When he reached Félix's cage, he counted to three before turning the handle on the metal gate. It was open, to his surprise. A shrill screech accompanied the movement until the piece completed an angle of ninety degrees. The door gave way.
What Salas saw then impacted him. He held his breath and managed to contain the shock. On the wall at the bottom of the cage, the impression between opacity, the monster was anchored to the stone by thick metal chains that supported his four extremities. Around him, in the shadows, he could see spots of urine and excrement. The smell of the room reminded him of a sewer, but multiplied. The prisoner maintained a docile attitude, however.
What the hell is this? The old doctor asked, dumbfounded. Why would they keep this being in such unclean conditions? He decided that he would speak very seriously later on with Grau. He took a couple of steps forward into the cage. Félix looked up and crossed his Martian eyes with his. They were submissive, like those of an abandoned dog who has become accustomed to being beaten.
"The incomplete protects the iron tube," he muttered.
“Hi, Félix.” Rafael's voice had compassion. “The old cheat has come to help you.”
"The incomplete hates the old senile cheater, don’t you, Félix? Don’t you hate him?”
The old man tugged the flap on his robe and knelt a meter from the chimpanzee man. He was grateful for the new stance, for his legs had begun to tremble. Her expression tightened.
"Who hates me, Félix?" He asked. “Do you hate me?”
The caged man responded with a sinister shriek that could be interpreted as a laugh.
"Félix doesn’t hate the old senile cheater," he mumbled through gurgles. “The incomplete does!”
Doctor Salas put his hand on his forehead and tried to find the solution to the new riddle. Who was that incomplete who hated him so much? The answer came to him like a shooting star.
“Well of course!” He exclaimed euphorically. “Incomplete is Charley Rubial! The fucking ballsy amputee!”
The misshapen man screamed sharply as he nodded. He was smiling.
"And tell me, Félix, what do you know of the incomplete?" He wanted to know, now fiercely.
"Old friend," came the brief reply.
"Are you from Ámber?"
The patient nodded again, showing his amorphous teeth. Salas thought that all he needed was to growl like a monkey. He stroked the syringe with his hand, inside the pocket of his robe.
"That's why you knew me then.” The old neurosurgeon was now talking in the air, self-absorbed. “Charley told you I was a cheater and a madman, right?”
“Incomplete very good with Félix,” was all he detailed.
A very subtle sound came to Salas from the corridor. A few minutes ago he had been aware that he was being spied on. However, he didn’t give any importance to it and continued with the game of riddles.
"Tell me, Félix, has it been a long time since you’ve seen the incomplete?"
“Since he hit the guy who spoke weird. The old senile cheater asks some very boring questions to Félix,” he told him.
"Who's the weird guy?" Salas was so intrigued that he had absolutely forgotten everything else. He did not think to leave without obtaining information from that monster. “Why did the amputee hit him?”
"A thrashing close to death."
The old man snorted.
"Yes, Félix. Why did the incomplete man beat the man who spoke weirdly?
"I don’t know," said Félix, very dry. Then an innocent revelation: “maybe by his accent.” And then, another: “Or because he lived on an island...” He finished the sentence in such a way that the person in the hallway spying on the conversation ran away immediately: “Police! The incomplete hated the cop who spoke weird!”
Rafael pursed his lips, ignorant of what Félix had decided to tell him about Charley. He didn’t know any policemen with an accent to which the bastard amputee wanted to smash his face, although in truth, Charley never needed a reason to fuck up somebody's life.
A progression of steadily vanishing steps was heard from within, which meant that the spy had decided to leave his post behind the door. Salas, therefore, was once again alone with the chimpanzee. He stood up and took the syringe from his pocket, which he carefully filled with the transparent liquid he had borrowed a few minutes ago. The sick eyes of Félix stuck to the needle, and at that moment he began to howl. The chains clanged aggressively at the patient's helpless gait and the wall rumbled. The creature was terrified, but Salas, determined as he was, grabbed the syringe like a chisel, raised his hand over his shoulder to gain momentum, and stuck the needle hard. The instrument was embedded in the monster's triceps, and when the doctor pressed the syringe to inject the medication, a thread of blood began to sprout from the perforated arm. Félix turned his head and the old man saw in him the look of utter bewilderment.
A second passed until the patient again called for help with his irritating timbre. The roar was heard throughout the building, and was more like a wild animal than a human being.
"This will help you to improve, Félix," Rafael promised in a strange whisper that no one heard.
Very cool and calculating, knowing that the screams would attract a whole legion of doctors and nurses, Rafael Salas turned on his heel, threw the syringe to the ground, and left the hole. When he had already traveled enough meters not to perceive the smell of Félix, he heard a series of voices that came closer to his position. Then they stopped, and he did the same. He sharpened his ear and listened:
"Félix! Who cut you?” Said a voice.
"... cut..." replied the deformed man with his peculiar defect of aphonic.
"Have you cut yourself?"
“C... cut just... alone.”
“It's very strange. You don’t have access to knives or razors here, they are forbidden. And it’s not possible that you did this wound with your hands or teeth.”
