Mapuche (28 page)

Jana attached the badge to the collar of her black jean jacket and walked toward the elevators, her bladder suddenly tight. An armed guard was standing near the emergency exits, wearing a beret in Navy colors. The tenth floor: a vast hall with a polished floor that reflected the sunshine passing through the bay windows that looked out on the new harbor. Little signs directed the visitors to the various administrative offices; Jana called a fictitious number on the cell phone Rubén had left her and began an imaginary conversation as she had a look at the room. “Yes . . . No . . . ” She roamed around without anyone paying attention to her: the archives room was at the far end, on the right.

A soldier sitting at a table in front of a crude desk was guarding the entrance, a pale Sean Penn lookalike with the air of a juvenile delinquent. A walkie-talkie, revolver, and nightstick hung on his belt. It was lunchtime, and he was eating a sandwich wrapped in paper, keeping an eye on the orderly area that, like him, was dying of boredom among the potted plants. Jana sat down some distance away on one of the vacant seats in the middle of the hall. She did not know how the place was organized or where the archives were kept, but the guard was alone. Jana found an old eyeliner pencil at the bottom of her purse and started making herself up to lessen the guard's suspicions. He took another long drink of water from a little bottle and put it back on the desk; it would soon be empty. A few minutes later he headed for the nearby toilets.

Jana didn't wait until he disappeared to take off behind him. She sped up and was a few yards from the entrance when a man came out of the restroom. He walked toward her, his uniform impeccable, frowned imperceptibly, and, showing the badge on his jacket, walked past her without saying a word. The coast was clear for the moment. Jana moved past the deserted desk and slipped through the varnished door. A shiver ran down her back.

The air-conditioning was on high in the archives room. Jana quietly closed the door behind her and positioned herself against the perpendicular wall in front of her: footsteps resounded in the semidarkness, soon followed by the sound of a door slamming. The Mapuche kept close to the wall of the coatroom, but her legs seemed to be giving way underneath her: what the hell was she doing there? She waited until the poison descended from her suddenly shaky legs and spread out and sank into the floor before finally daring to look around. The room was empty. Two computers with flat screens were humming on desks, next to impressive rows of shelves: there were about twenty of them, a cathedral of paperwork dimly lit in this windowless bunker. Jana dashed into the corridor between the closest rows and hurried, hunched over, to the far end, as if that would make her invisible. Her need to urinate was becoming more pressing. Two men soon entered, their hoarse voices echoing in the confined universe of the archives room. They were talking about soccer; she didn't listen. Sweat was running down her temples. Jana moved away, light-footed, hid at the end of the row of shelves, and looked up. D3, that was the number on the shelf.

The employees' voices were indistinct, at the very end of the corridor. She made her way through the labyrinth. M1, M2, M3. Jana found a shelf corresponding to the name Montañez in M4. Hundreds of files were piled up in the corridor that led to the open space. She hesitated a moment before starting into it: was it instinct, a sign of the times? An employee walked by twenty yards farther on, upright as the letter I, without noticing her presence.

Jana's T-shirt was soaked with sweat; she walked stealthily between the walls of documents that protected her, holding her breath. Monterubio, Monteramos . . . Montalban, Monta­mas, Montañez: fifth shelf, just above her head. Jana grabbed a stack of files, heard footsteps, and held her breath: someone was two or three rows from her.

A minute passed with an awful taste of eternity. The footsteps finally moved away. The Mapuche went through the military records, her heart racing. Montañez, Oswaldo, born October 2, 1971: too young. Montañez, Alfredo, born August 24, 1967: also too young. A drop of sweat fell on the yellowed paper of the file she was holding in trembling hands. Montañez, Ricardo, born June 12, 1955, in Rufino. The birth date was right, and also that of his entry into the ESMA, which he had left in late 1976 with the rank of petty officer. He was the one. It had to be him. Crouching at the foot of the storage shelves, Jana found her throat grow drier. A voice made her jump.

