Betty Boo

by Claudia Piñeiro

  Lorenzo Rinaldi picks an Italian restaurant, one that only serves pasta, where the few tables are complemented with old chairs in different styles and coverings. There’s a wine cellar in the basement visible through glass panels in the floor so that the clientele can see the wines without having to move from their tables. The best thing about already being here, Nurit tells herself, is that in a few minutes they will be eating and then in one or two hours she’ll be liberated from Lorenzo Rinaldi and his repartee. But the atmosphere improves as time goes by; in hopes of forestalling Rinaldi’s dreary conversation, she brings up topics that interest her more – cinema, books, her children, the Chazarreta case. But he doesn’t really seem drawn into the subjects she chooses. He answers in monosyllables, nods and smiles but doesn’t listen, merely waiting for her to finish so that he can go back to talking about himself and his world. Starters, mains, wine (selected by Rinaldi after a bit of back and forth with the waiter to show that he knows about this), dessert, coffee. Done. They get back into the car. But Rinaldi doesn’t start the engine. He looks at her. He smiles. He puts a mint in his mouth to freshen his breath; he offers her one. No thanks, Nurit says, and the fact that he’s worrying about his breath rings alarm bells. Did you know that I had an operation a month ago? Rinaldi says. No, I didn’t know. A major one? No, nothing serious, uncomfortable more than anything. They signed me off a week ago. I’m pleased to hear it, she says. Prostate, he says. Ah, that’s not unusual in men your age, is it? That’s what they said, too, but it wasn’t much of a consolation, he says, and laughs. He sits back in the seat, as though to look at her better, and it’s clear that he has no immediate plan to start the car. I’m a virgin again, he says. What? says Nurit. I haven’t tried out the new equipment since the operation, he clarifies. Is this guy really talking to me about his prick? Nurit Iscar wonders, silently marvelling. They told me there won’t be any problems, but I can’t rest easy until I’ve tried it. Is that right, says Nurit. He smiles at her, looking her straight in the eye. She fears what is about to come, what is portended by the breath mint. Do you want to help me out, Betty Boo? Rinaldi asks, with the expression of a newborn lamb separated from the fold. Are you really serious? she answers with another question. We were good together; as far as I remember, anyway. Am I wrong? Yes, we were good, says Nurit, until we were bad. Come on, he says, don’t you want to be the first? You should consider yourself privileged. No, no, what a bastard! Paula Sibona will say a couple of hours later when Nurit tells her that – the “consider yourself privileged” bit. And so brazen, without even trying to romance you a bit? Carmen will ask. I think that honour rightly belongs to Marisa, Lorenzo, Nurit says. She’ll be patient; she’s known you so long. Go off to Bariloche, relax in that dreamworld and try out the new equipment with her. Rinaldi shakes his head then says: Don’t ask me why, but I’m sure that it’s not going to work with Marisa. Then try a prostitute: they’re definitely experts in reviving dicks, says Nurit, looking straight back into his eyes and holding his gaze without even batting an eyelid at the word “dick”. She doesn’t recognize herself speaking to Rinaldi with such brass, but she enjoys doing it. You said that to him? Carmen will ask, helpless with laughter. Son of a thousand bitches, Paula will say again. No, it won’t work with a prostitute, either, Rinaldi says and sighs before continuing: You know I never liked having sex with prostitutes. Now’s the time to give it another go, she quips. You know how tastes evolve – you might prefer salty food when you’re young and sweeter food when you’re older. Maybe if you try again you’ll be surprised. And there I was hoping you were going to be my Florence Nightingale, he says. You really don’t want to be my Florence Nightingale? I don’t believe you, Carmen will say, appalled. I don’t believe you. Tell me it’s not true; he didn’t say that. But who does this arsehole think he is? Paula will say. No, I don’t want to be your Florence Nightingale, Nurit says.

  The drive back to La Maravillosa seems interminable; to her, at least. He drops her at the door of the house, but this time doesn’t leave the car. Think it over, he says. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I can be your man. Tuesdays and Thursdays, Nurit repeats. And remember what good times we used to have together. She keeps looking at him. Think it over, he says again, and Nurit smiles and goes into the house without answering.

