300 Days of Sun (13 page)

I put the mug on the low table in front of me, and stood up. I had to tell Nathan—­then decided not to. Best to wait. Best to find out what more I could. Reports on rolling news changed all the time, for all kinds of reasons—­what if this was the only time this was mentioned? I stood closer, increasing the volume. But that was it. Now the setting was being described. The camera panned to show police vehicles blocking the entrance to the resort. The picture cut to show an aerial shot: red cliffs at the edge of the sea, the discreet villas nestled like shy animals in the green pines, now scored through by the headlines moving across the bottom of the screen.

I wasn't sure that I had heard right, that my mind wasn't mixing and matching sounds to the track already playing in my head. Better to let Nathan sleep on while I waited to see whether the information would be repeated.

Curled up on the sofa, I flipped between local channels. The pictures from Horta das Rochas were coming round on a loop. I thought I heard Ian Rylands' name but I wasn't a hundred percent sure. There was no further mention of the Walde family or child abduction.

A knock at the door startled me. I ran my hands through my hair and got up to answer it, heart pounding. Which would it be, hotel staff or the police? It was a young woman, uniformed and holding a large tray covered in a white cloth.

“Breakfast, compliments of the manager,” she said. She came in, set it on a table by the window, shook out the cloth to reveal coffee, rolls, and a plate of ham and cheese, nodded and was gone before I could think about finding some money for a tip.

The coffee didn't help my anxiety, and I had to force myself to chew some bread. It occurred to me that simply by mentioning Terry Jackson and his invitation to Nathan to meet him here we had effectively set wheels in motion. The police wouldn't leave it there. It was already done. If Jackson was involved in Rylands' murder, and it certainly looked that way, then Nathan's story was bound to come out, one way or another.

When Nathan finally mooched downstairs, the story was still being broadcast from the entrance gate, the reporters continuing to speak over stock pictures taken inside the grounds and main buildings.

He looked dazed.

“Story's broken,” I said.

The room phone rang, and we both jumped.

“This is the manager's office,” said a female voice, in English. “I am calling to tell you that the police will be coming to see you soon. Please do not leave the room.”

The first thing I said to Nathan was “We have to tell them we knew Rylands. It will come out somehow that we've been seen with him. And then there'll be all sorts of repercussions.”

I didn't have long if I was going to tell him about what I thought I'd heard about the Walde family but I decided against it. I wasn't sure enough. At this stage that was a complication we could probably do without.

We took turns to try to shower some life into ourselves and make the best of yesterday's limp clothes.

T
he police—­in the form of Detective Aloisio Gambóias, face now as close-­shaven as his head was bald, and a woman police officer called Inez Something—­arrived on the doorstep at around eleven.

This time Nathan and I were interviewed together. Gambóias took the lead, while Inez, her aggressively dyed blond hair bobbing, wrote copious notes. The same questions as the previous night. What we both did from the time we arrived at the resort. We both told the same truth as before. I sensed a softening in tone. Though still wary, I took the chance as soon as I could.

“The television news,” I said, looking over to the screen still playing with the sound turned down. “The victim has been named as a British man. Ian Rylands.”

“They have named him?” Gambóias looked predatory.

“One of the channels said it earlier.”

“They shouldn't have done that.”

The ticker tape headlines still read “A British expatriate.” Male expatriate. No name.

“The thing is, when we found . . . the victim, I thought he looked familiar but I wasn't sure. It was half-­light by the lamp, his face was in an odd position, his mouth was open . . .” I didn't want to overdo it. “If it is Ian Rylands, then I should tell you that I have met him. In Faro.”

A leap of faith in justice.

Gambóias was impassive. I maintained steady eye contact.

“When did you meet him?”

“A ­couple of weeks ago.”

“How did you meet him?”

“I made contact through the Anglo-­Algarve Association.”

“Why?”

“Something that interested me. I'm a journalist. I was thinking about maybe writing a feature—­”

“Feature?”

“A long article, perhaps for a magazine.”

“You did not say this last night.”

“Last night I was in shock. I saw a man's body. I wasn't thinking about a man I hardly knew.”

“You met this Ian Rylands only once?”

