The Book of Murder

by Guillermo Martinez

  “Please! The only thing an Argentinian policeman can come up with is that the victim is also the prime suspect. Why would Luciana do such a thing?”

  “For the most obvious reason: guilt. She knows she’s guilty and she’s giving herself the punishment she thinks she deserves. Because her father, a religious fanatic, instilled in her a belief in the whip, in self-flagellation. Because she’s crazy, yes, but to an extent that neither you nor I can imagine.”

  Kloster said it without emphasis, with the calm coldness of a chess player watching a game, analysing possible moves. I said nothing. Again he pointed at the plastic folder under my arm.

  “So what are you going to do with that? You still haven’t told me.”

  “I’ll keep it in a drawer for now,” I said, “and I’ll wait: as long as there are no more tails in the sequence that’s where they’ll stay.”

  “That’s rather unfair,” said Kloster, as if trying to talk round a difficult child. “Unless I’m much mistaken, Luciana’s grandmother was already very elderly ten years ago. She was in a care home. And if she hasn’t died yet, it could happen at any time.”

  I didn’t detect any hint of a threat either in his expression or in his voice. He simply seemed to be making a logical objection.

  “A death from natural causes obviously wouldn’t count,” I said.

  “But don’t you see? Luciana wouldn’t consider anything a natural death. Even if her grandmother died in her sleep she’d claim I climbed down the chimney and smothered her with a pillow. She thinks I poison cups of coffee and spread toxic fungi and free prison inmates, so nothing will stop her.”

  “But I can judge for myself and I know the difference between a sequence of four tails and one of seven.”

  “The number seven,” said Kloster, as if he were suddenly fed up. “You shouldn’t make the same mistake. Apparently Luciana’s father didn’t teach her about biblical symbolism. The Hebrew root of the word ‘seven’ is related to the completeness and perfection of cycles. That’s the way the number seven is used in the Old Testament. When God warns those who want to kill Cain, he’s not referring to a literal number, to a numerical ratio, but to vengeance that is complete and perfect.”

  “Don’t you think the death of four loved ones is sufficiently complete vengeance?”

  Kloster looked at me as if we were arm wrestling and he acknowledged my effort but wasn’t prepared to give an inch.

  “I can only know my own pain,” he said. “Isn’t that, basically, the problem with punishment? A dilemma, as Wittgenstein would say, of private language. I don’t know how many deaths are equivalent to the death of a daughter. And anyway it’s not something that depends on me, or something I can stop. As I said, I’m simply writing a novel. But I see I haven’t convinced you, and it’s getting late. I’ve got an appointment: a girl from a secondary school is coming to interview me for her school paper…”

  Kloster stopped, possibly because he’d seen the look of surprise and alarm on my face. I hadn’t mentioned Luciana’s fears for her sister in the pages I’d given him to read. I stood, frozen, waiting for him to say more. But he simply motioned peremptorily towards the stairs, indicating that I should leave at last. As I descended the stairs I turned: he was still standing at the top, as if he wanted to make sure I really was going.

  “You said on the phone that you had a question for me,” I remembered suddenly. “But you haven’t asked me anything.”

  Kloster made a gesture, almost like a wave.

  “Don’t worry. You’ve already told me what I wanted to know.”

  ∨ The Book of Murder ∧

  Eight

  In the street I looked for a phone. I didn’t have my address book with me so I called Directory Enquiries and gave Luciana’s name and address. A moment later an automated voice gave me the number. I dialled it immediately before I forgot it.

  “I’ve just spoken to Kloster,” I said. “He made me leave because a girl was arriving to interview him for her school paper. Could it be your sister?”

  For a moment there was silence at the other end.

  “Yes, my God, yes,” she said faintly. “I thought she’d given up on the idea. But she must have arranged it behind my back. She’s just gone out. She wouldn’t tell me where she was going but I saw her put one of Kloster’s novels in her bag. I thought that was odd because she’s already read it. She’s probably taken it for him to sign.” There was desperation in her voice. “I could get a taxi, but it’s too late now: I don’t think I can catch up with her. Where are you calling from?”

  “I’m just round the corner from his house, in a call box.”

  “Then you could wait for her and stop her, until I can get there. Would you do that for me? I’ll get a taxi straight away.”

  “No, I’m not going to do it,” I said as firmly as I could. “You and I need to talk. I’m sure Kloster wouldn’t try anything stupid in his own house. There’s a café on the corner; I think I can see the entrance to the house from there. I’ll keep an eye out until you arrive and then we can talk. I’ll sit in the window and wait for you.”

  “All right,” she said reluctantly. “I’m leaving now. I just hope Kloster hasn’t convinced you too.”

  ♦

  I went into the café, which was almost empty at that hour, and sat at a table by the window from where I could see Kloster’s house across the street. Before I’d even had time to order coffee a small handbag passed the window. I would have recognised it anywhere. I leaned forward to look out but the girl had already crossed the road and a bus at the traffic lights was blocking my view. By the time it moved away there was no sign of Luciana’s sister and Kloster’s front door was just closing. All I’d glimpsed of her was the handbag inherited from Luciana, and the sleeve of her navy blue coat.

