Chapter 5

The cab Da Silva was following turned from the Avenida Atlântica into the Avenida Raínha Elizabeth, heading for Ipanema and Leblon, and Da Silva eased up on the accelerator, dropping back a bit, aware that traffic along that section of the beach would be less concentrated. The girl, should she think to investigate, might well spot him. Still by keeping at least two city blocks to the rear, one should well avoid the danger of being recognized. At that distance every cab in Brazil looked the same, with the exception of the new Volkswagens that had begun to make their appearance on the streets, and they didn’t look like automobiles, let alone taxis.

He swung from the Raínha Elizabeth into the Avenida Vieira Souto, keeping steady pace with his quarry, relaxed and at peace with the world—and then jumped nearly a foot, biting his tongue, as a siren exploded directly in his ear, its scream echoing wildly inside his skull. Startled—to say the least—he automatically swerved to the right side of the road to allow the ambulance or police car or whatever to race past him down the avenue on its business, but instead, the rádio patrulha responsible for his fright shot by and angled in immediately, its brake lights flashing red as it cut him off. Fuming, Da Silva jammed on his brakes, coming to a skidding halt, missing a collision by inches. With his radiator nudging the rear fender of the patrol car, he sat waiting for an explanation, his eyes frozen with anger. Ahead of him the cab he had been following quietly turned a corner and disappeared.

Two plainclothes policemen hopped out of the patrol car, guns drawn, and moved quickly and efficiently alongside Da Silva’s cab, one on each side. Without a glance at the glaring driver, and almost as if they had rehearsed the movement many times, they hesitated a split second and then, in unison, pulled open the rear doors and pointed their guns at the floor where somebody might have been crouching. There was a moment’s silent tableau as they stared at the empty space. Their eyes came up, studying the captain’s face. One look and they knew, somehow, that they had done something wrong.

“Are you two quite finished?” Da Silva’s quiet voice was all the more deadly for its very silkiness. “I don’t want to interfere in essential police business, but do you mind telling me the reason for nearly wrecking my car? I’ll overlook the fact that you nearly killed me in the process.”

One of the men—the braver of the two—attempted to explain.

“The dispatcher got a call from Lieutenant Perreira, Captain, saying you were in trouble. We had instructions to locate you and—” He swallowed. Whatever they had been instructed to do had obviously been a mistake.

“I see.” Da Silva turned off the ignition and climbed down. A few bathers across the road looked at the scene and then looked hastily away. They didn’t know what the poor cabdriver had done to merit so abrupt a halt on the part of the police, but they did know they didn’t want to be witnesses to any part of the matter. Witnesses usually spent more time in the xadrez than criminals. Da Silva marched to the patrol car, climbed in, and picked up the hand microphone.

“Hello? This is Captain Da Silva. I—”

“They found you, Captain?”

“They found me, so you can inform the rest of the cars in Rio of the fact, so I won’t keep being rescued interminably! And now, please get Lieutenant Perreira, from my office, and tie him into this call, would you?”

“Yes, sir!”

Da Silva waited, glaring at the wide avenue that stretched down the beach to eventually disappear, apparently, into the rock wall at the end. And where is my pretty lady now? he thought savagely. He brought his attention back to the hand set as a click announced Perreira’s presence on the line. The lieutenant sounded pleased.

“Captain? So they got to you in time, eh?”

“They got to me in time.” Captain Da Silva’s voice was under control, but Lieutenant Perreira frowned. It was a tone he knew and recognized; somehow he had done something foolish. But what? The captain continued calmly. “Actually, they got to me a little ahead of time. Who do I thank for my rescue?”

“Mr. Wilson, sir.” Perreira was not one to steal credit from the deserving, especially not in face of that tone. “He heard you ask for help on the shortwave. What was the trouble, sir?”

“Nothing that can’t wait to be discussed.”

Da Silva shook his head in disgust with himself. It was his own fault for turning on the radio when he knew it worked badly, and his alibi to himself at the time—that he wanted to have Wilson as a witness if necessary—was ridiculous. He did it as a gag, and like so many gags, it backfired. Well, no sense in crying over spilt shortwaves at this hour.

“What I wanted you for, Perreira—” He fished into his shirt pocket and came up with a crumpled slip of paper, unfolding it, reading the license number aloud. “Do you have it? It’s a cab. I want his regular pôsto; that’s all for now. If I need anything else on him later, I’ll let you know.”

