“The Mayakovsky reader,” she said, recovering.
Gonzalo nodded. And suddenly he was hit by the amazing resemblance between Tania and the old woman. All it took was a little imagination to see that in thirty or forty years’ time, Tania would look identical. The woman’s daughter, maybe? Granddaughter?
“My secretary gave me your card,” he said awkwardly, by way of greeting.
After seeing the parking garage security tape, Gonzalo had wondered how to broach this meeting, what to say, what to do. He’d gone over it meticulously in his mind, but one thing that had not occurred to him was that he’d feel like a nervous teenager, swallowing repeatedly, nor did he picture himself standing there stupidly, her business card in his trembling fingers.
“I can see that,” Tania said, glancing down at it with a bored look. She’d been smoking; the smell of tobacco lingered. Maybe she’d had a drink as well, not a big one, but something strong. Her eyes were a bit red. Or perhaps she was just exhausted, or sleepy, or something had made her cry not long ago. She stroked her butterfly tattoo and flexed her neck gently, as though to loosen tight muscles. The elegant way she moved her ring-covered fingers only increased the similarities he now saw with the old woman downstairs.
“Did you want a photo shoot?” Her tone presumed the opposite. Not even I could do much to improve that suit and haircut, she seemed to imply.
“Actually,” Gonzalo fumbled, “I was hoping we could talk about what happened in the garage the day I was attacked. First of all, I suppose I should thank you.”
Tania frowned, creasing her perfectly shaped brows and grimacing as though she’d pricked herself with a pin.
“And then I’d like to ask why you left before the police arrived.”
Tania’s eyes remained fixed on the floor. She didn’t look surprised. It was as if she’d taken for granted that his visit was inevitable, or as though she’d wanted him to come but not quite yet, before she was ready. She clucked her tongue and then looked up expectantly at Gonzalo.
“I could do with a beer, couldn’t you?”
There were almost no customers in Bar Flight. It was a small place, below street level, its redbrick walls the same as those of the Roman wall in the Casco Antiguo. Overhead spotlights illuminated some sections and left other areas of darkness behind the historic columns, which the bar’s designer had been obliged not to touch. Gonzalo was struck by the framed Russian newspaper clippings dating from the Second World War and the photos of heroes and soldiers hanging all over. Some were anonymous battlefield scenes, airfields, pieces of artillery with smiling gunners, pilots with their arms around smiling girls; others were famous colonels and generals from the Red Army. There was also a large oil painting of Stalin in his marshal’s uniform. The contrast between that, the modern furniture, and the small stage at the back created a contradictory but agreeable effect.
Tania didn’t have to order. The owner walked over with two beers and a little saucer of potato chips. He was an old man, in his eighties, but he still had a sort of youthful rosy-cheeked expression and lively blue eyes that twinkled kindly. He kissed Tania warmly on both cheeks and stared at Gonzalo for a moment before flashing him a brief smile.
“Having a bad day?” he asked, pointing to the faded bruises on his face. His accent was thick, the words rolling in his mouth before fighting their way out in guttural Spanish.
“No worse than others,” Gonzalo replied curtly.
Tania and the old man exchanged glances. She shrugged, and the man walked off with a rag over his shoulder.
“He was just trying to be nice,” she scolded.
The man’s skin gave off a sour smell, like rancid lard, though it was nothing to do with his hygiene.
“I apologize…Why does he smell like that?”
Tania smiled. In time she’d learned to put up with the smell without turning her face away.
“Fear.”
Gonzalo gave her a blank look.
“He spent years in prison camps. He fought against Hitler’s troops when they invaded Belarus, and fell prisoner in the first war offensive; they deported him to a camp near Warsaw, and when the Red Army liberated the camp in 1945 he was found guilty of treason and sent to a gulag in Siberia. According to the Russian authorities, he hadn’t fought hard enough. The fact that he was alive was irrefutable proof of his cowardice. He spent eleven years in Siberia, and he’s smelled like that ever since. Like fear. Terror. It got into his skin and he’s still sweating it out.”
