When we see clients, our secretary is invariably on holiday or out on an errand. Nonetheless, there is always a little bottle of red
Chanel
nail varnish and other small items on her desk that supposedly betray a feminine presence: a
Liberty
foulard draped casually over the back of her chair (which, one festive night, after a couple of generous measures of Cardhu, Borja confessed he'd requisitioned from a restaurant coat-stand), a copy of
Hello!
(inevitably a very out-of-date copy purloined from my brother's sun-tanning salon) and a plant that doesn't require much water. He reckons such anodyne objects lend credibility to the idea that a woman is at work there. We also keep a filched bottle of
L'Air du Temps
in one of the drawers of the desk, whereon rests a
Mac
that doesn't work, and occasionally when we are expecting a visit, we squirt the scent around and perfume the atmosphere with the high-class secretarial touch Borja believes to be so vital. As for our non-existent offices behind fake doors, they are always being painted or redecorated.
After all my setting of the scene, it must be apparent that our customers almost always belong to the upper classes, and that what we can offer them is absolute discretion in the matters they confide to us. “Eduard, lie under an oak tree and your acorns will prosper,” Borja likes to repeat. It's one of his favourite sayings. The other is the one about God and dice.
“Eduard, God doesn't play dice ...” he likes to quip when we find ourselves up a blind alley or enjoy a sudden stroke of good luck.
In fact, Borja and I play the role of intermediary in the kinds of negotiations the rich don't like to conduct themselves, such as buying or selling whatever comes their way and pawning jewels and art objects. We sometimes get involved in collecting information on rival firms or disloyal partners, and occasionally we've even checked out the veracity of a prolonged absence from work brought about by a pleasant, highly dubious depression. Unfortunately, as we have to earn our crust one way or another, we must also occasionally get to grips with cases of infidelity. We aren't detectives or anything like that, and that's precisely why our clientele decides to place itself at our mercy. It's not like contracting an agency of professionals to tail your wife (or mistress, which is usually what it amounts to), and then facing up to a grizzly individual who hands over a fat file and an even fatter invoice confirming your irksome suspicions â it's more like asking a friend to find out what he can in exchange for a generously filled envelope. We provide this friendly service: we don't bug, don't take photos, don't hoard files or write long reports. We work by word of mouth, and frequently relay our findings to clients comfortably ensconced together in one of the few decent cocktail bars that, according to Borja, are still left in Barcelona. We're not anonymous employees of a sordid private detective agency advertised on balcony hoardings, but two understanding friends who, if needs be, can find a word of consolation and offer a shoulder to cry on when one of our clients decides to divulge all. “Be prepared” is our motto, salvaged by Borja from our wretched time as obedient boy scouts. As he says, it reflects the professional skills we offer, not to mention the over-the-top fees we try to command.
You can take it as read that when I accepted Borja's partnership proposal I never imagined things would take off and that we'd find ourselves embroiled in trying to solve a murder case. I must confess neither of us had the slightest idea about how to tackle such a situation, either then or now. In fact all our knowledge of the criminal underworld originates exclusively â I kid you not â from
reading crime fiction on childhood holidays spent in Premià de Mar with our parents and grandparents, when Premià was still a small village sufficiently distant from Barcelona to perform as a summer holiday resort. As far as I'm concerned, this bookish experience was supplemented on the beach at Caldetes, where Montse, the children and I still spend the summer: the main aim of such page-turning being to keep in check the tortured testosterone of a young man prostrate on the sand and surrounded by splendidly curvaceous flesh as naked as the day God brought it into this world. Frankly, our sources never went beyond Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, G.K. Chesterton, Georges Simenon, Vázquez Montalbán and, recently, Mrs Jessica Fletcher and Colombo (the series shown repeatedly on television, of which Borja never missed a single episode). You can also take it for granted that the nearest we've ever got to pistols, and firearms in general, was the front row of the cinema stalls. As we are orphans, we enjoyed the privilege of never being conscripted, so neither of us has ever held a CETME, that Spanish army-issue rifle with a life of its own, characterized by a tendency to backfire at will. As for our knowledge of matters legal and forensic, they add up to a combined total of zilch, if not less.
