The Mastermind

by David Unger

  “How did he know where we were going?”

  “I never go anywhere without my driver. See you there,” says Miguel, changing his mind about waiting for the bill. Instead, he simply puts three hundred quetzales on the table.

  * * *

  Guillermo wobbles over to his car at the 13th Street lot and drives down to Tenth Avenue, where he turns toward the Zona Viva. The traffic is dense, all first- and second-gear driving, until he reaches Villa Olimpica and Mateos Flores National Stadium where he’s finally able to get into third gear. He guns the accelerator and races down the ravine next to the stadium, not letting up until he reaches the blue polytechnic school, the Justo Rufino Barrios statue, and the old Casa Crema on Reforma Boulevard. He loves all these landmarks, still standing, on some level belying the fact that Guatemala City has devolved over the years into chaos.

  He turns left on 12th Street in Zone 10 and drives past the Mercure Casa Veranda Hotel, where he once spent a weekend cavorting with Araceli. The parking lot entrance to the Fontabella Mall is a few blocks north. He turns in, drives slowly down the ramp, and finds a parking spot next to a post, which he grazes, lightly scraping the fender of his car. Given his state of inebriation, the dent is small potatoes.

  On the way to the elevator, he passes a blue Hyundai and jumps. He remembers seeing one the first time he met Maryam at the Centro Vasco. There must be hundreds of them in Guatemala. But still, why here?

  He looks inside the Hyundai, but it’s empty.

  Guillermo stumbles into the elevator that will bring him to the mall lobby. From the lobby he takes the escalator to the second floor. Raoul’s is down the corridor from the Sophos Bookstore, as Miguel indicated, in a hidden corner. The display windows show only the finest of clothes, tastefully arranged on lifelike mannequins. The store could be on Coral Gables’ Miracle Mile or even on Michigan Avenue in Chicago. But now it’s totally empty except for the one salesman sitting on a stool facing out from the display counter. He absentmindedly files his nails.

  As soon as Guillermo walks in, a bell sounds. The salesman looks up, but doesn’t move. Miguel comes out of a door in back, by the dressing rooms, and signals for Guillermo to join him in his office.

  To his surprise, Paredes’s office is all computer screens and file cabinets—no trace of the ledgers or cloth swatches that befit a haberdashery. Instead, it resembles the headquarters, the huge central brain, of an extensive informational spy network. Clearly Raoul’s is a front for some other kind of business.

  “Take a seat here,” Miguel gestures to a gray swivel chair facing a huge Mac computer screen.

  As soon as Guillermo sits down, Miguel moves the cursor over to a still open video window and clicks play. “Watch now,” he says.

  The black-and-white film is very grainy, but despite his drunkenness, Guillermo recognizes the driveway leading up to the guardhouse and the parking lot of Ibrahim’s textile factory. There’s a light-colored car near the top of the screen, which is not moving. There’s no way to read the license plate from this distance. For four or five seconds everything seems frozen, then a man steps out of the parked car and looks down toward the guardhouse through binoculars, though the distance is less than twenty feet. He gets back into the car, and about two minutes later does the same thing, only this time he appears startled and quickly gets back into his car.

  Miguel is leaning over Guillermo. “That man’s a lookout. Watch the next part very carefully.”

  Guillermo glances up at him, not understanding.

  “No, no, don’t take your eyes off the screen!”

  Guillermo lowers his eyes back down just in time to see a black Mercedes come into view. He feels a pain in his chest as he recognizes Maryam’s car, and his eyes well up. The car’s moving very slowly, much more slowly than Maryam would normally drive, even in a blurry video. Whenever she picks up her father, she turns the car around by the chain-link fence so she can drive away as soon as he comes down. This time, the car stops about ten feet from the factory and office door, which will force her father to walk over gravel to her. Five seconds later, a man steps into the camera’s view and moves slowly toward the car.

  “That’s Ibrahim!” Guillermo shouts incredulously, as if the man was still alive.

  “What’s surprising about that?”

  “Nothing, really. It’s just strange to see him alive like this, walking toward the car, toward my Maryam.” Guillermo realizes what he has confessed, but he’s beyond censoring his words.

