioned boot in the crutch. In other circumstances it might have killed or crippled him, but the fact that I was only wearing canvas rope-soled sandals took a little of the steam out of things.

In any event, the end result was perfectly satisfactory. He kept on going for a moment, carried forward by the momentum of his own rush, did a rather neat somersault and ended up in the ditch at the side of the road, curled into a very tight ball.

I shoved the girl into the jeep and scrambled in beside her as one of the Terrible Twins howled like a dog and rushed me. I gave him the door full in the face, rammed my foot down hard and took the jeep forward. I had a final impression of the other gibbering like some great ape in the headlights, then he bounced to one side like a rubber ball and we were away.

The girl leaned over the seat, as exciting and disturbing a sight as any man could wish for, and searched vainly in the shadows for the reefer coat. I gave it half-a-mile, just to be on the safe side, then pulled into the side of the road on a small bluff that overlooked the sea. I found the coat, gave it to her then got out of the jeep and walked to the edge of the cliffs. As I lit a cigarette the door slammed behind me. When I turned, the girl was watching me. She’d buttoned the reefer to the neck and turned up the sleeves, but it was still five sizes too large. The contrast between how she now looked and her former condition was incongruous enough to be almost funny.

She came forward, hands in pockets and I offered her a cigarette which she refused. ‘Are you all right?’ I said.

Her answer was to collapse against me with a long, shuddering sigh. I got an arm around her quickly and held on tight.

After a while, she pulled away. ‘Thank you. I’m all right now.’ Her English was excellent, but with a pronounced French accent.

I said, ‘I’d choose my company a little more carefully another time if I were you.’

She ignored that one and turned to look out to sea again. ‘It is really very beautiful, this world of ours, don’t you agree?’

Which, considering what had gone before, was calculated to take the wind out of anyone’s sails. But she was right, of course. It was a night to thank God for.

‘I know,’ I said. ‘Where every prospect pleases and only man is vile.’

She looked up at me, frowning slightly. ‘You’re a strange man. You can be so gentle, yet back there …’

‘I know, angel,’ I said. ‘Red in tooth and claw. I served my apprenticeship in a rough school. Of course, I could have passed by on the other side. Would you have preferred that?’

‘Please forgive me. I’m being very stupid.’ She held out her hand. ‘My name is Claire Bouvier and I’m really very grateful.’

I held on to that hand for a moment longer than was strictly necessary, not for romantic reasons, but out of simple curiosity at discovering how work-roughened the palm was. She just didn’t look the type.

‘Jack Nelson,’ I said. ‘Was I in time back there?’

She took another of those deep breaths. ‘Yes, Mr Nelson. You were in time.’

‘That’s all right then. Where are you staying?’

‘A hotel in Ibiza on the Avenida Andenes close to the pier where the boat leaves for Formentera.’

‘All right,’ I said. ‘I’ve got a friend who has a villa about a mile from here. I’ll take you there first, get you some clothes, then I’ll take you to your hotel. Or to the police - it’s up to you.’

‘No - no police.’

The reaction was sharp and definite.

I said, ‘Why not? They’d probably run them down without too much difficulty, the state I left them in.’

‘No, they’ve been punished enough.’ She was almost angry. ‘And it wasn’t that kind of assault. It wasn’t how it looked. Don’t you understand?’

Curiouser and curiouser, and I think she was on the point of telling me more, but I had enough troubles of my own to carry without taking on anyone else’s.

‘Your affair,’ I said. ‘Anyway, let’s get going.’

I moved to the jeep, opened the door. When I turned she was still standing there at the cliff edge.

‘For God’s sake,’ I said. ‘If I’d wanted to rape you I’d have been at it by now. And you’re not my type. Thin as a rail and your hair’s too short.’

She didn’t move an inch. Just stood there looking at me gravely, her face pale in the moonlight. I suddenly had that vaguely helpless feeling one gets on occasions when faced with a stubborn child, intent only on going its own way.

I said as gently as I could, ‘All right, you’ve had a rough night, I understand that, but you’ve got to start trusting people again. My friend’s place is no more than a mile from here and she’s a woman so she’ll be able to fit you up with some clothes, give you anything you want. You may have heard of her. Her name is Lillie St Claire.’

‘The film actress?’

‘The very same.’

She came forward slowly, looking suddenly rather forlorn in that ridiculously large reefer coat and held out her hand again. ‘Forgive me for doubting you, my friend, but I see now that you are a good man in spite of yourself.’

Speechless and utterly defeated, I climbed in beside her and drove away.

Lillie’s place was a typical Ibizencan villa. What the locals called a finca, only on a grander scale than most. A great Moorish palace named the Villa Rose built on various levels to fit into the landscape at the end of the point. Castillian arches, iron-grilled windows, the whole so white that in the heat of the day it hurt to look at it.

A high wall surrounded the entire estate, palms nodding beyond, black against the night sky. The great, iron gates were locked tight. The old gnarled peasant who emerged from the hut, complete with Alsatian on a chain, flashed a torch at us.

‘It’s me, Jose,’ I called.

He nodded without a word and returned to the hut, dragging the dog at his heels. A moment later the gates swung open and I drove through.

I could smell the lemon grove although I could not see it, the almond trees and palms swayed gently in the slight breeze, their branches dark feathers against the night sky. And everywhere there was the rattle of water. I pulled in beside the fountain at the bottom of the steps which led up to the great oak front door. When I got out Claire Bouvier joined me reluctantly.

