Monday August 4 th 2008
What a fucking day.
I waited for Maria at the shop and, when she went home for lunch, I followed her. I had made up my mind to approach her before she got back to the flat: after spending the night trying to figure a way to beat the system.
I had visited the shop twice in the morning, once when it was busy and once when it was quiet. On both occasions Maria escorted me into the box room. Short of mugging her I was at a loss as to how to check out the code from the envelope.
On the way home she stopped at a corner store. I couldn’t see what she was buying but when she emerged I walked up to her and put on my best smile. She offered a polite but wary ola. I explained that I was on my way to the shop and had caught sight of her. I apologised for approaching her in the street.
‘Do you fancy a cup of coffee? I have a little favour to ask.’
I expected to be blanked but she surprised me.
‘There is a small cafe around the corner. Ten minutes and then I need to go.’
I smiled.
When we got in the cafe we sat at the only free table and she ordered an espresso. I doubled on that.
‘So how can I help?’
‘I have a small issue to do with a friend of mine,’ I started. ‘He is a customer of yours and, when he heard I was coming to Mallorca, he asked me to pick up something from his security box.’
‘And your friend’s name is…?’
‘Well there it gets a little more awkward. You see the account is not his. Well not strictly his. It belongs to a friend who passed away sometime ago.’
‘And their name is…?’
‘Eh? Well. Awkward. My friend won’t tell me but I have the code for the box.’
‘So let me get this straight. A friend of yours has an account with us. Rather a friend of a friend of yours does. Your friend wants the contents and gives you the code but you don’t know what this friend’s friend’s name is.’
I nodded.
‘Senor, I cannot help you.’
‘Look I know it sounds fishy but here’s the bottom line. I’ll give you the code. Go and check for yourself. I’m not sure the bloody thing exists. I’ve spent enough time on this already. I’m supposed to be on holiday.’
“So why did you open an account?”
“I wanted to check that it was possible. That’s why I came in twice this morning. I mean it sounds daft to me and I wanted to check that the code I have might be genuine. My account and the friend’s account numbers have the same number of digits‘.
‘I still cannot help.’
‘Look all I’m asking for is a little help.’
‘But I cannot open someone’s box.’
‘Why not?’
‘You are not the box’s owner so I cannot help.’
She drained her coffee. This was not going anywhere so I changed tack.
‘Do you enjoy your job?’
‘Si.’
‘It seems strange that you work on your own all the time. Don’t you have any help?’
‘It is the way my boss likes to run things.’
‘What do you do on your days off?’
She said nothing.
‘You do get days off.’
She went to stand up. I reached out and put my hand on hers.
‘Look I’m not an ogre and I’m not trying to chat you up. I just said I would pick up the contents for a friend and I like to keep my word.’
The chat up line was weak but to my surprise she sat back down.
‘Where are you from?’ I asked.
She opened up a little. Mainly small chat but she didn’t seem in a hurry to get away once she got chatting.
She was from Barcelona, although she had spent ten years working in London. This explained her excellent English. She had been working in hotels. Mostly cleaning. She knew she had no future in the UK and was tired of businessmen hitting on her. It seemed that some of the guests thought that the maid was a complimentary extra. Her sister lived in Palma and had told her that a friend of her husband’s was looking for someone who knew the UK, to manage one of his stores.
Maria had jumped at the chance and for a year she had managed the Palma branch of Mallorca Security.
Most of the customers were British and to her dismay the customers took it for granted she was on the game. Mallorca Security turned out to have a far sleazier clientele than even the worst hotels had exposed her to. She had complained to her boss who had moved her to the Inca branch.
Things were better in Inca. The new job was much like the old one, only quieter. At first there had been three of them working the shop but, earlier that year, this had been reduced to two and for the last three weeks she had been on her own. She worked six days a week.
‘I need to go now.’
I stood up to let her leave. She looked at me.
‘Come to the shop at six o’clock and I will see if I can help.’
With that she was off.
