Tangier Bank Heist: Interzone Mystery, #1

To Almudena, my wife

And Julián, my son

CHAPTER ONE

Right after the war, Tangier was full of refugees. People fleeing Hitler. People fleeing Stalin. People fleeing Franco. People just fleeing. On the other side of the Strait of Gibraltar from Spain, Tangier offered a safe haven from the chaos of Europe while still being in sight of it.

Tangier attracted other types too. Back then it was run as a free port by half a dozen European powers. The Sultan was nominally in charge, but no one gave a damn what he said. In fact, no one was in charge and most things that were illegal everywhere else were readily available here. The perverts came for the flesh. The addicts came for the drugs. A whole army of hustlers and grifters and con men came for the loose laws and free flow of cash and contraband. Everything was for sale in Tangier and the price was cheap. Any man or woman who wanted to indulge their vices or take a chance on making easy money came here if they had the smarts and the opportunity.

So why was I here? Because it was the only place that would have me.

Besides, it was a great place to be a private detective. You got cases like in no other place I’d ever been, and I’d been all over. Cases you couldn’t believe ever happened. Like when I had to track down the guy who stole the bank.

No, he didn’t rob the bank, he stole it.

Here’s how it happened.

It was a typical day in the Petit Socco, the little square in the heart of the medina that was the epicenter of Tangier life for both foreigner and Moor.

The Petit Socco is an oblong plaza a little smaller than a football field. Half a dozen alleys pass out of it, leading downhill to the port, uphill along Silversmith’s Street through the Jewish Quarter and beyond to the Grand Socco, while other alleys lead into the heart of the medina, the maze of the Arab quarter.

Hemming in the plaza were closely set buildings three or four stories high, their whitewashed walls gleaming in the sun. Their green shutters remained closed, at least in those rooms lived in by the natives. Other than a brief glimpse of a headscarved woman hanging laundry on the line below the sill, you never got a peek inside their homes. Arabs are private types; only the Jews got them beat in that. You could spot a Westerner’s room by the fact that the windows stayed open during the day, at least once the occupants recovered from their hangovers. Not many of those windows were ever open. Only the truly desperate among the foreign community lived in the medina. Everyone came here, though.

At the ground floor, the Petit Socco was ringed with cafes and little shops. The street-side tables were filled with people from every nation—all watching, all drinking, all gossiping. Moroccans—or Moors, as we called them—sat outside along with the Westerners, while the dim recesses of the cafe interiors were more for the Moroccans to smoke their long pipes of kif and for those Westerners who had an aversion to the sun and the constant public gaze the Petit Socco put you under.

The plaza was as packed as the cafes. Moors in voluminous robes, some sporting fezzes, passed Europeans in summer suits and straw hats. Frenchwomen in the latest Parisian fashions bought bouquets of mountain wildflowers from Berber tribeswomen swathed head to foot in cloth, even the bottom of their faces covered by a strip of black material tucked under the nose.

Among the foreigners, one could immediately tell how long an individual had been in Tangier by the number of locals following them. Those just off the boat had a small army of Moors coming in their wake, offering tours, reed baskets, shiny trinkets, poor quality hashish, or directions to brothels. They often got saved by some trickster of Tangier’s foreign community, who would dismiss the throng with a sharp word of badly pronounced Arabic and then lead the mark into a subtler con. Those who had been here for a while might have one or two hangers on, desperate street people who hadn’t learned that particular foreigner’s tastes or who had been given a coin by them three months ago and still hoped for a second handout.

People like me, who had been here for a couple of years, didn’t get the usual hassle. No street hustlers followed me anymore. Only the professional schemers, mostly foreign but some native, came to me with their plans to get rich quick.

I took a sip from my beer and watched as a marabout, a religious wanderer, his robes covered in strips of differently colored cloth, spun around the center of the plaza, arms flung wide and ululating a long cry to Allah. Nobody paid him much attention. People were far more interested in that German girl with the impressive Nordic legs, her calves brilliantly exposed to the Mediterranean sun, or the twitching American junkie walking stiff-limbed off to a hookup, or the pair of loudly arguing Jewish shopkeepers who had decided to air their differences in the most public place in the city, but in a language that none but their kind could understand.

And around this scene, sipping their tea or beer or gin, were the cafe sitters—the idlers, the schemers, the plotters, the poseurs. Moor and foreigner alike came here to watch and to maneuver.

