Authors: Antonio Hill
Never late, never made mistakes, never absent … Salgado thought Sara Mahler did everything to perfection. Even committing suicide.
“Did you know her well?”
“I told you. She was my secretary. If you mean did I know anything of her private life, I’d say no, at least not that she told me. She simply completed her tasks to an excellent standard, but she didn’t tell me too much about herself.”
“And the rest of the staff?” asked Salgado. He was proceeding a little blindly, since he was unaware of the size of the company in question and thought it preferable not to ask. He would know soon enough if it were necessary.
“Sara was a reserved woman. I’m not sure she had friends at work.”
And it appears not outside it either, Héctor said to himself. But Víctor Alemany continued, “I think it was a question of mentality, you know? Sara was Austrian, she had a very strict upbringing. There are still certain cultural differences.”
“Yes.”
There was a pause while they both reflected. Salgado began to consolidate his profile of Sara Mahler: organized, punctual, unsociable, demanding of herself and of others; no important family ties.
“Do you know if she had a boyfriend?” the inspector finally asked.
Alemany seemed to come back to himself.
“I don’t know, although honestly I don’t think so. I suppose at some moment or other she’d have talked about it.”
Héctor nodded.
“Listen, Inspector Salgado, if there is something we can help with … Anything. I know she scarcely had family, so if money is required to repatriate the remains or …” The word “remains” suddenly didn’t feel adequate, given the circumstances of the death. “You understand me. I still can’t believe that … It could have been an accident, couldn’t it? Maybe she got dizzy and fell …”
“It’s always difficult to accept. Although you are right: there is the possibility of an accidental fall.” He paused, “Or that someone pushed her deliberately.”
“Who would do such a thing?”
That’s the big question, thought Héctor. From the little he knew of Sara Mahler, she seemed to be a woman capable of provoking dislike but not hatred.
“Well, if you need anything else, you know where to find us. By the way, I have to go away tomorrow and won’t be back until Friday. Contact the company for anything you need.” Víctor Alemany took out a business card and scribbled a phone number. “It’s my sister Sílvia’s direct number. We work together.”
Boss together, Héctor corrected him mentally. That kind of business had always fascinated him: the complexity of familial relations made even more tangled by business matters.
Víctor Alemany was making as if to rise when Héctor stalled him with a suave gesture.
“One moment. Does this photo remind you of anything?”
The image of the strangled dogs made Víctor whiten. He was the sensitive type, no doubt about it.
“What’s this?”
“Someone sent it to Sara’s cell phone, with a message that said: ‘Never forget.’ ”
Víctor remained uneasy, but chose to say nothing more.
“You’re sure you’ve never seen this before?”
“Yes,” he lied.
It was obvious that Víctor Alemany would tell him nothing else. Héctor knew when people were clamming up, and he also knew when not to persist.
While the taxi he’d caught at the station exit advanced as much as the traffic lights on Paral·lel—designed to slow traffic already unmoving at this time of the day—would allow, Víctor Alemany resisted the conversational attempts of the driver, an older man with a desire to talk about the economic crisis and the “gang of thieves” that made up the government. Víctor, who considered himself progressive and who hadn’t the least intention of discussing politics with an old-school taxi driver, resorted to giving a couple of monosyllabic answers and consulting nonexistent messages on his phone. The driver took the hint and avenged himself by connecting to his colleagues via the service radio, so the vehicle filled with faltering, harsh, somewhat sinister voices communicating in a code which to the passenger’s ear was reminiscent of that used by a gang of bank robbers in a film.
He noticed the vibration of his cell phone and looked at the screen, despite having few doubts as to who it was. Sílvia. Impatient as ever, incapable of waiting for the customary phone call. Not enough that she’d insisted on his going to the station … For an instant he felt like ignoring his sister, but habit, instilled in him from tenderest infancy, forced him to answer. “Hello. Listen, I’m in a taxi. I’ll call you when I get home. Yes, yes, all fine. No, they said nothing about that. Don’t worry.”
His own words provoked a feeling akin to remorse in him. “All fine.”
