Message From Malaga Read Online Free PDF Page B

eyes watching Reid’s hands. Reid kept his voice casual. “Were you out on that balcony?”
    “It’s a good place to see what is going on.”
    “It could be a foolish place, too.” Reid chose the nearest chair, sat down, crossed his legs, made no attempt to reach for his cigarettes.
    “Did you see me out there?” The man slipped his throwing knife back into the cuff of his tight sleeve.
    Reid shook his head. And was I supposed not to notice that knife? “You know, if I had come up here to kill you, I would have entered with a revolver pointed. I would have peppered the room in the direction you moved. There’s a good six-to-one chance that I would have got you.”
    “A noisy method.”
    “There are such things as silencers. Even without one of them, the noisy method might have seemed only part of the flamenco. Pablo’s heels rattle like a machine gun.”
    The man sat down at the table. “Don’t be so sure you would have got me,” he said softly. “The light from the shutters reached the threshold of the door. I could see your feet—and your hands.”
    So this was a type who never apologised, and if he explained it would be to show how right he was. Certainly, he wasn’t afraid of risks; but he calculated them. And his reflexes were remarkably quick. Physically, he was of medium height andweight, with even features, thick dark hair now greying, heavily tanned skin, pale lips, two deep furrows on either side of his mouth, expressionless brown eyes under heavy brows. He was dressed, surprisingly, in a neat summer suit of silver-grey, a cream silk shirt, a broadly knotted tie of almost the same colour. He was totally unlike any refugee who had ever emerged from a packing case in the hold of a cargo ship.
    “You were late,” the man was saying, continuing his explanation.
    Two minutes.”
    “I saw you leave your table. Someone could have been waiting for you near the staircase. A matter of substitution, you understand.”
    “Quite,” said Reid gravely. He repressed a smile. He had the feeling that this man might not appreciate any joke about conspiracy: he seemed to accept it as a natural way of life. Yes, Magdalena might have been right—this man could be trouble. “How did you know who I was?” He could risk taking out his cigarettes and lighter.
    “Tavita pointed you out to me. Necessary, wouldn’t you say?”
    “Certainly cautious.” Reid took a cigarette, was about to light it, remembered politeness, and rose to offer the pack. “Do you smoke?”
    “I prefer cigars.”
    “But not here,” Reid said quickly. “Tavita doesn’t smoke cigars.” He lit his own cigarette, sat down at the table with his hands well in view. The lighter was at his elbow. “The smell stays in a small room for days.”
    “Does she smoke this brand of cigarette?” The man reached across the table, lifted the pack, examined it briefly, tossed it back.
    “As a matter of fact, she does,” Reid said. “We are cautious, too, you see. I’m sorry we had to lock you in here, but that is also part of—Something wrong?” The stranger had stretched his arm across the table again, tapped Reid’s left hand.
    “Only your watch. I’m amazed that a careful man lets it run slow.”
    “I don’t think so.” If he’s interested in this watch, then let’s encourage him, Reid thought. Let’s keep his curiosity away from the lighter. Reid unfastened the watch from his wrist, wound it a little. “It usually keeps perfect time. Are you sure it isn’t your watch that is fast?”
    “Perhaps. Certainly, it isn’t as elegant as that one. So very thin.”
    “The newest fad. All face and no works. Like some people I know.”
    “No works?”
    “Hardly any. See?” Reid displayed the watch with an owner’s usual pride, let the man examine it closely. “I don’t suppose there are many of those for sale in Havana.”
    “The first I’ve seen.”
    Reid took the watch, strapped it back on his wrist. “Now, where were we? Oh,