She had a good, clear voice. Her nervousness was evident but not overwhelming, as it was for some. As he was deciding how to proceed, a youngish man in an advocate's black robe hurried forward to stand beside Señora Márquez.
"My apologies, Señoría. I was detained briefly, receiving some information that may be applicable to your questions."
Juez Garibey doubted that. After all, no one knew exactly what his questions were going to be. Only Pedro and his team had an inkling. Only they knew about the smartphone data copy.
His eyes narrowed. No, that wasn't necessarily true. Might Señora Márquez have realised that her smartphone had been copied? She would certainly know what was on it. Also, there was still that unsolved theft of the laptops. He must proceed with care.
"Señora, I have asked you to appear today as a witness in order to ask you about payments that seem to have been paid by three companies, Constructores Equilibris, ServiArquitectos and MultiMedia Hispania. You know you're appearing under oath."
Juez Garibey stopped, deliberately. It would do no harm to let the gravity of the circumstances set in. He resumed.
"I've a selected list of payments here, many of which seem to be duplicates, and a second list where credit notes were not reclaimed by CE, ServiArquitectos or MMH. Do you recognise any of these transactions and can you explain how they were handled by the issuing organisations, several of which I believe to be your clients?"
Internally Marta was shocked. It was bad enough having to appear at all in a court in front of a criminal Juez de Instrucción. But his producing printouts of transactions that she was sure only CE, MMH and ServiArquitectos would possess surprised her. That the Juez also seemed able to connect these to her specific clients made matters worse. She waited as the papers were brought to her.
She spent a while looking at them. To all intents and purposes these were the same lists that the wretched ORS people had sent her when demanding repayment. Perhaps Juez Garibey had access only to ORS records. If so that would not prove much, except that her clients had over-invoiced or under repaid. It was not her fault that CE, MMH and ServiArquitectos had not been responsible. Nevertheless, she took her time thinking about how best to reply.
"Well, Señora?"
"Señoría, I do recognise some of these. Are you aware, for example, that any discrepancies between MMH, CE and ServiArquitectos have been resolved with Inocenta Acosta and the Gómez law firm? A third, with FyP, is under negotiation."
Juez de Garibey had not known this. He would have to talk with Pedro.
"I presume what you say is readily verifiable?"
Marta mumbled assent.
"Well let's consider your other three clients, though we may have to come back to FyP if the negotiations don't succeed. Can you explain why these companies in effect accepted overpayments from their customers? Can you also tell me what happened to the excess receipts within your clients?"
"Without going back to examine each one, Señoría, I cannot. That's something that would require substantial work."
"Is it possible?"
"I imagine so, providing no records have been destroyed."
Juez Garibey stated blandly, "Which they shouldn't have been if the legal requirements on retention have been observed."
"I agree."
"Shall we reconvene next week? I wouldn't expect you to substantiate every transaction in a few days, but I do expect explanations for at least, say, one hundred of the largest items from each invoicing organisation – for both duplicate payments and for lack of credit notes processed."
Marta looked at her lawyer who said to her, "That does seem reasonable. He's not asking for anything untoward yet, though what might follow is unknown."
He stood, "Señoría, if it takes more time than you anticipate please permit my client to postpone next week's appearance. Her clients may take longer to deliver than either you or she expect."
"Fair enough. I appreciate your point."
Juez Garibey was disappointed though not downcast. The process of assembling information and evidence was always laborious and often painfully slow. What had happened in front of him had not caused surprise. He had decided beforehand not to go on the immediate offensive with Señora Márquez, at least until he knew more. He left the Sala.
Back in his working office he called Pedro, who acknowledged that he had not taken on board that there had been settlements or the implications of ongoing negotiations with FyP. Pedro confirmed that he would follow up, by asking more questions of Felipe.
After summarising what had happened with Márquez, Juez Garibey went out for a coffee, preferring to leave the building and frequent a favourite bar than drink what was available from the cafeteria. About a half an hour later he returned to find a message from his assistant asking him to call Pedro as a matter of urgency.
Over the phone Pedro said, "Márquez was correct about the two settlements and the negotiation. In my view that does not stop you asking the same questions about what happened to the excess monies. But it's unclear, after the repayments, whether CE, MMH and ServiArquitectos have done anything wrong, so we must focus on the recipients.
"But here's an interesting aspect. Felipe, the gerente of ORS, went to visit Luis Zavala, head of the El Cerámico business, who turned him out, refusing pay a penny to CE or ServiArquitectos. Felipe is about to initiate legal proceedings against El Cerámico. I have the feeling that, given how Felipe described his abortive meeting with Luis Zavala, the latter might talk. What about citing him to appear?"
"Interesting. You must tell me more. But I think that's a good idea, especially if we can arrange it before Márquez returns."
They continued discussing options.
Wednesday: Madrid
"That was awful, Alfredo. I haven't been present before a Juez de Instrucción before. He was polite but I felt afraid."
"What did he ask?"
