Antonio Hill - The Summer of Dead Toys

Leire continued holding Inés. The young woman was sobbing almost silently, as if she were ashamed of it. When Fèlix came in, all eyes were on him. But it was Joana who said in a clear, loud voice:

“You felt relieved when she told you he hadn’t penetrated her? Truly, Fèlix?”

He looked at her without answering.

“You did nothing?” she went on, accusing him in fury. “Nothing? This child told you what this bastard was doing to her and you thought since he hadn’t raped her, none of it mattered? You didn’t report him, even when this little girl drowned herself in the pool?”

Héctor grabbed the pages Inés had left on the table.

“You should read them, Father. And if indeed God does exist, I hope he forgives you.”

Fèlix hung his head. He seemed incapable of defending himself, of saying a single word in his own defense. He didn’t sit down. He remained on foot in front of this improvised tribunal.

“Don’t put all the blame on him,” murmured Inés. She moved softly away from Leire and looked at the priest. “What he did wasn’t right, but he didn’t do it just for himself. He was also protecting me.”

“Inés-”

“No. I’ve spent years with all this. Feeling I was to blame. Thinking myself in debt to Iris, keeping her alive even if only in a symbolic way. . Until last Christmas, when I found these pages and learned the whole story. I showed them to Marc in Dublin and he reacted in the same way you are now. Appalled, enraged, anxious to know the truth. But there’s a part of that truth I didn’t dare tell him. I let him hate his uncle, initiate a plan of revenge against him, to make him confess what he wanted to know.” She took a breath before going on. “When the truth is that, very early that morning, I heard footsteps in the house. I couldn’t sleep in Mama’s bed; she kept moving. I went out to the corridor without making a sound and didn’t see anyone, but I was sure someone had gone downstairs. One of my dolls was on the floor. I picked it up and went down to the garden.”

Iris is sitting at the edge of the pool in a nightdress. Her eyes see only the dolls. She hasn’t slept all night, staring at them intently. They belong to Inés and at this moment she hates them with all her heart. She’s pulled the heads and arms off some of them before tossing them in the water; others she’s submerged as if she could drown them. There’s only one left in her hand, her sister’s favorite, and before throwing it in with the others she contemplates her work, satisfied. The pool has become a pond full of little plastic bodies floating adrift. She doesn’t notice Inés’s presence until she hears her voice.

“What are you doing?”

She laughs like one possessed. Inés bends down and begins taking out the ones floating closest to the edge. The water is freezing, but they are her dolls. She loves them.

“Don’t touch them!”

Iris tries to stop her. She grabs her with all her strength and wrestles her to the ground, but although Inés is smaller, Iris is very weak. Inés tries to free herself from her sister’s arms and they struggle at the edge of the pool, they roll around fighting until they fall into the water. Inés notices how the pressure eases, how the cold penetrates her entire body. She barely manages to come to the surface and paddles like a puppy to the steps. Then she looks back. Iris is emerging from the bottom, like a big dead doll.

“That’s how it was,” Inés finished. “I ran away and hid. Mama found me a little later, with my hair still wet. She hugged me and told me not to worry. That Father Fèlix would take care of everything.” Silence overwhelmed the room. Father Castells had sat down, although he kept his head lowered.

“God,” said Joana. “And Marc?”

“Marc didn’t know anything, Joana,” answered Fèlix. “I took care of that. You can say I did wrong, but I swear that I tried to do the right thing.”

“Oh really?” asked Héctor. “I doubt hiding the abuse of a minor was doing the right thing, Father. You knew the truth. You knew Iris was beside herself and you knew why.”

“And what good would it have done?” shouted Fèlix. He stood up suddenly and his flushed face showed the torment escaping him. “Iris was dead, and this girl wasn’t to blame!” He swallowed and continued, in a quieter but no less tense voice. “I doubted what Iris said. Perhaps I didn’t realize the significance of it. I thought part of it was true and part the fruit of a problematic child’s imagination. But then, when she died, I told myself that bringing all that filth to light would only serve to make this poor little girl face so much. Her mother begged me to protect her. And I opted for the living, Inspector. I confessed the truth to the inspector who took on the case,” he said, not mentioning his name. “I asked him to stop investigating for this little girl’s sake. And he agreed.”

“But you didn’t tell him you were letting a paedophile go free, did you? You just told him about a fight between sisters, an unfortunate accident. And what happened to the monitor?”

“I spoke to him as well.” He knew it didn’t matter, that by this point his excuses were falling on deaf ears, but he continued anyway. “He assured me he’d never do it again, that he would reform, it was just that one time, because-”

“Because Iris was looking for it, right?” Leire intervened.

Fèlix shook his head.

“He was a good boy from a good family. He believed in God and he promised it would never happen again. The Church preaches forgiveness.”

“Justice, Father, preaches something else,” interrupted Héctor. “But you all think you’re above it, isn’t that right?”

“No. . I don’t know.” Fèlix lowered his eyes again. “I said the same thing to Marc when he came to see me after returning from Dublin. He wanted to know that boy’s name. He barely remembered who the camp monitors were, he was only six. And I refused to tell him. I told him to forget the whole matter.”

“But Marc didn’t forget,” continued Héctor. “He said so in his blog: he spoke of means and ends, revenge and justice, truth.”

“I don’t know what he was planning. I didn’t discuss the subject with him again.” He looked at Inés, as if she might have the answer.

“He didn’t give me the details, but it was some plot against you. He didn’t want to tell me what it was.”

Héctor stood in front of Father Castells.

“Well, now the time has come to give this name, don’t you think? The name of the monitor who abused this little girl and is, morally at least, responsible for her death? The name Marc was trying to discover?”

He nodded.

“I hadn’t seen him for a while, but I met him yesterday at the Martís’ house. His name is Eduard. Eduard Rovira.”

“Pigs,” said Leire as she drove toward the Rovira home. “They’re all pigs. I’m sure that the friendship with the Roviras mattered more than what had happened to the cook’s daughter. A good Christian boy from a good family who has made a mistake. .”

Héctor looked at her and couldn’t deny it.

“There was an element of that, I’m sure. And also hurt pride or fear. How could you justify all this happening under your nose without your seeing it? With Iris dead, the most “practical” thing is to bury the matter.”

Leire accelerated.

“I want to catch this fucker.”

They caught him at home. The elder Roviras weren’t there, so it was a surprised Aleix who opened the door to them, thinking they were looking for him.

“I thought it was tomorrow-”

Héctor grabbed him by the collar.

“We’re going to talk then for a little while, you and I. But first we want to chat to your dear brother. Is he in his room?”