The Summer of Dead Toys

by Antonio Hill

  “Now I’ll tell the boys to take it to the lab, in case they find something.” Hands protected by gloves, Leire moved the mouse and the computer screen came back to life. There was a brief message, written in large letters: “I cant take it any more. I have 2 do this . . . I cant live with the remorse.” There was something else.

  Leire minimized the message and brought up another page. The first thing Héctor saw was a blurred photo of a little girl and just below it another, in black and white, of a young woman with blonde hair blown by the wind. Leire scrolled up with the cursor until she reached the top of the page. A simple heading, typical blog format, said: “My stuff (above all because I don’t think anyone will be interested!)” At the side, a small photo revealed that this was Marc Castells’ blog. But what most caught Héctor Salgado’s attention was the blog entry Gina was reading before she died, dated 20 June. The last one Marc had written before dying. It was very short, just a few lines: “Everything’s ready. The hour of truth is approaching. If the end justifies the means, justice will back up what we’re going to do. For Iris.”

  “The name was familiar from the list of Marc’s calls, and the text is very strange.”

  Héctor thought of Joana’s email. Alwaysiris . . .

  “We’ll take it.” Before closing it, he saw that Marc’s blog didn’t have many followers; in fact, just two: ginaM and Alwaysiris. “We need to speak to the Martís. Then we’ll take care of this.” While they went downstairs, he brought Leire up to date on his conversation with Joana Vidal. “This Iris who signed the message asked her not to mention her to anybody until they could see each other in person. I think it’s best to follow her instructions for the moment. I hope that Sunday will tell us something important.”

  Leire nodded.

  “Inspector, what do you think of all this?”

  Héctor had a lost look on his face for a few moments.

  “I think that too many young people are dying.” He turned his head toward the room they’d just left. “And I think there are a lot of things we don’t know.”

  “To tell you the truth, Gina Martí didn’t strike me as the suicidal type. Yes, she was sad, but at the same time I got the impression she was enjoying her role. Like Marc’s death had elevated her into the main-character category.”

  “Main characters sometimes die too,” he replied. “And maybe Gina’s problem wasn’t depression, but the feeling of guilt.” Leire shook her head.

  “I don’t see her pushing him just because he didn’t love her back. They’d been friends since they were kids . . . Anyone could have typed that note.”

  “Friendships can sometimes become twisted in unexpected ways.”

  “Do you think she killed him out of love?” she asked with a touch of irony.

  Just then, a hysterical sob followed by a murmur of footsteps rose toward them. Regina, who hadn’t said a word all night, broke into loud and uncontrollable weeping when the agents took Gina from the bathtub, on a stretcher and completely covered by a white sheet.

  Savall was waiting for them at the bottom of the stairs, beside the door leading to the lounge. It was obvious that he was longing to leave.

  “Salgado, will you take care of this? I don’t think you’ll be able to speak to the Martís tonight.”

  Regina’s tense, hoarse voice reached them.

  “I don’t want a tranquillizer. I don’t want to be tranquil! I want to go with Gina. Where are they taking her?” Regina escaped her husband’s arms and walked toward the door. They saw her almost run in pursuit of the agents. But at the door she stopped, as if an invisible barrier prevented her crossing. Her knees buckled and she would have fallen to the floor if not for Héctor, who was behind her.

  Her husband approached her with the hesitant step of an old man and looked at the agents with deep-rooted hostility. For once, words failed Salvador Martí and he just demanded: “Can you leave us in peace for today? My wife needs to rest.” It seemed unbelievable that the streets could be so calm, so alien to the drama unfolding just metres away. If on summer weekends the barrio was empty, this one, after days of hellish heat, had provoked an almost total exodus. Not even the rain in the evening had managed to dissuade anyone. A middleaged man was walking a dog of undetermined pedigree in the centre of Via Augusta; closed shops, dark cafés, parking spaces on both sides of the street. A panorama of peace broken only by the blue lights of the police cars that were moving away without making a sound, silent sparkles that took with them the last remains of the tragedy.

