Part 16 (2/2)

'Oh yeah,' I protested. 'What would you have done if you hadn't met me? Probably carried on mugging old ladies in Andytown and setting fire to school libraries in the name of the cause. You Irish p.r.i.c.k. You owe me a drink at least.'

We had several drinks in Castell's and Regine's. By now, Jim was well known at each. His front had progressed, buying and selling art. We moved to Elysee Matignon, a club patronised and rumoured to be owned by Jean-Paul Belmondo, who greeted Jim as a long-lost friend.

'Jean-Paul, let me introduce you to Mark Thatcher, just back from Saudi Arabia. Mark Thatcher, this is Jean-Paul Belmondo.'

I hated Jim when he did this. Why did people believe him? I pretended to be Mark Thatcher. It wouldn't last long. We got drunk. We smoked more joints. Roman Polanski walked in. McCann introduced me to him as Andrew Lloyd Webber. I left. Jim followed. We got back into his Mercedes.

'Can you still sell dope? I mean lots.'

'Of course, Jim. You know I'm the best.'

'Can you pick it up in Amsterdam, take it over to England, and sell it?'

'I'll get someone to do that, Jim, for sure. It'll have to be on credit, mind.'

'I know. I know. You Welsh a.r.s.ehole. I'll have 250 kilos ready for you next Wednesday. Leave a car in the Marriot Hotel park. Leave a copy of Playboy Playboy on the pa.s.senger seat. Leave the keys in the exhaust pipe. I'll load the car up, and somewhere in the country you'll have to transfer the dope to a truck or caravan or whatever you're using to carry it over the Channel. Here's a sample of the dope and a book for you to read. I'm taking you back to your hotel now. Let me know when you've sold the gear. And no rip-offs.' on the pa.s.senger seat. Leave the keys in the exhaust pipe. I'll load the car up, and somewhere in the country you'll have to transfer the dope to a truck or caravan or whatever you're using to carry it over the Channel. Here's a sample of the dope and a book for you to read. I'm taking you back to your hotel now. Let me know when you've sold the gear. And no rip-offs.'

The dope was half a kilo of excellent Afghanistan/Pakistan border has.h.i.+sh. The book was an internal DEA publication instructing dope-busting agents what to look for in commercial s.h.i.+pments. There were hundreds of pages of examples of busted dope s.h.i.+pments and what had caused them to look suspicious in the first place. This was fascinating. Where had Jim got it from? Throwing caution to the wind, I smuggled both sample and book into England.

Who could I use to pick up the 250 kilos? Selling it once it was in England would be no problem. I still knew plenty of dealers, but they didn't have trucks. Only London villains tended to have those at their disposal. I wondered if Mick Williams was out of the nick yet. He'd be able to handle it. I called his number.

'H, you don't know, old son, how glad I am to hear yer. Let's 'ave a meet, shall we?'

We met at Richaux, opposite Harrods. Mick listened to my proposal.

'I'm over the moon to do it, H. I need a quick trade. My mate's got a truck. Goes over all the time. Sweet as a nut. My other mate's got a BMW. He just done a ten stretch. Did every day. One of your own, H. Straight up. It's all sorted.'

The truck went to Rotterdam. The BMW was taken from the Marriot Hotel, Amsterdam, by one of McCann's henchmen, loaded to saturation with well over 250 kilos of has.h.i.+sh, and reparked in the Marriot. Mick Williams went to pick it up and was descended upon by the Dutch drug squad. Mick's sister told me about it. Mick was 'gutted'.

I was pretty 'gutted' myself. Mick was in prison. I'd lost money I'd put up as expenses for Mick and his mates. I'd have to take care of Mick's defence costs. I'd almost got busted. I might get busted. McCann would figure I owed him a million pounds.

'Don't ever f.u.c.king see me again, you Welsh p.i.s.s-artist, unless your act is completely together. You hear me?'

'Okay, Jim. Thanks for the s.h.i.+t.'

Shortly afterwards, McCann was arrested in Amsterdam by Dutch police, not for has.h.i.+sh but on the basis of a German extradition warrant relating to the 1973 charge of blowing up a British Army post in Monchengladbach. Still furious over France's previous refusal to hand over McCann, the Germans were going to strong-arm the Dutch into doing just that.

Mickey's bust was a bit of a lesson. Maybe I really should go straight: concentrate on my little straight business empire in Soho and normalise my tax affairs.

However, the Inland Revenue made it clear that whatever settlement might be reached, they'd be on my back for ever. Stanley Rosenthal explained the advantages of non-residency. If I could live outside the United Kingdom and spend only two months a year physically doing business in the country, I would incur no British tax liability, and the Revenue would have no business being on my back in the future. Judy did not wish to live too far away from Britain. Switzerland was out of the question, much too cold and expensive. We wanted somewhere new and warm. Our time in Corfu had been enjoyable enough, but the island's telephone technology was still prehistoric, and who needed Greek as a second language? We narrowed down the choice to Italy or Spain.

