A Silent Death

Chapter Eight

It’s a hot one. The words of Santana’s ‘Smooth’ reverberated around Cleland’s head like an earworm. And he tried to stay cool just like in the song. But it was hard in the olid airless space of this armoured truck. He wore a pair of freshly pressed linen trousers and a crisp white shirt, brought to his cell first thing that morning by his abogado before they transferred him to the truck. He had showered, shampooed and deodorized, determined to look and feel his best. But already his thick, blond-streaked brown hair had fallen across a forehead beaded by sweat. He felt a trickle of it run down the back of his neck.

If he could, he would have held his breath. Neither of the armed Guardia who sat with him in the back of the truck had showered this morning, of that he was certain. The stink of stale body odour and last night’s garlic filled the air. But he tried hard to remain impassive, keeping his own counsel.

He could feel the smooth surface of the AP7 motorway beneath the tyres. They had not yet, he knew, reached Marbella, a town classier than most along this stretch of coast. The Cannes of the costas, he had heard it called. It was here, and in Puerto Banus, that he shopped for his clothes in the best boutiques, where he bought his wines in the most discerning stores — Priorat a favourite, a Catalan wine rarely available in this southern part of Spain, its grapes cultivated in a unique terroir of black slate and quartz soil many kilometres to the north.

He sat on the bench opposite his two guards, leaning forward, elbows on his knees, hands cuffed together between his thighs. He endeavoured not to look at his captors for fear of igniting the rage that burned inside him, a rage that he had kept tamped down with reluctant restraint, a patient biding of time.

The truck slowed. One of the guards stood up and slid aside a small hatch that opened through bars to the front cab. ‘What’s happening?’

‘Peaje,’ the driver called back. They were approaching the tollbooths at the San Pedro turn-off.

The Guardia slid the hatch shut and resumed his seat. But instead of coming to a stop immediately, the van swung right and made a long looping curve down the off-ramp before coming to a juddering halt.

‘What the hell...?’ The officer was on his feet again and pulling the hatch open. He could see quite clearly that they were at the tollbooth on the exit road. ‘Where are you going?’ They were all jumpy.

‘Diversionary route,’ the driver shouted above the rumble of the engine. ‘They said the autopista would be too risky.’ The guard glanced at the armed officer who sat up front with the driver, but all he did was shrug. Nothing to do with him.

Again the hatch slammed shut and the officer sat down heavily as the truck lurched off on the uneven surface of the road. This would not be as smooth a journey as the motorway. He glanced at his fellow Guardia then glared at Cleland. The prisoner sensed eyes on him and raised his own to meet them. The guard immediately looked away, uncomfortable.

They bounced and bumped over a deformed and potholed road, the truck leaning dangerously at times on its camber. Ten or fifteen minutes passed before Cleland felt the driver turn the wheel sharply, and the tarmac beneath them gave way to a rutted uneven surface. Cleland’s eyes were fixed now on the guards opposite. He could see that they knew there was something wrong. Then apprehension morphed to alarm as the truck skidded to an abrupt halt. The guard nearest the hatch was on his feet again. But before he could open it, raised voices and gunshots resounded from the cab beyond. And then silence. His hand withdrew from the hatch as if his fingers had made contact with red-hot metal, and it moved instead towards his holster.

He caught Cleland’s eye and the almost imperceptible shake of the prisoner’s head caused his hand to freeze on the leather. Slowly he sat down again, and lowered his gaze to stare at the floor. Perhaps, Cleland thought, like a child this guard believed that if he couldn’t see he wouldn’t be seen.

There were more voices now, shouting beyond the rear doors of the truck, before a single gunshot reverberated around its interior and the doors swung open. Sunlight flooded in, blinding the three men inside. Half a dozen men clustered in silhouette at the back of the vehicle, the dust of a dry dirt road still hanging in the air behind them. Cleland rose calmly to his feet and walked to the open doors. He held out his hands for someone to unlock and remove the cuffs. Then someone else placed a pistol in his open palm. He weighed it for a moment, checked that the safety catch was off, and that there was a round in the chamber before turning back into the darkness.

The two guards remained seated, side by side, inert with fear.

‘Hey!’ Cleland shouted at them, and both men reluctantly looked up to meet his eye. ‘Which of you is Paco?’

Paco’s eyes opened wide with alarm, and he glanced at his fellow officer, the one who had been so preoccupied with the hatch. Then returned them to meet Cleland’s. Paco was a young man. Twenty-six or twenty-seven. Short dark hair, a well-defined jaw shaved to a shadowed shine. His mouth was as dry as desert sand. He could not summon enough saliva even to swallow. His voice came in a whisper. ‘I am.’

Cleland nodded and raised his pistol to shoot Paco’s colleague in the head. Warm blood and brain tissue spattered across Paco’s face and he released an involuntary cry as his fellow Guardia slumped heavily to the floor.

Cleland leaned in, using the barrel of his gun to force Paco’s face around to meet his. He said, ‘You tell Cristina that I’m coming for her. You understand?’ Paco nodded. ‘Good.’ Cleland raised his gun to point it at Paco’s head and for a moment the young man thought he was going to die. Then Cleland smiled and lowered his weapon to shoot Paco in the thigh. Paco screamed and Cleland leaned in again. ‘Don’t forget now.’ And as he straightened up. ‘Better get that seen to before you bleed to death.’

The last Paco saw of Mad Jock was his shadow as he jumped down into the blaze of light beyond the truck, and the callused hands that reached up to grasp him.