“Waterbury sets to work the following morning and writes the first pages of Teresa Castex’s book. At his request she has given him photographs and flyers of the era, a copy of French Vogue from decades past, other trivia to give him the feel of the times. He intuits that Teresa Castex wants to rewrite her life into a story much grander than it has really been, with herself more adventurous and romantic and her husband perhaps a bit more dutiful. The work lacks inspiration, but the author puts together some twenty pages by the time of their next meeting and provides La Señora de Pelegrini with a copy. Her eyes are shining as she clutches the little stack of papers and reads her own character in the paragraphs: her adventures in Paris and in a Buenos Aires of urban guerrillas and stern military men. Her excitement makes the leaves tremble in her hand. ‘Perfect!’ she says. ‘You have captured exactly what I was looking for!’ With that, she continues her story of the wealthy woman and her husband.’
“‘Mario, the woman found out over the next five years, was even more clever than he appeared to be. An excellent salesman, yes. He made friends rapidly and signed extraordinary contracts with the military, with financial institutions and the leading businesses of the country. He paid special attention to the middle ranks, those faceless men who shaped the specifications for bids and wrote the contracts, who could create overwhelming advantage or insurmountable obstacles with a few tiny lines of print. Mario was thoughtful and discreet, and he never forgot the names of these men’s wives and children.’
“La Señora de Pelegrini looks over at Waterbury, who has halted his pen above the page. ‘Aren’t you writing this down?’ she asks him.
“‘It’s just that it’s a very abrupt change of direction.’
“‘Oh. We’re just getting started, amor. Didn’t you say you wanted to write a thriller?’ She crosses her arms and narrates into the still air of the room.
“‘March of 1976 arrives. Peron is dead and his widow Isabella is floundering through the last farcical year of her presidency. The golpe comes and the Generals stare down from the podium. Now the money began to flow in from the northern hemisphere like weather. The foreign bankers could lend with confidence, because in the documents signed by the military and their economic functionaries, the entire nation of Argentina will be the collateral. What a paradise! Loans guaranteed by the government, cumbersome financial regulations loosened: an excellent climate for a man with good contacts, a man who never forgets your wife’s name.
“‘By that time Mario had come to have great influence. In some branches of the National Bank and the Ministry of Public Works the entire middle range of bureaucrats were secretly on his payroll. When contracts were to be bid, one allocated an extra seven percent for Mario, who would apportion it most usefully. And those who didn’t take that friendly lunch with Mario, or have a comfortable chat with him over a drink at the Jockey Club, would find themselves always left standing on the outside of the deal. Mario offered clever ways to hide the money overseas, and to circulate it back into Argentina through secret partnerships in his growing web of businesses. Mario came to dominate trucking and package delivery. He built on his wife’s fortune, buying cattle farms and meat packing plants and government concessions to manage the airports and the harbors. With more money he opened more businesses, with more businesses he had more contacts, and with more contacts he could pay more bribes. Thus he rose to create his stinking corrupt empire, and to decorate it with pretty young girls who looked at him as if he were a great man!’
“La Señora de Pelegrini etches a few more specifics. How Mario used sabotage and violence to destroy his competitors in the trucking business, and blackmailed his package delivery rivals into selling out to him. She tells how he organized his friends in the Armada into a secret offshore corporation, then used their influence to procure huge contracts supplying beef to the armed forces. She begins to name names, including that of the admiral who provided Waterbury with his introduction to Pelegrini.
“Waterbury looks up from his notes. ‘Wait a minute.’ He feels the project veering off into a confusing and perhaps dangerous quadrant and is unsure whether he wants to hear more. At the same time, it is too early to refuse a prize of two hundred thousand dollars based on a bit of gossip. ‘Let’s return to the wife,’ he says. ‘What is she doing all this time? Does she suspect what’s going on?’
“La Señora at once relaxes into a happy nostalgia. ‘Ah, his wife! His young beautiful wife is lost in the splendor of motherhood, dutifully caring for his most precious possessions. It is she who must manage the servants and oversee the nannies. She is the one who must sort through the flood of invitations and social obligations that a family of such importance is burdened with and, of course, maintain her position as a leader in the world of Arts. After Fiorella comes the birth of Edmundo, and then Alicia. Her life is busy and blissful, until, like an astronomer sensing the gravitational pull of a dark hidden moon, she feels the presence of mortal sin intrude upon her life.’
“Waterbury looks up from the page. ‘Mortal sin?’
“She turns to him. ‘Of this, we’ll talk the next time. I think I’ve given you enough to fill twenty pages, no?’
“She accompanies Robert Waterbury through the empty rooms of the Castex Mansion and retrieves from the front closet a sealed cardboard box. ‘I prepared these materials to help give you a sense of the times.’ As he walks to the car Waterbury can feel Abel Santamarina examining him with his strange light eyes.
“At his room he opens the box. Editions of La Prensa announce the golpe de estado that brought in the Dictatorship, and small articles dipped from the financial newspaper detail the business transactions of obscure corporations. Again there are magazines of the Seventies and Eighties, a cassette of popular music of the time, a dried rose coming apart in an envelope, a silver rattle, a picture of a tomb in La Recoleta and a book of poems, privately printed in a luxurious leather-bound edition, written by a poet who hides her identity behind the filigreed initials ‘T.C.’