  Héctor and Leire strolled toward the Diagonal almost without intending to. Unconsciously, they sought light, traffic, a feeling of life. She knew that Tomás was waiting for her but she didn’t feel like talking to him. Héctor was putting off calling Joana to tell her what had happened, because he didn’t really know what to say to her and needed to clarify his thoughts. Returning to his flat didn’t appeal to him either: he felt as if appalling surprises might await him in that once welcoming space. The vision of him mercilessly hitting that bastard was neither easy to forget nor pleasant to remember.

  “I saw what you left me about Aleix Rovira’s calls,” he said. And he went on to tell her about his chat with Óscar Vaquero: the suspicion that Aleix could be passing cocaine was a strong link to his calls to this small-time dealer, this Rubén. The calls to Regina Ballester were more curious, thought Héctor. He went on, not giving her time to say anything, speaking to himself as well as to her. “I think that I’m starting to have an idea of what happened that night. It was San Juan, a good day for Aleix’s business. Gina told us he arrived later, so he must have sold something, but he definitely had more. He was receiving calls, and if we assume he was making a living from this, they had to be possible customers. But he didn’t answer any of them. And if what his brother says is true, he returned home as soon as he left Marc’s. If there was a fight, and the blood on Marc’s T-shirt makes it more than likely, it’s possible that the coke was the reason for the argument. Or at least part of it.”

  Leire followed his reasoning.

  “You mean they fought and Marc destroyed the coke? That would explain why Aleix didn’t answer his customers’ calls. But, why would they fight? Gina told us about an argument: she said Marc had come back changed from Ireland, he wasn’t the same . . . But there has to be a more important reason, something motivating Marc to confront Aleix and take revenge on him by destroying the cocaine.”

  “Aleix dominated both of them. And Marc rebelled.”

  “Are you suggesting that Aleix could have returned to Marc’s house to settle the score with him? And then killed Gina, faking a suicide so she wouldn’t give him away?”

  “I suggest we shouldn’t come to any conclusion until we interrogate this boy as God wishes. I also suggest we set a little trap for his friend Rubén. I want to have them both by the balls.” He paused, and went on: “And then we have Iris. In Joana’s email, in Marc’s mobile, now in his blog. She’s like a ghost.”

  “A ghost that will appear the day after tomorrow.” Leire exhaled. She was exhausted. She noticed that her muscles were beginning to relax after the tension accumulated in the Martís’ house.

  “Yes. It’s late, and tomorrow a hard day awaits us.” He looked at her fondly. “You should rest.”

  He was right, she thought, but she guessed it was going to be hard for her to sleep that night. Not knowing why, she was starting to feel at home with this calm guy, somewhat taciturn but solid at the same time. His chestnut eyes hinted at a well of sadness, but not bitterness. Healthy melancholy, if that meant anything.

  “Yes. I have to go and get the motorbike.”

  “Of course. See you tomorrow.” He moved a few steps away, but suddenly he turned around to call her, as if he’d remembered something important. “Leire, earlier you asked me if I thought Gina had killed Marc out of love. No one has ever been killed out of love; that’s a fallacy from tango. One only kills out of greed, spite or jealousy, believe me. Love has nothin
g to do with it.”

  22

  Héctor entered his office as if he were an intruder. He’d had no desire to go home and had decided to return to the station to read Marc Castells’ blog. He tried to shake off the feeling that he was doing something he shouldn’t, but wasn’t entirely successful. He started up his computer, remembered his password—kubrick7—and typed Marc Castells’ blog address in the browser, while he pondered the lack of decency these twenty-first-century diaries betrayed. The old ones, paper ones, were a private thing, something read only by the person themselves and therefore they could pour all their secrets into them. Now private lives were exhibited on the Web, which he was sure imposed a certain censure at the time of writing. If one couldn’t be absolutely honest, why bother writing it? Was it a cry to the world for attention? Hey, listen, my life is full of interesting things! Do me a favor and read about them . . . Maybe what was happening was that he was getting old, he thought. Nowadays people got involved on the internet; some, like Martina Andreu, even married people they’d met in that hazy world that was cyberspace, people who sometimes lived in different cities and whose paths might never have crossed had they not been seated in front of the computer one evening. You’re definitely old-fashioned, Salgado, he concluded while the page was opening. My stuff (above all because I don’t think anyone else will be interested!). It was a good name, although it was ironic that Marc’s stuff was interesting to someone after he’d died.