Italy began as the clear favourite. I'd spent that six months as a fugitive in Genova in 1974. Judy and I had maintained a place in Campione d'Italia for three years. We felt fairly familiar with the Italian language and traditions. The Mafia still fascinated me despite my familiarity with some of their operations. We decided to do some exploration, starting with Tuscany. We flew to Pisa and rented a house outside nearby Lucca. We visited Florence, Siena, and Livorno. We saw an open-air opera at Puccini's house and drank some Brunello di Montalcino. The sensuality of the country and people captivated us again, but we were getting increasingly irritated by such quaint Italian customs as paying exorbitant fees to sit on a beach and frowning on foreigners not sporting Gianni Versace socks. Nevertheless, there were always the addictive autostradas, so one morning we rose early and drove south.

At Castellamare di Stabia, the eight-lane autostrada from Rome suddenly turns into a horse-and-cart track. The visitor has four conventional choices: see Naples and die from mugging, go to Capri and die from poverty, trudge through Vesuvius's volcanic ash in Pompeii, or die from exhaust fumes crawling around the Malfi coastline. We ignored these distractions, parked the car at Naples airport, and caught an Itavia flight to Palermo, Sicily. My suitcase flopped onto the carousel, pursued by three large, snarling Alsatians. Judy looked horrified.

'What have you got in that case, Howard?'

'Nothing, love. Don't worry. This is a domestic flight. They can't search our bags. We haven't come in here from any foreign country.'

'But, Howard, you swore you would never carry dope when we travelled with the children. Those were your precise words.'

I had faithfully promised not to bring out any hash with me from England, and, as a supreme sacrifice, I had stuck to that promise. Something weird was happening.

'Who are you meeting here? I knew something was going on when you suggested coming here.'

Judy knew nothing of the 250-kilo bust involving me, Mickey Williams, and McCann. But my agitated behaviour over the last couple of weeks had ignited her suspicions.

'I'm not meeting anyone here. I promise. I've no idea what this is about.'

It was true. I didn't.

Four armed policemen grabbed me and escorted me and my suitcase to an empty room. Judy was told to aspetti, per favore aspetti, per favore. The Sicilian cops tore my baggage apart, looked in every crease and pocket, and took away each item of paperwork. The words of the Dutch chief prosecutor ran through my mind: 'For this charge, Mr Marks, you can be prosecuted and serve consecutive sentences in England, America, Holland, Austria, France, Ireland, and Italy.'

I had already been done for it in England and Holland. Were they going to do me in Italy now, for the same charge? During the 1970s, I'd entered and exited Italy with a variety of different pa.s.sports and broken the country's stringent currency regulations on countless occasions. Did they know this?

One of the Sicilian cops came back, clutching my paperwork and brandis.h.i.+ng a computer print-out. Grinning broadly, he extended his hand.

'Ah! Signore Marks. Il capo di contrabando. Il spione. Benvenuto a Sicilia Il capo di contrabando. Il spione. Benvenuto a Sicilia.'

This was unexpected. Judy and the children were politely ushered in. We were all taken to a furnished room.

'Dove restare in Palermo?'

I explained we had booked rooms at the Villa Igiea (the old haunt of Lucky Luciano and Palermo's finest luxury hotel). The policeman called the hotel and summoned its chauffeur.

Palermo is a seriously criminal city. The city's centre is dominated by its prison. The mega Mafia trial involving several hundred defendants was in full swing. A newly-dug tunnel connected the prison to the courthouse. Tanks guarded the gates. The heavily armed guards allowed no photographs. Around the corner, olive-skinned kids played Sicilian hopscotch within the white-chalked outlines of recent murder victims. Photographs were not encouraged. None of the taxi-drivers used their meters. All the clothes boutiques and hairdressers were men's. Bodyguards were everywhere. Telephonic communications, particularly by Italy's standards, were excellent. The cuisine was among Europe's finest. The solitary international flight was a weekly non-stop to New York, packed with hit men and currency-regulation violators posing as olive-oil exporters. I wasn't bored for a moment, but I had to agree with Judy that it was no place to develop my legitimate business empire. We left, but not before I had opened an account at the Banca di Sicilia. Asking people to pay into an obvious Mafia account might increase the speed of settlement.

A day or so later, we were at the departure lounge of Pisa's international airport. Poking around the duty-free shelves, I ran into Neil Kinnock. He was smoking a cigarette. I liked what I knew about Kinnock. Would he turn out to be the long-awaited (at least in Wales) combination of King Arthur, Owain Glendower, and Nye Bevan that would oust the iron lady Thatcher and become our new Prime Minister?

'You're Mr Kinnock, aren't you?'

'Yes. What part of Wales are you from?'

We launched into an enjoyable discussion of South Wales geography and weather. We lamented the recent performances of the Welsh rugby team.

'Howard. Come here,' Judy's voice boomed from nowhere.

'Wait a minute, love, I'm talking to Mr Kin ...'

'Please, Howard, come here at once.'

She was angry. Why?

I excused myself from Neil Kinnock's presence. Judy started walking away, very briskly.

'What's the matter, Judy? What is it?'

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