by Frei Betto
He was served a daily fare of prostitutes, pimps, counterfeiters, cheap hotels and unimaginative killers. He had no doubt his talent was being wasted in Lapa as he worked his way up the career ladder, biding his time. But if he were a bandido, he’d be untouchable, or so he liked to think.
A keen observer of himself, he had loftier ambitions than stabbings, shootings, punch-ups, extortions, car thefts and crude muggings. He longed for a bank safe emptied without the alarm going off; the death of a senador in his mistress’ apartment; the kidnapping of a millionaire businessman. Del Bosco dreamed of having his photo on the front pages of newspapers, of doing TV interviews on the evening news, of being paraded before the public as the hero who’d managed to solve a crime that would go down in the annals of police folklore. All of which was why he was treating the Lapa beheading as a routine crime that he needed to get out of the way quick smart.
Meticulous in his investigations, time – the doyen of truth – was on his side. He only ever resorted to aggressive methods when he ran out of patience. To hell with scruples.
He’d joined the Academia de Polícia with the military dictatorship in its death throes. In the main building, an inscription on the wall had been considered great sport even among black rookies: a negro standing still is suspicious, a running one is guilty. Del Bosco had experienced training exercises in which apprentices were electrocuted and burned with cigarettes, had their heads held under water or their bodies turned upside down and tied to a pole – the so-called parrot’s perch. His left arm bore the scar of a wound caused by a colleague who’d been incited to “thrash the bandido with a cudgel”.
Del Bosco saw himself as a fisherman that fish just couldn’t help swimming towards.
HOLOGRAPHIC PHOTO
“What did senhor ask me again?” said Cândido, his eyes distracted by a cockroach that had come sneaking out of a light switch on the wall behind the detective.
“Whether senhor suspects anyone of committing the murder?”
“Não. I haven’t a clue who could have done it.”
Cândido possibly didn’t have a clue what the detective was even talking about, for he felt an itch on his left leg, where the sock met the opening of his trousers. He gave it a twitchy slap with his hand. Cockroaches made him feel pantophobic. The image of the insect grew in the corner of his brain and played with his emotions, until a holographic photo emerged, divided into a mosaic of fragments, each one containing an image of the cockroach.
The detective stood up and laid his sunglasses down on top of the papers on the table. He started to walk from one side of the room to the other, as if to stress his thinking.
“If I were to say that we suspect the crime to be connected with the international trafficking of precious gemstones, I would doubtless only be expressing a hypothesis that had already passed through senhor’s head.”
No such thing had passed through Cândido’s head. He had imagined other things: Seu Marçal as the victim of an eyeball-smuggling mafia who, having snuck down the dark corridors of the hotel, had surprised the pedlar in his room and, after immobilizing him with chloroform, stabbed him in the heart and set about decapitating him, removing his eyeballs with scissors and pincers, before depositing them in a special solution containing essential nutrients.
INTERLUDE
“Or, who knows, man,” whispered Odidnac, “maybe it was revenge for his hand brushing up against one of those girls who shimmy past semi-naked to the beach.”
“True, the old guy was rather fond of a firm bum-bum, but it’s probably best to keep quiet about that.”
DETAILS
Cândido scratched his head, intrigued. He would have liked to object to being asked to make conjectures when he was neither a policeman nor a relative of the deceased. He cared little whether the victim was or wasn’t a link in some supposed international chain. Only one thing intrigued him: why pull his eyes out? Still, he refrained from saying anything. He kept the cockroach under careful surveillance.
“There’s incriminating evidence,” continued the peripatetic detective, “that the killer nurtured a strong hatred for the victim. We’re not dealing with a mere settling of scores here, rather a carefully executed revenge with a strong emotional component. Nobody goes to the trouble of removing a head from a torso, much less extracts the eyeballs, at great risk of being caught red-handed, unless they’re compelled to do so by some uncontrollable impulse. I don’t know if senhor has ever hated a person enough to want to wipe them off the face of the earth, but it’s a lion-like feeling, colossal, indomitable. It awakens the killer inside us and gives us extraordinary strength to crush the enemy mercilessly.”
