Corruption's Price: A Spanish Deceit

by Charles Brett

  He pushed the mute button on the control as the screen returned to some form of morning chat show and said, "You heard?"

  "Yes. That reporter summed it up better than I could. But I can add some more detail. It seems that among the next people being cited to appear by Garibey include the current Cardinal Archbishop and Inocencio Fajando of Opus Dei, plus some politicians from the left and the right. I don't care about the politicians. The other two I do. As mentioned before, I don't want to see the Church, or Opus Dei for that matter, dragged through the dirt. What are you going to do?"

  "What do you expect me to do? I told you before, my powers are limited. The courts are inviolate. The justice system must be allowed to work."

  Isidoro knew he was babbling, but what else could he say?

  "In theory I understand you can do nothing. In practice Moncloa has always found ways to finesse situations like this to its desired end. Arrange for the Church and Opus to be omitted."

  Isidoro's connection died. He was not sorry, until his assistant returned to say that el Presidente wished to see him immediately.

  As he walked the few metres to the prime minister of Spain's magnificent office he reflected on how his wonderful beginning to the day – he held the naked image of Consolación in his eye – had turned sour in seconds.

  He entered to find el Presidente, normally placid to the point of bovinity, raging at all in his presence, and there were many. As most of these were funcionarios, civil servants, from his support team this was unseemly, and unworthy. To behave like this with his politician peers was one thing, but to do so with people whose jobs were to serve was another. Isidoro was disgusted.

  "Señor Presidente, please be quiet. You're being unfair and unreasonable."

  Isidoro's voice was quiet but insistent.

  Juan Pastor Nieves gaped. He sputtered but did not manage to add anything coherent before Isidoro had firmly instructed everyone else to depart. They looked relieved someone could handle the situation. The room emptied.

  Once the room was clear Isidoro returned his focus to Pastor Nieves: "How may I assist?"

  He offered this in the softest, blandest tones he could summon. He had never seen anger in Pastor Nieves. Now it was manifest, in full, purple and unroiled flow.

  "How dare you! What do you think you were doing by telling me to shut up? I'm head of this government. I tell people what to do, not you."

  "I apologise, Señor Presidente, if I offended. You may treat me as you will, for I'm paid for that. But you may not abuse the ill-paid servants of state who work tirelessly for you with minimal recognition and who cannot answer back because of fears for their jobs, careers and families."

  There was a prolonged silence. His Prime Minister stared daggers of intense distaste. He paused before saying more. Eventually he asked, in an almost normal voice, about what Isidoro proposed to do to fix the situation.

  "What situation? You mean a lawyer whom you personally were about to propose as His Majesty's Ambassador to Panama has been caught red handed? Nothing. The law must take its course."

  "He is innocent until found guilty. But that isn't what I meant and you know it. What I want to know is how do we turn this Juez de Instrucción off? He must not be allowed to proceed. Too many interests are at stake."

  "You'll have to talk to your Minister of Justice. However, I should warn you, Señor Presidente: if it ever emerges publicly that your government deliberately sought to bend the law to protect its own interests or that of others, there'll be a backlash. I predict that would require your departure."

  Another prolonged silence filled the room. Eventually Pastor Nieves was the one to speak.

  "I hate it, Silvestre, when you're elliptical and sanctimonious. You go on and on about corruption – as if anybody cares. Everybody knows about it. Everybody participates. It is how the system works. Nobody would be surprised if all is rearranged.

  "Remember that I've earned my reputation for being clean. This was one of the reasons I was elected as el Presidente del Gobierno. If the office of el Presidente is clean then this flows down. So, to repeat myself, how do we rid ourselves of this nuisance?"

  Isidoro experienced extreme disgust. In front of him was an honest man, by universal account including his own, who did not seem to realise that he was proposing others execute dishonest actions on his behalf. It was sickening that a prime minister could not see the contradiction, that he was lowering himself to the level of Gómez and others.

