The Ripper

by Carmelo Anaya

  - 'I've been expecting you,' she says, motioning for us to have a seat.

  - 'But you haven't been to see us.'

  She looks at me coldly, a haughty expression on her face.

  - 'I was wondering how long it would take you to turn up. Much more fun this way.'

  - 'There's nothing fun about this.'

  She ignores Malasana.

  - 'So you're the famous Commissioner. Well, well, well. I have to say I'm very curious about you.'

  - 'This isn't a social call.'

  - 'What a pity!'

  - 'You were at Sex Land with Cristiana Stoicescu,' interrupts Malasana rudely. 'On the 17th of August.'

  - 'That's some memory! How was I to remember?'

  - 'How did you meet her?'

  - 'Someone mentioned her to me.'

  - 'Who?'

  - 'My dear Commissioner, I don't remember.'

  - 'Don't call me dear again.'

  - 'My, my! So sensitive! I've heard a lot about you.'

  - Probably all bad.'

  She bites her lip and swivels in her chair. We've never been introduced. Her peevishness and arrogance are common knowledge round these parts. You'd have to live under a rock not to have heard of Rita Oehlen. She's the only daughter of an Austrian who emigrated to Spain in the 1950s. An SS officer on the run, according to rumour. Offered protection under the Franco regime. He founded a holding, now the biggest of its kind in the southeast of Spain. It encompasses estate agents, construction firms, finance companies, shipping companies, chemical plants, road building firms and anything else you can think of.

  She's unimaginably wealthy, and her wishes are her command. She rules the roost of business in Baria.

  - 'Well...' she says slowly. 'This is rather boring. Someone mentioned her in passing at a party. I can't remember who. I hired her for a role play. The night you said, the 17th. That's all.'

  - 'Did you speak to her?'

  - 'Just about logistics. I didn't hire her for her conversation.'

  - 'Uh-huh.'

  - 'We met outside Sex Land. Then went in together. A while later, she ran off. She didn't like what she saw.' She smiles.

  - 'Why?'

  - 'Do you really want to me to go into detail about my sex life, Commissioner?'

  - 'If necessary.'

  She shoots me a hard look, challenging me.

  - 'She didn't want to take part in a same-sex encounter.'

  - 'I see.

  - Is there anything else?'

  She shakes her head, like a naughty teenager.

  - 'We'll be seeing you,' I warn her.

  - 'She may be rolling in it, but Ms Bulging Eyes doesn't convince me,' says Malasana when we leave.

  Sex Land is a villa located far from the madding crowd. We drive out of the city and through the desert. An artificial forest built around a Nordic-style villa gives it away, its steep roofs and exposed wood incongruous with the surroundings. A discreet location that's only a fraction less sordid for its high prices. In summer, Sex Land organises private swingers' parties on Saturday nights. There's a select guest list.

  - 'Boss, the house where the tapes were made belonged to a friend of Rita Oehlen's dad. Also Austrian.'

  - 'OK.'

  We park on an esplanade circling a fountain, a naked nymph in the middle. The wind whispers in the tops of the trees. Pines. Cypresses. Beeches. Fig trees.

  The front door stands under an awning, the veranda wrapping around the house. We see several women cleaning the rooms, bustling about with piles of sheets.

  The man who opens the door is almost as tall at me, but heavier set, with the freckled face of mischievous schoolboy. His big ears hold up a Nike cap. He introduces himself as Carlo Taddonio, from Piamonte, he says. He's drippingly subservient, unnervingly so.

  He takes us through to a corner office. Out of the window, we glimpse a Z next to a thicket.

  - 'Yes. They were here. But the girl left very quickly.'

  - 'Why?'

  He looks around, as if about to disclose a secret.

  - 'Well. Rita wanted a woman's only group. And the girl refused. She was furious. Started going off in Romanian. She pushed everyone aside and run out.'

  - 'Did anyone go after her?'