I noted he wasn't confirming or denying the victim's identity. The truth, as near as possible to the whole truth. “Nathan and I took a boat trip to the Ilha Deserta a few days ago. By chance, Ian Rylands was on the ferry, too. We sat with him, and then he walked awhile with us on the island. He is—­was?—­an interesting man. He was generous with his knowledge.”

“What did you talk about?”

“He was explaining the geography of the barrier islands, mostly, as we went through the salt marshes. About how two of the islands were fixed to preserve the port entrances, but that there had been consequences for the outer islands, with the strong sea drift moving the sand.” That was all anyone could have overheard.

“And you?” he turned to Nathan, who was sitting uncharacteristically quietly. “You remember this?”

“Yeah . . . sure. He seemed a nice old bloke . . . man.”

“But?”

“Bit boring, if I'm totally honest. I wasn't quite as interested as Jo in the geography lesson. I was quite pleased when he wandered off and left us to it.”

“You didn't recognise him last night either?”

Nathan shook his head slowly. He did a good job of looking utterly baffled and slightly queasy at the implications. Which wasn't really so far from the truth anyway.

Gambóias rubbed his chin. The silence became oppressive but he was looking at the TV. Inez picked up the remote control from the coffee table in front of us and put the sound up. To the visible annoyance of both of them, the red-­haired woman reporter was now broadcasting from inside the grounds. A row of holiday villas stretched behind her, though whether it included Villa Eleven, I couldn't have said. The detectives exchanged glances and Gambóias reached for his phone. He tapped out a text.

I held my breath, as if that would make it easier to hear what the TV reporter was saying. No doubt the glossy hair and lips had persuaded someone to open a door.

Then she said it, distinctively, as if she wanted to get the pronounciation correct. “Ian Rylands.”

Gambóias stood up. He took some heavy paces away from us and started shouting into his phone. Nathan looked at the floor and I didn't dare catch Inez's gaze. I fixed on the television screen and offered the reporter my silent thanks. I was coming round to her. She was sharper than she looked.

I
spent the afternoon on my own with Gambóias and Inez in a meeting room in the main hotel complex, a business venue kind of room that was designed to make anyone long to be outside in the lush garden beyond the tall windows. Now I had admitted to knowing Rylands, they were drilling down to test what I knew of him. It was more, I suspected, than they did. I was still nervous, but took heart from the fact that they had told us that we were witnesses, not suspects. It simply wasn't possible for us to have killed the man, and I had to draw strength from that. Coincidences happened. We were not suspects.

At one stage, Gambóias asked Inez whether she had heard anything from Faro, and her reply seemed to be that the ferry pilot had indeed noticed the three of us on his boat. That we had sat where I said we had sat. Above the engine noise, it wasn't possible to confirm what we discussed, but we walked up the jetty on the Ilha Deserta together, in a friendly manner.

When there were no more questions they hadn't asked three times already, I was free to go. They told me to wait for Nathan in the main lobby of the hotel. Nathan arrived there half an hour later. His jaw was tight but he said he was fine.

In the car before we set off back to Faro at last, I called Will Venning again. “Have you seen the reports of Ian Rylands' murder?” I asked, cutting to the chase.

“I'm not sure we're going to cover it, Jo. ­Couple of pars, max. Not for us.”

His clipped tone took me aback. “I wasn't calling to file copy, though actually, it is a good story. Just tell me, in all his crazy theories . . . did Rylands ever say anything to you about the authorities having been complicit in child abductions?”

“Listen, Jo . . . let's go for a drink when you get back to Brussels, eh? It would be good to catch up.”

“I won't be back for a while. Can't you tell me now?”

Now he sounded awkward. “Bit difficult. Even then, I'm not sure I can help.”

Face to face, I would have been better able to judge, but I thought there was an element of embarrassment in his tone. “What are you not telling me, Will?”

A pause.

“Will?”

“You don't want to get involved in conspiracy theories, Jo. It just makes you look a fool.”

“Is that what you're saying this is?”

“Believe me, Jo, it's not worth it.”

“OK. Message received and understood,” I said. “I'll buy you a beer at Les Brasseurs when I get back—­and thanks.”

