Thomas Cook - The Crime of Julian Wells

“Vargas was a double agent?” I asked.

“Yes,” Irene said. “Juan was suspicious of this. This is why he puts much pressure on Vargas to prove himself. It is what Juan always did. He works like a thumbscrew, tighter, tighter until his people break. For this reason, Vargas tries to give Juan better and better information.”

Her features suddenly grew tense, as if she were afraid that she was being watched even now.

“But it was never good enough for Juan,” she said. “So he always asks Vargas to prove his loyalty. He threatens to cut off Vargas’s ears, cut out his tongue. This he would do if Vargas does not deliver him the goods. And by this he means people.”

“People?” I asked.

“Juan wanted to scare Vargas into giving up a big-time Montonero. So he makes Vargas like a man in the ocean who sees the shark coming toward him. He does not have time to get out of the water, so he takes some smaller man and puts this man between himself and the shark.” She laughed. “Juan loved this game. He said to me, ‘Vargas will pluck out his own eyes and cut off his ears. He will give me the name of this woman by the time I am finished with him.’”

“Woman?” I asked.

Irene nodded. “A real she-devil, this is what Juan called her. She had kidnapped some children of the junta. She would lure them with little candies. There would be a van, and very quick, they were gone, these kids. She was good at this. She sent them back torn and burned. It was very bad. The eyes gone. More than anyone, the big men at Casa Rosada wanted this woman for what she had done to these children. And it was this woman Juan wished to get from Vargas because it would be a big catch for him, and he would get a big promotion if he found her.”

“How did you happen to know so much about what Ramirez was doing?” Loretta asked.

“He wants me in his bed, so he makes himself a big man to me,” Irene answered. “He tells me everything, his many stories of the spies and agents. He does this more when he has too much wine.” Her eyes squeezed together, as if I were a distant object she was trying to bring into focus. “But he was a clever man, Juan. And when the house was on fire, he got out through a little hole.” Her smile was pure contempt. “He speaks only Spanish, and so he goes to Spain. He sits in the park and talks to the old men of the Falange.” An odd defeat settled over her. “There is always a place for such men.”

She paused like one exhausted by history, then continued with what seemed to be considerable effort, determined to complete her tale. “But enough of this,” she said finally. She waved her hand as if to wipe the whole dark era from her mind. “So, Julian. Your father says to me that you want to know what I say to Julian when he comes to Casa Rosada, no?”

“Yes,” Loretta answered quietly.

“Well, he comes to look for this woman,” Irene said. “Excuse me, please, but I do not remember her name.”

“Marisol,” I told her.

Irene glanced toward Loretta, then turned to me. “Julian comes to Casa Rosada to find this Marisol.” She looked at Loretta. “I am sorry to hear of his death. Such a young man. It is always a tragedy when death comes so soon.” With that, Irene turned her attention back to me. “Your father sends Julian to me, but I know nothing of this girl.”

“You knew nothing at all?” I asked. “I thought you might have given him a picture of Marisol with Emilio Vargas. I found it in his room in Paris.”

The old woman shook her head. “No, I do not give Julian such a picture. I go to Juan. I ask about this girl who has disappeared. I can see he knows this girl, but he tells me nothing.”

“I thought he told you everything,” I said.

“This I also think,” Irene said. “But about this one, he is silent.”

“He said nothing at all?” I asked doubtfully.

“He says to me, ‘Irene, to know about this one, this is not for your ears.’ And he will say nothing more about her. He tells me if this American comes again, to tell him to go home and forget about this girl.”

“So who was she?” Loretta asked. “Marisol.”

Irene shrugged. “This Juan never tells me, but I think she is big fish, because after a while, he is very big man at Casa Rosada.” She smiled. “All of this I would have told Julian when he came here, but he did not ask about this girl.

“Julian came here?” Loretta asked.

“Yes,” Irene answered. “Just for one afternoon. We have cold drinks, and talk of the old days.”

“And during that time, Julian didn’t mention Marisol?” I asked.

“No, nothing of this girl.” She looked oddly puzzled that this was the case. “So, I think maybe he knows already what happened to her.”

My lips parted in dark amazement.

“Knew already?” I asked. “But he couldn’t have known.”

“This is how it seems me, yes,” Irene told me. “That he has no more questions about this girl.”

For the first time, Loretta looked skeptical, though she had perhaps been so all along. But now she made no pretense of believing the old woman’s story.

“Then why did he come here?” she asked.

“He comes here to-how I should say? — to say good-bye,” Irene answered. “He wished to thank me for talking with him back in the old time, when he came to Casa Rosada.” She faced Loretta. “He has much trouble, your brother. There is a heavy weight on him. This I can see. And so I tell him that I know this weight.”

She turned her gaze to an old album that lay on a nearby table. “You can hand this to me, please?” she asked.

I stood, walked over to the table, retrieved the book, and gave it to her.

“There is the bad thing I show to Julian and speak to him about,” she said as she opened the book and began leafing through its ragged pages.

“Ah, here it is,” she said as she motioned Loretta and me to come forward and look at it.

In the photograph, a young woman with a rifle, wearing an Arrow Cross armband, stands beside a priest, staring down at the sprawled bodies of a group of men and women, all of them in civilian clothes.

“That is Father Kun,” she said. “He is a priest, but it is his fantasy to be a soldier. He wears always a gun in his cassock and he lines up the Jews and he draws this gun and he says to us, the ones with rifles, he says, ‘In the name of Christ, FIRE!’” She looked up from the photograph. “And so I did.” She closed the book. “This is my confession, and I tell it to Julian.” She smiled. “He says good-bye. He kisses my hand. He says he goes soon to Rostov.”

“Because that’s where Andrei Chikatilo lived,” I said.

Irene clearly did not recognize the name.

“A Russian serial killer,” I told her.

She shook her head. “Julian says nothing of this killer,” she said. “He is going to Rostov to say also a good-bye to this man from many years before. I know his name from my time in Argentina. He was a Russian agent there.”

“Julian was in contact with a Russian agent while he was in Argentina?” I asked.

“Yes,” Irene said. “This is what he tells to me. He met with this man many times, he says to me. He was a man who knew many secrets from the bad times in Argentina.”

“Who was this Russian?” Loretta asked.

“His name is Mikhail Soborov,” she answered without the slightest hesitation. “Juan had much fear of him.”

“Why?”

She laughed. “Because he is one-as we say here-he is one who knows where the knife is.” She sat back slightly. “Did Julian meet with him in Rostov?”

“I don’t know,” I answered.

Irene shook her head softly and, with that gesture, appeared to slip into some former life. “There was something about Julian that made you wish to speak with him the things you do not speak about with others. When I make my confession to him he tells me that he also has known bad things. He says he is like me.”