  From what he could see, Marc had started in the blogosphere when he went to Dublin, probably as a way of communicating with the girl who’d been his best friend, who commented profusely on almost all his entries. It included photos of his room in a Dublin students’ residence, the campus, streets drenched by rain, colorful doors in austere Georgian buildings, immense parks, jugs of beer, colleagues holding the jugs. Marc didn’t spend much time writing: the majority of his entries were short and discussed subjects as enthralling as the weather—always rainy; classes—always boring; and parties—always overflowing with alcohol. As he became bored with his commentaries himself, they became less frequent. Héctor scrolled down until he found a photo that caught his attention: a young woman, blonde hair being blown by the wind, standing on a cliff. Her face couldn’t be seen because of the wind. Involuntarily, he thought of The French Lieutenant’s Woman, who wandered through her sorrow over other sea-battered cliffs. Caption: “Excursion to Moher, February 12th.” Gina hadn’t commented at all. The following entry was dated six days later, and it was the longest blog entry by far. The heading read: “In memory of Iris.”

  It’s been a long time since I thought of Iris or the summer she died. I suppose I tried to forget it all, in the same way I overcame nightmares and childhood fears. And now, when I want to remember her, all that comes to mind is the last day, as if these images have erased all the previous ones. I close my eyes and bring myself to that big old house, the dormitory of deserted beds awaiting the arrival of the next group of children. I’m six years old, I’m at camp and I can’t sleep because I’m scared. No, I lie. That very early morning I behaved like a brave boy: I disobeyed my uncle’s rules and faced the darkness just to see Iris. But I found her drowned, floating in the pool, surrounded by a cortège of dead dolls.

  Héctor couldn’t help shuddering and his eyes went to the black-and-white photo of that little blonde girl. Sitting in an empty office that had become alien to him, in a half-lit station, he forgot about everything and became absorbed in Marc’s tale. In the story of Iris.

  I remember the floor was cold. I noticed when I got out of bed barefoot and ran quickly to the door. I’d waited for daybreak because I didn’t dare leave that big deserted room in the night, but I’d already been awake for a while and I couldn’t put it off any longer. I took a few seconds to close the door carefully without making a sound. I had to take advantage of this moment, when everyone was asleep, to achieve my goal. I knew there was no time to waste, so I went quickly; however, before walking the long corridor I stopped and took a deep breath before daring to go forwards. The downstairs blinds let a weak line of light in, but the upstairs corridor was still dark. How I hated that part of the big house! Actually, I hated the whole house. Above all on days like this, when it was almost empty until the next group of kids with whom I’d have to share the next ten days would arrive. Luckily this was the last one: then I could go back to the city, to that familiar room just for me, to new furniture that didn’t creak in the night, and white walls that protected rather than scared me. I exhaled without noticing and had to breathe in once again. It was something Iris had taught me: “Breathe in and breathe it out as you run, so you blow out the fear.” But it didn’t help me much: maybe because my lungs didn’t hold enough air, although I never told her because I was embarrassed. I tried to move ahead clinging to the wooden railing placed along the length of the corridor so no one would fall down and keeping my eyes fixed straight ahead to avoid seeing the stiff, big, ugly bird who, from the little table against the wall, seemed to be watching my steps. By day it wasn’t so horrible, sometimes I managed to forget about it, but in the shadows that owl with glass eyes was terrifying. I must have clung even tighter to the banister because it creaked and I let go immediately: I didn’t want to make a sound. I walked straight ahead, following the pattern of the cold tiles, and I clearly remember the feeling of treading on something rough when I stepped on a broken one. Not much further: Iris’s room was the last one, at the end of the corridor. I had to see her before everyone else got up because if not, they wouldn’t let me. Iris was being punished, and although deep down I thought she deserved it, I didn’t want another day to go by without talking to her. I’d barely had time to the evening before, when one of the monitors found her after she had run away and spent a whole night in the wood. Just thinking about the idea of it, that wood peopled with shadows and immobile owls, gave me goosebumps. But at the same time I was dying with curiosity for Iris to tell me what she’d seen there. Maybe she’d behaved badly, but she was brave and that was something I couldn’t help admiring. Of course it was precisely for that reason she was being punished; her sister and her mother had told me so. So she wouldn’t run away again. Frighten them like that.