“Waterbury surveys this strange expediente of Teresa Castex’s life with pity. Her poems are odes to ‘Arte’ or ‘Amor’ that crumble in a heap of pretentious references. ‘Oh Art, my lover, why have you ravished me and left me sitting in the waste can like an invitation from a social inferior?’ He senses Teresa’s boundless aspirations, desires which he knows will forever suffocate beneath her narrow spirit and non-existent talent. He begins to think of what she has told him in a different light, the story of a trivial woman who gradually discovers the depths of corruption within the man closest to her and so begins her own awakening.
“Waterbury begins to write, and to his surprise, it comes easily to him. A magnate, an ingénue, a background of theft on such a massive scale that it can only be called business. There are the revolutionaries and the corrupt politicians, there the complicit functionaries of the United States, as he himself had been. The tango, the pompous facades, the racks of cow bones suffering over hot coals: it all whirls around him and becomes the city itself, so that when he walks in the streets they are the streets of his book, the bitter taste of coffee is of his book. Waterbury writes without thought, crashing through ten or twelve pages at a sitting where before he would only write three. The vain and shallow Teresa Castex becomes a woman torn between her own material security and the knowledge that she has become part of an evil cancer that includes her in its filthy web. Shall she expose it, and risk the luxuries and status it accrues to her? Or shall she close her eyes? Thus Waterbury extracts his novel from the frivolous clucking of Teresa Castex.
“At the same time, distant footsteps are pacing in the background of Waterbury’s brain. There is something a bit dirty about this arrangement. As a guest of Don Carlo, he is a traitor. As a friend of Teresa Castex, he is a user. And as a foreigner balancing between a rich and ruthless magnate and his angry wife, he is a cursed boludo. In his latest encounter with Don Carlo he has noted a tension that worries him. He meets with Pablo at his office to ask for advice.
“‘With Carlo Pelegrini? The Carlo Pelegrini, of MovilSegur and all the rest?’
“‘Yes.’
“Pablo swivels his head downward to the white carpet, letting out a long rich breath. He is silent for a surprising amount of time before he looks up. ‘Does he know you are here?’
“Waterbury feels a little flutter of anxiety. ‘No. Why?’
“‘Pelegrini . . . ’ He shakes his head. ‘How did you meet Pelegrini?’
“‘Some friends gave me an introduction, and then things developed.’ The writer mentions the admiral and the former minister of economy, then recreates his little tango with Teresa Castex and her version of her own life and the life of ‘Mario.’
“Pablo nods, and for the first time Waterbury sees his carefree features dulled down with worry. ‘You shit yourself, hermano.’
“‘What do you mean?’
“‘Pelegrini is heavy. He has a security apparatus directed by exrepressors of the Dictatorship. He has many turbid businesses. Don’t mix in with him.’
“‘I’m already in, Pablo! I have a contract for two hundred thousand dollars. We can live for four years on that. It buys me the time to write a real book.’
“‘Don’t put yourself—’
“‘I’m just a fucking novelist! What’s more useless and ineffectual than that? He has nothing to fear from me!’
“‘It’s not what you are, it’s what he thinks you are. Moreover, to play games with another man’s wife, here in Argentina, is always dangerous. This isn’t a culture where the two men shake hands and talk about philosophy.’
“‘Don’t be ridiculous. I have a wife!’ His protest feels weightless even to himself. He wonders if Pablo knows of his continuing friendship with Paulé.
“‘That’s fine! You don’t have to convince me. But be careful, Robert.’ He clears his throat. ‘And one more little thing: better that you don’t come to this office again. From now on we meet outside.’
“‘What do you mean.’
“His friend speaks delicately. ‘Robert, I tell you this as a friend, and it must be kept in absolute confidence. The theme is thus: The relationship of Grupo AmiBank with Pelegrini these days is a bit tense. There’s a species of competition, let’s say, between the Grupo and the Pelegrini interests. If Pelegrini sees you coming here and meeting with me, well, he might have the mistaken idea . . . ’ He puts up both hands to close the matter. ‘Better that no, Robert. My advice is that—’
Fabian’s sentence was interrupted by the sound of Fortunato’s cell phone. The Comisario took it from his pocket. “Fortunato.”
The Chief’s voice boomed through the tiny holes. “Miguelito! How goes it, querido? I called to see that La Doctora left well content. Did you give her the certificate of appreciation?”
Fortunato could feel Fabian and Athena trying to interpret the call. “No.”
The little voice sounded surprised. “You forgot to give it to her? What happened, Miguel? Now we’ll have to send it.”
“Mira, this moment is a bit inconvenient. I’m in a reunion with Inspector Diaz and a colleague from the United States, the Doctora Fowler. It’s a matter of some priority. I’ll call you afterwards.”
Fortunato waited a few seconds then said agreeably, “Perfecto!” and cut the line. He threw a dismissive little pout to his companions. “Continue.”