“Right, Captain. But I thought—”

“What?”

“I mean, what about your vacation?”

“What vacation?” Da Silva asked sourly.

Perreira wisely dropped the subject. “I’ll get right on to the license bureau, Captain. Will you hold on?”

“I’ll wait.”

There was silence. The two large detectives from the radio patrol car stood on the curb, their pistols now holstered and covered by their jackets, scuffling their feet and looking at each other a bit foolishly. Captain Da Silva stared ahead unseeingly, still blaming himself for having lost the girl. Perreira finally came back on the line.

“The driver’s name is Alonso, Captain. Genêsio Alonso. His regular station is at the end of Leblon, where the Ataulfo de Paiva runs into the Dias Ferreira. Near the canal, there. Do you know where that is?”

“I know the stand there. It’s in a small bar, next to a bakery.” A second thought came to Da Silva just as he was about to hang up. No sense in waiting to get on with it. “One more thing, Perreira, and very important. I want you to get me a list of all cabdrivers in town who live in the Catatumbá slum. I want photostats of their license application, both sides—that’ll give me their picture and everything else I need.” He thought a moment more. “And I want the police record of each one, if he has one. Get the dope together as soon as possible and have Ruy bring it to Mr. Wilson’s apartment on the Lagôa. You know where it is?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Make it as fast as possible. Call Mr. Wilson and tell him I’ll be there as soon as I can. And to expect Ruy if he gets there ahead of me. And one last thing”—he smiled; the two detectives on the curb smiled with him. They didn’t know why any of the three were smiling, but they preferred to see the captain happy—“tell Mr. Wilson to leave a little of the Remy Martin.”

“Leave a little of the Remy Martin?” Perreira was puzzled.

“He’ll know what you mean,” Da Silva said. He hung up and climbed down from the car. He looked at the two large men at the curb and tilted his head politely in the direction of the patrol car. “Would you please—”

“Yes, sir, Captain!”

He walked back to his cab, climbed in, started the engine, and waited until the radio car had backed from the curb, noisily clashed gears, and driven hastily away. He released the clutch and headed down the beach; across the road the bathers watched his departure with curiosity, wondering just how much money freedom had cost him. Da Silva sighed. He supposed he’d have to wait around for the driver to come back from his delivery—assuming he didn’t pick up another fare on the way. Or else send a man out to wait for him. What a day! What a vacation!

He turned off the beach road a block before the canal marking the unofficial southern limits of the city, cutting over to the Rua Ataulfo de Paiva, and swinging about to approach the line of taxis parked before the botequim that, together with its wall phone, served as their station. Several drivers were leaning on the tall marble counter, sipping coffee and chatting. Da Silva slowed down and then nodded in pleased surprise. The final taxi in the line was the one he was seeking, its driver slouched on the front seat reading a newspaper. Actually, it wasn’t too surprising; the girl simply lived in the neighborhood. Assuming, that is, that she hadn’t changed taxis again. In that case, of course—Da Silva refused to consider it.

He drove past the taxi rank, pulling to the curb far enough ahead to clearly indicate that he was not attempting competition. He walked back until he came to the last cab, bent down, and leaned in at the open window.

“Genêsio?”

The cab driver looked up from his paper, curious. “Yes?”

“What happened to that girl you picked up in Copacabana? Your last fare? Where did you drop her?”

Recognition appeared in the other’s eyes. He grinned, revealing stained teeth. “Oh, yes—you’re the guy whose cab she got out of. What did you try to do to her? What did you say?” His grin faded a bit, replaced by suspicion. “What’s it to you where I dropped her?”

Da Silva dug his wallet from his hip pocket, opened it to his identification, and thrust it under the other’s nose. “Let’s just say I’m curious. Just answer the question, then we can all go home. Where did you drop her?”

Alonso’s eyes moved from the picture on the ID card to the hard face before him; he sat up straighter, putting aside the newspaper. “What did she do?”

“She robbed a gas station.” Da Silva’s voice hardened. “Well?”

Genêsio Alonso still thought it most unfair of policemen to go about disguised, let alone disguised as cabdrivers. However, it came to him that this was not the time to register a complaint, nor this tough one the man to register it with.