I have no idea why she changed her mind. I didn’t utter a word during her monologue. Maybe she just needed someone to listen. Maybe I look sympathetic. Maybe her money problems made her act a little irrationally. Although if she had such worries she never mentioned them. I didn’t care. This was the in I needed and the fact it didn’t involve breaking and entering was good news.
I was outside the shop before five thirty. I wanted to check that I wasn’t being set up. It had occurred to me, while lying on the hotel bed, that maybe she had decided to phone her boss and tell him about our little chat.
Two people entered and left as I looked on. Both looked like customers and, unless someone was hiding in the back shop, Maria seemed to be on her own.
I walked into the shop at six on the dot.
Maria smiled and gently nodded her head up and to the left. I put on my ‘what the…’ face and she did it again. I looked over and realised she was motioning towards the CCTV. I nodded and told her I wanted access to my box. She clicked the little gate that led to the box room door. I punched in my code and the door opened. I walked in.
Once inside the box room I looked round but there was no sign of a CCTV — but given the size of cameras nowadays that meant nothing. I assumed that there was none. I couldn’t see anyone being too happy at being watched as they deposited and withdrew from the boxes. The few Mallorca Security customers that I had seen didn’t seem the kind to take well to such intrusion.
To keep up appearances I retrieved my box and retired to one of the three small booths.
The booths looked like voting booths, even down to the small drawn curtain and shelf where you would have marked your X on the voting slip. It occurred to me that they may well be second hand voting booths — it would fit with the Mallorca Security cost ethic.
I heard the door open behind me, followed by the soft whoosh of cloth opening and a voice came from the booth next to mine.
‘Give me the code.’
I told her and she left. A few seconds later and she returned, holding a box. I was surprised at how quickly she had found it. After all the only thing I had was the code and there were a lot of boxes in the room to check. I took it and laid it next to my own and lifted the lid.
My mouth dropped open.
A single sheet of paper lay in the bottom of the box. Written large in flowery script were the words:
‘Bonjour. Vous etes mort.’
I knew next to fuck all French but I recognised the word for dead. Jesus this was a set up. Either that or an elaborate joke. I closed the box and left the booth. Maria looked at me and I knew she was wondering why I didn’t return the boxes to their homes. The reason was simple. If this was a set up I needed to get the fuck out of this place with speed.
As I slammed open the door leading to the front shop I saw two men standing at the entrance door. Both were looking directly at me. As soon as I appeared they stepped forward. I weighed up the option to charge them, but they were bruisers and focussed on me. Dupree’s men. I jumped back into the room and pulled the door shut. I heard the lock click and could only hope they didn’t have the access code. I turned to Maria.
‘Is there another way out?’
‘Why?’
‘There are two men about to break down that door and they don’t want to talk to me about the weather.’
She surprised me by running past me towards the door. I thought she was going to open it. Instead, she slammed her hand on a small red button on the wall. I heard a click and then an alarm went off.
‘They won’t be able to get in. The alarm changes the code.’
‘How do we get out?’
‘We don’t. We wait on the police.’
‘The police. I don’t want the police.’
‘What else would you have me do?’
She tilted her head towards the ceiling.
I looked up and spotted a tiny camera — almost hidden from view. I realised that I had gone into thick mode. She was acting exactly as she should have in the situation.
A customer had just told her he was under attack and she had hit the alarm. If someone was recording this, then her actions wouldn’t look out of place; she was one smart cookie.
I had no choice but to wait for the police to arrive, and they did within minutes. I heard rapping on the door and a splash of Spanish. Maria responded and unlocked the door.
Two policemen stood in the doorway. Maria went all talk, talk, talk and I was ushered out of the room. Once they had established I couldn’t speak Spanish one of them told me, in broken English, to sit on a chair. When they were finished with Maria she came over with them and acted as translator.
‘Just tell them what happened,’ she said.
I kept it simple and didn’t embellish. I told them that I had seen the two men advance towards me and panicked. They asked if I had any reason to think they would attack me. I told them that I didn’t. The questioning turned to who I was, where I was staying and so on. The conversation was shorter than I expected and, after a few minutes more with Maria on her own, they left.
