if anything had been left for me, and save time and messing around later. I was going to the same place that I’d collected the insulin packs and explosives from. The marker was the same Coke can. It would be left in position if something was there for me, and I would remove it once I had picked up.
I drove past Hubba-Hubba’s cover position, then the drop-off, and on to the picnic area. My headlights hit the recycling bins and two huge green plastic bottle banks, each with a large steel ring poking out of the top. The Coke Light can was still in position just under the forward right-hand corner of the nearer one.
There were no other vehicles in sight, so I parked up on the mud and gravel just past the bins, and turned off my lights. I pushed my hand underneath the one to the left of the Coke can, and felt for the broken brick that would be there if I had a message. Bingo. I dragged it out, a lot lighter than an ordinary brick, then took the can as well.
I turned the car around and headed back the way I’d come, wanting to be clear of the area as fast as I could. Once back on the main road I turned left, toward BSM, leaving the warship lighting up the bay behind me. At the turnout behind the OP, I closed down the Megane, then got out my Leatherman and started to dig into the brick with the pliers.
The center had been hollowed out, then its contents plastered over. I pulled out the Saran-wrapped package and unraveled it, at the same time brushing the plaster dust off my clothes. Inside was a sheet of lined paper, covered in tight print. I opened the glove compartment and laid it on the drinks tray. There was no introduction, just the message.
George did know about the connection between Curly and Greaseball. It also seemed the Ninth of May was well known to the French police. They suspected it had been used more than once to ferry heroin from here to the Channel Islands.
Curly’s actual name was Jonathan Tynan-Ramsay, and he originated from Guernsey. I didn’t give a fuck: he was going to stay Curly for me. He had a list of minor drug offenses, and had been on court-imposed drug rehab programs, which he’d failed to complete. He’d eventually served five years in jail in England for his part in a pedophile ring, and left the U.K. after being put on the sex offenders list. He had lived in France for the past four years. He and Greaseball were members of all the same clubs. The sort of clubs Hubba-Hubba wanted to put a bomb under.
George finished with a warning. The local police were taking an interest now that the Ninth of May was on the move; it had last been seen in Marseille three days ago. The police didn’t know what had happened in Marseille, but George reckoned it had picked up the Romeos from the Algiers ferry, and now the police were waiting to see where it popped up again. It was just routine, he said, but be careful.
I tore the message into bite-size pieces and started chewing. As I headed back down the mountainside, I wondered why the hell George hadn’t told me all this in the first place. There’d been enough opportunity.
Chapter 38
I passed Lotfi’s vehicle position in the hotel parking lot and could see nothing out of the ordinary. Below and ahead of me was the marina, and quite a few of the boats were still lit up. Driving down to the entrance, I saw nothing to get me worried, nothing parked near the bus stops, no bodies sneaking around. I continued on up to the turnout behind the OP. It was empty, no sign of Hubba-Hubba’s vehicle. Good man: he had thought about the third party, parked elsewhere, and walked over to pick up my Megane.
So far everything looked normal — which didn’t mean a thing.
A vehicle approached from the other direction, passed me, forgetting to dip its lights, and continued. I followed the line of the mountains toward Monaco, not wanting to park behind the OP now in case the van was back: it’d make too much noise this time of the morning. The marina lights in my rearview mirror disappeared as I completed the corner and drove into the darkness. Eight or nine vehicles were parallel-parked in a turnout ahead. They probably belonged to the cluster of houses above me on the steeper ground — apart from Hubba-Hubba’s Scudo. I pulled in at the end of the line.
I got out, checked my fanny pack, and moved the Browning hammer away from the sore on my stomach, which had started to bleed. From the back of my Megane, I retrieved the towel, left in the Saran-wrapped dump and urine-filled water bottle, and replaced them with my fresh supply of water and Snickers bars.
I locked the Megane, slung the towel and its contents over my left shoulder, and started back down to the OP with my cap firmly on my head to keep me warm later on.
There were just one or two lights on in the houses way up the hill; other than that the mountain was asleep.
An animal scurried away from me as I approached the entry point in the hedge. I had a quick look around before climbing over and following the hedge line on my hands and knees until I reached the V-shaped palm shrub.
I sat there for a while and tuned in, then got the binos out of the towel. They worked well as a night-viewing aid with a little help from the dull lighting around the marina. I started with pier nine, but couldn’t be sure that the Ninth of May was still there. A boat was parked in its position, but it didn’t seem to have the same silhouette. The binos were inconclusive; they were good, but not that good.
I’d have to go down to the pier to confirm physically, and do it right away. There was no point sitting waiting for first light, only to find that the thing wasn’t there.
I scanned the general area through the binos for the van. There were about a dozen vehicles in the parking lot, only two of them vans. These were right next to each other, and parked facing the boats. The one nearest to me had some signwriting on that I couldn’t make out from here. Worryingly, both had a good view of pier nine.
Leaving the towel and its contents behind, I crawled to the exit in the hedge but, instead of going through it, continued on for another twenty-five or thirty yards as a vehicle moved into the marina. I turned downhill toward the Petite Afrique beach. There was no pathway, just scrub and dry earth all the way down to the sand.
Once I hit the sand I got up and walked to the parking lot. My detour meant I was approaching the vans from the rear, on the assumption that if anyone was inside them they’d be concentrating on the target.
I passed the swings and jungle gym, using the huge piles of sand as cover but walking normally, as if I were taking a shortcut back to my boat. It was pointless getting tactical and running, crawling, ducking, all that sort of stuff. I was out in the open and, no matter what I did, I would be seen when I crossed the flat, open expanse of parking lot, if not before.
My Timberlands slipped and slid as I negotiated the sixty-odd yards of beach; then I hit the heat-cracked asphalt of the parking lot. I checked inside the cars as best I could, to see if any heads were pulled back in their seats, with their car windows open just an inch to prevent that ever-compromising condensation. The odd vehicle still moved to and fro along the main road, and I heard laughter from the far side of the marina. As I got closer to the parking lot I could see the silhouette of a couple kissing in a sedan to my right, near the garbage area, but that was all. It was probably the vehicle that had come in while I was moving down here. I didn’t think I’d seen it there before. I sauntered along until I got between the two vans. Once there, I stopped and listened, standing as if I were taking a piss. If there was surveillance, it would probably be in the unmarked one. The other was too easy to spot with such a VDM — visual distinguishing mark.
There was nothing I could do but stand there and listen. I put my ear gently against the side and opened my mouth to cut off any cavity noise, but heard nothing. I did the same with the other one, but again, nothing. It would look highly suspicious to anyone watching, a guy putting his head against a couple of vans, but I didn’t have any other options.
I must have been there for about three minutes, hearing nothing but the gentle lapping of water against boats, and the odd clanking of the rigging.
A vehicle screamed along the main road toward Monaco as I stepped out onto the pier. I wasn’t concerned about the kissers: they had other things on their minds, and might be there all night. The Germans weren’t dreaming of life on the big blue sea along with everyone else around here. Their TV was still going full blare as I passed, but it was the last thing on my mind by then. I had a horrible, empty feeling in my gut. I took a few more steps and stood, looking foolishly at the laundry that hung along the back of a boat called the Sand Piper, which was
