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“Is it the same one?”
“I don’t think so, unless he’s shrunk with this wet weather. This one looks l
ike a novice. He’s carrying a sports page that’s six days old. Fumero must be recruiting apprentices from the charity hospice.”
When we got to Els Quatre Gats, our plainclothes policeman sat at a table a few yards from ours and pretended to reread last week’s football-league report. Every twenty seconds he would throw us a furtive glance.
“Poor thing, look how he’s sweating,” said Fermín, shaking his head. “You seem rather distant, Daniel. Did you speak to the girl or didn’t you?”
“Her father answered the phone.”
“And you had a friendly and civil conversation?”
“It was more like a monologue.”
“I see. Must I therefore infer that you don’t address him as papá yet?”
“He told me verbatim that he was going to beat my brains out.”
“Surely that was a rhetorical flourish.”
At that moment the waiter’s frame hovered over us. Fermín asked for enough food to feed a regiment, rubbing his hands with anticipation.
“And you don’t want anything, Daniel?”
I shook my head. When the waiter returned with two trays full of tapas, sandwiches, and various glasses of beer, Fermín handed him a handsome sum and told him to keep the change.
“Listen, boss,” he added. “Do you see that guy sitting at the table by the window—the one dressed like Jiminy Cricket with his head buried in his newspaper, as if it were a cone?”
The waiter nodded with an air of complicity.
“Could you please go and tell him that there’s an urgent message from Inspector Fumero? He must go immediately to the Boquería Market to buy twenty duros’ worth of boiled chickpeas and take them without delay to Police Headquarters (in a taxi if necessary)—or he must prepare to present his balls to him on a plate. Would you like me to repeat it?”
“That won’t be necessary, sir. Twenty duros’ worth of chickpeas or his balls on a plate.”
Fermín handed him another coin. “God bless you.”
The waiter nodded respectfully and set off toward our pursuer’s table to deliver the message. When the watchman heard the instructions, his face dropped. He remained at the table for another fifteen seconds, torn, and then galloped off into the street. Fermín didn’t bat an eyelid. In other circumstances I would have enjoyed the episode, but that night I was unable to get Bea out of my mind.
“Daniel, come down from the clouds, we have work to discuss. Tomorrow, without delay, you must go and visit Nuria Monfort, as we said.”
“And when I’m there, what do I say to her?”
“You’ll find some topic of conversation. The plan is to follow Mr. Barceló’s very sensible suggestion. You make her aware that you know she lied to you knowingly about Carax, that her so-called husband Miquel Moliner is not in prison as she pretends, that you’ve discovered that she is the evil hand responsible for collecting the mail from the old Fortuny-Carax family apartment, using a PO box in the name of a nonexistent solicitors’ firm…. You tell her whatever is necessary to light a fire under her feet. All in a melodramatic tone and with a biblical expression. Then, just for the effect, you leave her to stew for a while in her own juices of unease.”
“And in the meantime…”
“In the meantime I’ll be waiting to follow her, an objective I plan to put into practice using the latest techniques in camouflage.”
“It’s not going to work, Fermín.”
“O ye of little faith! Come on, what has this girl’s father said to you to get you into this frame of mind? Is it the threat you’re worried about? Don’t pay any attention to him. Let’s see, what did this lunatic say to you?”
I answered without thinking. “The truth.”
“The truth according to Saint Daniel the Martyr?”
“You can laugh as much as you like. It serves me right.”
