Mary Dear - Redux Page 10

  He freshened up and around eight they went to the Plaza Mayor for a drink just as night was falling and the street lamps where being switched on. Joe loved Madrid, knew it well from his stint working for his company in their Spanish office in Las Rozas.

  ‘Is my favourite restaurant still in business?’ He asked knowing Vicky would know what he meant.

  ‘El Espejo. Sure it is. I haven’t been there since the last time you and I went and I need hardly tell you how long that’s been.’

  ‘Fancy a trip down memory lane?’ He winked.

  ‘Why not,’ she said and they left to grab a taxi to Paseo Recoletos.

  The restaurant was as good as Joe remembered, they were early and he asked for a table in the terrace, a favourite for him, where they could enjoy the warmth of a Madrid night in early June.

  An elderly waiter took their order of tapas and a bottle of Marques de Riscal.

  ‘So Joe, what’s all this about Tim? He can’t have disappeared surely.’ She was pulling a face that conveyed disbelief.

  ‘Mary’s worried about him. She hasn’t heard from him in over a month. You know my sister-in-law; love her dearly but a drama queen. Anyway I’m retiring soon and thought I could go off early and get a holiday thrown in. Always wanted to see that part of the World.’ She was looking at him, an understanding look on her face.

  ‘Now you’re making sense,’ but she could see that Joe felt uneasy and was not as unconcerned as he was making out. ‘He’s a grown man for goodness sake,’ she said reading his mind, ‘and a tough guy with it. Remember the narrow escape with the Great White in South Africa. He doesn’t need babysitting.’ But she knew how Joe felt about his nephew so she just shook her head, smiled and let it go.

  ‘You’re right. I know you are, but hey I’m getting a holiday,’ he said.

  ‘Yeah right.’ She laughed, and then changed the subject to her own life in Madrid.

  They had not seen each other in a while and there was no shortage of conversation. When dinner was over and they left the restaurant, they decided to walk back slowly, though it was a long walk it was a lovely evening, and they chatted easily as they strolled, arm in arm along O’Donnell past the Metro at El Retiro and continued on finally reaching Vicky’s flat in Calle Lanuza. By the time they got back to her place he’d almost pushed his worries about Tim to the back of his mind but he knew they would resurface the moment he was alone. The silence worried him. Vicky was right, of course she was, Tim didn’t need babysitting but he could not ignore Tim’s change in behaviour. It was strange.

  ‘Penny for them?’ She was looking at him and he realized he’d been absent.

  ‘Nothing. Well...Tim,’ he said apologetically.

  ‘Worrier,’ she said and pecked him on the cheek.

  The following day after a quick breakfast of coffee and a bocadillo at a local cafeteria, Vicky and Joe parted promising not to let so much time pass by before their next reunion. He thanked her for her hospitality and she headed off to her office at the Ministerio del Aire while he took a taxi to the international departures at Barajas.

  Soon as he arrived, he headed to the Iberia counter, checked-in and three hours later boarded his flight, to Colombia where he landed at El Dorado in Bogotá. The flight was long and uneventful. Joe caught a Copa flight to Panama and arrived in Tocumen at 20:10 where he planned to stay overnight. The following morning he made an early start and took the TACA Airbus for the final leg to Juan Santamaria airport in Costa Rica where he had just landed.

  Joe thanked the two young stewardesses who were standing by the exit door as he disembarked, and followed the signs to passport control.

  ‘Good morning Mr Shepherd.’ The immigration officer greeted him in English with an American accent. ‘Is your visit business or pleasure?’

  ‘A little of both,’ Joe said, and smiled noncommittally.

  ‘Enjoy your stay in Costa Rica,’ he said, stamped his passport and handed it back to him.

  Once through the custom’s formalities, after collecting his luggage from the carousel, Joe glanced around the terminal for the usual exit sign that would be marked ‘Taxis’. He moved quickly past crowds of friends and family gathered there to collect the newly arrived passengers or say goodbye to friends or family.

