The Marks of Cain Read online

  Maps had been one of David’s passions as a child, maps and atlases. As he unfolded this one, in the desert light from the window, he realized he was holding a rather beautiful example.

  It was a distinctly old-fashioned road map, with dignified shading and elegant colouration. Soft grey undulations showed mountains and foothills, lakes and rivers were a poetic blue, green polygons indicated marshland beside the Atlantic. It was map of southern France and northern Spain.

  He sat down and scrutinized the map more closely. The sheet had been marked very neatly with a blue pen: little blue asterisks dotted those grey ripples of mountains, between France and Spain. Another single blue star marked the top right corner of the map. Near Lyon.

  He looked at his grandfather, questioningly.

  ‘Bilbao,’ said the old man, visibly tiring now. ‘It’s Bilbao…You need to go there.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Fly to Bilbao, David. Go to Lesaka. And find José Garovillo.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  The old man made a final effort; his eyes were blurring over.

  ‘Show him…the map. Then ask him about churches. Marked on the map. Churches.’

  ‘Who’s this guy? Why can’t you just tell me?’

  ‘It’s been too long…too much guilt, I cannot, can’t admit…’ The old man’s words were frail, and fading. ‘And anyway…Even if I told you, you wouldn’t believe me. No one would believe. Just the mad old man. You’d say I was mad, the crazy old man. So you need to find out for yourself, David. But be careful…Be careful…’

  ‘Granddad?’

  His grandfather turned away, staring at the ceiling. And then, with a horrible sense of inevitability, the old man’s eyelids fluttered shut. Granddad had fallen back into his fitful and opiated sleep.

  The morphine pump ticked over.

  For a long while, David sat there, watching his grandfather breathe in and breathe out, quite unconscious. Then David got up and closed the blinds; the desert sun was almost gone anyway.

  He looked down at the map sitting on the hospice chair; he had no idea what it signified, what connection his granddad had with Bilbao or with churches. Probably it was all some ragged dream, some youthful memory returning, between the lucidity and the dementia. Maybe it was nothing at all.

  Yes. That was surely it. These were just the ramblings of a dying old man, the brain yielding to the flood of illogic as the final dissolution approached. Sadly, but truly, he was crazy.

  David picked up the map and slid it into his pocket, then he leaned and touched his grandfather’s hand, but the old man did not respond.

  With a sigh, he walked out into the hot Phoenix summer night, and climbed into his rented Toyota. He drove the urban freeway to his motel, where he watched soccer on a grainy Mexican satellite station with a lonely sixpack and a pizza.

  His grandfather died early the following morning. A nurse rang David at the motel. He immediately called London and told his friends – he needed to hear some friendly voices. Then he called his office and extended his ‘holiday’ by a few days, on the grounds of bereavement.

  Even then his boss in London sounded a little sniffy, as it was ‘only’ David’s grandfather. ‘We are very busy, David, so this is exceptionally tiresome. Do be quick.’

  The service was in a soulless crematorium, in another exurb of Phoenix. Tempe. And David was the only real mourner in the building. Two nurses from the hospice showed up, and that was it. No one else was invited. David already knew he had no other family in America – or anywhere for that matter – but having his relative loneliness underscored like this, felt notably harsh – indeed cruel. But he had no choice in the matter. So David and the two nurses sat there, together and alone, and exposed.

  The ceremony was equally austere: at his grandfather’s request there were no readings, there was nothing – except for a CD of discordant and exotic guitar music, presumably chosen by his grandfather.

  When the song was done, the coffin trundled abruptly into the flames. David felt the briskness like a punch. It was as if the old man had been quick to get off stage, eager to flee this life – or keen to be relieved of some burden.

  That afternoon David drove deep into the desert, seeking the most remote location, as if he could lose his sadness in the wasteland. Under an ominously stormy sky, he scattered the ashes between the prickly pears and the crucifixion thorns. He stood for a minute and watched the ashes disperse, then walked to his car. As he returned to the city, the first fat raindrops smacked the windscreen; by the time he reached his motel a real desert storm had kicked up – jagged arcs of lightning volting between the black and evil clouds.

