Message From Malaga (44 page)

“We wouldn’t give them any valuable information, of course. But one thing is vitally important: we must not arouse their fears. We don’t want them secretly skipping out for asylum in Moscow. So take it easy, Ian. Don’t probe, don’t test them. Don’t—don’t anything. Got that?”

“Martin will be the easier for me to handle. I don’t like
him, and he doesn’t like me. But Waterman...” Yes, that was another matter altogether. I’ll have to stop remembering him as a friend; I’ll have to keep thinking of him as a Soviet agent. What is his role? Martin is a double agent, obviously. But Waterman? Just a highly trained man who had been skilfully directed into sensitive spots? No, he must be more than that. What’s his specialty? Propaganda, disinformation, or simple espionage? Or is he a future contact for the Marxist underground in America? He speaks of making a close study of their newspapers—that could be his future cover. Or is he connected in some way with Department Thirteen? Why else is he involved in tracking down Fuentes?

O’Connor came out of his own long silence, said angrily, “We are way ahead of ourselves. Nothing is proved. Nothing is certain. Nothing.” There was a definite pause while he got his control back. “By the way,” he said, forging into a pleasanter subject, “you must have made good time up that tunnel. You did a first-rate job. We are all grateful. I was a little worried that Tavita might delay you. She’s a powerful delayer, that woman. All the feminine tricks and hesitations.”

Ferrier was worried, unhappy, restless. He rose, searched for a cigarette. “No delay,” he said abruptly. “She was on the telephone when I arrived. Some journalist wanted to interview her this evening. Big deal. Except—Gene Lucas is setting up a fake interview with Tavita. It’s his excuse for entering the house.”

“How did you learn that?” And O’Connor did not like it.

“From Amanda. And unless you start believing her, the opposition is not going to leave Granada disgruntled. They are going to leave with some hard information. Sure, they won’t find Fuentes at Tavita’s. But they’ll question her.”

“They most certainly will.”

“She may deny everything. She doesn’t scare easily.”

“That,” said O’Connor, “will depend on how they ask their questions. And don’t think that these boys will hold back just because she is famous, popular, a woman who would make page one on any Spanish newspaper. When is that interview?”

“I didn’t have time to ask Amanda.” And that was a bad slip on my part, thought Ferrier. “But—” he thought back to Tavita’s final remarks on the telephone—“Tavita said she probably could arrange an interview for ten tonight.”

O’Connor threw up his hands. “Which gives them a pretty good tip that she expects Fuentes to be gone by then. She might as well have said the all clear sounded at ten.” He rose, paced slowly to the window, smoothed his hair with one hand, and let his mind grope for a possibility. “They’ll step in earlier, try to get Fuentes before we can move him from Tavita’s house. Yes, that’s how they may well be planning it. They’ll arrive any time between now and eight o’clock. Certainly before nine. They’ll figure that we’ll be on the scene as soon as it is dark enough.” As indeed we would have if Fuentes had really been hidden at Tavita’s place. That was exactly what I was planning this morning when Ben Waterman drove me around on that scouting expedition. Ben Waterman... Oh, for God’s sake, surely not. O’Connor swung round and glared at Ferrier. If any other outsider had brought me that story, O’Connor thought, I’d have laughed him out of the room. But Ferrier is no fool—that’s the damnable part. “Look, you’d better get around right away, see Tavita. Tell her that the safest thing for everyone, herself included, is to keep saying that Fuentes was only a rumour. Just that. Nothing more.”

“What if I got her away—took her out for a drink, kept her out all evening? They’d search the house, and then leave.”

“And come back tomorrow to question her. They won’t leave without hearing her story. I think you’d better tell her there is some real danger—” O’Connor stopped, listened, went quickly over to the door, let Sam inside.

“Sorry I’m late,” Sam seemed a little more subdued than usual. He avoided O’Connor’s eyes. “I’ve been searching the bar, the terrace, the public rooms, the shops. Waterman wasn’t in his own room.”

O’Connor stared at him, his lips tightening. He glanced irritably at the telephone, which had chosen this moment to start ringing.

“The bed wasn’t even slept on. The maid had turned it down for his siesta. But not one dent, not one wrinkle. Virgin-pure. His grey suit was hanging under his bathrobe in the closet.” Sam looked over at Ferrier, gave him a nod. “Boy,” he said softly, “did you call it!”