‘You should go now. My boss will be here. The alarm goes to his mobile phone.’
She was whispering. Christ the place was bugged for sound as well.
‘Will he know you let me see the other box?’ I whispered back.
‘I will quit before he finds this out. Now go.’
I got up and, with a thank-you, I left.
Outside I scanned the road and pavements. I was certain that the two men would be waiting. It was just a matter of where.
I headed away from my hotel. My head was in a flat spin. None of this made sense. Why would Dupree set me up? Why had the men not lifted me before I went to the shop? It was hardly the best place to grab someone. Had Dupree conned Martin and Spencer into helping or had he threatened them? If so, to what end? Why the hell lead me to Spain? More questions than answers.
I turned into the first street and then left into the next. The road headed up a hill and under a bridge. I walked quickly and as I passed under the bridge I looked back and saw the two men less than fifty yards behind me. I hit the gas pedal and sprinted up the incline.
At the top, the street opened into a wide boulevard peppered with shops. There were some shoppers around but probably not enough to worry my pursuers.
I ran across the boulevard and saw a small lane on my left. It was roofed in and I dived into it — hoping it wasn’t a dead end. I slowed to a jog — there was no way I could keep a sprint on. Then I had an idea. Not a good one, but an idea.
I exited onto another road and turned in the direction of my hotel. I checked behind and the two men tumbled out behind me. I moved back to a jog.
After a couple of hundred yards I slowed to a quick walk as I was running out of breath again. A glance behind and the two men were also walking. At the next corner I walked out of view and then, grabbing energy from somewhere, I ran, sprinted for thirty yards and dived into a small gap between a house and a factory.
There was a wall about five feet high at the end of the gap and I jumped over it and into a small courtyard. A quick scan and I could see there was no way out, save through a series of what looked like back doors.
I slumped behind the wall, counted to thirty and then looked back over the wall. I could see maybe two yards of pavement from where I was and there was no sign of the pursuers. I jumped back into the small alley and slowly walked up to where the pavement started.
I poked my head around and looked to the left. About twenty yards away the two men were gazing around, one of them was on the phone — I ducked back in. I waited for another count of thirty and looked out. The men were gone. I exited the gap and ran to my right and hit the road that the hotel lay in.
If there were others waiting at my hotel I was screwed but there was fuck all I could do about that.
I hit the lobby at a flat spin and raced up the stairs to my room. Two minutes later and I was back on the street, suitcase in hand. I thanked God that I had kept it packed and ready to go.
I pulled the car keys from my pocket. The car was parked at the end of the hotel road and, as I jumped in, I heard a shout. I slammed the door shut and hit the central locking before pushing the key into the ignition. My hands were sweating but I got the key home first time and started the engine. I heard a thump as someone or something hit the car and I hit the accelerator. I glanced in my rear view mirror and saw the two men screaming at me.
I kept my foot down and horns went up around me before I realised I was driving on the wrong side of the road. I came within inches of front ending a Fiat 500. I swerved to the right and spent ten minutes losing myself in the maze of streets before heading for the motorway that led to Palma.
I had no plan beyond getting the hell out of Inca and, as I passed a Lidl supermarket I hit a roundabout that sat above the motorway. I only had eyes for Palma and the plane home. But the flight was four days away. Add to this that Dupree would have a watch put on the airport and I changed my mind and took the motorway north to Alcudia and Puerto Pollensa.
I kept my foot as close to illegal as made no difference — putting the miles between me and Inca. At the Puerto Pollensa turnoff I slid off the motorway and turned left towards Pollenca and Puerto Pollensa.
Five miles along the road I pulled off onto a dirt track. The light had long since gone and the adrenalin from the encounter had turned sour. I found an open gate to a field and slid the car into the field.
I put my head back and dozed for an hour before waking and pulling out my digital recorder to waffle for a while.
It’s time for bed and I have no plan for tomorrow.