THE ENGLISH WITNESS (28 page)

“Come out, Jack,” shouted Julio. “We can
do this the quick, easy way. But if you annoy me any further there’s another
way. Your friend is going to get a bullet in the stomach on the count of three.
One… Two…”

Jack took his right hand away from the
pistol and stood up, positioning himself at a slight angle to Julio so that his
hanging left hand and the pistol it held were shielded from view. Txako was
kneeling on all fours on one of the cove’s few sandy patches, which was now
stained with his blood. Julio was standing over him, the gun trained diagonally
down at his head. Txako looked up into Jack’s eyes from a distance of no more
than half a dozen metres. His hair was grey, his face sunken, his posture limp
and defeated, but his eyes said something more daring. He flicked them three
times towards Julio, and Jack knew there was a message in there. For another
second he pondered, then he noticed that Txako was bracing his upper body
weight on a large, round stone. At least, that is how his slumped posture made
it seem. But his fingers were wrapped so tightly round it that the knuckles
were white.

Jack got the message. He casually raised
his eyes to the path down the cliff, and smiled but said nothing. A moment later,
Julio noticed where his gaze was focused. He abruptly pointed the gun at the Englishman’s
chest. “What’s going on?” he snapped.

“You’re too late,” muttered Jack without
looking at him. “The cavalry’s here.”

Too surprised and bewildered to shoot,
Julio whirled round to follow Jack’s eyes. But before he had turned his body
more than a few degrees, Txako’s hand flew upwards. Ballasted by the stone he
had been holding, it smashed into Julio’s groin with a dull thud. The effect
was spectacular. For a split second the tall man held out against nature by
sheer force of will. Then he abruptly jack-knifed into the classic wounded male
pose. His hands, including the one holding the gun, went between his legs.

“Jimmy, run,” wailed Txako, but Jack’s
own conscience got in the way, and he lost the chance of ever finding out how
Txako came to be there. In what seemed like slow motion, Julio’s pistol came
back up. Normal combat tactics dictate that you take out the enemy with the gun
first, but Jack’s gun was out of sight while Txako was close at hand and looking
up at him insolently. The Ruger swung down towards Txako’s chest. There was a
flash and a report, and he leather-clad figure pitched backwards onto the sand.

The next moment, the gun in Jack’s hand
was firing—a much deeper sound than the crack of the Ruger. One, two, three, and
click—the ammunition was spent. But Julio was lying stretched out on the sand
with blood gushing from his head and chest. Jack did not think he was a danger
any longer, but he kicked the Ruger away from its owner’s outstretched hand and
rushed over to see Txako. “Lord, into your hands…” muttered the monk in his
final delirium, then he was still.

Jack turned to examine Julio. The dying
man seemed unable to move or even speak, but his eyes showed awareness and
horror. It took several minutes for the light in them to fade.

Starting with Julio, Jack searched both dead
men’s pockets and quickly found the two things he was looking for. The digital
recorder that contained his tormented oral account of the past, he tucked
firmly down into his own trouser pocket. Then, in a zipped compartment in the
lining of his old friend’s leathers, he found an undamaged mobile phone.

He stood up, tapped in a number, and a
few seconds later a smile came to his lips. “Hi darling,” he shouted over the
sound of the sea. “I just wanted to let you know I’m OK. I’ll be getting the
train back up to Paris in the morning… Yes, I’m sorry, I haven’t been able to
charge my phone… Yes, it is the sea you can hear; it’s quite rough… No,
Antonio’s not with me right now. He had to lie down… Yes, it’s done me good. I’ll
see you the day after tomorrow, and I’ve got a lot to tell you. Bye, darling. Pass
on my love to the kids.”

Starting with the snub-nosed pistol and
going on to the Ruger and finally Txako’s rifle, Jack ejected the magazines and
hammered each barrel against a rock until it was ruined beyond any chance of
repair. Then he hurled the gun parts and the phone out to sea, and picked his
way back to the foot of the path. He had not been looking forward to the long,
dark walk up to the headland, and he was relieved to see Txako’s BMW standing
there with the key in the lock. Forcing his head into a helmet that was a
little too small for him, he kicked a leg over the saddle and folded away the
stand. Then he started the engine, and, rather gingerly at first because he was
out of practice, he rode the BMW up the footpath into the gathering night.