“So what’s with all the Red Army décor? And the portrait of Stalin? Shouldn’t he detest all that?”
Tania glanced affectionately at the old man serving a couple of men at the bar. Maybe life had dealt him a few bad hands, but he made up for it with a good-natured, ear-to-ear smile and immaculate dress. He had the instinctive kindliness of those who chose to see the bright side almost as a defense mechanism.
“He needs to believe that everything that happened made sense. He was a political commissar, you know? Even when he was in Siberia he refused to deny his past. It would have been like negating his whole existence. You won’t find a more fervent Communist than Vasili Velichko, I can assure you of that.”
“How do you know him?”
“He’s an old friend of my mother’s. The man’s like an uncle to me.”
“Was the old lady at the bookstore your mother?”
Tania gave him a long stare before nodding. Her eyes went straight to his heart, which fluttered and then pounded until she decided to let go.
“I’d be careful about calling her an old lady. She can still smack you around, you know.”
Gonzalo smiled. “I like her bookstore.”
“She’ll be happy to hear that. Especially since you like Mayakovsky. That’s her favorite poet; she taught me to read him,” she added, pointing to a picture above his shoulder.
Gonzalo fixed his gaze on the glassy light illuminating the poet’s photo. It was a half-body shot of Mayakovsky shortly before he shot himself in the head, leaving his last poem unfinished. Gonzalo was moved, a shiver ran down his spine. He pictured Laura sitting on the kitchen floor with an open book, reciting the man’s verses in Russian as their mother looked on, ready to jump in if she made a mistake.
The memory brought him back to his reason for being there.
“Why did you leave without waiting for the police to arrive?” he asked, returning to the subject of the tape.
Tania clucked her tongue. Gonzalo watched her fidget, peeling the label off her beer bottle.
“So you’re the type who always looks for some ulterior motive in people’s actions,” she concluded. Her eyes, however, looked hopeful.
“I’ve seen the tape. All the way through. The entire sequence.”
“You’re lucky I just happened to be picking up my car right at that moment,” she claimed.
Gonzalo continued to gaze at her, wondering what it was that made some people more attractive than others. Maybe it was their skin, maybe it was chemistry—and yet Tania hadn’t touched him, hadn’t even brushed against him, and his body was charged with electricity. In the past he’d occasionally fantasized about a client, or a waitress, an actress, there was even a neighbor he often used to bump into at the newsstand in the mornings—but those were all passing fancies and he’d never seriously considered cheating on Lola. None of those women had awakened anything real in him, a concrete desire to make something happen. Maybe he’d been waiting to find one who wouldn’t fill him with doubt and regret. And here she was right in front of him, feeding him lies without batting an eyelid.
“You’d been there for some time. I rewound the tape and saw you arrive.”
Tania processed this information calmly, unruffled. She should have foreseen the fact that the garage would have a security camera, but she hadn’t. In part, Gonzalo felt relieved at that.
“I don’t know if it’s in your best interest to pursue this conversation,” she said, recalling her mother’s warning.
“Let me be the one to decide that.”
Tania shrugged. “I’d been curious about you since the day we met on the balcony. I liked your comment about Mayakovsky and the faraway look you had, gazing out at the street. When I went down to the garage I recognized your SUV and suddenly had the urge to see your stuff. People’s cars say things about them, they leave things inside them: books, CDs, spare change in the ashtray, a pack of cigarettes under the driver’s seat.”
Gonzalo wondered what kind of message his things were sending about him, how Tania saw him. She wasn’t planning to tell him, clearly, and for now, he decided not to ask how she’d even known he drove an SUV.
“When Atxaga attacked me, I had a computer bag with a laptop on me, or maybe I’d just left it in the car, I can’t remember. Either way, that computer is really important and now it’s gone. When the police arrived it had already disappeared.”
Tania finished her beer and debated whether to order another or bring the conversation to a close. The butterfly wings on her neck seemed primed for a leisurely takeoff. Gonzalo got the feeling she was watching him with the same bemusement as her mother, as if she were somehow laughing at him.
