The Black Jersey

by Jorge Zepeda Patterson

  Finally, there was the Spaniard, Pablo Medel, from team Baleares, who was completely unpredictable on an ascent. Actually, unpredictable in many ways. Medel is the only cyclist I’ve ever known who carries business cards, as if he were an insurance salesperson. I know because he gave me one. There was a title inscribed under his name: professional cyclist, as if he were afraid of being confused for a ballet dancer despite the racing jerseys he never took off.

  But he was nothing like an insurance salesperson when it came time to get on a bike. He could keep the power going at more than 550 watts for half an hour. Translated into a breakaway on a steep road, that could mean five minutes over a rival in the last few kilometers. And that difference could help him leap to the lead at a decisive stage. Medel was one of the perennial champions when it came to the kinds of short races—three or four days long—that are held the rest of the year, though, to his dismay, his epic efforts in the longer, three-week competitions really took their toll on him. Even so, his DS had managed to contain his strategy, and he was in the top ten, making him a real threat on the mountains that end the Tour.

  When the group reached the day’s finish line without incident, my list was down to four names: Radek the resentful, Matosas the veteran, Paniuk and his powerful team, and Medel and his legendary climbs. I knew the four of them extremely well, especially Medel, with whom I practiced my Spanish and played dominoes during the less demanding races. Except for Radek, I never considered the possibility that any of them could be the criminal we were looking for. But because they were the beneficiaries of the tragedies, their coaches, mechanics, technicians, doctors, and soigneurs became my main suspects.

  As soon as I got off the bike, I realized all this could also be said of Steve. There was one person who was actually more interested in my friend’s triumph than Steve himself. Giraud, our team’s DS, was willing to win at any cost.

  In short, my list was composed of five possible lines of investigation. Three of them were made up of personal threats: If they wanted to be champions, they needed to get rid of Steve, or me, or both of us. On the other hand, Radek’s resentment was like a Russian roulette that could take down anybody. And the last name on the list, Giraud, didn’t present a threat to any member of our team, being Fonar’s directeur sportif. Yet, if I had to pick a villain, part of me preferred that it be somebody in a suit instead of one of my fellow cyclists.

  That night, I couldn’t get away from Steve or from the commissioner. When we were finally done with our post-race routine of stretches, hydration, and massage, we gathered to eat on a terrace on the outskirts of Mûr-de-Bretagne. I was more tired than usual, although it’s true that, as the Tour goes on, you think that same thing every single night. When you finish each stage, you’re convinced you’ve hit rock bottom and that you have no fuel left in your body for the next day. Repeating that routine for three weeks is a challenge that ends up being impossible for about a third of the racers, who abandon the competition before the finish line. And that’s without any killers or saboteurs.

  But that night my fatigue was different. Even though the run had been simple and the cyclists had seen it as a kind of break, I felt as if I’d just crossed the Alps. I chalked the additional exhaustion up to the mission assigned to me by the commissioner. To imagine conspiracies, to inventory suspects and to fear being a victim of a double cross doesn’t exactly make covering 180 kilometers in five hours a stroll in the park.

  So I would have preferred to skip dinner and sneak off to drop into bed back in my room. A room with a shower and not a rusty bathtub, thank God. But I couldn’t stand Steve up for a second night in a row, the commissioner was looking for me so we could talk as we had agreed to, and Fiona was waiting for me in the trailer parked a few meters from our hotel.

  All I had to do was take one look at my teammates’ faces as they arrived at the dining-room table to understand something had happened. Apparently the Tour had released a statement acknowledging Fleming’s suicide, and everyone present, about fifteen total including cyclists and technicians, was whispering about it in trios and pairs. I heard words of praise for our fallen friend’s career, alongside curses because of the mounting calamities. Guido, a Portuguese member of the Fonar team, filed his usual protest against the organizers, as if Fleming’s suicide had been an act of rebellion motivated by the conditions imposed on the racers.

  As soon as Giraud arrived, a silence fell over the room. Steve was two steps behind him. They must have been talking alone before joining the group.

  “Few of you know this, but I was Fleming’s first coach,” Giraud said as he sat down at the head of the table. “It was thirteen years ago, in Liverpool, when I went to give a series of workshops and ended up coaching a semiprofessional team for a few months. He was a natural climber, and I helped him see he needed to leave the island to find mountains to meet his talent.” He was talking as if he had made Fleming, although I knew him well enough to recognize that this was pure performance. Giraud always made everything about himself, including poor Fleming’s life.

  I looked over at Steve’s anguished face and for the first time since I’d known him, I thought I saw a crack in his impregnable optimism. His chin was pressed to his chest, his eyes were wet, and there was a curl to his lip that made me think, also for the first time, that he looked an awful lot like his father.

  “Today we lost a great man,” said Giraud, seeming to take pleasure in his dramatic pauses. “His track record doesn’t include a lot of trips to the podium nor record times, but everyone on the circuit knows the battle for the mountain will never be the same. Fleming didn’t conquer a lot of stages, but he helped forge a lot of conquerors. He never wore the yellow jersey, but without his help, more than one Englishman would not have been able to wear it in Paris. Above all, he won the love and admiration of all of us who had the honor of riding at his side. Let us respect the reason for which he made this terrible decision; let us honor him with a minute of silence and dedicate every single kilometer we overtake on the road tomorrow to him.”

