Finally Antonia stood in the doorway, and for all her grey hairs she looked as proud as a new mother. “She is ready, Señor Angeli.”
He stood up and came around the desk. In the soft glow of the wall sconces, the child's appearance was changed utterly. Now that she was warm again and fed she was a healthy pink colour again and her face had resolved itself again to cherubic serenity. Angeli smelled the faint aroma of curds.
“Jorge bought diapers and baby clothes and blankets,” Antonia gushed. “And some milk formula, we had to ...”
“Thank you, Antonia.” He took the child from her arms. “That will be all.”
She seemed reluctant to part with her.
“That will be all,” he repeated.
She left the room.
Angeli took a deep breath. Holding the child in the crook of one arm he went up the stairs to his wife's bedroom.
***
But Francesca was not there. The bed was unmade and there were clothes strewn about the floor. Then he heard her singing in the next room, what would have been their daughter's room, if she had lived. It sounded ghostly; the voice could have belonged to a small child. The small hairs rose on the back of his neck.
Well, never mind that. Angeli looked at the sleeping infant in his arms and re-arranged her blanket as if primping her before she was to go on display. Then he went through to the nursery.
Francesca sat beside the empty cradle, still in her nightgown, murmuring a lullaby. Angeli's shadow fell across her face and she looked up.
“Little Simone is awake, my love. She was crying for you.” He bent down and laid the child in his wife's arms.
He held his breath and waited to see what would happen.
Francesca gasped with surprise and then her face creased into a beatific smile. “Why, thank you, César.”
She rocked the child and continued singing, as if nothing had happened.
Angeli watched her for a moment, then went out, shutting the door softly behind him. He let out a long sigh. Well, time would tell.
***
Gabriella had been suspended from a hook on the ceiling by her ankles. Her arms were tied behind her back. There were dark, plum-coloured bruises on her back and her ribs and a froth of blood at her nose and mouth. Angeli could hear her breathing from the other side of the room.
He barely recognised her.
Turturro stood to one side with the doctor. He shook his head. “She is obstinate.”
“It doesn't matter now. I have just heard from the Ministry of the Interior that her husband has applied for asylum at the Mexican Embassy. He is beyond our reach.” Angeli took the nine millimetre pistol from the holster at his belt and held the barrel against her temple.
Gabriella mumbled something. He leaned closer. Perhaps some last minute bargain? “Señora Altman? You wished to say something?”
It was hard to pick out her words. At the third attempt he understood. The word she had spoken was: “Simone'.
“Simone is to go on to a better life. And so must you.”
He pulled the trigger. In the confines of the cellar the discharge of the pistol sounded like a cannon shot. Gabriella's body jerked on the end of the chain and then was still.
Chapter 26
A WEEK LATER the apartment was rented to a new couple.
It was too dangerous to ask questions about people who had been disappeared. Stephen reported the incident by telephone to the British embassy but the minor functionary he spoke to was brusque and disinterested. The Altmans, he was informed, were not British citizens and the affair was therefore not the concern of Her Majesty's Government.
The scandal involving the Altman Group was not covered in the Argentine press but a few days later he learned about it in the English-language Buenos Aires Herald. It was reported that the entire Altman family had disappeared. The government claimed they had been involved in a massive foreign exchange fraud and had since fled the country.
And still no one came to the apartment to ask about the Altmans or their children. It was as if Reuben and Gabriella had existed in a vacuum.
From the morning following her parents' disappearance the child cried incessantly. Nothing seemed to pacify her. Mercedes took her to a local doctor, pretending the child was her own. The doctor could find nothing physically wrong with her, apart from a mild fever. He prescribed sedatives.
The Barringtons' housekeeper and maid, Maria, was told what had happened and was sworn to secrecy. She helped with the infant's care but Mercedes insisted on doing most of the work herself. One day he found her bent over the child's makeshift cot, changing her diapers. Mercedes was singing to her, softly, her face lit with rapture. It scared him. She was not their child, and the longer she was here, the more attached his wife would become.
They had always wanted another child. But Luca was almost six years old now and there had been three miscarriages in the intervening years. Their doctor had told them he did not think Mercedes would carry to full term again.
But Mercedes' devotion brought results. After about a week the child stopped her incessant crying. Just the sound of Mercedes' voice would settle her. They did not know the child's name so Mercedes had started calling her “Diana', the name they had agreed on if Luca had been a girl.
It was too much. Stephen announced that the situation could not continue. “We must find out if the Altmans have a family somewhere.”
“If we start asking questions we put ourselves in danger,” Mercedes said.
“What we are doing is illegal.”
“And what was done to her parents, was that legal? Think about the child. What will happen to her if we go to the police?”
He knew she was right. “But she's not ours!'
“She has to belong to someone. If they disappear her parents, what will happen?”
“There were two children. She had a twin!'
“Maybe they killed her as well.”
“What will we tell everyone?”
“We'll say we adopted her. We can make up a story about it. No one knows the real story except Maria, and she won't tell.”
