SOMETHING GOLD FLASHED from beneath Maldonado’s shirt cuffs. Cámara tried to catch a glimpse of it as the head of Homicidios waved an arm towards a hard wooden chair on the other side of the desk.
‘Have a seat.’
It was a Rolex. Where the hell was Maldonado getting the money from to buy himself a Rolex? Not from a chief inspector’s salary, that was for sure. Unless it was a fake, which would not be beyond him. The easy way to tell was by checking the magnification glass over the date: if the numbers were clearly visible it was real; if they were small and hard to read it was phoney. Cámara tried to see, but the watch was either out of sight or moving around too much on Maldonado’s wrist.
Maldonado saw that Cámara had noticed his new acquisition and grinned.
‘You’ve been back for how long now?’
He knew the answer but was asking all the same.
‘Just over a month,’ Cámara said.
‘You got quite a lot of time off. Nine months?’
A lot had happened in nine months. His previous boss, Commissioner Pardo, had sent him on extended leave at the end of the Sofía Bodí case. Cámara had been made homeless: his block of flats had collapsed after digging for the new metro line in his street had weakened the foundations. A neighbour and her young son had died when the thing came crashing down.
Maldonado was just one of the others back then, a murder detective, albeit a pain in the arse. Now he was a pain in the arse with power: Pardo had been promoted and in Cámara’s absence Maldonado had taken his place.
Cámara had been uncertain about returning to his police job, despite Torres’s pleas for him to save them from Maldonado’s petty-minded tyranny. Life had been moving in new directions – getting back with Alicia and spending a few months at her place in Madrid – before his grandfather had a stroke and Cámara rushed back to his home town Albacete to look after his ageing – and only remaining – relative. Mercifully the stroke had been mild and Hilario was now almost fully recovered. But events in his home town – the murder of a young woman and the subsequent investigation – sucked Cámara back into work, and fantasies of leaving policing for good were abandoned.
Now he was back in Valencia, in his old job. The country was running out of money and the State could barely afford to pay its civil servants: their salaries had been cut twice already and there were rumours that the measure might be repeated soon. But he knew that if he had not returned when he did there would have been no chance of walking in where he left off. The accountants were looking for any opportunity to reduce costs and a murder detective who had not shown up for months would be an easy target. And then finding some other kind of work would be almost impossible. The fact was that there were virtually no jobs any more. For anyone. Being kicked out of the police would mean a couple of years’ dole money and then he would have to live off his wits – like millions of others.
The idea of scavenging in rubbish bins or getting food handouts from the Red Cross did not overly trouble him. The problem was that he had dependants now, people who needed him to earn a wage in order to survive. Hilario had left Albacete and come to live with him. Despite his protestations to the contrary, his grandfather needed someone around, just in case. He had happily accepted the idea of coming to live in Valencia, framing it in his imagination as a new beginning, new horizons. And in his usual way he had been keeping himself very busy since they arrived. But his advanced age – which for so long had appeared not to hinder him – could no longer be ignored. He was in his mid-eighties now, and despite having survived more difficulties than most – the Spanish Civil War as a boy, the Eastern Front as a young man, then the harsh early Franco years back in Spain – he was getting frailer, at least physically. Mentally he was as sharp as ever – perhaps even sharper: Cambio de pasto engorda a la ternera, he kept repeating. A change of pasture makes the cow fatter. And pushed back death by at least another ten years.
But it had taken a while to sort things. First cleaning the flat in Albacete and renting it out; no one was buying any more. Then finding somewhere in Valencia and settling in. They had a place in the Barrio Chino – the old Chinatown, on the edge of the Carmen district in the centre. Hilario had a room at the back with a terrace that he soon filled with pots of bright red geraniums and marijuana plants. And Alicia had joined them shortly afterwards. The newspaper in Madrid had folded and she was out of work; there was no point to her staying in the capital now. Her Valencia flat could provide something of an income, as long as she could find a lodger. But the luxury of her and Cámara having separate lives was not affordable. Besides, now that circumstances had pushed them closer, they found living together more enjoyable than they had expected. Even with Hilario around. Perhaps even because he was around.
In nine months he had moved three times, rekindled an old relationship and solved a murder while supposedly on leave. Much had happened while he was away from the police. Time, he thought, would be better measured by its density than its length.
‘I’m sure Personnel can confirm how long it was,’ he said now.
The garish watch on Maldonado’s hand came briefly into view and Cámara tried to get a glimpse of the second hand, but it quickly disappeared under the shirt cuff again.
‘Things have changed,’ Maldonado said. ‘You know the situation. Things are tight, very tight.’
‘I’ve heard.’
‘Now I’ve been meaning to talk to you since you got back, but have been tied up.’
‘Cut the shit, Maldo. There hasn’t been a murder since the beginning of the year.’