  “Look, look, Guillermo. Tell me if you see anything strange.”

  Guillermo does not enjoy Miguel’s warm, stale breath on his neck, but he’s totally mesmerized by what’s happening on the computer screen. It’s almost like he is there, witnessing the event in real life, or on reality TV.

  Guillermo sees the car inch up a few more feet and stop dead. Instead of getting into the car as Ibrahim normally does, he places his forearms on the door and looks in as the passenger window rolls down. From this angle there is no way to see the driver.

  A conversation ensues. How strange. Why doesn’t he just get into the car? Guillermo can only see Ibrahim’s right shoulder. Suddenly he notices what looks like a dark blob moving in the backseat, blocking the light from the back window for a fraction of a second. Either the passenger headrest has been raised or there is someone in the backseat.

  “What’s that shadow?”

  “Look, Guillermo. Look.”

  Ibrahim raises his shoulders, opens the door, and sits down in his usual place. A few seconds go by as he puts on his seat belt, and then the car makes a right-angle turn and drives off slowly, back the way it came. At one point it is no more than ten feet from the car parked on the side of the road. About five seconds after Maryam’s car disappears from the camera’s view, the light-colored car whips around, throwing up a cloud of dust, and follows. For another ten seconds nothing can be seen but the driveway, the same edge of the guardhouse, and the cloud of dust rising from the pebbly ground and disappearing into the air. Then the view is frozen, there is no movement, and the screen turns black.

  “You can play it again if you’d like. Move the cursor over the replay button and click.” Miguel shuffles away.

  “There was someone tailing Maryam,” says Guillermo. It’s obvious to him that something made Ibrahim hesitate before stepping into the vehicle—perhaps there were three people inside—but for now he says nothing.

  Miguel comes up to him with two goblets in his hand. “I think we both need this. Zacapa Añejo rum, twenty-three years old. It’s like drinking a Hennessey XO.”

  Guillermo takes his goblet in his trembling hand and swallows it in one gulp. Another man who has been in the office the whole time—Miguel’s driver?—comes over with a bottle in his hand and refills Guillermo’s goblet.

  “Just click on the button and the video will play.”

  Guillermo watches the video again and discovers nothing new or strange. He keeps wondering if there’s someone else in the backseat, and believes Maryam may not be the driver.

  After his third run-through (by this time, Miguel has sat down in another swivel chair beside him), Guillermo pushes back from the table. Miguel asks him if he has seen anything at all that might shed some light on who was in the light-colored car.

  “The image isn’t very clear. And the camera’s too far away to read the license plate. In fact, I can’t even tell what kind of car it is.”

  “The guard thought it might have been a Nissan; a Japanese or Korean car for sure.”

  “That’s what Fulgencio said? I don’t know. Too grainy for me to see.”

  “Anything else?” Miguel persists. “Anything that surprised you?”

  Guillermo sits back in his chair. By now he has had three glasses of Zacapa in addition to the two rums he had at Café Europa, and his head is whirling out of control. Even as he talks, he replays the tape in his head. He has seen a couple of things that don’t make sense. He’s wavering, but finally decides t
o reveal his doubts to Miguel, whom he is beginning to embrace as a kind of guardian angel or a kindred soul.

  “You know that I came down with Ibrahim several times from his office and joined him with Maryam before returning to work at his office in the afternoon. Never in all those occasions did I see Maryam stop the car short and wait for her father to come to her. And certainly Maryam would never roll down the window and speak to her father from the driver’s seat while he stood outside in the sun. He would simply get into the car, and she would drive away.”

  “So what does that tell you?”

  “I don’t know. It’s a bit crazy, but maybe Maryam wasn’t the person driving.”

  Guillermo signals for Miguel to watch the tape with him for a fourth time. When he gets to the part where Ibrahim is about to step into the car, he stops the tape. “Take a look into the car. For an instant you’ll see a dark blob block the sunlight from the back. It’s as if someone in the backseat suddenly sits up for a split second and then lies back down.”