  Luciana arrived half an hour later. As she came through the swing doors she glanced at her reflection and made a furtive, desperate attempt to tidy her hair. I realised my call must have got her out of bed and she’d only just noticed what she looked like. Her face was drawn, without make-up, and her eyes were glassy as if she’d taken sleeping pills.

  “Has she gone in?” she asked without preamble.

  I stood up and gave her my seat so that she could watch the entrance herself, and sat down opposite her.

  “Yes, a while ago. Actually I only caught a brief glimpse but I think it was her: she was carrying the handbag you used to have and wearing a navy blue coat.”

  Luciana nodded. “Yes, a long coat. It used to be mine too. What time did she go in?”

  “About ten minutes ago. But I told you, nothing’s going to happen to her. I spoke to him as you asked.”

  “And he convinced you,” she said, looking into my eyes, unrelentingly searching for the truth. “Now you believe him.”

  “I didn’t say that,” I said, uncomfortable. “But I’m sure he wouldn’t do anything so direct. And certainly not in his own house.”

  “He could do other things to her,” she said darkly. “Valentina has no idea, she’s just an impulsive teenager. She doesn’t know what he’s like. I don’t know what image of him she’s built up from his novels. But remember, I know him. I know how captivating he can be.”

  “That’s really what I wanted to talk to you about. His version of events is pretty different from yours.” I saw her draw back warily.

  “I suppose a writer can invent all sorts of stories. What did he say?”

  “That when you started working for him it never entered his head to try anything. He was too happy with the arrangement and with the way his work was progressing to ruin it all by trying anything more. He thought you were pretty but he wasn’t attracted to you. He said it was you who made him notice you. He told me that on one occasion he was dictating a section about a scar on a woman’s arm. He said you showed him the vaccination mark on your shoulder and invited him to touch it.”

  “I showed him the mark, that’s true, but I never asked him to touch it. I
didn’t think there was anything wrong in it. I’d forgotten all about it. I can’t believe he’s trying to give it another meaning.”

  “He said it was the first time he’d touched you, and you seemed proud to have got his attention. He also said that later on you let him massage your neck.”

  “Well, I see you’ve become good friends. How did you get him to tell you about that? One day he enquired about my neck. I bent my head to show him where it hurt and he started massaging it. It’s true that I didn’t stop him, but I didn’t think he had any other intention. I trusted him. I told you, I thought of him as a father. I didn’t think he had anything else on his mind. And it was only one time.”

  “One time, and then another. He said he stopped the second time because you weren’t wearing a bra.”

  “It may well have been twice. And I didn’t wear a bra very often in those days.”

  “You did when you worked for me,” I said.

  “Because I knew I had to be careful around you. But it never occurred to me he was getting ideas. Until he got back from his trip, when he seemed to have turned into a completely different person, none of it had ever occurred to me. But what are you driving at? Even if I did lead him on, which I didn’t, even if I was wrong to sue him, does that justify what happened later? Does that justify killing my whole family?”

  “Of course not,” I said. “It doesn’t justify anyone’s death. I just want to know whether so far, in this part of the story, he was telling me the truth.”

  “That all happened,” she said, looking away, “but he got the wrong idea. And I’ve told you a thousand times I regret suing him. But I can’t believe that this is my punishment.”

  “He does blame you for his daughter’s death. You were right about that.”

  I recounted what Kloster had revealed about his relationship with his wife, the fears he’d had since Pauli’s birth, and the unspoken pact he and Mercedes had had in the last few years. Luciana looked increasingly shocked: she seemed to have no idea of any of it. I told her about the wife’s reaction, her outburst when she read the accusation at the head of the letter, her immediate decision to get a divorce and the court order she’d used to separate Kloster from his daughter, using Luciana’s accusation as justification. I told her how Kloster had had to move out to a hotel, about his waiting to be allowed to see his daughter again, and what happened on the day of his visit. I tried to use the same words as Kloster had when describing that afternoon, from the time when he telephoned to when he found his daughter’s body in the bath. I told her about the crypt, the gallery of photos and the film of his daughter holding the little bunch of flowers. By the time I finished, Luciana’s eyes were filled with tears.

  “But none of it was my fault,” she whimpered.

  “Of course not,” I said, “but he thinks it was.”

  “But it was his wife who…who…It was his wife,” she said helplessly.

  “He believes it was your letter that broke their pact. He was sure he could have maintained their agreement for a few more years, until Pauli was older. He put it like this: his daughter would still be alive if his wife hadn’t read that letter. And there’s something else you’re right about: his being in Villa Gesell that summer wasn’t a coincidence. He said he couldn’t bear the thought that you were carrying on with your life as if nothing had happened, when his daughter was dead. He wanted to be there to make you remember. So that you’d think of her every day, as he did. So that your life should stop, as his had.”

  “If that was his only aim, he succeeded a long time ago. But you see he admitted he wanted to get his revenge. That’s what I wanted to know. Because I don’t expect he confessed to the murders, did he?”

