“You tell me,” replied Roberto. “You seem like a pretty accomplished Peeping Tom.”
“Well, unfortunately, from here you can’t see the stretch of road in front of the church, which is where I assume the get-together happened. Or was it indoors?”
Roberto had to muster all his willpower to hide his feeling of relief. As chance would have it, the impromptu gathering and the opening of the bundle had happened right in one of the telescope’s blind spots. That meant Ibaibarriaga wouldn’t have seen Diego’s attack on Pampín, or the body being carried to the adjacent store.
But the lighthouse keeper was interested in other things, of course.
“I’ll tell you what Ithinkwent down.” He gave another grim smile. “None of the day’s events happened by chance. Someone tipped you off about whatever it was down in the water. I don’t know if it was Docampo over that beer, or the Freire boy later on, and I don’t care. You knew the bundle was going to be there, and that’s why you went down to the beach. But that’s not the most important thing.”
“Oh no?”
“No.” The man leaned closer and paused dramatically before going on in a knowing whisper. “The thing is ... I already know what was in the bundle.”
They sat staring at each other for a moment. The lighthouse keeper nodded significantly, leaned back again, and slurped a little more coffee. Roberto remained silent while the implications of this revelation flashed through his mind. It changed everything.
If Ibaibarriaga knew about the money, that meant he was in cahoots with its owners or, worse still, that he himself was the owner. Either way, it complicated things even more.
“Look, I didn’t know—”
“Cocaine,” Ibaibarriaga said with the triumphant look of a poker player laying down a flush.
“What?”
“You heard me. I’m certain that bundle was full of cocaine. It’s the only thing that could get all the Freires and Docampos to pounce like hyenas as soon as it came ashore.” His grin grew wider. “It’s fallen into their laps, and now those greedy bastards want to make some money out of it.”
Roberto was dumbfounded and had to make a superhuman effort not to burst out laughing. Ibaibarriaga had been close but in the end clearly hadn’t the faintest idea. For all his arrogance, he was miles off.
“Judging by the size of the bundle, I estimate about one hundred pounds, more or less.” The man scratched his nose, making mental calculations. “At market price, that’s about a million euros, maybe a little over.”
“So what’s your point?”
“That bunch of morons won’t get a decent price for it, a quarter of a million max ... and that’s if they don’t get caught red-handed,” he said, spreading his palms. “They don’t have any contacts, not unless ...”
“Yes?”
“Unless you’re the contact for the sale.” He squinted at him. “Are you?”
Roberto laughed, despite himself. “No, no, I’m not their contact.”
“Good news—I’m partly wrong, then—you didn’t know what was going to be in the bundle.” He frowned, clearly unsure on this point.“Tell you what. I don’t know what kind of agreement you and the families have come up with, and I don’t care, because we’re going to make a little modification. Tell them that one-third of the profit from the sale is mine.”
“Wow,” Roberto said. “That’s quite a cut.”
“I know people,” Ibaibarriaga said. “I’ve got contacts on the mainland who can place that cocaine for a lot more than they’ll manage to get. Possibly twice as much. It’ll be win-win: I get my piece, and they get about the same as they were going to anyway. And you get yours, of course.”
“And your colleagues, Varatorta and Pazos?” Roberto gestured to the kitchen. “Won’t they want a piece?”
“Borja’s like a son to me; he’s a good kid; he’ll do as I tell him.” Ibaibarriaga shrugged. “As for Varatorta, don’t worry about him. He has his ways, but I know how to handle him.”
Roberto bit his lip. It wasn’t great to be taken for a two-bit drug dealer, but that was nothing compared to the man’s smugness as he presumed to give him orders.
However, it was hardly in Roberto’s interest to disabuse him. As long as Ibaibarriaga thought it was all about a drug deal, with just a few hundred thousand euros up for grabs, it would keep him out of what was really going on. If he learned that tens of millions were in play, the situation could get seriously out of hand. Besides, Roberto was already implicated in a murder, and he didn’t need anything new to contend with. So, though burning inside, he managed to compose himself and put on a heavyhearted, docile look.
“I’ll talk to the others,” he lied, before draining his coffee, now cold. “I don’t think it’ll be a problem, but I’ll need a few days to bring them round. You know how pigheaded they are, and all the rivalry. It’ll take some serious diplomacy.”
“A couple of days is no problem. Have you seen the forecast?”
Roberto shook his head, and the lighthouse keeper stood up with a snort, going and taking a folder from a desk on which stood a radiotransmitter. He pulled out a bundle of freshly printed papers. It was a weather forecast, showing several isobar maps and dozens of columns crammed with numbers.
