Water-Blue Eyes

by Villar, Domingo

  ‘As eccentric as ever,’ smiled his father.

  Leo looked at his watch. It was past four.

  ‘Are you going back to the vineyard? After lunch, I mean.’

  ‘Yes, I finished my errands here this morning. You know, the less time I spend in the city the better.’

  ‘Would you mind dropping me off a bit beyond the station? You’ll have to make a detour, but that way we’ll have more time to finish our lunch and I’ll save myself the walk uphill on a full stomach.’

  ‘Sure‚’ his father agreed. ‘I’ve got nothing else to do. Where are you going?’

  ‘I’ve arranged to meet someone for work at the cafeteria of the Mexico Hotel,’ he said, steering clear of any specifics. ‘I don’t want my assistant to be there before me, as you never know what might happen when he’s on his own.’

  His father nodded. He’d heard how impetuous his son’s new subordinate could be.

  ‘Talking of being on your own – is Alba back at home yet?’

  ‘No,’ said Caldas, staring at the sole. ‘She’s not coming back.’

  They drove uphill away from the ría. They passed the train station on their left, and kept on climbing with the traffic towards the aptly-named Calvario – Stations of the Cross. They had to dodge a few barriers marking off potholes, which were already part of the urban scenery. The inspector’s father was flabbergasted at how pedestrians negotiated the obstacles on the pavements while sweating under the fierce afternoon sun.

  ‘One day you’ll have to explain to me what stuff these people take to be able to go on living here, Leo.’

  The inspector refrained from reminding him that he had spent several decades himself in the city he now loathed. Caldas just kept silent, hoping his father wouldn’t ask him any questions concerning his job or insist on discussing his relationship with Alba.

  He checked his watch and saw it was two minutes past five. He was late for his appointment with the DJ from the Idílico.

  ‘In the countryside you can watch the days go by,’ speechified his father. ‘Here, apart from the fact that you’re surrounded by all this rubbish, you rush through the days without seeing anything. Haven’t you thought of that, Leo? I bet you’ve never thought of that.’

  ‘When you put it that way …’ replied Calda tersely.

  ‘Do think about it.’

  ‘I’ll get out here,’ said the inspector, seeing an opportunity now the car had stopped at a red light, ‘so you don’t have to turn round and can escape even sooner.’

  ‘Already?’ asked his father, surprised at his sudden farewell. ‘When will you come down to visit me, Leo?’

  For no particular reason, the inspector usually lied when he said goodbye to his father. But this time he thought he might be making an accurate prediction about how soon he’d have some time off.

  ‘Next week I’ll come to the vineyard.’

  ‘Promise?’ his father asked him, as if he were still a child.

  ‘I’m afraid so,’ he said, opening the door. ‘I’m pretty sure I’ll find the time.’

  ‘Leo!’ his father stopped him before he got out and, as he turned round, added: ‘You know, it’s not good to be alone.’

  The inspector gave him a hug, and closed the door behind him.

  The traffic lights turned green, and several drivers started beeping their horns so that the ones ahead would move.

  Leo Caldas saw his father lose himself in the traffic, and wondered whether he might not be right.

  Encouragement

  It was the hour for the sports talk show on Radio Vigo, and the presenter greeted the audience while the theme tune played out.

  Caldas, who’d sat by one of the windows overlooking the station, was the only customer at the cafeteria. The hotel’s guests were either out visiting the city or keeping away from the heat in their air-conditioned rooms. Caldas stared at the trains going past the Soviet-looking concrete buildings that someone with dubious taste had erected many years before. At least, he thought, they hadn’t built a Volkhaus to match.

  He kept looking at his watch. He was hoping this talk with Orestes, the shaven-headed DJ from the Idílico, might offer a few leads to help him solve the murder of Luis Reigosa as speedily as possible.

  He’d been waiting impatiently for over half an hour when, through the window, he saw his assistant galloping like a crazed rhino. Estévez looked exhausted. The effort of hauling his bulk up the hill at such a pace had obviously been too much. Estévez glanced about the tables and, when he located the inspector, walked over, with no time to catch his breath.