"Not much. He presented several lists of transactions, the same as ORS, from CE, MMH and ServiArquitectos and asked me to explain. I said that your firm and another client had settled and that FyP was negotiating. He seemed to lose interest in those that had settled, and potentially FyP –"
"–It's excellent news!" Alfredo waved to a waiter to take the debris of their lunch away. "If he's lost interest in my firm it opens up new opportunities for me."
"What are you talking about?"
"If my firm is off his suspects' list, as is Inocenta – she's lovely, by the way, we did enjoy meeting her – and potentially FyP, the scope for finding anything to lay at our door reduces. It also means I could represent you in any future appearances, assuming you want me to."
"You mean because your firm is no longer being reviewed? Okay, though you seem optimistic to me."
"Ah, but that's where I have the advantage. I know how Jueces de Instrucción work. If they don't chase an issue it generally means that they regard that avenue as being a dead end and closed. In addition, think again. What wrong to CE, MMH or ServiArquitectos has occurred if full restitution has been paid? None. So where can he go from there?"
"You've almost convinced me. I'd love to have you by my side in front of Garibey. He may be near retirement but he has a formidable presence. The young lawyer you sent doesn't have the gravitas to offset my nerves and Garibey's persona."
"At ease, Marta. My sense is this is coming under control. Plus I have three other pieces of news for you."
"Yes?"
"First, we loved being in Valencia with you. Puri was enchanted with Inocenta. The two are very similar. She sends profound thanks via me, and will no doubt say the same in person when you two next speak. She wants to know if you'll visit us soon, and perhaps bring what she called 'your man'. I assume not your husband?"
Marta went pink.
"Don't worry. Your secret's safe with us and you can always stay at Puri's and he at my house, or the other way round, if discretion is to be the order of the day."
"Thank you, Alfredo. It might be better the other
way around, though I doubt my mister will find it easy to get away. His wife's pregnant."
Oops, she had said too much, but Alfredo carried on, seemingly regardless: "Excellent! That's almost arranged. I'll leave it to you and Puri to resolve dates while I concentrate on matters here.
"The second piece of news is that, and I have it on reliable authority, ORS is almost insolvent. My godson, my source, says too little money is coming in. Any FyP settlement will only prolong the agony."
"My last piece of news is that I did as Puri suggested. I followed up on the possibility of the ambassadorship. My feelers apparently went down well and I've an impending appointment in the offices of the Jefe de Gabinete for the Presidente del Gobierno. I expect to be invited out to Moncloa later this week or next."
"That's wonderful news. Have you been given any idea of where?" A thought occurred to her. "Or when?"
"Don't worry." Alfredo touched her arm in sympathy. "No announcement will be made anytime soon. It won't affect my availability to appear beside you in front of Garibey."
Marta felt acute relief. Knowing that she would have a heavyweight in court relaxed her, until she had thought this might be snatched away. It seemed it would not be. Alfredo carried on as if it was of small consequence, which it probably was.
"As for where? It seems that there are two broad choices, given that I speak passable English. My French is not nearly so good. The first is a smaller South or Central American country, which rules out Brazil, Mexico or Argentina and probably Chile, Venezuela or Colombia. I rather fancy Panama and I do know the present incumbent there has to return to Madrid within the next twelve months to take up a new position being created for her."
"And the second choice?"
"One of the lesser European countries, perhaps one of the Baltics or Balkans."
"Have you any preference?"
"The European ones would be closer to home and more interesting. The South American ones would be warmer and more familiar – if further from Spain. I think, at least at the moment, the latter.
"But what cheers me most is your news that Garibey is no longer interested in my firm. What concerned me was that my ambassador opportunity might be hamstrung by the threat of ongoing enquiries. If those are out of the way we may be free and almost far away, having sorted you out into the bargain."
"Thank you. You said 'we'? Including Puri?"
"If all goes to plan, yes. She wouldn't be my formal partner living in the ambassadorial residence, but she'd come to the same place and we'd live unofficially together. To our great relief my so-called wife isn't interested in leaving her spiritual advisers."
"You told her? I thought you said she'd leak like a sieve?"
"I asked her if work took me away from Spain for a couple of years whether she'd want to accompany me. She was horrified and rejected it out of hand. I said nothing about being an ambassador. I think the precedent is set. Her mind's made up. She tends not to alter her decisions. Usually this is a disadvantage. This time it should work in my favour."
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Getting closer
Monday: Alcobendas
Pedro sat down with Carlos, Lucas, Caterina and Emilia and said, "I'd like to review progress. How did you get on last week, Lucas?"
"You mean with talking to CE, MMH and ServiArquitectos?" Pedro nodded. "Pretty well. With Caterina's assistance we soon obtained access to the accounting systems for past years for CE and MMH. To keep each happy we agreed to have a single dedicated computer here for each company." Lucas pulled a face. "It did mean, sir, having to buy more machines, for the sake of acting while the iron was hot, so to speak. I hope you won't mind. They were quite expensive. Caterina insisted on large memory and disks to enable us to undertake the maximum processing, even storage. They are now connected."
Lucas looked towards Caterina for support, who distractedly nodded her head, before turning back to her new laptop. She was working and preferred no disturbance.
Pedro said, "You mentioned CE and MMH but not ServiArquitectos. Do I surmise there's a problem?"