“I’ve never lost my head,” replied Cândido, with monk-like calm.
Del Bosco came to a halt as if someone had tipped a bucket of cold water over him. He clasped the back of the chair, raised his eyebrows and said:
“Lost his head… Lost his head…” He stressed every syllable, seemingly talking to himself.
“Maybe the explanation lies in Minas,” said Cândido, still monitoring the cockroach, which was now climbing the far wall and heading for the picture that dominated the room – an official portrait of the Presidente da República.
The detective sat back down. He put his right elbow on the table and rested his temple on his clenched fist. Cândido thought it looked as if he was trying to keep his head from coming loose and falling to the floor.
“We’ve already requested the assistance of the Vale do Rio Doce police force,” Del Bosco said. “I’ll go up there personally if our preliminary inquiries don’t shed any light on the case.”
He paused and changed his tone.
“There’s something that intrigues me even more than the murderer’s cruelty. Other than the eyeballs, nothing was stolen. The killer didn’t take a single gemstone, didn’t even remove the victim’s ring from his finger. There was no sign of struggle in the room. No windows or doors were forced. And the victim didn’t fight off his attacker or try to defend himself.”
The detective opened an envelope that was lying on the table.
“Take a look at the photos. I’ve never seen anyone die with such a happy face! Which would suggest he was killed by someone he considered a friend. According to forensics, before having his head chopped off, he was stabbed in the heart with a blade as fine as a stiletto. He evidently received the blow while sitting on the bed. Immediately after that, the attacker cut his head off using a cold weapon, something similar to a sword. Based on the unevenness of the laceration, this operation must have taken at least an hour.”
Cândido placed his hand on his own neck in a reflex gesture, then checked on the cockroach’s progress: it was calmly crossing Sua Excelência’s presidential sash.
“Where was senhor at the time of the murder?”
“In my room, eating an orange,” said Cândido. “I’d finished dinner and taken the fruit we’d been given for dessert to my room.”
“If senhor were to draw up a list of suspects, would Diamante Negro and Madame Larência be on it?” asked Del Bosco.
“Why those two in particular?” Cândido replied, managing to contain himself. In different circumstances he would have dared ask: “Is senhor prejudiced, perchance?”
The detective stood up again, seeming not to notice the surprise in Cândido’s voice, and caught sight of the cockroach climbing Sua Excelência’s nose. Inside the picture frame the president looked terrified, paralysed by an alien force and half squinting, as if he could feel the vile creature advancing on his eyes.
With a brusque motion, the delegado swung and slapped at the insect. The cockroach fell to the floor, as did the picture itself, smashing into pieces and sending fragments of glass flying across the room.
“Perdão!” exclaimed Del Bosco.
Cândido didn’t know whether the detective was apologizing to him, the cockroach or the Presidente da República, who lay stretched out on the floor, sporting the smile of a dethroned hero.<
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The cockroach emerged from the mess in a frenzy, eager to get home right away. It ran round in circles, finding its progress blocked after making short advances and brandishing its probing antennae to sniff out danger and continue its retreat. It bore the trauma of its interrupted ascent and could also sense the disturbing presence of two huge bulks monitoring its progress.
The detective lifted one of his Italian moccasins and brought the sole down hard on the cockroach, making a sound like a monkey nut being crunched between molars.
Cândido felt a shiver run down his spine and a sick feeling sweep through his mouth. Nevertheless, he was relieved: a living cockroach took up too much space in any room he found himself in.
Del Bosco concluded:
“Ora, it’s not a matter of prejudice, if that’s what senhor thinks. I’m a modern man. In this job I hardly ever deal with normal people – Lapa is a hotbed of sexual deviants – and I treat everyone the same. I only have my suspicions about Diamante Negro and Madame Larência because they were the two guests who had business dealings with Seu Marçal. And, as senhor is doubtless aware, they do both lead irregular lives.”
4Sparkling
“Name?” asked the detective.
“Elias Procópio da Silva,” said the suspect, before adding in a contralto voice, “Diamante Negro to my fans.”
“Profession?”
“Transformista.”