Instead Fabian rose from the table. “With your permission,” he said, and looked towards the back of the restaurant. Fortunato’s bladder had been insisting for some time, but he’d suppressed it, unwilling to leave Fabian alone with Athena. Now he stood up and followed the Inspector to the bathroom. A mistake: the tiny bath room felt crowded and he had no choice but to talk to Fabian’s back as he waited his turn. Fortunato stared at the expanse of parrot-green cloth, its collar concealed by the cascade of blond curls. If one wanted to commit a murder, this would be a good way to set it up, except in this case there would be no alibi or escape route. Too early to say whether Fabian was attacking or supporting him, or if Fabian knew he had committed the murder at all. He wasn’t sure where to start.
“I congratulate you, Fabian. I don’t know how much of this is true, but on a cinematic level, it’s a great success.”
“That’s the important part, Comiso,” Fabian said to the wall. “When they make the film I’ll try to get you named as a technical advisor. Thus we can spread the money a bit between colleagues, as is the tradition.”
“The thing that bothers me is that you didn’t put me up to this beforehand. Combining forces we could have arrived much more rapidly. I had heard that the Federales were arming an investigation.”
Fabian adjusted himself and then turned to the Comisario, who was blocking the door. He forced a stiff pleasantness onto his face. “With your permission, Comiso. I don’t want to be rude to La Doctora.”
The lunch hour had ended and the waiter scattered another round of little white cups on the table. Fabian had accessorized his plumage with a small cigar he’d bought at the counter and now he hung it in the air between them and cocked his head as if he were listening to the smoke. When the Comisario sat down he began again.
“Bien. Waterbury has written more than thirty pages in three days. He prepares a copy for La Señora and arrives at the Castex Mansion at the appropriate hour. Unexpectedly, Santamarina, the ex-torturer, intercepts him at the security post and surprises him with a full search. He revises Waterbury as if he has never before visited the Mansion Castex, then takes his portfolio and empties out the papers, carefully surveying their contents. Finding the sheets that tell the story of Mario’s rise to power, he rewards the author with a stare of violent contempt, then puts the manuscript in a paper bag and guides Waterbury towards the house. The butler does not meet them at the door. Instead Santamarina himself leads him through the long silent gleam of the mansion, past the frescoes and the smiling Dutch peasant. There is a smell of floor polish, of lemon. Don Carlo is waiting for him in the smoking room, ensconced in the aroma of leather and tobacco. Above him hangs a photograph of a racehorse that was put to sleep before he was born.
“‘Ah, Robert. Sit down! Sit down, amigo.’ The magnate wears a button-down shirt of cream-colored silk, crossed by an iridescent gray tie loosened at his neck. The jacket lying across the arm of another chair makes Waterbury suppose that he has come home from his office for this meeting.
“Waterbury creaks into the leather armchair that Pelegrini has indicated. ‘Teresa isn’t here?’
“‘Yes, she is here,’ the businessman says, ‘but she’s busy at the moment. She asked me to receive you myself.’
“‘Oh!’ Waterbury says. In the room with them now is the fictional Mario, and the tales of Mario’s beatings and extortions hover in the air. ‘It’s an unexpected pleasure.’
“Don Carlo nods to Santamarina and the bodyguard places Waterbury’s pages beside him and moves wordlessly out the door. ‘And,’ Carlo says glancing at the words. ‘How is your project with my wife?’
“Waterbury feels the vague sting of an accusation, tries to steady his voice as he answers. ‘It’s going well.’
“‘And does she have great potential as an author?’
“‘Bien,’ Waterbury says, trying out some old verso, ‘in literature there is nothing absolute. An excellent book in the literary sense may sell poorly, and be considered a failure, while a mediocre book may sell a million copies.’ Don Carlo is still pinning him there with his eyes. ‘So, as to her potential, that’s a disposition that I can’t really make, especially not before the book is finished.’
“Don Carlo stares at him silently for a time, then turns his attention to the manuscript and begins to look through it, saying at the same time, ‘So long since I studied English, and then it was technical English, of the kind needed to read service manuals and write invoices. Not fine English, like this.’ He examines the page. ‘Ah, look at that! Extortion. It’s the same in Spanish. Extorción. And here: bribe. That’s a coima, no?’ He continues reading for fifteen minutes, without excusing himself or apologizing, knowing that Waterbury will sit quietly and wait for him. ‘What’s this?’ he says. ‘Blackmail?’
“‘Chantaje,’ the writer answers him softly.
“‘Ah, chantaje, of course. And here is liar, that means mentiroso, and arrangement. That means arreglo, no?’ Carlo looks up and Waterbury can see the veneer of his smile wearing away. ‘This Mario is a real hijo de puta!’
“The writer swallows, feeling the heat rise to his face. ‘Yes. That particular character isn’t very straight, but he’s operating in an environment where that’s demanded of him for success. At the end of the book he changes.’
“‘But how? From what I see here he is beyond change! He has a standard of living based on extortion and bribery. Such people can’t change. Especially when they are part of a corrupt system. You have to kill them!’
“Waterbury begins to speak and his voice rises and breaks. ‘You know, Carlo, it’s not up to me to judge my characters. I just try to present them. A novel needs a full array of characters, and . . . ’ he tries an intimate little shrug, ‘somebody has to be the bad guy, no.’
