Landing Page

APRIL IN SPAIN

JOHN
BANVILLE

Dedication

To Andrew Wylie

Contents

1. Title Page
2. Dedication
3. LONDON
4. Chapter 1
5. DONOSTIA
6. Chapter 2
7. Chapter 3
8. Chapter 4
9. Chapter 5
10. Chapter 6
11. Chapter 7
12. LONDON
13. Chapter 8
14. DONOSTIA
15. Chapter 9
16. Chapter 10
17. Chapter 11
18. Chapter 12
19. Chapter 13
20. Chapter 14
21. Chapter 15
22. Chapter 16
23. DUBLIN
24. Chapter 17
25. Chapter 18
26. Chapter 19
27. Chapter 20
28. Chapter 21
29. Chapter 22
30. Chapter 23
31. Chapter 24
32. Chapter 25
33. Chapter 26
34. Chapter 27
35. Chapter 28
36. Chapter 29
37. Chapter 30
38. Chapter 31
39. Chapter 32
40. Chapter 33
41. Chapter 34
42. Chapter 35
43. DONOSTIA
44. Chapter 36
45. Chapter 37
46. Chapter 38
47. Chapter 39
48. Chapter 40
49. Chapter 41
50. Chapter 42
51. Chapter 43
52. Chapter 44
53. Chapter 45
54. DUBLIN
55. Chapter 46
56. About the Author
57. By the Same Author
58. Copyright

LONDON

Chapter 1

Terry Tice liked killing people. It was as simple as that. Maybe liked wasn’t the right word. Nowadays he was paid to do it, and well paid. But money was never the motive, not really. Then what was? He had given a lot of thought to this question, on and off, over the years. He wasn’t a looney, and it wasn’t a sex thing, or anything sick like that – he was no psycho.

The best answer he could come up with was that it was a matter of making things tidy, of putting things in their right place. The people he was hired to kill had got in the way of something, some project or other, and had to be removed in order for business to proceed smoothly. Either that, or they were superfluous, which was just as good a reason for them to be disposed of.

Needless to say, he had nothing personal against any of his targets – which is how he thought of them, since ‘victim’ would sound as if he was to blame – except insofar as they were clutter. Yes, it gave him a real sense of satisfaction to make things neat and shipshape.

Shipshape, that was the word. After all, he had been in the British navy, for a while, at the end of the war. He was too young to enlist, but he had lied about his age and was taken on, and ‘saw action’, as the fruity-voiced high-ups liked to say, hunting German submarines in the North Atlantic. Life at sea was boring, however, and boredom was one of the things Terry just couldn’t put up with. Besides, he was prone to seasickness. A sailor who was seasick all the time, that would be a fine thing. So as soon as the chance came, he got out and transferred to the army.

He served for a few months in North Africa, propped on his elbows in wadis, fighting off the flies and taking potshots at Rommel’s famous Afrika Korps whenever they put up their big square heads, while off on the horizon the tanks buzzed like beetles, spitting fire at each other day and night. After that he did a spell in Burma, where he got the chance to kill a lot of little yellow fellows, and had a fine old time.