The Payback (22 page)

‘If you get us a location, then of course. But it will cost you. The lack of preparation time means it will be risky.’

‘How much?’

‘Another hundred thousand dollars.’

Schagel grunted. ‘Just do it,’ he said, and hung up.

From Ternate we drove south and joined the main South Luzon Highway, heading to Batangas, which was the main ferry port to the island of Mindoro – the place that had once been my home.

I’d been happy then. Running a sleepy little dive operation in the palm-fringed paradise of Big La Laguna Beach, along with my old mate Tomboy. Taking people out every day to dive the myriad sites that peppered the craggy, volcanic coastline; coming back to watch the sun set every evening at the beach bar and guesthouse we also owned. Letting life slip by in that warm, familiar ex-pat fog of drink and sand and heat, enjoying the occasional affair, never thinking too much about what the future might hold.

Until that one day when it had all ended. When I’d decided to go back to England to find out who’d murdered an ex-colleague of mine, and by doing so had ended up opening a Pandora’s box that’s given me nothing but regret and heartache ever since.

I often wondered what would have happened if I hadn’t gone back. I wouldn’t have met Emma, of course, a thought that even
now was difficult to bear. But life would have been good all the same, I was sure of that. Dull perhaps, but my conscience in those days had purged itself of guilt, and I would have been content. I would never have known about Tomboy’s past – his single, terrible crime – and our friendship would have been untainted.

It seemed strange to think that I was coming back here now, fully prepared to kill him if it came to it.

It was gone two p.m. by the time we’d wound our way in hard, thoughtful silence through the sprawling, semi-industrial maelstrom that was the port of Batangas, and parked the rental car near the ferry terminal in the shadow of one of the giant oil refineries that bordered the city.

The terminal was quiet, with just a few families sitting round under shelters lining the gangplanks, and a couple of boats bobbing up and down in the water. After some asking around, followed by a bout of haggling, I found a guy who agreed to take us on his outrigger direct to Sabang, the small tourist town on Mindoro where Tomboy and I had been based, for two thousand pesos, as long as we didn’t mind travelling with a party of holidaying South Koreans.

It was a glorious sunny day with barely a cloud in the sky, and the journey across the clear blue waters of the Verde Island Passage that separated the main island of Luzon from the mountainous majesty of Mindoro passed quickly. The sea was calmer than I remembered and halfway across we were joined temporarily by a pod of bottlenose dolphins, much to the delight of the South Koreans on board, although their presence did little to lift the continuing tension between Tina and me.

I watched her looking out to sea, and I could see the stress she was under. For a young and attractive woman in her prime, she’d experienced far more than she should have done in life, and the
frown that seemed to be her default expression sat far too easily on her pale features, now showing the first deep lines. Maybe I should have left her in the hotel room the previous day after I’d failed to pull the trigger, because by staying with her I was only adding to her pressure. And yet for all her toughness, I wasn’t sure she could do this alone. She was in a dangerous foreign country, up against well-organized enemies. I figured that with me alongside her we at least stood a chance of success.

Or maybe I was just kidding myself. Maybe I was with her now because I was attracted to her in a way I hadn’t been attracted to anyone since Emma.

‘That’s Verde Island,’ I said eventually, pointing to a large rocky landmass swathed in green and dotted with the occasional building that appeared to our left as we got closer to Mindoro. ‘There are a couple of rocks a few hundred metres off the southern end. They barely stick out of the water, but they’re the pinnacles of two underwater mountains, and the diving down there’s magnificent. I used to take people there all the time.’

‘That’s nice,’ said Tina, before turning away, and I fell silent again, wondering how long she was going to keep this up for.

