Face to the Sun Read Online Free PDF

was still on hands and knees. I assumed he was after the
briefcase and felt a fleeting sympathy for Dona Juana before I became unconscious.
    When I woke up I found myself in a small white­washed room lying on a trestle bed with a couple of blankets under me. The room seemed to be an attic for there was no window, only a skylight.
The briefcase was on the floor beside me with the lock cut away. I stretched out a shaky hand to it, and fingers felt that my wad appeared to be intact. Then for what had I been hijacked, and how
had I been traced in spite of all my precautions?
    The door opened and a young man whose build and clean-cut profile suggested Spanish birth and breeding, asked me how I was feeling.
    ‘Fairly lousy, thank you,’ I replied.
    ‘I am sorry to have had to deal with you so drastically, but we had to be sure that you didn’t have a chance to yell for help. Now what is your name?’
    ‘Whatever I choose to tell you.’
    ‘A professional, ha?’ His English was excellent. ‘Then from whom did you get your orders?’
    ‘What orders?’
    ‘To get hold of the model Punchao del Dia.’
    ‘Nobody. It – well, came into my possession.’
    I told him of my surprise when I found it in the black crocodile bag and that I did not know at the time who was its owner or what was its importance.
    ‘Where is it now?’
    ‘I do not know,’ I replied, for I was not going to give away the Presidenta.
    ‘I believe I should have knocked the first of your teeth out at that point,’ he said, ‘but as you will have seen I am not a Malpelo policeman. What do you know of my
country?’
    ‘No more than what your president’s wife and daughter told me.’
    ‘And what was that?’
    ‘That the Moment of Daybreak – the Punchao del Dia as you call it – was of great value to General Heredia.’
    ‘I see. We were wondering why she did not mention the loss to the police. But why did she go to Zurich?’
    My heroics in keeping silent over Doña Juana had evidently been quite pointless, so I gave him the truth.
    ‘Because I would not take a cheque.’
    ‘She couldn’t draw enough cash in London?’
    ‘Apparently not. May I ask how you know so much?’
    ‘You may. It will be a useful lesson for you in future, if you have one. Remember that the wife of General Heredia is a person of importance and cannot just jump on a plane like anyone
else. There was a Special Branch man on duty at the VIP lounge. He recognised La Presidenta from the newspaper photograph and was curious why she should have gone to Zurich and back in a single
day. It may be that he thought the robbery was faked and she was planning to get the insurance.’
    He went on to tell me that when she and her daughter returned to Heathrow and were met by a man who looked like a high-class crook from the City, the Special Branch chap took the number of their
taxi and when it parked again at the airport he asked the driver where he had dropped them. Enquiries at the hotel made it easy to identify the two ladies. The door had then been discreetly watched
until I left that morning. They assumed the Punchao del Dia was in that briefcase of mine, but it was now obvious that it had been delivered against payment.
    ‘And who are “we”?’ I asked.
    ‘Do you speak Spanish?’
    ‘I do.’
    ‘Then you will find out from a rather more serious interrogator.’
    He went out and before the door had closed behind him, I heard a silvery voice remark impatiently:
    ‘Well, what’s the bastard got to say?’
    I was hurt by the contempt in that beautiful voice. It was a shock after the gentleness of my interrogation, apart from the casual reference to my doubtful future. What the devil had I walked
into?
    And how the devil was I going to walk out of it? My polite interrogator had locked the door and there was not a stick of furniture in the room beyond the light trestle bed on which I lay. It was
obviously too short to reach the sloping window in the roof, but I