Antonio Hill - The Summer of Dead Toys

“It’s over,” she said out loud. She couldn’t take it any more. She wasn’t giving any more of herself. Maybe the best thing was to report the finding of the body with all the consequences and for Héctor to submit to the appropriate investigation. She’d done all she could. . She took a few minutes before making the call that would set the whole process in motion, while she considered how to cover up her act, unprofessional from any perspective. She set the Omar papers aside and while she meditated on her own situation, she opened the file of battered women who had registered for the self-defense course she would be teaching in the autumn. If she wasn’t put on checkpoints when all this came out, she thought. She went on leafing through pages, looking at photos. Unfortunately they couldn’t accept them all, although she made an effort to take the maximum number of pre-registered women. Then some always dropped out, whether because they didn’t feel able or they’d resigned themselves to putting up with these bastards. Poor women, she thought once again. Those who didn’t deal with them didn’t have a clue of the terror they were subjected to. They were all ages, from a variety of backgrounds, different nationalities, but they all had fear, shame, distrust written on their faces.

She stopped at the photo of a woman she instantly recognized. It was Rosa, no doubt about it. María del Rosario Álvarez, according to the form. Finding her there didn’t surprise Marina all that much: Rosa had spoken of a husband she feared. She remembered her words in the park, her desperate plea to remain anonymous. Rosa must have forgiven her husband, since the report of assault was from February. But then another name caught the sergeant’s eye. A name that chilled and unnerved her at once. The lawyer who’d represented Rosa was Damián Fernández, the same person who defended Omar’s interests.

She had to force herself to stay calm, to think about this unexpected connection with a tranquillity which had abandoned her hours earlier. She went back to Omar’s file, but this time she studied it from a radically different perspective. Who had seen Omar on Tuesday? Rosa. Who had positively identified Héctor? Rosa. Only her, because an Argentine accent, the butcher’s contribution, was easily imitated. Other than this woman’s word, there was no proof that Omar was safe and sound on Tuesday evening. If this testimony was discounted, what was left? Damián Fernández’s statement, which said he’d met Omar on Monday. And that was probably true. That Monday, the lawyer had gone to see his client, not to present the deal offered by Savall but to beat him. Yes, to beat him and steal the money he definitely had hidden in some corner of that fucking house! And then. . then he’d calmly brought the badly injured body, in the middle of the night, to the empty flat, taking advantage of the fact that Héctor wasn’t returning until the following day. The strange feeling she had had leaving the keys in Carmen’s house, that game with all the keys of the building that the woman barely used, came back to her forcefully. She didn’t know how Damián Fernández managed to get them, but she was sure he had. Keys he’d copied and used as he pleased, entering Héctor’s house when he wasn’t there, and the empty flat to imprison Omar’s body and record his death. Even Carmen’s assault fitted now. She must have surprised him at some point, probably while he was leaving the latest bits of evidence in Salgado’s home, and he’d had no choice but to split her head and bring her down to the first floor. And, amidst all this, his accomplice Rosa had called her and played her part to perfection, putting Héctor at the scene.

Excited, with adrenalin pumping through her body, Martina Andreu knew that she didn’t yet have all the answers, but she did have many questions to put to Rosa and Damián Fernández. And she didn’t plan to wait until the next day to start asking them.

Héctor listened, somewhat astonished and overwhelmed, to the tale that a sergeant seemingly possessed by an inexhaustible energy was telling him at four in the morning.

“We have them, Héctor! Maybe it would have been more difficult if we hadn’t caught them in bed together in his house. Fernández was a tough nut to crack, but she went to pieces straight away. She told us everything, although obviously she denies knowing anything about the murder. And when we put Rosa’s confession before him, he couldn’t keep putting on an innocent face.”

“Robbery was the motive?” After thinking about curses and dark rites, the explanation almost disappointed him.

“Well, a relatively meaty robbery for two wretches like Fernández and Rosa. We found more than a hundred thousand euros in the lawyer’s house, which no doubt were stolen from Omar’s office.”

“How the hell did he get my house keys?”

“He didn’t open his mouth, but Rosa told us when we leaned on her a little. He boasted to her, saying he’d passed himself off as an air-conditioning salesman. Poor Carmen showed him the house, had a nice long chat with him, and he took advantage of a moment of distraction to take those keys. He arranged a second visit for the following day and returned the originals.”

She lowered her voice.

“He was spying on you the whole time, Héctor. He took advantage of your movements to go into your house and leave those discs.”

“He did that too?”

Andreu frowned.

“It’s strange. He recorded you beating Omar with the camera in his clinic and they were thinking of presenting it as evidence against you, so it occurred to him to use it to back up the other one, the one showing the doctor’s death. With regard to your ex. . I don’t know what to think. Fernández says he found it among Omar’s recordings.” Andreu paused. “He added something about the doctor having been preparing something in the days before his death, one of his rituals.”

“Against me?”

“It doesn’t matter now, Héctor. He’s dead. Forget all this. Just think that we have enough proof to charge them both. And to exonerate you. .”

There was a brief silence, charged with complicity, with gratitude. With friendship.

“I don’t know how to thank you. Really.” It was true.

She raised her hand to her brow. The long night was catching up with her.

“Don’t worry, I’ll think of something. It’s late. . or early,” she added, with a smile. “What are you going to do? Go home?”

“I suppose I’ll have to go back tomorrow. But for tonight I’d prefer to sleep in my office, believe me. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

That night Héctor didn’t sleep at all: he stayed awake, asking questions and setting out interrogations. It also helped, he knew deep down, to drive the memory of Leire Castro’s laugh out of his mind.

The airport was a seething mass of tourists pushing trolleys and suitcases on wheels. Some turned their heads for a last glimpse of that sun that had accompanied them, bronzed and hot on the beach and in front of the Pedrera; a star which, once they arrived at their northern destinations, would have disappeared or at best would appear timidly from behind a mass of clouds. Others moved toward the exits with excitement etched on their faces, although they stopped just after going through them and leaving behind the air-conditioned new terminal, with floors like black mirrors, to receive the first shock of heat.

Leire had picked Héctor up at his house, at his request. She had been surprised to receive his call, since they’d arranged that she would go to the airport alone to search for Inés. Having gone to his house first thing-just as long as was necessary to shower and change his clothes-he seemed to be in an excellent mood. The shadows under his eyes were still there, no doubt about that, but the spirit had changed. She hadn’t slept much herself, and the bout of nausea that morning had been the worst yet. Worse than an awful Sunday hangover.