Cafe Central was the favorite of Tangier’s glitterati of all nationalities, with its comfy wicker chairs and marble tables, its expertly mixed drinks and its bright yellow awning to shade the drinkers, so I didn’t go there. Those people didn’t glitter in my eyes. A bunch of remittance men, boozers, letches, and leeches. Instead I drank on the terrace of the Cafe Tingis, a low cast iron railing keeping the beggars and hustlers at bay, at least those who didn’t buy a drink. Back then, the Tingis attracted an interesting mix of conmen, chancers, currency exchangers, and some of the city’s growing number of artists. I liked it because it was a bit grungy, the terrace chipped, the wooden tables worn and stained, and the drinks cheaper. I also liked it because it stood at the top of the sloped plaza and offered a good view of every cafe and every entrance to every alleyway.

And the view was what everyone came here for. The old Moroccan men in their cowled robes, their younger relations in locally made Western styles, the young Moorish and Spanish hustlers, the fat German procurer, the confidence men, the wide-eyed tourists, and the American private detective all came to watch the swarm of people passing through and to see who was sitting with whom at which cafe. Because everyone passed through the Petit Socco.

Cafe Tingis served as my office. My detective agency had an actual office just off the Boulevard Pasteur near my apartment, but the Tingis is where the action was and that’s where people knew to come looking for me.

People like Laszlo.

Laszlo had a last name, but it was unknown to everyone. I suppose I could have asked him but he would have just made something up.

Ever see Peter Lorre in M? Laszlo looked an awful lot like the crazed child killer in that movie. The same bugged out eyes, the same cheap suit, the same round head, and the same oily black hair combed over his bald spot. But Laszlo was gaunt while Lorre was stout. When Laszlo sat down next to you and started a conversation, he’d sit right at the edge of his seat and bend that skinny body toward you like a gargoyle.

That’s what he did now.

Shorty, have you heard the news?

That’s me—Kent Shorty MacAllister. A whisker shy of five-five, there was no escaping that nickname. I didn’t mind it from my friends.

Laszlo was not my friend.

What news? I asked, already wanting him gone. This town is full of news.

The South Continental Bank is gone! he said in a breathless voice. I wish it had been breathless. He stank of garlic.

Banks fold all the time, I said, taking another sip from my beer. It’s a great way to steal from the investors.

I lost my savings! Laszlo said, teetering on the edge of his wicker chair so much that I thought he might fall into my lap.

I’m not buying you a drink, Laszlo.

Laszlo made a halfway decent attempt to look offended. A drink? Oh no, my friend, I don’t need you to buy me a drink. I am not bankrupt unlike some people this morning. I diversify my assets just as I diversify my sources of income.

Those sources of income being pimping, money laundering, and smuggling.

Glad to hear it, I said. Looking around the Petit Socco, I noticed an American couple sitting at the Cafe Manara across from the Central—he in straw hat and loud tie, she in summer dress and too much costume jewelry—gaping at everything like they’d just stepped out of New Jersey and into the Arabian Nights. An old Moroccan man with a long white beard and matching djellaba, very picturesque, sat with them and regaled them with tales of Oriental splendor, his bony arms making broad sweeps to gesture at the sights around him. He called himself Sultan al-Magrebi, and was a local guide and pickpocket. He’d take those fresh off the boat on a grand tour of the city and pick their pockets with the skill of a maestro. Then he’d give a signal to one of the little street boys in his employ to bump into the rubes in an obvious way and run off.

Check your wallet, Sultan al-Magrebi would advise.

The wallet would be checked and found missing, at which point Sultan would run after the thief, who of course would get away.

At that point Sultan would become charity itself, taking the marks to the police station to make a report, to the American Express office to get replacements for their traveler’s checks, and even buying them lunch.

I am so sorry this has happened to such esteemed guests of my country. It brings down shame on the head of every Moroccan, he’d state with such sincerity that I sometimes believed he believed it.

The marks, of course, would be so grateful they’d end up giving Sultan a fat tip from their replaced traveler’s checks. Then they’d head out on the next boat, Sultan and the boy would divide whatever cash had been in the wallet, and Sultan would take up his usual spot at the Cafe Manara and start again.

Laszlo kept talking.

No, Shorty. I did not come here to cadge a drink, as the English say. I need your help. I want to hire you.

I cocked my head. I’d heard a lot of scams from Laszlo, but this was a new one.

Hire me?

Yes, to get my money back.

You can’t fight the banks, Laszlo, not unless you overthrow the whole capitalist system and I already lost that fight.

Spain: 1936 to 1939. The greatest hope and the greatest disappointment of our generation. Finally, a government of the working class gets democratically elected, and suddenly the whole world turned against it. Not even World War Two was a bigger disappointment, because while that war finally defeated fascism, it kept in place the system that created and profited by fascism.

Laszlo mopped his brow with a soiled handkerchief and stuffed it into the breast pocket of his old suit.

