----------------- Cuenca, Spain ----------------- She sat next to the window, the sole occupant in her small but comfortable cabin two carriages back from the engine, dressed in a dark brown sweater and tall knee high leather boots. A small duffle bag was across her knee. The sway of the train set the small loose hairs about her face moving gently but she paid them no mind. The broken clouds were red and pink the blue of the sky as the sun began dip below the horizon. The brown sweater was warm against her throat, her black overcoat already unbuttoned, her hat crumpled in one hand as she idly tapped a foot on the floor of the carriage. Beyond the windows the Spanish landscape was slowly taking on the soft golden glow of the days’ final light. She could feel the train begin to slow as it curled around the base of the cliffs that held the town of Cuenca. By pressing her face to the glass she could just see to the top of the cliffs where a tall curtain wall of stone enclosed the ancient Moorish fortress and town “Cuenca Station! All passengers for Cuenca Station!” A conductor, his red and white pillbox hat thrust sharply forward over a fantastic moustache, was making his way through the carriage sliding open compartment doors as he went. He spared her a brief smile as he passed. She jammed her short cap onto her head, swung her duffle bag onto her shoulder, and stepped into the passage. Several other people appeared in the corridor, their feet muffled by the green carpet. They formed a small cluster at the door behind the conductor. She ignored the quiet stares she received from several of the other passengers. Black people where still pretty thin on the ground in Spain and she tended to attract looks wherever she went. The conductor paused, opened the door, and stepped onto the cobblestone platform. She followed behind him, her boots making a “tock” sound as she stepped a modern platform. Heavy duty concrete had been poured to replace the ancient cobblestone station that was now abandoned just north of them, covered in graffiti and already being reclaimed by nature. A sturdy metal roof covered the platform and the tracks on both sides, protection from the small rocks that came loose from the cliffs above. She thanked the conductor, handed him a twenty peseta note, waved away his thanks and hurried toward the platform exit. It was simple enough, a flight of concrete stairs down to a covered driveway where a long row of taxis waited, their multicolour sides muted in the dying light. She stepped into the first one, closed the rear door and sat back in a torn and pitted leather seat that smelled strongly of cigarettes and cologne. “Where to senorita?” The driver glanced at her, or she thought he did, from eyes almost hidden beneath bushy eyebrows a massive black beard that almost appeared to run together. His tone was friendly but resigned, the tone of a man who drove folk about every single day. She pulled the small envelope from inside her jacket and passed it across to him. He took it, glanced it over, nodded, and then shifted the old taxi into gear. It coughed, sputtered, and then they were lurching along the recently laid concrete roadway. Cuenca was only an hour by train from Madrid and improvements had begun several years ago to make it more accessible to tourists. The railway, train station, and most of the motorways had been repaved. Only in the town itself had little been changed so that the cobblestone streets and brick buildings might maintain their historic roots. The road the driver took did not climb into the town however but rather passed into the countryside. The darkness here became more pronounced as they left behind the bright lights of civilization. She cranked down the window and rested her head on her arm, allowing the fresh night air to play across her face, escaping the stench of the taxi. The drive was less than ten minutes, the landscape sinking into blackness so that she could only see the verges of the motorway as the headlights played over them. She saw the startled faces of sheep, the guilty glances of young lovers beneath a tree, and occasionally the flash of passing lights as an automobile whisked past them in the opposite direction. “Here we are.” The driver sounded unsure as he began to slow, turning into a car park just in front of a small white clad church. A single light burned on the front step. There was no on else around. A small barn was the only other building. A wall of olive trees hemmed it all in on three sides. “Are you sure?” “Yes, thank you.” She paid the fare, adding an extra bill for which the man thanked her profusely before he started up the taxi and turned back onto the motorway toward Cuenca. It was none of his business if his passenger wanted to be left in the middle of nowhere. As the red taillights faded into the distance she became aware of how vast the silence around her seemed. She could make out the distant glow of light where Cuenca perched on its rocky hilltops, and the odd glimmer here and there told her of farmers cottages. High above her an aircraft droned steadily toward Madrid. A horse whinnied somewhere in the darkness as she sat on the stairs and stretched her long legs out in front of her to wait. She did not wait long. She had mentally counted to one hundred and twenty when two men appeared from the shadows. They wore simply farmers garb but had the lean muscled size you rarely saw in farmers, but was common among soldiers. One held an image in his hand that he held up and compared it to her as he shone a torch on her. She blinked in the bright light but didn’t