“You know, some people might say I saved your life, and here you are accusing me of being a thief. Nice display of gratitude. If you’ve seen the tape, you already have your answer.”
Gonzalo had, of course, studied every frame, searching obsessively for the laptop. After Atxaga had taken off, she’d tried to help him, covering his wound with one hand and using the other to make a phone call. She’d stayed by his side until the flashing lights of the ambulance came into view. And then she’d quietly slipped off. But most of the images were blurry, and from the angle at which they were taken, some of the attack was either partially obscured or off camera.
“No, no. I’m not accusing you of anything, definitely not. I was just wondering if you saw anyone else there.”
Tania half closed her eyes, and Gonzalo thought it was like the sun setting on the horizon. Then, out of the blue, she stood. “It’s late and I’ve got things to do.”
Gonzalo got up, too. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”
She gave him an almost apologetic smile. Tania had a theory: Some people found themselves in places they didn’t belong, as if they’d accidentally ended up in lives that weren’t theirs. Gonzalo struck her as one of those people. He tried to walk her out, but she told him she didn’t really go in for chivalrous gestures.
“Stay and finish your beer.”
Gonzalo watched her leave, hair tousled, head held high, body swaying naturally beneath her clothes as though it was not in her nature to be constricted. He was certain that Tania was lying to him, or at least not telling him the whole truth. And what’s more, he didn’t care. He just wanted to see her again.
It took Gonzalo a minute to realize that the owner of the bar was staring at him.
Everything was in order—visas, local guide, hotels, tours. Taking a group of twelve tourists on a twenty-five-day trip through three countries in Africa required painstaking organization, but Carlos had done a good job. He felt satisfied and Lola eyed him discreetly as he pointed out possible itineraries on a map he’d spread on a table at the travel agency. His chiseled face lit up as he described possible tourist attractions in great detail. With a touch of malice, Lola thought that he himself would be one of those attractions for some female on the tour. It wasn’t hard to picture.
“You’ve done a magnificent job,” she said, touching his shoulder and leaving her hand there a second longer than necessary, aroused by the scene she’d just envisioned. Carlos gave her a penetrating look. So much so that she took her hand away, slightly embarrassed.
What are you playing at? she asked herself. Her life was a mess, and here she was flirting with some kid just to distract herself from her troubles. And Carlos had already made it quite clear, in more ways than one—meaningful looks, double entendres, undue solicitude—that he was ready to take things farther if she just said the word.
“How are things going at home?” he asked, voice full of concern he didn’t feel.
Lola, stupidly, had unburdened herself to him and now felt uncomfortable with him asking about it. She’d fallen into the well of self-pity and felt victimized, something she hated in other women. Sleeping with a new man the moment yours walks out the door was a game for younger women, unbecoming of someone her age, and besides, she wasn’t like that, she told herself angrily. Lola didn’t need some kid to console her, didn’t need his sympathy. Sure, she had problems, but she’d solve them, end of story. And yet Carlos had asked her to lunch to finalize details on the trip, and without even realizing it, over dessert she cried and complained bitterly about her life, enumerating the real and invented affronts she’d been forced to endure during the course of her marriage. And Carlos held her hand, willing and attentive.
“They’re fine, thanks for asking.”
Her clipped tone sent a message so at odds with the hand she’d left on his shoulder that Carlos was disconcerted, didn’t know where he stood in the tug-of-war going on inside Lola. He opted for a prudent retreat. He could be patient.
“If you need anything, you know you can count on me.”
Lola barely acknowledged the offer. She had been wavering, but she had to put an end to this right now. The last thing she needed was to get between this kid’s sheets.
“How are things with Javier?” she asked. It was a desperate shot. Mentioning her son was a way of bringing things back down to an appropriate realm, and of reminding them both who was who.
Carlos’s expression darkened, taking the hint. He began carefully folding the map.
“We haven’t seen much of each other lately.”
“Do you know if he has a girlfriend?”