  - 'I did. I picked her up when she was running down the motorway. I couldn't let her do anything stupid, couldn't risk anything happening to her.'

  We stare at him. He shrugs, palms upturned.

  - 'Bad for business. Imagine what people would say. I drove her back into town, where she told me to, that's all. Then drove back out here. I have witnesses.'

  - 'Why did they let Rita in with a woman? Saturday is swinger's night, isn't it?'

  - 'If we hadn't let her in she would have bought us out and fired us all.'

  - 'Did you see the girl again?'

  - 'Never. Just in the papers. After...'

  He sees us out to our car, letting us know we're welcome any time, except Saturday night.

  Ladies and gentlemen, may I have your attention please.

  The slaughterhouse is this way, just follow me.

  If you want to put a stop to your desires

  You'll never put a top to your desires

  So I don't want to put a stop to my desires

  Ha ha ha hahahahaha

  Only desire can free me from my desires

  Aaargghhhhhhh

  20

  Chief. Aguas Negras. You'll find what you're looking for there.

  My phone buzzes at 7AM. I know what that means. 'Shit! Shit!

  - Have you told anyone?' asks Malasana when I pick him up, practically without stopping the car.

  - 'No.'

  I drive through the city like my life depends on it. Then cut violently through the roads snaking through the estates on the coast. Once we get close to the sea, I head north and speed through Villaricos, the wheels spinning on each curve. When we finally get to Aguas Negras, it's deserted. The autumn morning is strangely empty in this secret hideaway on the coast. Aguas Negras is a cove, the beach covered in lethal-looking shards of slate, dirty seaweed piling up here and there, drifting in the water. It can't be seen from the coast road - the slope is too steep, the beach too far down to see. Four houses are tucked away down here, built decades ago, where no one would think to go looking.

  Metamorphosis, he says...

  We make our way down to the beach and poke around the nooks and crannies the water has washed into the slate. The sharp stones shine, damp with seafoam, washing over them again and again, relentlessly. Then we climb back up to the road again and walk over to the quarry, from which the houses in the cove are visible. There's no movement. The houses are shut up and stand empty. Then:

  - 'Over there,' points Malasana.

  All I see is a pile of black slate breaking up the smooth coastline, at the highest point of the quarry, on the other side of the cove.

  As we move towards it we see that the solid black mass isn't just slate.

  A body sat on the ground. Its legs are bent, the torso seeming to lean forward, between the legs. The arms have been positioned on either side of the legs, like an insect. It's been slathered in black paint, dried hard, keeping it in the position that brings to mind a monstrous cockroach.

  - 'A shot to the nape,' says Braulio the pathologist, matter-of-factly professional. He shows more fortitude this time, far from the ghosts of the mutilated women, which he can't stand. 'Finally, a normal murder,' he says, with palpable relief.

  Italics: A work of art, Chief.

  The message comes in a while later. I feel like throwing my phone at the rocks, smashing it into smithereens.

  - 'Wasn't his nickname Robot? Well, now he looks like he's made of metal,' jokes Braulio.

  - 'You were right, boss,' says Malasana loudly so everyone can hear. Especially the Madrid team, who came running as soon as they heard.

  But
it's no consolation. The Ripper has broken off the only tie that might have led us to him.

  He will see to it that the press finds out, insinuates.

  - If we had focussed our efforts on finding him, instead of wasting our time –shouts.

  - It could have been your friend – said Inspector Galan, on a mischievous voice, her arms crossed over her chest, more because of fear of the scene that out of cold.- As soon as he left the station, he dodged out our tail. Slick job. Whoever did it was no amateur. A bullet to the back of the neck. Shot point-blank as soon as your man was released. What do you want us to think, Commissioner?'

  I turn around and walk away.

  - 'We need to go through every step Robot took after he escaped from hospital,' says Malasana.

  - 'He was in hiding. It's not going to be easy.'

