Death of a Sweep - M. C. Beaton [59]
She then wandered down the boulevard until she found a shop selling tourist souvenirs. Sandra bought a baseball cap and then saw they had a display of souvenir knives. She bought the one with the longest blade.
Returning to the hotel, she asked the concierge to hire her a car, asking for a four-wheel drive as she said she would like to see some of the country. When she paid for the hire and deposit, she had very little money left.
In Guildford, Sandra had taken the advanced driving test. She had often driven her husband when they were abroad on holidays. The car had a sat-nav, so she followed the directions and soon found herself in an industrial park on the outskirts of the city.
Chile Modes was in a low building at the back of the estate. She sat and waited, watching small delivery vans come and go, the new baseball cap pulled down over her eyes. Her heart sank as she realized that Jaime had probably disappeared with the money. He would expect her to have called the police.
But suddenly she saw Jaime emerge from the building, and he was carrying her travel bag. He was shouting something at a burly man and then gave him the finger.
Jacking in his job, thought Sandra, with a rising feeling of excitement. Jaime got on to a battered Vespa after strapping the travel bag to the back of the seat. She ducked down as he roared past her. Sandra swung the car round and followed in pursuit. She hoped he would not go back into the centre of the city – following a Vespa, which could nip in and out of the heavy traffic, would be difficult – but he drove off into the countryside along a dusty road. The magnificence of the Andes loomed in the distance.
She looked cautiously in her rearview mirror. Apart from the two of them, the road was empty. Sandra put her foot down on the accelerator, raced forward, swerved as she came alongside him, and sent him flying into the ditch, where he lay stunned.
She got down from her vehicle. Quickly she unstrapped the travel bag and threw it into her car. Jaime came stumbling up on to the road. He drew a knife out of his boot. His eyes were gleaming with rage. Sandra thought of prison and all because of this idiot. He brandished the knife.
‘Give me the money,’ he said.
‘All right,’ said Sandra with deceptive mildness. She leaned into the car but picked up a tyre iron, thinking quickly that if she engaged in a knife fight with Jaime, she would lose. She threw the bag in his face and then lunged forward and smashed the tyre iron down on his head with all her force.
Then she stood back, panting, looking desperately to right and left. His head was a mass of blood. She forced herself to feel for a pulse but found none. Sandra put down the back seats in the car and, with a superhuman effort, shoved his body in.
Heading towards the city, she stopped at a wayside stall which was selling shawls and bought two. She covered Jaime’s body and drove off. Now the problem was to dump the body somewhere it wouldn’t be found until she was well clear of the country.
She passed a tavern which was little more than a shack; a little farther on was a building site. The men must be on their break. They had been laying the foundations of a building and cement had been poured into an oblong square, shaded with a plastic covering on poles.
Sandra got out. She knelt down and felt the cement. It was wet. She dragged the body out of the car and tumbled it into the cement. Would it be deep enough? Jaime lay lifeless, and then the body slowly disappeared from view.
Spotting a barrel of water at the side with a ladle next to it, she ladled a scoop of water over the cement to smooth out any disturbance on the surface. It wasn’t perfect but she hoped the workers would think they’d made a sloppy job or that some animal had fallen in.
Sandra wasn’t worried about the Vespa. She shrewdly guessed that someone would steal it before nightfall.
When she returned to the hotel, after scrubbing out the inside of the car and then taking it through a car