Antoni Mates thought that Dorotea’s disappearance left one less person to compromise him. Dorotea had been silenced forever more. Antoni Mates had stopped going to the Club Eqüestre. He hadn’t seen Frederic in ages, and had no desire to run into him. Frederic felt the same way. Since Frederic had been saved, he had no interest in further analysis of the details, but when he was all by himself he couldn’t help thinking that what he and his brother had done was not very clean. Frederic also did his best to avoid Guillem. Guillem, on the other hand, radiated satisfaction … A newcomer to actual fraud, he derived great pleasure from both the game and the adventure of it. He hadn’t yet reached the stage of disappointment. We won’t call it remorse because that would be excessive, but a sort of sadness of mere routine does ultimately take over, even for someone who is collecting a string of murders.
Guillem considered the Baró de Falset a repugnant and cowardly scorpion, without a drop of venom. He didn’t merit a moment of regret. Guillem believed he was doing society a favor by morally eroding a man like the Baró de Falset, squeezing money from him as if from a sponge. Guillem was wielding the most vile and criminal of weapons, but he didn’t see that, or preferred not to. He thought that high-stakes swindling put one in a brilliant position, as vivid and as human as allowing oneself to be nailed to a cross. He enjoyed the artistic voluptuosity of the game, and like a coward he accepted the venal turpitude and all the economic profit he could derive. Guillem was thirsty for fine suits and fine ties, dinners in fine restaurants, and sleeping with fine women. Once he had dared to blackmail a man of the category of the Baró de Falset, the scorn he felt for his father and for all his family’s prejudices was only exacerbated. A satanic, but still immature, flora grew within the bookish depravity of the younger Lloberola. In men’s hearts two phenomena carry tremendous sexual force: the first is the thrill of lowering oneself, of squatting like a dog, and suffering discomfort and physical pain to draw closer to divinity, the same idea of divinity and integral union with God that some mystics of monotheism have aspired to by means of these somewhat sadistic procedures. The other phenomenon, full of sensual intensity, consists of stifling within oneself any reminiscence of fear or mercy, any of the apparently irreducible religious and moral subconscious that is present even in frigid temperaments, until one has achieved the absolute absence of shame or scruples in the face of any situation. In his puerile, twisted and literary way, Guillem leaned toward the second of these phenomena.
Guillem decided to blackmail the Baró de Falset again. He formulated his plan in writing, a marvel of composition. Having the authentic letter from Antoni Mates in his possession, Guillem was able to pose the affair in such a way as to assign himself no role in the shameful events at the heart of the extortion. The document explained the carryings-on of the married couple with a third person, whose name did not appear, but whose existence Guillem could certify, as he had come to know the facts through the confession of the person in question. Moreover, in light of Antoni Mates’s social position, the third person was of very little consequence. As proof, Guillem submitted the evidence of the previous extortion, and the irrefutable testimony of the baron’s letter to his brother. In the event Antoni Mates didn’t wish to deliver the amounts requested to Guillem, he would find a way to spread the defamatory news wherever it would be most prejudicial. Still, Guillem didn’t believe he would have to go so far, and he always assumed that the baron would pay up.
Two days after hearing the news of Dorotea Palau’s murder, Guillem requested another meeting with Antoni Mates. Flustered and practically jumping out of his own skin, naturally the baron conceded it to him. Guillem was paid a considerable sum. Mates handed it over with relative dignity, considering the panic and rage that consumed him. A short time later, Guillem turned the screws a little tighter. At that point the baron lost control, cried, groveled, threatened to kill Guillem and then begged Guillem to kill him, to free him of this torture. In the end, the baron gave in. Guillem performed magnificent demonstrations of serenity, cold-bloodedness, soullessness. After he had paid Guillem, the baron attended a very important board meeting. They were preparing for the Exposició Internacional on Montjuïc. Those were the days of the most unrestrained squandering of the dictatorship, and the Baró de Falset anticipated magnificent returns. This was where his brilliant and splendid reality lay; he hid his tortures, his fear and the secret and unutterable reality deep within his breast. The baron wondered if he was the victim of strange hallucinations. When push came to shove, the young man could say whatever he liked. What of it? Who would believe him? And if they did believe him, then what? The baron would recover his serenity for a few days but then, every so often, he would remember the letter he had written and the fear would return. It was the infamous letter that kept him up at night. He could have gone to Frederic and demanded that he return the document, throwing in his face his indelicacy in not having burned the letter, as he had requested. But he would soon desist because that would have exposed him, and muddied the waters, when what he most wanted was for the waters to stay nice and quiet, and for not a word to be breathed.
To understand the intimidation of the Baró de Falset, the acuteness of his panic and the extent of his vulnerability, one must always bear in mind the weakness and cowardice that stemmed from his abnormality. The other thing that must also be kept in mind is the kind of prestige he enjoyed and the kind of people he lived among.
Antoni Mates sought out a famous Jesuit priest. Mates had a reputation as a great Catholic and a great believer, even though at the core his religiosity was a sham. But he tried. He made an attempt to see whether his religion could be a living, breathing thing, and whether he could find some kind of consolation in it, in the event of a catastrophe.
The Jesuit was an intelligent man, but he felt lost here. The Baró de Falset was a moral wreck. He had no faith, no resignation, no repentance, nothing; he had only the asphyxiating fear of a rabbit, and nothing more. Antoni Mates also realized this was not the path for him.
When a cowardly man finds himself in a blind alley, he is capable of who knows what foul things. So it was that the Baró de Falset had a grotesque, criminal idea. He was in good standing with shady elements of the Ministry of the Interior — the Minister was Martínez Anido — who was in contact with other even shadier elements, more given to, shall we say, “direct action.” The Baró de Falset believed that, if he paid enough, there would be a way to make Guillem de Lloberola disappear, in an apparent accident or — why not? — a murder. So many had disappeared this way in Barcelona, what difference could one more make? He came very close to proposing the idea to a person who very possibly would have welcomed it, but he couldn’t, he didn’t have the guts. He didn’t trust the person he had in mind.
Secure in his power, Guillem initiated a new attack. That day the baron’s nerves were in better shape than usual. Guillem said:
“All right, it’s your decision! I will do as I see fit.”
Before the young man’s resolute expression, the baron proposed a transaction, but then Guillem decided to up the ante, and with appalling aplomb he uttered:
“I don’t give a damn about your money: it’s you I want to ruin. I will risk it all, I don’t care. I wouldn’t keep silent even if you gave me your entire fortune, do you understand? You are contemptible, and since you have no imagination, you can’t possibly comprehend the pleasure it would give me to annihilate a person like you. Even if I had to annihilate myself in the process, even if it meant the death of my father. As you can imagine, the death of a father, or anyone else, is nothing compared to the joy of ripping off a mask as well-anchored as the one attached to your face. What merit is there in destroying a worm, a wastrel, and a ne’er-do-well like me with a scandal? None at all. The merit lies in destroying the falsehoods of an imposter like you, surrounded by priests and bank accounts, flush with credit and consideration. To watch as this hypocritical society you belong to writhes disgustingly with joy and horror on hearing that one of the biggest fish in said society has been tarred with infamy and tossed into the gutter in his underwear. You must understand that if it is in my power to enjoy such a spectacle, I will not be so foolish as to let the occasion pass. I swear to you, everyone will know! Everyone will know who the Baró de Falset is, I swear it!”