‘Tyler helped me get guns into Ethiopia.’ That gave her pause. ‘You should read some of his reports on Italian atrocities. He hates Mussolini.’
As a way of saying ‘he’s one of us’ it was perfect and the look on her face changed from impending anger to a dazzling smile. Quite out of character, because he was not the type for gallantry, Tyler leant over, lifted her hand and kissed it, then smiled.
‘I would be happy to read them to you.’
‘As bedtime stories?’ Cal interjected, not without irony.
‘Can I buy you guys dinner later?’
‘We’ll see,’ was the reply from Callum Jardine.
The look on Tyler Alverson’s face then was a curious one, almost wolfish. ‘We’re bound to run into each other; after all, I’m staying in this joint too.’
‘I’m sure we will.’
‘And then, Callum Jardine, you can tell what it is you are being so secretive about.’
Cal tried bluff. ‘Who says I am being secretive?’
Tyler Alverson tapped his nose. ‘This old buddy of mine, and it’s never wrong.’
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Prime Minister Largo Caballero was not a man who could be called upon in secret; in the atmosphere prevailing inside his government, which, with much manoeuvring and abandonment of principle the anarchists were preparing to join, suspicion was the watchword. Trust no one, watch everyone and keep a keen nose twitching for betrayal, so arrangements had been made to meet him away from the parliament building, El Congreso de los Diputados.
But first Cal had to be introduced to the politician who would represent the CNT-FAI, Juan Garcia Oliver, a man about the same age and, according to Florencia, as much of a long-time firebrand as Laporta, with whom he had planned and carried out assassinations. He looked very much less of a fighter, being slim and handsome, with a high forehead, though he shared a countenance not much given to smiling.
He certainly did not favour the foreigner with one, and though it was clear that he and Andreu Nin, now a full member of the Catalan regional government, had already agreed a common position, it was also obvious, from the looks thrown in his direction, that Garcia Oliver questioned the need for Cal to be present. Nin had to take him aside and engage in a whispered discussion to put his mind at rest.
That over, the quartet — it included Florencia — proceeded to their destination. The meeting took place at the home of a trusted political ally of Caballero, a house in a quiet cul-de-sac where Cal came face-to-face with a man whom he knew from the reports he had boned up on had, as much as any other, inflamed the politics of elections during the Republic.
A fiery orator in the tradition of men obliged by internal competition to ratchet up the rhetoric of blood-filled gutters should his opponents get back into power, it was Caballero who had threatened mayhem should the parties of the centre and right triumph in the last elections, he who had possibly created in the generals, now fighting, the feeling that Spain was about to sink into anarchy.
Yet for someone supposed to be a demagogue, Largo Caballero looked remarkably ordinary, more like a career bureaucrat than a budding Lenin: silver-haired, well barbered, bland-faced and very polite, with a calm manner of speaking much at odds with the passionate arguments to which he was obliged to listen.
Cal could only be partly involved; his improved Spanish was insufficient to follow more than the drift of what was a circumlocutory conversation between the male trio, in which little would be openly stated, this not aided by the loathing each had for the other, while Florencia was too intent on what was being said to do much translating.
It was more by watching her face that he followed the drift of the conversation, which appeared to be positive, indicated more by half-smiles and semi-nods from Caballero than any outright declaration. The meeting broke up with handshakes, and only when they were away from the house, in the open, did Florencia fully enlighten him.
‘Caballero agrees that the possibilities should be investigated.’
‘No more than that?’
‘No.’
‘Money,’ Cal said as a weary reminder.
She nodded to include Nin and Oliver and, preparatory to telling him, she first advised them as to what she was about to say, before reverting to Englsih.
‘The POUM have agreed to provide funds from their party coffers to begin the investigation in to making a purchase of arms, though apart from Andreu they have no knowledge of you. Likewise, Garcia Oliver and Juan Luis will be the only anarchists who know of your identity and purpose.’
The use of the names had both men looking at him keenly.
‘No one else must know. Caballero dare not be found undermining his cabinet, for if he is it will fall apart, nor can he seek to apportion what is needed for purchase until matters are close to a conclusion, since he will have to sneak the payment past the communists, but he is sure it can be shipped, as and when needed, at a few days’ notice.’
‘That will not do, Florencia.’ Unfazed by her flash of anger, picked up by the two men, Cal continued, ‘The money has to be there before the deal is done. It is a transfer that has to be simultaneous. This is a business in which there is no such thing as trust.’
That was followed by a rapid burst of explanation. Nin, who responded after a brief word with Oliver, which was followed by a handshake and his departure, was thankfully more calm and measured than her.
‘Andreu says one step at a time,’ Florencia said, with none of the tone in which it had been imparted to her.
‘I gathered that.’
They were now near the main boulevard, and worried about being observed in Nin’s company, Cal had a look around. Tyler Alverson was easy to spot, mainly because he was making no attempt to disguise himself or hide; he was, after all, dressed in a near-white suit. Cheekily, the American touched the rim of his panama, then immediately spun round and departed.
Annoying as it was, there being nothing he could do to change that Cal concentrated on finalising the arrangements to transfer funds into the account that he had opened with Monty Redfern’s bank draft, which was obviously a speculative amount and he was careful to ensure there could be more if needed.
There was no way of knowing if and what Drouhin would send him and what would be required to be expended, so he was obliged to play safe and request a hefty sum of money that made Nin think hard before agreeing, with the caveat that approval for such a large amount would have to be sought from his committee.
That engendered a discussion of keeping the information secure; if infiltration was a communist tactic, Cal insisted, it would be naive to assume that spies had not penetrated both the POUM and the CNT. That was when it ceased to be a dialogue and became a row, Nin and Florencia displeased with the notion that their close comrades would betray them.
Agreement was reached eventually that the money would be earmarked for foreign propaganda purposes — no mention would be made of armaments to anyone who did not already know of the plans — and finally Cal and Florencia parted company and made their way back to the Florida Hotel as night began to fall. Tyler Alverson was in the lobby.
‘Bit early to eat, Cal,’ he boomed, ‘but just the time for the first drink of the evening.’
The American was too shrewd to enquire what Cal was up to while Florencia was present, instead he kept the conversation genial and general about the places he had been and the things he had seen — and often wished he had not — in the trouble spots of the world. A natural topic was his and Cal’s shared adventure in Abyssinia; the one subject he tried to stay off was the present civil war.