The Hidden Assassins

by Robert Wilson

  ‘Her face was completely clear.’

  ‘You’d better take the riot squad with you into that press conference,’ said Ramírez. ‘They’re going to go mad if they hear about that.’

  ‘Inés came round to my house the other night,’ said Falcón. ‘She was behaving very strangely. I thought for a moment she wanted to get back with me, but now I think she was trying to tell me what was happening to her.’

  ‘Did she seem in pain at all?’ asked Ramírez, preferring to stick to the facts.

  ‘She was swearing like I’d never heard her swear before and, yes, she did hold on to her side at one point,’ said Falcón. ‘She was furious with him for all his…’

  ‘Yes, we know,’ said Ramírez, who hadn’t banked on this level of intimacy.

  Falcón’s eyes filled, his mind taking its grief in gulps. Ramírez squeezed his shoulder with his huge mahogany hand.

  ‘We’d better start thinking about today,’ said Falcón. ‘Did you manage to read that file about the unidentified body found at the dump on Monday?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘We don’t get that many dead bodies in Seville,’ said Falcón. ‘And in my career I have never come across such a disfigured corpse, and poisoned with cyanide, too. And all this happens days before a bomb goes off in the city.’

  ‘There doesn’t have to be a connection,’ said Ramírez, wary of letting himself in for more fruitless work.

  ‘But before we get a ton of forensic information from the mosque, I’d like to see if there is one,’ said Falcón. ‘At least I’d like to identify the victim. It might open up another pathway into this situation.’

  ‘Any pointers before I start reading?’

  ‘The Médico Forense thought he was mid forties, long-haired, desk bound but tanned and didn’t wear shoes very much. He had traces of hashish in his blood. There was also tattoo ink in the lymph nodes, which is the reason his hands were severed: they had tattoos on them, small ones, but presumably distinctive.’

  ‘Sounds like a university type to me,’ said Ramírez, who was suspicious of anybody with too much education. ‘Post-graduate?’

  ‘Or maybe a professor trying to recapture his youth?’

  ‘Spanish?’

  ‘Olive-skinned,’ said Falcón. ‘He’d had a hernia op. The Médico Forense removed the mesh. See if you can get a match for it, find the company that supplied it and to which hospital. Of course, he might have had it done abroad…’

  ‘Do you want me to do this on my own?’

  ‘Take Ferrera with you. She’s done some work on this already,’ said Falcón. ‘Pérez, Serrano and Baena can tour the construction sites of Seville, especially any with immigrant labour. Tell them they have to find the electricians.’

  ‘Didn’t I hear someone say that you were having a model made of this guy’s head—the one from the dump?’

  ‘The sculptor’s a friend of the Médico Forense,’ said Falcón. ‘I’ll follow that up.’

  ‘You missed your session last night,’ said Alicia Aguado.

  ‘Something cropped up,’ said Consuelo. ‘Something very upsetting.’

  ‘That’s why we’re here.’

  ‘You told me to make sure I had a family member to look after me when I came home after my session on Tuesday evening,’ said Consuelo. ‘I asked my sister. She was there, but couldn’t stay for long. We talked about the session. She could see that I was calm and so she left. Then yesterday afternoon she called me to check that I was still OK, and we chatted and she remembered something she’d meant to ask me about the night before. My new pool man.’

  ‘Pool man?’

  ‘He looks after the pool. He checks the pH levels, hoovers the bottom, skims the surface, cleans the…’ said Consuelo, getting carried away on the detail.

  ‘OK, Consuelo, I’m not going into the pool-cleaning business,’ said Aguado.

  ‘The point is, I don’t have a new pool man,’ said Consuelo. ‘The same guy has been coming round every Thursday afternoon since I bought the house. I inherited him from the previous owners.’

  ‘And what?’

  Consuelo tried to swallow, but couldn’t.

  ‘My sister described him, and it was the same disgusting chulo from the Plaza del Pumarejo.’

  ‘Very upsetting,’ said Aguado. ‘It unnerved you, I’m sure. So you called the police and stayed with your children. I can understand that.’

  Silence. Consuelo was slumped to one side of the chair, as if she’d lost some stuffing.

