The Hidden Assassins (30 page)

‘An organization with a charismatic leader, that uses questionable psychological techniques to control its followers.’

Falcón left that hanging, sipped his coffee and took the top off his water. He glanced up at the television to see that Lobo and Spinola had now been replaced by Elvira and del Rey.

‘The apartment which Informáticalidad bought on Calle Los Romeros near the mosque—did you ever go there?’

‘Before it was bought they asked me to look at it to see if it was suitable.’

‘Suitable for what?’ asked Falcón. ‘Diego Torres told me…’

‘You’re right. There wasn’t much to look at. It was entirely suitable.’

‘How upset were you by Ricardo’s death?’ asked Falcón. ‘That’s a terrible thing for a devout Catholic to do: to kill himself. No last rites. No final absolution. Do you know
why
people commit suicide?’

A frown had started up on Marco’s forehead. A trembling frown. He was staring into his coffee, biting the inside of his cheek, trying to control emotion.

‘Some people kill themselves because they feel responsible for a catastrophe. Other people suddenly lose the impetus for carrying on. We all have something that glues us into place—a lover, friends, family, work, home, but there are other extraordinary people who are glued into place by much bigger ideals. Ricardo was one of those people: a remarkable man with great religious faith
and
a vocation. Is that what he suddenly lost when that bomb exploded on 6th June?’

Barreda sipped his coffee, licked the bitter foam from his lips and replaced the cup with a rattle in its saucer.

‘I was very upset by his death,’ said Barreda, just to stop the barrage of words from Falcón. ‘I have no idea why he committed suicide.’

‘But you recognize what it means for a man of his faith to do that?’

Barreda nodded.

‘You know who Ricardo’s other great friend was?’ asked Falcón. ‘Miguel Botín. Did you know him?’

No reaction from Barreda. He knew him. Falcón piled on the pressure.

‘Miguel was Ricardo’s source in the mosque. A Spanish convert to Islam. They were very close. They had great respect for each other’s faith. I have a feeling that it was as much Miguel Botín as Ricardo’s old priest, that pulled him back from the brink of fanaticism to something more reasonable. What do you think?’

Barreda had his elbows up on the table, his fingertips pressed into his forehead and his thumbs pushing into his cheekbones, hard enough for the skin to turn white.

Falcón had Barreda right there on the brink, but he couldn’t get him to move that last centimetre. His mind seemed locked in a state of great uncertainty and doubt. Falcón still had his ace up his sleeve, but what about the drawing? If he showed it to him and the man was unrecognizable he would lose his present advantage, but if it was a close likeness it could blow the whole thing open. He decided to play the ace.

‘The last time you saw Ricardo was on Sunday,’ said Falcón. ‘But it wasn’t the last time you spoke to him, was it? Do you know who was the last person on earth that Ricardo spoke to before he hanged himself out of his bedroom window? The last number on the list of mobile calls he made?’

Silence, apart from the television burble at the far end of the café.

‘What did he say to you, Marco?’ asked Falcón. ‘Were you able to give him absolution for his sins?’

The whole bar suddenly erupted. All the men were on their feet, hurling insults at the television. A couple of empty plastic bottles were thrown, which glanced off the TV, whose screen was full of del Rey’s face.

‘What did he say?’ Falcón asked the man nearest to him, who was shouting: ‘
Cabrón! Cabrón!
’ in time with the rest of the men in the bar.

‘He’s trying to tell us that it might not have been Islamic terrorists after all,’ said the man, his tremendous belly quivering with rage. ‘He’s trying to tell us that it could have been our own people who’ve done this. Our own people, who want to blow up an apartment block and schools, and kill innocent men, women and children? Go back to Madrid, you fucking wanker.’

Falcón turned back to Marco Barreda, who looked stunned by the reaction around him.

‘Fuck off back to Madrid,
cabrón
’!

The bar owner stepped in and changed the channel before someone put a glass bottle through the screen. The men settled back into their chairs. The fat guy nudged Falcón.

‘The other judge, he beat his wife, but at least he knew what he was talking about.’