‘You don’t need to worry,’ I said. ‘Most of the servants come in during the day. At night there’s only an old crone called Isabel who does the cooking and Carlo, the chauffeur.’

She gazed at me blankly. ‘She needs a chauffeur at night.’

‘You know how it is,’ I said. ‘No knowing when she might feel like a ride.’

I had pulled the chain at the side of the door and it swung open instantly to reveal Isabel, a gaunt old woman who had never ever uttered a word in my presence, though whether this was from some personal dislike of me I’d never been able to discover.

She wore traditional dress as always. Blue shawl, a tight-fitting black bodice beautifully embroidered in gold, a black apron worn over the long ankle-length skirt. As usual, she didn’t have a thing to say. Not even a flicker of emotion showed on that gnarled old face at the sight of the Bouvier girl, who to Ibizan eyes must have looked eccentric in the extreme.

‘Don’t look her full in the face or you’ll turn to stone,’ I told the girl, and I led the way across the wide hall with its beautiful red and white ceramic tiles and mounted a curving staircase to the landing above.

Glass doors stood open to the night and beyond, most of the garden at that level was taken up by a superb illuminated swimming pool. The faithful Carlo was standing beside a wrought-iron table gazing up at the high diving board, a great ox of a man, shoulders bulging beneath the snow-white jacket.

‘The Love Goddess,’ Claire Bouvier whispered as she looked up at the slim figure in the black costume poised on the edge of the board.

‘That’s what they call her,’ I said, and as Carlo turned sharply, I raised my voice and cried, ‘Heh, Lillie, come down out of there. You’ve got visitors.’

She waved, then dived a moment later, flashing down through the yellow light, entering the water with hardly a splash. As she surfaced at the side of the pool, Carlo moved in, bathing wrap at the ready. She slipped into it, eyes sparkling, that wide, wide mouth of hers opening into what must surely have been the most devastating smile of all time.

‘Why, Jack, lover. It’s been an age.’ She kissed me, then grabbed an arm reasonably ostentatiously and turned her gaze on Claire Bouvier. ‘I didn’t know we were having a floor show.’

‘Meet Miss Claire Bouvier,’ I said. ‘I just saved her from a fate worse than you know what back along the road a piece.’

‘How perfectly dreadful for you, darling,’ Lillie said, managing to sound as if she didn’t give a tinker’s damn in hell. ‘You must tell me all about it down to every last rapacious detail. When you reach my age, you can’t afford to miss out on anything. You have a swim or something, lover, I’ll see you later.’

‘There’s a thousand of those foul American fags you like in the back of the jeep.’ I said. ‘Plus a case of Bourbon. A present from Turk. Shall I bring them in?’

‘Good heavens, no. You might pull something mysterious. Ruin your sex life. Leave it to Carlo. He’s so much stronger than the rest of us.’

Which was an undeniable fact for I had seen Carlo on occasion, training with weights in the yard by the garage at the back, and stripped he resembled Primo Carnera in his prime. Lillie grabbed the Bouvier girl by the arm and took her inside, Carlo bowed slightly and followed them.

Which left me very much on my own, so I went along to the changing room, found myself a pair of trunks and had a swim.

The salon was an exquisite room which had been based on an ancient Moorish design. The floor was of black and white ceramic tiles and the ceiling was blue, vivid against stark white walls. A log fire burned on the open hearth. I was sprawled at my ease in front of it, one of Carlo’s generously large gin and tonics in my hand, when Lillie came back in.

She really was the most amazing creature I’d ever known. Must have been anywhere up to fifty - had to be to have done the things she had - yet even in the harsh, white heat of the day never seemed to look a day over thirty-five.

Like now, for instance, dressed in a long, black, transparent creation. As far as I could see, she didn’t have a stitch on underneath and her legs must have been giving Marlene Dietrich a hard time for years.

She draped herself elegantly across me and kissed me, that mouth of hers opening wide enough to swallow me whole. When the tongue was finally tired of moving around she lay back with a long sigh.

‘I’ve missed you, lover. Where’ve you been?’

‘Working.’

Carlo appeared, a drinks tray in his gloved hands and gave her a martini. She took it just as she accepted the light he held out for her cigarette, as casually as if he didn’t really exist. He withdrew silently to a position by the terrace.

She said, ‘Where was it these hippies had a go at the kid?’

‘Near the mill at La Grande.’

She emptied her glass and paced restlessly across to the fire. ‘The dirty bastards. They should drive them off the island, every last one of them.’

‘Don’t tell me you’re frightened?’ I said.

She was almost angry when she turned on me. ‘What if I am? They’ve done some funny things. Broken into people’s homes. This is a lovely place …’

‘With Carlo here?’ I demanded. ‘You’ve got to be joking. He’s the original six-at-one-blow man. I thought that was why you kept him around.’

She changed completely, her face illuminated by that dazzling smile, the famous Lillie St Claire smile, as she moved across to Carlo.

‘That’s right. Of course it is. You wouldn’t let them hurt me, would you, Carlo?’

Carlo took the hand she held out to him and kissed it gently. From the look on his face I’d say he’d have torn the arms and legs off anyone who even tried.

She patted his cheek. ‘Bless you, Carlo. Let’s have a movie, shall we? What about The Door to Hell.’