  ‘All right,’ said Aguado. ‘Tell me what you did, or did not do.’

  ‘I didn’t call the police.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I was too embarrassed,’ she said. ‘I’d have to explain everything.’

  ‘You could have just told them that an undesirable person was snooping around your home.’

  ‘You probably don’t know very much about the police,’ said Consuelo. ‘I was a murder suspect for a couple of weeks five years ago. What they put you through is not so different to what you’re doing to me here. You start talking and they smell things. They know when people are hiding the shit in their lives. They see it every day. They’d ask a question like: “Do you think it possible that you know this person?” and what would happen? Especially in my fragile mental state.’

  ‘I know you might find this difficult to believe, but to me this is a positive development,’ said Aguado.

  ‘It makes me feel like a failure,’ said Consuelo. ‘I don’t know whether this person could be a danger to my children, and just because of my own shame I’m prepared to put them at risk.’

  ‘But at least now I know that he’s real,’ said Aguado.

  Silence from Consuelo, who hadn’t considered this alarming possibility.

  ‘Our minds have ways of correcting imbalances,’ said Aguado. ‘So, for instance, a powerful chief executive who controls thousands of people’s lives may redress the balance by dreaming of being at school and the teacher telling him what to do. This is a very benign form of balancing things out. More aggressive forms exist. It’s not unusual to find successful businessmen who visit a dominatrix in order to be tied up, rendered powerless and punished. A New York psychologist told me he had clients who went to nurseries where they could wear nappies and sit in oversized playpens. The danger comes with the uncertainty between the fantastic, the real and the illusory. The mind becomes confused and cannot differentiate, and then a breakdown can ensue, with possible lasting damage.’

  ‘What you mean is, I’ve had the fantasy and I may take the next step and seek out the reality.’

  ‘But at least you weren’t describing an illusion to me,’ said Aguado. ‘Before your sister confirmed his existence, I wasn’t sure how advanced you were. I told you not to allow yourself to be distracted on your way here because, if he was real, then the reality you were seeking was very dangerous for you…personally. This man has no idea of the nature of your problems. He has sensed some vulnerability and is probably just a predator.’

  ‘He knows my name and that my husband is dead,’ said Consuelo. ‘Those two details came out when he accosted me on Monday night.’

  ‘Then you really should talk to the police about it,’ said Aguado. ‘If they think you’re strange, refer them to me.’

  ‘Then they’ll know I’m a lunatic and take no notice,’ said Consuelo. ‘There’s been a bomb in Seville, and a rich bitch is worried about a chulo in her garden.’

  ‘Try talking to them,’ said Aguado. ‘This man might assault or rape you.’

  Silence.

  ‘What are you doing now, Consuelo?’

  ‘I’m looking at you.’

  ‘And you’re thinking…?’

  ‘That I trust you more than I’ve trusted anyone in my life.’

  ‘Anyone? Even your parents?’

  ‘I loved my parents, but they knew nothing about me,’ said Consuelo.

  ‘So who have you trusted in your life?’
r />   ‘I trusted an art dealer in Madrid for a bit, until he moved down here,’ said Consuelo.

  ‘Who else?’ asked Aguado. ‘What about Raúl?’

  ‘No, he didn’t love me,’ said Consuelo, ‘and he lived in a closed-off world, trapped by his own misery. He didn’t talk to me about his problems and I didn’t reveal my own.’

  ‘Was there anything between you and the art dealer?’

  ‘No, our attraction was nothing remotely sexual or romantic.’

  ‘What was it then?’

  ‘We recognized that we were complicated people, with secrets we couldn’t talk about. But he did once tell me that he’d killed a man.’

  ‘That’s not an easy thing to do,’ said Aguado, sensing that they might be closer to the heart of the tangled knot than Consuelo suspected.

  ‘We were drinking brandy in a bar on the Gran Via. I was depressed. I’d just told him everything about my abortions. He traded this secret of his, but he said it was an accident when, in fact, it was much more shameful than that.’

  ‘More shameful than appearing in a pornographic movie to pay for an abortion?’

