An Air of Murder

by Roderic Jeffries

  ‘I can tell you all the known facts.’

  ‘I am not surprised it has been indicated I might be assigned to this area on a permanent basis.’

  It seemed, Alvarez thought miserably, the official hearing into his conduct had reached its verdict even before being convened.

  Dolores looked across the table. ‘Are you feeling ill?’ she asked Alvarez. When he did not answer immediately, she said: ‘Are you in pain?’

  ‘I’m all right.’

  ‘Then why are you not eating what has taken me all morning, slaving in the kitchen, to prepare?’

  ‘I’m not hungry.’

  ‘I know why,’ Juan said. ‘Uncle’s chasing after a woman who’s so much younger, she runs rings around him.’

  ‘How dare you!’ Dolores said angrily.

  ‘That’s what you said the other day when . . .’

  ‘Another word and you’ll go up to your room and stay there until tea time.’

  ‘But you did . . .’

  ‘You did not understand what I have just said?’

  Juan tried to kick Isabel under the table because she had been silently jeering at him.

  Alvarez refilled his glass.

  ‘If you’re ever going to catch one, she’ll have to be older than you or you never will catch up!’ Jaime sniggered until Dolores looked at him.

  ‘What aren’t you hungry? Is something wrong?’ Dolores asked a second time.

  ‘The superior chief has sent Inspector Rios to Llueso to take command.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘He reckons I’m not doing a good enough job.’

  ‘Then he is an even bigger fool than I have always thought!’

  ‘And I’m to appear before a hearing, charged with inefficiency and being insultingly rude to an important English lady.’

  ‘Because you couldn’t catch her?’ Juan asked.

  ‘Up to your bedroom,’ Dolores snapped.

  Juan angrily pushed back his chair, stamped over to the stairs and up them.

  Alvarez emptied his glass. ‘All I did was ask her questions which had to be asked. But she’s the kind of person who expects you to bow before you speak. I’m convinced she has the key to the problem, but if I’m not allowed to question her again, I’ll never know if I’m right.’

  ‘Of course you are,’ Dolores said loyally.

  Rios had been in Llueso only four days, but to Alvarez it seemed more like four months. Everything he did was questioned and criticised; time and again, he was reminded that the Manual of Procedure demanded this was done that way and that was done this way; crime was solved by facts, not fanciful suppositions; his manner of work was suggestive of an inbuilt laziness; his liking for alcohol was a sign of moral as well as physical degeneracy.

  He parked in the shade of a tree and made his way toward Club Llueso along roads crowded with tourists whose aimless wanderings irritatingly caused him to zigzag. He had almost reached the club building when a cry of Inspector’ halted him. He turned to face Laura Gerrard, her expression as indicative of worry as had been her tone. ‘Good morning, Señora.’

  ‘Thank God we’ve met. I must talk to you.’

  ‘Then since I was about to have a coffee, perhaps you’ll join me?’

  Her concern was such, she didn’t thank him, merely nodded.

  He led the way inside and across to a window table. ‘It’s a pleasant custom to have a coñac with the morning coffee, Señora, so may I get you one?’

  ‘No.’ She realised she had been rudely abrupt. ‘Thank you, but I won’t.’

  ‘Would you like a coffee cortado, solo, or con leche?’

  ‘I don’t mind.’

  Alvarez crossed to the bar and gave his order. ‘So you’ve found company,’ said the bartender, with a knowing wink.

  ‘It’s work,’ Alvarez replied shortly.

  ‘She’s not young enough to get it all off without you having to try?’

  ‘You’ve a mind like a sewer.’

  ‘I adjust my conversation to the customer.’ He started the espresso machine, then with bad-tempered small-mindedness poured a normal-sized brandy.

  Alvarez carried the two coffees and one brandy on a tray to the table, passed one cup and saucer to Laura. She poured the contents of a packet of sugar into her cup, then began to screw the paper between thumb and forefinger.

  ‘Something is troubling you greatly, Señora,’ he said, as he settled opposite her.