"Hands or teeth..." echoed the ape-man.
Rafael shook his head, blinked repeatedly, and resumed his flight. He didn’t stop until he went outside. In the garden under an oak, Saul Morgan was waiting for him to begin what was to end up being an interesting interview.
Rodolfo Grau paced the corridors of the psychiatric center with a halting breath. He didn’t pay attention to the clamoring noise that was being focused in the zone of the cages for maximum security; he decided that later he would ask what happened. He went into his office and dialed a phone number as he loosened the collar of his shirt.
"José Miguel, today is your lucky day," he said as soon as he heard the other side of the communication.
"Grau?" Said the tired voice of Judge Callejo. “Do you have anything?
"I have a lot," the director said bluntly, as if the words were crowding in his mouth anxious to be pronounced. “I left Félix's cell open and Salas has taken the bait. At last they had time to talk about their things.”
"Mother of God!” Callejo spoke in whispers. “Any good?”
For the next quarter of an hour, Dr. Rodolfo Grau was describing to his new confidant, Judge José Miguel Callejo, the singular conversation between Rafael and Félix. He didn’t omit any details of the riddles. When he finished, there was such a long silence that Grau thought the call had been cut off. The judge was the first to speak again:
"Answer a question: how did you know Salas was going to look for, find and have a conversation with Félix?"
The answer fell like the first thunder of a storm:
"I forbade it. There is no greater attraction than the forbidden, Callejo.”
As soon as he finished the telephone conversation, and without actually getting off the handset, the judge checked the call history on his telephone and pressed the return key when the cursor stopped on the English police number.
"I want to talk to the police officer Thomas Carroll," he said.
"I'm Carroll.” A pause. “Mr. Callejo, is that you?”
"Agent, I need you to put me through right now with your partn
er Alfred Horner.” As he spoke, he thought he should also call Julian Barreneche to let him know the news of the case. He hated talking to that idiot, but he couldn’t leave him out. The Anglo-Saxon voice of the Oxford cop removed the grotesque figure of Barreneche from his mind.
"Alfred is on leave, he took a few days off. Why? Something new?”
José Miguel Callejo pushed the receiver away from his face and struck a mad thump on the table with the palm of his hand. "Shit!" He mumbled.
“Sir?” Carroll's voice came robotic through the speaker.
"Agent Carroll, we need to find your partner," he said ruthlessly, trying to make his words sound like an order. “It’s urgent.”
Snowflake waited for Alfred's voicemail to cut off the call he made.
"Shit, he doesn’t answer," he cursed under his breath.
The whole thing smelled rotten. Why on earth had the last call from the judge come? It was obvious that something had happened in Spain that had precipitated the investigation, but what was so urgent, Fred? Did he have any relevant information that he was hiding? In the depths of his being, Carroll knew that Alfred was absolutely capable of anything. Therefore, he assumed, it could be plausible that the police of a small town in Spain saw in him the key to solve the mystery that was driving them all crazy.
He dedicated to the world an expletive, took his jacket and left the police station.
A few minutes later he was in the Kidlington neighborhood ringing the doorbell to Alfred's house. The neighborhood was quiet, like most are in Oxford. There it was customary to ride a bicycle, so Thomas found a parking space right in the door, behind a red Mini Cooper. Horner lived in a small terraced house of a height that peeked after an unattended front garden. The curtains of the windows overlooking the road were drawn, and there was no trace of life inside. He insisted on calling a second time. No one answered.
Carroll issued his second expletive in the morning, this time with a hint of concern. After a few minutes of waiting, he returned to the car and started. As he circled the streets of Kidlington, he dialed Judge Callejo's international number on his cell phone.
"I can’t find Horner," he said with a horrible foreboding. If Fred had decided to take any steps, he would have told him first. Had something happened to him?
"We can’t afford to waste any more time, Officer," the judge said caustically. “I want you to travel to Torrelavega right now and meet me.”
The offer, if it was, fell to Thomas like a jug of ice water.
"Have I understood you correctly? You want me to catch a plane now and meet you at your place of work?”
"You understood me, Agent. In fact, we are already taking too long. I am going to hang up. I’ll wait for you in my office. Bye.”
The Bluetooth of Snowflake’s car began to emit tones periodically, which meant that the judge had hung up. Gently, he stopped the car at a gas station and stared at the dashboard, self-absorbed. Was he facing the most surreal situation of his career? He peered through the inside rearview mirror. He was paler than usual; his albino expression resembled that of an alien. He put the phone in his pocket and swallowed. He resumed his drive and adjusted his mind as soon as he could. He dialed the address of the Heathrow airport.
The afternoon was beginning to fall when he got out of the taxi without luggage. The building of Torrelavega’s courthouse gave the impression of being an old hostel that had just been reformed inside. Erected next to a central square, the reddish stone of the facade was blackened by half a century of rain and humidity. The interior was equally bland, for the contrary reason. The renovation had dyed the walls a nuclear white that almost glowed with the fluorescent lights of the ceiling. Carroll walked over to the security booth, where a big, orange-haired, large-mouthed man asked him to identify himself. A metal plaque on which Toño had been carved hung from his uniform at the level of his chest.