He moved away as silently as usual. She poured another drink and flung herself into the chair next to me. This was a ritual I’d been through many times before. There was a small projection room at the rear of the salon and Carlo handled things at that end, using the smooth white wall next to the fireplace as a screen.

As the lights dimmed I said, ‘What about the girl?’

‘I left her in the bath. She shouldn’t be long. Did she tell you how she came to be mixed up with those creeps?’

‘I didn’t ask.’

‘I did. She said she’d arranged to meet a friend at the windmill at La Grande at nine o’clock. She went out there by taxi only he never showed. Then those pigs jumped her.’ She shook her head, ‘The whole thing stinks to high heaven if you ask me.’

‘Her affair, not ours.’

She carried on as if I hadn’t spoken. ‘And her hair.’

‘What about her hair?’

‘I don’t know. It’s not natural. Reminds me of something and I can’t think what. A picture I was in once.’

‘Why don’t you shut up?’ I said. ‘… and let’s enjoy this one which, for a change, I don’t think I’ve actually seen before.’

I think she’d have given me the hard word at that except for the fact that at that moment, her face filled the screen and as usual, she was swept up in the greatest love affair since Antony and Cleopatra. That of Lillie St Claire for Lillie St Claire.

‘1938,’ she said. ‘I’d been in Hollywood two years. My first Oscar nomination.’

She was standing at the top of a great flight of marble stairs in some sort of negligee or other, being menaced by the swords of half-a-dozen Roundheads, who all looked villainous enough to play Capone-style gangsters, and probably did the following week. At the appropriate moment an athletic-looking character in breeches and a white shirt dropped into the picture, a sword between his teeth and proceeded to knock all sorts of hell out of the Roundheads.

‘Jack Desforge,’ she breathed. ‘The best there ever was.’

‘Better than Lillie St Claire?’ I demanded.

‘Damn you, lover, you know what I mean. Dietrich, Joan Crawford. Oh, they were great. Wonderful, wonderful people. They don’t breed them like that any more.’

‘Only you were the greatest.’

‘Look at my last film.’

‘I didn’t know anybody had done.’

I ducked to avoid the glass she threw at me for the film was very much a sore point, an Italian production of the worst kind; a programmer which had sunk, as they say, without trace.

Behind us there was a slight polite cough and Claire Bouvier moved down to join us. She wore a pair of slacks and a polo-necked sweater which combined with the short hair to give her a strangely boyish look.

She looked up in some bewilderment at the sword play on the wall then turned to Lillie and said hesitantly, ‘You have been most kind, Miss St Claire. I will see these things are returned to you tomorrow.’

‘That’s all right, darling. You can give them to the deserving poor when you’ve finished with them.’ Lillie told her.

She didn’t offer to put her up for the night which was much as I had expected for she was never one for competition in that quarter.

I said to Claire Bouvier, ‘All right. Let’s get moving.’

She glanced first at Lillie, then at me, strangely diffident, then went up the steps and out into the hall. Lillie said, ‘Do you fancy her?’

‘I hadn’t thought much about it.’

‘You’d be making a mistake. There’s something funny about that kid.’

She slid her arms about my neck and gave the full treatment, following this with a completely unprintable suggestion breathed into my right ear.

‘Impossible,’ I said.

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ she said. ‘We could always try. It shouldn’t take you more than an hour to get down to Ibiza town and back again.’

She kissed me hard, that mouth of hers opening wide again and beyond, I saw Carlo waiting respectfully, his face showing no expression worth noting, yet there was something in the eyes I think. I could almost feel the knife going in between my shoulder blades.

I patted her face, ‘Perhaps,’ I said. ‘We’ll see,’ and I moved out fast.

She didn’t have much to say for herself on the way down to town. As we passed the mill where it had all begun I said, ‘What in the hell were you doing up here on your own anyway?’

‘I had an appointment to keep. With a friend.’

‘Who didn’t show?’ I was surprised at my sudden surge of anger. ‘He should have his backside kicked, whoever he is.’

She turned and looked at me sharply, but made no comment. I kept my eyes on the road. After a while she said, ‘Tell me about yourself. What do you do?’

‘I’m a charter pilot. I keep a floatplane down at Tijola.’

‘And Miss St Claire - you have known her long?’

‘Long enough.’

We were coming into the outskirts of Ibiza now and I took the direct route in along the Avenida de Espana. There were still plenty of bars open for the night, for Spain at least, was still young, but when I switched off the motor outside the small, waterfront hotel on the Avenida Andenes, it suddenly seemed very quiet.

She got out and moved to the entrance and I followed her. ‘I don’t suppose you’d feel like a drink?’

‘Not really,’ she said. ‘I’m very tired. You understand?’

‘Of course.’

She held out her hand and I took it, suddenly reluctant to let her go.

‘What can I say?’ she said. ‘I owe you so much.’

‘You could satisfy my curiosity’

She thought about it for a long moment then nodded. ‘Yes, I owe you that at least. You know the Iglesia de Jesus?’

‘One of the most beautiful churches in the island.’

‘Can you meet me there in the morning?’

‘I think so.’

‘Would ten o’clock be too early?’

‘I’ll be there on the dot.’

She took my hand again briefly. ‘Thank you, dear friend,’ she said, reached up and brushed my cheek with the lightest of kisses, then slipped inside.