“What's that smell?”

Fear.

Her fear, dripping from her body.

The guy was in the next row, smelling her presence.

“Hey, is anyone there?” he called blindly

Jana had already stuck the document in the pocket of her jumpsuit; she put the file at random on the shelf and slipped off in the direction of the emergency exit, at the end of the row. Nobody on the left, nobody on the right. She opened the fire door and disappeared.

“Hey, is somebody there?”

Ten floors. They would notify security, which would have only to pick her up at the bottom of the stairs. Jana followed the little green light, rushed down the stairs, hanging onto the rail to muffle the sound of her steps, and came out on the ninth floor, her heart beating wildly. The group of military men talking in front of the bay windows hardly deigned to look at her. Jana pushed the button on the elevator, struggling to keep calm. Still no alarm. However, the employee in the archives room must have heard the emergency door click shut. The elevator came quickly: she pushed on the button, made the doors close behind her, and began her descent. She was wiping away the beads of sweat on her forehead, imploring the gods of her ancestors to spare her this time when the elevator car suddenly stopped. Fifth floor. A tall man in a uniform with stripes came in without a word: the officer she had met a little earlier, coming out of the restroom.

“You going down?” he asked.

“Yes.”

His affable demeanor didn't last. The elevator had hardly begun its descent before the man drew back: a disagreeable odor permeated the car. He scowled starchily at the Indian woman, who was staring at her Doc Martens. Finally the elevator doors opened on the main lobby: Jana gulped down the saliva she no longer had and set out for the reception area, a haven of peace in the storm. No one stopped her. Still not. She left the badge with the uninterested woman in a wig behind the counter, and forced herself not to run to the exit.

The security men's walkie-talkies began to crackle. Jana walked by them at the moment they were answering and took the broad stairway that led to the parking lot. Two men rushed out of the building, too late: the wind was cooling her face and the
colectivo
was arriving at the end of the esplanade.

 

*

 

The seaside resort of El Tigre had emptied out at the end of the summer. The rowing clubs were still busy, and a few morons were still making their jet skis howl among the rotting lemons that were floating on the surface of the water. Rubén was driving down the main artery, holding a sandwich he'd bought on the fly in one of the shops on the embarcadero. Gianni Del Piro lived at the end of the avenue, in a detached house that clashed with the sumptuous residences around it, which had been built a century earlier.

A compact car was parked in the carport. Rubén threw the rest of the sandwich to the dog that was going through the neighbor's garbage cans and rang at the front door. The pilot's wife promptly opened the door. Her name was Anabel, a plump bleached blonde with a crude red smile who, to judge by her vast heart-shaped décolleté, still refused to accept the fact that she had turned fifty.

“Hello!' she chirped to the dandy standing on her porch.

Rubén, all smiles, passed himself off as an old army pal who had been assigned to round up the squadron to celebrate the retirement of a mutual friend. Charmed by the attention, Anabel explained that Gianni had left the preceding week for Neuquén to participate in training course in “advanced acrobatics” and that he would be back on Sunday, but that she could still call him to let him know about the reunion.

“If you want me to, of course!” the coquette added.

“I'd like to surprise him,” Rubén replied cagily.

“As you wish!”

Rubén briefly sounded out the woman who was fanning herself on the threshold. She'd had a facelift, and even though she was flirting with him, her innocent air was convincing. He left Anabel to her Botox and returned to his car, which was parked a little farther down the street. Leaning on the hood, he called the flying clubs in Neuquén.

One of them offered training courses given by experienced pilots, but according to the fellow he talked to on the phone, the next course in acrobatics didn't begin until the following month.

Then he called Anita.

She hadn't read Muñoz's autopsy report regarding the death of María Victoria Campallo, but according to the information she'd gleaned, the theory that it was a homicide remained in doubt: an accident, a suicide, a murder—Captain Roncero's team, to which Luque had assigned the case, was not excluding any line of investigation.