The exact meaning of the term escaped Del Bosco, but he knew it was “something to do with gays”. He didn’t ask so as not to show his ignorance.
In fact, Diamante Negro was a quick-change artist. He imitated black singers in late-night cabaret shows in Cinelândia, transforming his voice with the same ease with which he changed wigs, sequined ballgowns and glittering jewellery. High heels lent his lankiness a touch of poise and grace.
He’d have passed for a basketball player if it weren’t for his camp manners and way of talking. He had a quip ready for every guest, much to Pacheco’s annoyance whenever he was the target.
“Pacheco, what do intellectuals and prawns have in common?”
“Bem, I suppose it’s their noble attire: they both look dapper in dress coats.”
“Oh, minha santa, it’s that their heads are both full of shit.”
Dona Dinó liked to say that in Diamante Negro’s chest “beat a mother’s heart”. When Marcelo was bed-bound with pneumonia, he found in Diamante Negro a devoted nurse. If Jorge was struggling to keep up with the dirty dishes, Diamante Negro bent over the sink unprompted, humming and swaying as he scrubbed. If Rosaura needed someone to hold the fabric tight as she stitched up a dress, the transformista’s nimble fingers could be relied upon to dance around her needles and thread, scissors and offcuts.
Nobody dared show Diamante Negro disrespect. Some feared his acid tongue, others secretly envied his self-assurance. He was true to himself and cared little for what others thought of him. Generous and mocking at the same time, there was a joy in his words and gestures that was absent from his eyes.
Osíris was his best friend at the hotel. The cat would often sneak out of Dona Dinó’s room in the middle of the night to go and nestle on one of the guests’ beds, and it invariably favoured Diamante Negro’s soft linen sheets.
“The cat is an animal that knows its own mind,” Diamante Negro would oft repeat. “It’s a matter of self-respect: the bicha won’t sleep with just anyone. I never did see a police cat, but they sure have plenty of dogs.”
BOX OF MAGIC TRICKS
When Diamante Negro abandoned Salvador and the family home, he left a letter stuck to the fridge in which he confessed he was tired of pretending to be someone he was not. “Inside me,” he wrote, inspired by the lyrics of a bolero, “I’m a mixture of panic, excitement, horror and charm. I burn with desire to taste the world, to sink my teeth into it and then spit it out because I don’t swallow.”
“I know the flip side of life,” he told his brother, who’d come down to Rio to try and coax Diamante Negro home. “Ever since childhood, people have expected the ways of a man from me, but I know I’m a woman. Inside and out. For years I’ve lived the nightmare of thinking I’m a maldito freak of nature. But life’s like that box of magic tricks we used to play with when we were little: full of surprises.”
His family was indeed surprised by the changes in Diamante Negro (or “Procopinho” as they’d always called him): his new tone of voice; his coarse, limp-wristed hand gestures; the swish of his hips as he walked; the way he’d express indignation by arching his back, placing his hands on his hips, sighing and rolling his eyes, or show indifference with a marked shrug of the shoulders. At school, he’d always shocked teachers and drawn laughter from classmates with his erotic interpretations of children’s stories:
“Snow White shacks up with seven dwarfs, Little Red Riding Hood gets into bed with the Big Bad Wolf, Robin Hood gives it to the poor, Cinderella’s prince is obviously a paedophile.”
He pleaded with his brother:
“My life is a constant conflict: on the one hand, there’s what you all want me to be; on the other, there’s what I am.”
“You’re not a woman!” shouted his brother.
“I’m a clone of myself,” said Diamante Negro. “I know I’m not a woman. I’m feminine. It’s different.”
It was a tough apprenticeship, but Diamante Negro managed to tread a new path for himself, one in which all features of the landscape pointed to the same horizon.
“Every man,” he was fond of saying, “carries a woman inside him, just as every woman has a man inside her. No one is solely the sex they appear to be. Everyone has a feminine and a masculine side.” And then he liked to add: “Even if one side remains forever trapped in the closet.”
In him resided the ancient voices of his heritage. As his talent for mimicry grew, he drew upon those voices until his own evoked African gods with its anguish, nostalgia and earthy sound. When he was on stage, he sang not with his vocal chords, but with his guts.
