All she needed to do was get away — and she would be free of everything.
Standing over the bin, she shook back out her own, raven black, hair, walked towards the wall and climbed the stone steps that led up to the battlements.
Half way to the top, as if a sixth sense had suddenly activated within her, she glanced behind, to see the man she had just seen from a distance, standing there with a half-smile on his face. Turning around, she continued on towards the top of the wall.
Walking past the dustbin, Swan had noticed the blonde wig. Then, quickening his pace and seeing a dark-haired woman wearing the distinctive dress about to ascend the stone staircase, he had caught up with her. She was now at the top of the wall.
He called out to her. ‘Señorita Sapphira Menendez. There’s nowhere left to run.’
He moved closer to the bottom of the old medieval steps.
‘My name is Alex Swan. The police will soon be here, but you can make it easier for yourself, Sapphira, if you just come down and talk to me about your assignment in London. That’s all I want to know about. I do not care about what you did to the mayor, in fact, from what I have heard, I think he deserved it.’
The woman froze. She glanced down at the figure below her.
‘You want to talk about an assignment for which I was never paid, Mr Swan. I have been double-crossed by your own government.’
Swan gave a surprised expression. ‘What are you trying to tell me?’
‘I was recruited to kill this man in the hotel in London and told I would find the money in my account.’
She slowly moved her hand across her handbag and rested it in front of her so it was now shielding her thighs. Then, her fingers crept towards the grip of the small .22 automatic resting inside a small holster around her leg. Grasping the butt of the gun, she decided to keep this man talking to distract him enough to do what she had to do.
‘You say your name is Alex Swan, from England? Are you a policeman?’
Swan nodded. ‘You could say that. I am investigating the Danvers murder. You left your fingerprints on a couple of pound notes. I suspected this could be your work, after what you did to the oil executive in Paris. The judicial police already have you on their files, so does Interpol. The prints matched, so here I am.’
Menendez forced a smile. ‘What you do not know, Mr Swan, is that it is your own government, which is behind all this.’
There it was again. It was if she was trying to tell him something else.
‘That’s what I want to talk about.’ He looked up into her eyes. ‘So, why don’t you come down? Or I could come up. We can go somewhere more private and I will listen to what you have to say.’
‘And then? So, what happens once you have your information? You hand me over to the pigs?’ She looked out over the wall at the spire of Santa Maria church. She had been christened there and the last ten years, had lit a candle for her late father on his birthday. Then, angry that she had not had a chance to do it today on the anniversary of his death, she pulled the gun.
She had fashioned the holster herself, a quick release, enabling her to have the gun pointing at this man from London, almost in a blink of an eye. Her handbag had been equally well-fashioned for her profession. In the base of the bag, was housed a slim sheath, accommodating a small throwing knife. She had been trained well by ETA and knew how to handle both weapons with ease. She parted her legs and held out the gun at arm’s length, aiming for Swan’s heart.
He put up his hands. ‘I’m unarmed.’
Gently, he pulled open his jacket to confirm this.
Menendez ignored his plea. This was him. The British policeman who was the only thing standing in her way to freedom. She took a few deep breaths and Swan instantly feared that she was preparing for the kill shot.
The shot rang out. In the moment just before he heard it, Swan had closed his eyes; to think of his beloved wife. He opened them again to realise the shot had come from behind him. He focussed, to see a staggering female figure fall forwards, her face grimacing in agony as her little gun clattered onto to the stone steps, only to bounce down and rest before him.
She clutched at her chest, the blood now staining her dress as it seeped through her fingers. Swan rushed up to her, catching her as she collapsed. Supporting her head, he gazed into her eyes as they danced their last, searching for a final resting place. She looked up into his face, fighting with consciousness to say her last word.
‘Cacador!’
She said no more. With the darkness now descending, she flopped into the SID man’s arms as he knelt, continuing to cradle her until the shroud covered her completely.
Swan then looked up to see who it had been at the other end of the Portuguese judicial police-issue, 9mm Beretta automatic, and expecting Ferreira, gazed into the face of his wife.
Janet Swan was still holding the gun at arm’s length in front of her. Lowering it, she crouched down and flung her arms around her husband. ‘Are you okay, my love?’
Swan nodded. ‘Yes, I’m fine and all thanks to you. I really did think that was it, Janet.’
He looked at the gun in her hand, took it, and pushed on the safety catch.
‘Where on Earth did you learn to shoot like that?’
‘During that field training. I had decided to go in early one morning, and happened to catch Irene and Jim Donnelly, our old armourer, in the office. Donnelly had his trousers down. I suggested to him, that as long as he taught me how to shoot, nothing more would be heard of it.’
Swan gave her a grateful smile, then turned to look at the dead woman, staring into the sightless eyes half-protruding through the locks of ebony hair.
‘She didn’t want to be caught.’ He closed her eyes. ‘She never even got her money for the London job.’
Ferreira then arrived on the scene. Stopping in his tracks, he placed his gun back into his shoulder holster.
‘What happened here?’
Swan explained his wife’s actions, then recounted what he had learned just moments before. ‘She was betrayed, Carlos. She said something to me, sounded like something in Portuguese. Cacador, I think it was. What does that mean?’
Ferreira suddenly looked confused. ‘It means, poacher.’
‘So, this is a kind of insult?’ Swan enquired.
Ferreira shrugged. ‘I have no idea, it is very strange for her to have said this.’
Janet Swan handed Ferreira back the gun she had taken from the glove compartment of the police car, explaining to him on seeing the woman with the patterned dress leaving the hotel, she had studied her, noticing that upon almost running into them, she had suddenly broken into a rapid walk up the hill, heading towards the town. Taking the gun, Janet had decided to follow her, but had lost Sapphira when she had dissolved into the crowd of tourists. ‘It was only when I saw Alex heading for the castle wall… I managed to be here just in time. Thank God!’
Ferreira, now shocked and surprised, picked up the assassin’s handbag. He rummaged inside it.
‘Found anything, Carlos?’ Swan asked. He then observed the officer as he pulled out a key attached to a plastic tag.
‘Only this. It is a key for a locker at Lisbon Central Station.’ Ferreira showed the key to the Englishman.
An hour later, the body of Menendez on its way to hospital, Ferreira left the local police with his sergeant, to conclude proceedings with the Escavaro assassination. Secretly, he was pleased to see this man dead. During his time in the secret police, Escovaro had accused Ferreira of corruption by the PCP. The accusation had almost cost Ferreira his career. It was only at the last minute, when evidence that he was innocent had been produced, that he had been saved from Peniche, himself. He drove Swan and Janet back to Lisbon. After all the drama back in Obidos, they had decided to go to a restaurant, before returning to the relieving and tranquil surroundings of their hotel.