“One day we may have to give her back.”
“One day is the day that never comes.”
He looked up, saw Luca listening at the doorway. He decided there was nothing for it but to give in. “Luca,” he said and smiled. “Do you like your new sister? Would you like to keep her?”
Chapter 27
IN SPRING THE pink buds appeared again on the palo borracho trees. The sunshine brought the neighbourhood mothers back to the plaza at Recoleta, strolling her with their pushers, other small children in tow.
Mercedes sat on one of the benches, in the shade of an ombú tree, watching the joggers and the professional dog walkers, the paseadores, who came here to exercise the pedigree Afghans and Airedales on the grass. Luca stared wide-eyed at two old men in dark suits and trilbies, singing milongas, busking for small change.
But nothing pleased her as much as staring at her new daughter. She was a miracle, a gift from God when she had all but given up all hope.
She loved Luca just as much, of course, he was her flesh and blood. But she had always desperately wanted a daughter; boys grew up and went away, little girls were yours forever.
Diana looked up at her and grinned and she melted. She wanted to pick her up and squeeze her. She remembered what Stephen had said to her: “But she's not ours! One day we may have to give her back.”
Well, Stephen was often right about a lot of things, but she thought he was wrong this time. She could even prove Diana was hers. She had been surprised at how easy it had been to obtain a forged birth certificate. She was Diana Barrington now.
The fuzz on top of her head had turned into a mop of thick, dark hair. She had huge brown eyes, olive skin and a delightful heart-shaped mouth. She was a beautiful child, an angel. She unfastened the strap and picked her up; something else that Stephen complained about. “Mercedes, leave the child alone. She won't sleep if y
ou're always picking her up!'
Mercedes reached out her hand and Diana gripped her finger back, putting it in her mouth. She had her first tooth.
Mercedes felt the sting of a tear in her eyes. “Chiquita,” she whispered. “You're mine now. I won't ever let anyone take you away from me. Not ever.”
***
Domingo Goncalvez hesitated. Beside the front doors of the Edificio San Martín there was a bank of dark green buttons with the apartment numbers engraved above each one on the brass backplate. He pushed the button under number 405.
A voice with an English accent demanded his name and business in Spanish.
“My name is Domingo Goncalvez. I have come about my sister, Gabriella Altman. She used to live in apartment 406.”
There was a long silence. Finally the disembodied voice said: “You had better come up.” He heard a buzz as the lock was released. He pushed open the door and went inside.
***
Stephen rested his forehead against the wall. He had been waiting for this moment for almost six months. There had been times recently when he thought that Mercedes was right, and nothing would happen. He had been right, after all, but it gave him no pleasure.
He waited by the doorway to the living room, took a breath, checked his reflection in the hall mirror. He saw a tall, rather thin Englishman in blazer and tie, with the wings of grey at his temples. He straightened his cuffs. Six months, and still he was not ready for this. He wished Mercedes were here.
A knock on the door. Their maid, Maria, welcomed their visitor and ushered him inside.
“Stephen Barrington,” he said and held out his hand.
“Domingo Goncalvez, señor.” He was perhaps thirty years old, with the dark complexion of a mestizo and the large coarse hands of a working man. He wore running shoes and an open-necked white shirt, stained with sweat. His brown suit was a size too small. There was a fresh pink scar over his left eye.
He looked around, ill at ease.
“How can I help you?”
“Señor, it is a personal matter. I hope I am not imposing on your time.”
“Please. Sit.” Barrington indicated the Chesterfield under the mirror. Domingo perched on the end of it, twisting a cloth cap between his fingers. Stephen settled himself in an armchair. Maria went out, closing the door softly behind her.
He waited.
“So. You said it was a personal matter?”
“My sister and her husband lived next door, in apartment 406,” Domingo said. “You knew them?”
“Not well. We nodded to each other in the lift, that was all.”
The other man hesitated again, staring at the framed prints of English hunting scenes. “Perhaps your wife knew them?”
“My wife is not here. She likes to take the children to the park on Saturday mornings.”
Domingo nodded and stared at his hands.
“You live in Buenos Aires?”
“Yes, señor. In Avellanada. But I was born in Córdoba.”
There was a difficult silence. Domingo stared at a sepia photograph
“My wife's grandfather,” Stephen explained. “With the Prince of Wales. He visited their estançion when he came here in the thirties.”
Domingo nodded, without comprehension. With every second that passed Stephen felt increasingly ashamed. He had often wondered what he would do if he was finally faced with this situation. He was disappointed with the answer. He realised he would only produce as much information as he was asked for, like a man hoping to keep a misplaced wallet.
“My sister ... has disappeared.”
Another hesitation. This was a dangerous conversation to be having these days, Stephen thought, even in private. He cleared his throat. “I know.”
“You were here?”
Stephen nodded.
“You saw it?”
“We heard ... noises. There were two cars ... a number of armed men.” Stephen hesitated. “This was over six months ago. No one else has been to the apartment has far as we know. It's been re-let.”
