Recently he’d started to imagine death might be somewhat similar: waking to an absence of atmosphere, onerous yet painless, stripped of expectation and surprises because it was only this: a bottomless, empty void, a dark, padded cloud cushioning him definitively. He also tried to recall the time there hadn’t been a sense of void or premonitions of death, when dawn rose like a curtain on a new performance, no matter whether imagined or improvised, at least it seemed right and appealed: a spontaneous desire to live another day. But it was like feeling sick and trying to think what it was like to be well, and he couldn’t, since the ubiquitous quease prevented him from reviving other pleasant sensations.
When he went out into the street, on such mornings that came hot with the dawn, a solitary taste of coffee lingering on his lips and no woman waving him farewell, no magnet drawing him into the future, the Count wondered what could be the latest incentive impelling him punctually to set his watch and alarm, given that time was the most objective manifestation of his void. And as he could find none – a sense of duty? responsibility? need to earn a living? movement by inertia? – he wondered yet again what the hell he was doing there, heading for a bus queue more crowded and violent by the day, smoking a cigarette that rotted his guts, seeing people who were less and less familiar, suffering a heat that got hotter by the minute, and he told himself it was his fast lane to hell. Then he touched his belt and realized, once again, that he’d left his pistol at home. He asked who was the last in the queue and lit his third cigarette of the day. If I’m going to die anyway…
“Major Rangel wants to see you.”
And, with that declaration from the duty officer, the Count resurrected at least one lost expectation: yes, perhaps he might now down a good cup of coffee, purge the sweet, stewed taste of the brown liquid sloshing with unidentifiable particles he’d drunk in the shabby cafe where he’d stopped before reaching Headquarters. He took one look at the queue by the lift and made for the stairs. He couldn’t imagine why the Boss wanted to see him, but his nasal memory was already enjoying the aroma of freshly brewed coffee, served in the shiny white cups his chief was so fond of. Three months ago, after his public punch-up with Lieutenant Fabricio, the Count had been tried by the Disciplinary Tribunal and sentenced to six months of card-filling and telex-sending in the Information Bureau, until his case was reviewed and a decision taken that he could return to his detective work. He’d avoided meeting up with the Boss ever since: the Count’s sentence was, as far the Major was concerned, a judgement against himself. Despite his eccentricities and increasingly apparent lack of rigour, the lieutenant had always been his best officer, and the Boss trusted him and more than once had shown him affection and respect, both publicly and privately. Consequently, to a degree, the Count felt he’d let him down. And, as the last straw, the Internal Inspection team now grilling the entire Headquarters kept Major Rangel in such a foul temper it was advisable to see him from a distance, he thought, when, that is, you had no option but to see him.
He pushed the glass-panelled door and entered the ante-room to the Boss’s office. Another woman now sat behind the desk that had been occupied for several years by Maruchi, the woman in charge of the Major’s office, someone in her fifties, uniformed, who wore a lieutenant’s stripes and vaporized the cup of coffee the Count had dreamt of lifting to his lips. Mario walked over, saluted, told her who he was, and informed her that the Major was expecting him. The secretary pressed a button on the intercom and sent the message to her boss’s office.
“Lieutenant Mario Conde.”
“Tell him to come in,” said the intercom, and the new secretary stood up to open the office door.
Major Antonio Rangel had got up behind his desk, and shook the Count by the hand. Such a gesture, unusual on the part of the Boss, was a warning to the lieutenant that things weren’t looking good.
“How’s it been downstairs, Mario?”
“So-so, Major.”
“Take a seat.”
The Count flopped down in one of the armchairs opposite the desk and could hold back no longer.
“What happened to Maruchi, Boss?”
The Major didn’t look at him. He was searching in one of his desk drawers, and finally extracted a cigar. It didn’t look good: too dark, veins too bulging, resistant to the flame from the lighter the Major brought to bear.
“It looks like a stick,” he pronounced finally, after exhaling two or three puffs of smoke, as he looked incredulously at the brand and the Count awaited his verdict. “I can’t believe it. Listen to this. ‘ Selectos ’, made in Holguin. Who the fuck’s ever heard of cigars made in Holguin? The country’s gone mad… They transferred Maruchi. I still don’t know where to, or why for. Anyway, don’t ask me, I can’t tell you anything, and if I could, I wouldn’t… You get my drift?”
“Impossible not to, Major,” the Count acquiesced, as he said goodbye to the coffee one could always extract from Maruchi. “And how come you’ve got no decent cigars?”
“I haven’t, and what business is it of yours? To the point,” said the Major as he slumped back in his chair. He seemed exhausted, as if he’d also fallen into the void, thought the Count, who’d always admired Major Rangel’s youthful brio, so distant from his real age of fifty-eight, nurtured and refreshed by lengths in the pool and hours of knocking balls around a tennis court. “I called you because you’re going out on a case.”
The Count smiled wrily, and decided to exploit his minimal advantage.
“Any chance of a coffee?”
The Major’s smile spread around the end of his cigar, slightly curled his upper lip.
“It’s the seventh, and we’re still waiting for this month’s coffee ration… You made life really difficult. Well, the problem is I don’t have enough detectives and I’ve got no option but to lift the sanction on you temporarily. I need you and Sergeant Manuel Palacios to get a hold on this case immediately: a trasvestite who’s been killed in the Havana Woods.”
“A transvestite.”
“That’s what the man said.”
“No, you said a ‘trass-vestite’. And it’s ‘trans-vestite’.”
The Major shook his head.
“Will you never change, my boy? You still reckon life is a game?”
His voice had changed: the Major’s voice could shift tone according to topic and agenda, or time and place, and currently it was sour and withering.
“Forgive me.”
“I can’t forgive you, Conde, no way can I forgive you. Can you imagine what my head’s like? You think it’s easy working with an army of Internal Inspectors here at Headquarters? You know how many questions I get asked every day? You know two detectives have been sacked for corruption and two more are about to get suspended for negligence? And do you realize all this stuff backfires on me? No, no way can I forgive you… And why are you in plainclothes? Didn’t I tell you to come in uniform while you were downstairs?”
The Count stood up and looked through the big office window. A few buildings, scattered trees and such a calm sea, in the distance, setting the boundary on so many dreams, destinies and deceits.
“Who’s got the low-down on the case?” he asked, and touched his belt again, where he sometimes wore his pistol.
“Nobody. He’s just been found. I think Manolo’s waiting for you in his cubicle. Now beat it.”
The Count turned round and walked towards the door. Grabbed the door handle, and stopped. He felt strange, didn’t know whether to feel flattered or manipulated, though he supposed the Boss must be feeling even stranger: as far as he knew, it was the first time the Boss had revoked a sentence imposed on a subordinate.
“It’s a pity you won’t forgive me and can’t offer me a coffee. But as I’m really fond of you, if it’s at all possible, I’ll get you some decent cigars,” he said, and left without waiting for a response or thanking the Major for giving him that assignment. He decided at the last moment it would have been in bad taste to thank him.