  ‘Of course it was. He’d killed somebody for—’

  Consuelo stopped as if she’d been knifed in the throat. The next word wouldn’t come out. She could only cough up a croak as if there was a blade across her windpipe. A powerful shudder of emotion rippled through her. Aguado released her wrist, grabbed her by the arm to steady her. A strange sound came from Consuelo as she slid to the floor. It was something like an orgasmic cry, and, in fact, it was a release, but not one of pleasure. It was a cry of acute pain.

  Aguado had not expected to reach this point so quickly in the treatment, but then the mind was an unpredictable organ. It threw things up all the time, vomited horrors into the consciousness and, this was the strange thing, sometimes the conscious mind could hurdle these terrible revelations, side-step them, leap across the sudden chasm. Other times it was scythed to the ground. Consuelo had just experienced the equivalent of being hit by a half-ton bull from behind. She ended up in the foetal position on the Afghan rug, squeaking, as if something enormous was trying to get out.

  27

  Seville—Thursday, 8th June 2006, 09.28 hrs

  The pressroom in the Andalucian Parliament building was filled to capacity, and there were more people outside in the corridors. The double doors had been left open. It was inconceivable to Falcón that something hadn’t leaked. The heaving level of interest in a routine press conference could not be so vast.

  The gravity of the revelations had brought Comisario Lobo to the conference and his glowering presence was a comfort. Lobo commanded respect. He induced fear. Nobody took his huge frame and coarse cumin complexion lightly. He was the most senior policeman in Seville and yet he seemed to be a man just managing to keep the lid on an extremely violent temperament.

  On the raised platform were six chairs set behind two tables, on which had been placed six microphones. The six stars of the press conference—Comisarios Lobo and Elvira, Juez del Rey, the Magistrado Juez Decano de Sevilla Spinola, Inspectors Jefe Barros and Falcón—were standing in the wings, occupying themselves with the folded lengths of card on which their names were printed. Del Rey had arrived only five minutes earlier, having taken a cab straight from the Estación Santa Justa. He looked remarkably calm for a man who’d been woken up at 6.15 in the morning and told to catch the next AVE train to Seville and take control of the largest criminal investigation Andalucía had ever seen.

  At exactly 9.30 Lobo led them out, like a cadre of gladiators being presented to the public. There was a clatter of shutters and flickering of flashes from the photojournalists. Lobo sat in the middle, held up a large finger and surveyed his audience, who instantly battened down to total silence.

  ‘The prime objective of this press conference is to introduce the new team who will be conducting the investigation into the Seville bombing, now referred to as 6th June.’

  He presented each member of the team, explaining their role. There was a human tremor at the introduction of Sergio del Rey as the new judge directing the investigation, which meant that Falcón’s role was lost in the aftershock.

  ‘Where’s Juez Calderón?’ shouted a voice from the back of the room.

  Lobo’s huge finger was raised once again, this time with a slightly admonishing edge to it. Silence fell.

  ‘The Magistrado Juez Decano de Sevilla will now explain the reason behind the change in our Juez de Instrucción.’

  Spinola stood up and gave a similar, terse and factual description of the events of the early morning down by the Guadalquivir river as Elvira had done an hour earlier. When he’d finished there was a missed beat and then a roar, as of a crowd in an enclosed basketball arena who’d just witnessed a heinous foul. Their hands came out waving pens, notebooks, and dictaphones. When their shouting failed to penetrate they started screaming, like maddened traders in the bear pit of a crashing bourse. It was impossible to hear any questions. Lobo stood. The Colossus of the Jefatura made no impact. The scandal was just too vast, and the herd too demented, to care about his immense authority. The journalists rushed the platform. Falcón was grateful for the barrier of the table. Lobo was decisive. The six men left the stage just managing not to break into a run for the door at the back. Barros was the last man out and he had to wrest his arm from the clutches of a woman’s bloodred nails. The door was shut and locked by security. The journalists hammered from the other side. The double doors seemed to swell, as if they might be about to burst open.

  ‘There’s no talking to them,’ said Lobo. ‘And, anyway, there’s nothing to be said beyond that statement. We’ll hold another press conference later and ask them to present their questions beforehand.’

