As he’d expected, the former revolutionary was far too wary to meet him someplace private: that kind of caution had kept him alive when an entire country was hunting him. He recommended a café in the middle of Ramos Mejia, a pizzeria large enough to guarantee some empty space around them in the dead hours of the afternoon the next day, but too central to allow someone to cork him without a dozen witnesses. Fortunato drank a whiskey as he made his proposition, and Cacho refused him before he could even get to the price.
“I’m not putting myself into this, Fortunato. I already told you that. Look for someone else to pick up Vasquez. Ask Domingo.”
“I’m doing this apart from Domingo. It’s private.”
“Even more crazy. Look for someone else.” The thief stood up.
“Cacho, don’t be so hard. It’s just to talk with him.” He saw the man hesitate. “I’ll give you two green sticks.”
“Twenty thousand? To talk? You could have him cut for that money, and buy the widow a new car afterwards. What’s happening, Miguel? What does Vasquez know that’s worth twenty thousand?”
Fortunato shrugged offhandedly. “Maybe he knows why Robert Waterbury was killed.”
Cacho shook his head of gray-streaked black hair. “I already read about the opereta with Onda. Very nice, Señor, but no thank you. That’s not my business. You want to talk about stolen televisions, call me.”
“Maybe he can tell us who killed Ricardo Berenski.”
Fortunato’s words halted Cacho at the edge of the table, and the Comisario could see he’d hit something. “You two are old compañeros, no? Berenski worked in Propaganda for the ERP; that’s well-known. Berenski kept up the struggle, in his manner. That’s why they killed him.”
“What would a merquero like Vasquez know about that?”
“Sit down, Cacho. Chat a little more with me. We’re old friends now. I know your crimes, you know mine. There’s little to hide. But of that night, of the gringo, it’s not like it seems.” The criminal sat down and lit a cigarette. Fortunato looked over his shoulder and went on in a confidential voice. “I fired the last bullet. That’s the truth. But it was Domingo and Vasquez that shot him up first. When I fired, it already was. I did it because . . .” He hesitated, remembering Waterbury’s agony, the look he’d given him before everything had gone bad. He’d been lying so long he had to work to try to muster the sincerity of the truth. “I did it because he was suffering. Vasquez shot him in the balls, the thigh. Domingo shot him in the chest.” Fortunato felt his voice cracking as he remembered the night. “There was no alternative, hombre. It already was. I killed him, yes, but for mercy. I never wanted to kill him! You know me. I’m not the type to kill an innocent man for a few pesos!”
He composed himself, continued in a more analytical tone. “I believe Pelegrini ordered the squeeze. There was a matter with the writer and Pelegrini’s wife. But I was told to squeeze him, not kill him. It was Vasquez who started shooting, then Domingo. I think someone else wanted him dead. And now,” he cleared his throat, “it falls to me to solve the crime.”
The criminal stared at him with a mixture of pity and amazement. He felt comfortable with the old Fortunato, the arranger, the tranquil bureaucrat. This other Fortunato made him nervous. “Estás loco, Comiso.”
“Mirá, Cacho,” the policeman said hurriedly. “You used to be for the Revolution, those years ago. Even the worst of the subversives had their idealism. A search for some . . .” the word felt strange and hypocritical to him, “justice.” He shrugged. “Maybe I’m looking for the same thing.”
“What could you know about the Revolution!” Cacho returned harshly. “It was a thing of the spirit! You were dedicated to killing all that!”
Fortunato gazed down his drink, his shoulders bowed around his gray head. “It’s not so thus, Cacho.”
Cacho looked at the crumpled man in front of him. He had seen a thousand little plays tried out by petty criminals and petty cops, and if this were a lie it would be such an obvious ridiculous lie that the Comisario wouldn’t even bother telling it. Something had happened to the Comisario. His wife’s death or the murder had tripped some strange switch that was changing him, cell by cell, giving him a conscience. Or maybe not. Maybe it was just the cheap remorse of those who know they are about to fall.
“Forget it, Miguel.” He stood up again, but he couldn’t make himself walk away. “Where do you see Berenski in this?”
Fortunato was heartened by the reprieve. “I’m still not sure where he enters.” He thought of telling about RapidMail and Pelegrini, but it was too vague in his own mind and it might spook Cacho. “But I know that Berenski had started to investigate the Waterbury case when they killed him. If Vasquez knows who really killed Waterbury, maybe it will tell us who put down Berenski.”
Cacho seemed drawn into the possibility for a few seconds then shook his head. “You talk about it as if it wasn’t you! You’re selling something! This is a trap!”
Fortunato heard him out and didn’t bother with denials. “You don’t believe me, Cacho. With reason. I’m an hijo de puta and if there is justice in Argentina I’ll end up rotting in Devoto for that crime and many others. Maybe it will turn out that way, but those are things that will be arranged later. In this case, I’m simply trying to do what is just.”
He stopped talking. Cacho was considering it and Fortunato could sense him handling the contours of his own history and whatever fierce idealism had once sent him on operations so unlikely that only the most visionary hopes for the future could induce a person to begin.
“Three green sticks,” he said at last. “And you pay me in advance.”