‘What an incredible day. We seem to have fed half Buenos Aires.’
‘And the other half brought their dirty plates along too.’
Raúl takes the envelope his boss hands him, squeezes the edges to see how many notes are inside. He puts it away and mutters a thank you that the other man does not even hear, because he has already left the kitchen. Raúl stands up, takes off his apron, and sticks his head under the cold water tap. Then he picks up a clean kitchen cloth to dry off his hair and face. When he emerges red-cheeked from rubbing his face dry, he realizes he is not alone. He recognizes the intruder, and nods to him. Out in the street, the other man invites him to get into a huge stretch Lincoln with tinted windows. The person waiting for him inside the car smells of fresh perfume and has pink, child-like skin. The limousine sets off, and Raúl’s host launches straight in: ‘Let’s get things straight from the start. I know who you are, and you should know who I am. I am Gálvez Jr., Richard Gálvez Aristarain. Do you remember? My father – Robinson, Man Friday. He was killed just a few weeks ago. My father promised to help you find your daughter. As I already told you, I found some references to the search among his papers. They’re interesting. Nothing definite, but interesting. In his notes, my father referred to a conversation in which you talk about a recent painful and surprising revelation. Something that opened your eyes. Was that here in Buenos Aires?’
‘No. In Spain.’
‘Was it that discovery which made you decide to come back to Argentina?’
‘Not exactly. I was already coming back when I found out.’
Gálvez Jr. is curious to hear more, but Raúl says nothing. He sighs.
‘Well, anyway. Cards on the table. From the outset, I suspected my father’s death was related to his attempts to blackmail a good number of my friends and colleagues in what you used to call the oligarchy. We don’t know what to call ourselves. Any suggestions gratefully received. One of the most dangerous people he tried to blackmail was Ostiz. Does the name mean anything to you?’
‘He was one of those who encouraged the military coup.’
‘Almost all the serious money in Argentina encouraged the coup, but as well as that, Ostiz is a very dangerous customer. He likes delving into sewers and getting his hands dirty. I’m certain he killed my father, and then he helped pay for the first stone laid to create a Robinson–Gálvez theme park. No one can remember if there ever was a second.’
‘What has Ostiz got to do with my disappeared daughter?’
‘That I don’t know, but in my father’s notes I came across the following scribble: Raúl’s daughter-Ostiz-Señora Pardieu.’
‘Why are you willing to help me?’
‘I am helping myself. I can’t take on Ostiz directly, but I want to make him pay for my father’s death. We knew who you were, and who Ostiz is, but we know nothing about Señora Pardieu. We’ve been looking into it, and she figures as a single mother who had a daughter in Buenos Aires in 1977. The name given to the daughter was Eugenia, but beyond that, we can’t find any trace of either mother or daughter. It’s a brick wall. With no chinks in it. So we have to go back to Ostiz. Why did my father make him part of the equation? Ostiz was one of the members of the oligarchy who arranged financial support for those who led the repression. That included the adoption of children of the disappeared, so it wouldn’t be too far-fetched to suppose he helped with the single mother Pardieu’s sinful labour. Who better than a single mother to disguise the presence of a military officer or policeman in the affair?’
‘Is there any military officer with the surname Pardieu?’
‘They wouldn’t be so careless.’
Carvalho opens the filing-cabinet drawers. One after another. All empty. He spins round, afraid he has fallen into a trap. He goes to the door and opens it a few centimetres: no one to be seen from where he stands. He slides back into the room. Checks the desks. Nothing interesting in the drawers. He surveys the walls, the furniture, as if he is making a visual inventory. Then pulls a bulky object from beneath his raincoat. It’s a petrol can. He sprinkles a trail across the room, like a signature that curls around the filing cabinets, over the desk and out with him to the staircase. He pours the rest of the can on the stairs. Stands back. Lights a lighter and uses it to set fire to a handful of rolled-up paper. Throws it at the trail of petrol. The fire catches, and snakes quickly up the stairs. Carvalho watches the flames take hold, then leaves the building with controlled haste. As he drives home he sees the flames in front of him, as if they were just beyond his windscreen. He imagines how different people will react. Pascuali. Pascuali’s superiors. You are a pyromaniac, he tells himself. You already were.
The director-general shouts into his telephone. He hangs up and collapses into his chair, on the verge of tearful self-pity. He opens a desk drawer and pulls out his blood pressure apparatus. He is terrified at the figures it offers him. He looks up, and his terror becomes indignation when he sees Pascuali standing there patiently in front of him.
‘Who burnt down the Aleph Club?’
‘Perhaps the firemen could tell you.’
‘The firemen? Balls to that! Here! Read this. Stop playing at being a policeman from some B-movie!’
He throws him a sheet of paper that floats in the air. Pascuali catches it. He reads it impassively, while the director-general says sarcastically: ‘It’s a list of the club members. Two ministers from this government, and God knows how many from every other government we’ve had! Right from the days of Sarmiento and Mitre! You want financiers? Take your pick. To start with, Ostiz himself, a boss of the bosses. He’s the chairman of these lunatics.’
He stands up to impress Pascuali with his size and rank.