Domingo nodded. “A friend of my sister's rang me the next day to tell me what had happened. So I made my way straight here. I was arrested downstairs in the lobby. They beat me and put me in prison. Why? I still don't know. I don't even know what my sister is supposed to have done. She had nothing to do with the comunistas, I swear it.”
Maria brought them tea, in a cottage china service of English floral pattern. There were scones nestled in a lace cloth and a small pot of raspberry jam. Domingo stared in bewilderment at this alien offering, unsure how to proceed.
Maria poured two cups of tea, added milk and sugar and handed one cup to Stephen and the other to Domingo. He balanced the tiny cup on his knees.
“This has been very hard for me and my family. No one can tell me what has happened to my sister or her husband. She had two baby daughters. Did you know that, señor?”
“Yes. Sometimes we heard babies crying.”
“Our parents are both dead, señor. Now there is just the two of us. But since we moved here to the city I did not see her very much. I think she was ashamed, you know? She married this big shot guy, and perhaps she wanted to forget about Avellenada.”
The silence seemed to go on forever. “So why were you arrested?”
“They wanted to know where to find señor Altman. You know Reuben? My sister's husband?”
“As I said, we spoke once or twice. In the lobby. That was all.”
“Why did they ask me these questions? Wasn't he here the night they came? Where was he? If he was not here, then why did he not come back after the arrest?”
“I don't know.”
“Did you not see him, Señor Barrington?”
He heard the front door open. It was Mercedes. He got to his feet and Domingo hurried to do the same, almost spilling his tea. His wife's smile fell away when she saw Domingo. She looked at Stephen, their eyes met. In the silent code of couples married for many years he gave her fair warning.
Mercedes took Diana from her stroller and handed her to Maria. Luca rushed for the television but Stephen adroitly headed him off. “Can you take him to his room, please?” he said to Maria.
He was bundled away with promises of dulce con leche.
Stephen introduced his wife. Domingo solemnly took her hand and gave a slight bow. “Señor Goncalvez is Gabriella Altman's brother,” he said. “He is hoping to discover what happened to her and her family.”
“I see.”
Mercedes assumed the expression of an expansive hostess. She was a formidable woman, his wife. She had the demeanour of a British Conservative politician, her Home Counties accent apparent, even when speaking Spanish, as she was now. Her Latin looks and small stature disguised a will of massive proportions.
She draped herself elegantly beside Stephen on the sofa and he poured her a cup of tea from the pot. She gave Domingo the same friendly, but impossibly distant, smile she reserved for guests such as Luca's music teacher and Stephen's business associates.
“Señor Goncalvez informed me that he came here the day after the Altmans disappeared. He was also arrested, downstairs, in the lobby.”
Mercedes sipped her tea. “You realise we are taking a very great risk even in talking with you,” she said to Domingo. “We could just deny we even saw or heard anything. It would be safer. That is what most people would have done.”
“Yes, I understand. You are very kind.”
Stephen stared at his wife, shocked. What game was she playing here? He heard Diana crying in the nursery. “But we were here,” he said. “And we did see, we did hear.”
“Yes, darling, we were here. What can we help you with, Señor Goncalvez?”
“Anything you know may be a help. All I know for now is that my sister and her whole family is gone.”
“As my husband has no doubt told you, we were woken by the sound of cars in the street. They used plastic explosives to blow the lock off the security gate. Then we heard men running up th
e stairs. You understand that my husband and I were very frightened. There was nothing we could do.”
“What time was this?”
“A little after three.”
“And then?”
Diana was crying even louder now.
“A short while later we saw the cars drive off again. We went in to your sister's apartment to investigate.”
“And what - what did you find?”
Stephen was about to answer but Mercedes talked over the top of him. “The front door had been kicked off its hinges. We went in but the apartment was empty. The desk and the filing cabinet in the study had been emptied out and the rest of the rooms had been ransacked. It was ... terrifying.”
“They had taken everyone?”
“Yes, everyone. Of course.”
“Even the babies?”
“They would hardly leave them behind. If they had, we would have seen them.”
Stephen was aghast at her perfidy. He had never known his wife to be anything less than scrupulously honest, had never caught her out in a lie before. This is not right, he thought. We must tell him. We must tell him the truth.
“They did not take everyone,” Domingo said.
You see? Stephen thought. He knows!
“They did not take Reuben.”
“Reuben?” Mercedes said.
“My sister's husband. As I was telling your husband, when I was arrested, the police kept asking me, “Where is Reuben?” At three o'clock in the morning, he should have been here with his wife and his children. Yes?”
“Perhaps he went away on business.”
“And never came back.” Domingo's attitude of humility dropped away and Stephen saw the raw hatred beneath it. “He abandoned his wife and children!'
“No man would do such a thing deliberately.”
“You think they would have taken my sister if he had been here? All they wanted was Reuben.” Domingo stopped and looked up. Maria was standing in the doorway, holding Diana in her arms.
“Excuse me, señora. I did everything I could. She will not stop crying.”
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