J.G. Ballard - Cocaine Nights

'Mr Prentice?' Cabrera was watching me with interest. 'You've remembered something…?'

'No. The keys weren't locked away, Inspector. Once you finished searching the apartment after Frank's arrest you handed them to Mr Hennessy. They were lying in his desk drawer. Anyone could have stepped in and had a copy made.'

'Of course. But how did your attacker know you were here? You decided only late in the evening to leave Los Monteros.'

'Inspector…' This pleasant but over-shrewd young policeman seemed determined to make me his chief suspect. 'I was the victim. I can't speak for the man who tried to strangle me. He may have been in the club when I arrived, and seen me unloading my suitcases in the car park. Perhaps he telephoned the Los Monteros Hotel after I left, and they told him that I was moving here. You might follow those leads up, Inspector.'

'Naturally… I happily take your advice, Mr Prentice. As a journalist you've seen so many police forces at work.' Cabrera spoke dryly, but his eyes were scanning the scuff-marks on the tiled floor, as if trying to calculate the assailant's height. 'You obviously have a feeling for the profession 'Does it matter, Inspector?' Paula stepped between us, irritated by Cabrera's questioning. Her face was calm now, and she took my arm, steadying me against her shoulder. 'Mr Prentice could hardly have attacked himself. What conceivable motive would he have had?"

Cabrera stared dreamily at the sky. 'Motives? Yes, how they complicate police work. There are so many of them, and they mean anything you wish to make them. Without motives our investigations would be so much easier. Tell me, Mr Prentice, have you visited the Hollingers' house?'

'A few days ago. Mr Hennessy took me there, but we couldn't get inside. It's a grim sight.'

'Very grim. I suggest another visit. This morning I had the autopsy reports. Tomorrow, when you have rested, I will take you there with Dr Hamilton. Her opinion will be valuable I passed the afternoon on the balcony, my neck chafing inside the orthopaedic collar, my feet resting on the scuffed floor. In the soil scattered from the plant tubs a demented geometer had set out the diagram of a bizarre dance of death. I could still feel my assailant's hands on my throat, and hear his harsh breath in my ears, reeking of malt whisky.

Despite all I had said to Cabrera, I too was curious how my attacker had entered the apartment and why he had chosen the very evening that I left the Los Monteros Hotel. Already I sensed that I was being kept under surveillance by people who saw me as something more dangerous to them than Frank's concerned brother. Another murder would not have suited their purposes, but a near-strangulation might well send me to Malaga airport and a speedy return to the safety of London.

At six, shortly before Paula returned, I took a shower to clear my head. As I soaped myself with Frank's bath gel I recognized the scent, an odd blend of patchouli and orris oil, the same odour that had clung to my attacker's hands and which now covered my body.

As I rinsed away the offensive fragrance I guessed that he had been hiding in the shower stall when I arrived, and that his hand had touched the gel container in the dark. I assumed that he was searching the apartment as Paula let herself through the door with her spare key, and that she had not realized he was present while she hunted for the postcard.

Yet far from warning me off, the attack had turned up the ratchet of my involvement with the Hollingers' deaths, and made certain that I would remain in Estrella de Mar.

I dressed and returned to the balcony, listening to the divers plunge into the pool below and the tennis machine serve its aces to the practice players on the courts. The faint scent of bath gel still clung to my skin, the perfume of my own strangulation that embraced me like a forbidden memory.

An ashy dust cloaked the hill slopes as the nearside wheels of Cabrera's car raced through the verge, a chalky pall that swirled between the palms and floated up the drives of the handsome villas beside the road. When it cleared we could see the Hollinger house on its fire mountain, a vast grate choked with dead embers. Teeth clenched, Paula worked the gear lever, chasing the policeman's car around the bends and only slowing out of respect for my injured throat.

'We shouldn't be here,' she told me, clearly still shocked by my assault and the thought that such violence existed in Estrella de Mar. 'You aren't resting enough. I want you to come to the Clinic tomorrow for another X-ray. How do you feel?'

'Physically? I dare say, a complete wreck. Mentally, fine. That attack released something. Whoever seized me had a light touch-I once watched professional stranglers doing their stuff in northern Borneo, executing so-called bandits. Extremely nasty, but in a way I…'

'Know how it feels? Not quite.' She slowed down to give herself time to look me over. 'Cabrera was right-you're slightly euphoric. Are you strong enough to go round the Hollingers' house?'

'Paula, stop playing the head girl. This case is about to break, I sense it. And I think Cabrera senses it too.'

'He senses you're going to get yourself killed. You and Frank – I thought you were so different, but you're even more mad than he is.'

I leaned my orthopaedic collar against the head-rest and watched her as she crouched over the steering wheel. Determined not to be left behind by Cabrera, she peered fiercely at the road, putting her foot down at the smallest opportunity. Despite her sharp tongue and brisk manner, below the surface lay a strain of insecurity that I found pleasantly attractive. She affected to look down at the expat communities along the coast, but had a curiously low estimate of herself, bridling whenever I tried to tease her. I knew that she was annoyed with herself for having concealed from Cabrera her presence at the apartment, presumably for fear that he might assume some personal involvement between us.

Miguel, the Hollingers' morose chauffeur, was opening the gates when we caught up with Cabrera. The wind had disturbed the ash that lay over the gardens and tennis court, but the estate was still bathed in a marble light, a world of glooms glimpsed in a morbid dream. Death had arrived at the Hollingers and decided to stay, settling her skirts over the shadowy pathways.

Cabrera greeted us when we parked, and walked with us to the front steps of the house.

'Dr Hamilton, thank you for giving up your time. Are you ready, Mr Prentice? You are not too tired?'

'Not at all, Inspector. If I feel faint I'll wait out here. Dr Hamilton can describe it to me later.'

'Good. In fact, your first sensible idea.' He was watching me closely, eager to see my reactions, as if I were a tethered goat whose bleats might draw a tiger from its lair. I was sure that by now he had no wish to see me return to London.

'Now…' Cabrera turned his back on the heavy oak doors, still sealed by their police tapes, and pointed to the gravel path that led around the south-west corner of the mansion to the kitchen and garages. 'The hall and the downstairs rooms are too dangerous for anyone to enter. I suggest therefore that we follow the path taken by the assassin. This way we will see events in the order they took place. It will help us to understand what happened on that evening and, perhaps, read the psychology of the victims and their murderer Enjoying his new role as stately home tour guide, Cabrera led us around the house. The Hollingers' blue vintage Bentley stood outside the garage, the only clean and polished entity in the estate. Miguel had washed and waxed the limousine, buffing the huge wings that flared above its wheels. He had followed us up the drive and now stood patiently beside the car. Still staring at me, he took up his leather and began to rub the high radiator grille.