“I dropped her at the Coronado Apartments. In the Avenida—”

“I know. Visconde de Albuquerque on the canal.” It was only three blocks from where they were. “Did she go in? Did she act as if she lived there?”

The driver shrugged. He wanted to be helpful, but how does one act to prove one lives someplace? He compromised. “She went in.”

Da Silva tried to think of more questions but couldn’t; the driver could only manage one, and that in a coaxing tone. “What did she really do?”

“She left her change at the supermarket,” Da Silva said, and marched back to his car, an angry light in his eye. The Coronado, eh? He climbed into the cab, drove around the corner and down two blocks, pulling up before a new, tall, luxurious apartment building. The Coronado was notorious as the home of the wealthiest kept women—or rather, he thought, putting the words in their proper sequence—the wealthiest home of kept women, in town.

So she belonged to somebody else; what had he expected? That a lovely body like that would sit in the rack unclaimed forever? He sighed. What a shame, and not in the usual sense of the word! What a pity! He could see that if he ever met this girl at that cocktail party he had been visualizing, he’d be there moonlighting as a waiter!

Despite his disappointment at discovering how the lovely girl lived, the thought of himself giving drinks to others made him smile. He climbed down and mounted the steps of the building, pushing into the ornate lobby, going to the mail desk in one corner. The gangling porter, resplendent in a uniform that fit him poorly, glanced up to judge his visitor, and then looked out of the window with concern.

“Somebody called a cab?”

His tone was worried. Normally he was asked to call cabs, and if people were calling cabs for themselves, possibly he was in disfavor. But then he remembered that he had been absent for a half hour and his face cleared, but only for a moment. His visitor was withdrawing a wallet from his pocket and a moment later was presenting him with a police badge.

“A girl,” Da Silva said. He slid the wallet back into his pocket. “She came in here within the last ten minutes. Fifteen at the most.”

“She lives here?”

“I have no idea. I know she came in.”

The porter’s face cleared again; actually it became a trifle superior. How typical of the police to look for somebody they didn’t know in a place they didn’t know she was! In any event, he was in the clear.

“I just got in from the post office, Captain. Just this minute.” He gestured toward the unsorted pile of mail. “We have a box there. It’s a lot more certain than—”

Da Silva was uninterested in the routine of the apartment. “You might recognize her from her description. About a meter-seventy in height; weighing between fifty-five and sixty kilos—sixty at the most. Her hair is dark and curly, and she wears it shoulder length.” He was watching the porter’s thin face steadily. “Extremely beautiful.…”

The tinge of superiority in the porter’s voice was augmented by a touch of pity.

“I’m sure the captain knows of the Coronado Apartments. We have no ugly girls here. And they wear their hair differently every day.” He tried to be helpful. “If you knew her name.…”

Da Silva bit back his first sardonic reply; at least the porter had given him an idea. It wasn’t a particularly brilliant idea, but it was the first one of any kind he’d had for some time.

“Do you have a list of the occupants? Name and apartment?”

“Of course, Captain.” The porter rummaged in a drawer of the mail desk and finally unearthed what he wanted. He checked it over quickly and then handed it across the desk. “We give them to every new tenant in case she—I mean, in case they—want to know who their neighbors are.”

“Is it up to date?”

“Yes, sir. People don’t move between lease periods. Or, anyway—”

Da Silva disregarded him, glancing down at the list. It consisted in the main of names of single women, none of which looked familiar; as far as he could see the list was useless. Still, one of those names could well be hers; unless, of course, she was visiting. Possibly he could wait for her to reappear and have the porter identify her, but that could take a week. He sighed and folded the paper, tucking it into a pocket.

“Well.… Thank you.”

“De nada, Capitão.”

Da Silva stared at him a moment more, could think of nothing to be gained by continued contemplation of the ferretlike face beneath the gaudy cap, and walked out of the building abruptly. He climbed into his cab, started the engine, and then leaned over, glancing up at the smooth expressionless facade of the structure, knowing that somewhere within it was a girl he wanted very much to see again, and only partly for police reasons. Although why he wanted to see a girl only partly for police reasons, whose rent was being paid by another man, was more than he could understand.

He sighed mightily, shrugged, and then put the cab into gear, swinging about in the narrow street, heading north for the Lagôa and Wilson’s apartment.