Chapter 17 A Friendly Chat
A Friendly Chat
For a moment, Roberto was speechless. It wasn’t going to be the lighthearted book-related chat he’d expected. The lighthouse keeper, a hard look on his face, was watching him intently.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Roberto said.
“Oh, I think you do.”
“I really don’t. You’ll have to explain a bit more . . .”
“Do I look like an idiot?” spat Ibaibarriaga.
“I beg your pardon?”
“I said, Do I look like an idiot?” Ibaibarriaga spoke slowly and deliberately. “Because I sure don’t like being treated like one. I know something’s gone down, and I want you to fill me in on all the details.”
Roberto didn’t like bullies, as Luis Docampo had discovered when the two had first met. And he also didn’t like it when people tried to intimidate him.
“What if I don’t feel like it?”
Ibaibarriaga shrugged, interlaced his fingers, and cracked his knuckles threateningly.
“This is a dangerous island in the winter,” he said blithely, “especially on stormy days like today. Things happen to people, bad things, all the time. And you don’t want bad things to happen to you, do you?”
“Are you threatening me?” Roberto got to his feet, his blood rising.
“Sit down, man. I was only joking,” said the lighthouse keeper, with an ambiguous expression that was anything but reassuring, while pointing to the couch. “This is just a friendly chat.”
“Doesn’t seem very friendly to me.”
“I’ll tell you what I believe went down, and you can tell me if I’m right or not. How about that?”
Roberto stared at him for a moment but eventually sat down again. Although he didn’t like the way the conversation was going, it seemed sensible to find out what the man wanted.
“The other day, soon after your arrival on the island, you went down to the village around ten in the morning. You sat on a terrace with Luis Docampo. The two of you talked for a while, and then you went to the beach, am I right?”
Roberto nodded, intrigued. The guy had been watching him through his telescope with all the patience of an entomologist who had just discovered a new species of insect.
Still, there were gaps in the story. He’d said nothing about Roberto’s encounter with Rosalía Freire and her daughter Helena.
The telescope must have some blind spots.
“Somewhere along the way, you met up with the little Freire weirdo, that Diego.” Ibaibarriaga paused to take a noisy sip from his coffee cup.
“The two of you then walked to the end of the beach, and there was something floating just offshore, and you stripped off, dived in, and went and pulled it out.”
Roberto felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. This was not sounding good at all.
“It looked like you and the kid didn’t have the easiest time of it, but you managed to fish the bundle out in the end.” He gave a wolfish smile. “A yellow one, about yea big. All coming back to you now?”
Roberto nodded mechanically. His coffee was getting cold, but he couldn’t bring himself to drink it.
“After a while, Helena Freire and Tristán Docampo came to help get the bundle up to the village in a wheelbarrow.” He paused briefly, looking pensive. “What was in that bundle, Lobeira? Tell me the truth.”
“Just some fishing gear,” he replied defensively. “Some lobster pots they wanted back.”
Ibaibarriaga chuckled, a mocking look on his face that Roberto didn’t like at all.
“This is where it starts to get interesting, because in a matter of minutes, at least a dozen Freires and Docampos came running into the village from all directions, and I’m wondering why. On account of some old pots?”
“You tell me,” replied Roberto. “You seem like a pretty accomplished Peeping Tom.”
“Well, unfortunately, from here you can’t see the stretch of road in front of the church, which is where I assume the get-together happened. Or was it indoors?”
Roberto had to muster all his willpower to hide his feeling of relief.
As chance would have it, the impromptu gathering and the opening of the bundle had happened right in one of the telescope’s blind spots.
That meant Ibaibarriaga wouldn’t have seen Diego’s attack on Pampín, or the body being carried to the adjacent store.
But the lighthouse keeper was interested in other things, of course.
“I’ll tell you what I think went down.” He gave another grim smile.
“None of the day’s events happened by chance.
Someone tipped you off about whatever it was down in the water.
I don’t know if it was Docampo over that beer, or the Freire boy later on, and I don’t care.
You knew the bundle was going to be there, and that’s why you went down to the beach.
But that’s not the most important thing. ”
“Oh no?”
“No.” The man leaned closer and paused dramatically before going on in a knowing whisper. “The thing is . . . I already know what was in the bundle.”
They sat staring at each other for a moment. The lighthouse keeper nodded significantly, leaned back again, and slurped a little more coffee. Roberto remained silent while the implications of this revelation flashed through his mind. It changed everything.
If Ibaibarriaga knew about the money, that meant he was in cahoots with its owners or, worse still, that he himself was the owner. Either way, it complicated things even more.
“Look, I didn’t know—”
“Cocaine,” Ibaibarriaga said with the triumphant look of a poker player laying down a flush.
“What?”
“You heard me. I’m certain that bundle was full of cocaine. It’s the only thing that could get all the Freires and Docampos to pounce like hyenas as soon as it came ashore.” His grin grew wider. “It’s fallen into their laps, and now those greedy bastards want to make some money out of it.”
Roberto was dumbfounded and had to make a superhuman effort not to burst out laughing. Ibaibarriaga had been close but in the end clearly hadn’t the faintest idea. For all his arrogance, he was miles off.
“Judging by the size of the bundle, I estimate about one hundred pounds, more or less.” The man scratched his nose, making mental calculations. “At market price, that’s about a million euros, maybe a little over.”