You misunderstand, my friend. The bank did not fold in the usual way. It just disappeared! This morning I went to make a withdrawal, and saw a distressed crowd blocking the sidewalk out front. Among them I recognized several customers, some quite respectable. What I saw next brought horror to my eyes. The bank’s doors were shut, even though it was well past opening time, and through the barred window I could see that the furnishings had all vanished. The marble desks, the money exchange board, even the clock were all gone as if the building had been cleared to let in another tenant.

That’s pretty screwy. I got to admit he had my attention by now.

Laszlo nodded eagerly. It gets worse, my friend. One of the customers went to fetch an officer. Within an hour they had gotten permission to clip the lock on the door and investigate. When the police emerged, they said the safe had disappeared too! Everything was gone!

Someone stole the bank? That’s a bold move even by Tangier standards, I chuckled, draining the last of my beer and motioning for the waiter.

So are you going to help me? Laszlo asked.

Nope. I just finished a missing person’s case and I’m flush. Even if I wasn’t flush I wouldn’t help you. I don’t care what happens to banks, I don’t care what happens to investors, and I sure as hell don’t give a damn what happens to you.

Besides, even if he did hire me, I wouldn’t see a plug nickel of my fee. I knew dice addicts who owed fewer people money than Laszlo.

But Shorty! Um, Mr. MacAllister. Good sir! You must help me.

Is that a fact? I handed the waiter a coin, adjusted the brim of my fedora, and walked out into the sun. Laszlo didn’t follow.

I strolled past Cafe Manara. Sultan was just leaving with the American couple, ushering them to their fate. I passed them by and headed down Rue Mokhtar Ahardan, which led to the port. I needed to talk to an assistant in the harbormaster’s office about getting some political literature through customs. It would cost a pretty penny, but the Party would pick up the tab.

I could have taken Rue Mokhtar Ahardan all the way downhill to where it ended at a steep flight of steps that got you to another road sloping down to the corniche and port, but I decided to cut through an alley on the right. This was a high-action area, and I’d been out of town for the past few days on that missing person’s case. I needed to feel out the medina again. If you want to know the real pulse of a city, you have to go to its worst parts.

Turned out it was business as usual. The alleys in this part of town were narrow and full of refuse. The city didn’t clean here and the residents didn’t bother. Tired-eyed women stood in doorways, waiting for the first of the day. Most were Moroccan or Spanish or a mix of both. The higher class neighborhoods had Frenchwomen and Germans and even the occasional American. Rumor had it that one gal named Spicy Sally was actually heiress to the Westinghouse fortune, and had decided to slum it while waiting for Daddy to die. I have no idea if that’s true or not. Anywhere other than Tangier I wouldn’t have believed it. Here, anything can happen.

High above, where the buildings leaned in on each other and almost touched, a few tiny windows remained shuttered to the day. All except for one, where a Moorish woman, face unveiled but hair covered, stood smoking a cigarette in the little patch of sunlight haloing her window. I knew her. Not that I ever went to her or anything but she was a familiar face. Every day around this time, the sun shone through the alley’s narrow top and bathed her window in light for maybe half an hour. And every day she would stand there, calmly smoking, the sun on her face, never sparing a glance at the alley below.

Looking at her, I almost bumped into a teenaged Arab boy in castoff Western clothing leaning against the wall. He touched his fingertips to his thumb and jerked his hand back and forth in an unmistakable gesture.

Mister Bob? Mister Bob? he asked me.

Mister Bob was a former resident of Tangier, famous among the boys for his very specific and relentlessly obsessive taste in recreation. Even years after his departure, Mister Bob had remained synonymous with a vice that in Tangier never had to be solitary.

I passed him by. No Mister Bob for me.

Hey, mister!

That was from a plump Spanish girl of about sixteen, her profession obvious from the clothing. She stomped down the alley ahead, shouting at the back of a European man who ignored her and walked deliberately toward me, the brim of his hat pulled low and a smug smile on his lips.

Mister, you no pay!

The guy had on twenty dollar shoes, an emerald tie pin, and a fat gold wedding ring, and he couldn’t afford the two bucks this girl charged?

As he passed me, I tripped him up, clouted him on the back of the head, and let him fall hard on the cobblestones.

By the time he had gotten face up, I had my .38 revolver out of the shoulder holster hidden beneath my jacket and pointing at his nose.

The lady provided a service, pal. Time to pay up, I said.

Bu-but...

The John seemed too entranced by the muzzle of my pistol for intelligent conversation, so I reached into his pocket, grabbed his wallet, and tossed it over my shoulder.

¡Muy bien! the girl said behind me, obviously having caught it.

This is robbery!