The television showed another current affairs programme. The interviewer introduced her two guests. The first was Fernando Alanis, whose introduction was lost in applause from the bar. They knew him. He was the one who’d lost his wife and son, and whose daughter had miraculously survived and was now fighting for her life in hospital. Falcón realized that this was the man they were all going to believe. It didn’t matter what he said, his tragedy had conferred on him a legitimacy that Juez del Rey’s vast experience and command of the facts totally lacked. In the other chair was Jesús Alarcón, the new leader of Fuerza Andalucía. The bar was silent, listening intently. These were the people who were going to tell them the truth.

Barreda excused himself to go to the toilet. Falcón sat back from the table in a state of shock. He’d lost all the leverage he’d just created. Why hadn’t Elvira given del Rey the message that he shouldn’t mention the other angle of the investigation? Now that the mistake had been made, it was clear that, even as an enquiry, let alone a possible truth, it was totally unacceptable to the local populace.

The topic of the TV discussion was immigration. The interviewer’s first question was irrelevant, as Fernando had come to the cameras well primed. There wasn’t a sound in the bar as he started to talk.

‘I’m not a politician. I’m sorry to say this in front of Sr Alarcón, who is a man I’ve grown to respect over the days since the explosion, but I don’t like politicians and I don’t believe a word they say, and I know I’m not alone. I am here today to tell you how it is. I’m not an opinion-maker. I am a labourer who works on a building site, and I used to have a family,’ said Fernando, who had to stop momentarily as his Adam’s apple jumped in his throat. ‘I lived in the apartment block in El Cerezo which was blown up on Tuesday. I know from the media people I’ve met over the last few days that they would like to believe, and they would like the world to believe, that we live in a harmonious and tolerant modern society here in Spain. In talking to these people I realized why this is the case. They are all intelligent people, far more intelligent than a mere labourer, but the truth of the matter is that they do not live the life that I do. They are well off, they live in nice houses, in good areas, they take regular holidays, their children go to good schools. And it is from this point of view that they look at their country.
They want it to continue in the way that it appears to them.

‘I live…I mean, I lived in a horrible apartment in a nasty block, surrounded by lots of other ugly blocks. Not many of us have cars. Not many of us take holidays. Not many of us have enough money to last the month. And
we
are the people living with the Moroccans and the other North Africans. I am a tolerant person. I have to be. I work on building sites where there is a lot of cheap immigrant labour. I have a respect for people’s rights to believe in whichever god they want to, and to attend whichever church or mosque they want to. But since 11th March 2004 I have become suspicious. Since that day, when 191 people died in those trains, I have wondered where the next attack is coming from. I am not a racist and I know that the terrorists are very few out of a large population, but the problem is that…I don’t know who
they
are. They live with me, they live in my society, they enjoy its prosperity, until one day they decided to put a bomb under my apartment block and kill my wife and son. And there are many of us who have lived in suspicion and fear since 11th March until last Tuesday, 6th June. And now it is we who are angry.’

Barreda came back from the toilet. He had to go. Falcón followed him out into the heat and fierce light of the street. All his advantage and initiative had gone. They stood under the awning of the bar and shook hands. Barreda was back to normal. He’d recomposed himself in the toilet and perhaps been strengthened by listening to Fernando Alanis’s speech on his way back.

‘You didn’t tell me what Ricardo said to you in that final phone call,’ said Falcón.

‘I’m embarrassed to have to talk about it after…what we’ve said about him.’

‘Embarrassed?’

‘I didn’t realize how he felt about me,’ said Barreda. ‘But then…I’m not gay.’

Seville—Thursday, 8th June 2006, 14.05 hrs

‘So why weren’t all these other lines of enquiry written up in a report?’ asked Comisario Elvira, looking from del Rey back to Falcón.