“The magnate drops his smile and cuts him off. ‘Don’t play the boludo with me. Do you think me so stupid?’ He puts his anger away and takes a softer line. ‘To the point. At the start, I was happy that Teresa had a project, because the truth is that since the children are gone she is a bit lost. She has paranoid fantasies of this and that. Do you understand? I indulged her fantasies because I thought that this might be a sort of therapy for her. But this,’ he holds up the manuscript, ‘this is an insult!’
“‘It’s just a character—’
“‘Yes, just a character with businesses like mine, that worked at a computer company, like I did. It’s an insult and a violation of my confidence in you! I welcome you into my house and in return you encourage my wife to defame me with this confection of lies she has invented from the newspaper! This doesn’t go! It doesn’t go! Not for a novelist or anyone else!’
“Poor Waterbury cringes into the squeaking leather cushions without an answer. Pelegrini goes on lashing at him. ‘She told me she already gave you ten thousand. Ingrate! Take that and don’t ever come back!’ Pelegrini rips out a little laugh. ‘Did you think a writer of the last ranks, like yourself, could legitimately make two hundred thousand dollars writing a book? You’re dreaming! Only in a dirty deal like the one you made with Teresa, where you take advantage of an unstable woman, only thus could you make that much money with your supposed talent. And if it was only I who thought so, you wouldn’t be here in Buenos Aires working a cheap confidence trick and trying to pass yourself off as a grand literary success!’
“The author doesn’t feel his body, only the lurid pink distress of his mutilated sense of self. He can only sit and wait for Pelegrini to finish annihilating him.
“‘This doesn’t go any further. You understand? If any part of this ever appears anywhere, in fiction or in any other form, no amount of money in the world will be enough to justify the consequences to you and your family. And don’t make any mistake: I can find you here, at the Hostal San Antonio—or there.’ Pelegrini recites Waterbury’s address in New York and the name of his daughter’s school, then lapses to a silent glare.
“Waterbury has no answer. He fumbles to his feet and stumbles out of the smoking room. Santamarina is waiting for him, puts his hand on his arm as he directs him across the spacious chesswork of tiles and the glittering chandelier. There is no Teresa Castex and her lucrative vanities, no inspired literary thriller, only the warm spring air of Buenos Aires, the straining Doberman of the custodian, the high black gate and then the unsteady sidewalk. Two blocks away a flock of black taxis gleam like cheap hearses in the sunlight.’
“Waterbury falls through the afternoon in a state of shock. His fabulous landscape has withered in front of him. Buenos Aires streams past his window with its glorious stone angels and verdigris domes, but all has gone gray and lusterless. His easy salvation has evaporated and left him groaning with debt and shot to pieces by Don Carlo’s devastating assessment of his talent and his character. Maybe it is his own corruption that has brought him to such a pass. If he had refused La Señora’s offer at the beginning he could have kept a steady course and written a book, rising and falling on his own merits. As it is, the sudden elevation and crash has left him feeling like he can give no more. He passes the hotel clerk with a wave and hurries to his room, throwing himself on the bed. On the tiny desk his books on writing a bestseller laugh at him, and he writhes in an agony of self-hatred and futility, a man who has failed himself and his family, a fraud, a liar, a pretender to literary achievement on the level of Teresa Castex herself. He is out of place on all sides. To stay in this empty and mocking city feels like torture, but to return home now, as a failure, impossible. He lies there as at the bottom of a smothering black pool, but into the dim room comes the buzz of the desk clerk. ‘You have a visitor,’ he says. ‘That French woman.’
“A tiny crack of light seems to open. ‘Send her up,” Waterbury croaks, and he gathers the resolve to rouse himself from the pit. She is, he tells himself, the Patron Saint of Desperation. He hears the elevator hum and clank, and then the knocking at his door. She stands there in her black dress and a little handbag. It’s tango night. ‘What a depressing room!’ she says, looking past him. ‘If I lived here I would have put a bullet in my head two weeks ago!’
“Waterbury’s smile dies out before it can complete itself and the dancer eyes him more closely. ‘What’s happening with you?’ she asks. ‘You look like your wife just sent you divorce papers!’ She strides into the room and puts her handbag on the desk. ‘It’s not for so much, amor! With all that money from La Señora de Pelegrini you can find a woman half her age!’ This does not cheer him, and she realizes that something is wrong. She speaks more softly, her gray eyes crystalline and wise beneath their slashes of liner. ‘Robert! Tell me what’s happened to you!’
“He lifts his hand as if to answer but before any words can escape he finds himself crying without control, finally buried by the years of frustration and failure, humiliated in his last attempt to be clever in his business and his art. La Francesa puts her arms around him and holds him but he goes on crying, clutching her as if she was the incarnation of every hope he once had for Buenos Aires, or himself. She pats him on the back and murmurs small incomprehensible consolations without knowing even what he is crying about. That it is all right, that she is here, that it will all pass, that the moon and the stars will still be shining when it is over. At last he takes a deep breath and sits on the bed, relating in a choking voice the events that have stolen away his hopes for easy salvation. She listens without interruptions, a grimace of discomfort crossing her face when the writer finishes with Pelegrini’s brutal summary.