‘I want that pyromaniac! I want order! I don’t want to have to lose my temper because you are allowing all this disorder!’
This time it is the director-general who leaves Pascuali with words on the tip of his tongue. He strides down corridors, fending off people wanting to ask him questions, and takes an elevator to the bottom level of the car park. He signals curtly to the two policemen who try to accompany him, and they desist. He opens a heavy iron door. Beyond it lies an art deco-style meeting-room that has suffered from damp and age, and in the middle of it, a smiling Güelmes, who greets him with a warm hug.
‘I wish I could be so cheerful. The Aleph Club has just gone up in flames, and the whole of Buenos Aires wants the head of whoever is responsible.’
‘That’s the Borges Jr. case. Unimportant stuff. You and I are going to continue a conversation from before, Morales, dear Morales. Let’s sit down. We’re going to sit down and relax a little.’
Morales is not sure that he can relax, but does so because a superior is telling him to.
‘Morales: in both the Raúl Tourón case and that of Borges Jr., which is connected to it, as well as in a series of other illegal activities, we find the Captain involved. Do you know who he really is, by the way? Do you know where he lives?’
‘That’s a state secret I don’t have access to.’
‘I know the Captain personally. He has had many names: Lage, Bianchini, Gorostizaga. Now he calls himself Doreste. When I was in his clutches, it was Gorostizaga. I must admit I find it hard to say, especially when you have the tongue and your genitals swollen from the electric prod. Don’t worry, I’m not going to talk about the past, it’s the future that concerns me. We can’t take on people like the Captain face-to-face, but they are getting in our way. They represent powers we no longer need, don’t you agree? We can’t stir up all the shit they are concealing, so we have to use the jujitsu technique. Do you know the rules of jujitsu?’
The director-general shakes his head.
‘They consist in using your opponent’s aggressive intentions to overcome him: his aggression becomes a trap. The Captain imagines he is all-powerful, but he has one weak spot – his relation to Raúl Tourón. It’s
not normal for him to be so obsessed with one person like that. There’s something between them that we don’t know about.’
‘And so...?’
‘I propose setting up a task force to get hold of Raúl Tourón and find out what he knows. Nothing official. Not even Pascuali is to know about it. Once we’ve discovered what Tourón knows, if it is really important and can destroy the Captain, then we release him and let him use it – we’ll stay alert, even help him like Captain Nemo did Ciro Smith in Mystery Island. If he doesn’t know anything, we’ll use the opportunity to hand him over to Pascuali.’
‘What kind of task force?’
‘You’re the one who’s director-general of national security. But don’t worry. The Captain and others like him gave me a few lessons in how to organize that kind of group.’
Alma’s arms are raised. She is gesticulating with her hands as if to underline the point she is making as she sits alone reading through a pile of written exam papers, as if she were talking and arguing with a student hidden somewhere among the sheets.
‘How’s it possible? “Metaphor” spelt with an “f”? And you don’t even know the year Martín Fierro was published! What school did you go to? And you? How can you be so careless? How can you write Curcius and not Curtius? Curtius. It’s Curtius!’
She throws her pen down on to the desk.
‘I’m going to fail half of them. We can’t go on giving degrees to generation after generation of ignoramuses.’
Her door bell rings. She looks up, glances at her watch, then gets up and goes cautiously over to the door. She is about to look through the spyhole when a voice from outside stops her in her tracks and makes her turn round, her face a picture of anguish. She tries to calm herself. Turns back to the door. Opens it. Sees a police badge in an enormous hand thrust in front of her face.
Carvalho is bending over to see how strong the flame is under a stew he is cooking. The door bell rings. He straightens up slowly. Goes over to the cutlery drawer and takes out a gun hidden at the back. He has this in one hand and is about to leave the kitchen, but pauses to taste the stew with a wooden spoon. His face shows a mixture of satisfaction and concern as he steps into the living-room. He crosses it and peers into the spyhole just as the bell rings again impatiently. Through the lens he can make out the distorted images of two policemen. He moves away from the door and gives a weary sigh.
‘Coming.’
‘It’s the police.’
‘At your service.’
Carvalho quickly hides the gun behind the books stacked on a shelf waiting to be burnt. Returns to the front door and opens it. Two policemen are standing there. One of them thrusts a badge in his face.
A patient on the point of death is having to put up with Don Vito recounting his exploits. Don Vito is still swathed in bandages, but by now he is sitting up in a wheelchair and is waving his arms about freely, and his half-uncovered face has got its lively expression back, despite the abundance of cuts and bruises.
‘Forgive me if I insist, but my contribution was vital. The chief inspector – Mendoza – said to me: “Altofini, if it wasn’t for you we’d already be surrounded: that is, done for.” They were so desperate they had been on the point of asking the Rosario police to come to their aid.’
This is too much for the dying man. He sits up, and screams incredulously: ‘Who on earth has ever heard of the Buenos Aires cops asking the Rosario force for help?’
‘It’s easy to tell you’ve only seen cops in the cinema. The Rosario police are very competent. They study things very closely. My mother was from Rosario, and she never missed a trick.’