Borja, and Einstein, may be right that God doesn't play dice, but I'm fairly sceptical when it comes to identifying coincidence and causality; I must, however, accept that in the case I'm about to relate, there were far too many coincidences for comfort. In the first place, how else would we have been drawn into the investigation of a tricky murder case in which leading figures from high society were key players? Given our total lack of know-how, the job was clearly beyond us, to put it mildly, but the strange circumstances surrounding the case (and the fact we ourselves got embroiled), put us in the position of having to take the case on. I won't deny there were circumstances to inspire all our detective heroes, because the crime we confronted was the stuff films are made of. If newscasters tell us day-in day-out of crimes that are sordid, vicious and eminently predictable, the majority perpetrated by head cases on drugs or poor wretches who commit suicide or give themselves up to the police, tails between legs, it was our lot to investigate a case that lacked any such spice. It was at once refined and unnerving. To tell the truth, given our day and age's fondness for blood, guts and cheap sex, the planning and execution of “our” murder suggested that a minor, yet truly macabre, masterpiece had been staged.
2
It all began one morning early in December when we were breakfasting on coffee and croissants in the San Marcos café in the High Street in Sarrià . We hadn't anything better to do and it was too cold in the office. I had just opened the newspaper when Borja's mobile rang.
“He didn't say who he was, but he repeated the word âconfidential' at least eight times. I made an appointment for half-past four at the office,” Borja explained after he'd rung off, then added “You'd better smarten yourself up a bit. I smell a big fish.”
“That would do us very nicely. Christmas is coming and Montse's starting to kick up ...”
“I told you not to worry. You'll get your double bonus. When did I ever let you down?”
It's true. Ever since we became partners, some three years ago, Borja has never let me down. It's as if he, not I, were the elder brother, even if there were only a couple of minutes in it. I don't know how he manages but I always end up being paid something before the fifth of every month when our mortgage payment is due. I suspect that when he's really at his wits' end he gets money from Merche, his girlfriend, or from Doña Mariona Castany, who has become a kind of aunt to him, but I don't dare ask. There are five mouths to feed at home, two belong to teenagers, and we can't make it to the end of the month on what Montse brings in. I can't allow myself the luxury of refusing Borja's handouts,
wherever they come from, usually a brown envelope stuffed with dog-eared notes.
“You heard me, make yourself presentable.”
“But I am really quite ...”
“For the nth time, please wear your uniform.”
What he calls “my uniform” is a dark grey Armani suit he forced me to buy (he was paying), a white shirt, also an Armani (I did the honours) and a tastefully striped silk tie my mother-in-law gave me for a birthday present, and which he approves of. It's what I wear when we see clients or take a dip in the world of the wealthy.
“And what will
you
wear?” I asked a touch sarcastically. “Will you dress up to the nines or say you've just come from the nineteenth hole?”
Borja sometimes turns up to our appointments in sports gear (not tracksuits, you understand, but designer polo shirts, cotton trousers and deck shoes), his hair still wet, as if he'd just taken a shower, a big bag of golf clubs or tennis gear slung over his shoulder. I've never seen him in action (in fact, as far as I recall, when we were kids my brother detested sport) and I've never discovered if he really plays or it's all a pose.
“I'm still undecided,” he smiled. I knew he had something else on his mind right then: the advance we might extract. We finished our coffee, which had gone cold after so much chattering, and went our separate ways. It was almost midday and early, so I went home to eat, shower and change my clothes.
