William McGivern - The Caper of the Golden Bulls

“Why not?”

“Because there’s something cold and cruel in his hands. When he helps me from his shoulders I feel that he’d enjoy snapping my spine like a celery stalk. And when he thinks no one is watching, he stares at Francois in a strange fashion. As if he despises him.”

“You can’t blame Phillip for sharing a majority view.”

“How did you meet him?”

“I’ve explained that.”

“Then explain it again.”

Her mood was getting worse, he saw. He shrugged. “I got talking with him in Pamplona. I saw he had the three things I wanted: greed, physical strength, and a lack of imagination.”

“I want you to get rid of him.”

He shook his head. “Either I run things, or I don’t. Make up your mind.”

“All right,” she said slowly. She sat up and regarded him with an appraising smile. “I really don’t like you, Peter. Do you realise that?”

“Yes, and it grieves me keenly. Now let’s talk about the film, shall we? I want it the morning Francois and I enter the bank. Francois will bring it along with him. Otherwise, I won’t blow the vault. Do you understand?”

“What makes you think you can give me ultimatums?”

“Because, Angela, I don’t like you either. And the tensile strength of my bondage isn’t infinite; you’d be wise not to strain it.”

“Peter! What would I gain by double-crossing you?”

“Why, nothing, of course.” He smiled into the shimmering lights of her narrowing eyes.

“I’ve sent Phillip on to Pamplona. I suggest you and Francois leave tomorrow. We’re almost at the point of no return now. So remember my terms: no film, no diamonds.”

She smiled back at him and nodded slowly.

Peter rose to leave. The crucial information he took away with him was that their trust and confidence in one another was non-existent. If faith could move mountains, theirs wouldn’t budge feather.

At Gibraltar British destroyers cruised over the green waters between Spain and Africa; the broad white tail of the tourist ferry was hull-down on its way to Tangier; whistles blasted the mild air, and gulls flew about with an expertise that seemed tinged with panic; fishermen with brandy and cheap watches and hashish in their boats rowed steadily but cautiously towards a Dutch freighter anchored in the Straits, while on the Rock itself, Indians and Tommies and Spaniards mingled in the streets, and children played cricket in squares ringed with venerable cannons.

Mr. Shahari’s shop was in the High Street. Bright silken kimonos and black lace negligees fluttered over the sidewalk, offering splintered glimpses of merchandise piled up behind dusty glass windows. For tourists and seamen there were Swiss watches, Toledo blades, watered perfumes, cuckoo clocks, banderillas in red and white streamers, figures of the Virgin and the Buddha, jade necklaces and bracelets, tambourines, castanets, guitars, and gaudy scarves emblazoned with the images of Roy Rogers and Gary Cooper, of stallions nuzzling mares in front of Canadian sunsets, of the peerless Manolete gazing sorrowfully at idealised bulls and sefloritas.

As Peter hurried towards this cornucopia of frivolities, he ran into Cathy Clark.

“Oh, Peter, how lucky. I’m so worried. I’ve got to talk to you about Morgan.”

At sight of her, Peter’s soul had curdled like an oyster dropped in boiling milk. That reaction was hardly fair, he realised; Cathy was young and innocent, and her voice was not at all like most Americans, but still, she had been in his office when he had received the summons from Angela how many decades ago had that been? and her presence recalled the shock of that moment all too vividly.

“I’m very rushed.”

“But Morgan’s in terrible shape, Peter. I went to see him yesterday. He’s going up to Pamplona with those ghastly Americans. Do you know them? One is so hairy he sheds. He really does. And the other one, his name’s Tonelli, I think, he looks like, well, like he’d love giving a multiple hotfoot to a centipede. Have you met them?”

“Yes.”

“They’re So cruel to him. They call him Fatso and Porky. And he doesn’t rant and rave like he used to, he just sits there and heaves big sighs. Are you a lawyer, Peter?”

“What gave you that idea?”

“Morgan seems to think you are. Peter, he’s in trouble. I know it.

Can’t you do something about him?”

“Well, what do you suggest?”

She frowned uncertainly. “I don’t know. But those men have a hold on him. He shouldn’t go to Pamplona with them.”

“Cathy, if Morgan wants to go to Pamplona, I can’t stop him. I’m late now. Excuse me.”

In the small office behind his shop, Mr. Shahari smiled complacently at heaps of merchandise on his desk. “I believe it’s all here, Mr. Churchman. The diet crackers and diet chocolate. The walkie-talkies, everything.”

Peter inspected the walkie-talkies, and placed them in his attaché case, along with the crackers and cans of milk.

“There will be no trouble with those items,” Mr. Shahari said. “In fact, it will please the Spanish customs officials to find a wealthy man who must nourish himself on dry crackers and milk that tastes like chalk. It will make them pleased with the prospect of the chickens and rice and wines that are waiting for them in their own homes. But as for the other things,” he looked soberly at the shining heap of precision tools on his desk, “they are another matter altogether.”

The bits and braces and drills sparkled palely in the light of the single bulb hanging from the ceiling. They looked powerful and cruel, like ferocious metallic animals, with deadly little jaws, savage claws, rows of glistening pointed teeth. They actually looked hungry, Peter thought, as if they were eager to start tearing and champing at a banquet of bolts and hinges and locks.

“You will need luck,” Mr. Shahari said.

“I know.”

“In fact, you’ll need a miracle.”

From the alley behind Mr. Shahari’s shop came the sound of low and mournful piping. Peter looked at his watch.

“Maybe there’s my miracle.”

Mr. Shahari raised his eyebrows. “No, Mr. Churchman. That is only a knife sharpener.”

Peter opened the back door of the shop. The old tinker with the mossy cheeks stood beside his wagon in the alley.

“You see, I told you that you could depend on me,” he said. The old man seemed in high spirits; his smile was wide, and his eyes gleamed with conspiratorial excitement. “We’ll play a good trick on them, eh senor?” There was a wine bottle in his pocket.

Peter collected the drills and braces and carried them to the doorway.

After a glance up and down the alley, he went out, side and spread the tools on the work surface of the tinker’s wagon. The old man smeared them all with thick coatings of black grease and, one by one, dropped them into the wooden tub of dirty water lashed to the side of his rig. On top of them he threw a half-dozen broken knives, and several dented pots and pans. When they disappeared from sight, he pantomimed smoothing the surface of the water with his hands, as if he were tucking them all away in bed. This set him to laughing hugely.

Overcome, he clutched his sides, and turned a flushed and merry face to Peter.

“What a trick!” he cried, between gasps. “What a trick!”

“Yes,” Peter said, a bit nervously, and glanced at his watch. “Now you must reach Spanish customs at exactly four-thirty. Before the day labourers check out. Got that?”

“You can depend on me,” the old tinker said, and, still laughing heartily, he trundled his wagon off down the alley.

“It’s very clever,” Mr. Shahari said. “I wish you luck, Mr. Churchman. Now, would you care to glance at this bill?”