City Without Stars
Page 34
Pablo Grande looked up at Padre Márcio. ‘Hold on, old friend. You put yourself here, but now together we will get you down.’
87
Fuentes
They drive in silence through canyons that are hostile with secrets. The mountains speak of struggle and defiance … and defeat. They are like liberated Titans, imprisoned for eons under the earth’s dark mantle before finally erupting in triumph, only to find themselves staring into the Gorgon’s eyes, fossilized before they could even celebrate their freedom. The mountains are like us, Fuentes thinks, fighting for something that has already been lost. ‘You know the chances of us coming back?’ he says to Gomez.
Gomez turns and stares at him with a look Fuentes knows: a Mexican attitude towards death look. ‘What’s there to come back to?’
The track begins to wind upwards, in a series of hairpin bends. Fuentes once had an answer to Gomez’s question, but that was before Ciudad Real. Before Tijuana. ‘Nothing …’
The track begins to level out to what looks like a plateau.
Gomez shucks the Remington. ‘So what are we waiting for, caballero …’
88
Pilar
Pilar watches the darkness running across the distant treetops towards them; a high tide of night. Out here in the arid hills, there is no pollution, no reflection from security lights. Out here the stars rise in triumph with the setting sun. She remembers the stories her mother told her; how she pointed out and named the constellations. All forgotten with the carelessness of childhood. If only her mother were still alive; if only she were with her, she could ask her the names, and this time Pilar would remember.
Headlights lance fast down the track, and the bus is overtaken by a Jeep, a mounted machine gun in the back, a man holding on to it. It’s the second one they’ve seen since they left the plateau. Ventura stands, snapping as it passes. ‘Don’t take photos!’
‘They didn’t see me …’ The bus shudders over a ridge and they all lurch in their seats. Ventura turns to her. They’ve hardly spoken since the abduction; since Pilar lied to her. ‘How bad is this going to be?’
It is the end, Pilar thinks – it’s the only way it could ever have ended. ‘I’ve seen worse. Much worse.’
The bus thunders through the night as though trying to escape Pilar’s lie. Pilar gazes up at the stars blooming in the desert sky. So close, so brilliant.
So far away.
Ventura sees the tear traveling down Pilar’s cheek. It’s like it’s always been there; a jewel revealed at exactly the right moment. Ventura knows what it signifies. She starts to sing, plaintive at first, wavering in uncertainty: ‘Los caminos de la vida’. Her voice rises up like an offering, slowly joined by other voices. It’s as though the bus was dead and is now being resuscitated, all the women joining in with their song about love and loss; obligation and memory. Singing a song about their lives, fighting their terror, everyone singing now … Except for Pilar. She is watching Ventura, who is struggling not to cry as she sings.
Pilar takes her hand. ‘It’s fine to cry,’ she whispers. ‘When we have nothing left, when everything is taken from us, we still have our tears.’ Pilar doesn’t have to tell Ventura the rest; she knows it in her own heart, the way every woman knows it: they are not tears for oneself, but for all women.
Acknowledgments
Enormous thanks to Xochitl Zepeda Blouin, without whom this novel would never have been possible.
Very special thanks also to Ernesto Zepeda, Dominique Blouin de Zepeda, Catalina Zepeda, Miguel Angel Chávez, José María Lumbreras and Gerardo Medina.
Very special thanks to Oscar de Muriel for his guidance with the Mexican Spanish usage in the book, and to early readers Julie Baker and Harriet O’Malley.
Deep appreciation to all at Faber, especially to my editor, Angus Cargill, whose guidance was as invaluable as ever, and to Samantha Matthews, Sophie Portas, Lauren Nicoll and Alex Kirby. Thanks also to copy editor Eleanor Rees for her sterling help.
Very special thanks to my agent, Tom Witcomb, for his great instincts, and to all at Blake Friedmann, including the late Carole Blake, Isobel Dixon and Hattie Grunewald.
My deep appreciation to my brother, Chris Baker, for his generous support and assistance.
Thanks to the following for their support throughout the writing of the book: Gabriela Arnon, Harry Avramidis, Lily and Bella Baker, Wayne Jowandi Barker, Clare Barry, Alison Benney, Natasha de Betak, Stefano Bortolussi, Ricardo Bravo, the late Liam ‘Billy’ Burke, Kent Carroll, Matthew Condon, Val Coy, Helen Curtis, Rosemary Curtis and Peter Horsam, Daniel Dayan, Emmanuel Dayan and Rachel Rosenblum, Yves Yang Diep, Colin Englert and Susan Wells, Josephine Ferrer Frogley and Janet Ferrer, Andrea Soler Ferrer, Maha Ismail, Jing Jin, Fiona McQueen and Beverly Oliver, Frank Moorhouse, Janica and Mike Nichols, Keith Nixon, Herbert Ochtman and Dominique Peguy, Harriet O’Malley, Steve Potts, Paolo Roversi and everyone at NebbiaGialla, and Hal and Arlette Singer.
Special thanks to les Berlugans: Yves Berthelot and Dosithée Yeatman-Berthelot, Delphine Berthelot-Eiffel and Alain Touchard, Arnaud Arches, Daniel Berger, Sylvie Bilardello et Frédéric Duprey, Stefanie Brandt and Pietro Alberti, Raymond and Gabrielle ‘Mounette’ Carli, Paulo and Eliane Chaves, Rino and Laura Corazzari, Massimo Di Paola and Stefania Orlandi, Fabrice Gaquerel, Gilbert and Aimée Garziglia, Yves Garziglia, Roger and Sylvie Garziglia, Philippe Huguet, Irena Kazaridi, Jeremy Lagarrigue, Laurent Lobby and Maria Nesmes, Laurent Millat-Carus, Anthony and Patricia Pharaoh, Adrien Plesu, Claudine Reinach, Quentin Richard, Christophe Rinaudo, Andreas Sirio, Bertrand and Béatrice Stevens, Christophe Tari, Olga Tchernychov, Bruno, Sylvie and Noémie Valois, Laurent Voulzy and Alain Souchon.
Enormous gratitude to my family for their support and encouragement: my late parents, Colin and Lorel Baker, Steven and Anna Baker, Nicholas Baker and Maryanne Blacker, Michael and Margaret Baker, and in particular Chris Baker. Above all, thanks to my wife, Julie, and our son, Nathaniel, for their sustaining and inspiring belief.
About the Author
Born in Sydney, Tim Baker lived in Rome and Madrid before moving to Paris, where he wrote about jazz. He has worked on film projects in China, India, Mexico, Brazil and Australia, and currently lives in the South of France with his wife, their son, and two rescue animals, a dog and a cat. His debut novel, Fever City, was published in 2016 and went on to be shortlisted for the CWA’s John Creasey New Blood Dagger and nominated for the Private Eye Writers of America’s Shamus Award.
@TimBakerWrites
Also by the Author
FEVER CITY
Copyright
First published in the UK in 2018
by Faber & Faber Ltd
Bloomsbury House
74–77 Great Russell Street
London WC1B 3DA
This ebook edition first published in 2018
All rights reserved
© Tim Baker, 2018
Cover design by Faber
Cover photograph © Michael Sugrue / Getty
The right of Tim Baker to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, incidents and historical events either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly
ISBN 978–0–571–33835–1
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