  Well, the guy gets zero points for seduction techniques, Paula Sibona says, handing her friend a cup of coffee. How can you be turned on by someone who invites you to be his Florence Nightingale? If he’s proposing something like that it must be because he’s sure that there are women who would willingly play the part, says Nurit. You know what? Paula says. What? Up until recently the problems the men we went out with had were pulled ligaments, cartilage damage, at worst a raging appendicitis. Prostate is a one-way ticket, Carmen says.

  19

  Around the time Nurit Iscar is treating her friends to a detailed recap of her date with Lorenzo Rinaldi, the Crime boy gets an email that surprises him. It’s from Gandolfini; not Gonzalo, though, but his father, Roberto, the brother of the dead Gandolfini. Hello, I heard from my son Gonzalo that you knew my brother and his friends. He also told me you asked him a number of questions that he couldn’t answer, so he passed on your email to me. But there’s so much to say about that time that it would probably make more sense for us to meet for a coffee. What do you think? What are your plans for the rest of this Sunday? Do you live in Buenos Aires, like us? Warmly, Roberto Gandolfini. The Crime boy starts to fizz again. Before answering he calls Jaime Brena again. What if I take things further and ask him to bring along some photos from that time? If he has a copy of the lost one, we’ll have a photo of the whole group. It’s a good idea, but what worries me is something else, kid: if you weren’t born at the time of the Dr Giubileo case, how could you have known Chazarreta and his childhood friends? When they were finishing secondary school you hadn’t yet been born. Or am I wrong? No, you’re right. They think it over for a while, the Crime boy and Jaime Brena, then the boy says: What about if you go in my place? Jaime Brena’s first journalism lesson: disguise yourself. How would that work? Gandolfini’s nephew knows my name; it’s on Facebook, and he mentioned it to his father when he passed on my message. To change it now or contradict myself would put them on their guard, make them suspicious. But they don’t have any other information about me apart from my name. My profile picture doesn’t show my face, just the Estudiantes de La Plata football shirt. You support La Plata, kid? No, only the student team, nothing else, he clarifies, and continues: But you could have been a friend of theirs, Brena. It’s true, God help me; I’m just as old as those poor bastards. There’s a risk, the boy says, that Gandolfini will recognize you; even though you’re a print journalist, you’ve been on TV a few times, and to make matters worse, you were speaking about the death of one of his brother’s friends. If the guy saw you on one of those reports and recognizes you, what will we say? That I do look like Jaime Brena, and that it’s caused me no end of trouble, but that luckily I’m not him. The boy laughs. It’s like you said, kid: blend in, disguise yourself, hide, say you’re something you’re not, whatever it takes – it’s all part of the job. Crime journalists are obsessive, neurotic detectives and stubborn, too, because we know what failure is; but we keep at it until the end. And as Walsh said, if there is no justice, at least let there be truth. At least I think Walsh said that. The boy says nothing, but makes a mental note to check this later. On the Internet. Arrange to meet Gandolfini in a bar in an hour or two, ask him to bring some photos. Oh, and forward me all the email correspondence between you and him or his son, so I don’t put my foot in it. Can you come and pick me up, then wait in the car while I talk to Gandolfini? Depending on what that conversation throws up we might go and work for a bit at Nurit Iscar’s place afterwards, what do you reckon? Fine by me. Shall I mail Nurit to bring her up to speed? I’ll call her, Brena says, if you give me her number. I emailed it to you, the boy says. You’re not going to make me switch the computer on just to find a p
hone number, are you, kid? The Crime boy relents, and tells him the number.

  Incredible, says Nurit Iscar when Brena calls, echoing his reaction when the Crime boy called with the news shortly before. We’re getting close, Brena. Closer, yes, he says, and then: Do you think we could come over to your place after the meeting with Gandolfini? It would be easier to compare notes and see if we can begin to draw some conclusions, however vague. Yes, of course, I’ll be here, she says. What time would you be coming? I’m afraid you won’t get out of buying pizza for supper, Betty Boo. She says: Worse things have happened to me, Brena. She smiles, and although he can’t see the smile, he feels it.

