“This is quieter than the city center, of course. And how was it with Sara?”
Kristin shrugged her shoulders.
“Well …” She twisted a long lock of blond hair and looked away. “The apartment is nice. To be honest, I don’t think I can pay for it. On my own, I mean.”
“I was asking about Sara,” the agent said gently.
Kristin seemed reluctant to talk about her roommate.
“Okay.” She smiled, as if she were going to say something unfair. “Well, it’s not nice to criticize those who aren’t here. But … Sara was a bit peculiar. How to explain it?”
It was clear that she wasn’t finding a way to do it, so Fort decided to be more specific.
“Had she shared an apartment before?” He wasn’t up to date with the salary of a PA, but the rent on this apartment didn’t appear to be very high. And, somehow, it seemed strange that such a solitary person, or at least with as few friends, as Sara Mahler would have allowed a stranger into her house.
“No. Well, maybe a while ago. When she arrived in Barcelona.” Kristin kept playing with the blond lock until she became aware of it and let it go. “I think that was the problem. I paid what she asked me, but she acted as if she were the landlady and I were a guest. I don’t know if you understand.”
Roger Fort had shared an apartment while he studied in the academy and was aware that the oldest tenant enjoyed acquired rights they wouldn’t give up easily. So he nodded, and Kristin smiled, relieved.
“And do you know why she rented out one of the rooms?”
“She didn’t tell me. She said something about becoming afraid to sleep alone in the apartment …” She lowered her voice before continuing, “Although then it was as if it annoys, annoyed, her to have someone here. I think she’d become used to living alone.”
“Yes. Apartment-sharing isn’t easy.”
Kristin shook her head as she sighed.
“I’m sick of it. I’m going to look for a studio or something like that, however small it is.”
“Was Sara very … fussy?”
“What do you mean?”
Fort tried to explain.
“Demanding … I don’t know, about housework or noise.”
“Oh yes! She was more like a bored mother. No, not bored …”
“Nagging?” he suggested.
“Yes! If I left dirty plates in the kitchen at night, she would leave me a note in the morning: “You should wash these.” If I left a sweater on the chair, she would fold it and bring it into my room. With another note.” Kristin blushed. “I’m not messy. Honestly. In the apartment before I was the only one who cleaned. But Sara was … excessively?”
“Excessive, I suppose,” said Fort.
Kristin nodded, and began to rant about Sara Mahler without the caution she’d shown at the beginning.
“Look, see that vase? The one on the table. Well, it broke. I broke it, by accident of course, while I was giving it one.”
The phrase made Roger Fort smile, although she didn’t notice and went on talking, as if the essence of her sharing the apartment with Sara Mahler was contained in the story of the broken vase.
“It’s not very nice, is it? I mean it’s cheap. Ugly. Not something to cry over.”
“Sara cried about the broken vase?”
“Almost … She looked at me as if I had run over her mother. I told her I would buy her another one. A nicer one. And she answered that I didn’t understand. That it wasn’t about the money but the affection she has for things. Afterward she spent the night glueing the pieces back together. You see? You notice if you’re close.”
“Did she often get angry?”
“Not get angry. She would make a face. And she was always here,” she added, now being blunt. “She hardly ever went out. Apart from going to work, of course. She was at home the rest of the time, in her room, in front of the computer. I’d say she was addicted to Facebook. My boyfriend says she was looking for … you know, sex, although I don’t think so. I don’t think she liked sex.”
She elaborated on seeing Agent Fort’s surprised face.
“She told me. Not in those words exactly, but she told me. Albert, my boyfriend, stays over sometimes. And one morning, when he left, Sara told me she had heard us. You know …” Kristin blushed a little. “She also asked me to please try not to make noise. But she had a look of disgust on her face. Seriously,” she insisted, as if it was inconceivable to her.
“Didn’t she have boyfriends? Or girlfriends?”
Kristin shook her head.
“Not that I know of. Although I didn’t hear about much. With one thing and another, I don’t have much free time …”
“And didn’t it surprise you that she didn’t come home on Wednesday night? If she rarely went out?”
“Oh, it would surprise me a lot. No.” She corrected herself. “It would have surprised me a lot. That’s right, isn’t it? But I wasn’t in Barcelona. Albert and I went to a house his parents have in the mountains and we didn’t come back until Sunday. And then I heard the message from the police and called.”
Roger Fort cleared his throat.
“You spoke to me.” He paused briefly. “I don’t want to be unpleasant, but do you believe Sara was capable of taking her own life? Did you ever see her sad, truly sad? Depressed?”
Kristin pondered her answer and took a while to respond.
“Well …” she said finally. “I’d think about suicide if I’d been her. Although, of course, then I wouldn’t be her exactly.” Seeing the agent’s perplexed face, Kristin elaborated. “I mean Sara was fine. She didn’t seem happy, but not sad either. It was as if she was always worried, yes. Sometimes about silly things, like the vase or because the lift wasn’t working properly. But I can’t imagine her jumping …”
And for the first time in the conversation, the young woman seemed to realize that her roommate, the woman she had described as fussy, over-the-top, solitary and frigid in one breath had thrown herself onto the tracks of the metro. Kristin reddened and her eyes filled with tears that she made no effort to hold back.
“I’m sorry …” she murmured. “It’s strange to be here talking about Sara while she’s … Excuse me.”
Kristin got up and shot off to the bathroom. From the other side of the door, Agent Fort heard her sob inconsolably, like a little girl. He waited patiently for her to emerge, but seeing that she’d be some time, he rose from his chair and took a walk around the apartment.
It was an impersonal space, he decided. Neutral furnishings. A painting that must have been there for years. The sofa, perhaps the newest piece of furniture, was encased in an insipid brown cover, certainly the same one that had hidden the previous sofa. It was clear that Sara hadn’t been too worried about décor. Fort moved toward the shelves with the vase; the cracks where it had been broken were visible. Kristin was right, it didn’t look expensive. It was a rectangular white ceramic vase, the kind sent with a bouquet of flowers. He was already moving away when something caught his eye. There was something inside. He took it out and saw it was a correspondence slip with the Alemany Cosmetics logo on it. It was signed, and it took Fort a while to decipher the names. Sílvia and … one beginning with “C”: César. Yes. Sílvia and César. So the vase, no doubt with a bouquet inside, had been a present from the company, thought Fort as he wandered around the apartment toward Sara’s room. He was just outside the bedroom when he heard the bathroom door opening.
“I was going to take a look at Sara’s room,” he told her without turning his head.
Kristin took a couple of steps, but hesitated before crossing the threshold.
“This is only the second time I’ve gone in without her being there,” she said by way of an excuse. “Sara told me very clearly when I arrived.”
Roger nodded. Sara must have been a fairly imposing woman to have her rules still stand even after her death. He had only seen her passport photo, so he went over to the ones pinned on a corkboard, on the wall beside the computer screen, thinking his sister had had an identical one when she was a teenager. He’d never understood the value of a train ticket, a cinema stub, or any of the small objects his sister kept on that kind of juvenile altar. It seemed it might be a female custom, because Sara Mahler, at the age of thirty-four, did the same.