“The silence sits there for a half-minute as she holds her chin and watches him. She shakes her head sadly. ‘It looked so easy. It floated your way and when you tried to capture it you found it was nothing more than a little ball of smoke.’
“She gives a long sigh. ‘Listen to me . . . ’ She kneels in front of him and puts her hand on his knee, her gray eyes wide and sympathetic. Her voice is soft and low, almost a hum in the quiet afternoon sun. ‘You came to Buenos Aires to make your last play. But Teresa Castex is not your last play.’ Her face is only inches away from his. She is nearly whispering. ‘Life is your last play, and it is happening right now. All around you. All at one time.’
“The moment overpowers them. He is kissing her, feeling her thick glossy lips and her unfamiliar tongue, smelling as always the odor of smoke in her hair, and her perfume. Without remembering how it happened he is on the bed with her, horizontal, holding her black-dressed body close to him as her arms writhe slowly across his back. He has forgotten his wife, or rather, he has abolished her and his daughter to a remote planet which he knows he must visit again in the near future but which for the moment is only a shadow. The dream is like a fever now, even more intense for the knowledge that it has reached its full bloom and as such has already marked some unknowable endpoint. Nothing exists but this dark room, this woman, and around it the idea of a city called Buenos Aires built not of bricks but of the infinite illusions of its citizens and the aspirations that are forever receding before them.’
/ / /
Fabian leaned back in his chair and shook his head ruefully. He seemed almost serious. “It’s a disappointment, I know, that Waterbury would be unfaithful to the wife who waits for him. Bad news to carry back to the widow. But thus it happened. Waterbury fell, as we all fall, to our own desires for things real or things imaginary. We can’t help it: that’s what pulls us on. You, me, the Comisario. For Waterbury, it was the flesh, or perhaps, looking more profoundly, the vision and the flesh made whole.” Fabian shrugged. “There are others who do much worse for much meaner reasons. Was it worse that he slept with La Francesa or that a decade before he devoted himself to extracting money from the country for AmiBank? I suppose it depends who you ask, no?” He slapped his forehead. “See that? Here I am going around in these boludeses again! I can’t resist!” He puffed. “Qué tonto!” He looked at his watch. “Fine, we are reaching the end now. Both I and Waterbury have little time left.”
“The next morning La Francesa returns to her room and Waterbury decides to look over the manuscript that he has already written. The first twenty pages of the Señora’s history can be easily condensed. That of the French Socialist is disposable, but the part about the young engineer and revolutionary who disappears, yes, there is something of value. And that of the magnate, the disagreeable Mario, in his progress to corruption, yes, a most interesting story in that. He is considering all this when he hears a knock at the door.
“Teresa Castex presents herself dressed in the manner of a schoolgirl in a gray skirt and white blouse. The feeling of recaptured youth is strengthened by her hair, which she has released from its tight bun to flow down over her shoulders and her back. There is a too-brilliant smile on her face, almost childish above the expensive leather portfolio that she presses to her chest. “I told the boy at the desk that I wanted to surprise you!” she explains, glancing around the room at the chaotic bed sheets and the general disarray.
“Waterbury feels immediately uncomfortable, both for the unusual state of animation of Teresa Castex and for the memory of his last encounter with her husband. He invites her in and throws the bedspread unevenly over the humped-up sheets. ‘This is half-Bohemian, Robert! You should have used some of your advance to get a better room.’
“She goes on with her comments about this part of town and other hotels that he would find more congenial to the project, and he answers her without much grace. Finally she puts the leather case on the desk and sits down. Her eyes are bright and nervous, her voice too gay for the occasion. ‘So, I decided we would have our normally scheduled session at your room today, to perhaps bring a different ambiance to the story.’
“An air of delusion has come over the dim lodging. Waterbury half-sits on the windowsill. ‘Teresa. Do you know what happened with your husband yesterday?’
“She plays the gil, but badly. ‘Yes, I was indisposed yesterday. Forgive me; I should have called you in advance. He told me that you chatted.’
“‘It was a bit more than a chat. He looked at the copy of the manuscript and he told me that if I continued in any form he would make me regret it.’
“She begins to get angry. ‘Why did you give him the manuscript? He has nothing to do with it!’
“‘I didn’t give it to him! The security guard took it away at the gate when I got there. What did you tell him about the book?’
“‘He has nothing to do with it!’ La Señora says again, flaming with indignation. ‘This is my project! It is my life and my novel, and he has no right to say what will happen with it or what its contents will be! I am Teresa Castex! Of the Mansion Castex! I am Castex!’ To Waterbury’s silence she commands: ‘Take out your journal and let us begin! Where were we? That was it! It was mortal sin, the mortal sin of adultery that the filthy Mario has entered into at the back of his innocent wife and children!’
“The writer is not prepared for the situation that is developing before him. He doesn’t move and Teresa Castex says ‘Come on! Take out your journal! Carlo does not control everything I do!’
“He tries to be calm. ‘Teresa. Your husband made his threats very clear.’