"Not really. The ServiArquitectos people were obstructive but eventually delivered pretty much all we asked, albeit with more constraints than with the other two. For example, we only have access to the specific five years agreed with the Juez de Instrucción and 'not a day more', to quote them. In contrast, CE and MMH have let us explore seven years. According to Caterina, this may prove an advantage."
"Good. I'm glad we move forward. So what happens next?"
"Both the M-In and M-Out teams are waiting for Caterina. She started work on Friday and has been running all sorts of data processing preparation followed by analyses. To be honest, at this point, she hasn't really explained much. Emilia, however, has been assisting her, prompting questions – and, frankly, running protection for Caterina whenever we try to understand what she's up to." He shrugged. "You should try asking her yourself?"
Pedro acknowledged the implied rebuke. He knew, from what Davide had once told him, that Caterina could disappear into a cloud of self-obsession once she had something to chew on. Davide had advised him not to break her concentration unless he had little alternative.
Indeed, Davide had confessed that he himself behaved similarly when confronting a challenge that engaged him – though nowhere to the degree of focus Caterina would display. He had admitted it was probably one of the reasons he and Caterina connected (when they did, he had added with heavy irony).
Pedro was bemused about Davide and Caterina as a pair. They seemed so simultaneously well- yet ill-suited. Well, this was one of those times to disturb her.
"Done!" exclaimed Caterina, before he could act.
She suddenly looked up as if seeing everybody for the first time that day. While haggard there was fire in her black eyes.
"Okay, Caterina. What have you got? Any chance of enlightenment?"
For the greater part of an hour Caterina behaved like a fire hydrant as she described what she had been doing all weekend. The gist, so far as Pedro could discern, was that she had pulled data from the accounting records belonging to the three ORS client companies and had gathered this into what she called a single logical data store. This was, in her own word, untrivial.
She had subsequently started some first analyses using techniques he had never come across, including something from Google called MapReduce. It was gobbledygook to him and to the others, judging by their expressions. Finally she stopped, asking if they understood. They looked blank.
"No? Never mind. It really doesn't matter. In essence I'm running a series of jobs, programmes to you, looking for matches and discrepancies and patterns, focused on the M-In payments. These will take some time yet to complete, maybe an hour or hours. There's a lot to crunch.
"After that I'll deliver to the M-In and M-Out teams a whole lot more detail than they have now. At that point the accounting sleuthe" – she pointed to Emilia – "can take over. I'll be very surprised if she doesn't find something. She's very good when given the right openings."
Emilia bathed in Caterina's unexpected paean of praise. While Emilia still thought of Caterina as a pain, her friend did not seem to harbour reciprocal feelings. They had talked a little over the weekend. Caterina was, as usual, having man-doubts – whether Davide was too good for her, whether he was wrong for her, whether she was good enough for him, where was everything going, and such like. Emilia, who rarely regretted anything, had switched off. It was easier to let Caterina rabbit on, making only supportive noises whenever seemed appropriate.
Pedro said, "So we have to wait on you?"
"Yes, but I genuinely hope there'll be unexpected nuggets. The trick is spotting the trail. Emilia's a genius at reassembling what really was going on at the time. My particular expectation is that somewhere there'll be one or two payments to an identifiable account to follow up. But you'll have to wait. Sorry."
"If that's how it has to be we'll wait. Let's have an early lunch to consume some time. Will An
a join us?"
Emilia mentioned seeing her earlier and left to find her. She would drop by Alberto to discover when he wanted to meet up. She was uncertain whether staying at Inma's had offended him. Should she offer him to Inma for experimentation? Now there was a thought. She doubted, however, Alberto would be tempted. Inma was so much older than he or herself for that matter.
Monday: Madrid
Marta and Alfredo met in his offices in central Madrid. It was easiest for both and they needed to plan before Marta had to appear again in front of Juez Garibey de Williams. Marta remained instinctively apprehensive whereas Alfredo exuded bonhomie and good cheer.
When Marta asked why, it turned out that his visit to Moncloa had gone well. He was no nearer knowing what might be offered. That would have to wait until some internal process was completed, which sounded awfully like a lottery. But he was assured that he could be an ambassador in post by the summer following. Alfredo's only regret was he could not pin down in advance where he might be sent. This was preventing him and Puri from making plans. Already, he confessed, they were dreaming what might be.
"Anyhow, we mustn't dwell on that. More important by far is your appearance in the Audiencia Nacional. What have you found? What do you think you'll say?"
"I went through the lists that Garibey handed me. I've selected about fifty items from each list, mainly medium-value items or ones where I knew a mistake had been made and subsequently rectified. Yes, there are some of those. He indiscriminately included a few."
"Excellent! Those will make him doubt his selections when we force him to confront your data, especially when you point out these out to him. Well done."
"For the others I've tried to choose innocuous transactions. But my explanations won't, I fear, sound great. There are items where clearly MMH, ServiArquitectos and CE really should've chased up because the amounts are significant and their records clearly show they'd paid twice or that credit note refunds were not sought."
Corruption's Price: A Spanish Deceit Page 23