‘As you know, I’ve been helping the CNI with one of their missions,’ said Falcón. ‘I’ve had to maintain the enquiry into this murder which happened prior to the bombing, and I’ve since acquired a suicide to investigate. However, all these enquiries, I believe, are linked and should be moved forward together. At no point have I deviated from my initial intention, which was to find out what happened in the destroyed building. You have to agree that there has been a breakdown of logic in the scenario, and it’s my job to create different lines of enquiry to find the necessary logic to resolve it. I didn’t hear what happened on television, but it has now been explained to me that it was the interviewer who interrupted Juez del Rey and said: “So you believe it was one of our own people that committed this atrocity?” It was
that
question which caused this public relations problem.’

‘Problem? Public relations catastrophe,’ said Elvira. ‘Another one, on top of this morning’s debacle.’

‘Did you talk to Angel Zarrías of the
ABC
?’ asked Falcón.

‘We’re a bit shy of the media right now,’ said Elvira. ‘Comisario Lobo and I are having a strategy meeting after this to see how we can repair the damage.’

‘Juez del Rey has done a great job bringing himself up to speed on a very complicated and sensitive investigation,’ said Falcón. ‘We can’t allow the thrust of our enquiry to be dictated by the media, who have seen an opportunity to manipulate a nervous population by playing games with us on television.’

‘What we’re playing with here is the truth,’ said Elvira. ‘The presentable truth and the acceptable truth. And it’s all a question—’

‘What about the
actual
truth?’ said Falcón.

‘And it’s all a question,’ said Elvira, nodding at his little slip, ‘of timing. Which truth is released when.’

‘Have the translations of the Arabic script attached to the drawings been completed?’ asked Falcón.

‘So you didn’t see the news
before
we went on,’ said Elvira. ‘And nor did we, which was why the wretched interviewer seized on what Juez del Rey was saying. Only afterwards did we find out that the evacuations of the two schools and biology faculty had been filmed,
and
a translation of one of the Arabic texts was aired with it.

‘Each text gave full instructions on how to close off each building, where to hold the hostages and where to place the explosives in order to ensure maximum loss of life, should special forces storm the building,’ said del Rey. ‘There was a final instruction in each text,
which was that one hostage—starting with the youngest child in the case of the schools—was to be released every hour and, as they made their way to freedom, they were to be shot, in full view of the media. This process was to continue until the Spanish government recognized Andalucía as an Islamic state under Sharia law.’

‘Well, that explains why there was nearly a riot in the bar I was in,’ said Falcón. ‘How did the media get hold of the text?’

‘It was delivered by motorbike to Canal Sur’s reception in a brown padded envelope, addressed to the producer of current affairs,’ said del Rey.

‘An enquiry is underway,’ said Elvira. ‘What were you doing in this bar?’

‘I was interviewing the last man to speak to Ricardo Gamero before he killed himself,’ said Falcón. ‘He’s a sales manager at Informáticalidad.’

‘This isn’t the old guy who was seen talking to Gamero in the Archaeological Museum?’ said del Rey.

‘No. This was the last call Gamero made on his personal mobile,’ said Falcón. ‘I presume that all members of the CGI’s antiterrorist squad would be vetted, Comisario, including their sexuality?’

‘Of course,’ said Elvira. ‘Anybody with access to classified information is vetted to make sure they’re not vulnerable.’

‘So it would be known if Gamero was homosexual?’

‘Absolutely…unless he was, you know, not practising…so to speak.’

‘The guy I was talking to, Marco Barreda, was at cracking point when the bar went crazy. He knows something. I think he feels that whatever it is that
he
or
they
have got involved in, it has spiralled out of control. He’s sick about Gamero’s death, for a start. That was not part of the script.’

‘And what script is that?’ asked Elvira, who was desperate for one.

‘I don’t know,’ said Falcón. ‘But it’s something that explains what happened in that mosque on Tuesday. If we had the manpower, I’d have the whole of Informáticalidad down at the Jefatura and interview them until they broke down.’

‘So what did Marco Barreda say were Gamero’s last words?’ asked Elvira.

‘That Gamero was in love with him,’ said Falcón. ‘He’d been reluctant to say anything because he was embarrassed about it. I thought it was significant that he’d been to the toilet. I’m sure he called someone and was given advice about what to say. He was at cracking point and then suddenly he seemed to be back on the rails.’