“Her face is blushing pink beneath the makeup. ‘To the devil with my husband! Your contract is with me! I paid you ten thousand dollars! Did you forget that? I demand that you begin right now to redact our book!’ Her command has no effect and she sees that she has blundered. Her face collapses. ‘He has nothing to do with this! Nothing! This is my project! Robert!’ She comes to her feet and lurches across the floor to Waterbury, and his vision is filled with her tight-skinned old features made young. ‘Don’t let him do this to us!’ She leans in to kiss him and he hears the clicking of her neck bones. He remains like wood and inhales her perfume. Her lips are thin and timid at first, then they grind away desperately at his mouth without bringing it to life. She leans back and regards him with a face of pure torment. ‘Forgive me,’ she whispers. ‘You don’t find me attractive.’
“Waterbury lies to try to comfort her. ‘It’s not that, Teresa. Of course I find you attractive. But I have a wife and daughter in the United States.’
“The skinny woman moves away. ‘Of course. How silly I am! It’s written on the back of your book!’
“The confusion now fills the air completely. Waterbury does not know why his life has suddenly become so rotten with deception. Just a few weeks before he was a desperate but honorable man.
“The wounded Teresa Castex, failure as both an author and an adulteress, can tell him nothing. She stands motionless, her hands pressed to her temples, then pounds her fists down through the air. ‘He has devoured my life! He has taken over my house and my social standing. He has belittled me in the eyes of my children. And now he is trying to take away our work, our relationship! He is pure corruption!’
“She reaches into her portfolio and subtracts a little packet of papers. ‘Bien,’ La Señora says a bit formally, ‘this is the material for the next section of the book. You must decide whether you will let my husband frighten you away from our book and your two hundred thousand dollars. I will await your call.’ La Señora de Pelegrini leaves the papers on his desk and closes the door behind her.
“I suspect that at that point Robert Waterbury was already under surveillance by Pelegrini’s men. In the movie version, I see a twenty-four hour surveillance, effected by weary men who wait for hours for him to emerge from his hotel and then follow him at a careful distance. A shot of a man sipping at a mate in his car, a man pretending to read a newspaper. They are studying his habits and his social contacts. Does he carry a cell phone or pager? Is he armed? All of those things. Pablo’s warning has come too late: Pelegrini already knows about his visit to the Grupo AmiBank, and he knows that Waterbury was once an employee of the bank. Perhaps before his wife appeared at Waterbury’s hotel room, he still believed his threat alone was sufficient. Who can say with certainty? What is certain is that Waterbury didn’t realize the true danger he was in before he opened up the packet that Teresa Castex had left on his desk. At last, his dreams have become his Destiny.
“He pulls out the papers and there it is. Correspondence, transcriptions of telephone conversations, documents from banks located in the West Indies. And with it, a description in Teresa Castex’s handwriting of transactions between certain officials and her husband that leave no doubt about her husband’s intentions towards the Post Office. In black and white he can see the fifteen million in bribes that Pelegrini was distributing to the Post Office officials and to various members of the government for the purpose of securing the right to take over the public mail system. In the hands of Pelegrini’s rivals at AmiBank, such information would be dynamite.”
Fortunato frowned. “Have you seen these papers, Fabian?”
Fabian held up his hand to stop their questions. “Afterwards we’ll talk about that. But you see now why Pelegrini had to act. It’s the classic. Waterbury knew too much. The documents showed the clear course of the money from Pelegrini to an offshore bank, and from there to accounts in the name of certain postal officials and fictitious companies that then invested their money back in Argentina. But all this was exposed by Ricardo Berenski and the others in their articles about Pelegrini. Surely you’ve seen them, Comisario.”
“I’ve seen them.”
Fabian lifted his palms towards Athena. “The biggest scandal in months! Though, of course, it was surely uncovered independently of Waterbury.”
“Fine. So what happened next?”
“Robert Waterbury becomes nervous, but also confused. That the Señora de Pelegrini would expose her own husband shocks Waterbury, though he understands what a depth of ancient resentment it comes from. He only wishes she had not chosen him to be her confessor. Now, yes, he begins to feel insecure. A part of him would like to go home. Another part is drawn to stay, to live out a few more weeks with Paulé and with his manuscript, to live this fantasy made real. In just a short time of intensive work he can complete the first redaction and then leave it behind forever: his affair, his blunder with the Señora.”
“Did he see any signs that Pelegrini was after him?” Athena asked.
“That we will never know. At this point the journals of Robert Waterbury end, and I can only speculate on the rest. I see Carlo Pelegrini questioning his wife about her visit to Calle Paraguay. It is uncertain how much she tells her husband, but her sobbing complaints move him from resentment to action. The order goes out to his security apparatus, who have been conducting the surveillance. I see three or four men arming the capacha with two automobiles. They would need some experienced men, but they find themselves lacking in the last days and one of the men decides to call on an old friend, Enrique Boguso, who is a bit erratic, but willing to undertake such a mission for not very much money. Here the first mistake. What is the mission? To intimidate Waterbury into compliance. Pelegrini suspects that his wife has revealed too much about his business affairs, and so it has gone beyond a matter of jealous husbands and disobedient wives. Waterbury must be shocked into permanent silence, even after he has returned to the United States. For this, he must experience a level of fear that will wake him up with a jerk for the rest of his life.
