He rolled slowly off the bed to a sitting position and said, ‘Senhor?’ Then before I could answer, he called something in Spanish to the small girl who was standing in the open door behind me. She answered. He put out his tongue and she retreated, leaving the door open. I shut the door with my foot and said, ‘I’m from Mrs Stankowski.’
He didn’t get it at first. He just looked at me, puzzled.
‘Mrs Stankowski,’ I said. ‘You wrote to her sending the letter you found in a beer bottle.’ I put my hand in my pocket and brought out a pile of Spanish notes and tossed them to him. I’d got them at the airport exchange bureau.
He caught them and the dark eyes flickered with sudden interest and understanding. He sat there, staring at the notes as though they had just fallen out of the blue into his hands, which in a way they had, and I knew that he was having a struggle not to start counting them. Some lingering trace of Spanish courtesy made him decide against it.
He said slowly, ‘But it is unbelievable. I think it all a joke.’
‘It’s no joke,’ I said. ‘Apart from the one for Mr Carver—have you found any other letters like it since?’
He stood up. ‘No, sir.’ He looked at me and then at the notes in his hands and shook his head.
‘You can count them later. Tell me, would you have any idea who had returned the beer bottles?’
‘No, sir. I am not in the shop when they come in. Only the evenings I am working to wash them.’
It looked as though I wasn’t going to get much from him.
I said, ‘Is there a Bar Tristan in this town?5’
He sat down on the bed, put the notes at his side and then looked at me, cocking his head like a thrush listening for a worm, and it was a good ten seconds before he said, ‘Yes, sir.’
I thought it was a bit too long for such a simple answer.
‘Where?’
‘It is around the corner from the supermarket. I shall show you.’
He began to fish under the bed for his shoes. When he came up with them he said, ‘You stay somewhere in this town, senhor?’
I didn’t like that. I was the one who had come to ask questions, and I didn’t think he was just making polite conversation. José Bonifaz had something on his mind.
I said, ‘We’ll leave that for a bit. Tell me—have you mentioned this letter business to anyone else? Your mother or father, for instance.’
‘No, sir. I live alone here. They are out in the country. A farm, you understand? I am here for my studies and to work.’
‘What about your friends? You tell them?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Sure?’
‘Yes, sir.’ He stood up and wiggled his feet into his loose sandals. ‘If you like I show you the Bar Tristan now.’
I moved a little nearer him, and I could see that he was nervous about something. His eyes were flicking as though they were full of grit.
I said, ‘You usually walk around the town in your pyjamas?’
He looked down at his pyjama trousers and was genuinely surprised. Then he gave a nervous laugh and began to move towards the wardrobe.
I put a hand on his shoulder and stopped him.
‘Tell me,’ I said, ‘who have you talked about it to?’
‘But senhor—’
‘No buts, José—this is a serious matter. You have talked to someone, haven’t you?’
He drew away from me. ‘No, sir. Not me. I write to Mrs Stankowski and Mr Carver and I say nothing to anyone.’
For all I knew I could be on a wrong tack, but I had to take a chance on it. Something really was worrying José.
I said, ‘You ever been in trouble with the police, José?’
‘No, sir.’ It was quite definite.
‘You might be if you don’t tell me the truth. This is a serious matter. After I’ve finished here I am going to the police. Once they know about it it won’t be good for you if you haven’t told the truth.’ I had him hooked and wriggling. Getting mixed up with the police had his black eyes blinking fast and his birdy head bobbing about with apprehension.
‘You have talked to someone, haven’t you?’
‘No, sir. Not me. That is . . . well, someone talked to me.’ Then cupidity came in with a rush. ‘If I say, it is still mine, the pesetas?’
‘If you say, you might get some more. As much, for instance, as anyone else has promised you.’
The relief on his face was like sunrise.
He ran the edge of his tongue round his lips and said, ‘He say that I get five thousand pesetas.’
‘Who did?’
‘This man. He comes to the supermarket one evening, two-three days ago and ask me if I find anything in beer bottles. I tell him about the letters. I get five thousand pesetas if I let him know if anyone comes to talk about it. He was here again yesterday to see if I hear something.’
‘Who was he? Did he give a name?’
I could see what had happened. Some time—wherever Wilkins was being held—Thérèse or Paulet had discovered one of her letters in a bottle. She would never have been content with writing two. It was common sense to run a check at the supermarket to see if any previous letters had got through. At the moment, now that they knew about the letters, they could be very worried—maybe even thinking of moving on. The Stankowski one they could discount, but not mine altogether.
‘He is a young man called Mimo. Just Mimo. Five thousand pesetas he promised to let him know—’
‘How were you to let him know?’ My dislike for José was thickening. He worried too much about pesetas.
‘At midday always he is in the Bar Tristan. But any other time, if anyone comes enquiring I let him know