‘Watch your mouth, Cámara.’ Maldonado thrust out a threatening finger from his puffy fist. ‘We’re not just work colleagues any more. I’m your superior now and talk like that will get you into trouble. I’ll have you know many here didn’t want you back, would have been happy to pay you off and see the back of you. But I was pushing for your return.’
There was something about Maldonado that made him lash out, like a nervous tic. It had got the better of him in the past, and now that he was in the Jefatura again his old patterns of behaviour were falling back into place. Better to hold them in check – or at least to try.
‘What’s this about?’ he said.
‘Look, I know we’re all upset over what’s going on.’
This was a new Maldonado, he thought: a peacemaker, a manager of men. The truth was that the King’s illness meant little to him: the man looked closer to the grave each year. So he had not been surprised at the news. What really struck him was the reaction of people around him, as though they could never have foreseen this coming, as though they thought the King would be there for ever. No matter how much politicians insisted that democracy was now deeply rooted in the country, Spain was entering uncharted and potentially very troubled waters.
‘No one is more worried than I,’ Maldonado went on. ‘But I have to be frank with you, Cámara, your position is very tenuous right now.’
Cámara pressed his hands together, as though in prayer, and looked straight into Maldonado’s eyes.
‘Yes, you’re back. But for how long? Don’t be under the impression that you’re safe now you’re in again. You’re not. All that time off looks bad. They have to make cuts. There’s no money. It’s a fucking miracle we’re still getting paid every month.’
‘They want to make cuts?’
‘Yes, like I said.’
‘Who?’
‘The powers that be.’
He waved a hand to the upper floors. On the top floor lived the regional head of the Policía Nacional, a political appointee answering directly to the ministry in Madrid. A free and very large flat in the Jefatura building was one of the perks of the job. Some perk, they used to joke.
Cámara tried to get another look at the ‘Rolex’ as Maldonado’s arm moved around. If there was no money, what the hell was he doing wearing such an expensive watch? It had to be a fake. Surely.
‘You know who I mean.’
‘Be more specific.’
‘Look, they want to cut at least one – and perhaps two – members from Homicidios. Is that specific enough for you?’
‘They can’t do that.’
‘They can and they bloody well will.’
‘And I’m the candidate for the chop.’
Maldonado leaned back in his chair.
‘You’re one of them, certainly. Like I said, I’m trying to be frank with you. I would want to know, if I was in your position.’
‘So this case you’ve just given me . . .’
‘The American girl.’
‘It’s, what, some kind of test? A probation?’
Maldonado tapped a finger on his desk several times before answering.
‘Yes.’
‘So fill me in. If I don’t solve the crime I’m out? Is that it?’
‘These things are more complicated, you know that.’
‘Fuck that, Maldo. Lay it to me straight. Is that it or not?’
There was a pause as Maldonado milked the drama of his moment.
‘That’s about the size of it,’ he said at last. ‘I can’t watch your back for ever, Cámara. I need to give them something to prove that you should stay, that you’re a good murder detective. But conversely, if you fuck up, there’s not much that I can do. The knives are out and they’re going to get someone. Do you understand?’
Cámara sniffed.
‘Hold on,’ he said. ‘I’m one of them, you said. There are others you’re looking at for the chop.’
‘Not me,’ Maldonado said defensively. ‘It’s not my call. It’s them.’
‘That’s why you called Torres in as well.’ He gave a hollow laugh. ‘Two cases come in at once and who do you pick? Torres and me. We’re the ones, aren’t we. Torres’s neck is on the block as much as mine.’
‘Less so, as a matter of fact. Which was why I gave him the suicide and you’ve got the girl. Yes, you’re right, Cámara. It’s between you and Torres. But Torres hasn’t been on extended leave fucking some journalist while the State paid for the privilege.’
Cámara’s legs jerked underneath him as he stood up sharply, his right fist already screwed into a ball to slam against the side of Maldonado’s head.
‘Punching your superior?’ Maldonado grinned. ‘Now that really would make my decision much easier.’
Cámara breathed deeply, willing his limbs to relax. Not now, he thought.
‘Does Torres know?’ he asked at last.
‘You’re a detective. Find out for yourself. Now fuck off and get going on this American girl.’
Cámara made for the door. Then stopped in his tracks and turned round. Stepping closer to the desk he reached over and pulled on Maldonado’s arm. The Rolex swung into view.
‘What? What the fuck?’ Maldonado spluttered.
He tried to pull his hand away but Cámara held on, his powerful grip tight over Maldonado’s forearm. The special glass clearly magnified the digits of the date window to the right of the dial. There was no mistaking it: the watch was genuine.
‘Just checking the time,’ Cámara said, dropping Maldonado’s arm.
‘You might want to brace yourself for this one, Cámara,’ Maldonado said. ‘It won’t be pretty.’
He sneered.
‘The girl was shot in the head. Several times from point-blank range.’