The Hermit (22 page)

As soon as Erhard utters the name Palabras, Lorenzo flinches as if he’s bitten a lime. It was exactly the effect Erhard was hoping for.

– Lorenzo! Adela calls from the door.

– Do we have an agreement? Erhard asks.

– Can I trust that you will never visit me like this again?

– If you do this, I will never come here again.

Lorenzo turns and walks back to the house. – Coming, Adela, he says in a baritone voice.

When the door front door closes, Erhard climbs in his car and collapses in the seat. Only now does he realize how nervous he has been during the entire conversation. He starts the engine and heads back towards the city.

As soon as there’s some shade on the balcony, he carries Alina to the rooftop terrace. Halfway up the stairs he lets her slide headfirst out of the tarpaulin. He turns her around and lays her head on a pillow, so that he doesn’t have to look at her face. Rigor mortis has begun to set in. Erhard wipes the blood from the tarpaulin and the wooden balcony floor.

Erhard is unsettled and indecisive, pacing between the balcony and the bedroom. He drinks the expensive coffee. The sun is red, and he gazes across the city and the beach at the kite surfers out near the Dunes. The city noise below makes him sad. Children shout when they leap off a buoy down in the harbour. One of the city’s many impatient lorry drivers honks as he squeezes his load of cucumbers or beer into some narrow alley. Erhard has always loved the city. This city. God only knows how much he hates other cities, particularly Copenhagen; no other city is so hyper-regulated and boxy with tower blocks as Copenhagen. But Corralejo is incomparably unique, marked by aridity, an excessive desire to please, and a population of inbreds. It’s just the place for Erhard. A provincial hole with long opening hours, a little city with a big city’s attractions. But even if he had the money, he’s not sure if he’d choose to live here. The noise, the smell, the nightlife, the bars, the friendly women, and city living as a whole – it would be the end of him. It has always been a pleasure to visit Raúl, to sit on the terrace with two attractive friends and enjoy the moment. Now he wishes, most of all, to go back to last summer, when they went to a fish restaurant near Morro Jable. That evening when they sat together in the car and laughed at the thunder.

He calls Raúl’s number again. But he knows that he won’t answer. So he dials 112 and requests an ambulance.

Then he waits on the street for it to arrive. The paramedics need to carry the stretcher up the stairs. As they climb, Erhard tells them how he found her, and how he kept his eye on her. His nerves are calmed when one of the paramedics seems unconcerned. As if picking up dead women is an everyday event.

When the paramedics see her, they sit down and wait for the police and the doctor who’ll perform the post-mortem to arrive. Although Erhard has predicted this, it still makes him uncomfortable. He prepares coffee in the kitchen so they won’t notice his trembling hands. Five minutes later the doorbell chimes and he hopes it’s Bernal, whom he knows. But it turns out to be a young policeman, a tall, Arabic-looking man who might very well be a troublemaker. Erhard states his full name, but the officer just introduces himself as Hassib, then asks Erhard to tell him what happened. When Erhard tries to explain, Hassib doesn’t pay attention. Instead he stares at his mobile. Behind the policeman, a young, short-haired doctor in a suit enters the flat. The new health inspector.

– The wealthy and their fucking lifestyles, Hassib says, watching the inspector as he pulls back the plastic sheet they’ve covered Alina with. He examines her without touching her; he photographs her, close up and from a distance, then rolls her over and repeats the procedure. He also takes photos of the stairwell. He sees a tooth on the floor and photographs that, too.

Erhard observes everything while he drinks his coffee. The officer speaks with the doctor briefly and in a hushed voice, then they strap Alina to the stretcher and begin carrying her downstairs. The inspector asks Erhard for the name of Beatriz’s doctor, but Erhard doesn’t know. Ask Emanuel Palabras, he finally says. The inspector thanks him and hands Erhard his business card, which is printed on cheap paper, before he exits the room, his mobile phone stuck to his ear. Hassib walks around the flat, circling Erhard until at last he’s standing beside him in the kitchen.

– So when did you find her?

– Around eleven o’clock. We’d gone out and had a few drinks, and I slept here. When I woke up, I found her. Then…

– Eleven o’clock? Why didn’t you call earlier?

– She cried out in ways I didn’t understand, so I thought she was just hurt. When she was better, I was going to drive her to the emergency room.

