A Silent Death

Chapter Nine

Sunlight cut sharp shadows into the mountains that spread their volcanic tendrils down through the coastal plane to the sea. Malaga gathered itself around the long curve of the bay and spilled out along the coastline east and west, as well as reaching back through fertile valleys into the plantations that climbed up into the Andalusian interior.

Mackenzie’s plane banked as it came in to land, and he saw the vibrant blue of the sea shimmering in the afternoon light. The plane had encountered some gentle turbulence as it descended over the mountains, but the sky was cloudless, and the pilot had told them that the temperature on the ground was in the high twenties. It was hard to believe that just over three hours ago he had been standing in the departure lounge at Glasgow watching rain run like tears down the glass, blurring the runway and reducing the sky to a grey smudge.

He tried not to think too much about his uncle, or the strange compassion which had overcome him as he watched the old man weeping at the kitchen table. He had not, Mackenzie was certain, deserved his nephew’s sympathy. And yet Mackenzie had found himself making a pot of tea, sitting down with him at the table, talking him through Hilda’s illness, the life that lay ahead, and how he would have to adapt to it.

Advice, he thought ironically, that he might have given himself in the wake of his separation from Susan. But separation was not death, even if it felt like it.

He had phoned to order a delivery of Indian from the restaurant at Clarkston Toll, and the two of them had shared a bottle of cheap white wine and eaten lamb bhuna Madras in an oddly comforting silence.

As suspected, he had barely slept, and climbed stiffly out of his bed to dress while it was still dark. At the foot of the ladders, he had heard the old man breathing heavily through his sleep in the back bedroom, and crept into the kitchen to leave him a note. He thought for several long minutes with the pen in his hand before scribbling his address. Then, I’ll be here for the next few weeks if you need me. And signing it simply, John.

He did not expect to hear from him, and hoped that he would not, but something had compelled him to make the offer. He had no idea what or why.

The terminal building was crowded with holidaymakers. Men in cargo shorts and brightly coloured shirts wheeling enormous suitcases, women in short skirts and print dresses and oversized sunglasses, anticipation in their raised voices of sunshine and sangria. Mackenzie felt conspicuous in his dark suit, and although he had dispensed with the black tie, he wore his depression like a shroud. Had anyone paid him the least attention, they would have known he was not here on holiday.

In his briefing he had been told he would be taken to a secure room at the airport where Cleland would be held under armed guard. There would be paperwork to be signed. A formality. But it was important that Mackenzie read it all carefully before signing. Which is why they had wanted someone fluent in Spanish. He and Cleland would then be escorted on to the aeroplane by armed officers who would leave the aircraft only when all other passengers had boarded and it was ready to depart. Cleland would be hand and leg-cuffed, and be removed from the plane on landing by officers of the Metropolitan police. Mackenzie, Beard had told him, would be no more than a glorified babysitter.

Mackenzie was expecting to be met by someone at the gate. He stood waiting impatiently for fifteen minutes, during which time his fellow passengers disembarked and headed off along a concourse that vanished into a lost and echoing distance. Announcements over the public address system made no reference to him in either English or Spanish.

Finally, reluctantly, he set off along the concourse himself. He had not anticipated having to clear passport control, remaining airside and never officially entering Spain. But in the absence of any information to the contrary he joined the queue at international arrivals and took out his iPhone. To his annoyance he found that it was not yet logged into the local server. He could not even call London to clarify his situation. He sighed his frustration and felt his blood pressure rising. Why was it that people were incapable of making plans and sticking to them?

He supposed that maybe someone might be waiting for him beyond passport control, but if so why had he not been told? It was a further ten minutes before he was syphoned off with others from the lengthening queue for the automatic passport readers, and invited across a white line to face an immigration officer who glared at him through a glass screen. Mackenzie slipped his passport through the hatch and glared back. An electronic reader below the counter scanned his biometric details before his passport was pushed back at him, and a flick of the head welcomed him to Spain.

There was no one waiting to greet him on the other side. No one raising a card with Mackenzie scrawled on it. Mackenzie was at a loss. He checked his phone and saw with relief that he now had a signal. He dialled the NCA and listened to it ringing two thousand miles away.

‘National Crime Agency, how may I help you?’

‘This is Investigator John Mackenzie. Could you put me through to Director Beard?’

‘The Director is not here today.’

‘You must have an emergency number for him.’

‘Is this an emergency?’