  ‘When I saw you . . . I’ve been going crazy with worry and you’ve always seemed so kind, I thought . . .’

  ‘You thought what?’

  ‘Maybe you would help. That beastly man keeps questioning my husband and making it obvious he thinks he is a murderer. Charles explains again and again he’d absolutely no idea Dora had much money or that she’d leave anything to him, but Rios just won’t believe that and one can see him inwardly sneering. He even suggested perhaps Charles had been caught by a peeper in a compromising situation and that he’d killed the peeper to prevent my knowing about it. Why can’t the man understand what sort of a person Charles is?’

  ‘I fear he judges everyone by himself.’

  ‘You understand, don’t you?’

  ‘I like to think so.’

  ‘You cannot begin to believe Charles killed Dora and that man?’

  ‘I am certain he did not.’

  ‘Then for God’s sake make Rios realise how stupid he’s being.’

  He drank some brandy, poured what remained into the cup. ‘Señora, he is now in charge of the case and unlikely to take any heed of what I say.’

  She stared at him for several seconds, then said bitterly: ‘In other words, you won’t try to help. You all stick together.’ She dropped the now fragmented pieces of paper into her saucer. ‘I must seem very stupid, asking for your help. But a wife becomes stupid when her husband is wrongly suspected of murder and in danger of being put into a Spanish jail.’

  ‘Señora, I certainly do not think you stupid. Of course I will speak to Inspector Rios and try to convince him that your husband would never commit murder, whatever the circumstances, but I do not wish to raise your hopes. Inspector Rios is . . . Will you understand if I say that one can show a man a book, one cannot make him read it?’

  She reached across the table briefly to touch his arm. ‘Forgive me.’

  He would have given much to be able to pluck out of the air evidence which would clear her husband and banish from her eyes that expression of desperate anxiety and fear.

  Alvarez climbed the stairs, paused to regain his breath and wipe the sweat from his forehead, entered the office. Rios sat at what had been his desk; a rickety old desk had been brought in from another room and that was now his. He sat, grateful for a rest.

  ‘You’ve been away a long time,’ Rios said.

  ‘Have I?’

  ‘You may find the superior chief will ask why you were not here.’

  ‘Is that a roundabout way of saying he phoned? If so, I’ll bet you didn’t tell him I was out on a case.’

  ‘Since you do not keep a Movements Book, I couldn’t say what you were doing.’

  ‘You should have told him, I was having coffee and a coñac with a charming lady.’

  ‘He does not appreciate childish jokes.’

  ‘It is not a joke. I have been enjoying Señora Gerrard’s company.’

  ‘Are you incapable of understanding an order? You were told to have no further contact with the case.’

  ‘When she stopped me in the street and invited me to have a coffee with her, should I have rudely spurned her invitation?’

  ‘What did she want?’

  ‘To ask me to explain something to you.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘You’ve been questioning her husband and making it obvious you believe he’s a murderer.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘Señor Gerrard is an English gentleman.’

  ‘You think that guarantees his innocence?’

  ‘In hi
s case, yes.’

  ‘Preferring logic to fantasy, I believe that to someone in great financial difficulties, more than two hundred thousand pounds is a very attractive reward for drowning an old woman. And having murdered once, a second murder becomes much easier.’

  ‘That’s to ignore the standards by which a man like him lives.’

  ‘I begin to understand ever more clearly the many reasons you have never gained promotion.’

  Salas phoned as Alvarez was about to leave the office to return home. ‘Until the hearing into your conduct, you are suspended from duty. The director-general will appoint a superior chief from the Cuerpo and a colonel from the Guardia to be adjudicators. You are entitled to be represented by an abogado or a notario, should you imagine the expense incurred could prove to be justified.’ He rang off.

  Twenty-Two

  JAIME HURRIED INTO THE DINING-ROOM AND SAT ON THE OPPOSITE side of the table to Alvarez. He picked up the bottle of wine and filled a glass. ‘You look like you’ve lost the winning lottery ticket.’

  ‘I’m to be given the date for the hearing.’

  ‘What hearing?’