  A young man in a loud yellow tee shirt with the logo ‘Pura Vida’ emblazoned in bright colours approached him.

  ‘Taxi Señor?’

  ‘Si gracias. Gran Hotel Costa Rica, por favor.’

  The young man took his case and asked him to follow him to where his Toyota was parked. Joe didn’t know the hotel of course, but a man he’d met in the waiting room at the Costa Rican Consulate in London had recommended it saying it would more than meet his expectations. Not knowing any better he had decided to take his advice.

  The hotel, a restored 1930s property standing adjacent to the Plaza de la Cultura and the National Theatre in San Jose, had seen better days but Joe decided it would suit him fine.

  Tired from his long journey, Joe took his clothes off without bothering to unpack and climbed into bed. He woke up well after midday. After showering, shaving and changing into some new clothes he hung the rest in the wardrobe and left his room to get his first look of San Jose and the Costa Ricans.

  Back at the hotel later that evening he asked the concierge to indicate a restaurant nearby where he could eat. His suggestion was a fashionable place downtown and he added that he was sure to like the atmosphere and the food. Joe decided that he would try to relax telling himself that he would start the following morning with a visit to the British Embassy. He could then decide on where to go from there.

  At the Café Mundo on Avenida 9 in Barrio Otoya, he was relieved to see that the concierge had not misled him. After he had been led to a table for two he sat and ordered the fettuccine with camarones, dispensed with dessert and had his first cup of Costa Rica’s famous coffee. He lingered for a while over a cigarette and a second cup, self-conscious of being a lonely male in a restaurant full of couples and left early when he realized that the Café Mundo also attracted a largely gay clientele at night and, sitting alone and feeling a little conspicuous, he did not wish to be subjected to unwanted attention. As he left he wondered if the concierge had been having a little joke at his expense.

  Ian McBride went into the diplomatic service straight from Cambridge and, during his years in the British Foreign office, he had represented his country all over the world, acquiring a good solid reputation and a distinguished service record. In 1993 he and his wife Muriel spent a holiday in Costa Rica. They fell in love with the place and its friendly laid-back people, so that when the opportunity had presented itself, Ian had pulled a few strings and landed the posting of Her Majesty’s Ambassador to Costa Rica. They had now made it their permanent home and could not imagine ever going back to live in England.

  After Joe’s call to the Home Office in London they had sent a request to the British Ambassador about Mary Martin’s missing boy, asking him to look into the matter. Ian McBride, had taken the message seriously. There had been an incident last month when a pair of backpackers from Twickenham had got lost while hiking near the Arenal volcano. The British press had got a hold of it and had had his department under close scrutiny with all sorts of questions being asked about what the British government was doing to protect their citizens abroad. McBride did not want any more adverse attention directed his way. The Costa Rican police had found the back-packers safe and sound and reunited them with their family. Needing to discuss the disappearance of Mary Martin’s son, Ian McBride had called the Costa Rican police a second time and again they had responded promptly.

  Costa Rica abolished its army in 1949, and now they have a police force that struggles with a rising crime epidemic of theft and murder. Fernando Juarez, the police chief, was a portly, educated man, with passable English who did his best with the limited resources at his disposal. He and McBride had met recently over the matter of the back-packers and they greeted e
ach other like old friends. Unlike their British counterparts, Costa Rican police chiefs are not averse to a sociable drink while on duty so Juarez accepted the offer of a glass of Glendronach, McBride’s favourite malt whisky. The distillery, south of the river Deveron, on the very edge of Speyside, is not far from where his parents came from, and he delighted in saying that his special stock, sent all the way from the UK, was just one of the perks that came from representing Her Majesty’s government in the far-flung corners of the world.

  McBride had called Capitan Juarez to his private residence rather than the British Embassy in San Jose. The matter had to be handled discreetly and he felt that this could best be achieved with a private conversation in a more informal setting. They took their drinks outside and settled into two comfortable rocking chairs on the veranda of Ian’s old, colonial style, house in Escazu. Two hours later, after sampling more of the subtle flavour of McBride’s Glendronach, Capitan Juarez left saying that he would get on the case straight away and promised to get back to him with good news very soon.