I sat staring beyond the windscreen without seeing when the call ended. Before it, I'd been sceptical about Rylands' far-­fetched theories. Now . . . perhaps it just wasn't wise to discuss them on the phone where anything might be overheard or even recorded. What was worse, was that Nathan and I had very few options as to what we did next.

“We have to find Eduardo Walde,” I said.

“Why?”

“Well . . . we have precious little to go on that doesn't involve Terry Jackson—­a man who is definitely in the frame as the killer of Ian Rylands, and whom I suggest it would be wise to avoid as far as possible. And I have a horrible feeling this is rather more relevant than we thought.” I reached into my capacious bag and pulled out Esta Hartford's book. “You need to read this.”

 

 

i

I
n Lisbon, fall faded into winter. Sea mists rose from the stately estuary and dropped gray furs over the shoulders of the statues of saints and horsemen. In the city's wide avenues yellow trams emerged like lamps from clouded valleys.

Alva navigated her way on foot by the smell of fish and the desolate flap of washed garments strung out overhead. During the day, when Michael was working—­he had a corner of the AP office now, even if he wasn't fully on staff—­Alva went out with her camera. Her ear was becoming accustomed to the strange sounds of the Portuguese language, with its words that looked intelligible on the page but turned impenetrably Slavic when spoken. Words like
praia
and
mare
, beach and sea.
Peixe,
fish.
Pão
, bread.

A marriage could survive anything so long as there was goodwill and both parties wanted it to survive. At least, that was what Alva told herself. Having counted her blessings, she should try harder to be a good wife while Michael pursued the stories of those unhappy refugees far worse off than they were. The Barton luck had held. They moved out of the Hotel Métropole when Michael met someone who knew someone else who had got on a boat and vacated a two-­room apartment in a dingy house behind the Rua Augusta. It was small: one room furnished with a cheap table and a two-­seater sofa, and a counter that functioned as a kitchen; the other room filled with a double bed that still left them feeling short-­changed as they tried to sleep. But the rent was a third of the price of the hotel, and there was a shower room off the landing with pleasurably strong water pressure. A central location, too; a short stroll to the Café Eva where the foreign correspondents hung out.

Alva quickened her pace, ignoring the inevitable propositions she received as men passed. It was later than she'd thought. After hours pleasantly lost in the gauzy vapors of the river, composing street scenes of figures materializing, she needed to buy food. And to make sure Michael ate it before he headed out again, as he inevitably did, to rejoin his colleagues. His preferred diet of whisky and wine was doing neither of them any favors.

She gave him a dinner of omelette that presented as scrambled eggs, and he pulled on his jacket as soon as he had finished it.

“You going out again?”

There was a pause, in which several stages of the argument were processed but skipped.

“I'm not saying ‘don't come,' just that there probably won't be much in it for you,” said Michael.

Alva wondered when exactly it had started, this feeling of separation from him. Was it on the journey into Portugal, or had it been earlier? When was the last time they had set out together for an amusing evening on their own? “You go,” she said.

“Why do you say it like that?”

She sighed, unwilling to say it again.

“Because you don't like the guys. I know. Well, honey, I have news for you: without these guys, we don't eat.”

“It's mainly just him—­Curnow.”

Michael didn't seem to understand that she found Blake Curnow unnerving. The intense eyes magnified by thick-­rimmed glasses, watching her with disinterested pity as he chain-­smoked.

“He likes arguing. That's the kind of guy he is.”

“It doesn't mean anything, then?”

“It might—­or it might not.”

Michael held out his hands in mock supplication. Neither of them wanted to open that argument again. There had been too many pointless spats lately.

“So have you decided, do you want to come to Estoril this time, or do you want to stay here?”

“You're going anyway, you mean?”

Of course that's what Michael meant. She was just making him spell it out. Had he always disregarded her wishes? Why couldn't it be like before? The questions were fast forming, like a overflowing river, whirling and eddying. How long had it been like this? Maybe longer than she allowed herself to admit.

“I'm asking my wife if she wants to come to Estoril with me. Is that unreasonable? You'd think I was being unreasonable, the way you look at me.”