Which very definitely drove every other thought from my mind, including Lillie. There was something elusive about her. Something indefinable that couldn’t be pinned down. Frankly, it was as irritating as an itch one couldn’t get at to scratch and irritating in another way also. I had a feeling that I was becoming involved in something in spite of myself and any kind of an entanglement where a woman was concerned, was something I preferred to keep well clear of.

I paused on the edge of the kerb to light a cigarette before crossing to the jeep and an old Ford truck came round the corner on two wheels, mounted the pavement and rushed me like a fighting bull in full charge.

I made it into the nearest doorway with very little to spare, was aware of Redshirt leaning out the cab window laughing like a crazy man and then the truck swerved round the corner into the next street and was away.

I didn’t attempt to follow. There’d be another time and I’d had enough action for one night. What I needed now was a long, tall glass of something or other and a cool hand on my fevered brow - which brought me straight back to Lillie.

When I got back to the villa I didn’t bother with the front gate, preferring a less public route out of deference to Lillie’s good name although I sometimes think she simply liked the idea of someone having to climb over the wall to get to her. As usual, she’d turned the electronic warning system off to facilitate matters.

As I came up out of the garden to the terrace outside her bedroom Lillie called out sharply and it wasn’t exactly a cry for help.

The French windows stood open to the night, curtains billowing like white sails and there was a light on inside. Carlo, as far as I could judge, seemed to be performing manfully enough. Certainly a slight, polite cough from the terrace would hardly have helped, so I did the obvious thing and got the hell out of there.

When I got back to Tijola, I stopped at the beach bar and had a large glass of the local brandy, a brew calculated to take the skin off your lips if you were injudicious enough to allow it to touch them. There was a light in the cottage window which didn’t surprise me for at that time Turk was in the habit of turning up most nights.

I found him sprawled across the table, out to the wide. The eye balls were retracted, but his pulse was steady enough. Heroin and Spanish Brandy. I wondered how much longer his system was going to be able to take it as I carried him across to the bed.

I covered him with a blanket, turned to go back to the table and saw a piece of paper pinned to the door with the breadknife. We put the bird to bed for you. Mind your own business in future or next time it’s you.

God knows why I bothered, but I was running when I went out of the door. Not that it mattered because when I reached the slipway, the Otter simply wasn’t there.

Definitely not my night.

3 The Jesus Reredos

I was up at first light and drove into Ibiza where I helped myself to a couple of aqualungs and various other essential items of diving gear from the Mary Grant.

When I got back to Tijola, Turk was still out cold. I tried slapping him awake which did no good at all and when I attempted to get him on his feet he collapsed instantly, boneless as a jellyfish. It was like handling a corpse and I got him back on the bed and left him to it.

So, I was on my own again - the story of my life, or so it seemed. One thing was certain. Whatever had to be done I would have to do alone so I pulled on one of the yellow neoprene wetsuits I’d brought from the Mary Grant, buckled on an aqualung and went to it.

I tried the obvious at first and simply waded into the water from the slipway. The seabed shelved very rapidly at that point so that it was four or five fathoms deep close inshore.

The water was like black glass, giving the illusion of being quite clear and yet visibility was poor, mainly because the sun wasn’t yet out.

I went out, as I have said, in a direct line from the slip-way for perhaps fifty yards, keeping close to the bottom and didn’t see a thing. So I tried another approach and moved back towards the shore, tacking twenty yards to either side of my central line in a slow, painful zig-zag.

Which all took time - too much time. I hadn’t eaten, hadn’t even swallowed a cup of coffee which was a mistake for, in spite of the wetsuit, it was cold.

I was getting old, that was the trouble. Too old for this kind of nonsense. The cold ate into me like acid and I was gripped by a mood of savage despair. Everything I had in the world was tied up in the Otter. Without it I was nothing. On the beach once and for all and no way back.

I surfaced close to the slipway and found Turk sitting cross-legged on the beach, a blanket around his shoulders. There was a bottle of that cheap local brandy wedged in the sand between his feet and he nursed a tin cup in both hands.

‘Enjoying yourself?’ he asked.

‘The only way to live.’

He swallowed some more of that terrible brandy and nodded slightly, a curiously vacant look in his eyes. It was as if he was not really there, in spirit at least.

He said, ‘Okay, General, what’s it all about?’

So I told him. The mill at La Grande, Claire Bouvier, Redshirt and his friends - the whole bit and as I talked, the sun edged its way over the point, flooding the creek with light.

When I was finished he shook his head and sighed heavily. ‘You never did learn to mind your own business did you? Little friend of all the world.’

‘That’s me,’ I said. ‘Now let’s have your professional opinion.’

‘Simple. You’ve been looking in the wrong place. The way the currents run in this cove you should have tried the mid-channel.’

My heart, as they say, sank. ‘But it’s fifteen or sixteen fathoms in places out there.’

‘I know, General. I know.’ He smiled wearily. ‘Which is why you’re going to need papa. Give me five minutes to get into my gear. We’ll use the inflatable with the outboard and make sure there’s at least twenty fathoms of line on the anchor. We’re going to need it out there.’

I said, ‘Are you sure you feel up to this?’

‘You’ve got to be joking,’ he replied without even an attempt at a smile.

He turned and walked away with a curious kind of dignity, the blanket trailing from his shoulders like a cloak and yet there was something utterly and terrifyingly wrong. Earlier when I had attempted to waken him he had seemed like a corpse. Now the corpse walked. It was simple as that.