  Miguel takes the tape off pause and it begins rolling again. It all happens very quickly. There is little to see, nothing more than a strobe blocking a spot of light. It doesn’t seem significant to him, not enough of a clue to matter. “You are seeing things, Guillermo. Sometimes your mind wants your eyes to see something that’s not really there.”

  “It’s there, all right.” Guillermo rubs his face with both hands. “I know what I know.”

  “What would a third person in the car mean? And who would that person be?”

  “I said I don’t know.”

  “Think, man!”

  “Her husband Samir,” Guillermo lies. “Maybe he came along to watch them die!”

  Miguel pauses, then touches Guillermo’s neck. “My dear man, you’re consumed by grief. I only showed you this tape so you could see the unmarked car. The killing was set up, but not by Samir. I know you were in love with Maryam, and that she wanted to leave her husband to marry you, but you can’t let this passion of yours confuse you.”

  Without opening his eyes, Guillermo shakes his head. “How do you know these things about me? We kept our affair an absolute secret.”

  “My friend, there was no other way to interpret your comments at the memorial service. Anyone would have guessed you were sad over the death of your client, but grief-stricken over the death of his daughter. If Samir Mounier wanted Ibrahim and Maryam killed, he wouldn’t be lying down in the backseat. He would simply hire someone to murder them and be miles from the scene. Actionable information develops from credible evidence. I’m afraid you are not providing credible evidence. No, I suspect there’s someone else who wanted to have Ibrahim killed, and had the means and the connections to plan it. That’s where we must look to find the murderers. Maryam, as much as you loved her, was collateral damage. She was never the target. Once the assassins planned to kill Ibrahim, the death of his daughter became just one more unfortunate piece of news.”

  “But what if Samir wanted them both killed?”

  Miguel scratches his chin. “It’s fair to assume Samir may have wanted Maryam killed to prevent her from getting together with you. I know you separated from your own wife and children months ago, and that they’re living in Mexico City with her uncle. Only you know if Maryam would have ever left her husband. It’s also true that with Ibrahim dead, Samir will now inherit the factory and the business, which will make him a very rich man, but I don’t find any of this likely.”

  Guillermo drops his head onto the desk. He’s tired. And drunk. Moreover, he’s angry, full of hate, and quite confused. He glances up at Miguel, who has a knowing look on his face.

  “You’ve set me up for this. You went to the funeral service hoping I would be there so you could talk to me afterward.”

  “Guillermo, I did no such thing.”

  “You had this tape ready for me, ready to roll as soon as I walked in.”

  “It’s true. I was hoping someone would say something that would make me want to show him this tape, but I didn’t know it would be you. Not today. I was planning to call you at your office in a couple of days and invite you to lunch.”

  “You know so much about me.”

  “Yes,” Miguel says, putting a tender hand on Guillermo’s shoulder. “But I know much about a lot of things. It’s my business to do so. Here, let me help you get up. I will have my men accompany you. They can drive you and your car home.”

  chapter twenty

  jimmy cracked corn, and i don’t care

  In the weeks that follow there’s a big brouhaha as the president appoints a special independent prosecutor to investigate the deaths of Ibrahim and Maryam Khalil. Since Miguel is the only one in possession of the tape, the query is nothing more than feathers flying in the hen house with no trace of the fox. The prosecutor assembles a team of investigators to study the circumstances of this double homicide and uncover the actual assassins. But since no one ever really wants to know what’s happening or has happened in Guatemala, the investigation resembles a 1920s silent movie in which a dog chases its own tail for forty minutes.

  Every week dozens of dead bodies appear in Guatemala City: corpses in alleys, in ravines, on street corners, at bus stops, and even inside of city buses, mostly at night. Of every hundred deaths, the police and detective squads are able to bring one or two culprits to justice. And even in these instances, those found guilty are often merely the hired hands of the true agents of the murder.

  All this begins to gnaw on Guillermo, like some undiagnosed bacteria. This, together with the immense loss he feels, is enough to debilitate him. His only remaining purpose in life is to find those responsible for the death of his love.