  - Now we can shout it to the four winds. A public call for support. Request than anyone who saw him come forward.'

  - 'We could have done that weeks ago.' He starts the Golf, frowning.

  - 'We didn't need to arrest him then, just find him and put the pressure on. In secret.' 'Arresting him wouldn't have made a difference.' 'We couldn't have got any information out of him.' 'We'd already tried everything.'

  - 'Fuck this!' The serum of truth is going to expire.

  The one good thing to come out of this is that as Robot is not officially linked to the Ripper inquiery, I can do as I like. I send out a communique to the press, asking the residents of Baria to come forward with any information that may be relevant to the inquiry into the latest murder in the city, unlinked to the crimes of the Ripper.

  In just a few hours we get over 20 phone calls. Some say they saw him in the Barrio Alto around noon yesterday. Others claim to have seen him driving on the motorway, two hours after the confirmed time of death. We've got kids saying they saw him in a beach house. But the team of officers we send out there say it's just squatters in the abandoned flats.

  A fisherman tells an officer he saw the dead man, whose picture is in the local papers today, a few days ago, at Macenas beach. We ask him to come in. He points out the spot where he was fishing on the map: in his boat, near the coast. He was out there when he saw a man making his way from Macenas castle to a half-finished building a bit further along. He didn't see anyone else with him, he says.

  An employee from the Deretil factory in Villaricos on his way home to San Juan de los Terreros after his shift says he saw a man on a motorbike leaving the road in Aguas Negras. He noticed him because he seemed to be having engine trouble, so he slowed down. The biker waved him off and he drove on.

  He was dressed from black in head to toe, with a helmet on, so he didn't see his face. The biker was tall and slim. He waved him off with a strange gesture, his right hand moving stiffly left to right.

  But he didn't notice the make of the bike or the plates.

  We thank him and hang up.

  - 'Should I tell the Madrid team?'

  - 'Don't bother them with this stuff.'

  Then I realise. How could I be so stupid?

  - 'If he killed him there, Robot was already out there!'

  We examine the surroundings of the vantage point where the murder left the body.

  - 'He had places he could go, boss,' says Malasana, pointing at the four houses, standing empty this time of year. 'Why would he stay outside exposed to the elements?'

  The first house is really a villa, set on a platform and so close to the water the sand has crept up to the front door, badly eaten away by the damp. The door and windowframes look like the swollen beams in a leaky boat. But they're intact; no one's broken in. There are three other houses staggered behind it, leading up the rocky slope. They're not as grand, but seem as empty as the first. The boat paint used to shield them from the wind and waves hasn't been enough and they seem eaten away by the pounding of the sea. Finally, we find what we're looking for in the last house, the one most tucked away under the cliff.

  The perfect hideaway.

  We examine the window and frame by torchlight, the dusk light already turning ashy grey, and see that the window has been removed from its hinges. It falls suddenly, a lone piece of twisted metal holding it up. We squeeze through into a courtyard with a shower, sink and clothesline. A white aluminium door leads through to the house itself. Someone's wrenched it open with a crowbar. We walk down a narrow passageway leadngs into a pantry with tins of food, beer and wine. Robot had his board covered. On the left, a door opens onto an empty garage, a white plastic boat hanging from one of the walls alongside some fishing rods, scuba goggles and flippers.

  Then a kitchen. Robot didn't bother wiping the table. Crumbs and other bits of food litter the counter and the sink. We move on, into a front room with a sofa and shelves, a TV. There's a sleeping bag on the sofa.

  - 'How long did he spend here?'

  - 'Couple of days, from the looks of the kitchen.'

  The sleeping bag reeks. We empty the rucksack: dirty clothes, a knife, brass knuckles, nunchucks, a mobile phone, a notebook.

  - 'Here, boss.'

  Malasana leafs through the small spiral notebook with squared paper. He shows it to me:

  - 'See this?'

  - 'He could read and write?'

  The first page is just a series of figures.