  “No. All he said was that as he was leaving the beach that day, from the promenade, he saw your boyfriend disappear from sight out at sea. And when he found out next day that he’d drowned, he felt that, with that death, the law of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth had been carried out. He said it gave him the idea for a novel about justice and proportionate punishment.”

  “It wasn’t enough for him. My God, Ramiro’s death wasn’t enough.”

  She looked once more across the street while feeling in her pocket for a handkerchief. She glanced at her watch again and dried her eyes.

  “Maybe not,” I admitted. “But he claims that since that day all he’s done about it is write his novel. A novel in which you and he are characters. He assured me he hasn’t seen you since then and that he only found out your parents had died when he got your letter.”

  She shook her head, still looking out of the window. “That’s a lie: he was at the cemetery the day of their funeral.”

  “I asked him about that: he goes there every day to visit his daughter’s grave. He claims not to have seen you.”

  She turned to look at me angrily. “I suppose I shouldn’t have expected him to admit anything. And he seems to have a lie ready for everything.”

  “Actually what I found most disconcerting was that he seemed to be telling the truth. He talked as if he had nothing to hide. He even told me something he could have kept secret, about your brother’s death, something we didn’t know: he did correspond with inmates of that prison at various times. He said the police had looked into it and that he gave Superintendent Ramoneda any letters he’d kept.”

  “But there might have been other letters that he got rid of—that he made sure to get rid of,” Luciana interrupted. “He could have found out from other inmates that that prisoner got out to commit robberies. And if he’d followed my brother and knew he was involved with that woman, all he had to do was send the anonymous letters to goad the killer on. Kloster wrote them. I knew it as soon as I saw them. He can’t fool me.”

  “He said he and Ramoneda talked about crime fiction and that at one point the superintendent showed him the anonymous letters and asked him what kind of person he thought could have written them. Apparently the superintendent thought it was more likely it was you.”

  She sat in silence for a moment, her hands trembling helplessly.

  “Don’t you see?” she murmured. “Don’t you see how he twists everything and turns everyone against me? I suppose he tried to make you believe it was me?”

  “Actually, no, he didn’t. That’s what I found most surprising. He seems to think there’s another possibility. I suppose it’s what he’s writing about in his novel. He said I’d never believe it.”

  “There is no other explanation: it’s him. I don’t understand how you can still doubt it. He’ll go on and on, until I’m all alone. Until I’m the last one left. That’s the revenge he’s after. The one he marked in the Bible: seven for one. And now Valentina is in there at this moment. In there with him. I’ll never forgive myself if something happens to her. I don’t think I can wait any longer,” she said, making as if to stand. I stopped her.

  “When I mentioned that section in the Bible he said it was wrong to interpret it that way. That the number seven is actually a symbol of completeness, of the perfectly finished. The vengeance that God reserves for himself. Even if it is Kloster behind the deaths, maybe the punishment is complete.”

  “In the novel about that sect that he was dictating to me, the number seven wasn’t symbolic. They killed seven members of a family one by one. That’s what he’s been planning for me from the beginning and that’s why he never had that novel published, so as not to give himself away. Did you ask why he was standing outside my grandmother’s nursing home?”

  I shook my head. “I couldn’t very well subject him to an interrogation,” I said, a little irritably. “I just tried to get him to talk. And I think I did pretty well.”

  Something in my voice made her back down, as if she realised for the first time that she’d asked too much of me.

  “I’m sorry. You’re right,” she said. “How did you get him to see you?”

  “I said I was writing a novel about the strange series of deaths around you, and I wanted to hear his ver
sion of events. I thought it was also a way of letting him know that somebody else is aware of what’s happening to you.”

  I realised Luciana was no longer listening to me. She was watching Kloster’s front door.

  “Thank God,” she murmured. “I can see her. She’s just come out of the house.”

  I looked round out of the window, but I’d missed Valentina for the second time. She must have been walking away in the opposite direction, because from her seat Luciana could still see her.

  “I think she’s heading for the subway,” she said.

  “Safe and sound, I hope,” I said. “We can leave now too.” I signalled to the waiter for the bill.

  “I’m going to tell her everything tonight. She has to know what he’s like, before it’s too late. Can I call over the next few days if I notice she’s behaving strangely? I feel she’s slipping away from me, and I can’t watch over her any more.”

  “I’m going to Salinas tomorrow,” I said. “To give a seminar. I’ll be away for a fortnight.”

  She was silent for a moment, as if I’d said something unexpected and brutal. She looked at me, all her defences down, and I saw the dismay in her eyes, and the abyss of madness dangerously close. Convulsively, almost involuntarily, she grasped my hands across the table. She didn’t seem to realise how hard she was gripping, or that she was digging her nails into my palms.

  “Please, don’t leave me alone with this,” she said hoarsely. “I’ve had nightmares every night since I saw him outside the nursing home. I know something very bad is about to happen to us.”

  Gently I freed myself from her hands and stood up. I wanted to get away from there as soon as I could.

  “Nothing else is going to happen,” I said. “Now he knows that somebody else knows.”

  ∨ The Book of Murder ∧