  Giraud managed to move everyone at the table, including a couple of racers who had had bad blood with Fleming; he had never been subtle when it came to blocking his rivals on the road. Steve choked up a little and several racers grabbed napkins to wipe their noses.

  Giraud moved everyone at the table but me. Maybe because I had been ruminating over Fleming’s death for hours, or because I’d found the manipulative sentimentality Giraud used a little shocking. I realized that I was not only unmoved but also irritated, and I soon understood why. What he had just said about Fleming could also be my epitaph. Maybe in three days in a hotel lobby or maybe in twenty years at a cemetery in Perpignan, but the words would be the same. “He never wore the yellow jersey, but without him…”

  We finished eating and went over the strategies for the next day, then broke off into small groups. Steve took my arm and leaned his body on mine as if he were on the verge of fainting.

  “Are you okay?” I asked, alarmed. “Do you feel all right?” I tried to remember if I knew anything about his past that might have brought him particularly close to Fleming but I couldn’t think of a thing. We had always been the Englishman’s heated rivals. Steve’s reaction seemed excessive, even for a colleague who had died in tragic and unexpected conditions. I thought about the commissioner’s words—a sloppy faked suicide—and a terrible idea crossed my mind. All the other incidents had been planned to perfection. It was possible those behind this one hadn’t intended Fleming to die, but had simply wanted to hurt him and force him out of the competition. It was possible the Englishman recognized his attackers and tried to get help and they were forced to kill him. Was this what was tormenting Steve? Was he feeling directly or indirectly responsible for this death? Was this the reason why Giraud had taken him aside? Were they both involved in this?

  “Don’t you realize what’s going on, bro?” Steve respo
nded, a tad exasperated. He stopped me and took hold of my shoulders. “You could be next!”

  “What are you talking about?” I asked. Supposedly only I knew there was a killer among us. How many of us had the commissioner talked to?

  “Giraud has connections in Jitrik’s office. He found out the organization called the police. They’re convinced someone is knocking off the favorites. Cuadrado has no team left and Stark just lost Fleming. They weren’t accidents but premeditated attacks. Now they’ll come for us.”

  “Calm down, nothing’s going to happen, that’s all hearsay, rumors on the circuit. This is a cursed Tour, that’s all. It’s not the first time the race has taken lives.”

  “Sure, on the road, but not at night, not in the hotel rooms and hallways,” he said as he checked out the shadows around us. There was genuine fear in his eyes. In spite of myself, I felt a shiver and turned my body to go back to the terrace from which we had come.

  “But you don’t have anything to worry about. I’ll protect you,” I reminded him while glancing around for one of the thugs who accompanied him wherever he went. A few years back, a million-dollar publicity contract had forced him to accept professional bodyguards, courtesy of a company that protected billionaires and Arab sheikhs when they traveled west.

  “It’s not me who’s in danger,” he protested, impatient. “They didn’t go after Cuadrado or Stark, but after the guys who helped them win. They’re not coming for me; they’re coming for you.”

  I was on the verge of responding when Giraud reappeared; he said something about making an adjustment to Steve’s shoes, since they had been bothering him the past few days. Steve’s body and skull had been scanned in high resolution, and that data had been translated into a sophisticated mannequin on which they designed his racing kit with state-of-the-art materials and technology. But he had so many personal sponsorships, he couldn’t always race with the brands he would have preferred.

  I was grateful for the interruption and looked for the quickest door to the street so I could meet up with Fiona. But the commissioner intercepted me as soon as I stepped onto the sidewalk.

  “So good you’ve come to meet me. Let’s walk for a bit and share notes,” said Favre. He took me by the arm and guided me toward a streetlight that illuminated the sidewalk. We stopped there. I was glad because we cyclists don’t usually take walks between stages. We tend to limit all displacement, and when we move, we move like old people; our routines are designed to hoard the calories our bodies are in the process of recuperating.

  “Do you mind if I sit down?” I said as I squatted and rested my back against the lamppost. The first commandment for any cyclist involved in a three-week race is to conserve energy: If you’re standing, sit down; if you’re sitting, lie down; and get as far away as you can from any stairway.

  A soft sea breeze began to ease the thick heat that had been building all day. Favre squatted beside me, obviously uncomfortable with such an unorthodox arrangement. It seemed the commissioner behaved according to a Hollywood idea of what the police should be. Sitting on the ground in the middle of the sidewalk did not conform to a single cinematic convention.

  “Any news? What kind of reactions did the squad have when they heard about Fleming’s death? Did anything catch your attention, sergeant?”

  “Everything you might expect: regret, amazement, confusion. It had a strong impact, although I didn’t see anything that seemed out of place.” But as I said it, I couldn’t help but picture Steve and his agitation a few moments ago. I wondered if Favre might have seen us from the bushes.

  He looked at me carefully, like he had done the night before, and it was only then I realized he’d managed to engineer it so the light of the lamppost fell directly on my face but left his partially obscured. Not unlike the arrangement during our first conversation in front of the fireplace. Maybe the scene was more orthodox than I had first thought.