  He becomes obsessed with the idea of impunity, that crimes can be committed and proof presented, but nothing done because the judge is paid off to render any concrete evidence inadmissible or tainted. He begins to see impunity everywhere: in people throwing garbage on the streets and driving off; horns sounding near hospitals; screaming in churches; people blowing smoke in your face on the street; moviegoers cutting in line to get the best seats; people tossing cigarette butts in restaurant glasses . . . everything revealing the absence of consequences.

  Guillermo actually longs for the days of armed conflict when the guerrillas were the clear enemy, setting fire to Guatemala, The Land of Eternal Spring. Back then Ríos Montt and his lapdog Pérez Molina vowed to establish military order by using a heartless slash-and-burn policy. What were they expected to do? Play footsies with the guerrillas? Turn the country over to bearded thugs and masses of barefoot Indians supporting them?

  What is happening now, with no distinct enemy, is more unnerving.

  He knows for a fact that Ibrahim and Maryam have been unjustly eliminated and that no one, not even Maryam’s very own husband, cares why or how it happened.

  The only one who seems to care is Miguel Paredes, and he is an expert at manipulation. He drops clues like bread crumbs to a starving man. Every time Guillermo’s desire to bring the murderers to justice flags, Miguel is there, ready to share some tasty tidbit to pique his interest. It is uncanny how this happens. Miguel, the master operator, knows exactly what to do and when to do it, and Guillermo obeys like a trained seal.

  Very often the two men meet in the late afternoon at the Sophos Bookstore café. They like one table in particular, the one that looks over the patio below. It is in a corner and just steps away from the bathroom. As far as they know, the store is free of cameras.

  The bookstore café fills with shoppers and writers, drinking lattes and macchiatos, ordering thin slices of pecan or lemon pie. Mild classical music plays softly from speakers in the background. It is the perfect venue for their conversations, much more so than Café Europa downtown, which is probably bugged. And meeting in such a quiet, sedate place gives their discussions a hint of respectability, as if all their dialogues about sinister plots and hired hands were legitimate possibilities.

  In this setting, Guillermo orders
a bottle of red wine and reveals everything he knows about the shenanigans of Banurbano. Miguel is more than happy to let his new friend talk as if to a father confessor. Guillermo feels that a load is being lifted from his shoulders and his heart as he’s allowed to speak openly about things he has held hidden. He repeats his theory that there was a third person in the car, but Miguel is not convinced. It doesn’t really matter: Guillermo is no longer the only person who knows what he knows, and this provides relief.

  Within two weeks of the church service, Miguel Paredes finally feels confident enough to discuss with Guillermo his master plan: he lets the proverbial cat, which has been mewling and scratching more vigorously than ever, out of the bag.

  “We need to consider that the government is behind Ibrahim’s death.”

  “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you! The question is why.”

  “To shut him up.”

  “The president wouldn’t sink so low as to commit murder to silence an opponent.”

  Miguel touches his friend’s hand. “Oh, but he would. Ibrahim’s investigations into the Banurbano accounts were making a lot of people uncomfortable. I wouldn’t be surprised if the president and his lovely wife were responsible for the murders. Guillermo, did you notice how quickly the special prosecutor disbanded his group of investigators? Ten days of investigation, no postmortem, no subpoenas of the files that you and Ibrahim have accumulated, no inquiry into the dropped calls and threatening messages. Whoever was behind this wanted the investigation to end. And you, my friend, are the only one who cares enough about the truth to change things.”

  “Did you ever show anyone in the administration or the police the security tape?”

  “Are you joking? Why would I? They would simply confiscate it and force me to provide them with every copy of the tape at the risk of death. I am brave, but not so brave as to smile down the barrel of a gun.”

  A sober Guillermo Rosensweig would never have fallen for this ploy, but the absence of Maryam amplifies his sense of hopelessness. To counter his desperation, he takes a weekend trip to spend time with his children, who are now living in Mexico’s fancy Chimalistac district. The first thing he notices is that the teenagers are happy to be out of the butcher shop Guatemala has become, and are even resentful they didn’t move to Mexico earlier. They treat him with a certain coldness. The major issue for them is not the death of his girlfriend, but his own betrayal.