Another argument neither of them wanted to open. Needless to say, there had been no discussion about having a baby for some time. He went out again, promising he wouldn't be too late. She said goodbye knowing that he would be.

His footsteps receded down the tiled passage, quickened almost joyfully on the stone stairs, and then all was quiet. The cramped living room was dingy under a dim electric bulb. Michael's possessions were strewn about where he had dropped them. In the past she might have seen in them a wry reassurance that he had everything covered, that she (still feeling affectionate) would never change him. Now she took in the discarded tie on the back of a dining chair, one of a mismatched pair, and the inevitable crumpled newspapers, and felt only irritation.

T
he city, along with Michael, was changing by the day, in ways that were not due solely to increasing familiarity or the turn of the seasons. The streets and cafés looked different—­sounded different. More and more foreigners were crowding in, bewildered and frightened, relieved to have made it this far but anxious to move on. It was almost impossible to find a hotel room. Women stood at bars that had previously been the preserve of men only. The polyglot newcomers spoke in low voices. Boredom and tension showed in the slump of their shoulders as they read the same old newspapers in the cafés. Strangers listened eagerly to conversations at neighboring tables, if only for the relief of hearing new thoughts.

Michael, after their initial uncertainties, had landed on his feet. There was a spring in his step as he realized that being in Lisbon was better than watching the war in Paris or Rome. He was optimistic about his prospects in a way that he hadn't been since they first arrived in Rome. Alva's perceptions were rather different. After a while she had grown unnerved by the unstoppable tides of refugees, and bored by the same old conversations, the same questions about whether visa applications had been approved, or tickets confirmed, or bank wires received. The situation became like the weather forecasts in the newspapers: only interesting if there was a specific reason for wanting reassurance. Meanwhile they were all stuck, even those who refused to admit it.

True, there were so many worse places they could have washed up. Only bread was rationed. The beaches were not mined. The Portuguese were friendly, and if rather venal, understandably so. They had not asked for this raggle-­taggle invasion, and it was surprising how resiliently welcoming they were. Living costs were extremely reasonable, and the Salazar dictatorship could be explained or excused by the superficial well-­being of the ­people. Above all, Lisbon was alluring, rising above the great river like the steps of a wedding cake, clean and rose-­pink at sunset. The sun and the colors masked the poverty of its hidden areas. It was noisy and eager and charming. The bulls were never killed in its bullfights. There was dried cod in abundance to eat, and octopus, and sea bass and sardines. The citizens wept during the mournful
fado
songs, self-­indulgently, in a way that allowed a luxurious dimension to tragedy, and named this state
saudade
, for which there was no easy translation; it meant a kind of nostalgia for the present moment, a strange feeling that was both a sad acceptance of destiny and yet celebratory.

The foreigners, the black marketeers, and the art and gem dealers scurried about their business. The British came off planes at Portella airfield in Lisbon wearing homburg hats and carrying umbrellas. Fishwives carried baskets on their heads; barefoot, despite a new law that demanded that all vendors wore shoes; quite often their rope shoes sat atop the sardines.

Would she go with him to Estoril this time? She hadn't decided. After that first trip up the coast, Michael had almost told her something important, she was sure of it. ‘I'm not stupid! Please tell me what is going on!' she had shouted. But he hadn't.

A
lva shut the door on the emptiness of the apartment and, disregarding Ronald Bagshaw's advice for respectable women, went out alone to the cinema on the Rua dos Sapateiros. There she tried to concentrate on an imported movie and then watched the news reels until she felt repulsed by the black-­and-­white images from across Europe and to the east: the tank formations and lines of men marching to triumphant music, arms extended in salutes to madness.

She didn't bother to switch on the electric light when she returned to the apartment. When Michael crept in at two in the morning, stinking of Scotch, she was still sitting, thinking, by the open window.

“Where have you been?” she asked.

“Just . . . you know . . .”

“Well, that's just it, Mike. I don't. I don't know what is going on here.”

“There's nothing going on.”

