Robert Wilson - The Ignoranceof Blood

'So there's a clear motive in every case.'

'Except Calderon,' said Falcon.

'He was beating her, that was clear, and he's never denied it,' said Zorrita. 'If he didn't kill her, then why didn't he just call the police when he discovered her dead body in their apartment? Why did he try to dispose of her body in the river?'

'He made a serious error of judgement.'

'You're telling me.'

'Another angle,' said Falcon. 'What was the worst thing that could have happened to our investigation of the Seville bombing?'

'I agree, losing Calderon at that stage was a disaster for you.'

'He was at the top of his game,' said Falcon. 'Giving good direction. Keeping the media away from my squad, the counter-terrorism guys and the CNI. If you were at the zenith of your career, would you choose that moment to murder your wife?'

'He chose that moment to start abusing her.'

'And that was important.'

'Why?'

'Because I think that when Marisa Moreno saw Ines in the Murillo Gardens she noticed somehow that she was being abused,' said Falcon. 'I've just been speaking to her, getting her family background. Her natural mother "disappeared" in Cuba. Her attitude to her dead father was not exactly respectful. He was, like Calderon, an inveterate womanizer. She had more time for her Sevillana stepmother than she did for him.'

'This isn't going to stand up anywhere near a court, Javier.'

'I know; all I'm trying to do here is find weaknesses. The only killing about which there's a very slight doubt in my mind is that of Ines.'

'But not in my mind, Javier.'

'Two hours after I'd been to see Marisa this afternoon I got an anonymous phone call telling me to keep my nose out of things that were not my concern.'

'It wasn't from me,' said Zorrita, deadpan.

They laughed.

'What else did Marisa tell you?' asked Zorrita. 'You must have something more than that.'

'I decided to go to see Marisa to ram a stick in the wasps' nest, to see what happened,' said Falcon. 'The only thing I had to go on was something one of my officers found while trying to dig up some dirt on her.'

'Marisa had no criminal record, I know that,' said Zorrita.

'The only thing my officer found was that Marisa had reported her sister missing.'

'When?'

'Eight years ago.'

'You really are clutching at straws, Javier.'

Falcon was tempted to tell Zorrita about Marisa's wood carving, but another glance at the family photo on the desktop persuaded him otherwise. He felt weak in front of Zorrita's steadiness, but still resisted the temptation to point up all the other little flaws he'd found.

'Marisa is no fool,' said Falcon. 'If you despised your womanizing father, would you be drawn to an incorrigible womanizer yourself?'

'I doubt it would be the first time it had happened,' said Zorrita, still feeling as solid as a rock.

'Her sister went missing again, but this time she was over eighteen.'

'So Marisa didn't go to the police.'

'Her sister is the only family Marisa's got. Father, mother and stepmother are dead. Would you just shrug your shoulders if your sister ran off again?'

'If I didn't care, yes,' said Zorrita.

'She cares,' said Falcon.

'You've still got a long way to go with this, Javier.'

'I know,' said Falcon. 'I just wanted to ask you if you'd mind me digging around.'

'Dig away, Javier. The way you're going, you'll come out in Buenos Aires.'

La Latina district, Madrid – Friday, 15th September 2006,19.45 hrs

The early-evening sun was still bright, but low in the sky so it was already dark in the cavernous Madrid streets. Falcon was sitting in the back of a patrol car, which Zorrita had arranged for him. He felt foolish as they left the Jefatura and he lay down across the back seat. The driver saw him out of the corner of his eye. Falcon told him to keep looking straight ahead.

The driver dropped him off at the Opera metro station and Falcon took the one-stop ride to La Latina. He checked the other occupants of the metro carriage. He was still smarting at Zorrita's scorn for his theory on Marisa Moreno. Was all this getting out of control in his mind? Everything looked dangerously plausible at three in the morning, but laughable by ten. And did he really have to be this careful about his assignation with Yacoub? Were there actually people on every street corner looking out for him? Once your mind had been proven unstable there was always a doubt, and not just to outsiders.

A car went into the garage of the apartment block on Calle Alfonso VI and Falcon ducked in behind it as the door was closing. He walked down into the dark, took the lift up to the third floor, stepped out into an empty landing, rang the buzzer and waited. He sensed the eyeball on the other side of the peep-hole. The door clicked open. Yacoub beckoned him in. They went through the customary pleasantries; Falcon asked after Yacoub's wife, Yousra, and his two children, Abdullah and Leila. There was nodding and thanks, but Yacoub was strangely subdued.

A full ashtray was the centrepiece of the living room, with a smoking, filterless cigarette on its edge. The curtains were drawn. A single lamp in the corner half-lit the room. Yacoub was wearing faded jeans and a white shirt untucked. He was barefoot and he'd shaved his long hair off to a short stubble, which he kept dusting with the palm of his hand as if he'd only just had it done. His head now matched his beard. His eyes seemed deeper set and darker, as if some wariness had put him in retreat to a safer place. He sat on the sofa with the ashtray at his side and smoked enthusiastically, with lips that twitched more than Falcon remembered.

'I made some tea,' he said. 'You're all right with tea, aren't you?'

'You always ask me that,' said Falcon, throwing off his jacket, rolling up his shirt sleeves. 'You know I'm fine with tea.'

'Sorry about the heat,' said Yacoub. 'I don't want to turn on the air-con. I shouldn't be here. I'm hiding.'

'Who from?'

'Everybody. My people. Your people. The world,' he said, and, as an afterthought, 'Maybe myself, too.'

He poured the tea, stood up, paced around the room to bring his nerves back under control.

'So, nobody knows about this meeting,' said Falcon, encouraging Yacoub to open up.

'This is just you and me,' said Yacoub. 'The only man I can trust. The only one I can talk to. The only one I can rely on not to use what has happened against me.'

'You're nervous. I can see that.'

'Nervous,' he said, nodding. 'That's why I like you, Javier. You keep me calm. I'm not just nervous. I'm paranoid. I'm totally fucking paranoid.'

These last words were accompanied by a ferocious sideways slash of the air in front of him. Falcon tried to remember whether he'd ever heard Yacoub swear.

Yacoub then launched himself into a long rant about the lengths to which he'd had to go in order to arrive unseen in this apartment.

'You were careful, weren't you, Javier?' he said at the end of it all.

Falcon reciprocated with his own procedure, which seemed to have a mildly calming influence on Yacoub, who listened and gnawed at a hangnail. Then he lit another cigarette, sipped his tea, which was too hot, sat down on the sofa, and stood up again.

'The last time you got like this was after those four days in Paris,' said Falcon. 'But you were OK. You were taken back into the fold.'

'My cover's not blown,' said Yacoub, quickly. 'No, there's no problem with that. It's just that they've found the perfect way to keep me… close.'

'Keep you close?' said Falcon. 'You mean in the sense of not straying? Does that mean they suspect you?'

'Suspect is too strong a word,' said Yacoub, tucking his hand under his armpit and chopping the air with his cigarette. 'They like me. They need me. But they are naturally unsure of me. It's the part of my brain that isn't Moroccan that makes them nervous.'