The younger man frisked Roberto, extracting his phone, his notebook, the key to the cottage, a flashlight, and the length of fishing line that Elvira Couto had given him. Ibaibarriaga looked the items over, becoming increasingly irate.
“What’s this?” Pazos’s fingers plucked at the chain around Roberto’s neck, then pulled it clean off.
“Give me that.” Ibaibarriaga took it from him. “Where’s this key from?”
Roberto clenched his jaw and readied himself for the inevitable blow, but just then, Varatorta stepped forward and took the key in his chubby hands.
“I think I know,” he said smoothly. “It’s the key to the church.”
“Are you sure?” asked Ibaibarriaga.
“Absolutely.” Varatorta nodded so vehemently that his hair flapped over his bald patch. “It’s a Fichet security key. The locksmith who came to install it last summer borrowed a drill bit from me. There isn’t another one like it on the whole island.”
A satisfied smile lit up Ibaibarriaga’s face. “The church, eh?” He slapped Roberto on the cheek a couple of times. “If you’d told me that at the beginning, we could have saved ourselves all this unpleasantness. All right, lads. I think we should go and say a few prayers for the souls of the deceased, past and future. What do you say?”
They let go of Roberto, and he sank to the floor, dazed.
“You can wait here for us,” said Ibaibarriaga from the doorway. “We’ll decide what to do with you when we come back with the cash. In the meantime, make yourself at home.”
He slammed the door shut, and Roberto heard the bolts slide on the other side. The men’s footsteps faded away, and a few moments later he watched from the window as they disappeared down the path. He wasn’t surprised to see that Ibaibarriaga had a shotgun over his shoulder.
Roberto hammered at the door with all his strength, but the effort was futile. The heavy teak door was bolted shut. He’d never be able to force it. And the window was sealed by iron bars. He could see the field behind the lighthouse, and the empty heliport, whipped by the wind and the rain. He shook the bars, but they had been set into the stone walls.
Desperate, he looked around the room, but the only thing inside it was the carpenter’s bench, so heavy that he couldn’t even move it.
Roberto buried his face in his hands.
His plan, hatched in a hurry, had been full of potential pitfalls. He’d known that and, even so, for want of alternatives, had forged ahead.
Well, things had turned out badly. And he had fallen right into the trap.
25
“You Don’t Fit but I Do”
The seconds turned into minutes and the minutes into hours. Roberto tried again to force the window bars, but he eventually gave up, his hands raw. He paced the room like a caged lion.
As the day wore on, the likelihood grew that the Docampos had already set out on their revenge mission. Antía would probably be wondering where he was, and might even have gone looking for him. The thought of her running into a party of bloodthirsty Docampos tormented him. But then again, she was nobody’s fool. Surely, after giving the Docampos the news, she would have returned home, and the Freires would guess what was coming or, at least, would take some basic precautions.
That was what he wanted to believe, because the alternative was too awful to contemplate.
He checked his watch. Two hours had already passed since the lighthouse keepers had gone off in search of the money. By now, they would have reached the church and found no trace of the loot. He could imagine how angry they would be when they returned.
And what they would do to him.
He heard a faint noise somewhere in the lighthouse, and for a moment he feared it was them. He heard the noise again. It was the squeak of unoiled hinges, the sound of somebody opening a door.
“Hey!” He hammered at the teak panels. “Is there anybody there? Help!”
The sound stopped for a moment. Then he heard light footsteps approaching and, finally, a gentle knock on the door.
“My friend,” whispered a familiar voice. “Are you there?”
Roberto almost fainted with relief.
“Yes, Diego, I’m here,” he said, his voice shaking. “Please open this goddamn door!”
He heard the boy struggling with the bolts and, finally, the door opened wide. On the other side, Diego Freire—dripping wet, his clothes clinging to his body, and looking as if he were about to drop dead from exhaustion—observed him with his green eyes.