O’Connor was too busy answering the telephone to make any comment of his own. “...He did, did he? What colour of suit?... All right. Stay on the job, Burt. Tell Al to keep a sharp watch for the Ames girl. Let me know as soon as she arrives.” He put down the receiver slowly. He said, “Waterman has just returned to the hotel in a taxi. He’s wearing a navy-blue suit.” Then he sat down, kept his eyes fixed on the wrinkled rug at his feet. “Well,” he said at last, “we listen to Ferrier. We’ve been warned. And if we can’t act on that, we shouldn’t be in this business.” He paused. “We’ll deal with Waterman. And Martin. I’ll make sure of that,” he added softly. He raised his head, looked at Sam. “For the next few hours, we just follow the plan.
No change. And play it easy—no jokes, no bright remarks.”

“From me?” Sam was all innocence. Then he turned serious. “I’ll be careful. Don’t worry.” And then one last crack, “Won’t even mention Kim Philby.”

“If you do, I’ll send you back to Max with your guts hanging out.”

“Pure Hieronymus Bosch,” said Sam cheerfully. He noticed Ferrier’s quick glance. “Another
aficionado
?” he asked with interest. “Have you seen—”

“Keep that for later,” O’Connor said. “We have plenty of other problems to solve.”

“Don’t we always? And thank God a double agent is seldom one of them. Martin is the first I’ve met. I’ve heard of them—there isn’t an intelligence agency that doesn’t get infiltrated. But Martin’s a first for me.” He sobered, watching the deep depression settling on O’Connor’s face. “Look at it this way, Bob. You’ve completed a successful mission—”

“Not yet.”

I know that, thought Sam. He went on determinedly, “And as an extra bonus, you’ve flushed out a double agent. Waterman, too.”

“Ferrier did that.”

Ferrier said, “No, Amanda.” And where was she? He had been delaying as long as possible, watching that telephone, hoping it would ring with Al’s report that she had just stepped into the lobby. But he had to get over to Tavita’s place. He began moving to the door. “Any further instructions—”

“Damn his miserable soul to everlasting hell,” O’Connor burst out, rose violently to his feet. “A thousand honest men—doing a job that has to be done, doing it well—risking
everything, sometimes their freedom, even their lives—a thousand of them and more. And one Martin comes along to smear them with his filth. One traitor, and a thousand are—” O’Connor broke off, fought for control.

“I always thought the Romans crucified the wrong man. It should have been Judas,” Sam said thoughtfully.

O’Connor took a long, deep breath, became aware that Ferrier had stopped half-way to the door, was rooted there by his outburst. “Instructions?” O’Connor asked, picking out the word he had heard distantly in his surge of anger.

“Instructions for Tavita,” Ferrier said. And I needn’t worry that Martin—or Waterman—is going to get away with it. No, I can stop worrying about that.

O’Connor was back to normal. He said briskly, “Perhaps you should call her first. Tell her to lock up, tight. Not to let anyone enter her house until you arrive. I’ve got the damnedest feeling that they are all ready to move in.”

Because Waterman had come back to the hotel, was probably on his way up here to keep them talking, keep them stuck in this room? Ferrier decided he would rather not face Waterman at all. He didn’t trust himself to play it quite so smoothly as O’Connor had suggested. “I’ll make the call from my room.”

“No need. The security of this place has been shot to hell. Just word your message carefully, that’s all. And I’d like to know what she says. If necessary, I’ll talk with her, too.”

Security shot to hell... Yes, thought Ferrier, everything keeps coming back to Waterman. I can’t stop thinking about him, wondering what started him on the traitor’s road. He made a good haul, here. Max, and Sam, and some of the other agents that Max brought in. And Mike last night in Málaga. Yes, he
has learned names and faces, clobbered their security. Good God, I’m talking about Ben Waterman—can I really be talking about Ben? Ben Waterman?

“I’ll get that number for you,” O’Connor said. “Finish your drink.”

It was engaged.

O’Connor’s language was getting worse by the second. Sam was grave, Ferrier gaunt with worry. And this was when Ben Waterman arrived.

“Well, well,” he said cheerfully, “you look the picture of gloom. I could hear you out in the hall, Bob.” He looked at O’Connor enquiringly. He was flushed, perhaps from hurrying, perhaps from the afternoon sun. And if he had been asked, he could have said he had had a very good sleep, thank you. He had changed his suit. He was back to his usual grey. “Who is your target?”

“Everything and everyone and mostly myself,” O’Connor said vehemently.

And how do I call Tavita? Ferrier wondered.

“Frustrations,” O’Connor went on. “Whoever said this was the simplest way to make a living?”