My wife, Montse, is usually very busy at this time of day and never comes home for lunch. She used to work as a professional psychologist, in a state school in the suburbs of Barcelona. When Borja suddenly appeared and our life took a 360 degree turn for the better, Montse soon abandoned her post, which she was sick to death of after years of bureaucracy, threats and disillusion. She and two friends opened an
Alternative Centre for Natural Wellbeing
in the district of Grà cia, just by the plaça de la Virreina. My wife and her friends were lucky enough to find roomy but decrepit ground-floor premises at a rock-bottom rent since the floor above was home to two dozen or so squatters and their dogs. The trio spent thousands transforming what had been a rag-and-bone man's shop into a space with the requisite New Age ambience, and I must admit they made it look nice and are doing pretty well. Against a backcloth of pastel shades, subdued lighting, ethnic music and scented candles, Montse and partners offer their female clientele a plethora of alternative therapies, from massages with unpronounceable eastern names and ecologically sound beauty treatments to techniques for defeating insomnia or flab. They also put on courses in yoga, Sanskrit and vegetarian cuisine and over the last few months have organized therapy sessions for smokers who want to give up (which Montse leads, though she herself is not yet an entirely nicotine-free zone). On Thursdays they put on literary get-togethers which usually involve performances by bards who self-publish with the help of a photocopier or by scraping together a public grant thanks to an uncle who works for the Generalitat, the Catalan government, and the gigs extend into the early hours once they transfer to one of the excellent
tapas
bars in the vicinity. At lunchtime, the Centre is usually going full tilt, so I grab a bite wherever I happen to be, often with my brother. On this occasion I had to come home to change my clothes. There was time enough to prepare myself a salad and a double-egg
omelette, which I gobbled down with a couple of slices of bread smeared with tomato and a glass of beer, and have a short siesta and even read the Catalan version of
El Periódico
. (Borja expressly forbids me to carry this radical rag under my arm in the districts we normally frequent).
I left home still feeling drowsy at three thirty. The sky was completely overcast and everything pointed to a storm, and that meant the streets would soon be clogged with cars and traffic lights would mysteriously break down. I'd forgotten my umbrella, but as it was getting late I resigned myself to getting soaked if there was a downpour. I had to wait almost fifteen minutes for a bus, but by a quarter past four I was nervously carrying out my duties in our office.
I proceeded with our customary ritual and squirted around the secretarial perfume, knowing full well that later on Montse would smell the perfume, frown and interrogate me. Montse had become quite jealous, especially as I sometimes had to go out at night and didn't get back till daybreak. Fortunately, by that time she'd also turned Buddhist and was being more laidback about life. Nevertheless, whenever she felt the need, Montse would swallow a couple of valiums to bolster her worldview.
It was more than probable that Borja would show up a quarter of an hour late. Making clients wait, impatient people who were themselves usually very punctual, was his way of making them understand we had work coming out of our ears. In effect, at four thirty on the dot, the bell rang, and, as usual, I hurried to open the door. The door to the street was unlocked, as we have a concierge. The first thing I saw was our mysterious client's sunglasses, which were obviously intended to hide his identity given that the sky was pitch-black and the stairs were a mass of shadows. When he took them off, I realized I'd failed to disguise my startled reaction. You bet he was a big fish; my clever brother's nose had been on target! I had before me an MP, but not a second or third-rate backbencher, the kind who only warms his seat in parliament while his main contribution to democratic life is propping up the parliamentary bar and keeping liver disease specialists in clover. This man was one who liked to hold forth, hog the headlines and appear in football chat shows on television and radio. I recognized him immediately and prayed Borja would soon put in an appearance.
“Good afternoon. Mr Masdéu, I presume?” he asked most politely.
“Eduard MartÃnez, his partner, at your disposition,” I replied, holding out a hand and ushering him in.
At first he hesitated, but then he crossed our threshold with considerable determination. Although I'm beginning to get used to such men of power, they still put me on edge, even when they're the ones with the problem. When faced with their preening, overbearing manner I always feel like a fish out of water.
“I had an appointment with Mr Masdéu,” he said rather uneasily, seeing I wasn't the person he was expecting to meet.