‘No, I want to wish him happy birthday. Of course it’s a fucking emergency!’ He closed his eyes and cursed himself for swearing.

‘One moment.’ Not a hint in the voice at the other end that his sarcasm had even registered.

Mackenzie sighed again. Why bother asking him to wait one moment when they both knew it was going to be much longer than that. In fact it was almost three minutes before the operator got back to him.

‘I’m sorry, Director Beard is not contactable right now. Can I take a message?’

Mackenzie fought to control his anger. ‘Tell him that John Mackenzie called and that it is very important he call me back as soon as possible.’

He returned the phone to his shirt pocket and looked about him, at a loss for what to do now. This was not going well. On an impulse he decided to follow the signs to baggage reclaim. From there he knew it would be possible to exit the terminal building itself. Perhaps someone would be waiting there.

As he cleared the customs hall, Mackenzie found himself confronted by a crowd of taxi and shuttle drivers all holding up cards. He scanned them quickly to establish that his name was not among them, then stepped through sliding glass doors on to a concrete apron thick with boisterous holidaymakers. Streams of people headed off towards a tunnel where taxis and shuttle buses and private cars came and went with relentless frequency. Others crossed a roadway to a multi-storey car park.

Mackenzie felt a rush of insecurity. He remembered his first day at school, taking a wrong turning on the way home after what had felt like an endless day. In all the years since, he had not experienced such a complete sense of loss and bewilderment. He had absolutely no idea what to do. The flight to London was scheduled to depart in two hours. If no one had contacted him before then, he decided that he would simply fly home. He carried the electronic ticket in his inside jacket pocket.

Across the concourse he spotted a tapas restaurant called Gambrinus and realized quite suddenly that he was hungry. Breakfast had consisted of coffee and a croissant at Glasgow Airport, hours ago now. He was about to head for the restaurant and get something to eat when he spotted the blue and white chequered stripes of a white Nissan SUV pulling up at the kerb short of the tunnel. Policía Local was painted across its doors. A petite uniformed policewoman scrambled out of the driver’s door, reaching back for a square of white card. She slammed the door shut before hurrying across the concourse towards the entrance to the arrivals hall.

Mackenzie inclined his head as she scurried past him and saw the word MCKENZEE scrawled on her card in the blue ink of a felt-tipped pen.

‘Señora,’ he called after her, and she glanced back without stopping. He raised his voice in fluent Spanish, although he had not actually spoken it in some time. ‘I think maybe you’re looking for me.’

This time she stopped and looked at him a little more closely. She raised her card at the same time as her eyebrows, silently asking if he was the MCKENZEE she was looking for. The card was upside down. He indicated as much with a turn of his finger. She looked at it and quickly turned it the right way up. He walked towards her.

‘Only that’s not how you spell it. It’s M-A-C, with an I-E at the end.’

She frowned, and he saw that she was flushed and flustered and perspiring freely.

‘And you’re late. I mean is this really how you people operate? I expected to be met at the gate by...’ He glanced at her uniform for some indication of rank. But there was none, just a police insignia to the right of the reflective yellow across her chest, the word Policía in grey on the left. A checkered black and white strip beneath the yellow of her otherwise black uniform suggested that she might be nothing more than a lowly constable. The only marking on either sleeve was a green and white patch sewn on to her upper left arm and bearing the legend Policía Local Marviña. He hesitated. ‘By... someone more senior.’

She bristled. ‘Someone other than a woman, you mean?’

Mackenzie bristled back. ‘Armed guards, I was told. I should have remained airside the whole time. And where is Cleland?’

Her face coloured, and a little of her self-assurance drained away. ‘The exchange has been cancelled.’

‘Why?’

‘Señor Cleland escaped.’

Mackenzie was momentarily speechless. Then, ‘Escaped?’ It hardly seemed possible. And all that went through his mind was that he had missed Sophia’s school concert for nothing. ‘Jesus Christ!’ He rarely blasphemed, believing it to indicate a paucity of vocabulary. But in that moment, as when he had sworn at the receptionist over the telephone, he lacked any other words to give adequate expression to his feelings.

She was defensive. ‘The armoured vehicle bringing him to the airport was attacked by armed men. Three of his guards were shot dead and a fourth seriously wounded.’ She thrust a hand towards him. ‘My name is Cristina Sánchez Pradell, an officer of the Policía Local at Marviña. I have been sent by my Jefe to bring you to our police station.’

