David Monnery - Days of the Dead

‘Macho to macho,’ Docherty murmured.

Rosa rolled her eyes in exasperation.

‘We should at least talk to Gustavo,’ Isabel interjected.

It was Docherty’s turn to look at her. The word ‘Mexico’ had taken him back to a buried chapter of his own life, one that came before Isabel. ‘OK,’ he said quietly. ‘But no promises.’ He knew Isabel still had nightmares about her time in the Naval Mechanical School – he had been shot into wakefulness on enough occasions by her sudden screams – and if it looked like this was going to upset her, there was no way he was touching it.

But there was always the chance it might have the opposite effect, he realized. Maybe something like this would help Isabel to finally exorcize her past.

He was probably grasping at straws, rationalizing his own desire to see Mexico again. Or even worse, just grabbing at any excuse to leave the cursed word processor behind.

The following morning, once Rosa had rung to make certain that Gustavo was well enough to receive them, Isabel and Docherty took the long drive across the city to the Macíases’ house in Devoto. ‘House’ was actually something of a misnomer – ‘mansion’ would have been a better choice. There was obviously quite a lot left for the daughters to inherit.

Eva Macías, a handsome, white-haired woman in her seventies, greeted them and led them out to the conservatory, where her husband was soaking up the tropical humidity, rather like General Sternwood in the opening chapter of Chandler’s The Big Sleep . The General had also wanted to know the fate of a missing young man, though in his case the man in question was assumed to be still in the land of the living.

Gustavo Macías was obviously not long for this world himself, but there was still life in the eyes and in the force with which he clenched his gnarled hands. It had taken him a year and a half, he told them, but he now had two names. Major Lazaro Toscono had supervised the operations of the arrest squads in Rosario for all of 1976 and most of 1977. Colonel Angel Bazua had commanded the Army base just outside the city, which served as both detention centre and place of executions, from late 1975 to mid-1978.

Bazua was two years into a five-year prison term for drug trafficking, and would probably be impossible to reach, but Toscono was now an ostensibly legitimate businessman in Mexico City. His business was doubtless a front, but there was nothing to stop anyone knocking on his office door, and Docherty could name his price for doing so. ‘Just go and see him,’ the old man said. ‘Ask him about my son. He will remember. They always remember the names, because they know no other way of telling people apart.’

Docherty looked at Isabel, then at Macías. ‘He may just refuse to speak to me, and you will have paid my fare for nothing.’

‘When I started this,’ the old man said, ‘I put half my wealth to one side for Eva – more than she could ever spend. Now money means nothing to me. I will pay you twenty thousand US dollars to make the journey, a hundred thousand if you bring me back the answer. And, of course, any expenses you incur. If you need more, just tell me.’

Docherty was silent for a moment. They didn’t exactly need the money, but twenty thousand dollars would certainly come in handy, and all he had to do was travel to a country already etched deep in his heart and ask someone for a consequence-free conversation. It seemed a no-brainer, but…

‘He’ll go,’ Isabel answered for him.

Docherty shrugged his acquiescence.

In the car outside, still sweating from their immersion in the conservatory steam bath, Docherty and Isabel sat in silence for a few moments. The quiet street, with its luxurious mansions, perfectly coiffured lawns and ornamental palms, seemed far removed from torture chambers and mass graves, but both knew it for the illusion it was. The torturers might have come from all sections of Argentinian society, but the men who had delivered up their victims had come from streets like this one.

‘You’re not doing this for my sake, are you?’ Isabel asked.

‘No. And if this is going to be hard for you I won’t do it. We don’t need the money that much.’

‘I know.’ She sighed. ‘Sometimes it seems so long ago,’ she murmured. And sometimes it seems like yesterday, she thought.

‘Some wounds take a long time to heal.’

She grimaced. ‘I’ll be fine. As long as you look after yourself. You’re not in the SAS now. If this pig Toscono refuses to talk to you, that’s it.’

‘As long as he refuses nicely,’ Docherty said with a grin.

She wasn’t amused. ‘We need you back.’

‘Aye,’ he said, leaning across and cradling her head in his arms. ‘I love you too.’

The 727 from Cartagena touched down in Miami in the middle of the afternoon. Her parents had acquaintances in the city who would happily put her up, but the thought of explaining the reason for her visit to strangers was too daunting, and Carmen had already decided to ignore the list of telephone numbers her mother had written out. The money her father had given her would probably be enough for several nights in a cheap hotel, and if not she had a little of her own to fall back on.

Her parents would be appalled, of course. Carmen knew they hadn’t really wanted her to come, though she was far from sure why. They had said they were worried for her – that losing one daughter was bad enough – but they obviously hadn’t been worried enough to accompany her. It was hard to believe that they weren’t desperate to know what had happened to their other daughter, but…Carmen shook her head and turned her attention to the business of disembarkation. She had come. Her parents’ feelings – or lack of them – were neither here nor there.

She had changed planes in Miami on all of her three trips to the United States, but the airport had never seemed quite so vast before. Immigration and Customs seemed to take for ever – no doubt flights from Colombia merited special attention. She had half expected the humiliation of a strip-search, but the officials were obviously as tired of the queue as its occupants and she was asked only a few cursory questions, her bag not even opened. With the aid of her guidebook she sought out the elevated Metrorail station just in time to catch an inbound train, and sat watching the sunlight reflect on the looming clutch of windowed towers which marked the city’s downtown.

Beneath these towers she had a glimpse of an older and more elegant Miami, but it was getting dark and she had no time to explore. A local woman helped her find the right bus stop for Miami Beach, and when the bus arrived she was amused to see an English-speaking passenger trying, and failing, to communicate with the Spanish-speaking driver. It was like her friend Miguel had said: Florida, California and Texas had been taken from Spain by the gringos, and now the gringos were having to give them back.

The bus drove east across a long causeway, giving Carmen her first views of the Miami which Miami Vice had made famous, and sooner than she expected they were driving up through the faded pastel splendours of Miami Beach. She had picked three hotels out of the guidebook, and struck lucky at the first attempt, finding a room that was clean, spacious and cheaper than the book had led her to expect. She showered, changed and sat on the bed, rereading the copy of the report which the Miami police had faxed to Cartagena, and which the local police chief had passed on to her father. The only new fact it contained was the name of the Miami Beach lieutenant in charge of the investigation, and she had an appointment with him the following morning.

There was a small balcony to the room, and she stood out on it for a few minutes, looking down at the busy street, her nose twitching to the aromas of cooking food. She was hungry, she realized, and ten minutes later she was ordering Orange Chicken in a Chinese restaurant recommended by the hotel receptionist. After eating she walked down to the beach, but in the darkness it looked more scary than inviting, so she made her way back to the hotel. She flicked through channels on the TV for a while but then decided it was time for bed, despite the earliness of the hour. She was exhausted, and with any luck tomorrow would turn into a big day.