  Tuesday: Sala de lo Penal, Madrid

  "Señora Márquez, I have many questions for you, but I'd like to start with a simple one. Does 'Cardarzob' mean anything to you?"

  Marta sat petrified. She couldn't move. Cardarzob was a reference she had invented for herself. The only place she had ever used it was in her special accounts, those very ones that she had kept on her smartphone. Her instinct was to deny.

  "No, Señoría. I don't recognise the word. What does it mean or signify?"

  Juez Garibey barely glanced at her, though he had registered her moment of discomfort. He was onto something.

  "I have evidence here of a payment for eleven thousand and twenty euros. This is an unusual amount and it has the reference of Cardarzob. Does that ring any bells?"

  "It doesn't."

  "What would you say if I told you that ServiArquitectos paid this amount to El Cerámico, your client? It's listed here" – Juez Garibey held up a print-out – "as a payment from El Cerámico to yourself and on the same day that same eleven thousand and twenty euros is paid out to an account called Cardarzob with the label 'Adrian'. It reappears the next day coming back in, almost as if it had been returned. Then the same amount goes out again, this time just as a payment described as sobr-Cardarzob."

  Juez Garibey wanted to see if Márquez would react. She didn't.

  "Señora, as you appear unwilling to explain, allow me to interpret. I suggest that Cardarzob is shorthand for Cardenal Arzobispo. At the time of the payment the head of the Catholic Church in Spain was Cardenal Arzobispo Adrian. Possibly sobr-Cardarzob means 'sobre' for the Cardenal Arzobispo, as in you gave eleven thousand and twenty euros in cash in an envelope to his Eminence or one of His Eminence's representatives. Am I correct?"

  There was a longer period where nobody spoke. Eventually Marta's lawyer intervened.

  "Señora, you do not have to answer but if you decline it will not look good and may be used against you."

  Marta missed Alfredo more than ever. She understood now why Garibey had begun with Alfredo who would have stood up for her and found ways to deflect this appalling man's questioning. Garibey must have access somehow to her private accounts. If only she had never visited ORS. If only she had not forgotten her charger. If only she had not had that conversation on the train with Estefanía that consumed the battery. If only she had followed Alfredo's original plan and not substituted her own...

  Now she needed to make a decision, one that was going to cost dear in some dimension.

  Juez Garibey decided to throw her a bone, albeit a modest one.

  "I see that you're reluctant to answer. Possibly you fear incriminating yourself, which is a valid fear. As you may have surmised from my questions, we have access to a depth of transactions and accounting entries. My investigation does not understand all of these. If you were to volunteer to assist in making sense of the transactions you would be assisting the course of justice rather than becoming an object in its sights."

  The way he spoke stupefied Marta, as was intended. Juez Garibey's long experience gave him a weight that most could not imagine.

  "Señora, I suggest that we adjourn until three this afternoon. If you would like to cooperate please ask your lawyer to contact me beforehand. Otherwise I will ask the same questions again later and require an answer. As your lawyer has informed you, a refusal to answer may be treated as incriminating yourself."

  After Garibey exited the Sala, Marta turned, registering Caterina. She had not really noticed her, being consum
ed with the questions to Alfredo. This time she recognised her nemesis for what she was, the person who had copied her smartphone when all she wanted to do was charge it. The hopeless stupidity of it all.

  She realised Caterina was regarding her with some sympathy.

  Marta approached Caterina and asked, "Did you deliberately copy my smartphone?"

  Caterina shook her head, "No, it was an accident. We both use the same software. I didn't know for sure until the following day what had happened. It was an accident."

  Marta heaved dry sobs. She was about to lose everything. All that hard work helping people achieve their objectives. What a disaster.

  She turned to her lawyer. "Tell Garibey I'll talk to him. Do it now, before I lose my nerve – or regain it."

  Her lawyer disappeared. It seemed like no more than a minute before he reappeared.