  ‘Fucking hills!’ he said. The police officer was sweating like a horse, and he gasped as he talked. ‘Didn’t you say it was only a little way uphill from the station, chief?’

  The inspector pointed to the station through the window; the trains were in plain view.

  ‘I know where it is, damn it, that’s where I came from. But you didn’t say I had to climb three hundred steps afterwards.’ He was so short of breath he had to pause again. ‘We’re always in a rush, everything’s uphill, and, to make matters worse, today the weather is treacherously hot and sticky.’

  Estévez pulled the collar of his corduroy shirt, unsuccessfully trying to put a bit of air between it and his body. He checked the watch on his left wrist. They’d arranged to meet at five and it was quarter to six.

  ‘And I’m late. Shit!’

  ‘No, you’re on time,’ corrected the inspector.

  ‘Hasn’t the DJ turned up yet?’

  ‘What do you think?’ asked Caldas.

  ‘For God’s sake, chief, enough with the cryptic messages, I’ve run all the way from down there,’ he said, pointing to the trains. ‘Has he not come at all or has he left already?’

  ‘I got here a little after five, and there was no one here then. I guess he hasn’t come.’ The inspector looked around the empty cafeteria. ‘I guess he won’t come,’ he added to himself.

  ‘Well you could have told me, chief. I would’ve driven up and parked the car nearby, even if it took longer to find a space.’

  Estévez turned to the bar and raised a hand.

  ‘Waiter! A Coke with lots of ice, please!’ he roared, taking the menu from the table and waving it in the air. ‘Have you had any thoughts about what we’re doing next?’

  Caldas eyed him in silence, with a musing look.

  ‘Me and you,’ insisted a bad-tempered Estévez. ‘Have you thought how we’re going to get out of this one? Because I guess it won’t be long before Superintendent Soto learns that a pair of stupid officers have been bullying none other than Doctor Zuriaga,’ he said.

  Caldas listened as if he didn’t really care.

  ‘No.’

  ‘You’d better think up something, chief, because they’re going to crucify us. I mean, I’m used to it, but God knows where they’ll send me this time … I’ll end up as a forest ranger on the Chafarina Islands, alone with the bloody seals.’

  Estévez wiped the sweat off his forehead with his hand.

  ‘Besides, I’m annoyed that his niece will not like the way things are going,’ he added.

  ‘Whose niece?’ asked Caldas, as if he didn’t understand.

  ‘Who do you think? You know damn well, chief. Zuriaga’s.’

  Estévez was fanning his huge belly with the menu.

  ‘Is that Coke coming or not?’ he shouted towards the bar.

  Leo Caldas smiled.

  ‘What’s so funny?’ asked Estévez.

  Caldas answered with a grin still on his face:

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘How do you mean, nothing? What struck you as so irresistibly funny, inspector?’

  ‘It’s nothing, Rafa.’ Caldas shook his head. ‘Our career’s on the line and you worry about Diana. Diana Zuriaga, no less. As if you stood a chance anyway.’

  Rafael brought down the menu on the table with a bang that, in the empty cafeteria, sounded like a shot.

  ‘Look, let m
e remind you that, firstly, it was your suicidal tendencies that landed us in all this trouble – and then they call me the crazy one. Secondly, I’ll worry about whomever I damn well please.’ Caldas was about to say something, but the officer, who had put out two fingers, uncurled a third without letting him. ‘Thirdly, it’s a moot point whether I stand a chance with that girl. I know perfectly well that I’m a few years older, and a good deal heavier than her, and that I’m probably not classy enough to be his driver.’ He took a breath. ‘But I’ve as much right as anyone else to build my hopes up with whomever I like without anyone mocking me, whether he is a superior or not. Do you get me, inspector?’

  ‘I wasn’t mocking you, Rafa.’ His smile had disappeared during his assistant’s tirade.

  ‘But you were, inspector, you were,’ spat Estévez, whose agitation made him sweat even more. ‘Do you think I don’t know that smug little grin of yours?’