  “I understand. I imagine that during the race there are few chances to chat with the other cyclists,” he said. “But what did they say at the Fonar meeting? It had to have been the only topic of conversation, right? Did your DS speak?”

  I felt as if I were being submitted to an interrogation. My face in the spotlight, contrasting with his in shadow, reminded me of a detective novel from the 1950s. Favre was just missing a black fedora.

  “Just the usual condolences,” I said grudgingly. The commissioner noticed my irritation and relaxed his body, apparently trying to activate some other facet of his personality.

  “Do you mind if I smoke? The breeze will disperse it,” he promised. He lit a cigarette and inhaled. “I’m not interested in your testimony, sergeant, but in your ability to observe, to find things out. I would like it if we could have a collegial relationship.”

  “I agree, commissioner, and hope it’ll be that way. I understand what’s at play and I promise to try my hardest, but I should’ve been resting already. If I don’t, I won’t be able to keep up with the group in the next few stages. The day I don’t make the cut, I’ll be eliminated. And, in that case, I won’t be much help. Let me suggest something. Whenever I discover information I think could be useful, I’ll get in touch with you. If I’m going to be undercover, then it’s not a good idea that we should be seen talking.” I thought this last argument would settle the matter once and for all.

  “We traced the money received by the thugs from Marseille. It was deposited in cash and sent from a small bank in Warsaw.”

  I couldn’t help but think about Radek the Pole and his unexpected return to the Tour. The commissioner kept talking, as if he were summarizing the case to his colleagues.

  “There are no unusual movements in the betting circles right now to justify an attack of this nature coming from the outside. That leads me to the conclusion that one of the winners in Paris will surely be guilty or related in some way to whoever is guilty. The problem, sergeant, is that we have to find out who it is now, before there’s another victim.”

  I thought the commissioner’s words had more than a hint of pressure, as if every minute the killer was free was my responsibility. Maybe that wasn’t his intention, but I’m one of those people who feels guilty whenever a police car drives by. So I got defensive: If Favre was light-years ahead of me when it came to criminal investigations, I had to make him see that, when it came to bikes, he was a novice.

  “With all due respect, commissioner, you don’t understand a thing about cycling. You’re concentrating all your energies on the battle for the yellow jersey without realizing there are a hundred and ninety-eight battles on the Tour. Each cyclist is involved in his own war and most of them are willing to die to win it. There are twenty-two teams this year. Each team ranks their members from one to nine, and each and every one of them wants to go up on the scale. Each cyclist wants to bump off the riders ranked higher. The kid who comes to the Tour for the first time knows there are four even younger racers behind him waiting for him to fall, and does the impossible in order to come back the next year. The guy who has been on two Tours and hasn’t finished either understands the next one could be his last. A climber will do what it takes to become the leader next season. And so on. The pressure is incredible, and not just for those on top. Name any racer and I can tell you at least three challenges he’s facing. And we’re not even talking about the competition between teams. So, no, this isn’t just about the final three who step up to the podium after the last stage.”

  I was breathless when I finished, but satisfied. I knew the commissioner’s hypothesis concentrating on the top leaders coincided with my own list of suspects, but I wasn’t going to tell him that. I was a little sick of his barely veiled condescension.

  “Every soccer or basketball player struggles to distinguish himself, but I don’t recall murders in the locker rooms,” he said, now a little defensive too.

  “But that’s precisely what you don’t un
derstand. Cycling isn’t a game. We say Let’s play soccer, or basketball or tennis, but no one says Let’s play cycling, because you don’t play cycling: Cycling is a battle; cycling is combat.” The phrase wasn’t mine, I’d heard some journalist say it, but Favre didn’t need to know that either. “That we’re talked about as a peloton isn’t a coincidence, because we’re a group on the way to war, except this war is among ourselves.” I thought that finish was even better because I assumed it was my own saying. Though I wasn’t entirely sure.

  “Well, then, even more reason to apply ourselves; there are many possible suspects,” he said, but this time without animosity, raising a white flag.

  I nodded silently and thought about my list again. I wasn’t ready to share it, not right then. I decided to take advantage of my small victory. If the commissioner wanted to play at being my colleague, he’d have to offer something in return.

  “You say Fleming’s suicide was faked. How do you know? What evidence do you have?” When Favre looked at me, I thought I caught a glimpse of surprise in his expression. He smoked half a cigarette in silence before he finally decided to answer.

  “They drugged him, maybe during dinner, or with one of those drinks or energy bars you all never stop eating. The assailants expected to find him sleeping. That’s our theory, anyway. But Fleming put up a fight at the last minute. There are bruises on his body, around the clavicles, as if they were holding him down. The truth is he died by drowning, not by bleeding out.”

  “The Brexit guys were at a small hostel, which they had to themselves. Anyone not with the team would have been noticed by the employees.”

  I was thinking aloud and a tad pleased with myself because I realized I had started to use police lingo. The Tour organizers chose hotels for each stage of the race and raffled them off to each of the teams. It wouldn’t be hard to know who was assigned where ahead of time.