Mario Llosa - Who Killed Palomino Molero?

The base commander agreed, and Lituma could see the effort he was making to keep his temper in check.

“You may not know it, but until three months ago I was commander-in-chief of the Piura Air Force Base. I served there for two years. I know everything there is to know about the base, because it was my home. Nobody but nobody is going to say in front of me that a common airman is carryrng on an illicit affair with, the wife of one of my officers unless he can prove it.”

“I never said it was an officer’s wife,” Lituma dared blurt out. “It could have been a maid, like the lieutenant said. There are maids on the base, aren’t there? Molero would sneak over to give serenades, and that we know for a fact. Colonel.”

“Okay. Find the maid, question her, question her husband about these supposed threats to Molero, and if he confesses, bring him here to me.” The colonel’s forehead was shining with sweat which had begun to pour out of him when his daughter burst into the office. “Don’t come back here about this thing unless there’s something concrete you want from me.”

Abruptly he stood up, signaling that the interview was over. But Lituma noticed that Lieutenant Silva did not salute or request permission to withdraw.

“We do want something concrete from you, Colonel. We would like to question Palomino Molero’s messmates.”

From bright red, the base commander’s face turned pale again. Purple shadows surrounded his beady eyes. “Aside from being a son of a bitch, he’s loony,” thought Lituma. “Why did he get like this? Where do these fits come from?”

“I’m going to explain it to you once again, Lieutenant, since it seems you haven’t understood a word I’ve said. The Armed Forces have certain rights, they have their own courts where members of the Armed Forces are tried and sentenced. Didn’t they teach you about that in the Guardia Civil Academy? No? Well, allow me to do it now. When a criminal problem involving a member of the Armed Forces arises, they themselves carry out the investigation. Palomino Molero died under circumstances as yet unresolved, off the base, when he had been declared a deserter. I have already sent the proper report on to my superiors. If they deem it necessary, I will order a new investigation, using our own agencies. Or my superiors may decide to refer the case to the Judge Advocate’s section. But until a direct order comes, either from the Air Ministry or the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, no Guardia Civil is going to violate the code of military justice in a base under my command. Is that clear, Lieutenant Silva? Answer me. Is that clear?”

“Quite clear, Colonel.”

The colonel waved toward the door with a gesture that was final. “Then you may withdraw.”

This time Lituma watched Lieutenant Silva click his heels and request permission to leave. He did the same and they both left. Outside, they pulled on their caps. Even though the sun beat down even harder than when they arrived and the air was even more oppressive than it had been in the office, Lituma felt refreshed and liberated out in the open air. He breathed deeply. It was like getting out of jail, goddamn it. In silence, they crossed the various squares that led back to the guard post. Did Lieutenant Silva feel as browbeaten and ill-treated as he did at the way the base commander had dealt with them?

As they left the base, they suffered yet another setback: Don Jerónimo had left them behind. The only way back to town was on foot: an hour’s walk-at least-sweating bullets and swallowing dust.

They started walking down the center of the highway, still in silence. “After lunch, I’m going to take a three-hour siesta.” Lituma had an unlimited capacity for sleep, at any time and in any position, and nothing cured him of the blues like a good snooze. The highway snaked around slowly, descending toward Talara through an ocher landscape devoid of green and littered with rocks and stones of all shapes and sizes. The town was a livid metallic stain below them, stretched along a motionless lead-green sea. In the intense glare they could barely make out the outlines of houses and telephone poles.

“He really put us through the ringer, didn’t he, Lieutenant?” Lituma dried his brow with a handkerchief. “I’ve never met a guy with a worse temper. Do you think he hates the Guardia Civil just because he’s a racist, or do you think he has a specific reason? Or does he treat everybody that way? Nobody, I swear, ever made me swallow so much shit as that bald bastard.”

“You’re out of your head, Lituma. As far as I’m concerned, the interview with Mindreau was a total success.”

“Are you serious, Lieutenant? I’m glad to see you can still make jokes. As far as I’m concerned, that little chat was as depressing as it could be.”

“You’ve got a lot to learn about this business, Lituma,” said the lieutenant, laughing. “It was a bitch of an interview, let me tell you. Unbelievably useful.”

“That means I didn’t understand a thing, Lieutenant. It looked to me as though the colonel was treating us like scum, worse than the way be probably treats his servants. Did he even give us what we asked for?”

“Appearances are tricky, Lituma.” Lieutenant Silva once again burst into laughter. “As far as I’m concerned, the colonel yakked like a drunken parrot.”

He laughed again, with his mouth wide open. Then he cracked his knuckles. “Before, I thought he knew nothing, that he was fucking around with us because he wanted to protect the precious rights of the military-justice system. Now I’m sure that he knows a lot, maybe everything that happened.”

Lituma looked at him again. He guessed that behind those sunglasses the lieutenant’s eyes, like his face and his voice, were those of a happy man.

“You think he knows who killed Palomino Molero? Do you really think the colonel knows?”

“I don’t know exactly what he knows, but he knows a lot. He’s covering for someone. Why would he get so jumpy if he weren’t? Didn’t you see that? You’re not very observant, Lituma. You really shouldn’t be on the force. Those fits, that bullshit: what do you think it was all about? Pretexts to cover up his nervousness. That’s the truth, Lituma. He didn’t make us shit in our pants; we made him go through hell.”

He laughed, happy as a lark, and he was still laughing a moment later when they heard a motor. It was a pickup truck painted Air Force blue. The driver stopped even though they hadn’t flagged him down.

“Goin’ to Talara?” a young warrant officer greeted them. “Hop in, we’ll take you. You sit up here with me. Lieutenant; your man can sit in the back.”

There were two airmen in the back of the truck who must have been mechanics because they were covered with grease. The truck was full of oil and paint in cans and paintbrushes.

“Well? You going to solve this one, or are you going to cover things up to protect the big guys?” said one of the airmen.

There was rage in his voice.

“We’ll solve it if Colonel Mindreau helps us a little,” answered Lituma. “But the guy treats us like mangy dogs. Is that the way he treats all of you on the base?”

“He’s not so bad. He’s a straight-shooter and he makes the base work like a clock. His daughter’s to blame for his bad temper.”

“She really kicks him around, doesn’t she?”

“She’s ungrateful,” said the other airman. “Colonel Mindreau has been both father and mother to her. His old lady died when the girl was still a baby. He’s brought her up all by himself.”

The truck stopped in front of the station. The lieutenant and Lituma jumped out.

“Lieutenant, if you don’t discover who the murderers are, everyone’s going to think you were bribed by the big shots,” said the warrant officer, pulling away.