  At last I got to the door and although I’d always been taught to knock before entering, I told myself it wasn’t necessary: Iris was sleeping and also the main thing was to not make a noise. She was sharing the room with her sister instead of with the other children because they weren’t at camp: they were the cook’s daughters. And that night her sister was sleeping with her mother. I’d heard Uncle Fèlix say so. Iris had to spend two days locked in her room, alone, to learn her lesson. Opening the door I saw that the windows were completely closed: they were strange, different to the ones in my house in Barcelona. They had glass, then a wooden board that didn’t let even a tiny bit of light in. “Iris,” I whispered, feeling my way. “Iris, wake up.” As I couldn’t find the light switch, I moved closer to the bed and felt it blindly, from the foot up. Suddenly my hands brushed against something soft and woolly. I jumped back and in doing so I stumbled into the nightstand, which shook a little. Then I remembered that there was a lamp on that nightstand, which Iris usually had on until the early hours of the morning to read. She read too much, her mother said. She threatened to take away her books if she didn’t finish her dinner. The little lamp was there. I followed the cable up with my hand until I found the switch that lit the light bulb. It wasn’t a very strong light, but enough to see that the room was almost empty: the dolls weren’t on the shelves, or Iris in the bed, of course. Only the teddy bear, the same one Iris had lent me for the first few nights so I wouldn’t be afraid, but I returned to her when one of the kids laughed at me. He was there, on the pillow, disembowelled: his stomach was open as if he’d had an operation and a green stuffing was showing.

  I breathed in again and knelt down to check if there was someone underneath the bed: there was only dust. And suddenly I was also annoyed with Iris, li
ke everyone. Why did she do these things? Run away, disobey. That summer her mother was scolding her every minute: for not eating, for answering back, for not studying, for continually pestering her sister Inés. If she’d run away again while she was being punished, Uncle Fèlix was going to be really angry. I remember for a moment I thought of telling him, but I told myself that wouldn’t be good: we were friends, Iris and I, and in spite of her being older than me she never minded playing with me. Then I spotted the window and thought maybe she had gone down to the patio at first light, like I had, while everyone was asleep. It was hard, but I managed to move the metal latch which held the wood in place. It was already day. Before my eyes the wood rose, lines of very tall trees reaching up the slopes of the mountains. By day it didn’t scare me; it was even pretty, with different shades of green. I didn’t see anyone on the patio and I was already closing the window when it occurred to me to look in the direction of the swimming pool. I could only see a little piece, so I leaned a little further out to have a wider view. I remember as if it were right now the happiness I felt on seeing her: that intense, childhood happiness that soars with things as simple as an icecream or a visit to a fairground. Iris was there, in the water. She hadn’t run away, she’d just gone for a swim! I had to stop myself shouting and I limited myself to waving to get her attention, although I realized it was silly since from where she was she couldn’t see me. I’d have to wait until she got to the opposite side of the pool, the part where the water was shallower, where the little kids swam and those not daring to get in at the deep end.

  And now, years later, thinking of all this, reliving every detail of that early morning, the same cold astonishment as then overcomes me. Because barely seconds later, I realized that Iris wasn’t moving, that she was still in the water, as if she was playing dead but the reverse. I know suddenly I didn’t care if they heard me and I ran down to the pool, but I didn’t dare go into the water. Even at six years old I knew Iris had drowned. And then I saw the dolls: they were floating, face down, like little dead Irises.