  - 'It's what you suspected, boss. He was making calculations. Working out how much to blackmail the killer. He knew! He knew who it is.' Now there's no doubt whatsoever.

  One figure: 100,000 euros, on one line. 30,000 a year, below it.

  - 'He wasn't that ambitious,' I say, 'if he was willing to make do with a hundred thou and then thirty grand a year, for keeping the biggest secret in the world. Any TV channel would have stumped up much more.'

  - 'It was a secret deal. He wouldn't have to deal with the scandal, getting called an accomplice or accused of engaging in concealment.'

  Then he shows me the places Robot jotted down in a shaky hand, with spelling mistakes. No extradition: Cayman Islands, Seycheles, Hong Kong. On another sheet of paper he's also jotted down, Send an account number for yearly payments.

  - 'He wanted to escape with the killer's money. And live out his life in peace and comfort.

  - His plans cost him his life,' says Malasana.

  - 'His life was in danger from the moment he found out who the killer was. If we could just work out how he found out, how they knew each other...'

  - 'Don't you think they were partners from the start? Because in the tape...'

  - 'I don't know,' I admit.

  We carry on flipping through the notebook. The pages are all blank, except for the last one:

  - 'Get a load of this.'

  You have no word, you mother fucker

  Metamorphosis

  What a masterpiece!

  Just like the classics

  My cosmogony

  My legend

  I believe, where others see only death

  Ha ha ha ha ha ha

  21

  The Ripper has put paid to the only lead we had, so I wake up in ann even worse mood than usual. Shower. Shave. Empty stomach. I drive to the station..

  The radio whines in the background and I ignore it until I hear Gomez's voice:

  - 'Do you believe that these crimes are a consequence of our way of life?' asks Gomez smoothly.

  - 'Without a doubt. Not that that means we can understand the terrible, cruel crimes being committed here in Baria, which have caused a great deal of alarm here and elsewhere...'

  - 'Unfortunately, we have been in the spotlight in the past few weeks, yes,' interrupts Gomez.

  - 'That's right. My point is that the nature of crime, criminality, varies from one society to the next. That's a given. And these types of serial killings are a consequence of a social model that leads to people feeling isolated, then resentful, and then increasingly selfish, self-absorbed. What does that cause? Criminals with absolutely no
empathy for anyone else.'

  I have a hard time making everything out on the tinny radio, but at last I recognise the hoarse tones of Whiskey Moran, my old friend who I haven't seen for so long.

  - 'What we're experiencing now,' he goes on, 'reminds me of a particular school of philosophical thought. It's fallen out of fashion now, but I think it might explain, at least in part, our current behavioural patterns. It's Max Stiner's exacerbated individualism. He was a major influence on Nietzsche, though he never acknowledged Stirner's work.'

  - 'Are you referring to Nietzsche's concept of the Ubermensch and scorn for human weakness?' interrupts Gomez again.

  - 'Not exactly. The idea of the Ubermensch came along a bit later. Stirner focused more closely on the common man. In the first half of the 18th century, the dawn of liberalism led to our metaphorical fall from Paradise. After the fall, the discredited man had to earn his social status by the sweat of his own brow; no caste, no class, nothing to assign a status. Each human being on their own, an isolated, separate individual. And Stirner understood that better than anyone. He said the only imitations we face as individuals is the power we have to get what we want. Social institutions, the state, property, natural laws, society, are all just reifications in our mind. The common man, the common person, anyone, answers only to themselves. Everything else is relative, as far as the self is concerned. Religions, politics, ideology: these are empty concepts, overlapping with individual desire and interests, so they do not stand. This philosophy has since been internalized in many industrialized nations, in conjunction with the budding mass society which fights against the individual. This leads to an explosive situation where many individuals refuse to accept any riles whatsoever.They are incapable of feeling empathy and as such, in their minds, they are free to break society's most fundamental rules with absolutely no remorse.