Antonio Hill - The Good Suicides

“But it wasn’t just that … I mean he didn’t just come to talk about work. He was … How can I put this? Upset.”

“And remorseful as well, no?”

Octavi sighed slowly, as if there were still smoke in his mouth.

“I calmed him down as much as I could. I also assured him he was prepared for the job. That he deserved it … I don’t know if I convinced him, although he gave me the impression that he left a little calmer. Then, barely a week later, I heard about what he’d done. I suppose he was weaker than we thought.” He paused and asked again: “Did you really think the Gaspar tragedy would be the end?”

“Maybe I was kidding myself.” César slowly shook his head. “What I never thought for a moment was that it would affect the others so badly. Sara, for example.”

“We agree on that. And maybe-I only say maybe-it will end here.” Octavi Pujades leaned forward and lowered his voice. “César, the worst thing we can do is panic. Up to now, yes, there have been two suicides. A young man who lost his head and killed his family, and a sad secretary who was fed up of being alone. That’s what I think, and what everyone will think. Both of them working for the same company is simply a coincidence. At least neither of them revealed anything.”

“That’s what Sílvia says. But what about the photo?”

“That’s another matter. Only one of us could have taken that photo. That is, you, Sílvia, Amanda, Brais, Manel or I, of course. Do you remember who was carrying a camera that day?”

“Not me. Sílvia, I think. And Sara too. I’d say almost everyone. Also you can take photos like that on cell phones.”

Octavi nodded.

“Of course. I hadn’t thought of that. I show my age in these things … The photo. And that command: ‘Never forget.’ ”

“Have you forgotten?” asked César. “Because I haven’t. For a few months, yes. Not that I totally forgot, of course, but … it faded. Like those confessions that come out when you’re drunk. With time, they lose importance, and in the end, they’re forgotten.”

Octavi smiled and took another cigarette.

“I’m not sure that’s a good example, César.”

“I suppose not … Though it doesn’t matter. It’s not what I came to discuss with you. We have to work out a plan.”

“Sílvia told me on the phone you’re meeting tomorrow, just as Arjona proposed in his email. I don’t think I can attend, but I’ll agree with whatever the majority decides.”

“That’s why I came to see you. Sílvia is in favor of continuing as we are, and the truth is I couldn’t care less about what the others think. Even Arjona, not because he’s an idiot, but because I don’t trust him an inch. I really want to know what you think.” He said it sincerely, almost begging.

Octavi Pujades slowly exhaled smoke. César seemed to hear a groan proceeding from the depths of the house.

“It’s half past eight. In a moment I’ll have to give her morphine. It’s all I can do for her: alleviate the suffering.” His tone changed and he looked César in the eyes. “I don’t know if I have a very clear-cut opinion on what should be done. What I do know is panicking won’t help at all. That must be made clear. And, César … if I were you, I’d trust no one. No one,” he repeated.

“Speak to his mother,” his landlady Carmen had said that same morning as they had breakfast together. Héctor Salgado trusted this woman’s instinct more than all the police reports written up by conscientious experts. “Think about it-she was his mother, but she was also a grandmother. She had to know if her son was capable of something so horrible.”

Héctor disagreed. He was certain that maternal affection could cause a kind of permanent blindness to filial defects. That it wasn’t the case with Carmen, who recognized that her Carlos was a layabout who out of sheer laziness didn’t get into deeper trouble, didn’t mean that the same applied in general terms. Even so, there was reason in her argument: Gaspar Ródenas’s mother was grandmother to Alba, whom officially he had smothered with a pillow while she slept the same night he shot his wife dead. All before shooting himself.

The police reports left little doubt about how the events had unfolded, although they contributed few certainties as to why. That’s if a thing like that could be explained in a rational manner, something Inspector Salgado tended not to believe. The how, the sequence of events that led to the killing of the family, seemed clear. Halfway through the month of July, Gaspar Ródenas bought a pistol. Héctor’s colleagues in the domestic violence unit had followed this lead with relative ease to the seller, a small-time thief who dabbled in gun-running from time to time. There was no proof of whether Gaspar informed his wife or not. All Susana Cuevas’s family lived in Valencia, and although they had spent some of the holidays together, the daughter visiting from Barcelona hadn’t mentioned it. This isn’t the States, thought Héctor. Here people don’t usually have pistols at home to protect themselves, much less a young couple with a little girl, living in an apartment in Clot, where the chances of this weapon being useful were nil.

So it was more logical to assume that Gaspar hid the purchase of the pistol from his wife. According to the report, her family had thrown little light on the case. They were so devastated by the tragedy they could barely speak. They simply said that Susana was very happy with her daughter, Gaspar had been promoted recently and to all appearances at least they were getting on well. It was clear that the family’s attention had focused on the little girl, whom they saw very seldom. “He must have gone mad,” Susana’s elder sister, who had been with them in Valencia, had said. “Su told me he was a bit stressed about the new job. But it was just a comment and she said herself it was ‘a question of time’ and he’d get used to it.”

No one kills their family just because of a problem with stress at work, Héctor said to himself. He was sure about that. In any case, continuing the chain of events, on the evening of September 4 Gaspar Ródenas had arrived home around 19:45. A neighbor passed him on the stairs and, as usual, they greeted each other. The building where Gaspar and his family lived was made up of only six apartments, two doors on three stories; the Ródenas lived on the first floor. A lady in her eighties, rather hard of hearing, lived on the same floor and the apartment above, until then occupied by a family of “darkies” according to the same neighbor, had been empty since they returned to their own country. The other neighbors were on holiday. The man who had passed him that night from the right-hand apartment, second floor, thought he’d heard noises in the middle of the night but hadn’t for a moment suspected they were shots.

The person who found them was Gaspar’s sister, María del Mar Ródenas, who went to see her niece on Saturday at noon, just as they’d arranged. “Gaspar wasn’t answering his phone, but as I’d promised them I would come, I went anyway. I thought they were busy with the little one … And, well, the fact is Susana never picked up when we called. But when I arrived and they didn’t answer the bell or their cell phones it did seem strange. To be honest, I was a bit annoyed. I work almost every Saturday, at the Hipercor in Cornellà, and Gaspar knew I was looking forward to having lunch with the little one on the one Saturday I was free each month.” María del Mar returned home, it must be assumed pretty pissed off, given that it was at least a forty-five-minute journey by metro from L’Hospitalet, where she was still living with her parents, to Clot. She kept calling all afternoon and finally, seeing that her brother was still not responding to her messages, she took the set of keys Gaspar had left at her house and returned to the apartment. “I’d never done that, gone in when they weren’t there. And I was sure Susana wouldn’t like it, but I didn’t care. Something wasn’t right … I just wanted to reassure myself that nothing had happened.”