Death Going Down
Page 13
“But Gustavo Eidinger’s plans also depended on her. He needed his wife’s money to live the kind of life he considered essential. Divorce would be a disaster for him. Don’t forget that the marriage took place in Switzerland, at Frida’s request, and as such the dissolution of the marriage in any country allowing divorce would strip her husband of any right to a potential inheritance.
“Gustavo Eidinger acted like a spoilt child. He uses others but cannot bear the thought of being used himself. In the case of his marriage he could only tolerate failure while taking advantage of the external situation to convince himself that ‘everything had turned out well’. Can you imagine the effect Frida’s confessions must’ve had on him? His perfect plan was failing and he learned that someone else was, like him, capable of coldly using others. His spite swelled until it led him to plan his wife’s death.
“The two adversaries in this conflict were very similar. Husband and wife shared the same cynicism and unscrupulousness. Frida Eidinger was one of those women who spend their lives dealing out moral blows under the pretext of being frank, as an outlet for their aggressive instincts.
“What could she have done to more brutally hurt her husband? She simply announced her plan: she told him she would divorce him to marry Luchter. As if in a game of skittles, she wanted to knock down the last pin of Gustavo’s personal defences. Frida was a woman capable of twisting a chicken’s neck in front of a sensitive child and then saying it was to strengthen his character. We have somewhat forgotten the meaning of old words, but ferocity will continue to be the most appropriate.
“Eidinger knew Czerbó. His own wife must’ve told him about the advances he’d made as a chemist in Germany. The police report showed that Boris was an instructor for the student group of which Frida was a member. This explains his subsequent interest in getting hold of the photos.
“Eidinger got in touch with Czerbó. He needed a way to eliminate Frida without creating suspicions. Czerbó had managed to fix potassium cyanide in a solution that could be incorporated into the carmine used to make lipsticks and other materials. Eidinger suggested making a poisoned lipstick, which he then substituted for his wife’s. He had promised to pay a hefty sum when he inherited Frida’s estate.
“But the circumstances of the death complicated things. (Frida carried that lipstick in her handbag because she had another one on her dressing table.) Anywhere else, señora Eidinger’s death wouldn’t have caused any bother for her husband or for Czerbó. It would’ve been seen as a suicide and it wouldn’t have been difficult to get rid of the compromising lipstick. In Luchter’s apartment, it would’ve only caused problems for him.
“The appearance of the body in the lift, Luchter’s perfect alibi, and the mysterious visit to señora Iñarra meant further dangers for Eidinger. He had to get rid of Czerbó and make us suspect it was a double crime for reasons of political revenge. Meanwhile, Czerbó wanted to get hold of the photographs because if reports were requested from the German police about the organization, it would become clear he had a previous connection to señora Eidinger and his situation would thereby become very dangerous.
“To eliminate Czerbó, Eidinger needed to get into his apartment and hide until both brother and sister went to bed. He knew their habits. The Czerbó siblings used the service quarters as storage space. Hiding there for a few hours wouldn’t be impossible. He planned to dissolve the cyanide in a glass of water and swap it for the one on Boris’s bedside table so he would drink it when he woke up. If his plan worked, no one would suspect him because it was difficult to get into the house. People would probably assume it was another suicide.
“All he had to do was get hold of a key for the apartment’s service entrance. Eidinger could move about freely, no one was watching him. It only took him a morning to find out which suppliers regularly ran errands in the building.
“That same day he found out personal details about them and chose Emilio Villalba, an unintelligent young man without any family, who needed money because he was fond of the races. He bribed him to get a wax impression of the key for the service door on the third floor. Emilio Villalba did this while Rita was looking for the supposed lost ticket.
“Eidinger didn’t waste a minute. He waited for Emilio Villalba in his car and drove him, after he’d handed over the wax impression, to a bus station, giving him enough money to pay for his bus fare and his silence. A poor devil doesn’t go to the police when he’d do better to hide from them.
“He returned home. In his workshop he had a casting kit he’d bought from a hardware shop in another neighbourhood away from where he was going to carry out the last and most dangerous part of his plan. He made a copy of the key, and conveniently disguised, but not so much as to arouse suspicion (a pair of glasses, a moustache, a roomy overcoat to alter his figure), he entered the building on Calle Santa Fe when people’s movements were not yet being monitored by Torres’s peasant-like suspicions, and hid in the Czerbós’s service room.
“From his hiding place he heard Dr Luchter talking to Rita in the kitchen. Luchter said he would go to the pharmacy to have some capsules prepared, which he would personally give to Boris, and told her she should go and rest.
“Luck was on Eidinger’s side. After taking the calming dose the patient would fall deeply asleep, the doctor said. Eidinger decided to change his plan and not wait for Boris to drink the water in the morning. It occurred to him to look for a dropper in the bathroom and administer the poison through his nose.
“When Rita gave her statement, all indications would point to Luchter. Eidinger silently carried out his plan, and Rita, behind the locked door of her room at the other end of the hall, could not hear him. Then he returned to the scullery, carefully washed the glass in which he had dissolved the poison and put everything back in its place. Finally, to further implicate Luchter, he opened one of the capsules and substituted its contents. He naturally took the precaution of wearing rubber gloves.
“The following day he called the police to tell us about the mysterious threat he had received, so as to make Frida’s death seem like a crime between ex-associates. Luchter and Czerbó, being German and former residents of Germany, would be implicated. Not even the discovery of the poisoned lipstick could incriminate him then. The presence of Betty and the fake theft of the photographs helped him further. Eidinger was sailing with the wind in his favour.”
“If Czerbó had decided to act earlier, or if Betty had talked,” said Blasi, “Czerbó wouldn’t have died, nor would Rita.”
“There’s no need for such regrets. The Frida Eidinger case would probably have been classified as a suicide. Time crystallizes facts but the measure of that time does not belong to man.”
Blasi seemed unwilling to get involved with his boss’s philosophical musings.
“How has Betty taken it?”
“Well, the charges against her are minor. Her home will soon get back to normal. Don Agustín is busy saving Gabriela and in the meantime suffers new crises. She, meanwhile, becomes the angel of the house.”
“But is Don Agustín very ill?”
“Ill enough to convince himself he cannot be left alone.”
“Poor Betty! What a way to come unstuck! A scandal was the last thing she wanted.”
“Those are grand words to hide the excessive desire to meddle she inherited from her father. There’s nothing wrong with sparing the suffering of those we love, but someone should tell your pretty protégée that she’d do well to be modest and not claim such a role in the joys or misfortunes of others.”
“That’s a good idea,” Ferruccio admitted. “I’ll call her as soon as I’m free.”
“To tell her?”
“No. To ask her if she’d like to go for a walk. We owe it to Muck.”
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Copyright
Pushkin Vertigo
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London, WC2H 9JQ
Original text © Julian Gil, 1955
First published in Spanish as La muerte baja en ascensor by Emecé Editores in 1955
Translation © Lucy Greaves, 2016
First published by Pushkin Vertigo in 2016
ISBN 978 1 782272 26 7
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission in writing from Pushkin Press
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