by Paulo Levy
“Dornelas.”
“Inspector, Caparrós.”
“What’s up?”
“A disaster, sir.”
Dornelas sat straight up.
“What happened?”
“Wilson Borges... he’s dead.”
“What do you mean?”
“We got to Peixe Dourado but he’d already left. The guard couldn’t tell us where he’d gone but said he was in a big rush. We stopped at a Highway Patrol station where we were told that a car on the way to Rio had a head-on collision with an auto carrier truck. We just got here. It’s him all right. What’s left of him is just mush, sir. His wallet was in the door and the license plates match. The truck driver is alive but he’s unconscious. According to witnesses in another car, Wilson was driving like a maniac.
Dornelas said nothing, lost in thought, immobile, the phone suspended in the air. ‘For sure Wilson decided to run as soon as he found out that Teodósio had not only failed to kill his brother, but that the cops had caught him’.
“Sir, are you still there?” asked Caparrós on the other end of the line. Dornelas could hear the sound of the voice buzzing from the phone, as if a gigantic mosquito had invaded his office.
“So be it,” replied the inspector. “The man dug his own grave. It’s a Highway Patrol case now. Make sure the paperwork gets here as fast as possible. I want to attach it together with our investigation and get it off to the district attorney ASAP.”
“I’ll take care of it.”
“Stay there as long as it takes. If anything comes up, call me on my cell phone. Good night.”
“Good night, sir.”
They hung up. Dornelas was having trouble figuring out his feelings. He certainly wouldn’t have had an easy night facing Wilson Borges in an interrogation. But that was the least of it. If that was the job, he’d do it like any other. But one thing was for sure: Wilson’s death would spare Nildo from the media, which now wouldn’t have a field day with stories about the councilman’s brother being involved in trafficking drugs. Initially, at least, the headline regarding Wilson’s death would be reduced to an automobile accident.
Secretly, deep down he was glad the guy died violently. He felt avenged for the brutality that had been meted out to Marina Rivera, a young, beautiful, well-intentioned woman with her whole life in front of her. That was the biggest injustice in the whole case.
He got his things and went home.
*
He turned the key and found Lupi waiting patiently for him. The couch in the living room was intact and unsoiled. ‘Neide must have taken him out before she left’, he thought. He looked around after he had entered: the silence, the dog, the tidy house. It didn’t make him feel sad; on the contrary, he felt comforted. An aura of a new beginning hovered in the air.
He went up to the children’s room, saw the empty beds. He picked up the phone and called them. He got the answering machine. He’d try again later. He was supposed to call Dulce, but he’d do that later too. He wanted to take a shower and enjoy the triumph of starting life anew on his own terms, at his own pace, and in his own time.
He was thankful for the career he had chosen. It was what had kept his mind sound during the most difficult period of their separation, in the beginning, when Flavia left him. To escape depression he had dived into his work. And it was his work, the work Flavia so criticized, that saved him. If it hadn’t been for the police he might never have gotten over the emotional shock of abandonment and the devastation it had wreaked on his life.
Deep down he realized that the Mangrove Crime had been different from the others. Not that it had been solved faster or slower, or that it had gone unsolved, but because, for the first time in his career, his work and personal life had walked hand-in-hand, without conflict, each part contributing to feed what his soul most needed. Recognizing this gave him immense satisfaction.
Dornelas went downstairs and poured himself a shot of cachaça. He made a toast to Our Lady of Aparecida, whose image he kept on top of the sideboard in the living room, took a sip and went upstairs to the bedroom. He undressed slowly and got into the shower with the glass in his hands.
He put it on the rack in the shower stall, next to the bottle of shampoo. And when he put his hand on the faucet to turn on the water he thought of José Aristodemo dos Anjos, White Powder Joe, Dindinho, the beginning of it all.
It came to him that the police still didn’t know the guy’s identity for sure. With no documentary or scientific proof, neither Dornelas nor anyone else could say with absolute certainty that the man was who everybody was saying he was.
In short, with the case practically solved the police could not positively state who the body that Dornelas had taken out of the bay belonged to.
But that was an issue he’d take up with Dulce Neves tomorrow.
Author’s Notes
The Mangrove Crime came in to my mind during a vacation in July, 2010. All the characters, without exception, as well as their names, are part of the fertile land of fantasy and do not, in any way, correspond to reality.
I am extremely grateful to the people who actively collaborated, each one in their own way, so this book could see the light of day. My brother Joca, the dear friends Antonio Cabral and Guilherme Britto for their invaluable contributions; Carminha Levy, for her wisdom; and a former Civil Police professional for his orientation regarding police procedures.
Keep in touch with the author
e-mail: [email protected]
website: http://www.paulolevy.com.br
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