  ‘I told you about it on Tuesday.’

  ‘Can’t remember.’

  ‘I’m suspended from duty.’

  ‘Some people get all the luck.’

  Some people lacked any sense of compassion. Alvarez drank. Alcohol might be a false comforter, but false comfort could be preferable to true discomfort.

  Jaime looked at the bead curtain over the kitchen doorway. ‘It’s quiet in there. Isn’t she back yet?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then lunch is likely to be late.’

  Alvarez was silent.

  ‘You’re a bundle of joy! What’s the real problem? That young bit of foreign goods you’re after is still running too fast for you?’

  ‘Can’t you understand . . . No, I don’t suppose you can.’

  ‘Talking about women, guess who we met in the supermarket when I had to carry what Dolores bought. Damned if I know why. Some of the things she wanted were heavy, but it’s not far to where the cars are parked.’

  Alvarez drained his glass, refilled it.

  ‘The Ortegas. By God, Benito’s talking big these days! To listen to him, you’d think he’d bought the whole island. And I can remember when he couldn’t rattle two pesetas together. I’ll tell you what’s the first thing I’d do if I had the money he says he does – I’d trade in Luisa. Married to her, a separate bedroom’s a luxury. And Eva’s a carbon copy of her mother.’ He drank. ‘We’ve got you to blame.’

  ‘Have you?’

  ‘She invited them all to a meal because she reckons Eva can’t hope to marry into a good family, not with her looks and manner, so she’ll have to make do with anyone who’ll ask and you’re going to do the asking.’

  ‘Like hell I am!’

  ‘Are you forgetting Manuel? He said he’d never bother to get married because the tourists provided all any man could want, but his mother demanded a grandson and in no time he was married to Magdalena. He still doesn’t seem to know how that happened. I reckon women are witches.’

  ‘Then I’d better eat a lot more garlic.’

  Isabel and Juan were with friends, so supper was quieter than usual and not much was said before Dolores served Coca de nata.

  She gave herself a small portion, picked up spoon and fork, but did not immediately eat. ‘Is it all right?’

  Since they were unable to judge what mood she was in, both Alvarez and Jaime hastened to assure her that it was the most delicious coca they had ever eaten.

  ‘My mother was a better cook than me, but she used to say I could make a better Coca de nata than she could,’ Dolores observed.

  ‘You’re wrong and she was right,’ Alvarez said.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Your mother could not have been a better cook and no one could produce a better coca than this.’

  There is no need to exaggerate,’ she said approvingly. ‘I think this is what I will serve on Monday.’ She turned to Alvarez. ‘We met the Ortegas and they are coming to lunch, so make sure you are here.’

  ‘I’m not certain I can be.’

  ‘I am. They will eat nothing but the best, yet even so perhaps they will enjoy my Llengua amb taperes.’ She was annoyed when neither of them claimed there could not be the slightest doubt. ‘We must serve a good wine. Jaime, you will buy two bottles – perhaps three would be better; Benito has the look of a man who enjoys the table.’

  ‘I suppose nothing less than hundred-euro bottles will be good enough?’

  ‘As my mother had reason to remark, “A man will often try to conceal his emptiness with stupidity.” ’

  ‘You said you wanted good wine.’

  ‘If I even once receive what I want, I will become a fortunate woman. Enrique, you will wear a suit when they are here.’

  ‘In this heat?’

  ‘Whatever the temperature. When one entertains important guests, one does not dishonour them by appearing like a tramp.’

  ‘What if one doesn’t mind if one dishonours them?’

  ‘You will wear a suit.’

  Alvarez leaned over and opened the right-hand door of the sideboard, brought out a bottle of Soberano. He poured himself a drink, passed the bottle across to Jaime, who made certain her gaze was not fixed on him as he helped himself.

  ‘Son Estar is a very noble possessio,’ she remarked.

  ‘I’ve been told by more than one person that the soil’s very poor,’ Alvarez said.

  ‘Many opinions are expressed by people who know nothing of what they talk about.’

  ‘One of the men who told me was working there right up until the place was sold.’

