‘Then you should stop the protest,’ Alberto suggested, still panicking, his voice no more than gently sculpted air. ‘It is what I am saying. We must stop. He can probably do anything he wants to from anywhere on the island. I think it would be wise to stop the protest.’
I had to agree. ‘Stop the protest. Yes, Marta, I think your father is right on this.’
‘Papá, you know that is not possible.’
‘Not possible is always possible. What number was the text from?’ Alberto asked, joining his daughter and craning his neck to look. ‘It looks weird. Two, seven, one, eight, two, eight, one—’
‘Wait!’ I stopped him from finishing. ‘That’s not a normal number. I know that number. Two-point-seven-one-eight-two-eight-one-eight-two, et cetera, for ever.’
‘I know it too,’ said Marta. She was a physicist. She knew her maths.
I nodded. ‘Euler’s number. The number e. The base of natural logarithms. Every businessperson’s favourite number. It is used to calculate how they can grow their wealth exponentially by compound interest. If you wanted one mathematical number that helped explain why the rich get richer, then it’s this one. It’s another sign. He knows we will know that isn’t a real phone number…He is telling us to be very careful.’
Marta stared at the wet placard as Alberto picked it up off the ground. ‘Exponential growth. That is all he is about. That is him.’
My mind was whirring. ‘Who gave permission? I mean, for the Es Vedrà development.’
‘Oh, um, well that was Sofía Torres. She’s the most powerful politician on the island…’
Alberto was trying to shake wine off the destroyed placard. ‘Everyone knows her. She eats in the same fish restaurant every night.’
‘Which fish restaurant?’
‘El Pescador. In the Old Town.’
Being a maths teacher, I knew that if you want to solve a problem you have to do it in the right order. And if there is an unknown element and a given quantity, you have to begin with the given quantity. Not the unknown element, because it is, well, unknown. And the known element was Sofía Torres, so it made sense to start with her.
‘We should go there,’ I said, feeling urgent and adventurous and ridiculous. The Marks & Spencer Don Quixote once more. ‘We should go there tonight.’
Mindfishing
I drove us all to Ibiza Town. In the distance we could see the fortified old town of Dalt Vila on top of a hill. Clustered buildings perched behind walls and neatly angular bastions, under a sky slowly fading towards night.
Alberto and Marta argued all the way in Spanish, and I could understand every word they spoke and every word they didn’t but wanted to. I was now as fluent in Spanish as if I had been born here.
Alberto was shaking his head, over and over again. ‘Tomorrow can’t happen.’
‘It’s happening. It’s arranged.’
‘Phone your people,’ he said, his voice strained with worry. ‘Please, Marta, phone Adriá and the others and tell them it can’t happen. Post it on the internet. Tell them not to come. Whatever Art Butler is, we are no match for him.’
‘Because that is how you deal with murderers and ecocidal terrorists, is it? You give in to their demands? No, Papá, I am doing this.’
‘I am your father. And it is my job to protect you.’
‘And I am a human, and it is my job to protect the planet.’
‘You’re impossible.’
‘No. You’re impossible.’
You get the picture. It was a family squabble. Their minds were full of love and concern for each other. This was one advantage of telepathy, I realised. It made the subtext text. It made the unseen seen. It showed love and kindness could sometimes be wrapped in rage and scorn. Marta really wasn’t scared.
‘Let’s have a good time,’ she said, defiantly. ‘It’s a nice evening. Come on, Grace, let’s have an adventure. Let’s go and save the world.’
‘An adventure?’ I said, and nothing else. Almost like I was offering myself an invitation.
Anyway, Maurice, we parked in a car park on the edge of the new town. I reverse parked, the way Karl had always recommended, and I imagined his satisfaction.
The plan was to head to El Pescador, but we deliberately parked far away. We wanted a long walk. We wanted to pass a lot of people.
Marta frowned. ‘Why are we parking here?’
‘We need to go mindfishing,’ Alberto told her. ‘Well, Grace does. I’ll do what I can. And Ibiza Town is the place for it. Someone here besides Sofía Torres must know something about Art Butler’s plans or where we can find him.’
It was a busy evening, which was great for our purposes.
As we walked past people, I caught their thoughts like butterflies. And, like butterflies, some were prettier than others.
‘Be on guard for anything suspicious,’ added Alberto. ‘The information we need could come from any mind…’
The crowds began to swell as we got closer to the centre.
There was a woman staring at a bright yellow summer dress in a window, imagining herself in it, wondering if she could stretch her credit limit some more.
There was a child who was tired and wondering why her parents wouldn’t let her have a rabbit.
There was a man who was worried his belly was too soft.