All fine for him, of course. All fine for them. And above all, with regard to Sílvia, all fine for the company. He almost laughed out loud thinking how much his sister had changed. When they were teenagers no one would have predicted that the rebellious Sílvia—the same one who shaved half her head and decorated her bedroom with graffiti and anarchist symbols, the one who ran away from home at eighteen to join a group of squatters, who yelled opinions taken from radical pamphlets—would exchange holey tights for tailored suits, graffiti for framed paintings and leftist slogans for others that could generously be described as practical and, realistically, neo-liberal.
A competent executive, strict mother to a teenage girl and an eleven-year-old boy, Sílvia was the antithesis of what she had been. Víctor remembered his father: the old fox must have been the only one to guess what would happen, since he never took his daughter’s defiance seriously. “Give her enough rope and she’ll hang herself,” he said the second time Sílvia left home. “When she gets tired of it, that will be the time to shoot her down.” And so he did: years later, when the prodigal daughter knocked on his door with two children around her neck and no one at her side, the old man imposed his conditions with a simple “Put up with it, or go.” The surprising thing was that Sílvia not only accepted his authority, but rather, probably weary of her previous wanderings, her lifestyle took a hundred-and-eighty-degree turn. Or maybe, Víctor suspected, his sister was more ready to convince herself the old man was right than to admit she’d been forced to give in. Now, forty-five and after many years of voluntary celibacy, she’d started a relationship with an employee of the company. Of course, given that in the new Sílvia there was no place for spontaneity, the wedding was already planned for spring that year. Time enough for Víctor to become accustomed to the idea that César Calvo, in addition to being responsible for logistics and storage for Alemany Cosmetics, was going to become another member of the family. A member with a voice, although not too loud, and whose vote would be merely advisory, thought Víctor. He hoped César was aware of it …
In any case, the coldness in his sister never ceased to shock him: the fact that Sara had decided to end her life in such a gruesome way had gone from being a tragedy to an inconvenience in a matter of minutes. Sílvia’s face, which he read as if it were his own, had reflected this shift of feeling. Those who didn’t know her as well, however, would have sworn that his twin sister’s serious expression showed feeling for the death of a person who occupied that uncertain terrain that exists in work relationships: not loved as a friend, of course, but more than a simple acquaintance. In the words of Sílvia herself, who in her role as Director of Human Resources had sent around a communiqué to the whole company, Sara Mahler had been “an esteemed colleague whom we will all miss.” Obviously, the circular made no mention of the cause of death, although—Víctor was sure—the rumors had already begun to spread by mid-morning. And by this time on a Monday evening, gone half past eight, all of Alemany Cosmetics would know that Sara Mahler, personal assistant to the MD, had committed suicide. And that her body was in an autopsy room, in pieces.
The image made him shiver, made his stomach churn. He wanted to get home, embrace Paula. The journey felt unending; he realized they had been stationary for several minutes. A dozen cars ahead the red light went to green without a single car moving, then jeered at them with amber and, when finally a car managed to cross, returned to its original red without the least trace of pity. The taxi driver let out a string of curses that Víctor decided to ignore: it suited him to isolate himself from the problems of others. And then, with this reflection, Sara Mahler’s worried expression one of the last times he spoke to her came into his head. It had been just after the company Christmas dinner.
It’s late. Night falls so early that he feels as if it’s only six, although the clock on the desk shows it’s actually twenty to nine. When he lifts his head from the reps’ reports he’s looking over, a task he wants to finish
before leaving, he notices that Sara has entered the office. She has surely knocked and he hasn’t even heard her. Tired, he smiles at her.
“Still here?” He knows his assistant usually stays until he leaves. He has never asked her to: Sara seems to have assumed it to be an inherent obligation of her post.
“Yes …” Unlike her usual self, Sara is stammering. Finally she decides, halfheartedly: “I wanted to talk to you, but it’s getting late. Better if I leave it till tomorrow.”
Yes, thinks Víctor. Tomorrow. The chat can be postponed; he wants to put a full stop to the day and go home. What he says, however, is very different.
“No, come in and sit down.” He signals the papers and smiles again, without much enthusiasm. “This can wait.”