look away. “Senorita Letizia.” The man said her name without question but she nodded anyway. Behind him an engine rumbled to life and the doors of the small barn opened to allow an immaculate black car to creep out onto the gravel. “This way.” The man gestured to the car. She climbed into the back seat and found herself alone save for the driver who offered her a smile and nod from the front seat. The other two men faded back into the darkness and in a moment the little churchyard was empty again. “Welcome to Cuenca, Senorita.” The driver was not much older than she was and clearly did not mind chatting to this woman he had waited in the dark for. “How was your journey?” “Well, thank you.” She leaned forward slightly to better hear him, the cars engine was as loud as it was powerful it seemed. “How far is it? I have been needing to take a pee since halfway here on the train.” The driver laughed, a flash of white teeth in the blue light, then pointed toward a small hilltop where she could see soft yellow lights glowing through the trees. “Just there. Only a few minutes.” She could wait a few minutes. She settled back into her seat and felt the knot in her belly growing slightly. For the past month she had sat in Madrid, wandering the ancient streets, pretending to be a British university student, living in cheap lodgings, waiting for something to happen. When she had come to Spain from Rhodesia, at the discreet invitation of Delgado himself, she had expected action right away. There had been only silence until two days ago when she was sitting down to a dinner of oxtail soup and stuffed mushrooms. A pretty Spanish girl with long black hair had sat down next to her and casually inquired if she had ever been to the Tower of London. It was a casual enough question but it was also part of Delgado’s prearranged code. The two women had flirted lightly and then Spanish girl laughing passed her a card with her telephone number. When Sara had dialed the number a voice on the other end had given her the address of the little church. The car climbed the small hill through a grove of Spanish oaks, the headlights playing off the heavy branches thick with leaves and huge wooden trunks. Small animals, deer mostly, vanished in fright into the darkness, their white tails bobbing ludicrously until the forest swallowed them. A gate and wall, topped with sharpened black spikes, loomed suddenly out of the forest and two men with machine guns slung across their chests stepped into the headlights, hands raised to stop the car. They spared a nod for the driver and then a bright torch snapped on as another picture was compared to her face. Despite the light she caught sight of a pair of floppy ears and great drooling jowls at the edge of the light. Security was tight. “Bienvenidos a la casa del silencio.” Said the soldier as he stepped back and waved the driver onward. The gate in front of them slowly began to open at a shouted order and the car drew through. The concrete roadway continued toward the distant light and she found herself whistling quietly as they drew closer. There were any number of old and ancient villas throughout Spain that would have cost a fortune to buy or restore. It seemed that Delgado had decided to build one from scratch and she found herself gaping at the clean lines and masonry of a modern two story villa. The car stopped at the edge of the drive and her driver leapt out, popped open her door and gestured toward the villa. “You’re to go right up. They’re expecting you, but don’t ask me where you’ll find them.” She turned in surprise at the last statement but the driver was already back in the car and shifting into gear to head back down the driveway. As the heavy engine faded into the distance she looked over the villa. She was clearly at the side of the building since no door opened out to greet her but a staircase of fitted blue, white, and yellow tile marched up and away around the corner of the house. Hefting her duffle bag, half expecting another soldier to appear from the brush, she began to walk up the stairs. Her shoes clicked pleasantly on the tile as she went, a marble balustrade on her left, a wall of falling ivy on her right, turning and rising until she stepped onto a patio that took her breath away. In front of her, pouring over the edge, was a large pool that glimmered with a deep blue colour. Soft lights glowed everywhere here, highlighting tall strong columns that supported a roof of dark brown tile. The pool was the focal point though and she admired the small fountain that fed it before it emptied at the far end, the water falling into another pool several feet below. It would give any swimmer the impression of a never ending swim into the darkness. A strong breeze hinted that the trees had been cleared here and she was able to make out an expanse of lawn that carried into the darkness. Everywhere she looked there was well fitted stone and marble trimmed with dark wood. Huge windows, like she had never dreamed of, rose from floor to ceiling to show the inside of the house and she felt her heart skip a beat. Never in her wildest dreams had she expected to see such luxury. Directly across the pool from her a large room dominated by a semi-circular bench covered in red cushions played host to three men, all of them white, and she was suddenly very conscious of her black skin. She brushed some wrinkles out of her jacket and made her way, now soundless, around the pool until she could easily see the sitting area, lit pleasantly by three electric lamps. She raised a hand and knocked on the wooden frame where