“Don't lie to me! I can't stand it when you lie to me.” She stood and moved toward him, began to press her hands into his chest; he pushed her away. She heard the words come out of her mouth before she had even thought them, knew at the same time he did that she had lost. “It's not fair!”

He started yelling at her then, and she fled to the bedroom and locked the door with his fury reverberating in her ears.

“It's for your own protection,” he said through the door.

“You talk of protection?” she said. “What have I got left to protect? What is there left of the person who has already had one life replaced by another, and then another and another? I don't want to stay here, Mike. I want to go home.”

“You have to trust me,” he said. “No, you
need
to trust me.”

“Don't go out every night then. Stay here with me.”

“I can't.”

“Tell me then.”

She unlocked the door. He didn't push it open immediately. When he did, she realized he wasn't as drunk as he was worried. He sat down on the bed and told her about the Canadian reporter.

Jim Kosek was a correspondent for the
Toronto Globe and Mail,
posted to Lisbon not long after the outbreak of war, Canada being in from the start, with its ties to Great Britain. “Last seen going into a
fado
club on the Rua do Capelão in Mouraria close to the castle. He'd told Frank Ellis that he was going to meet a contact, that he had a promise of information that could be a game-­changer. He even asked Frank if he would come in and watch them from across the room. But Frank had heard it all before. The information was never as good as promised. And he couldn't abide the wailing, said
fado
took the enamel off his teeth, even if it was a national passion. So Frank said good night to him outside and came on back to the Café Eva.”

“Who was the Canadian guy going to meet?” asked Alva.

“All he said to Frank was that he could be on to something big.”

“And all newspapermen say that.”

“We live in hope.”

Alva said nothing.

“Jim Kosek never came out of that club. Blake Curnow and I went back there the next night, but they couldn't even find anyone who would admit to seeing Jim in there. No one. From the manager down. Not even the hatcheck girl—­and we were offering a generous tip for her trouble.”

“Did you find out what he was on to, who he was meeting there?”

“Turns out, according to one of the other Canadians, he was only supposed to be meeting a guy who works at the airport and keeps an eye on the movements of Axis flights. It's a regular thing that he hands the schedules to the Canadian Embassy.”

“And what has any of that to do with Frank?”

“He gets the schedules from Jim and gives them to our guys—­at our embassy. All information is useful, even if it does seem small beer at times.”

“But Frank is a journalist. Journalists break stories in newspapers, they don't gather information and not use it.”

“Sure they do. But Frank's a special case. He wasn't always a reporter. Maybe he's not much of one now. He's a government employee. In the Foreign Ser­vice. Everyone's using what they can, see?”

“I see.” Alva narrowed her eyes, knowing from the flip tone of her husband's voice that there was more.

“Don't look at me like that. It's enough that the Germans and the Portuguese are watching my every move. I have to contend with you, too?”

“You don't do stuff like that.”

“Sure I do. We all do. Jim did it too obviously, in the wrong place, that's the only difference.”

Alva leaned against the windowsill, trying to look nonchalant.

“Should you be telling me this?”

“Don't be a fool, Alva.”

No, she wasn't. The person in front of her looked just like Michael, raking back his hair with a hand as was his habit when he wanted to appear more relaxed than he felt, but she wasn't sure she knew him at all. Had she ever? And if not, did that make her a fool after all?

“This is only because of the war, though, isn't it? You didn't do stuff like this in Rome?”

“Not all that much.”

Silence.

“Why didn't you say?”

In his hesitation was a world of disappointment and
frustration.

“I didn't know,” said Alva. “In Paris—­?”

“It started getting serious. France was preparing for all-­out war. Troops were massing. Information was the most important currency there was. No less important for us, even if Uncle Sam wasn't directly involved.”

“But that's not quite what you told me three months ago, is it, Mike? When we got out of France, I asked why we didn't just go home to New York, when we could have, and you said you had to make this work and get back into a senior position with the AP. If you didn't make it in Lisbon, you'd be finished as a reporter. That we'd left Rome, left Paris; you couldn't leave again, this was your last chance to hack it. Remember?” She was amazed to hear her own voice sounding so reasonable. She didn't feel reasonable. “To hack it
as a reporter
, Mike, no mention of any of this.”