  "He'll see you at 2.30. He suggests you have lunch because the afternoon could be drawn out, depending on how matters proceed. I agree. I should also inform you about your choices so that when having to commit you'll know your legal position."

  Marta could not believe the banality of it all. What could she care about food at this moment?

  Tuesday: Chamberi, Madrid

  "I hadn't realised that Juez Garibey was imprisoning us," Davide said to Ana. "Once we finished your list, at least until more information appears, we're stuck here. We can go out but can't associate with anyone except each other."

  Deliberately playing the coquette, Ana responded: "Don't you like living with me? Don't you like my apartment? You mean that we are not soul mates?"

  Davide chortled. Ana entertained him. She was alert, bright, funny and refused to let things get under her skin. Just like now she refused to let a difficult situation become serious. She was right. There was nothing to be serious about. It was no more than an inconvenience being cooped up here and far better with her for company than being isolated in a hotel room or police barracks.

  "Next you'll be telling me that you're lucky to have me to amuse you!" commented Davide acidly.

  "Exactly. I couldn't have put it better myself."

  They pulled mock-horror faces at each other.

  The problem for Ana was that it was proving increasingly hard to contain herself. The more she was with Davide the more she liked him. They shared much and yet were very different. He liked the visual arts while she gravitated to the aural ones. He preferred books whereas she favoured a movie or listening to something on her headphones. Both liked the radio and disliked the television, which was good, as she did not have one. Emilia had complained and considered buying one when it was clear Ana would not. Nothing had progressed, fortunately.

  Over and over she wondered what to do. Ana was convinced Davide was attracted to her. She had seen his admiration, and liked it for its discretion.

  Yet she was equally certain that he would make no first move. Was that because of Caterina? She was a subject that both avoided. What could either say?

  Ana's sense was that Davide was not someone to judge or badmouth people. She remembered what Inma had said in front of Emilia about Caterina treating Miriam in a way that produced no cooperation whilst Davide had been so much the opposite that Inma had been happy to open up. Polite and friendly without any sense of condemnation, even though both he and Caterina had possessed the same basic facts, had proven to be an irresistible combination.

  That Inma warmed to him spoke volumes. This applied even more so now that Ana appreciated just how able Inma herself was.

  Davide's interrupted her thoughts. "Why did you decide not to practise law?"

  "Why do you ask that all of a sudden?"

  Davide wondered whether to insist she answer his question first but decided not to.

  "You're smart and gifted. I've watched you manage Felipe and ORS, Pedro and Lucas and Carlos, as well as Caterina and Emilia. And me." He grimaced. "Look where it's got me? Isolated with a beguilingly pretty Miss Long-Legs, behind which mirage she shelters a formidable intelligence. Even Inma is puzzled why you hide your talents as you do. What is it?"

  Mierda, mierda y mierda, thought Ana. This man is more perceptive than I ever dreamt. He sees in ways others don't. Was this what Inma had meant? Now he had put her on the spot and she'd no real idea what to say. Dare she bare her soul? She had refused to do so for anyone before and had given up on the many clumsy attempts of contemporaries to make her do as they wished and in so doing induce her to become a subservient wife.

  "How old am I?" she countered.

  "What's that to do with anything?"

  "Believe me, it matters."

  "I'm no good at guessing ages. I'll have to ask Inma."

  "Guess!"

  "Late twenties?"

  "Joker. You're out by at least five years."

  "What? You're in your early twenties? No way!"

  "Why not? Because I look too decrepit and haggard to be twenty-two or three?"

  "I didn't mean it like that and you know it. No, you can't be because you once mentioned finishing university seven years ago."

  Davide calculated. His eyes widened.

  "If you graduated at, say, twenty-four or five you must be in your early thirties."

  "No, mid-thirties. I did a Masters, which took longer. Do you know what thirty means for a woman like me in Spain?"

  This was uttered with a helpless viciousness that moved Davide.