The other patient lolls back, ready to die, and Don Vito is about to go on with his story when a police badge glints before his eyes. When he looks up, Pascuali is standing there. The two men’s attention is momentarily distracted by the other’s death rattle, especially his very last gasp, which is a gloriously indignant farewell to life.
‘You see? I was the one keeping him going.’
Altofini repeats the story in great detail to Alma and Carvalho when he joins them in the police van. He weeps as he recalls the last words the other man ever heard.
‘He was from Rosario, and I was trying to cheer him up by telling him how good their police force was. I’ve been arrested illegally. I’m sure there’s a law against arresting convalescents.’
In the police station, Carvalho, Alma, Don Vito in his wheelchair, together with two or three of the usual suspects: a prostitute arrested for public disorder, a young couple sitting holding hands and hoping never to have to go home, a psychopath pacing up and down like a caged animal, police officers behaving like shepherds of psychopaths and a world full of suspects.
Students standing around in small groups. Muriel at the centre of the most agitated of them, as if an important decision is about to be taken. Finally one of the group, Alberto, is urged to get up on the platform from where Alma usually gives her classes. He calls for silence.
‘Our lecturer Alma Modotti has been arrested on the ridiculous excuse that she took part in the burning of the Aleph Club. This unacceptable event is a warning there could be further human rights violations and means we must show our solidarity. We have to demand she be set free at once.’
‘What about our exams?’
‘This is no moment for jokes.’
‘Or for scratching our balls either.’
Arguments for and against. The student on the platform and Muriel show their disappointment. Muriel moves her lips as though she is trying to say something, but either she cannot get the words out or they cannot be heard above the general uproar. Her face reflects her frustration through the journey home, and once she is in her room, she sits pressed up against the window waiting for her father to return. Eventually headlights sweep across the front of the house to announce his arrival. Muriel leaves her post at the window, goes out on to the first-floor landing, and bounds down the stairs two at a time to meet him. She hardly even notices her mother dozing in front of the television, a bottle of Grand Marnier next to a hand still clutching a glass. Muriel reaches the front door just as her father and the fat man are about to step in.
‘Papa, I have to go out tonight. But before I do, I need to ask you a favour, something I want with all my heart.’
‘What’s that?’
‘They’ve arrested one of our lecturers. You know who. Alma. Alma Modotti. They’ve invented a stupid charge against her: setting fire to a club. You know a lot of powerful people.’
‘How do you know who I know?’
‘Because I’ve got eyes in my head, and I’m not deaf. I know you’re connected to military goons and to important cops.’
‘That’s all I need: to hear my daughter call me a military goon!’
‘I’m sorry, that’s what we call military people, even if they are our parents. But can you do something for Alma?’
Her mother is still dozing in front of the TV set, the fat man is hovering discreetly in the background and Muriel stands waiting for her father’s verdict. The Captain has sat down carefully on the sofa, and is apparently quite calm, but his hands are tense, and so is the stare he directs towards his daughter.
‘So the young lady would like me to use my influence among military goons, to use the prestige I gained fighting wars, fighting the Malvinas war, to go and see my superiors, however superior they might be, and to tell them: set Señora Alma free at once. Alma what? Ah, yes – Alma Modotti; because she is a literature professor and we all know literature has never done anyone any harm. And all professors are harmless teachers.’
‘I don’t know why you’re being so sarcastic’
‘Excuse me, Captain, but perhaps it’s time for the girl to know what kind of scum it is who manipulate things at the university’
The Captain crucifies the fat man with a look.
‘What is it she sho
uld know?’
‘That not everything that glitters is gold.’
‘Who told you to poke your nose in?’
By now Muriel is at the front door. She turns to give her father a last look.
‘Are you going to do something or not?’
‘Isn’t this a country governed by the rule of law? Isn’t it a democracy? Let justice take its course. I don’t think it’s ethical for me to use my influence.’
‘So you trust the ethics of power? How often have I heard you say this democracy is a farce?’
‘I say what I like, and I do what I think is right.’
Muriel opens the front door, and to the astonishment of the Captain and the fat man, leaves the house slamming it behind her. The noise rouses her mother from her befuddled slumber. She stares at the Captain and at the fat man with fear and hatred in her eyes.
‘A shot. That was a shot. Who have you killed this time?’
Two policemen push the wheelchair where Don Vito is doing his best to appear even more prostrate than he really is. Alma follows them, watching to see if they know how to manoeuvre the chair properly. When Don Vito sees he has been left in one piece on the pavement, he salutes the two policemen, who return his salute. Alma takes over the chair handles and starts to struggle along the street, one eye open to the possibility of a taxi. Suddenly the look on her face changes from one of hopeful expectation to surprise and emotion. She has seen Muriel and two other students coming out of a side street. By the time they have drawn near, Alma’s eyes are glistening. She caresses the boys’ faces, and hugs Muriel, rejoicing in her warmth and tenderness. She gradually regains her composure, and adopts a certain ironic distance, although she has to wipe away the tears with the back of her hand as she comments: ‘What kind of a country do you think this is? This is a democracy, you know.’
The Buenos Aires Quintet Page 29