‘So what have we got on Informáticalidad?’

‘Nothing, apart from the fact that the apartment was bought with black money.’

‘And what do you think this apartment was used for?’

‘Surveillance of the mosque.’

‘With what purpose?’

‘With the purpose of attacking it, or enabling others to attack it.’

‘For any particular reason?’

‘Other than that they are an organization recruited from the Catholic Church and therefore representative of the religious Right and opposed to the influence of Islam in Spain, I’m not entirely sure. There might be
a political or financial angle that I don’t, as yet, know about.’

‘You haven’t got enough,’ said Elvira. ‘You’ve interviewed all the sales reps and you’ve tried to capitalize on Marco Barreda’s vulnerability without success. All you have is an unsubstantiated theory to go on. How could you apply any more pressure? If you brought them down here, they’d come with lawyers attached. Then there’d be the media to contend with. You’re going to need something much more solid than your instinct to break open Informáticalidad.’

‘I’m also concerned that that was
all
they did,’ said Falcón, nodding. ‘Provide surveillance information and nothing more. In which case we could interview them for days and get no further than that. I need another link. I want the old guy seen talking to Gamero in the museum.’

‘Did you show the drawing to Marco Barreda?’ asked del Rey.

‘No. I was concerned that it might not be a close enough likeness and I wanted to apply pressure to his vulnerable point, which was Ricardo Gamero.’

‘What’s your next move?’

‘I’m going to take a look at all the board directors of Informáticalidad and the other companies in their group, including the holding company, Horizonte, and see if I can find a likeness to the sketch,’ said Falcón. ‘What are the CNI and CGI doing?’

‘They’re concerned with the future now,’ said Elvira. ‘Juan has gone back to Madrid. The others are using the names from this investigation to try to get leads to other cells or networks.’

‘So we’re on our own with this investigation here?’

‘They’ll only come back to us if we find, from the DNA sampling, that the Imam, or Hammad and Saoudi, weren’t in the mosque at the time of the explosion,’ said Elvira. ‘As far as they’re concerned, there’s nothing more for them to extract from this situation and they’re more worried about future attacks.’

Back in his office, Falcón ran an internet search for Informáticalidad and Horizonte and extracted photographs of the directors of all the individual companies, their groups and the holding company. As he scrolled through the search engine’s results for Horizonte he came across a web page dedicated to the celebration of their fortieth anniversary in 2001. As he’d hoped, the page showed a banquet with more than twenty-five shots of the great and the good at their tables.

The memory is a strange organ. It seems to be random and yet it can be jogged into patterns by other senses. Falcón knew if he hadn’t just seen him on television he would never have picked him out from all the other faces at the Horizonte candlelit, floral dinner. He stopped, scrolled back. It was unmistakably Jesús Alarcón, with his beautiful wife sitting three places to his right. He looked at the caption, which said nothing, other than this was a table belonging to Horizonte’s bankers—Banco Omni. Well, that figured. Alarcón had been a banker in Madrid before he came to Seville. He printed out the page with all its photographs and left the Jefatura, Serrano having given him the name of the security guard at the Archaeological Museum.

The security guard was called to the ticket desk and Falcón showed him the photographs, which he flipped through quickly, shaking his head. He ran his finger
over the fortieth anniversary banquet shots. Nothing jumped out at him.

It was too hot even for a quick snack under the purple flowers of the jacarandas in the park, and Falcón drove back into town with too much on his mind. Pablo from the CNI called and they agreed to meet in a bar on Calle Leon XII near the destroyed apartment building.

Falcón was there first. It was a downtrodden place. The staff hadn’t bothered to clear away the ankle-deep fag butts, sugar sachets and paper napkins after the coffee-break rush. He ordered a gazpacho, which was a little fizzy, and a piece of tuna, which had less flavour than the plate it was served on, and the chips were soggy with oil. Things were going well. Pablo arrived and ordered a coffee.