Mackenzie ignored her outstretched hand. ‘No, no, no. My instructions were to accompany Cleland back to the UK aboard the British Airways flight to London that departs in’ — he looked at his watch — ‘just under two hours. If you don’t have him, I’m going back into the airport to get myself something to eat, and then catch that flight home on my own. Nothing I can do here.’

Cristina withdrew her hand, her face hardening as she thrust her jaw towards him. ‘My instructions are to take you to Marviña.’

‘Why?’

‘I’m sorry, señor, as a low-ranking police officer of the female gender, that’s above my pay grade.’ She had no idea how senior an officer Mackenzie might be, and realized she was sailing dangerously close to insubordination.

It was not lost on Mackenzie. He glowered at her. ‘Well I don’t care what your instructions are. I am not answerable to you or your Jefe.’

‘No señor. But as I understand it, this has been agreed by your Jefe in London.’

‘What?’ Mackenzie was startled. ‘Rubbish!’ He pulled out his phone and hit redial. But after further dialogue with the operator at the NCA, and more waiting, it was established that Beard was still unavailable. As was his deputy. Mackenzie ended the call in frustration. Cristina watched him implacably, though he was convinced he saw something like satisfaction lurking behind her dark brown eyes.

‘Maybe you’d like me to take your bag,’ she said, reaching for the handles of his holdall.

He held it away from her. ‘I’m quite capable of carrying it myself, thank you.’ And he set off walking briskly towards where she had parked the police SUV.

Cristina pursed her lips in annoyance and followed.

They drove in silence out of the airport, past rows of cheap car rental firms and long-term parking sheds, past the San Miguel brewery and up the ramp on to the A7 to join the traffic heading west.

The sun beat relentlessly through the side windows of the Nissan as the road climbed up out of Malaga, and sent light coruscating across the Mediterranean below. A gentle sea breeze blew hot among the fronds of the tall palms that sprouted from every housing development along the clifftops.

It wasn’t until fifteen minutes had passed, and they swung off on to the AP7 toll motorway, that Mackenzie finally asked, ‘Where is Marviña?’

‘Beyond Estepona.’ Cristina glanced across to the passenger seat and saw that this meant nothing to him. She added, ‘Another forty-five minutes.’

Mackenzie sat gazing into the heat haze shimmering in the distance, nursing mixed thoughts, before squinting to steal a surreptitious look at the young policewoman behind the wheel. She was not what he would have described as pretty, but not unattractive, although he was not attracted to her himself. Her tanned face was unlined and bore no trace of make-up, hair drawn back in an austere ponytail. No attempt had been made to enhance her appearance, and he realized he liked that about her. Her fingernails were clipped short, but well cared for and polished to a shine. She had fine, long-fingered hands, but they gripped the wheel too tightly, pale knuckles revealing the tension in them. He noticed how she was chewing on her lower lip. And although her eyes were fixed on the road ahead her mind was clearly elsewhere.

He replayed their meeting at the airport and pulled her name back from memory. Cristina Sánchez Pradell. And in recalling it he realized he had not shaken her outstretched hand. Regret stabbed him in the chest. Susan would have said it was typical of the way he alienated people. Sánchez Pradell... He ran the name through his mind again and realized why it was familiar.

‘Officer Sánchez Pradell.’ She turned to look at him. ‘You were one of the arresting officers.’

She nodded and turned her eyes back to the road.

‘You saw him shoot the girl.’

‘Yes.’

‘He blamed you.’

‘Yes.’ She pressed the heel of her hand to the horn and pulled out in front of a car that was threatening to trap her behind a truck. ‘He threatened to kill me and every member of my family.’

Mackenzie said, ‘Which wasn’t much of a threat while he was still in custody.’

She shrugged.

‘And now?’

‘The surviving Guardia from the attack on the truck this morning was my sister’s husband, Paco. Cleland told Paco to tell me that he was coming for me, then shot him in the leg. I think the only reason he didn’t kill him was so that he could deliver the message.’

Mackenzie reran the briefing notes he had read on Cleland. Mad Jock, they called him. Not, apparently, without reason. ‘Are you scared?’

Cristina flicked him a glance. ‘Yes, I am scared. But I also have a husband, a ten-year-old son, a sister with cancer, an aunt who is deaf and blind. And I am scared for them, too. I looked this man in the eye, señor. He is loco. Quite mad.’

Mackenzie closed his eyes and regretted everything about the way he had spoken to her at the airport.