– Emergency room? That woman is a mess.

– I thought she’d get better.

– But she’s dead, don’t you get it? Someone may have pushed her. Since Raúl Palabras hasn’t turned up yet, he might be our man.

– It’s not him. He would never do that to her. It must’ve been an accident.

– Where did you say he went?

– I didn’t say. I don’t know where he is. I’ve called him, but he doesn’t answer.

– If you know where he is, you need to tell me now. If we don’t get any more information, we’ll have to charge you.

They would do something like that, Erhard thinks. Take the first and best suspect. – All I did was sleep here, he says.

– If you talk to your friend, tell him he’s better off turning himself in.

Erhard doesn’t know what to say. He plucks a sour grape from a bunch on the table.

– Where did you say you slept?

– I didn’t say. In the bedroom, Erhard says, pointing.

To his amazement, the policeman strides through the living room and into the bedroom, then snaps on the light and looks around. – Where did Palabras sleep?

– I don’t know. I was pissed. We sat up on the terrace this morning drinking Bloody Marys and talking. I got really tired and pissed and wanted to go home, but they asked me to sleep down here. So I did. When I woke up, Raúl was gone and…

Erhard notices that the policeman is not writing anything down. He’s investigating the crime scene because that’s what he’s supposed to do, but he doesn’t actually care.

– How much did she drink? The girlfriend.

– Not much, I don’t think. We woke her up when we arrived, and she came out to the terrace with us. But she was tired and yawned the whole time.

Erhard’s surprised at how well he’s lying. All he has to do is recall the events of the morning and alter them slightly.

– How long have they lived together?

– Eight or ten years, maybe. Eight.

– They were happy together?

– Yes. He was crazy about her. And vice versa.

Erhard considers the words she’d uttered:
Help me
.
Let me go.
Do they mean anything? Are they just something Erhard imagined? He hopes not. Now that he’s set everything into motion so that he can hide Beatriz. To save her from someone who wishes to do her harm. It can’t be Raúl.

– But why did you sleep down here? asks the policeman. He rounds the bed and opens the wardrobe.

– How should I know? Hospitality, I guess. That’s the way Raúl is.

– Where did they sleep?

The policeman riffles through Raúl’s collection of suits.

– Maybe on the sofa. Or up on the terrace.

– Have you ever witnessed Raúl Palabras abusing Beatrizia Colini?

– Abusing?

– You know, hitting her? Slapping her around?

– Never.

The policeman goes to the living room. On the way he peers through the half-open door into the office. – What did you say was in here?

– The office. They never use that room.

The policeman switches on the office lights, and a twinge of misgiving runs through Erhard: Did he remember to clean up in there? For some reason, he hadn’t thought the police would spend any time searching inside the flat if the body was discovered on the balcony.

Hassib walks around the desk and strokes the closed laptop. – Whose is this?

– I don’t know. Maybe Raúl’s?

– I’ll take it with me, the policeman says. He picks up the computer and the attached cord.

– What’s going to happen now? Erhard follows the police officer into the living room and onto the balcony. The red stains on the stairwell and the woodwork are still there. – What will happen to her? Will she be taken to forensics now?

– We have to find her family. Do you know where they live?

– She doesn’t have any family here on the island. Maybe on Gran Canaria.

– Girlfriends? Ex-boyfriends?

– Not as far as I’m aware. It was always just Raúl.

– Work?

– A few days a week. Down at the boutique on Señora del Carmen. The one with the elephant. She’d just started.

– Does she have a mobile anywhere?

– I’ve looked, but I haven’t found it.

– Let’s give Señor Pérez-Lúñigo some peace and quiet to find out what happened to your friend. Anyway, we’ll seal off the flat. What is your name and address? We’ll need to speak with you again, I’m sure. He unwraps a long white stick of chewing gum and folds the stick three times before popping it into his mouth. – And we’ve got to find that bastard Raúl Palabras.

34

He’s hardly able to breathe until they’ve gone. He stands listening, his ear pressed to the door, as the paramedics and the police officer chat all the way to the lift. He hears the lift rattling down the shaft.

The corridor falls silent. Sitting at the dining table, he stares at the front door, anticipating the policeman’s return. But he doesn’t return.

Evening comes. He loves the evening. Aromas swirl up from the street: cinnamon, caramel, urine, sea.

