An Enigmatic Disappearance Read Free Page B

‘She’s a fool to think I would go on working for eight hundred when down in the port it’s now over a thousand. And what is an extra hundred to the likes of them? You tell me that.’
    â€˜It does mount up over time…’
    â€˜Listen to him! It mounts up. You think a foreigner has to worry like that when they’re as rich as a mayor who’s enjoyed ten years of brown envelopes?’
    He thought few foreigners could be that rich. ‘What’s the address?’
    â€˜Ca’n Nou.’
    â€˜Which is where?’
    â€˜Cami de Polso.’
    In the past couple of years, reputedly at the European Union’s expense – this seemed likely since the exercise had been unnecessary – every lane in the countryside had been given a name and posted; this was not one he recognized, but he was not going to give her the satisfaction of admitting so. ‘Tell the señor I’ll be along as soon as possible.’
    Having replaced the receiver, he studied the files and paper which littered the desk and sighed at the thought of all the work involved if ever he decided to sort them out and clear them up. He checked the time. It should be possible to speak to Ogden about his missing wife before it would be necessary to stop work for lunch. Lunch. Dolores hadn’t cooked Cocido Andaluz for quite a while so perhaps she was doing so now. In her hands, beef, bacon, beans, potatoes, pumpkin, chorizo, morcilla, garlic, tomatoes, and spices, became miraculously transformed into ambrosia … But what if the unthinkable were thought? What if Dolores had listened to Concha’s ravings? Lunch then might be so plain and uninteresting that even a starving pilgrim would hesitate to eat … He left the room a troubled man.
    Downstairs, the cabo was still reading; his resentment at Alvarez’s interruption was clear. ‘Never heard of the road.’
    Alvarez left the post and made his way to a shop near his parked car which sold electrical goods, including computer equipment. The young woman behind the counter was too busy concentrating on a computer game – set up to attract customers’ attention – to notice him, until he said: ‘Do you know where Cami de Polso is?’
    â€˜No.’ She zapped a couple of aliens.
    â€˜Where’s the boss?’
    â€˜Couldn’t say.’
    â€˜Would you see if he’s around?’
    She zapped a couple more. ‘Why?’
    â€˜Because I want a word with him. Cuerpo General de Policia.’
    â€˜And there was me thinking you was Arnie!’ She reluctantly left, to go around a display of television sets into the back of the shop.
    He wondered who Arnie was. Having watched which controls she’d used, he set out to zap the oncoming aliens. He failed ingloriously and a notice came up on screen to tell him he’d been eliminated.
    A voice from behind him said: ‘You need to be under twenty to survive.’
    He had known Valverde long enough to remember a skinny, snot-nosed boy from a family so poor that he had always worn cast-off clothing. Now he was sleekly plump and dressed in the height of casual fashion. They shook hands. Valverde, uncertain why Alvarez wanted to speak to him – the assistant had not bothered to explain – and therefore fearing it might be the wish to buy a piece of equipment at a heavy discount, complained about the rise in the cost of living, the drop in the numbers of tourists and the miserly spending of those who did arrive, and the rapacity of the tax collector who was rapidly reducing him to penury.
    â€˜It’s a cruel world,’ Alvarez agreed. ‘You own a lot of property about the place, don’t you?’
    Valverde, ever careful, said: ‘Just the odd field, bought for old times’ sake seeing as the old folks used to farm.’
    â€˜Then you may know where Cami de Polso is?’
    â€˜That’s what you want to