He scoffed inwardly. “Not as far as I know. Why do you ask?”
“He’s been very distracted lately, head in the clouds. And he keeps asking me for lots of money. I thought maybe it was for dinners, drinks, hotels…”
Javier had become something of an obstacle for Carlos. His little scenes and jealousy were getting old. It was no longer worth the hassle. Carlos had another target in mind now.
“We’re friends; I hope you’re not trying to turn me into your confidant. I don’t think it would be fair of me to tell my friend’s mother what he’s up to.”
Lola tucked her hair behind her ear, slightly embarrassed, and realized that her tone had wounded Carlos’s pride.
“No, of course not. It’s just that Javier is very quiet, and I’m sure he’d turn to you before coming to me if he had a problem.”
“If that were the case, I’d let you know, don’t worry.”
Lola nodded. The charged atmosphere of a few minutes earlier had vanished, and although part of her was relieved, another part felt let down.
That morning she’d arranged to meet Gonzalo for lunch. She’d called him at the office and spoken to Luisa, his assistant. Lola had never liked the woman, whom she found slightly foulmouthed and verging on the disrespectful.
“I’ll give him the message. He’s meeting with a client right now.”
That wasn’t true. Despite the newly painted sign and fresh geraniums on the balcony, day after day things were looking grimmer. The hours passed in silence, and though Gonzalo seemed very busy with his own investigation, Louisa herself had started looking for other jobs and sending out résumés.
Gonzalo couldn’t blame her. In a few weeks he would run out of savings, and then they’d have to close the firm. Over the past few days his father-in-law had made a few attempts at reconciliation, tried to get him to change his mind. The old man was willing to loosen the noose with which he was strangling Gonzalo; all he had to do was step back, reconsider
. There was no need to see it as defeat; it would be a smart move: Wise men reconsider. But wisdom wasn’t one of Gonzalo Gil’s fortes.
It was in this hostile, contradictory frame of mind that Gonzalo sat down for lunch with Lola. They’d been apart only a few days but the distance between them was huge. They struggled to look each other in the face, or to find anything to talk about beyond the kids, and therefore exchanged rote questions and pat answers. Too many things were swirling around in each of their heads, and although it was woefully apparent to both of them, neither brought them up, which served only to hinder any honest attempt to resolve their issues.
“This weekend my father wants to take Javier and Patricia to the house in Cáceres. I thought I might take advantage of it, take a little break. We could go away someplace, get a room at that little hotel in S’Agaró.”
Gonzalo wasn’t even listening. His attention was focused on the man sitting at one of the tables in the back. He’d come in with Lola and then discreetly withdrawn, but hadn’t taken his eyes off the door. It was one of Alcázar’s men that Agustín had hired to protect his family. It made Gonzalo feel a bit better to know that at least his family was safe. Gonzalo’s own protection had been removed the moment he left the hospital. From time to time, Alcázar stopped by to see him, updated him on the search for Atxaga (zero progress), and asked about him, though not too much. The truth was, the inspector came around only to feel him out about the Matryoshka business, to try to wheedle information from him. Ever since their last conversation, when Gonzalo had said he had cause to reopen Laura’s case, the inspector had been uneasy. Gonzalo suspected that the man’s attempts to find Atxaga would be stepped up considerably the moment he agreed to cooperate.
“How has it come to this?” he murmured with a sideways glance at the bodyguard.
An hour later, Gonzalo was back at his rental still wondering the same thing, unable to make sense of what had happened after he’d sent those words into space like a probe in search of life. Lola had grasped his hand tightly, repeating what she’d said a few weeks earlier: They could start over; they had two incredible kids; they still loved each other. She loved him, she stressed desperately. And it was that precise moment—the way she’d squeezed his fingers as he contemplated her bright-red nails—that Gonzalo knew he simply couldn’t carry on with the charade anymore. He pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and lit one. For a few seconds he watched the match burn between his fingers. Then he looked up and saw Lola’s face crumble, saw her increasing distress.
A Million Drops Page 29