windows could be fitted for the window. “Ah, Senorita Reicker, welcome. Please come in.” Delgado stood as he spoke, a warm smile on his face. He did not wait for her to come to him but rather he took two strides and embraced her in the Spanish fashion with a kiss on either cheek. “Please, be seated.” He gestured to his own place as he took her jacket and placed it across the back of the red cushions before pouring her a small glass of wine from the decanter on the table. “Thank you, Viceroy. This is a lovely home you have.” She could barely tear her eyes away from the interior of the house now that she could see it. It was nothing like the gaping 18th Century Palaces of Madrid, or the “new” buildings of her native Rhodesia. “I would like to take credit, but all I did was pay for it.” He replied with a smile, and then indicated the other two men, both of whom likewise stood to greet her. “General Marc Marginedas of the Cazadores, and Manuel Casal of the Servicio Nacional de Investigación. Gentlemen, this is Sara Reicker of whom I have told you.” “You are as dangerous as you are beautiful the Viceroy tells us, Senorita.” Said Casal with a small bow. “Thank you.” The compliment had been well given without being to forward. This was perhaps the reason she had liked Delgado so much the first time she met him, that fact that she was a woman, and a black one at that, did not appear to bother him at all. “Wine.” It wasn’t a question as Delgado passed her a small glass of the red liquid. She had no palate for wine and would not have known a good one if it slapped her in the face, but she sipped it anyway, nodding her thanks. “To business then.” Delgado continued as he carried a chair into the room from the nearby dining area, placing it so he could face the other three. She noted that there were no papers on the heavy wooden table in front of them and, as far as she could tell, no one else anywhere nearby. “You three have been gathered here to help me with a delicate problem, shall we say. Spain is an Empire that is perched on a dangerous precipice. Spain herself, Portugal, and the Midi-Pyrenees are firmly in the control of officers and men loyal to me. The bulk of the army posted to Africa and charged with subduing Algeria, however, is not. We took great care to ship most of the Royalist officers loyal to our young King over with the invasion force to keep them occupied.” He glanced up at the others to see if they were following. Sara was privately wondering what on earth this had to do with her but she was starting to get some inkling as Delgado continued. “With most of Algeria under our control those officers are going to be looking to come home, and their men with them. That potentially places a well armed and experienced fighting force in a position to destabilize the country.” “Señor Casal, who has been keeping an eye on the mutterings for me, has informed me that our much beloved Head of the Inquisition has been in touch with these enterprising officers and suggested that they might do Spain a great favour by removing me. I do not have to tell you how a civil war would devastate this country. The Old King did a fine thing keeping us out of the Great War and look how we have prospered. But now we are faced with the possibility of ending up like Ethiopia with a young idiot in charge backed by very enthusiastic supporters who see their own means easily brought to fruition by propping up that same weak leader and using him to their own end.” Delgado turned his deep green eyes on Sara and she felt the power of his personality bear down on her. The man was charismatic as anyone she had ever met, and his handsome Spanish features did a lot for her. “This is where you come in Senorita. The Royalists are planning to have a victory parade in Algiers in two weeks’ time, and it is well deserved. However, there is also a planned staff meeting the day before with the majority of the Royalist officers invited.” Casal has easily taken up the thread of conversation. “Your mission, Sara, will be to ensure that those who attend that meeting do not survive.” That was a lot to think about all of sudden and Sara stared at the three men in silence for a moment. She had certainly killed before, but never multiple men, and never military ones, at the same time. “Did you have a plan in mind?” “No.” Delgado answered simply. “I will admit I had suggested we just drop a bomb on them but that might just give the Royalists more ammunition to say I am not to be trusted.” He shrugged at her bemused smile. “You will have a free hand, an unlimited budget, and all the resources of the Cazadores and the SNI at your disposal. This is our top priority at the moment, including even the problems in Portugal.” Casal was speaking again. “You will allow me to do this however I want?” Sara was acutely aware of the tremendous amount of power that was being placed in her hand, and the ramifications if she failed. “Yes.” Delgado smiled. “And I don’t need to say something as cliché as “Tell anyone and we kill you”. Instead I will offer you this. When you succeed you will be paid a sum of one million pesetas and, if you wish to, a top role in the SNI.” For an orphan from the depths of Africa, the sum of money Delgado had just offered Sara was staggering. She could a city in Rhodesia for that kind of money. She blinked a couple of times as her mind began to race. Money and a desk job, she wouldn’t have to risk her life in the field anymore. It was an offer that no sane person in her position could refuse. She leaned forward and raised her glass. “We had best begin working on a plan.”