IN THE CAB, Vargas didn’t open his mouth. He kept his eyes fixed on the window, his bad mood spreading like poison in the air.
Alicia tapped his knee gently. “Cheer up, man. We’re off to Casa Leopoldo.”
“They’re wasting our time,” he mumbled.
“That surprises you?”
She smiled calmly. “Welcome to Barcelona.”
“I don’t see what you find so funny.”
Alicia opened her bag and pulled out the notebook she’d found in Valls’s car.
Vargas sighed. “Tell me this isn’t what I think it is.”
“Does it whet your appetite?”
“Leaving aside the fact that removing official evidence is a serious misdemeanour, all I can see is a notebook with blank pages.”
Alicia pushed her nail between the rings of the spiral and pulled out a couple of shreds of paper that had got trapped inside.
“So?”
“Pulled-out pages.”
“Of great use, I’m sure.”
Alicia spread the first page of the notebook on the taxi’s windowpane. The sunlight brought out the indentation of lines marked on the paper.
Vargas leaned over and screwed up his eyes. “Numbers?”
Alicia nodded. “There are two columns. The first is made up of a sequence of numbers and letters. The second only has numbers. Sequences between five and seven digits. Have a good look.”
“I can see. And?”
“The numbers are consecutive. They start with forty thousand three hundred and something and end in forty thousand four hundred and seven or eight.”
Vargas’s eyes lit up, although a shadow still hovered over his face. “It could be anything,” he said.
“Mercedes, Valls’s daughter, remembered that her father had said something about a list to his bodyguard the night before he disappeared. A list with numbers . . .”
“I don’t know, Alicia. Most likely it’s nothing.”
“Perhaps,” she agreed. “Feeling hungrier now?”
Vargas gave in at last and smiled. “I’m always hungry.”
The visit to the Museum of Tears and the possibility – as slim as it was – that the unlikely clue found in the indentations of a blank page might lead somewhere had lifted Alicia’s spirits. To sniff a new trail was always a secret pleasure: the perfume of the future, as Leandro liked to call it. Mistaking her good mood for an appetite, Alicia confronted the Casa Leopoldo menu like a Cossack and ordered for both, and for two more as well. Vargas let her do so without complaining, and when the parade of rich food began to flow incessantly and Alicia could barely tackle it, the veteran policeman just muttered under his breath while he made short work of his own servings and a few more.
“When it comes to table-sharing we also make a great team,” he remarked, finishing off an oxtail stew with a superb aroma. “You order and I devour.”
Alicia nibbled at her food like a bird and smiled.
“I don’t want to be a spoilsport, but don’t get too excited,” said Vargas. “Those numbers might only be references to spare parts jotted down by the driver, or who knows what else.”
“That’s a lot of spare parts. How’s the oxtail?”
“First class. Like one I ate in Córdoba in the spring of 1949, which I still dream about.”
“In good company?”
“Better than the present one. Are you investigating me, Alicia?”
“Simple curiosity. Do you have a family?”
“Everyone has a family.”
“I don’t,” she snapped.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t—”
“There’s nothing to be sorry about. What did Leandro tell you about me?”
Vargas seemed surprised by the question.
“He must have said something,” she insisted. “Or you must have asked him something.”
“I didn’t ask. And he didn’t say much.”
Alicia smiled coldly. “Between you and me. Go on. What did he tell you about me?”
“Look, Alicia, whatever game goes on between you two has nothing to do with me.”
“I see. That means he told you more than you admit.”
Vargas faced her. He looked irritated. “He told me you were an orphan. He said you lost your parents during the war.”
“He said you have a wound that gives you constant pain. And that this affects your character.”
“My character.”
“Forget it.”
“What else?”
“That you’re a solitary person, and you have a problem establishing emotional ties.”
Alicia laughed half-heartedly. “Did he say that? Did he use those words?”
“I can’t remember exactly. Can we change the subject?”
“Right. Let’s talk about my emotional ties.”
Vargas rolled his eyes.
“Do you think I have problems establishing emotional ties?”
“I don’t know, and it’s none of my business.”
“Leandro would never pronounce those words – they’re a string of clichés. They sound straight out of an advice column in a fashion magazine.”
“It must have been me, then, because I’m subscribed to quite a few.”
“What did he say exactly?”
“Why do you do this to yourself, Alicia?”
“Do what?”
“Torment yourself.”
“Is that how you see me? Like a martyr?”
Vargas looked at her in silence, and finally shook his head.
“What did Leandro say? I promise that if you tell me the truth, I’ll never ask you again.”
Vargas weighed up the alternatives. “He said you don’t think that anyone can love you because you don’t love yourself, and that you think nobody has ever loved you. And that you can’t forgive the world for it.”
Alicia looked down and gave a false laugh. Vargas noticed that her eyes were shining and cleared his throat. “I thought you wanted me to tell you about my family.”
Alicia shrugged.
“My parents were from a small village in . . .”
“I meant, did you have a wife and children?” she cut in.
Vargas looked at her, his eyes empty of all expression. “No,” he said after a pause.
“I didn’t want to annoy you. I’m sorry.”
Vargas smiled reluctantly. “You don’t annoy me. And you?”
“Do I have a wife and children?”
“Or whatever.”
“I’m afraid not.”
Vargas raised his glass of wine. “To solitary souls.”
Alicia took her glass and touched his, avoiding his eyes.
“Leandro is an idiot,” the policeman remarked after a while.
Alicia shook her head slowly. “No. He’s simply cruel.”
The rest of the meal took place in silence.