Winter in Madrid (47 page)

‘That’d be good.’ Harry took a deep breath. ‘I’m grateful for your bringing me in on this.’

‘That’s all right,’ Sandy replied quietly, patronizingly. He smiled.

They climbed to the top of the mountain road; above them, the highest peaks were already covered in snow. Then they descended back into the bare brown countryside, drove through Segovia and turned west, towards Santa Maria la Real. There was little traffic, the countryside was still and empty. It reminded Harry of the day he arrived, the drive into Madrid with Tolhurst.

After an hour Sandy turned into a dusty cart track that wound between low hills. ‘We’re in for a bit of a bone-shaking, I’m afraid. It’s another half hour to the mine.’

On the track donkeys’ hoofmarks were overlaid with deep ruts made by heavy vehicles. The car clattered and juddered over them. Sandy drove confidently.

‘I find myself thinking about Rookwood since we met up again,’ he said reflectively. ‘Piper moved back into our study after I was sacked, didn’t he? You said in a letter.’

‘Yes.’

‘Bet he felt he’d won.’

‘I don’t think so. He hardly mentioned your name again, as I remember.’

‘I’m not surprised he turned to communism, he always had that fanatical streak. Used to look at me as though he’d like nothing better than to put me up against a wall to be shot.’ He shook his head. ‘The Communists are still the real danger to the world, you know. It’s Russia England should be fighting, not Germany. I thought things were going to turn out that way after Munich.’

‘Fascism and communism are as bad as each other.’

‘Oh, come on. At least with right-wing dictatorships our sort of people are looked after so long as we toe the party line. There’s hardly any income tax here. Though I admit dealing with the bureaucracy’s a pain in the arse. Still, the government has to teach the people who’s in charge. That’s their thinking, make everyone follow all these procedures, teach Spaniards order and obedience.’

‘But the bureaucracy’s completely corrupt.’

‘This is Spain, Harry.’ He gave him a glance of affectionate irony. ‘You’re still a Rookwood man at heart, aren’t you? Still believing all those codes of honour?’

‘I used to be. I’m not sure I’m anything any more.’

‘I admired you for it, you know, in the old days. But it’s schoolboy stuff, Harry, it’s not real life. I suppose the academic life’s pretty sheltered as well.’

‘Yes, you’re right, it is. I’ve had my eyes opened to some things out here.’

‘The real world, eh?’

‘You could say that.’

‘We all need security for the future now, Harry. I can help you get that if you let me.’ There was something like an appeal for approval in Sandy’s tone. ‘And nothing’s more secure than gold, especially these days. Look, here we are.’

Ahead a high barbed-wire fence ran round a wide stretch of rolling land. Large holes had been gouged in the yellow earth, some half filled with water. A couple of mechanical earth-movers sat nearby. The track ended at a gate with a wooden hut on the inner
side. Two more huts, one large, stood at a little distance and there was a large stone blockhouse too. A board by the gate read: ‘Nuevas Iniciativas S.A. Keep Out. Sponsored by the Ministry of Mines.’

Sandy sounded his horn and a thin elderly man ran from the hut and opened the gates. He saluted Sandy as the car tooled through and came to a halt. They got out. A cold wind was blowing; it stung Harry’s cheeks. He pushed his hat down on his head.

Sandy turned to the gatekeeper. ‘All well, Arturo?’

‘
Sí
, Señor Forsyth. Señor Otero is here, he is in the office.’ The gatekeeper’s manner was deferential. What you’d expect from a junior staff member to the boss, Harry supposed. It was strange to think of Sandy as a boss, in charge of staff.

Sandy pointed into the distance. A sizeable farm, surrounded by poplars, was visible in a fold of the hills. Black cattle grazed in the fields around it.

‘That’s the place we want to buy. Alberto’s been onto the land on the q.t., taken some samples. He’s quite happy about your visit now, by the way. I talked him round. He was worried about trusting someone who worked at the embassy, but I told him your word was your bond, you wouldn’t say anything.’

‘Thanks.’ Harry felt a stab of guilt. He concentrated on what Sandy was saying.

‘The seam of gold runs right under that farm, gets richer there too. The owner breeds bulls for the
corrida
. He’s none too bright, he hasn’t twigged what we’re doing here. I think we could get him to sell.’ He laughed suddenly, gazing over the fields. ‘Isn’t it wonderful? All just lying there. Can’t believe it myself sometimes. And we’ll get that farm, don’t worry. I’ve told the farmer I’ll pay him cash, he can go and live with his daughter in Segovia.’ He turned to Harry. ‘I can usually persuade people to see things my way, sniff out something they want and dangle it before them.’ He smiled again.

