The Silent and the Damned. Robert Thomas Wilson

teased out some paper which was glossy black and curled at the edges but still white in the middle. He turned it over to reveal a black-and-white shot of a girl’s head and shoulders. She was standing in front of a woman whose presence had been reduced to a ringed hand resting on the girl’s clavicle.

      ‘Can we date it?’

      ‘This sort of stock hasn’t been used commercially in Spain for years, but it could have been developed privately or come from abroad where they are still using that kind of stuff. So…tricky,’ said Felipe. ‘The girl’s hairstyle looks a bit old-fashioned.’

      ‘Sixties, seventies?’ asked Falcón.

      ‘Maybe. She certainly doesn’t look like a girl from the pueblo. And the woman’s hand on her shoulder doesn’t look as if it’s done any manual labour. I’d have said they were well-off foreigners. I’ve got some cousins out in Bolivia who look a bit like this, you know, just not up to date.’

      They bagged the piece of photograph, found some shade and cleaned themselves up.

      ‘You burn old letters and photographs if you’re putting your house in order,’ said Felipe.

      ‘Or your head,’ said Falcón.

      ‘Maybe he did kill himself and we’re just imagining things.’

      ‘Why would you burn this sort of stuff?’ said Falcón. ‘Painful memories. A part of your life you don’t want your wife to find out about…’

      ‘Or a part of your life you don’t want your son to find out about,’ said Felipe, ‘when you die.’

      ‘Perhaps it could be dangerous material if it falls into the wrong hands.’

      ‘Whose hands?’

      ‘I’m just saying, you burn this sort of thing to get rid of it because it’s either painful, embarrassing or dangerous.’

      ‘It could just be a picture of his wife as a girl,’ said Felipe. ‘What would that mean?’

      ‘Have we tracked down Sra Vega’s parents yet?’ asked Falcón. ‘They should really be looking after the boy, rather than Sra Jiménez.’

      Felipe told him that Pérez was working on it. They went down to the gardener’s house. The door was not locked. The two rooms were stuffy, airless and stripped of all possessions. The mattress was half off the bed as if he kept something under there, or perhaps just slept on it outside. The only other furniture in the bedroom was an upturned box, used as a bedside table. The kitchen had a gas ring and bottle of butane. There was no fridge and only dried food out on a sideboard.

      ‘The staff didn’t see much of the Vega luxury,’ said Felipe.

      ‘Better than living in Tres Mil Viviendas,’ said Falcón. ‘Why run?’

      ‘Allergic to police,’ said Felipe. ‘These guys get asthmatic when they see 091 on the wall of the phone booth. A dead body…well, you don’t hang around waiting for the disaster to happen, do you?’

      ‘Or he might have seen something or someone,’ said Falcón. ‘He must have been aware of Sr Vega burning his papers, probably saw him standing out in the garden in his bare feet. Maybe he even saw what happened last night.’

      ‘I’ll take some prints and run them through the computer,’ said Felipe.

      Falcón walked back up to the house, his shirt sticking to his back. He called Pérez on his mobile.

      ‘Where are you?’ asked Falcón.

      ‘Now, I’m in the hospital, Inspector Jefe.’

      ‘I left you searching the garage and the outside of the house.’

      ‘I did that.’

      ‘What about all the burnt papers in the barbecue?’

      ‘They were burnt. I made a note of it.’

      ‘Did you hurt yourself?’

      ‘No.’

      ‘What are you doing in the hospital then?’

      ‘Sra Jiménez sent the maid over, saying she was having trouble with the boy, Mario. She thought it would be good for him to see a familiar face, get the grandparents over.’

      ‘Did you speak to Juez Calderón about this?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘He didn’t mention it to me.’

      ‘He had other things on his mind.’

      ‘Like what?’

      ‘He’s not going to tell me, is he?’ said Pérez. ‘I could see he was preoccupied, that’s all.’

      ‘Just tell me why you’re in the hospital,’ said Falcón, who had never quite got used to Pérez’s maddening style of working and reporting.

      ‘I arrived at the apartment of Sr and Sra Cabello, who are the parents of Sra Vega,’ he said. ‘They’re both in their seventies. They let me in. I tell them what’s happened and Sra Cabello collapses. I thought it was shock, but Sr Cabello says she has a weak heart. I call an ambulance and give her first aid. She’s stopped breathing. I have to give her heart massage and mouth to mouth, Inspector Jefe. The ambulance arrives and fortunately has a defibrillator on board. She’s now in intensive care and I’m sitting here with Sr Cabello. I’ve called his other daughter and she’s on her way down from Madrid on the AVE.’

      ‘Have you spoken to Sra Jiménez?’

      ‘I don’t have a number for her.’

      ‘Juez Calderón?’

      ‘His mobile’s turned off.’

      ‘Me?’

      ‘We’re talking now, Inspector Jefe.’

      ‘All right, good work,’ said Falcón.

      Back in the cool of the house Falcón’s insides felt like smouldering wreckage. Everybody was standing around impatiently. Both bodies were bagged and lying on stretchers in the hallway.

      ‘What are you waiting for?’ asked Falcón.

      ‘We need Juez Calderón to sign off the levantamiento del cadáver,’ said the Médico Forense. ‘We can’t find him.’

      Falcón called Sra Jiménez on his way over to the Krugmans to tell her about Sra Vega’s parents and the imminent arrival of Lucía’s sister from Madrid. Mario had collapsed with exhaustion and was now sleeping. She asked him over for a drink in the heat.

      ‘I’ve still got things to do,’ he said.

      ‘I’ll be here all day,’ she said. ‘I’m not going to work.’

      Marty Krugman answered the door stretching as if he’d been dozing on the sofa. Falcón asked after the judge. Marty pointed upstairs and dragged himself back to his sofa, barefoot, his jeans hanging off his backside. Falcón followed the sound of voices speaking English. Calderón was quite fluent and had the eagerness of a leaping puppy.

      ‘Yes, yes,’ he said. ‘I can see that. The sense of deracination is palpable.’

      Falcón sighed. Art conversations. He knocked on the door. Maddy tore it open with a sardonic smile on her face. Calderón’s eyes behind her right shoulder were staring, wild with dilated pupils. It put Falcón on the back foot for a moment.

      ‘Inspector Jefe,’ she said. ‘Juez Calderón and I were having such an interesting conversation, weren’t we?’

      Falcón apologized for interrupting but the judge was needed to sign off the second body. Calderón pulled himself together piece by piece, as if he was picking up his clothes in a strange woman’s bedroom.

      ‘Your mobile