  Caldas remained silent, and Estévez, turning to the waiter, bellowed:

  ‘And you, will you bring me that bloody Coke today, or do I have to go and get it myself?’

  The waiter sprang up from behind the bar and brought the drink in one hand and a glass in the other. He left them on the table, as near as possible to the impatient policeman.

  ‘Don’t be so touchy, Rafa. I didn’t mean to …’ said the inspector by way of excuse once his assistant seemed a bit calmer.

  ‘Let’s drop it, inspector. It’s too hot to get upset.’

  Estévez grabbed the Coke to pour it into the glass, and turned to face the waiter.

  ‘Where’s the ice?’

  ‘Is it not cold enough?’ the waiter asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’ Rafael Estévez didn’t feel the need to explain. ‘I want it with ice.’

  The waiter saw things differently.

  ‘I’ve just taken it out of the fridge. Look,’ he said, taking the bottle and moving it nearer to the officer, who smacked at the glass and gave him a furious look.

  ‘I don’t give a fuck how cold it is or if a penguin brought it all the way from the South Pole. Bring me some bloody ice,’ he ordered, making a huge effort to remain seated.

  The waiter touched the bottle with the palm of his hand as if to prove it was positively glacial.

  ‘I said with ice!’ shouted Estévez, out of control.

  The inspector didn’t dare ask him to keep his voice down. The unflagging waiter, however, seemed determined to use his powers of persuasion, and moved the bottle a bit closer to the officer.

  ‘If you want ice, I’ll bring you ice, but check how chilled it is.’

  Estévez stood up, grabbed the waiter by the neck, and proceeded to shake him this way and that.

  ‘I want it with ice, lots of ice! Do you get me?’ he shouted heatedly. ‘You pigheaded buffoon, you Galician son of a bitch!’

  Leo Caldas jumped up and gripped his angry assistant’s arm.

  ‘What’s wrong with you, Rafa, are you insane? And you,’ he ordered, ‘just bring that ice, will you? You’re even crazier than he is.’

  The waiter, paralysed with fear, nodded slowly. As soon as Estévez let go of him, he ran off to the bar. He came back bringing a small metal bucket filled to the brim with ice cubes.

  Leo Caldas and Rafael Estévez sat in silence for a few minutes. The inspector smoked a couple of cigarettes looking out of the window, while the officer rested his sweat-drenched forehead on his hands.

  Once the mood had improved, Caldas tried to put his thoughts in order and go over ideas that might cast some light on the case. None of them made much sense. But then, remembering his lunch with his father, and the telephone conversation he’d had with Moncho Ríos, it struck him as curious that Isidro Freire had skipped work that day. It was easy to assume he was ill, but there were other possibilities that might explain his absence: he might be scared, as Moncho Ríos had jokingly suggested, or someone might have made him disappear in order to silence him.

  ‘Aren’t you going?’ Estévez suddenly asked, lifting his head and looking at the inspector.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘The radio, chief,’ said Estévez, pointing to the loudspeaker hanging from the ceiling. ‘They’ve just announced your show. It’s starting in half an hour.’

  ‘Shit!’ muttered Leo looking at his watch. He’d forgotten his programme was on that afternoon. He’d been hearing the radio in the background all this time, as if it were the soundtrack of a film, without paying attention to anything but his own musings.

  ‘Rafa, are you OK?’ asked Caldas with concern. He was still disconcerted by his assistant’s fiery reaction.

  Officer Estévez confirmed he was.

  ‘I’ll push off then. Wait here a bit longer’‚ asked the inspector. ‘If Orestes doesn’t show up, go and find him. We can’t afford to lose him.’

  ‘And where shall I go and find him, as you put it?’

  ‘I don’t know really. The Idílico if it’s open, his house … Perhaps they know something about him at the station – they know a lot of people who work in bars and suchlike. If you’d rather not drive, take a taxi wherever you need to go and we can claim it as expenses.’

  Estévez rested his forehead on his open palms once again.

  ‘Rafa, I’m sorry about earlier.’ Caldas regretted saying this as soon as he started the sentence. ‘But we have to go on. This is quite possibly our last chance to dig ourselves out of this one.’