  Joe Martin was in his mid-fifties and, at six foot two, cut an impressive figure with his weathered face, piercing blue eyes and thick auburn hair that had started greying at the temples. Slightly old fashioned, and a bit shy where women were concerned, Joe had remained single and slightly set in his ways. He hadn’t planned it, it just panned out that way. He came from a middleclass family whose father had served with The Royal Marines and who, after retiring from active service, had successfully played the stock market, made a pile and decided, henceforth, to take things easy. Joe’s parents had moved to Berkshire and joined Sunningdale Golf Club where they could be found most days, weather permitting, playing a round of golf or enjoying a drink in the clubhouse with their friends. Their holidays were invariably spent in their cottage in Devon.

  Joe had always wanted a military career and in 1971, at the age of nineteen and with his father’s help, he’d joined his dad’s old regiment and served during The Troubles in Northern Ireland rising to the rank of Captain.

  Most people who lived through “The Troubles”—named with typically Irish understatement—say they started in May 1966 with the formation of the Ulster Volunteer Force. The UVF, as it was more commonly known, was an illegal loyalist paramilitary organisation that formed at the time of the 50th anniversary of the Easter Rising in response to a perceived revival of the IRA. To most people The Troubles appeared to have no solution and things were not helped when Lord Carrington, the then Secretary of State for Defence, announced that the Army was to be issued with six-inch rubber bullets that could bring down a rioter at 30 yards. That’s going to earn us many friends, Joe had thought but kept it to himself. Then again, good PR had not been top of the agenda with his bosses in Whitehall. On 9th August, the year he’d joined up, the government introduced a policy of interning IRA suspects without trial. Hundreds of people were arrested in massive military operations in the Falls Road area of Belfast and in the Bogside in Londonderry. Joe could see it coming, a blind man could have, the Army’s tactics managed to achieve complete alienation of the Catholic population. The final paroxysm was reached when paratroopers opened fire on rioting Catholics in Londonderry, killing 13, on 30th January 1972—on what became known as Bloody Sunday.

  Joe thanked his lucky stars that he had not been part of that operation.

  Two weeks later rioters in Dublin burned the British embassy while the police watched. The one attempt at an agreement between the British government and the IRA occurred during that period. In 1972, they arranged a ceasefire and held secret talks. Joe had done the patrols; had shot and been shot at right up to 1991 when he left 45 Cdo at South Armagh after twenty years’ service. The mood of the Irish people changed as they became tired of terrorism, and the long peace movement that would result in the IRA renouncing violence, though still a few years off, had begun.

  For Joe, the return to civilian life meant a complete career change. His rank as a Captain in The Royal Marines had given him an assertive bearing and an ability to command. Joe got his CV together and mailed it to a dozen or so agencies seeking employment in whatever capacity they could offer. He thought he would be as flexible as possible in the hope that a job would be found.

  His experience in the army did not leave him particularly well placed for a civilian job and after six weeks he was beginning to wonder if he would be able to find something soon.

  One weekend, while enjoying a delicious Sunday lunch that his mother had prepared, the subject of work came up in the conversation. Joe mentioned that he was still trying but hadn’t had much luck and his mother reminded him about a friend from his school days who had done rather well in Public Relations. Why not? Joe thought it was definitely worth a shot. Later that evening when he was back at his flat, what his mother had said during lunch came back to him. He remembered a day years ago when he was still a child, that his friend’s father had taken them to London for a pre-Christmas visit to see the lights in Regent Street and had stopped off at his club on the way back. For some reason the name of The Travellers Cub had stuck in Joe’s memory and he decided to try his luck there first.

  Joe had contacted the club and been told that the Colonel had passed away but that his son was a member. Bertram Cooper-Cooper or Bertie to his friends had an association with the club going right back to when his father Colonel Cooper-Cooper used to take him there and let him sit quietly by his feet playing with his lead soldiers while his dad smoked his cigar and read the Times.

