Page 63 of The Last Postcard

Tangier

July 1978

There have been many rumours about the people who live at Dar Nglîz, but Mouad is right. Whoever you spoke to, he must have been a ghost.

Abdelhamid’s words were in Sam’s head as he hurried back towards the Interpress building. The late afternoon light was playing tricks, throwing angled shadows everywhere. In their depths, he thought he felt someone watching, a figure whose eyes were moonlight on water and whose breath held the rank, mineral sweetness of the sea as she called his name …

He shook his head. It was idle café chatter, the gossip of radio medina, passing from one tea glass to another, that was all. A story told around the sebsi, a tale for dark nights in the casbah, a warning that even foreigners weren’t immune to the hidden magic of the city.

He strode across the busy Place de France, the sun in his eyes, not caring about the taxis that blared their horns at him. Mouad and Abdelhamid were wrong, he told himself; Langham was alive and well and living in Dar Portuna, as he had been for years. He was just private, that was all, intensely private.

Still, it was obvious that Abdelhamid knew more than he was letting on. When Sam had tried to press him about the ‘rumours’ that surrounded Dar Nglîz, Abdel had become strangely vague, before quickly taking his leave. Why didn’t he want to talk? Sam’s neck kept prickling as if someone was breathing on it, thoughts of drowned men and old crimes filling his head as he ran up the steps of the Interpress building. Before, he’d been praying that Norton would find something. But now …

‘Sam Hackett,’ he gasped to the woman on reception. ‘Here to see Ellis Norton, please.’

She put down her pen. ‘He was here a little while ago waiting for you. I’ll ring up and tell him you’re here.’

He’d sat with Mouad and Abdelhamid for longer than he thought. He only had half an hour to get up to the Bab al-Bahr, to be at the gate just as the afternoon call to prayer ended. It felt like an age before the lift doors opened and Norton appeared.

‘Sorry,’ Sam rushed, stepping towards him. ‘Sorry, I lost track of time, and now I’ve got to run—’ He stopped. Norton was wearing a strange expression, his face flushed. Under his arm was a huge, leather-bound folder. Sam’s stomach tightened. ‘What is it? You didn’t find something?’

‘I did,’ Norton said breathlessly. ‘I bloody did, I hit the jackpot.’ He heaved the binder open, balancing it on one arm. ‘Look.’

He was pointing at the front page of an old newspaper, one of the dozens sewn into the binder. Sam had to blink hard in order to focus on the close-set type, his eyes still full of dust and sun and smoke.

THE TANGIER GAZETTE

Tuesday, 31 July 1928

31 July … Just three days after the mysterious letter. He skimmed over the tight columns, past news of the Summer Olympics in Amsterdam and communists arrested in Paris, to a short article below the fold. A column headed by four, impossible words:

ENGLISHMAN DROWNS IN STRAIT

Spanish police recovered a body yesterday from the western end of Plage Merkala. The body has been identified by personal effects as that of a Mr Arthur Langham, late of Dar Portuna, Tangier. Langham was last seen late on Saturday night, when he is believed to have sailed his yacht, Spindrift, out on to the strait while under the influence of alcohol. The yacht itself was discovered capsized and abandoned shortly after the discovery of the body on Monday afternoon. Investigations are ongoing.

‘No.’ Sam pushed the article away. ‘No, it’s a mistake. Or a misunderstanding. I’ve seen Langham. I’ve talked to him. I was with him last night.’

They say the man could see the lights of his house as he drowned.

‘Don’t you get it?’ Norton was saying. ‘Whoever you’ve been talking to isn’t Langham.’

‘What?’

‘Look, “Investigations are ongoing”.’ Norton jabbed at the article. ‘It means the death was suspicious.’ He leaned closer, his voice low. ‘Why would someone take a yacht out when they were drunk in the middle of the night? What if Langham did himself in? Or was done away with, for his money?’

Sam’s mind was racing. At Dar Portuna, hadn’t there been that trophy on the shelf, proclaiming Langham the winner of a sailing race, an experienced yachtsman? Why would he capsize on a summer’s night in familiar waters? He shook his head. ‘It doesn’t make sense. I’ve been talking to … Who the hell is it if it isn’t Langham?’

The minute he said it, a face came to mind, sullen, beneath a pale hat, and a name: Alejandro del Potro.

‘That’s what I’d like to know.’ Norton’s face was alive with interest. ‘I think you might have stumbled across something here, Hackett. And someone wants to keep their identity quiet, hence the notes, the secrecy.’

Sam couldn’t answer. The writing case had come from the police station, taken as evidence, or from a person who had committed a crime.

A, I am sorry. One day, I hope you’ll understand.

‘My god,’ he heard himself murmuring.

‘My god indeed.’ Norton’s eyes were bright. ‘OK, here’s what we do. You go back there tonight and act like nothing’s happened. Plumb the old man for information, when he came there, what he does for money, all of that. Ask about the yacht if you can manage it in a roundabout way. Keep an ear out for anything suspicious, and don’t let your guard down. I’m going to talk to editorial, phone around, see if I can find anything else about this Langham or his death—’