Harry bent and scooped up some of the yellow soil. It was similar to the earth in the canister in Sandy’s office. It felt friable, cold. Sandy clapped him on the arm.

‘Let’s go and get a cup of coffee in the office. To warm us up.’ He led Harry towards the nearest hut. ‘No one’s here today, just the security people.’

The office was spartan: a desk and a few folding chairs. There was a picture of a flamenco dancer on one wall, and a photograph of Franco above a desk where Otero sat, reading a report. He rose when Harry and Sandy entered and shook Harry’s hand. He smiled, his manner much friendlier than a few days ago.

‘Señor Brett, welcome, thank you for coming all this way. Would you both like a coffee?’

‘Thanks, Alberto,’ Sandy replied. ‘We’ve been freezing our
cojones
off. Sit down, Harry.’

The geologist fussed with a kettle and gas stove that stood in a corner. Sandy sat on a corner of the desk and lit a cigarette. He picked up the document Otero had been reading.

‘This the report on the latest samples?’

‘Yes. The results are good. That section by the stream is one of the best. We only have powdered milk I am afraid, Señor Brett.’

‘That’s OK. It’s a big site.’

‘Yes. But the land we have has been comprehensively surveyed.’ He looked round at Harry. ‘The new samples are from the farm nearby.’

Otero handed round mugs of coffee and sat down again. ‘It is so frustrating. We cannot start intensive work until we have ministry clearance. Under Spanish law minerals under the soil belong to the government and it is a matter of agreeing our mining rights, our commission. The ministry keep demanding more samples, which cost more money, and we need funds if we are to buy the farm. We have the Generalísimo’s support in principle, but the ministry keep telling him to be cautious and he follows their advice after the Badajoz fiasco last year.’

‘If Madrid agreed and you got the farm, how much could you make? Over a year, say?’

Sandy laughed. ‘The big question.’

Otero nodded. ‘One cannot say exactly, but I would say twenty million pesetas. Once we bring the farm to full production, who knows – thirty, forty?’

‘That’s over a million pounds the first year,’ Sandy said. ‘If you bought a three per cent share, that’d be fifteen thousand sterling for a five hundred pounds investment. Thirty thousand if you put in a thousand.’

Harry sipped his coffee. It was bitter, globules of powdered milk floating on the surface. Sandy and Otero sat looking at him, smoke curling from their cigarettes.

‘That’s a lot of money,’ Harry said at length.

Otero laughed. ‘You English, always you understate everything.’

‘Especially Harry.’ Sandy laughed and stood up. ‘Come on, we’ll show you the diggings.’

They walked him over the site, showed him how slightly different colours in the earth indicated different gold content. The ground was dotted with little circular holes; Otero explained that was where samples had been taken. Clouds appeared, chasing each other across the sky.

‘Let’s look at the labs,’ Sandy said. ‘How’s your hearing these days? It seems OK.’

‘Yes, it’s pretty much back to normal now.’

‘Harry injured his ear at Dunkirk, Alberto. The Battle of France.’

‘Really?’ The geologist inclined his head in sympathy. They came to the laboratory hut and went in. There was a harsh chemical tang in the air. Long benches were covered with glass filters, big metal pans and trays full of clear liquid and the yellow earth.

‘Sulphuric acid,’ Sandy said. ‘Remember that from stinks lessons at school? Don’t touch any of those jars.’ They led him round, Otero explaining the processes for extracting gold from the ore. It didn’t mean much to Harry. As they left he looked again at the blockhouse, noticing the little windows were barred.

‘What’s that?’

‘We keep the ore for the second stage of the refining process there. It’s too valuable to leave lying around. The key’s back in the office, but have a look through the window if you like.’

The interior was dim but Harry made out more laboratory equipment. There were a number of large bins as well, mostly full to the brim with yellow soil, ground down to a fine tilth.

They went back to the office where Otero, still friendly, made more coffee.

‘I have experience on the South African goldfields,’ Otero said. ‘It was the place for a geologist to go when I was young. I learned some English there but I have forgotten it now.’ He smiled apologetically.

‘How does this place compare?’

