by Antonio Hill
“Tomorrow I’m going to Garrigàs, to the house where they spent those days, to see if I can find anything.” Héctor turned to Fort and added, “On the other hand, dismissing the possibility of identifying the person responsible for the message, we have to keep investigating what Sara Mahler did on the night of her death.”
“Sir, it still seems strange that there is no data on her cell phone. It’s on the factory settings, but she hadn’t bought it that day.”
“Get on those two matters. There are too many loose ends in Sara’s death.”
Roger Fort nodded and, sensing that this order implied leaving the office, he went out rapidly.
“Héctor,” said Savall when they were alone, “I’m not against using the press on this occasion. But be careful. It could cause us problems.”
“I know, but I think this time we needn’t worry.”
“Fine, I trust you.” Savall seemed to consider the meeting finished; however, as the inspector was preparing to leave, he added, “I’m glad to see you back on form, Salgado.”
Already at the door, Héctor stopped. The superintendent went on in a tone grave yet tinted with something akin to affection. “I’m aware that you felt bad about my taking you off Ruth’s case. Believe me, I’m sorry, but I had no choice. I couldn’t allow one of my best men to become obsessed in that way.” He waited for a reply from Salgado, then seeing there was none forthcoming, went on: “Sometimes you have to turn a page, however hard it is. Doing it was very difficult for me. You know I’ve always supported you, even at the worst times, and both my wife and I care a lot about you both … You and Ruth.”
Hearing her name then, Héctor realized he hadn’t thought about her for hours, maybe days. He knew it was absurd, but he couldn’t help a strange feeling: he’d promised not to forget her. He didn’t know what answer to give the superintendent. He left without saying anything and walked toward Fort’s desk. Speaking to the agent with her back to him, he made out a feminine figure who from a distance he confused with Lola. Then the woman turned and he saw it was Mar Ródenas.
32
Mar seemed so out of place in the station that Héctor decided to talk to her somewhere else. He invited her for a coffee in a nearby bar. He also needed to smoke and could have a cigarette en route.
Once inside, two coffees in front of them, hers decaf, Mar Ródenas took from her bag the newspaper in which the article about her brother had appeared. I should have seen this coming, thought Héctor. Despite the article speaking of suicides, the coincidence of three in a few months had to arouse unease in their loved ones, and Mar Ródenas’s appearance faithfully reflected that emotion.
“What does this mean, Inspector?” she asked, straight to the point though in a faint voice.
“I wish I could tell you,” he replied, “but at this time we know little more than what’s in the article.”
“But … but the text seems to imply that …”
Hope, thought Héctor. That was what was in that glance. The hope that what she’d accepted until then as a fact was actually an illusion. The hope that her brother wasn’t a parricide, but a victim in the end. Salgado didn’t want to raise her hopes and yet neither could he deny the truth.
“The case has been reopened. That’s all I can tell you.”
He considered that for Mar, that was enough. It was at least an open door, a road toward a reality different from the painful one with which it was her lot to live.
“Do you have siblings, Inspector?”
“Yes.” He didn’t elaborate: he was certain that an elder brother who chose to look away when your father gave you a beating wasn’t the example Mar was hoping for.
“Gaspar was a few years older than me.” She smiled. “Sometimes he was worse than my parents: he didn’t let me out of his sight.”
Héctor prepared to listen to her. It was clear this girl needed to talk about her brother, that boy who protected her in school and bickered with her at home; the boy who in her mind had little to do with the man who’d died from a bullet in that domestic tragedy. Mar continued talking for a while, ever more animated, as if for the first time in months she could enjoy these memories, spoiled by Gaspar’s sad end. And without meaning to, Héctor also ended up relating anecdotes from his childhood in Buenos Aires.
“I’m sorry,” said Mar. “I’m sure you have better things to do than exchange family stories.”
“Don’t worry.” He looked at his watch. “Although I must be going now.”
“Of course.”
She protested mildly when he paid for the two coffees, but the inspector took no heed. They walked in the same direction, he toward the station and she the metro.
“Inspector,” Mar said to him, “I know my opinion isn’t very objective when I tell you Gaspar was essentially a good person. He was incapable of anything so horrible.”
“When it’s about people, no opinion can be objective,” he said, affectionately. “Mar, let me ask you something.” He’d just remembered; it wasn’t an important detail, but it couldn’t hurt to clear it up. “Did Gaspar belong to an animal rights group or anything like that? You know, environmental groups …”
Mar seemed taken aback.
“Not that I know of. Although maybe … Are you asking for any reason in particular?”
Salgado shook his head.
“Someone told us so, but it’s not important. Don’t worry about it.”
When he returned to his office, Fort had already left and he couldn’t see Martina Andreu at her desk either, so Héctor thought of calling Lola and suggesting she come with him to the house in Garrigàs the next day. Although it wasn’t following procedure, he was sure she’d like to, and he trusted her discretion. He had to leave the suggestion recorded in her voicemail, since Lola didn’t pick up the call. However, shortly afterward he received a text with a succinct: “Okay. See you tomorrow.”