“The night of October 30th comes. Waterbury goes to eat at a restaurant around the corner at approximately eleven o’clock and leaves the restaurant shortly after midnight. A building is under construction and they park their car next to a container piled with shattered wood and plaster. Waterbury comes around the corner. He walks beneath the scaffolding, as he has other nights, and two of the men corner him there. It’s the logical place. Boguso has a hose filled with little balls of lead, and he silences the writer with a blow to the head.
“I see Waterbury in the auto, confused by the blow, confused by his situation. How could this be happening to him? He is only a writer. He guesses about Pelegrini and he wants to talk to the magnate, to dismiss his worries and assure him that his relationship with Teresa is only platonic. It all seems rather absurd, but at the same time, frightening. He has already been beaten a bit, and held on the floorboards of the car with handcuffs on. What might happen?
“For some time they drive, gradually making their way to the outer suburbs of Buenos Aires. Waterbury asks questions that are answered with a blow or an insult. Perhaps he is thinking of his wife and daughter, wishing he was home with them. Or perhaps he is thinking of La Francesa, or Pablo, or of what an interesting story this will make someday. I suspect that some part of Waterbury is still apart from his circumstances. They come to rest at a vacant lot on Calle Avellaneda, in San Justo, and Waterbury is pulled erect on the seat. He looks around at the abandoned neighborhood and now an ugly sense of reality begins to swallow him up. The dark windows, the apathetic weeds. A lost place, apart from all mercy. Perhaps it occurs to him, ‘This is the kind of place where one takes a bullet in the head.’ I imagine now that remorse comes over him. For the vanity of Teresa Castex, for his affair with La Francesa. For all the silly dreams that dissolved the life he had with his wife and daughter and made Buenos Aires seem more golden and more real. Because what is it now? The filthy gray light, the cheap swaggering by men who hit him while he is in manacles. Waterbury has tried to be stoic, to reason, to joke, to plead, to say nothing, but no approach will change the men.
“Now his captors are losing control. Empty little papers of merca scatter to the Boor and the atmosphere in the car has an electric feel, like that bitter smell of ozone around a red neon sign. The intimidation of Waterbury becomes an entertainment for the kidnappers. Guns are waving in the air, guns are pressing into his balls and then without reason a gun goes off and the last cord of sanity snaps. Waterbury panics and reaches out. Another explosion, then another. Waterbury is screaming, bleeding from the thighs, the balls, the hand, the chest . . .”
“Enough, Fabian,” the Comisario snapped.
The Inspector ignored him. “Finally Boguso takes up his nine millimeter Astra and walks around to the back door. The killer—”
“I said it’s already enough.”
“I’m almost finished, Comisario.” He looks at Athena. “The killer leans in, he raises the pistol towards Waterbury’s head—”
“Enough!” the Comisario shouted. “What’s happening with you? Is this entertainment? You’re so content! What good luck that a man is murdered in an empty lot! What diversion!”
The uncharacteristic outburst halted Fabian; he dropped his gaze to the table. A stupid thing for Fortunato to do, but it had escaped by itself, the reaction to the long afternoon of mockery and insinuation. And then, to see the murder playing out in front of him again, acted out by the stinking Boguso . . . Fabian might know nothing or he might know enough to put him in perpetual chains, and after two hours listening to him he still couldn’t tell. Fortunato released the tension with a sudden flush of stale air. “Forgive me, Fabian. I lack your ironic distance.”
Fabian’s eyes glittered briefly, but Fortunato couldn’t tell what that meant. “It’s fine, Comisario.” He cocked a smile. “With good reason.”
Fortunato felt another curtain of dread flutter through his body, then his cell phone sounded. “Fortunato.”
Chief Bianco’s panic traversed half of Buenos Aires and erupted from the handset. “Boguso retracted his confession!”
“What?”
“This morning. He’s implicating Carlo Pelegrini as the intellectual author!”
Fortunato answered slowly. “And what others?”
Bianco ignored the question. “The matter is, Miguel, that this is a very delicate time! Other things have happened . . . ” The Chief stopped himself, but his nervous complaint kept ringing in Fortunato’s head even after he pushed on. “Where are you?”
“In the center, near Corrientes.”
“I want you to come to my office immediately.”
“Forgive me, Sargento, but I’m occupied right now. Thank you for the information. I’ll call you for the papers. Está? Perfecto!”
Fortunato hung up the phone and looked at the two of them. He didn’t know what to say so he simply raised his eyebrows. It already was. He looked at Athena. “That was Central. Enrique Boguso recanted this morning. He implicated Pelegrini as the intellectual author. As Fabian must have known when he met us at the Sheraton this morning.”
Athena turned to the blonde Inspector, her voice inquisitorial. “You already knew?”
Fabian sighed. “It’s the truth: I already knew. But, as you were about to leave and we had to eat lunch anyway . . . “ He shrugged. “I thought I would give you the film version. I am, yes, a bit eccentric in that respect. But even so, this will all come out in perfect form, with evidence and photocopies and a pretty expediente stamped with all the rigor of the Law. I just wanted to save you the trip home.” He dropped his grin. “Seriously, Athena, the truth is this: Robert Waterbury was killed by Carlo Pelegrini because of the questionable relationship with his wife and the information about his bribes to try to secure the Post Office contract.”