  "It means that you are – what's the English expression? On the fence. No, on the bench. That sounds wrong too. On the shelf? From my perspective at twenty-nine you're eligible. At twenty-nine and 364 days you're eligible. At thirty you're past the hill.

  "Men in Spain can marry when they want, at any age. Have you ever thought about the number of single women over thirty living with their parents? You haven't. Why should you? You're a man. Spanish men can marry when they choose, but only if their partner is sub-thirty. Reach that damnable age and you are damned. I studied. I learned. I qualified and suddenly I was on the hill."

  "It's over the hill. You? On the shelf and over the hill? Don't be daft."

  As he said it Davide caught a glimpse of an inner-anguished Ana, one previously unrevealed.

  "You mean you've chosen to underrate yourself as a disguise?"

  "As is the way I behave, dress and work." Bitterness seethed. "Actually, I'm not much different to Inma. She wrapped herself in shapeless brown clothes for years and denied herself."

  "I saw that a couple of times. She was not as she is now, thank goodness. Ana ... You are ..."

  "You know what's worst? Being with Felipe or Emilia and Caterina."

  Shit! She had not meant to mention Caterina. Too late now.

  "Felipe doesn't even suspect I'm several years older. His relatives didn't tell him. As for the other two, they are only a little older than me yet frolic like lambs expecting to pick up partners at the flick of a finger or tit. Think about it. Think." Ana was almost yelling at him now. "See. You can't say anything. You're speechless."

  "Yes, I am. I've no clue what to say, though I take your point about the manic duo."

  Ana nearly hugged him for his honesty.

  "To me you are ... No, you're right. I haven't the words."

  Ana nodded resignedly, the action of someone confirming her own defeat. Her expression wasn't quite sullen but awfully close.

  Davide did not even notice.

  "But I do have a memory, a vision of a beautiful, self-possessed lady in a half-black, half-white dress walking in perilously high heels drawing the blatant admiration of a plaza. I was the one they were envious of, of my being with you. And accompanying this there is, or was that day, an acute intelligence. You showed it that evening and have many times since."

  Ana unwittingly stepped back, stunned. He saw the inside as well as the outside. Now it was her turn to feel hapless. No one – no one – had ever paid her such an elaborate compliment or had matched her interior with the exterior. She desperately wanted to kiss him. Yet her feet had tak
en the initiative and involuntarily carried her away. What were they doing?

  "Sorry, Ana. I didn't mean to offend or to open wounds. I really would like, one day, the answer to my original question, or for you to at least try to explain. That is if I've not hurt you beyond further discussion. I'll call Pedro and arrange to go elsewhere."

  His face portrayed sadness, disappointment, of even being lost.

  "Davide, you're a clown and a fool. Offend? You just said the best things to me in years, if not my life."

  She took a breath and two steps forward to kiss him once, twice, while he wrapped his arms round her. She felt them tighten.

  Her phone rang. Of course it was Pedro.

  "Your enforced privations may soon be over. I hope it's not proving too awful."

  Not long enough, sang a voice in Ana's head, as she turned to Davide to repeat Pedro's message.

  Tuesday: Sala de lo Penal, Madrid

  Consumed by nerves after a lunch that she had not tasted, Marta's lawyer escorted her to Juez Garibey's office. After inviting her to sit he explained the legal position she faced if she chose to exercise her right to avoid self-incrimination. He was gentle but firm.

  He laid out the advantages of cooperation and how she might benefit by helping the processes of justice. She noted with awe his clarity and openness. He did not promise her anything that he could not himself deliver, which meant that it was conceivable she could still be prosecuted. That would not be up to him although any recommendations he made would carry significant weight.

  Juez Garibey had, he said, one main objective. That was to prove the accuracy of what he called the M-In and the M-Out Accounts. If Marta would provide additional information, like explanations, along with where monies were deposited and credited and who for and when that would probably be sufficient. When she had looked puzzled at M-In and M-Out he explained the references and how they related to the accounts found on her smartphone.