  Jaime Brena prints out the emails forwarded to him by the Crime boy, reads them, folds them up and puts them in a pocket. Taking his pad, he writes down the name of each of the murder victims so far in a column on the left-hand side with an arrow from each name to the cause of death in a column in the right margin, sometimes with explanations in brackets. Pedro Chazarreta, arrow, throat slit (ditto his wife). Gandolfini, arrow, road accident. Bengoechea, arrow, skiing accident. Luis Collazo, arrow, still alive. Brena remembers that Gladys had mentioned there being four or five of Chazarreta’s friends in the photograph: Five including Chazarreta, I think, she had said. Or was it six? she had wondered afterwards. So he adds two more entries to take account of the maximum number of possibilities. Unknown One, arrow, still alive? Unknown Two, arrow, still alive? Jaime Brena stares at his rough diagram. He knows that it’s telling him something he can’t yet hear. Or see. Or decipher. He looks at the names and the arrows, one above the other, and the causes of death. What links each of these deaths, besides the photograph? What’s the pattern? What game is the assassin playing? Why does he think of a game, and an assassin, if the majority of these deaths were accidental? Or were they? The facts say they were. The only death known to have been as the result of a crime is Chazarreta’s. He thinks. And asks himself again: What are these names saying; what are these deaths telling me? What is fate (or coincidence, or destiny) saying when three people from a small group pictured together in an old photograph that’s disappeared from its frame are now dead? He thinks. The intercom buzzes. He goes to the kitchen, picks up the receiver and says: I’ll be down in a minute. Although he can’t hear anything, Brena knows that it’s the Crime boy; for months now the system hasn’t been working properly and he can’t get the building’s administrator to fix it. He can still open the door to people buzzing up from downstairs, but he can’t hear them speaking. He’ll have to give the administrator a bigger tip; the intercom doesn’t matter too much, but it’ll be a pain if something else breaks. He goes to look for a leather jacket and matching cap that he hasn’t worn for a long time. He puts them on and studies his reflection in the bathroom mirror. Recognizing this get-up as a kind of camouflage, he laughs gently at himself. In this hat, and bearing in mind the time that has passed since his last TV appearance and the weight he’s put on since then, he would defy anyone to say that the man looking back from the mirror is Jaime Brena. The buzzer sounds again as Brena is opening the door of his flat. He doesn’t pause to assuage what he takes to be the Crime boy’s impatience, but carries on out and summons the lift. When he arrives at the ground floor, however, he’s surprised to see that the person waiting outside is Karina Vives, with unmistakably red eyes. He opens the door quickly and says: What’s happened, gorgeous? But she doesn’t answer, just hangs onto his neck and sobs disconsolately. He lets her cry. A long time ago he learned that when a woman cries the best thing is not to try to solve her problem but to give her time to unburden herself. After a while he leads her over to a sofa in the lobby, sits down and gets her to sit beside him. What’s happened? Jaime Brena asks again, as the frequency of hiccups and sighs begins to abate. I’m pregnant, the girl says. He looks at her. He waits without saying anything to give her time to say more, but she doesn’t. Questions come into his mind that he won’t ask, questions that he could never ask. If Karina Vives doesn’t mention who the father is, for example, he’s not going to ask her. Jaime Brena strokes her hair. He smiles at her. She still says nothing. He says: What do you think you’ll do? That’s the problem, Karina Vives says, and starts crying again as she speaks: I don’t know what to do; one day I’m sure that I want it and the next I’m just as sure that I don’t. Jaime Brena takes her hands. How can I help you, gorgeous? Like this, by holding my hands, says Karina, and she lays her head on his shoulder. Brena puts an arm around her back and she moves more comfortably against his shoulder, drawing closer to him. Jaime Brena looks into the street and sees the Crime boy, standing on the other side of the glass watching them and clearly unsure how to interpret the scene in front of him. Or more likely misinterpreting it. Brena gestures to him to wait a minute. He holds the girl’s chin and lifts her gaze to meet his: I have to go on an assignment with the Crime boy, he says, nodding towards the door so that she can see that the boy is waiting there. Would you like to come with us? Karina twists round to look at the boy. Don’t tell him, she asks Brena. No, of course not, he says. Without explaining any further, he gets her to stand up and guides her towards the door, opening it with the keys that were in his jacket pocket, then greets the Crime boy and, also with no further explanation, announces: She’s coming with us. The three of them get into the car and drive towards their rendezvous.