He has to save Beatriz. When she opens her eyes, when she wakes up in a few days, she can tell him what happened. Maybe she can tell him where Raúl is. Erhard can save both of his friends. Suddenly Emanuel Palabras comes to mind. Maybe Raúl called him? Or maybe Raúl’s at his place? He decides to drive home and give him a call. It’s time for a Lumumba.

The house is darker than usual.

Knowing that Alina died at his house, right around the corner where the field begins, makes everything feel unsafe and barren. More than ever.

He checks the generator and snaps on the light, then brings pillows from the sofa and a dining room chair into the bedroom and sits watching Beatriz’s body fill with air, empty, and fill again. The rattle of the wind, a tug and pull, hypnotic and exhausting.

But he doesn’t sleep. He sits rigidly, like a night watchman, and listens to Beatriz’s inhalations, thinking of Raúl the entire time, that he’s dead, and thinking of the little slit in the blanket through which he can insert his hand and feel her vagina. It’s terribly wrong of him, but even now, after having been unconscious for more than twelve hours, she still smells of juice and cinnamon and warm raisins. Just because there are no other women in his life. If there were, his sexual fantasies wouldn’t be about Beatriz. He tries to imagine Emanuel’s Maasai girl and her little ass, which he could see through her sheer dress. But he can’t. She’s too much and not enough. What the hell does he know about women? It’s been so long since he’s had one. There have been women in his life, brief encounters, mostly with the prostitutes he could afford. But he has always picked the older models, so that it wasn’t too embarrassing or strange for either one of them. Not to mention to give them a little business. The young ones have enough work. Those his own age just hang about reading magazines or eating yoghurt. Twice he’s picked the same woman, a Spaniard by the name of Afrodita. That wasn’t her real name, of course, but that’s what she called herself. She was a rather uninteresting woman who might’ve been mistaken for a cashier at a souvenir stand. The first time was at a place called La Mouscita in Puerto – which is now a pizza joint – and he’d actually pointed at another woman, a more exotic-looking mulatto; but the manager had misunderstood Erhard, and Afrodita almost appeared grateful when she was nudged forward. He didn’t have the heart to correct the mistake. Besides, it turned out, she had a strange but pleasurable fellatio technique which Erhard could feel the effects of for weeks afterward. The second time, he’d planned in advance to go right after the mulatto, but she wasn’t there; she might have been out sick or had the day off to attend her little brother’s wedding. During the hesitation that followed, he made eye contact with Afrodita, and he felt that he owed her another round for old time’s sake. He asked her to focus on sucking him off. He enjoyed her talents, but more importantly, he wouldn’t have to watch her remove her clothes. Not because he didn’t like her body, but because the first time she’d been so meticulous about removing and folding her clothes. He’d guessed that she’d once worked at a clothing shop, not a souvenir stand; it took such a dreadfully long time. So much time, in fact, that he lost interest in sex and didn’t get aroused again until she began to breathe warmly on his penis. Afrodita on her knees like a cleaning woman. Afrodita scouring the bottom of a boat. Afrodita diving among turtles. Afrodita talking to him under the water, bubbles pouring from her, downward, between the rocks where she gathers oysters.

Erhard wakes up every half-hour. He listens to Beatriz’s breathing, listens to the device. And every time his eyes scroll down to that dark slit that fits perfectly with his hand. Drowsy and horny, he turns back to his pillows. The night seems endless.

35

The hills lie in shadow, and the sky is as yellow as an egg-yolk.

He’s standing among the rocks watching the goats trot towards him one after the other. Laurel’s little bell jangles each time he plants his front hooves on the ground.

Emanuel Palabras had been strangely detached on the telephone. He hadn’t seen Raúl for weeks, he said. When Erhard told him that Beatriz was dead and that Raúl was missing, he said Raúl was his mother’s child. Then he laughed as though he were sitting in a sauna shooting the breeze. Erhard has always felt oddly connected to Palabras. Two men out of step with modern times. A generation with a strong work ethic and a rawness towards life. One shouldn’t get mixed up in things one doesn’t understand, Palabras said several times, his pent-up irritation at his son on full display. In the end Erhard had to change the subject:
How’s it going with ‘Coral’?
Palabras just grunted and ended the call.