And then, a few minutes later, Sabang Bay opened up in front of us, with its thin white line of low-rise buildings nestling between the sea and a mountainous green backdrop, and I felt a lump in the back of my throat as my memories finally took on a physical dimension. Over half a decade, and little had changed. Kids still played on the narrow strip of beach amid the outriggers pushed up on the sand; music still blared from the floating bar in the middle of the harbour, and its few square yards were still filled with drunken, pink-looking westerners swaying in the mid-afternoon heat. It struck me then that, although it was nice to have the smell of the sea in my nostrils once again, I’d outgrown
this place, and actually missed my new home in the landlocked hills of northern Laos.

The ferry manoeuvred its way through the boats bobbing up and down in the bay before pulling up at the shoreline. There were no piers in Sabang so we had to take off our shoes and paddle ashore in the warm knee-deep water. I looked around to see if there was anyone I remembered. But too much time had passed, and those few locals sitting on the stone steps that led up to the pavement running down the front of the buildings didn’t even bother to look my way.

I thought back to the last time I’d seen Tomboy. It had been a warm, balmy night and we’d been sat having a drink together outside our old place, while he tried to persuade me not to go back to England. He’d told me that no good would come of it, and of course, in many ways he’d been right. We’d parted with a handshake, and he’d looked in my eyes and wished me luck; and the thing was, I knew he’d meant it. He’d cared for me. I’d cared for him too, far more than I’d admitted to myself these past six years, and even now I felt vaguely nauseous at the prospect of pointing a gun at him.

The dive operation and guesthouse we’d run together on Big La Laguna Beach was a ten-minute walk along the coast, and I led Tina along the narrow path round the nearest headland to Small La Laguna Beach. The Point Bar – a lovely open-air place that sat on a rocky promontory overlooking the bay, which I used to go to sometimes – was still there, but as we rounded the corner I saw that someone had built a high-rise monstrosity at the end of the beach that completely dominated the view. So, mass-market tourism had finally come to this part of the Philippines. It was a pity. There’d always been something quaint and off-the-beaten-track about the beaches of northern Mindoro; it was one of the
reasons why, as a fugitive, I’d found it so easy to settle there. But it was clear by the growing numbers of westerners, particularly young ones, we were encountering as we walked that it was now part of the backpacker trail.

A group of sunburned English gap-year girls – pretty in a wholesome, Home Counties way – came past, clad in skimpy bikinis, forcing us to move aside to avoid them. Chattering excitedly among themselves, they didn’t give me a second glance. But then, of course, they wouldn’t. These girls would have been young children when my misdeeds had been dominating the news. In the ultra-fast world of the twenty-first century, I was nothing more than ancient history.

We cut through a gap in the headland by the big hotel and emerged on Big La Laguna, the best of Sabang’s three main beaches, which to be honest wasn’t saying much since none of them was that much cop. Even so, it was busier than I remembered, with groups of backpackers and tourists clustered along the sand. One guy with a huge afro was playing the guitar and singing some folky number, while half a dozen girls sat round him in an admiring semi-circle passing a joint from one to the other.

Tina stopped and looked around, taking in a big deep breath of the fresh sea air. She tipped up the sun hat she was wearing, and when she looked into the sunlight, her eyes gently closing as she finally relaxed, I thought she looked beautiful. She held that position for a few seconds before looking back at me, all business once again. ‘Is it much further? I’m dying of thirst.’

‘It’s just up here,’ I said, feeling a nervous trepidation as I walked along the sand.

But then I stopped.

Tina stopped beside me. ‘What is it?’

‘It’s not here any more,’ I said, looking at the spot where the Big
La Laguna Dive Lodge had been, and where a hotel at least five times the size calling itself Anglo-Danish Divers, with a big PADI dive centre out front, now stood.

For a few seconds I just stood there, sweating and feeling foolish, as it dawned on me that we’d made this whole journey for nothing. I looked beyond the hotel, wondering if I’d made a mistake with the location, and saw a second new hotel beyond it. No, I was definitely in the right place. It was just that the world – and, it seemed, Tomboy – had moved on without me. The emptiness that was always squatting in my heart seemed to grow just that little bit bigger.