  ‘Disposessed tenants make poor judges.’

  ‘The house is in bad shape.’

  ‘Money will turn it into a palace.’

  ‘Water might become a problem with the drop in the water-table.’

  ‘New wells can be bored.’

  ‘Only with permission.’

  ‘The owner of Son Estar will never be refused permission.’ Alvarez gave up trying to denigrate the attractions of the estate.

  ‘Benito and Luisa are naturally very fond of Eva.’ Dolores observed, ‘and they will make certain that when they die, the government will not be able to steal a peseta. Eva will inherit everything. The man who marries her will be rich indeed.’

  ‘And paying for every crumb she lets drop,’ Alvarez muttered, forgetting how keen her hearing could be.

  ‘You are suggesting?’

  ‘From all accounts, she’s already much like her mother.’

  ‘Fortunate is the daughter who resembles her mother and not her father.’

  ‘Except when the mother has the looks of a Gorgon and the warmth of an Arctic wind.’

  ‘Men!’ she said, so sharply they started.

  ‘You have to admit . . .’ Alvarez began.

  ‘I will tell you what I have to admit. The shame I endure because my cousin cannot believe he is no longer young and handsome and the women, half his age, whom he lusts after conceal their smiles of contempt at his approach.’ She stood. ‘I have a headache so you will clear the table and if you want coffee, you will make it for yourselves. Jaime, you can put that bottle of coñac back.’ She watched him return it to the sideboard before she made her way upstairs.

  Jaime faced Alvarez. ‘You’re so selfish, you’re determined to ruin everybody’s life.’

  For once, Alvarez found difficulty in falling asleep, because he could not escape mental pictures of his being married to Eva Ortega and suffering the humiliation which visited men whose wives were much richer than they; a humiliation which must become all the more vivid when Luisa was one’s mother-in-law. He could, of course, show independence by refusing to turn up at the forthcoming meal. But that would anger Dolores, which would ensure that for days, even weeks, meals would be poor.

  Ironically, when he did muffle those fe
ars, distress remained because he remembered his promise to help Laura Gerrard, made because he could not bear to see her suffering so much. How could he have given such a promise when he knew he was forbidden to make any further enquiries and soon was to appear before a tribunal, charged with incompetence, insolence, and anything else Salas could think up?

  Mercifully, increasing tiredness eventually dimmed his panicky fears and self-reproach, but it was then, about to fall asleep, he was suddenly jerked wide awake by inspiration – there was a way of escaping both a fate worse than death and honouring an impossible promise.

  Twenty-Three

  ALVAREZ AND JAIME WERE ENJOYING THEIR PRE-LUNCH DRINKS, Dolores was laying the table, when the phone rang. She put down the cutlery in her hand, straightened up. ‘Does it occur to either of you to answer that? Does a piglet look forward to Christmas?’ She hurried out.

  Jaime accepted the opportunity to refill his glass.

  She returned. ‘The superior chief wants to talk to you, Enrique. It was a man who spoke and told me this, not the woman with the manners of the superior chief. Has she been sacked?’

  ‘I don’t think so. I expect she needed a relief and one of the cabos is temporarily doing her job.’

  He hurried through to the front room and raised his voice as he said over the phone: ‘Alvarez speaking, Señor.’

  ‘And this is the director-general who’s awarding you crossed turnips for being a lying bastard.’

  ‘But Señor, I don’t think I can,’ he said, speaking still more loudly.

  ‘And I’m dead certain you can’t.’

  ‘It’s just that I have a very important personal matter.’

  ‘Let’s have her name so I can warn her what kind of an s.o.b. you are.’

  ‘Of course I understand personal matters cannot be allowed to interfere with work.’

  ‘You mean, you don’t allow work to interfere with your personal matters.’

  ‘I wouldn’t dream of disobeying an order, Señor.’

  ‘Or consider obeying one.’

  ‘Yes, Señor, I understand.’

  ‘That you owe me a slap-up meal at Bona Cepa for this.’ He returned to the dining-room and sat. He tried to look thoroughly downcast.