  Estévez lifted his head and grabbed the bottle of Coke, which had remained untouched on the table.

  ‘You sure you’re OK?’ repeated the inspector as he got ready to leave.

  Rafael reassured him and Caldas patted him on the back.

  He was opening the door when he heard the waiter.

  ‘Are you leaving your friend on his own?’ he asked anxiously.

  Refuge

  Leo Caldas went into the building across from Plaza de la Alameda, greeted the caretaker, quickly climbed the staircase and, once on the first floor, pushed open a door. He walked down the long corridor to the sound booth, hearing the music Radio Vigo was playing in the background.

  ‘Hello, inspector,’ greeted the technician sitting in front of the sound console as he came in.

  ‘Good evening.’

  Caldas, pausing under the cold jet coming from the air-conditioning, saw it was already five past seven, and read on the thermometer that the temperature outside was thirty-two degrees. He recalled Estévez’s soaked corduroy shirt and reckoned he would have been very glad to stand there just then. Rebeca and Santiago Losada were chatting in the studio on the other side of the glass. The presenter, with his headphones round his neck, seemed worried at the producer’s words.

  Caldas knocked on the glass and both heads turned at once. Rebeca smiled at him, but Losada pointed angrily to the digital clock on the wall, and signalled frantically for him to come into the studio without delay. Caldas met Rebeca at the soundproofed door.

  ‘Where were you, Leo? I’ve been calling you on your mobile for over an hour.’

  ‘Work,’ replied Caldas dryly.

  ‘And what about the messages on your voicemail? Leo, you’re a complete disaster.’

  ‘The battery must have run out,’ lied the inspector, who had turned off the phone at the restaurant after talking to Ramón Ríos.

  ‘You’d better go in. The media man in there almost suffered a heart attack when you didn’t turn up. He can do most of the show, you know, but he needs you for this one thing …’

  Leo Caldas slipped into the studio and took his usual seat, the one nearer the window.

  ‘You’re late,’ was Losada’s welcoming greeting.

  ‘I am.’

  Rebeca spoke over the interphone.

  ‘Santiago, shall we start Patrol or do you want me to play another song?’

  ‘Enough songs. Let’s take those calls,’ rushed Losada.

  ‘By the way, Leo,’ continued Rebeca, ‘Superintendent Soto seems to want to speak to yo
u pretty urgently. He’s called here a dozen times. It seems he hasn’t been able to contact you on your mobile either.’

  Exactly why I switched it off, Leo said to himself.

  ‘Thanks, Rebeca.’

  Caldas could predict that future conversation with Soto as if he had the gift of foresight, and he wasn’t at all interested in facing his superior’s accusing shouts – not without first gathering some reasons that might explain why he had harassed Zuriaga. What was worse, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to gather them in time. Zuriaga was too powerful and would surely move quickly. Besides, the small hope that Orestes represented had dissolved like sugar in a glass of warm milk. He needed to speak to the DJ, and though Rafael would do anything in his power to find him, the officer wasn’t exactly a discreet man, and was not familiar with the ins and outs of the city. Not by a long way. Orestes would see him coming a mile off, and would disappear again, leaving them exposed to any legal action that the doctor might want to bring against them.

  Santiago Losada raised his hand and the theme tune of the programme rolled around the studio. Through the window Caldas saw the mothers talking in the square. They had chosen the shade under the trees for their daily gathering. The children ignored the heat and chased the pigeons, frightening them away in their daily hunting session. The birds waited until the last possible moment before they took flight.

  Caldas thought of Alba. She too had flown, she had escaped when he thought she was closest to him.

  Santiago lowered his hand, and with that movement the melody faded out and a red light came on in the studio, indicating that they were now on the air.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, now with us … Patrol on the Air. The forum where the voice of the citizens meets the voice of public order with one goal – to improve the way we all live together in our beloved city.’ Santiago Losada paused theatrically in mid presentation.

  Leo Caldas turned to the table and picked up the uncomfortable headphones, waiting for the first call before putting them on.