Otero sat down. ‘Much smaller, of course. The Witwatersrand deposits are the biggest in the world. But there the quality of the ore is poor and the seams run deep underground. Here the quality is high and it is on or near the surface.’

‘Enough to give Spain serious gold deposits?’

‘Enough to make a significant difference to the country? Yes.’

Sandy looked at Harry over the rim of his cup. ‘What d’you say, then?’

‘I’m interested. But I’d like to consult my bank manager in London, write to him. Just in very general terms, about investing in a gold mine with proven reserves, I won’t say where, comparison with other investments and so forth.’

‘We’d need to see the letter,’ Sandy said. ‘Seriously, this is a confidential project.’

Otero looked at him with the sharpness Harry remembered. ‘As we said, no one at the embassy must know. A letter to England may be opened by the censor.’

‘Not if I send it via the diplomatic bag. But I don’t mind you seeing it before it goes, if you like.’

‘A bank manager will say it’s a risky investment,’ Sandy warned.

Harry smiled. ‘I won’t necessarily
take
his advice.’ He shook his head. ‘Three per cent of a million.’

‘In the first year.’ Sandy paused to let this sink in. Harry thought, perhaps that could have been mine if I wasn’t spying on them. He had a sudden urge to laugh.

Sandy rose and clapped his hands on his knees. ‘OK! I should be getting back. Dinner with Sebastian tonight.’

Otero smiled again as he shook Harry’s hand. ‘I hope you will come in with us,
señor
. It is the right time for you to invest. A thousand pounds would be useful to us now, prevent the ministry from grinding us down. And for you –’ he waved a hand – ‘the possibilities …’ He raised his eyebrows.

As Harry and Sandy crossed to the car the gatehouse door opened. A different man emerged, small and thin. To his astonishment Harry recognized Maestre’s ex-batman, Milagros’s chaperone.

‘Lieutenant Gomez,’ he said without thinking.
‘Buenos días.’

‘Bueno’ día,’
Gomez muttered. His face wore an impassive soldier’s expression but an agonized beseeching look in his eyes brought Harry up short. His heart sank as he realized he had made a mistake, a serious one.

‘You know each other?’ Sandy’s voice was sharp.

‘Yes, we met at a – a function a while ago, didn’t we?’

‘
Sí señor
, a function, that was it.’ Gomez turned and opened the gate, keeping his head averted as the car passed through. Sandy watched him in his mirror as he went back into his hut.

‘He’s our new gatekeeper,’ he said. ‘Just come on duty.’ He spoke quietly, conversationally. ‘How did you come to meet him?’

‘Oh, at a function, a party.’

‘You met a doorkeeper at a party?’

‘As a servant, a servant. Family retainer or something. Perhaps he got caught pinching the spoons.’ Harry laughed.

Sandy was silent for a moment, frowning. ‘General Maestre’s party that you told me about? For his daughter?’

Hell, Harry thought, hell. Sandy was so bloody quick; Maestre’s party was the only one he had mentioned and Sandy would have remembered, Maestre being an enemy. Sandy was still looking at the gatekeeper in the driving mirror.

‘Yes. When I took Maestre’s daughter to the Prado later, he picked her up. As I say, he must have been sacked.’

‘Perhaps.’ Sandy paused. ‘He came recommended, said he was an unemployed veteran.’

‘If he was sacked, he’d need to explain not having references.’

Sandy’s voice became casual. ‘Seen any more of the daughter?’

‘No. I told you, she’s not my type. I’ve met someone else,’ he added, to distract Sandy’s interest. But Sandy only nodded. He was frowning now, thinking. Harry thought, Maestre’s put Gomez in here as a spy and I’ve just betrayed him. Hell. Hell.

They passed through a village. Sandy stopped at a bar. Outside, two donkeys stood tied to a rail.

‘Can you wait just a minute, Harry?’ he asked. ‘Got to make a quick phone call, something I forgot.’

Harry waited while he went into the bar. The donkeys at the rail made him think of the Wild West. Gunfights at dawn. What would
they do to Gomez? The stakes were very big. He swallowed.
Had
Maestre sent him here as a spy? A couple of ragged children stood looking at the big American car. He waved and they turned and ran away, bare feet slithering in the mud.

Sandy emerged. His face was set and cold in a way that reminded Harry of the day he had been caned in class, the day he began planning his revenge on Taylor. He opened the car door and his face relaxed, he smiled. He got in. ‘Tell me more about this girl,’ he said as he started the engine.