"I'm Thomas Carroll. I have an appointment with Judge José Miguel Callejo.”
Someone exclaimed something on the other side of the safety latches before Toño could check Thomas's appointment.
"Agent Carroll! Incredible, authentic English punctuality!”
The emphatic reception came from a middle-aged man with leafy, pale furry hair whose boring physical description did not match his enthusiasm. Everything about him seemed artificial. He gestured to Toño and the redhead opened one of the locks.
"You are Judge Callejo, I suppose," said Carroll, as he was led through such bare corridors as his companion's suit.
"No, no, I'm Dr. Rodolfo Grau," he said. “Excuse my awkwardness for not introducing myself. José Miguel will be here soon.”
They entered a conference room without windows. Carroll was a bit claustrophobic, and he hated the windowless spaces. What need was there to set up a meeting room on an underground floor?
Three table seats were reserved. There were jackets hanging on the backs of two of them, and Thomas guessed that the third place would be for him. He took off his jacket and placed it on the back of the chair he'd been assigned. Dr. Grau went straight to the coffeepot in the corner.
"Do you want coffee or tea while we wait?" He offered.
"A coffee, thank you."
“Wow this really is good! A Brit who drinks coffee,” he teased. “Are you for football or tennis?”
"Football, I suppose.”
“I knew it! I've always thought tea drinkers are more for playing tennis, don’t you think?”
Carroll shrugged and looked away. He had no intention of wasting his time thinking about that stupidity.
"Excuse me, I assume you are a doctor?" Carroll's disorientation kept growing. What did a doctor do in a secret police investigation?
"I am, in fact, the director of Ámber's psychiatric center," the doctor said with a hint of arrogance in his eyes. “I am collaborating with the judge in this case.”
But what exactly was the case? Thomas decided to be cautious and find out as he went.
The door opened and a serious man with glasses entered, diligent but cheerful. He was very cordial as Judge José Miguel Callejo. Then, the three men took their respective seats around the end of the table.
"You may wonder what you’re doing here." The judge had started the meeting most importantly.
Truth be told, Thomas had been thinking round and round for most of the flight. The unexpected disappearance of Alfred bothered him. He wished he were at his side at that moment, defending the investigation and facing the two men in front of him. He felt alone and out of place in a strange city. He hadn’t even had time to take a shower, for the taxi had left him directly at the door of the courthouse. He looked up and faced the two pairs of eyes. He had no idea how he was going to focus the conversation. He chose to respond by answering question by question and seeing where the meeting was taking him.
"I'm here for the Lennard case," he said, almost convinced.
"Not exactly," the judge contradicted him. Grau, on the other hand, watched him with the unmistakable smile of the owner of fireworks that are beginning to burn. All he had to do was rub his hands together.
Carroll drew a wrinkle between his eyebrows.
"I'll start at the beginning." He leaned his forearms on the table and touched his fingertips in the shape of a bell. “A few days ago, Dr. Rafael Salas, an old neurosurgeon of the region, entered the psychiatric center that is directed by the man who is sitting next to me.” Rodolfo Grau nodded, as if the judge's reference had not been perfectly clear. “There he met Félix.” The telephone in the meeting room began to ring, and Callejo stopped his speech to pay attention to the screen of the device.
"Okay, it's Julián Barreneche, the cop who carries some of my cases. I told him to join the meeting,” he said, as the phone continued to ring. He pressed two keys and went to the speaker.
"Julian, you're on speaker." Dr. Grau, from the psychiatric center, and ICD agent Thomas Carroll are with me,” he explained, his voice slightly high. “We just started.”
; "All right," said an arid voice from the device.
"As you said, Salas got to know Félix in the center," continued the judge. “To give you an idea, this Félix is like a mix between the monster Frankenstein and an abandoned dog. This is certainly the most serious patient Grau has right now.” Carroll saw that the director of the center was nodding with a somewhat feigned rawness. “Well, as we have known, Félix maintained some kind of friendly relationship with Charley Rubial in the past.”
Carroll held up his hand.
"Wait a second," he said. “Charley Rubial is Lennard's twin brother, right? He’s the sentimental couple of Grifero, your main suspect. Am I wrong?”
Thomas knew, by the way the two men who shared a table with him, looked at each other, that they had thoroughly done their job.
"Yes, exactly," said Callejo, who seemed to not mind his interruptions as long as they gave light to his explanation. “We have known for days that Alyssa Grifero and Charley were more than friends, until he committed suicide. Since that fateful October 12th, Julian's team has been tracking the girl.”
The arid voice of the speaker participated for the first time:
“Effectively, the kid who works for me has been looking for her all over the country for days.”
"Any news of Tena, by the way?" He took advantage of the pause to catch up.
“None. That kid refuses my calls. I'm going to give him his due for incompetence, and then I'll open a file of dismissal.”
The judge glanced at the phone and his jaw tightened. It was obvious that the man on the other side of the speaker was peeing out of the pot. Damn, Callejo took a deep breath a couple of times and continued with the story.
The Butterfly Effect Page 24