Having her sit on the other side of the desk seems strange to him, because Sara usually remains standing. The solemnity of his assistant’s gestures worries him a little, and for a moment he is assaulted by the vague fear that she might put forward a serious problem to him at this hour. She is uncomfortable, that’s obvious: rigid, sitting on the edge of the chair. He changes his glasses and then, when he finally sees her clearly, he notices that her eyes are red.
“Has something happened? Is there a problem?”
Sara looks at him as if what she is going to tell him is vitally important. She remains silent, sad, then finally speaks.
“It’s about Gaspar.” She says it quickly but with no force.
An expression of disgust appears on Víctor’s face. He doesn’t want to talk about Gaspar Ródenas. In fact, he’d prefer never to have heard that name. He changes his tone, adds a hard note to his voice.
“Sara. The Ródenas thing”—he feels incapable of pronouncing his name—“was a tragedy. We will never understand it. It’s something that escapes human understanding. Best thing we can do is forget it.”
Although she nods her head as if she agrees, Víctor regrets having started this conversation. He looks away toward the street: he’d love to
enjoy a more elegant view, like Diagonal; in the first moments of success, when the anti-cellulite cream, their star product, broke sales records, he thought of moving the offices to a more lofty location. In any case, although the inhospitable empty streets of the Zona Franca can be seen from this window, he still wants to leave the office, not bring up what to him seems a dark, gruesome subject.
“I know,” says Sara. “And I’ve tried. We all try … However …”
She stops herself; perhaps he still looks lost in thought, suddenly absent. She notices this, of course, and hangs her head.
“You don’t want to talk about this, do you?” asks Sara. A touch of disappointment makes her voice quiver.
“Not now, Sara.” He turns to her. “I understand that it was a shock for everyone. For me too. I trusted him, I promoted him.”
His tone conceals that what he says is not completely true: he’d given his vote to the other candidate. Sílvia and Octavi Pujades, Gaspar’s direct manager, had voted for him. And something in Sara’s face suggests that she knows it: a gleam in her eyes reveals that she doesn’t believe what he is saying. But Víctor lets this impression go and continues speaking, anxious to put an end to the subject.
“It’s impossible to know what goes on in people’s heads. Or what happens at home, behind closed doors. Ródenas just worked here. What he did, however horrible it seems to us, has nothing to do with us. And we should forget it, for the good of the company. So, in answer to your question, no, I don’t want to talk about it.”
In the last few minutes Sara has regained her usual composure. She is offended, thinks Víctor. Nevertheless, it is too late to back down, to ask her what she wanted to tell him. She doesn’t give him the option anyway. She murmurs an apology, gets up and walks to the door. She stops a moment before leaving. For an instant, Sara seems resolved to turn around, interrupt him again and let out what she had on her mind when she came in, point blank. She doesn’t. Víctor tries not to look directly at her so as not to invite her to unburden herself, but even so
he notices that Sara’s face doesn’t express disappointment, or wounded pride, but sadness.
The taxi braked sharply on Nou de la Rambla, just in front of the address he’d given on getting in. Víctor paid and got out with a brusque good-bye and, although he was dying to see Paula, he stopped in front of the old-fashioned door, “with character” as she said, and took out his cell phone to call Sílvia. There were certain subjects that he didn’t wish to discuss at home and another that he didn’t wish to discuss with his sister, so to keep it brief he confined himself to giving her a recap of his interview with the inspector.
Kristin Herschdorfer loved Barcelona. She said this a number of times, as if her good opinion of the city might ingratiate her with the agent who had come to see her and talk to her about her roommate, when the reality was that Roger Fort wasn’t altogether comfortable in the City of Counts yet. To him it seemed big, full of people and not especially welcoming. This morning, for example, he’d circled several times to park the car near Collblanc market and then had taken a while to find Passatge Xile, the street where Sara Mahler had lived. And yet he understood that for this twenty-four-year-old girl born in Amsterdam the fact that the sun shone in January was already a big point in Barcelona’s favor. Kristin was attending a course in Spanish at the university, not very far from her house, with the intention of starting a master’s in renewable energy in September. Like the majority of foreigners, the Dutch girl was slightly bemused by the bilingualism that prevailed in the city.