  His flight was looming. He began to pack. And then the motel phone trilled. His ex girlfriend maybe? She’d been calling on and off the last couple of days: trying to elevate David’s mood. Being a good friend.

  David reached for the phone and answered.

  ‘Uh-huh?’

  It wasn’t his ex. It was a breezy American accent.

  ‘David Martinez? Frank Antonescu…’

  ‘Uh…hello.’

  ‘I’m your grandfather’s lawyer! First of all, can I say – I’m so sorry to hear of your bereavement.’

  ‘Thank you. Uhm. Sorry. Uh…Granddad had a lawyer?’

  The voice confirmed: Granddad had a lawyer. David shook his head in mild surprise. Through the motel room window he could see the desert rain pummelling the surface of the motel swimming pool.

  ‘OK…Go on. Please.’

  ‘Thank you. There’s something you oughta know. I’m handling your grandfather’s estate.’

  David laughed – out loud. His granddad had lived in a heavily mortgaged old bungalow; he drove a twenty-year-old Chevy, and he had no serious possessions. Estate? Yeah, right.

  But then David’s laughter congealed, and he felt a pang of apprehension. Was this the reason for his grandfather’s weird shame: was the old man bequeathing some insuperable debt?

  ‘Mister Martinez. The estate comprises two million dollars, or thereabouts. In cash. In a Phoenix Bank savings account.’

  David swayed in the high wind of this revelation; he asked the lawyer to repeat the sum. The lawyer said it again, and now David experienced The Anger.

  All this time! All this time his grandfather had been loaded, minted, a fucking millionaire? All the time, he, David, the orphaned grandson, had been struggling, fighting, working his way through university, just keeping his head above water – and all along the Beloved Grandfather had been sitting on two million dollars?

  David asked the lawyer how long his grandfather had possessed this money.

  ‘Ever since he hired me. Twenty years minimum.’

  ‘So…why the hell did he live in that crappy little house? With that car? Don’t get it.’

  ‘Damn straight,’ said the lawyer. ‘Trust me, Mister Martinez, I would tell him to use it, spend it on himself, or give it you of course. Never would. At least he got a good rate of interest.’ A sad chuckle. ‘If you ever do find out where the money came from, please let me know. Always puzzled me.’

  ‘So what do I do now?’

  ‘Come by the office tomorrow. Sign a few documents. The money is yours.’

  ‘Just like that?’

  ‘Just like that.’ A pause. ‘However…Mister Martinez. You should know there is one codicil, one clause to the will.’

  ‘And that is?’

  ‘It says –’ The lawyer sighed. ‘Well…it’s a little eccentric. It says that first you have to utilize some of the cash to…do something. You have to go to the Basque Country. And find a man called José Garovillo in a town called Lesaka. I think that’s in Spain. The Basque Country, I mean.’ The lawyer hesitated. ‘So…I guess the best way to do it is this: when you reach Spain you just let me know and I’ll wire the cash into your account. After that it’s all yours.’

  ‘But why does he – did he – want me to find this guy?’

  ‘Search me. But that’s the
stipulation.’

  David watched the rain through the window, as it turned to drizzle.

  ‘OK…I’ll drive by tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Good. See you at nine. And once again, my sympathies on your loss.’

  David dropped the phone and checked the clock: working out time differences. It was too late for him to call England and tell anyone the bizarre and amazing news; it was too late for him to ring his boss and tell him to go choke on his stupid job.

  Instead he went to the little table and picked up the map. He unfolded the soft, sadly faded paper and scrutinized the tiny blue asterisks. The stars had been firmly and neatly handwritten next to placenames. Striking placenames. Arizkun. Elizondo. Zugarramurdi. Why were these places marked out? What did this have to do with churches? Why did his grandfather even own this map?

  And how come his impoverished grandfather had two million dollars that he never touched?

  He needed to look for flights to Bilbao.