The brevity of the answer caused him a momentary pang of sadness. He kept his eyes fixed on the screen of the phone, annoyed with himself and these dregs of melancholy that seemed to seek any motive to overflow. No, he corrected himself, not any old motive.
He was going to leave the phone on the desk, like someone banishing the messenger who brings unwelcome news, when he remembered that he had his fortnightly session with his therapist the following day. He picked up the discarded phone and looked for the number among his contacts to cancel the visit, when suddenly it occurred to him that the kid might be able to help, not him, but in the case. He called, hoping he might still be at the practice and could spare him a few minutes. And this time, fickle law of averages, he got the answer he was seeking.
Not having him opposite seemed strange, which was logical: it was the first time he’d spoken to him on the phone. He didn’t know if he did sessions by telephone—or even better, on Skype, in this century where the virtual was gaining on an ever less tangible reality. Not one for preambles, Héctor got straight to the point.
“You want to talk to me about suicide, Inspector?”
“Yes, but not mine, don’t worry. This isn’t a subterfuge to reveal my hidden desires.”
On the other end of the line he could hear a suppressed chuckle.
“It never would have occurred to me to think you had the profile of a suicide, Inspector.”
“No, I suppose my aggression tends to erupt outward rather than inward. Now seriously, is there such a thing as a suicide profile?”
“Calling it a profile would be too strong. There are characteristics of personality that, combined with the right circumstances, could increase the risk of someone taking that step.”
“I’ll be honest with you.” He regretted it as soon as he said it, since the expression made out that he hadn’t been so at other times. “I’m investigating the possible suicides of three people whose only thing in common was working in the same company.”
If the psychologist had heard about the case, he gave no sign of it.
“And you wish to ask
me if there is a possibility that it may be the work environment that is causing the suicides?”
It wasn’t exactly what he wanted to ask, but Héctor decided to let him speak. Then he would clarify what he wanted to know.
“It’s a very complex subject, Inspector. And it’s difficult to talk about it without citing theories or explaining experiments using terminology unintelligible to most people.”
“Try. I’ve become an expert after six months of therapy.”
There was a moment of silence.
“Well, before anything else let me tell you that suicide is considered a sin here, or an unnatural act, although this idea isn’t the norm everywhere. In other cultures it is a dignified exit: remember the philosophers of ancient Greece or, later on, the Japanese and their hara-kiri. It is Christianity which believes that life does not belong to us but to God, and that He is the only one capable of giving or taking it.
“To answer your question, this organization, be it company or group, which aids or indirectly causes suicide would have to confront the individual resistance of its members, owing to the survival instinct and some sociocultural norms that condemn the suicide. There have been cases of mass suicide in sects where the leader has great influence over the members. But in a modern company this would be unthinkable: workers have social lives, families.”
“But there have been cases—”
“Yes, of course. In the context of great stress, changing conditions, extreme work insecurity, worker anxiety increases. The employee suicides of which I’ve read clearly express that the cause of the act they are going to commit is at work.”
“A kind of posthumous accusation?”
“Exactly. I’ll simplify it so as not to go on too much. Think that the suicide commits this act maybe because he honestly believes he doesn’t want to live anymore, or because he’s trying to place his death on someone’s conscience. In the first case, it’s a coolheaded decision, reasonable from the subject’s point of view: a terminally ill person who doesn’t wish to be a burden to their loved ones. In the second, the aim is somewhat more perverse: imagine an adolescent who’s been left by his girlfriend; he kills himself and wants the whole world to know that she is to blame, so he leaves a note accusing her more or less overtly. Understand?”
“Of course. And if there’s no note? None at all?”
“That’s more unusual. People tend to explain themselves, to justify what they’re about to do … To exonerate some of blame and accuse others. Unless it’s a moment of desperation, a heated decision so passionate that, if the attempt fails, the suicide never repeats the act.”
“Does the lack of a note indicate a sudden decision?”
“In general terms, yes, Inspector, but in our world to generalize is to lie.”
Héctor nodded silently. Neither Gaspar, Sara nor Amanda had left a note. Maybe because they wanted to hide the cause from the world; or maybe because someone had decided for them.
“One more thing, Doctor,” he sometimes called him that, though he knew he wasn’t one, “perhaps the subjects don’t want to accuse anyone specific.”
“If the suicide leaves nothing written down, the guilt is even more diffuse: everyone around them might take it personally, whether it’s for not having foreseen it or for fear of having indirectly caused it.”
“So it’s even worse. More … inconsiderate.”
The psychologist laughed.
“Unlike in your world, there are no good guys and bad guys here, Inspector.” His voice became serious. “What you call considerate suicides would be those that minimize the guilt for those around them and attribute the blame to themselves in an obvious way. The sick person who decides to end their life and leaves that in writing, for example. Or—”
“Or?”
“Those who camouflage their suicide by means of an accident. They die by choice, but don’t want the people they love to feel guilty, so they crash the car. Their suicide is unproven and their loved ones can grieve without feeling remorse. That would be a good suicide, to use your terminology.”