I was crouched in the dinghy in mid-channel taking a breather just before nine o’clock when Turk surfaced and gave me the sign. I adjusted my mouthpiece, went over the side and followed him down through around ten fathoms of smoke-grey water.

The Otter was crouched in a patch of seagrass like some strange marine monster. From a distance everything seemed perfectly normal and then, when I was close enough, I saw the holes ripped in the floats and hull.

So that was very much that and there was certainly nothing to hang around for. I followed Turk up and surfaced beside the dinghy. He spat out his mouthpiece and grinned savagely.

‘Somebody’s a handy man with a fireaxe. You certainly know how to win friends and influence people.’

I pulled myself into the dinghy, unstrapped my aqualung and started the outboard. ‘All right, so I’m splitting my sides laughing. What are the prospects?’

‘Of raising her?’ He shrugged. ‘Oh, I could do it, but I’d need to have a couple of pontoons and a steam winch and we’d need to recruit half-a-dozen locals as general labourers.’

‘How long?’

‘A month - maybe more if the weather plays us up, but whatever happens it would cost you. Four, maybe five thousand dollars and that would be cutting it to the bone, a friend for a friend.’

Which still left repairs to the floats and hull and the entire engine would have to be stripped, the control system. And add to that the airworthiness check the authorities would insist on before she flew again. God alone knows how much that would cost.

‘Is it on?’ he asked.

I shook my head. ‘Not in a thousand years.’

‘What about insurance?’

‘Nothing that would cover this. I could never afford the right kind of premium.’

I killed the motor as we drifted in through the shallows and we got out and pulled the dinghy up onto the beach together.

Turk picked up his aqualung. ‘This character in the red shirt and wire glasses. I’ll ask around. Somebody must know him.’

‘What good would that do?’ I said bitterly. ‘He could never pay for this.’

‘Maybe not, but you could always take it out of his hide some, after asking him politely why he did it?’

I suppose it was only then that the full extent of the catastrophe really got through to me and I kicked out at the inflatable dinghy savagely.

‘Why?’ I said. ‘Why?’

‘I’d say the girl was the person to put that question to.’

‘Claire Bouvier?’

‘She didn’t want the police in on things did she? She told you it wasn’t how it looked. This creep tried to run you down in a truck and failing in that direction, sees the Otter off and leaves you a warning to mind your own business. I’d say if anyone can throw any light on the situation it should be her.’

I glanced at my watch. It was just after nine-thirty. ‘Okay, that makes sense if nothing else does. I’ve arranged to meet her at ten o’clock at the Iglesia de Jesus. You want to come along for the ride?’

He smiled, that strange, melancholy smile of his. ‘Not me, General, I haven’t been to church in years. It’s not my scene and neither is this. I’ve got my own coffin to carry. You’re on your own.’

And on that definite and rather sombre note, he turned and walked into the cottage.

The Iglesia de Jesus is no more than a ten-minute drive from the town and stands in the middle of some of the richest farmland in Ibiza. An area criss-crossed with irrigation ditches, whitewashed farmhouses dotting a landscape that is strikingly beautiful. Lemon groves and wheatfields everywhere, even palm trees combining with the Moorish architecture of the houses to paint a picture that is more North African than European.

The church itself is typical of country churches to be found all over the island. Beautifully simple in design, blindingly white in the Mediterranean sun. A perfect setting for one of the most glorious pieces of Gothic art in Europe.

When I opened the door and went inside it was like diving into cool water. The silence was so intense that for a moment, I paused as if waiting for something though I hadn’t the slightest idea what. A sign perhaps, from heaven to tell me that everything was for the best in this best of all possible worlds. That my own experience of life and its rottenness was simply an illusion after all.

There was the usual smell of incense, candles flickered down by the altar. There was no one there, and I suddenly knew with a kind of anger, that the girl wasn’t going to come. Had never intended to.

And then I saw that I had been mistaken in thinking I had the place to myself for a nun in black habit knelt in front of the Reredos, head bowed, hands clasped in prayer.

I took a deep breath, fought hard to contain the impulse to kick out at something and made for the door.

A soft, familiar voice called, ‘Mr Nelson.’

I turned slowly, too astounded to speak.

The central panel of the Jesus Reredos portraying the Virgin and Child is a masterpiece by any standard and beautiful in the extreme. But it is an austere beauty. Something quite untouchable by anything human with the quiet serenity of one who knows that God is Love beyond any possibility of doubt and lives life accordingly.

Standing in front of it in that simple, black habit, Claire Bouvier might well have been mistaken for the artist’s model had it not been for the fact that the Reredos had been painted in the early years of the sixteenth century.

It could only be for real - had to be - I didn’t doubt that for a minute, for in some strange way it fitted. At least it explained the cropped hair and I sat down rather heavily in the nearest pew.

‘I am sorry, Mr Nelson,’ she said. ‘This must be something of a shock for you.’

‘You can say that again. Why didn’t you tell me last night?’

‘The cirumstances were unusual to say the least as I think you will agree.’

She sat down rather primly in the chair next to me, hands folded in her lap, those work-roughened hands which had so puzzled me. Then she looked up at the Reredos.

‘I didn’t realise it was so beautiful. Everything is so moving - so perfectly part of a whole. Particularly the scenes from the life of the Virgin on the predella.’