  3

  In the crowded Arrivals lounge of Bilbao airport he opened his laptop and emailed Frank Antonescu. Attached to the email was a jpeg of himself holding a Basque newspaper, to prove his arrival in the country: to fulfil the one stipulation of his grandfather’s will. The entire escapade was surreal, and borderline foolish, and yet this was what his grandfather wanted. So David was happy to obey.

  Despite the troublesome time difference, the lawyer emailed back, at once – and with impressive efficiency: the money was being wired over.

  Clicking on a website, David checked his bank account.

  There. It was really there.

  Two point one million dollars.

  The feeling was unsettling, as well as gratifying.

  He was rich but in a garish and discomfiting way; he didn’t quite feel himself; he felt like someone had snuck into his house, and painted his furniture gold. Was he even allowed to sit down?

  Shutting his laptop, David yawned, and yawned again, and glanced through the wide glass terminal doors. It was raining, very hard. And he was very tired. He could do the rest of his travelling tomorrow.

  Sheltering ineptly under his copy of El Correo David wheeled his luggage to the taxi rank; he was saved by a cheerful cab driver with a lurid Barcelona soccer shirt under a smart leather jacket, who smoked and chattered as they pulled out of the airport.

  The taxi slashed along the rainy motorway. On the left was the distant greyness of the Atlantic Ocean, on the right sudden green hills reached to the clouds; in the steep dips between the hills lurked steelworks and papermills, and factories with tall redbrick chimneys churning out ribbons of smoke the colour of faded white underwear.

  David buzzed down the window and let the rain spit onto his face. The cold rain was good – because it pierced the weary numbness; it roused him, and reminded him. He gazed at the Basque Country. He was here.

  He’d done some investigating during his thirty-hour flight around the world: some internet research into the Basque Country, and the Basques.

  He now knew that some people thought the Basques were descended from Neanderthals. He knew that they had surprisingly long earlobes. He knew they had a unique and complex language unrelated to any other language in the world; he knew that Arrauktaka meant ‘to hit someone with an oar’.

  He had also learned that the word ‘bizarre’ came from the Basque word for ‘bearded’; that the people were tall and burly compared to Spaniards; that the Basques were expert whalers; that they had special cherries, a passion for rugby, their own form of linen, a wavy solar symbol called a lauburu, and a tiny wild horse called a pottok.

  David buzzed the window shut. The research had been diverting enough, but it hadn’t been able to give him any of the information he really wanted. Who was José Garovillo? What was this reference to churches? What about Granddad’s map?

  The memory of Granddad was a discernible pain. David fought back the emotion; if he thought of his grandfather the thread of cognition could so easily lead to his parents. So he needed to do and not think; and he had one more severance to make, one more definite change to enact.

  He picked up his mobile and pressed.

  The phone rang in London.

  ‘Roland De Villiers. Yes?’

  It was the normal snooty, self-consciously weary locution. The same voice that David had endured for half a decade.

  ‘Roland, it’s David. I –’

  ‘Oh for God’s sake. Rilly. David. Where are you now?’

  ‘Roland –’

  ‘You do realize your desk is piled high? I don’t care about your frankly peripheral circumstances. You are a professional, get a grip. I expect to see you behind that screen in the next hour or –’

  ‘I’m not coming back.’

  A pause.

  ‘You have one hour to get back here –’

  ‘Give my job to that guy in accounts. The one who’s banging your wife. Bye.’

  David clicked off. And then he laughed, quietly. He could picture his boss in his office, red faced with anger.

  Good.

  In front of him the motorway dipped and curved; they seemed to be cutting towards the middle of the city. Grey apartment blocks, stained by rain, stood to attention along the route.

  The taxi driver looked up at David, mirrorwise:

  ‘Centro urbano, señor? Hotel Donostia? Sí?’

  ‘Sí. Er…sí. Yes. Centre of the city. Hotel…Donostia.’

  The driver turned off the autopista and headed down into the wide and principal streets of the town. Large grey offices exuded an air of damp pomposity in the gloom. Many of them seemed to be banks. Banco Vizkaya. Banco Santander. Banco de Bilbao. People were scurrying past the sombre architecture, with umbrellas aloft; it was like a photo of London in the 1950s.