Athena’s face was as hard as ice. “Who squeezed the trigger? And don’t lie to me this time!”
“Enrique Boguso killed him, with two accomplices. One is Abel Santamarina, Pelegrini’s chief bodyguard. We believe the other is fugitive in Paraguay.”
Her green eyes roved irritably over Fortunato before returning to Fabian. “Why wouldn’t Boguso confess this in the beginning?”
“To betray Pelegrini is a death sentence. Boguso looked for a way to stop the investigation before it touched Pelegrini and his chief of security. Thus he might at least go on living even in prison, and probably with the hope of Pelegrini’s help in arranging a quiet parole in a few years. Now . . . “ Fabian shrugged. “His future is not so very brilliant.”
Fabian precluded any more questions by looking at his watch. “Carajo! The afternoon is escaping me. Athena . . . ” he leaned down and quickly kissed her. “I’ll call you at the hotel. Comiso,” he gave him a little salute, “we’ll see each other.” Backing away from the table with a little grin. “Don’t worry about the bill. I’ll arrange it later.” With that, he fluttered out the door and onto the sidewalk like a flake of green confetti in a parade.
Athena watched him go, sipping at the last of her soda water, trying hard to conceal her resentment. “What do you think?” she asked in an even voice.
Fortunato shrugged. “Much must be true. Either that, or he has a grand career ahead of him as an author.” He paused. “Berenski had it right. He mentioned the missing diary.”
“But how would Fabian get it? And who would be doing a parallel investigation? The Federales? Besides, if it’s true, where are the documents that he claims Teresa Castex gave Waterbury? It seems like those would be enough to bring down the government.”
“Athena, at this altitude I don’t even want to guess. Did Boguso assassinate Robert Waterbury?” He swallowed before laying out the lie. “I believe, yes. But that of Pelegrini’s woman and this Francesa . . . I don’t know more than you.”
There was a short silence as Athena let her thoughts drift out the big window. “What bothers me is that he has no feelings about it at all. It’s just a game to him.”
Fortunato allowed himself the luxury of taking out a cigarette without answering. He could feel that he had lost her trust, but he had to put that aside for the moment. In the last two hours, everything had changed. Fabian’s group was running things now. They wanted the man at the top of the pyramid, and as long as Boguso held up in the role of material author, they might spare the rest along the way. But Boguso would never hold up. Fortunato scratched a flame from his lighter and squinted through the smoke. Some detached part of him realized that it was only a matter of time.
He and Athena lobbed desultory comments back and forth for another twenty minutes, though with Fabian gone the waiter no longer came to offer them anything. In the end Athena threw a few bronze coins on the table and they walked out.
Fortunato listened absently to Athena as he drove her to the Sheraton. She was asking all the relevant questions about Fabian’s story, but in a half-hearted disconnected manner, as if she didn’t really expect answers from him. As he fended her off he was thinking about the one discrepancy of Fabian’s narrative that stood out above all the others for him, a discrepancy that only an intimate witness to Waterbury’s last hours could pick out. Throughout Fabian’s long story, with its personages both expected and unexpected, a single name had been left out, a name that Waterbury himself had uttered in the half hour before he died, suspecting that he, and not Pelegrini, might have brought down on him the terrible events of that night. Berenski too had blanched at that name. Another Northamerican, with a long history in Buenos Aires: William Renssaelaer.
They arrived at the hotel and Athena paused with one leg out the door. Fortunato felt a pang at seeing her leave. “What are you going to do?”
She turned to him. “I suppose I’ll try to extend my stay.”
He smiled. “At least it will be good to have you around a bit longer.”
She ignored his attempt at irony and swung her other leg out of the car. The Comisario felt a stab of panic as she began to shift to the pavement.
“You know who we should talk to?” he said brightly. “Ricardo Berenski. He’s the expert on Pelegrini, and he knew something of what was going on between Pelegrini and the RapidMail/AmiBank group. Maybe he has some idea about the missing documents of Teresa Castex.”
“I have his number,” she said noncommittally. “Adios.”
He watched her walk towards the entrance of the Sheraton, a flood of grief and loneliness sweeping over him as it had when the morgue had taken Marcela’s body away. He felt his throat clogging up and he fought back the sorrow. It was too much. Too much of explanations that explained nothing, of disdainful looks. Too much knowledge of Robert Waterbury.
Athena turned back and looked towards Fortunato from the door of the Sheraton, regretting her harsh departure in spite of herself. The car was still there: he was sitting at the wheel staring straight ahead. She thought of going back and saying something, but she considered the whole stupid sham of an investigation and turned back towards the lobby. She was done with Fortunato.
In truth, she’d known since early in Fabian’s speech that she would be calling Ricardo Berenski as soon as she left the café. She would tell Ricardo the details and he would laugh and laugh, and within thirty seconds he would have some new insight, a possible lead, and a friend he could contact to corroborate a detail. Ricardo would straighten things out.
By the time she reached for the telephone to call him, Ricardo Berenski was already dead.