‘To hell with the …’ She turned sharply and I took a deep breath and continued. ‘Look, what do I call you for a start?’

‘I am still Claire Bouvier, Mr Nelson. Sister Claire, if you prefer it, of the Little Sisters of Pity. I’m on leave from our convent near Grenoble.’

‘On leave?’ I said. ‘Isn’t that a little irregular?’

‘There are special circumstances. I’ve been in East Pakistan for the past couple of years or BanglaDesh as they now call it.’

The whole thing seemed to move further into the realms of fantasy by the minute. I said, ‘All right, just tell me one thing. You were dressed like a nun last night when our friends grabbed you?’

‘That’s right.’

‘And you said it wasn’t just an ordinary assault. You wouldn’t let me take you to the police, for instance, which I would have thought reasonably strange behaviour for someone of your persuasion.’

She got up abruptly, moved towards the altar and stood there gripping the rail. I said quietly, ‘Our friend in the red shirt tried to run me down in a truck last night after I left you. When I got back to my cottage at Tijola, I found a note telling me to mind my own business.’

She turned quickly, a frown on her face. ‘From whom?’

‘Redshirt and friends. It has to be. You’ll be interested to know they also towed my seaplane out into the middle of the channel and sank it in sixty feet of water, just to encourage me.’

There was genuine horror on her face at that, but she turned away again, head bowed, gripping the rail so tightly that her knuckles whitened.

I grabbed her by the shoulders and turned her round roughly. ‘Look, that plane was all I had in the world and it’s not salvageable, so I’m finished, Sister. A ruined man because I played the Good Samaritan last night. At least I’m entitled to know why’

She looked up at me calmly without struggling and nodded. ‘You are right, dear friend. I owe you that at least. Perhaps there is a quiet place you know of? Somewhere we could talk …’

I took the road to Talamanca then followed a cart track that brought us after a couple of miles to an old ruined farmhouse in an olive grove above the sea. There wasn’t a soul around. She sat on a low stone wall which had once marked the boundary of the grove and I sprawled on the ground at her feet and smoked a cigarette.

It was a marvellous day and quite suddenly, nothing seemed to matter very much. I narrowed my eyes, watching a hawk spiralling down out of the blue and she said, ‘Did you really mean what you said back there in the church? That you are ruined?’

‘As near as makes no difference.’

She sighed, ‘I too, know what it is like to lose everything.’

‘Is that supposed to make me feel better?’

She looked down at me sharply, something very close to anger in her face for the first time, but she controlled it admirably.

‘Perhaps if I told you about it, Mr Nelson.’

‘Has it anything to do with this present affair?’

‘Everything.’ She plucked a green leaf from a caper shrub, shredding it between her fingers as she stared back into the past. ‘I was born in Algeria. In the back country. My father was French, my mother, Bedu.’

‘An interesting mixture,’ I said. ‘Where do you keep your knife?’

She ignored me completely and carried straight on. ‘We had a large estate. Two vineyards. My father was a wealthy man. When de Gaulle declared Algeria independent in 1962 we decided to stay, but by 1965 things were very bad. All agricultural land owned by foreigners had been expropriated and most of the French population had gone. When my mother died, my father decided it was time we left also.’

‘How old were you then?’

‘Just fourteen. He decided to fly us out secretly, mainly because he considered it unlikely that the authorities would allow us to leave with anything worth having.’

‘There was another reason?’

‘I think you could say that.’ She smiled faintly. ‘There was a convent of the Little Sisters of Pity not far from our place at Tizi Benou. An old Moorish palace built like a fortress. I received my education there. During those difficult early years of independence, it acted as a refuge many times and churches over the entire region sent their more tangible assets there for safe keeping rather than see them looted.’

The whole thing was beginning to sound more than interesting and I sat up and turned to face her. ‘These tangible assets - what exactly did they consist of?’

‘Oh, the usual things. Church plate, precious objects of various kinds. Most of this was rendered down into bullion at the convent, crudely, but effective enough.’

‘Why bullion?’ It was something of a superfluous question for I already knew the answer.

‘So that my father could fly it out.’

‘And how much did that little lot come to?’

‘Something over a million pounds sterling in gold and silver. A rough approximation only and then there was a considerable amount in precious stones impossible to estimate and the most important item of all was priceless.’

‘And what was that?’

‘A statue of the Virgin in beaten silver, known as Our Lady of Tizi Benou, but actually manufactured by the great Saracen silversmith, Amor Khalif in Damascus in the eleventh century’

‘My God, but they must have loved you when you flew in with that little lot.’ I said. ‘But we didn’t, Mr Nelson,’ she said calmly. ‘That’s the whole point. It’s still there.’

‘The pilot my father hired was a man named Jaeger. A South African. He flew in from France by night at four hundred feet. He told me that was to foil their radar.’ She shook her head and there was a kind of sadness in her voice. ‘He was so alive. A great, black-bearded man who seemed to laugh all the time and wore a pistol in a shoulder holster. I think he was the most romantic figure I’d ever seen in my life.’

‘What was the aircraft?’

‘A Heron, is that right?’

I nodded, ‘Four engines. They used them for the Queen’s Flight a few years back. What about passengers?’

‘My father and I and Talif who was overseer of the vineyards.’

‘What was his story?’