  Joe had told the concierge to give his contact number to Mr Cooper-Cooper when he next saw him. Bertie had called the very next day, made a fuss about old times and had been delighted when Joe mentioned he wanted to meet. That meeting—their first reunion since their schooldays—had resulted in a position for Joe at the firm of Matthias-Young and Associates, Public Relations Consultants. It would not be a hindrance to have a distinguished Royal Marine Captain on his staff, and Joe was put to work handling a new MOD contract.

  That had been sixteen years ago. Sitting on his hotel-room bed in Costa Rica, Joe thought back to his original meeting with Bertie at the club and to their time at St. Paul’s school when it was still in that beautiful old terracotta building in Hammersmith. Bertie had been rather shy and a bit skinny then; now he was anything but that. At the time, Joe would have been hard put to recognize him if he’d bumped into him in the street. Joe figured his friend had discovered the Gym and made use of it every day. Since that reunion Bertie and Joe had remained close friends and met once a week for a chat and a drink at Bertie’s club.

  Joe asked the hotel’s telephonist to get the British Embassy on the phone and pass the call to his room.

  A moment later came the voice in that singsong accent of the Costa Ricans: ‘Embajada Británica buenos días.’

  ‘My name is Joe Martin,’ he said, ‘I would like to speak with the British Ambassador please.’

  ‘I am very sorry Señor Martin, His Excellency has a visitor with him but he should not be too long, can I take your number and get him to call you?’

  Joe told her he would be in his room for the next hour and gave her the number and the name of the hotel. She knew it well and noted the room number promising that the Ambassador would not be long in calling him.

  When Ian McBride returned Joe’s call half an hour later, he was a bit frosty, but his demeanour changed immediately when Joe mentioned Tim’s disappearance; he realized that this was not another journalist. He apologised for not recognizing his surname since it had just recently crossed his desk on the missing-person report he’d received from the Home Office in London.

  He suggested that they meet later that afternoon but on second thoughts, he asked Joe if he had any plans for lunch and, when Joe replied that he had not, Ian McBride suggested that they meet in the Club Unión around 12ish, where they could discuss his problem away from the disturbances of the day-to-day running of the Embassy.

  Joe arrived at the club punctually an hour lat
er and the concierge ushered him to a comfortable room to await the arrival of the British Ambassador. ‘Señor Martin,’ the concierge said, ‘Señor McBride has telephoned to say that he has been unavoidably delayed. He sends his apologies, and says that he will not be long. Is there anything I can get you?’

  Joe declined saying that he would be quite comfortable until his host arrived.

  ‘The Club Unión, was founded in 1923 by a group of Costa Rican society friends and its first president, Sr. Oscar Rohmoser, served there from its foundation until 1930. The imposing neoclassic building is directly opposite the Correo Central, the main post office right in the heart of San José...’

  Joe was reading this in the club’s brochure that he’d picked up from the coffee table by his armchair when Ian McBride arrived impeccably turned-out in a tailored linen suit, smart white shirt with French cuffs and a club tie.

  McBride took great pride in his appearance. Five foot six inches tall, nine and a half stone in weight, of reddish complexion and going bald at a young fifty-three, he looked every inch the diplomat. His hair, or what there was of it, neatly parted on the left since the day when, as a lad, his father had taken him to Trumper’s and the decision had been taken off his hands.

  McBride extended a delicate hand that was engulfed in Joe’s own firm grip. He held it for the briefest of moments, careful not to hurt the Ambassador, while McBride excused himself for not being there to greet him when he arrived. He proceeded to regale his guest with a potted history of the Club as he lead him into the member’s bar for a drink or two, before lunch in the Club Union’s elegant restaurant.

  Half an hour later Joe felt he had the measure of the Ambassador. Not what you might call a man’s man but charming and educated all the same. Most important of all, he’d taken a special interest in Tim’s disappearance.