The conversation was depressing him even more and Héctor had the urgent desire to hang up, go home, go running, anywhere he could breathe in life and not death.
“One more thing.” Héctor suddenly remembered the women’s association that appeared in Sara Mahler’s bank transactions. “Have you heard of the Hera Association, by any chance?”
“Yes, colleagues have given talks there. Why do you ask?”
“It came up in the course of an investigation. Can you tell me more about it?”
“It’s an association run by women for women, specializing in victims of sexual abuse and assault.”
Suddenly, all the unconnected information about Sara’s personal life began to make sense.
“Thank you very much. I won’t take up any more of your time.”
“Take care. And I hope to see you next week, Héctor. You have to tell me if you’ve done the task I set you.”
Héctor assured him it would never occur to him to disobey. A while later, perhaps to drive darker voices from his head, as he was considering the positive things in his life he wondered whether or not he could count on Lola.
33
The highway stretched out before them. A straight, solid, well-delineated space capable of providing a secure setting for a turbulent journey, shaken by a tide of uncertainties. Even the sky helped emphasize this insecurity with some dense clouds, slow as a funeral cortège, although from time to time they were distracted and allowed a tenuous ray of sunlight to slip through. Inside the car, Héctor and Lola had discussed the article and its consequences, they’d expressed their doubts about what they were going to find and in the end had lapsed into an elevator silence, polite and slightly challenging. One of those pauses that can be tolerated for only a limited time and in a static environment, with no potholes to prick consciences.
Héctor made as if to take out a cigarette, but stopped himself.
“Smoke if you like,” she said. “I’m still in the phase when the smell of smoke is pleasant.”
“You sure?” He lit the cigarette with the car lighter and lowered the window halfway. He blew the smoke out. “When did you give up?”
“Twenty days ago.” She smiled. “I know. The typical New Year’s resolution.”
“I should give up too.” This sentence, just after taking a generous drag on his cigarette, seemed faintly ridiculous.
“To tell the truth, I’ve tried a few times with no success, but now I’m taking it seriously. At first I was smoking roll-ups. It’s supposed to be relaxing, but it made me anxious. In the end, rather than put up with substitutes, better to give it up completely.”
The ray of sun was buried once again behind a slow but implacable cloud. Not much longer, thought Héctor.
A quarter of an hour later, they turned off onto the mud track that led to the house. The friendly road on which they’d been traveling became a narrow, treacherous trail, full of stones and holes. Lola clung to the door handle as the car stumbled along, nervous, faster than the terrain permitted.
A woman in her forties was waiting for them at the door of the house, smaller than it looked in the pictures. It was clear the people from the development center had let her know ahead of time.
Héctor had left the car at the entrance, to one side of the road, although he was almost certain he could have parked in the middle of the road without inconveniencing anyone for a good while. Though the trail didn’t end at the house, from that point it became even rougher. He and Lola walked toward the woman, who raised a hand in greeting. It was cold: the sun had already given up in that uneven battle. For the umpteenth time that day, Héctor asked himself what they could possibly discover in this house, ten months after the Alemany Cosmetics group had been there. Lola, however, seemed in good spirits, even if it were simply being out of the car at last and able to walk.
The woman received them with a smile that wasn’t free from distrust.
>
“Good afternoon.” She had a pronounced Catalan accent, like the majority of the region’s inhabitants. “Come in, come in. They told me you were coming, although I was expecting you later. I’m Dolors Vinyals. My husband Joan and I have a little house nearby and we take care of this one when they ask us to, as you already know.”
Héctor introduced himself and Lola, not specifying that she didn’t belong to the forces of law and order. Señora Vinyals didn’t ask and they went inside.
It was just as the photos had shown: a classic masía, with mismatched furniture that somehow managed to create a harmonious whole. The fireplace, unlit, provided the indispensable decorative country touch to a room usually heated by radiators. That day they weren’t switched on, which had to mean no group was expected. It was chilly and none of the three removed their jackets.
“If you’d like to see the rooms …” said the woman, doubtfully.
“Not just now,” answered Héctor. “We really wanted to speak to you.”
Dolors Vinyals didn’t invite them to sit, though in all probability this was due to the fact that she wasn’t in her own home. Neither Héctor nor Lola felt like it; they’d spent hours in the car and it wouldn’t hurt to stretch their legs a little, so they remained standing in the middle of that long, narrow dining room.
“I don’t know what Señor Ricart has told you …” Héctor began.
“He told me to give you all the information you need,” she replied, very proper.
“Do you remember this group? They came in March last year and were here for three days,” he said, showing her the photo.
The woman looked at the photograph with interest, and for a moment seemed not to recognize them.
“Maybe it would help if I told you that an unpleasant incident occurred during their stay: they found some dogs strangled.”
The information was enough for Señora Vinyals to nod her head.
“Ah, yes! I didn’t remember their faces, to be honest. But that, yes. I don’t understand how anyone could do something like that to those poor animals. People from elsewhere, certainly.”