  They left the building and all except Lobo, Elvira and Spinola were driven back to the pre-school. Juez del Rey still hadn’t completed his reading of the case file, which was already huge. He said he’d need until midday to complete it and then he would like a meeting with the investigating team.

  Falcón called Dr Pintado, the Médico Forense who’d handled the unidentified corpse from the dump, and asked for Miguel Covo’s number, saying he had to see anything that the sculptor had been able to accomplish as soon as possible. Pintado said that Covo would call if he had anything to show.

  A call came through on his personal mobile. It was Angel. He should have turned the damn thing off.

  ‘I was there,’ said Angel. ‘I’ve never seen anything like that in my life.’

  ‘I thought we were going to have to fire tear gas at you lot,’ said Falcón, trying to keep it light.

  ‘This is a disaster for your investigation.’

  ‘Juez del Rey is a very capable man.’

  ‘You’re talking to me, Javier—Angel Zarrías: public relations expert. What you’ve got on your hands is…’

  ‘We know, but what can we do? We can’t turn the clock back and bring Inés back to life.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, her name reminding him to be solicitous. ‘I’m really sorry, Javier. I just got carried away with the madness in there. It must have been hard for you. Not even your experience could have prepared you for that.’

  The saliva thickened in Falcón’s mouth as the bitterness of his grief hit him again in another unexpected wave. He was surprised. He’d thought he’d rid himself of all emotional entanglements with Inés and yet here were these odd residues. He’d loved her, or at least he thought he’d loved her, and he was amazed at how that seemed to have stood the test of her cruelty and selfishness.

  ‘What can I do for you, Angel?’ he said, businesslike.

  ‘Look, Javier, I’m not a fool. I know you can’t talk about anything even if you did know what had happened,’ he said. ‘I just want you to know that the ABC is on your side. I’ve spoken to the editor. If Comisario Elvira needs help we’re prepared to give our full support.’

  ‘I’ll tell him, Angel,’ said Falcón. ‘I’
ve got to go now, I’ve got another call.’

  Falcón closed down that mobile and opened the other. It was the sculptor, Miguel Covo. He had something to show him. He gave Falcón directions to his workshop. Falcón said he could be there in ten minutes. He called Elvira on the way and mentioned the conversation with Angel Zarrías.

  ‘Nothing comes for free in this world,’ said Elvira, ‘but we are going to need all the help we can get. I’ve just read the autopsy report and…I’m sorry, Javier, I shouldn’t have mentioned that.’

  ‘I saw her,’ said Falcón, his stomach lurching.

  But he didn’t want to hear it. He’d read autopsies before of battered wives and girlfriends and been stunned at the body’s capacity to absorb punishment and still keep going. He tuned himself out from Elvira’s voice. He really didn’t want to know what Inés had suffered.

  ‘…a civilized man, a respected and brilliant legal mind, a cultured person. We used to bump into each other at the opera. There’s no telling, Javier. It’s a terrifying thought that even these certainties cannot be trusted.’

  ‘Perhaps I shouldn’t have told you about Angel Zarrías’s offer.’

  ‘I don’t follow you.’

  ‘That’s Angel Zarrías’s talent. He has a genius for the manipulation of image.’

  ‘The suspicion is going to be that we knew about Calderón’s behaviour and condoned it with our silence because of his exceptional ability,’ said Elvira, who seemed more panicked by the power of the media now that he’d lost Calderón, his brilliant front man. ‘Things are going to come out once Inspector Jefe Zorrita starts digging. And then there’ll be all the women he was…you know…’

  ‘Fucking?’

  ‘That wasn’t the word I was after, but, yes, I understand it wasn’t just one or two,’ said Elvira. ‘Less scrupulous newspapers than the ABC might get hold of them and there’ll be more stories stretching back over the years…We’ll all look complete idiots, or worse, for not having spotted the flaws in his character beforehand.’

  ‘None of us did know about it,’ said Falcón. ‘So we shouldn’t feel guilty about presenting our case. And it’s the way of the world that these things have to be conducted through the media. But at least some good will come out of it.’