Waterman walked over to the window, looked out. “Well—you get a view like this one. And all expenses paid. Travel and meet the world.” He turned back. “What you needed this afternoon was a good deep sleep. All those late nights and early-morning rising. Why don’t you have a nap before dinner? Which reminds me—are we having dinner here, or are we stopping somewhere on the road to Seville?”

“I don’t know,” O’Connor said, and he was perfectly honest about that. “Possibly we’ll be leaving soon—at least I will. No
point in hanging around for nothing. Max will probably decide to stay for a day or so. He’s pretty mad—”

“Where is that big beef-eater, anyway? I thought we’d have seen him glowering at us from behind a menu at lunchtime. Or has he given up food for the duration, like you, Bob? You’ll be in trouble if you don’t eat and sleep more. Never pays.”

“Max has been seeing his friends,” O’Connor said cryptically.

“Some of these mysterious characters who sit over café tables?” Then Waterman became serious as he noted O’Connor’s worried frown. He said sympathetically, “Have they been giving him bad news?”

“No news at all,” O’Connor snapped. “And that’s bad.”

“No lead about this Tomás Fuentes?”

O’Connor shook his head. “Just rumours, and all conflicting. The same as in Málaga. The same as in Washington. Who has been feeding us a dish of tripe?”

“Oh, come on, Bob—it can’t be as bad as that.”

“It can be. A bloody waste of effort and time.”

“But this morning when I dropped you off at Tavita’s place you seemed pretty cheerful. What has soured you?”

O’Connor seemed to hesitate. “I was following a pretty hopeful lead. It looked good. I thought the whole business was settled. And it wasn’t.”

“I don’t get you. But then, I haven’t been told too much.”

“No reason why you shouldn’t know, now. I thought Fuentes might be there. He wasn’t. Not one trace of him. Nothing.”

“You searched?”

“All three terraces, every room, talked with the servants.”

“And Tavita allowed this?” Waterman enjoyed the picture he was seeing in his mind’s eye. “I’d have bet she would have
stamped her foot, flashed her eyes, and given you a good old flamenco toss of the head.”

“I came as a friend of a friend. And I was diplomatic. Hell, what do you think kept me there so long?”

“Did you actually speak the magic word ‘Fuentes’?”

“At the end of the visit. Brought it up unexpectedly. And that was where she stamped her foot, flashed her eyes, and burst into a stream of Spanish, none of it complimentary. She really hates Fuentes’ guts.”

“Then she knows him. Don’t you see, Bob? She is covering up—”

“She knew him some thirty-odd years ago.”

“A long memory.”

“When you build up that kind of reputation for yourself, you aren’t easily forgotten.”

“A real bogey man. But he couldn’t have been much of a public figure—at least, I never heard his name and I thought I knew some of Spain’s history. What is his real importance now? Or is that breaking security?”

“It is. But perhaps it isn’t, if what I’m beginning to believe is on the right track. He’s another dead myth.”

“And all your trip to Spain was based on a rumour?”

“That’s how we work, Ben. Just like a newspaperman. We follow a rumour until it peters out. And this one is petering out hard. Tomás Fuentes isn’t in Granada. That’s the maddening—”

The telephone rang. “Just a minute,” O’Connor said. This was either Burt or Al with another report from the lobby. “Yes, go ahead Max, go ahead.” O’Connor listened to Al’s slightly astonished voice. But the report was clear enough, even if the phrases were carefully disguised. It was, in effect, a joint report.
From Burt came the information that Gene Lucas had returned in the Buick he had been using, parked it in front of the hotel. Three of his friends had already arrived and were staying outside with their cars—a Chrysler and a Mercury, each with a white oval plate clearly marking its origin as the USA.

“Oh, no,” O’Connor said in disgust, and then let Al continue his own report. He had seen Lucas talk briefly with someone in the bar and then go to his room after a quick visit to the lounge.

“Beautiful, just beautiful,” O’Connor said in even greater disgust. “Not one scrap of confirmation? Come on, Max, your people can do better than that.” He listened to Al’s brief comment on his remark. Around him, the silence of the room grew solid; there wasn’t a movement. “I just can’t advise you. Not over the phone. But I’ll be pulling out tonight. I’ve wasted time enough. Sorry about bringing you here... I know, I know. What else could we have done? Ignore it?... All right. See you next time around.” He ended the call, reminded himself to compliment Max on the way he had picked Al (trained, perhaps?), and sat down on the bed. He looked not only beaten but also baffled. “Oh, well,” he said, and left his thoughts right there. “Have you a cigarette, Ian?”