“The autopsy report is wrong,” Rubén replied, “you know that as well as I do.”

“Right. That makes two of us against the rest of the world. María was buried not long ago and no one will allow us to exhume the body to get a second opinion. Unless we can prove that the Campallo family is not genetically related to its stolen children. Where are you with that?”

“I've got the name of a guy, Gianni Del Piro, a former military pilot who works in a little flying club in El Tigre. I suspect him of having transported María's body and falsified his flight record to make himself invisible. He gave his wife and his employer a bogus story about a training course in Neuquén and left the conjugal household the day before the double murder last week. Could you use his cell phone number to find this guy?”

“I remind you that my functions are limited to driving the patrol car in the presence of a male colleague and typing up reports, because these
pajeros
13
have only two thumbs,” Anita retorted.

“How about your pal at the telephone company?”

“It's still possible to keep an eye on calls,” she grumbled, “but Del Piro can't be located without Ledesma's permission.”

The police chief in the neighborhood where she worked.

“Luque and his elite cops see this as a pile of old shit at best.”

“Ledesma might want to complicate his life,” Rubén suggested.

“At two years from retirement, the Old Man isn't going to take the risk of getting himself dismissed without having solid proof,” his subordinate replied.

“Tell him that it's about the murder in Peru Street, the murder of the laundress's transvestite son who is supposed to have been seen in a tango club with the Campallo daughter shortly before she disappeared.”

“Damn it, Rubén, if I tell him that I'm conducting a parallel investigation regarding Campallo, he'll have me picking up bums in the boonies!”

“A wonderful opportunity to change assignments, no?”

“Very nice. Do you have a job for me?”

“Del Piro is involved in this,” Rubén said, “I'm sure of that. He can lead us to Miguel and the killers. Figure out a way to make that palatable for Ledesma and find this guy for me. I'll make him tell us what we want to know.”

He could be counted on to do that.

“You're making me do stupid things,” his childhood friend complained. “The Old Man is going to want to know who my source is.”

“Tell him that the Grandmothers have serious doubts about the real identity of María Campallo, and that Del Piro is suspected of having been involved in the kidnapping of Miguel, the main witness, who has disappeared.”

Anita briefly evaluated the situation—yes, the thing was doable.

“All right,” she agreed, “I'll see what I can do. In the meantime, this will cost you dinner in a restaurant. With candles, O.K.?”

Leaning on the hood of his car, Rubén smiled—a girl passed by on a bicycle, her bare legs flying.

“By the way,” Anita said, “I have news from Colonia. The body found in the ruins of the house was identified as that of Jose Ossario. He died from a bullet in the head, a .22 caliber that belonged to him. Obtained legally. An investigation is underway but the fire has made things difficult, especially since the call for witnesses hasn't produced anything.”

“How about Ossario's neighbor, Díaz? Didn't the local police question him?”

“I'm repeating what I was told: no witnesses. Your botanist must have cleared out,” Anita suggested. “Or he's scared and is keeping quiet. It's also possible that he's been liquidated. That he's been thrown out of an airplane to see if he could fly.”

“Right.”

But he didn't seem convinced.

“People have a tendency to die after they've been around you, have you notice that?”

Rubén received another call on his BlackBerry: it was Jana.

“Excuse me, I've got to go,” he said hurriedly. “Try to convince Ledesma. We'll talk again!”

He took Jana's call, his pulse accelerating.

“Jana?”

“Everything O.K.?”

“What's going on?”

“I found the petty officer, Montañez, there, in the Navy archives.”

Rubén frowned under the beating sun.

“What?” he said.

“I went there at noon today,” she explained. “His name is Ricardo Montañez, that's his full name. The birth date on the military record corresponds to one of the guys I talked to yesterday on the phone.”

Rubén looked for a little shade along the residential street.

“You went digging around in the Navy's archives?”

“That's where the military records are stored,” Jana retorted. “You're the one who told me that.”

“But I never told you to go there!”