“So what’s your point?”
“That bunch of morons won’t get a decent price for it, a quarter of a million max . . . and that’s if they don’t get caught red-handed,” he said, spreading his palms. “They don’t have any contacts, not unless . . .”
“Yes?”
“Unless you’re the contact for the sale.” He squinted at him. “Are you?”
Roberto laughed, despite himself. “No, no, I’m not their contact.”
“Good news—I’m partly wrong, then—you didn’t know what was going to be in the bundle.
” He frowned, clearly unsure on this point.
“Tell you what. I don’t know what kind of agreement you and the families have come up with, and I don’t care, because we’re going to make a little modification.
Tell them that one-third of the profit from the sale is mine. ”
“Wow,” Roberto said. “That’s quite a cut.”
“I know people,” Ibaibarriaga said. “I’ve got contacts on the mainland who can place that cocaine for a lot more than they’ll manage to get. Possibly twice as much. It’ll be win-win: I get my piece, and they get about the same as they were going to anyway. And you get yours, of course.”
“And your colleagues, Varatorta and Pazos?” Roberto gestured to the kitchen. “Won’t they want a piece?”
“Borja’s like a son to me; he’s a good kid; he’ll do as I tell him.” Ibaibarriaga shrugged. “As for Varatorta, don’t worry about him. He has his ways, but I know how to handle him.”
Roberto bit his lip. It wasn’t great to be taken for a two-bit drug dealer, but that was nothing compared to the man’s smugness as he presumed to give him orders.
However, it was hardly in Roberto’s interest to disabuse him.
As long as Ibaibarriaga thought it was all about a drug deal, with just a few hundred thousand euros up for grabs, it would keep him out of what was really going on.
If he learned that tens of millions were in play, the situation could get seriously out of hand.
Besides, Roberto was already implicated in a murder, and he didn’t need anything new to contend with.
So, though burning inside, he managed to compose himself and put on a heavyhearted, docile look.
“I’ll talk to the others,” he lied, before draining his coffee, now cold. “I don’t think it’ll be a problem, but I’ll need a few days to bring them round. You know how pigheaded they are, and all the rivalry. It’ll take some serious diplomacy.”
“A couple of days is no problem. Have you seen the forecast?”
Roberto shook his head, and the lighthouse keeper stood up with a snort, going and taking a folder from a desk on which stood a radio transmitter. He pulled out a bundle of freshly printed papers. It was a weather forecast, showing several isobar maps and dozens of columns crammed with numbers.
“They’re calling this one Storm Armand,” he said. “It’s a big one, and it’s heading right this way across the Atlantic. It’ll be on top of us in the next twenty-four hours. We’re talking twenty-to-thirty-foot waves, and hurricane-force winds, seventy miles per hour. Do you know what that means?”
“Bad weather?”
Ibaibarriaga shook his head. “We’re going to be completely cut off from the mainland for at least a few days.
No boats, no choppers. Until Armand passes, nothing and no one is going to be coming or going on the island.
” He patted the radio transmitter. “The only comms will be via the cell tower or, if things get genuinely bad, with this.”
Roberto stood up. “I’ll go talk to them, but you’ll need to bear with me.”
“You’ve got until the storm passes,” said Ibaibarriaga.
“Not a day more. Or else I’ll be calling the Guardia Civil.
That’ll be bad for the families but much worse for you, given how much you’ve got to lose.
I’m sure your readers won’t be very pleased to know the kind of trouble you’re in. A serious mess.”
You don’t know the half of it.
“You’d better get going.” Ibaibarriaga glanced out the window. “Looks like it’s eased somewhat, but who knows for how long.”
They left the library and started toward the front door. In the hallway, Varatorta and Pazos were busy stacking some heavy boxes.
“Off already, Mr. Lobeira?” Varatorta leaned on one of the boxes, mopped his brow, and held out his hand, clasping Roberto’s for a second or two longer than seemed necessary. “It was a pleasure to meet you.”
“Yes, I need to get off if I want to avoid getting drenched,” said Roberto, attempting his best poker face. “Thanks for the meal.”
“You’re welcome. Come back soon—if it’s all right with the boss, of course. And if you need something to read, feel free to use the library.”
“Of course!” Ibaibarriaga said, shaking Roberto’s hand effusively.
He was once again the friendly bookworm—all trace of the cold and calculating dealmaker had gone.
Roberto almost admired his brazenness. “Thank you so much for honoring us with your presence! As Varatorta says, you’re welcome anytime. ”
“The pleasure was all mine.” Roberto held his gaze defiantly.
“Don’t be a stranger!” Ibaibarriaga winked at him, as if sharing some particularly amusing joke. “It’ll be such a delight to see you again.”
Roberto didn’t deign to answer this. Bidding farewell to the other two, he stepped outside.
The rain had stopped, but the sky was if anything more leaden.
Under the roaring wind, a dull, deep rumbling persisted, the waves pounding on the cliffs—a foretaste of the savage blasts that were going to be unleashed in a few short hours.
He set off almost at a run. The need to talk to Antía Freire had become an absolute priority. There was too much going on—he couldn’t handle it all by himself.
He needed someone to help him with his plan, someone he could trust.
He didn’t know for sure if Antía was the right person, but he didn’t have much choice.
The clock was ticking.