IMPRESSIONS
“Who killed Seu Marçal?” said the detective, staring him in the eye.
“It must have been some pervert,” replied Diamante Negro.
“Why a pervert?” said Del Bosco, fighting the urge to burst out laughing at the suspect’s mannerisms.
“Because only a pervert would chop off a head.”
“And who do you suspect it was?”
“Não sei. Maybe the boyfriend of one of those meninas he used to lust over at the hotel door.”
“Couldn’t you have killed him?” said the detective, trying to be intimidating.
Del Bosco privately amused himself by following the directives of the Manual do Interrogador. He had the authority to break, at least morally, the backbones of those he questioned. Suspects typically showed up thinking they’d provide proof of their innocence and be on their way in a matter of minutes. But Del Bosco knew that in the confines of the interrogation room, not only was he the referee, he got to choose the rules of the game as well. He derived twisted pleasure from conducting interviews by slowly racking up the psychological pressure: he explored apparent contradictions; insinuated knowledge of facts that were mere bluff; issued threats simply to watch, right there in front of him, the metamorphosis of a civilian losing his composure, confusing his thoughts, stumbling over words, experiencing fear and humiliation.
Del Bosco saw himself as a spider watching a fly from the safety of its web. The fly thought itself somehow superior, but as soon as it touched against the network of threads, it was confronted by the manifest supremacy of the arachnid.
“Me, a murderer, delegado?” said Diamante Negro, flabbergasted. “Call me ‘queer’ or ‘homo’ or whatever, but, por favor, don’t confuse me with rat poison.”
“Where were you at the time of the murder?”
“At the Galeria Alasca, in Copacabana, rehearsing my new show, Ferradas, porém felizes. I’ll have to send senhor an invitation to the premiere! I imitate the divine Elize
th Cardoso. A whole bunch of colegas can confirm that I arrived at the theatre at six in the afternoon and didn’t leave until the small hours. My taxi dropped me off at the hotel just as the meat wagon was taking Seu Marçal away. I only just got there in time to say adeuzinho.”
“Were you friends?”
“It was only me and Larência who got on well with him at the hotel. I’ve a collection of gorgeous gemstones bought from his fair hand. Senhor should see the red fire of the tourmalines! A real showstopper, believe me!”
“But you also sold stones on for him.”
“Ora, money’s tighter than a tranny’s truss at a beauty pageant, delegado! In the old days a queer was a queer and a man was a man. Today the competition could kill you! Transvestites, gays, drag queens, transformistas, bisexuals, transsexuals, in the closet, out of the closet, passive, active… A whole fauna of God only knows what!”
“Would Doutor Pacheco have had motives for eliminating Seu Marçal?” asked the detective.
“Pacheco? He’s nothing but a safado bootlicker. He starts drooling the second he sees a bigwig. He must know all there is to know about crimes against humanity, but I doubt such a pirate’s papagaio would be capable of chopping someone’s head off.”
“And Professor Cândido?”
“Ah, he I don’t know,” said Diamante Negro. “He gets on well with everyone, but he’s not friends with anyone. He’s Dona Dinó’s queridinho: ‘Elias, don’t touch the soup on the stove – it’s for Professor Cândido.’ Argh! I can’t stand all that surrogate mothering! He doesn’t seem to be the one with the Oedipus complex, though; he just acts himself. Might he be a serial killer? Não sei, maybe he lopped heads off all over Minas. I’m always wary of people who paint themselves out as the Good Samaritan. Senhor probably thinks that my colegas who work the streets are afraid of drunks and dockers, men with ugly faces and dirty clothes? Quite the opposite, delegado! They’re the upstanding ones – pardon the expression. The ones you really have to mind your behind with are the office types, with their shirts and ties and leather briefcases, the ones who smell of cologne. They’re ruffians, delegado! They treat the girls like disposable dolls, haggle over the price and then knock them about – as if the girls are guilty for making them feel guilty! Professor Cândido loves street children. Why? He could be a paedophile for all I know. He comes in and then rushes off again, running to the aid of some young rapaz who’s been arrested.”