‘He had worked for my father for years. They were very close.’ She shrugged. ‘He preferred to come with us rather than stay. There should have been others, but there was trouble at the last moment and we had to leave in a hurry.’

‘What went wrong?’

‘Oh, I don’t really know. Somehow the local area commander got to know - Major Taleb. He and my father never really got on. Taleb’s mother had been French, but for some reason that only seemed to make him hate France more. He’d fought with the F.L.N. for years.’

‘What happened?’

‘We took off as Taleb arrived to arrest us. Not that it did us any good. I suppose he must have got on to their air force straightaway’

‘And you were intercepted?’

She nodded. ‘Over the Algerian coast near Cape Djinet. Are you familiar with that coast at all? Do you know the Khufra Marshes?’

‘I’ve heard of them.’

‘Jaeger managed to crash-land and in one of the lagoons in there. He and my father were killed and the Heron went to the bottom, but Talif managed to get me out in time. He took me to a fishing village not far away, a place called Zarza and nursed me back to health. Later, he got me to France and placed me in the care of the Little Sisters at Grenoble.’

‘And did you tell anyone about all this?’

‘Only the Sisters, but there was nothing to be done about the situation obviously. To the Algerians, of course, we were all dead.’

‘So what happened then?’

‘The Order used its influence to get Talif work in Marseilles. I continued my education with them and eventually realised I had a vocation. After my training as a nurse, they sent me to our centre in Dacca.’

‘And now you’re back.’

‘For a time only. I had yellow fever very badly. It was thought that a spell in Grenoble would prove beneficial.’

Which was all absolutely fascinating, but came nowhere near explaining more recent events.

‘So what’s all this got to do with Redshirt and his friends?’ I demanded.

‘That’s simple enough. They work for Taleb. He’s a colonel now in the Algerian Security Police. I’ve made enquiries.’

‘But how in the hell did he come back into the picture?’

‘Talif came to see me in Grenoble three weeks ago. It seems that about a month ago while working on the Marseilles docks, he was recognised by an Algerian merchant navy officer he’d known years before. He packed his bags at once and moved to Lyon where he got work on the night shift at the local market. When he got home one morning, he found Taleb waiting for him in his room. He told Talif that if he came back to Algeria with him and showed them where the plane had gone down, they’d give him ten per cent and a government job.’

‘And what did Talif do?’

‘Pretended to agree, then gave him the slip on the way to Marseilles and came to see me.’ She raised her hands and suddenly her face was flooded by the most glorious smile imaginable. ‘Oh, how can I put it to you. It seemed like a sign. Like something that was meant to be.’

I was completely puzzled. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Our hospital in Dacca was burned to the ground, Mr Nelson. We lost everything. We have willing hands, plenty of those, but now what we need more than anything else in the world is money’

I saw it all then, in that single, precise moment in time and stared at her in astonishment. ‘And you think the best way of raising it is to pay a quick visit by night to the Khufra Marshes.’

‘Exactly,’ she said, her eyes shining. ‘When Mr Jaeger was dying, just before the plane sank he gave me the exact bearing, made me repeat it to him. It’s burned into my brain until this very day’

‘What do the Sisters of Pity think of this little scheme?’

‘They know nothing about it. I was due some leave and I’m taking it. Talif agreed to help and we decided, between us, that Ibiza would be the most suitable base for operations. It’s only two hundred miles from here to Cape Djinet. I borrowed a little money from an old aunt in Dijon and Talif came on ahead of me to procure a suitable boat.’

‘You must be stark, staring, raving mad,’ I said.

‘Not at all. Talif wrote to tell me he had arranged for a boat and was negotiating with a diver. He suggested I join him this week and booked a hotel room for me.’

‘Let me get this straight,’ I said. ‘You actually intend to go with him?’

‘Naturally.’

The whole thing by then, of course, had assumed all the aspects of a privileged nightmare and I was aware of that curiously helpless feeling again where she was concerned.

I said, ‘All right, what about Redshirt and his pals last night.’

‘There was a note from Talif at the hotel when I got in yesterday. It asked me to meet him at the Mill at La Grande at nine o’clock. It seemed genuine enough. I went out there by taxi.’

‘And promptly found yourself in the bag.’

To my astonishment she said, ‘They were not responsible for their actions, those young men. They were all under the influence of drugs.’

‘Oh, I get it,’ I said. ‘I suppose I hit them too hard. Anyway, how can you be sure they weren’t just three fun-loving boys out for kicks?’

‘Because they had an argument about keeping me intact, as the one in the red shirt termed it, for Taleb.’

‘In other words, things just got out of hand?’

‘I suppose so.’

‘And Talif?’

‘Not a word. He gave me no address. Simply told me that he would contact me through the hotel.’

Which didn’t look too good for Talif.

I said, ‘So what are you going to do now?’

‘I don’t know. Look for him, I suppose.’ She hesitated, glanced at me rather shyly, then looked down at her hands. ‘It’s a great imposition I know, Mr Nelson, but I was wondering whether you might be persuaded to help me.’

‘To go into the Khufra Marshes?’ I demanded. ‘You must be joking.’

She held up a hand defensively. ‘Of course not. I simply want to find Talif, that’s all, and it occurred to me that with your local knowledge, you might be able to help.’

The face, framed by the white band of her hood, was as guileless as any child’s. I sighed heavily, got to my feet and gave her a hand up.