‘Come on,’ said Tina quietly, the first hint of sympathy in her voice. ‘I need to get out of the sun. Let’s grab a drink.’

We made our way over to an adjacent, and thankfully quiet, beach bar and took a seat at one of the tables.

Which was when someone called my name. Or more accurately, they called me by the name I’d been known by during my time in the Philippines.

‘Mr Mick?’

It was the barman. He was waving at me from behind the bar, a big grin on his face, and I recognized him immediately. His name was Frankie and he’d worked the bar at our place when I was there. He still didn’t look a day over sixteen, although he had to be at least thirty by now. It unnerved me how easily he’d recognized me.

I walked over, Tina following.

‘Frankie. How are you doing?’

We started to shake hands, but then he leaned forward and hugged me, pulling away reluctantly. ‘Where have you been, Mr Mick? You’ve been gone for years.’

‘Away,’ I said with a weary smile. ‘This is my friend Tina.’

‘Not your wife?’

‘No. Not my wife.’

They shook hands, and Frankie smiled nervously at her, vaguely intimidated, I think, by Tina’s short bleached-blonde hair, and her lean, muscular body.

‘Why did you never call or write? Why did you never come back?’ He looked at me, genuinely perplexed. ‘We all missed you. Mr Tomboy missed you a lot. He wasn’t good at running the place without you.’

‘What happened to it?’ I asked, looking over to where Anglo-Danish Divers now stood.

‘Mr Tomboy sold it to the arsehole who runs that place,’ he said, wrinkling his nose in distaste.

‘How long ago?’

He thought about it for a moment. It looked like it was quite an effort. ‘A long time back. A year. Two years. Maybe even longer.’

I hid my disappointment. ‘Do you know where Tomboy is now?’

‘Sure. He’s still here. He lives up past the headland.’ He motioned vaguely over his shoulder. ‘Nice house. Good views. You want me to show you where?’

‘No, it’s OK. You’re working. Just tell me where it is.’

He gave me the name of the house and rough directions, and I memorized them.

‘It’ll be a nice surprise for him,’ said Frankie.

Somehow, I didn’t think so. It wasn’t going to be all that pleasant for either of us. But there was nothing that could be done about that.

I ordered two Cokes from Frankie and we went back to our table.

‘I want to go up there alone,’ I said to Tina, taking a huge gulp of my drink. ‘I think it’ll be easier that way.’

Tina looked into my eyes, as if she was trying to gauge what was beyond them. ‘Are you going to kill him?’

‘I hope I don’t have to, but this time I’m going to get answers.’

She seemed to think long and hard about that, before eventually speaking again. ‘Do what you have to do. I’ll wait here.’

I finished my drink and got to my feet. ‘I’ll be back as soon as I can.’

‘One other thing,’ she said as I moved away.

I turned round, but didn’t say anything.

‘Be careful.’

I managed a smile. ‘Don’t worry about me. I’m always careful.’

Which was bullshit of course, but for the first time that day, her words made me feel good.

It was a fifteen-minute walk up to Tomboy’s place, past landmarks that had once been familiar but that had now changed beyond all recognition. Where once there’d been a ramshackle collection of shacks, peopled by extended families of locals who liked to do all their cooking on spits outside, and where chickens, even the odd pig, roamed the narrow streets, there were now rows of bland single-storey chalet-style cottages, with tarmac walkways between them. Only when I got up past the headland and into the quiet woodland that surrounded the coastal resorts did I see traces of what Mindoro had been like before the tourists had come.

Frankie was right. Tomboy’s place was nice. A two-storey white-washed villa set back on its own behind mature teak trees, nestled close to the edge of the cliff with views back across towards Sabang, it was a damn sight better than anything he’d owned six years back. I very much doubted whether the proceeds of selling our small dive business would have paid for the Mitsubishi Shogun sitting in the drive, let alone anything else.