Robert Wilson - A Small Death in Lisbon

We went into the open-plan living room with a floor-to-ceiling arched window and the view. We sat around a table scattered with photographs and four coloured mobile phones.

'You know Senhora Teresa Oliveira?' I asked.

He frowned.

'She's the wife of Dr Aquilino Dias Oliveira, a lawyer. They have a house here in Cascais,' I reminded him.

'Yes, I know them.'

'How?'

'I sold him a computer last year.'

'Is that your business?'

'It was then. Now I'm at Expo. I installed most of the equipment there.'

'The stuff that didn't work?' asked Carlos, getting his needle in early.

'We had some teething problems.'

'Made some money though?'

The photographs on the table showed a farmhouse in the Alentejo by the look of the land-the cork trees and olive groves. Another fashion accessory.

'This yours too?' asked Carlos.

He nodded. So did we.

'We understand you became intimate with the lawyer's wife. When did that happen?'

He looked over his shoulder at the bedroom door, open a crack.

'May,' he said. 'I think it was May, last year. I'd like some coffee… would you like some?'

'We won't keep you long,' I said. 'Why did you become intimate with Teresa Oliveira?'

'What sort of a question is that?'

'One of the easier ones,' said Carlos.

He leaned across the table to take us into his confidence.

'She wanted sex. She said the old guy wasn't up to it any more.'

'Where?' asked Carlos.

'In the usual place,' he said, pulling some cockiness together, now that he knew this wasn't a fiscal investigation.

'Geographically.'

He gave Carlos his best false smile.

'In her Lisbon house.'

'Not here?'

'Once or twice when I was home early on a Friday evening she'd come over… but it was mainly in Lisbon. I'd go out on a sales call and drop by her house. That was it.'

'And the daughter,' I said, 'Catarina?'

He looked like a man whose parachute had just failed to open.

'The daughter ?' he said.

'Her name was Catarina.'

Was?'

'That's what I said.'

'Now look, I haven't seen Catarina for… for…'

'Go on… for how long?'

He swallowed hard and put his hand through his styled hair.

'We heard you went to bed with her,' I said. 'When was the last time?'

He slapped his thighs, stood up, shouted something inarticulate and strode across the room gesticulating. Suddenly we were in soap opera.

'Sit down please, Senhor Branco,' I said, getting out of my seat and pointing at his.

He was stunned. The door to the bedroom clicked shut-the girl probably looking for her underwear by now. Paulo Branco sat down and viced his head between his hands, not wanting to hear any more.

'I want a lawyer,' he said.

'You've got the number of one here in Cascais,' said Carlos, enjoying himself too much.

'We're not going to charge you with having sex with an underage girl… or child abuse as it's more commonly known, Senhor Branco,' I said. 'But if you murdered her. That's a different thing. Maybe you should get a lawyer.'

' Me? ' he said, his sunny day suddenly gone very black. 'I didn't kill her. I haven't seen her for… for…'

'When was that last time?'

'Months ago.'

'How did you meet her?'

'In the house in Lisbon.'

'How? Senhor Branco… not where.'

'I came out of the bedroom…'

'Whose bedroom?'

'Her mother's… Teresa's bedroom. She was standing in the corridor.'

'When?'

'It was a lunchtime… June, July last year.'

'What happened?'

'I don't… she had her shoes in her hand. She walked down the stairs. I was leaving. I looked back at her mother and followed her. We met again in the street. She was putting her shoes on.'

'Did she say anything?'

'She told me to be there the next Friday lunchtime.'

'You took that from a fourteen-year-old girl?'

'Fourteen! No, no. That's not possible. She said…'

'Don't waste our time, Paulo,' I said. 'Let's have the rest of it.'

'I turned up the next Friday. Teresa wasn't there. She went to Cascais on Fridays.'

'We know.'

'I had sex with her,' he said, and shrugged.

'In the mother's bed?'

He scratched the side of his head and nodded.

'Anything else?'

'She took five thousand escudos off me.'

'You allowed that?'

'I didn't know what to make of it. I wasn't sure what she could do.'

'Don't give me this shit,' I said. 'You're a grown man compared to her.'

'You didn't even have to turn up,' said Carlos.

He sized us up for the big schoolboy admission.

'We can take it,' I said.

'I got a kick out of it,' he said. 'Having sex with the mother and the daughter in…'

'Big deal,' I said. 'Now how many times did this happen before Teresa found out?'

'Three. She came in on the fourth.'

'Anything unusual about that day?'

His face weakened to a six-year-old's. He giggled with nerves.

'Shit,' he said, and squeezed the bridge of his nose, 'there was something different. That was the first time Catarina seemed to be enjoying it.'

'She didn't put it on all the time?' asked Carlos.

Paulo stared into the table determined not to rise to it.

'She was shouting, and kind of smiling, but not up at me… over my shoulder. I looked round and Teresa was standing by the door.'

'What did Teresa do?'

'I got off the bed. Catarina sat up… didn't even close her legs, just looked at her mother and smiled. Teresa ran at her and smacked her across the face, shit, it was like a rifle shot.'

'Did Catarina say anything?'

'In a baby-girl voice she said, "Sorry, mummy.'"

'And you?'

'I was out of there and down the stairs.'

'You never saw Teresa again.'

'No.'

'And Catarina?'

He glanced back at the bedroom door again and spoke quietly.

'She came round a few times. The last time was… March. Yes, March… a couple of days after my birthday, the seventeenth.'

'She came round for sex?'

'It wasn't conversation.'

'You didn't talk?'

'She walked straight in there and took her clothes off.'

'Do you think she was on drugs?'

'Maybe.' He ducked his head.

'Did she take money from you?'

'Yes, until I hid my wallet.'

'Did that annoy her?'

'She didn't comment.'

'How many times did she come here?'

'Ten, twelve times.'

'And why didn't she come back after the nineteenth of March?'

'She did. I just didn't let her in.'

He nodded back at the bedroom door and we looked over there too.

We left a little after that and sat in the car outside. The girlfriend came out a few minutes after us, taking strides far too long for her legs, her stacked heels wobbling on the calçada. Carlos nodded, satisfied that the girl had seen what he had.

'That guy,' he said, ' novo rico.'

We drove back to the lawyer's house. I had a couple of questions for Teresa but Dr Oliveira wouldn't allow it until she came into the corridor and beckoned us in. She was moving like an old woman and her speech was slow and drifting at the edges.

'The day you found Catarina in bed with Paulo Branco… why did you go back to the house?'

'I don't remember.'

'Weren't you already here?'

'I was.'

'It must have been something important to go all the way back into Lisbon.'

She didn't say anything. I apologized and stood to leave. Her face had sagged. Pouches that hadn't been there before appeared below her eyes.

'I went back,' she said, so tired she could hardly get it out, 'because Catarina called me. She said she'd hurt herself at school.'

The three of us exchanged looks. She held her hands open to show us how life could be.