  The Hotel Donostia was very much as it had appeared on the website: faded but formal. The concierge looked disdainfully at David’s creased shirt. But David didn’t care – he was almost delirious with tiredness. He found his room and fought with his keycard; then he collapsed into his oversoft bed and slept for eleven straight hours, dreaming of a house with no one inside. He dreamed of his parents, alive, in a car – with small wild horses, cantering across the road.

  Then a scream. Then redness. Then a small boy running across an enormous empty beach. Running towards the sea.

  When he woke, he opened the curtains – and gawped. The sky was bright blue: the September sun had returned. David pulled on his clothes, filled up on coffee and pastries, then called a cab, and hired a car at the railway station. After a moment’s hesitation, he rented the vehicle for a month.

  The main road out of grimy Bilbao took him east towards the French border. Again he thought of his mum and dad and Granddad; he averted himself from the thought, and concentrated on the route. Was he going the right way? He pulled over at an Agip service station; its huge plastic logo – of a black dog spitting red fire – was overly bright in the harsh sunlight. Parked up, he took out the old map and traced his finger over the cartography, examining those delicate blue stars dotting the grey foothills. They looked like distant policelights, glimpsed through mist and rain.

  Then he half-folded the map, and for the first time he noticed there was proper writing, in a different hand, scribbled on a corner of the map’s reverse. Seen in the stark sunlight the writing was very faint, and possibly in Basque, or Spanish. Maybe even German. The writing was so small and faded it was quite indecipherable.

  It was another puzzle – and he was no nearer to solving any of it. But at least the map told him one thing: he was going the right way, into the ‘real’ Basque Country. He started the car once again.

  The drive was hypnotic. Sometimes he could see the blue ocean, the Bay of Biscay, sparkling in the sun. Sometimes the road ducked instead through those dark green shady valleys, where the white-painted Basque houses looked like cuboid mushrooms, suddenly sprouted overnight.

  At last the road divided, near San Sebastian; thence the smaller,
prettier road headed for the interior: the Bidasoa Valley. It was as scenic as his research had promised. Tumbling mountain rivers ran down shady gorges, enormous oak and chestnut forests whispered in the delicate September air. Lesaka was close. He was in the Basque Navarre. He was nearly there.

  As David slowed, he noticed.

  Something was happening in Lesaka. The edge of the town was marked by big black police vans, with metal grilles over the windscreens. Surly-looking Spanish riot policemen were sitting on walls, and chatting on mobile phones; they all had very obvious guns.

  One of the cops stared at David, and frowned at the car, and checked the numberplate. Then he shook his head, and pointed at a parking space. Mildly unnerved, David slotted in the car. The policeman turned away, uninterested. He just wanted David to stop and walk.

  Obediently, David slung his rucksack over his shoulder and paced the rest of the way into Lesaka. He remembered what he had read about Basque terrorism: the campaign for Basque independence by the terror group ETA. It was a nasty business: killings and bombings, intense and surreal atrocities, men in women’s wigs shooting teenagers dead. Very nasty.

  Was this police activity connected with that?

  It was surely possible; yet it was hard to reconcile such horrible enormities with a place like Lesaka. The quiet air was cool and sweet: mountain freshness. The sky was patched with cloud, but the sun was still shining down on ancient stone houses, and an old church on a hill, and mild stone palazzos surrounding little squares. On streetcorners there were strange pillars, carved with the curvilinear sun symbol, like an Art Nouveau swastika. The lauburu. David said the word to himself, as he walked through Lesaka.

  Lauburu.

  Not knowing quite what to do next, he sat on a bench in the central plaza, staring at a large stone house hung with the green, red and white Basque flag, the ikkurina. He felt a sudden foolishness: what should he do next? Just…ask people? Like some amateur detective?

  An old woman was sitting next to him, clutching a rosary, and muttering.

  David coughed, as courteously as he could, then leaned nearer and asked the woman, in his faltering Spanish: did she know a man called…José Garovillo?