‘All right, Sister, I’ll find Talif for you. It should be simple enough. Algerians aren’t exactly thick on the ground in Ibiza. But that’s all - understood?’

‘Perfectly, dear friend,’ she said with that calm, radiant smile of hers, turned and led the way back to the jeep.

I followed a trifle reluctantly, I admit, but when it came right down to it, I didn’t really seem to have much choice - or did I?

The hotel she was staying at was decent enough. Little more than a pension really and it was certainly no tourist trap. Quiet and unpretentious. I could see why Talif had chosen it. There was no one behind the desk in the tiny entrance hall and when I rattled the brass handbell it sounded unnaturally loud in the quiet.

‘I tried to make some enquiries about Talif this morning,’ Sister Claire whispered. ‘But I didn’t get very far. The proprietor only seems to speak Spanish and half a dozen words of English.’

A door at the back opened and a fat, amiable man appeared in a straw hat and green baize apron. From the trowel in his hand it seemed a fair assumption that he had been gardening.

He removed his hat instantly, not for me, but for Sister Claire, a slightly anxious smile on his face. It seemed more than likely that the language difficulty had been a great worry to him.

‘Ah, senor,’ I said in Spanish. ‘Perhaps you could help us?’

The relief on his face was intense and he bobbed his head eagerly. ‘At your orders, senor.’

‘The good Sister is anxious to contact her friend. The one who booked the room for her. Unfortunately she has mislaid his address and as her time is strictly limited …’

‘Ah, the Arab, senor.’ He shrugged. ‘What can I say? He left no address with me.’

I turned to Sister Claire who waited anxiously, ‘It’s no go, I’m afraid.’

And then the proprietor added, ‘Of course, I have seen this man on many occasions, senor.’

‘And where would that be?’

‘Pepe’s place at the other end of the harbour by the breakwater. You know it, senor?’

‘My thanks.’

We went out into the heat of noon. There was a small cafe next to the hotel, tables and chairs spilling across the sidewalk.

‘Did he tell you anything?’

‘Only that Talif’s been in the habit of using a certain bar at the other end of the waterfront. I’ll go and see what I can dig up there.’

‘Can’t I come with you?’

I shook my head. ‘Not your style at all, Sister. The sort of place stevedores and sailors use. They’d run for the hills if a nun walked in. You have a coffee and admire the view.’

I steered her firmly towards a table under a large and colourful umbrella, snapped my fingers for a waiter and was away before she could argue.

She was on her second cup when I got back, the waiter hovering, anxiously a table to two away, for Ibizans, like all Spaniards, have enormous respect for anything to do with the Church.

She looked up eagerly. ‘Did you get anywhere?’

‘I think you could say that.’ I told the waiter to bring me a gin and tonic and sat down. ‘The man who owns the place, Pepe, had arranged to hire Talif a thirty-foot sea-going launch and he was trying to find him a diver.’

‘And Talif?’

‘Pepe hasn’t seen him for the last couple of days, but he was able to tell me where he’s been staying. It seems Talif wanted somewhere cheap and quiet so Pepe arranged for a cousin of his to rent him an old cottage in the hills near Cova Santa.’

‘Is it far?’

‘No more than half-an-hour.’

She didn’t even ask if I would take her, simply pushed back her chair, stood up and waited for me to make a move with obvious impatience.

I swallowed the rest of my gin and tonic hurriedly. ‘Don’t I even get to eat, Sister?’

She frowned in obvious puzzlement. ‘I don’t understand, Mr Nelson.’

I sighed as I took her elbow. ‘Take no notice, Sister. Just my warped sense of humour. Lead on by all means and let us be about the Lord’s business.’

We drove out of town following the main road to San Jose. As was to be expected at that time of day, we had things pretty much to ourselves, the locals having the good sense to get in out of the fierce noonday heat.

She didn’t say a word until we were through Es Fumeral and then she said suddenly, as if trying to make conversation, ‘This Cova Santa you mentioned. What is it? Another village?’

I shook my head. ‘Some underground caverns. A big tourist attraction. The mugs roll up by the bus load during the season to see the stalactites by electric light. Then they’re invited to take part in a barbecue, for which they’ve already paid handsomely. Roast sucking pig and plenty of cheap wine. And I mustn’t forget the exhibition of folk dancing in national costume. They’ll even allow you to take part. A wonderful chance to experience something of the simple joys of peasant life.’

She turned to look at me and I kept my eyes on the road. ‘You hate life then, Mr Nelson, or just people?’

I was angry, touched on the raw, I suppose, and showed it. ‘What in the hell is this supposed to be - confession? Three Hail Marys, two Our Fathers and be a good boy in future.’

She turned to look at me, no anger in her at all, only a slight frown of enquiry and then she sighed, the breath going out of her in a dying fall.

‘Ah, I see what it is. Now I see. It is only yourself you hate. Now why should that be?’

But now we were close to the dangerous edge of things - too close for comfort.

I said warmly. ‘I’ll go to hell in my own way, Sister, like all men. Let’s leave it at that.’

I put my foot down hard and took the jeep away at the kind of speed which made any further conversation impossible.

About a mile up the Cova Santa road and still following Pepe’s instructions I turned left into a cart track and climbed into the hills.

On the lower slopes there was a farm or two, terraces of almonds and wheat still in its young growth, but we climbed higher into a wilder terrain of jagged peaks and narrow, tortuous ravines, stunted pines carpeting the slopes.

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