‘First thing,’ he said, sitting down. ‘Yacoub has made contact and we’ve given him his instructions on your behalf. He knows what to do now.’

‘And what is that?’

‘Yacoub belongs to two mosques. The first is in Rabat: the Grand Mosque Ahl-Fès, which is attended by the powerful and wealthy. It’s not known for any radical Islamic stance. But he also belongs to a mosque in Salé, near his work, which is a different kind of place altogether, and Yacoub knows it. All he has to do is step over to the other side and start getting involved. He knows the people…’

‘How does he know the people?’

‘Javier,’ said Pablo, with an admonishing look, ‘don’t ask. You don’t have to know.’

‘How dangerous is this going to be for him?’ asked Falcón. ‘I mean, radical Islam isn’t known for its
forgiving nature, and I imagine they’re especially unforgiving when it comes to betrayal.’

‘As long as he maintains his role there’s no danger. He communicates with us at a distance. There’s no face to face, which is where things normally come unstuck. If he needs to see anybody then he can organize a business trip to Madrid.’

‘What happens if they take him over and start feeding us emails of disinformation?’

‘There’s a phrase he has to use in his correspondence with us. If that phrase isn’t employed then we know it isn’t him writing and we react accordingly.’

‘How quickly will they come to trust him?’ said Falcón. ‘You’ve always been of the opinion that this bomb was a mistake, or a diversion. Maybe you’re expecting an information return too quickly if you think that he can help you with attacks which have already been planned.’

‘They’ll recognize his value immediately…’

‘Has he been approached by the GICM before?’ asked Falcón, these things only just occurring to him.

‘He’s in a unique position because of his business,’ said Pablo, pointedly ignoring Falcón’s question. ‘He can travel freely and is widely known, respected and trusted by his business partners. He will arouse no suspicion from the Moroccan authorities looking for radicals, or European authorities looking for terrorists or their planners. He’s the perfect person for a terrorist organization to make use of.’

‘But they’ll test him first, surely?’ said Falcón. ‘I don’t know how it works, but they might give him some valuable information and see what he does with it. See, for instance, if it appears elsewhere. Just like
the CNI did with the CGI here in Seville, come to think of it.’

‘That’s
our
job, Javier. We know what we can use from him and what we can’t. If we have information that could only possibly have come from him, then we know to be careful,’ said Pablo. ‘If he tells us that there’s a GICM cell operating from an address in Barcelona, we don’t just storm the building.’

‘What’s the other thing?’

‘We want you to communicate with Yacoub tonight. There’s nothing to be said, but we want him to know you’re here and in touch with him.’

‘Is that it?’

‘Not quite. The CIA have come back to us with the identity of your mystery man with no hands or face.’

‘That was quick.’

‘They’ve developed quite a system over there for tracing people of Arabic origin, even when they’ve become American citizens,’ said Pablo. ‘Your model man did a good job with the face, and his identity was corroborated by the hernia op, tattoos and dental X-rays.’

‘What were the tattoos?’

‘On the webbing between thumb and forefinger he had four dots configured in a square on his right hand, and five dots on his left hand.’

‘Any reason?’

‘It helped him count,’ said Pablo.

‘Up to nine?’

‘Apparently women never failed to comment on them.’

‘
That
is on his
file
?’ said Falcón, amazed.

‘You’ll see why when I tell you he was a professor in Arabic Studies at Columbia University until March
last year, when he was fired after being found in bed with one of his students,’ said Pablo. ‘And you know how they found out? He was shopped by one of his other students who he was bedding at the same time.

‘You don’t do that sort of thing at an American university and get caught. The police were brought in. The girls’ parents threatened to sue the university and then him personally. It was the end of his career—and it cost him, too. He managed to settle out of court on advice from his lawyers, who knew he would lose and that they wouldn’t get paid. He had to sell his midtown apartment, which had been left to him by his parents. The only job he could get after the case blew over was teaching maths privately in Columbus, Ohio. He lasted three months of a Mid West winter and then flew to Madrid in April last year.