Infinite Ground (8 page)

His instinct was that the timelines didn't fit, the killer being too old for the photograph in the offices. Most likely he had been mistaken in sensing a connection. It was an uncommonly similar face, simply a coincidence.

But it wouldn't leave him. He needed to rule it out. Apprehending the criminal was the last he had seen of him. After armed backup arrived the man had been taken to hospital, then a holding cell, transferred on to a high-security unit, trialled and swiftly sentenced. The inspector's colleagues, particularly the senior officers in his department, had been unusually accommodating, granting him a short period of leave; his boss had then insisted he undergo a minimum three sessions with a staff counsellor – only appropriate, she had said, given the unusual trauma involved in the arrest. The perpetrator, by all accounts, had made no effort to conceal his actions; this was evident from the start, and meant things could move forward quickly. The inspector's presence had not been required in court and he was simply asked to participate in a comprehensive debriefing, detailing exactly what had happened that August afternoon.

He wouldn't try to work out the connections. Recalling the scene, even just thinking about the killer, caused his stomach to cramp, his temperature to rise, and he thought, moving ambitiously to his desk, he might vomit again, he might faint.

He wasn't sure what he had eaten, what precisely had given him the poison, but he had some idea. He pushed away a dull, distant thought. He'd start preparing his own food again. He'd live a simple diet now, fluids, carbohydrates and vegetables. He could purify himself. Hopefully he'd ejected most of what it was and the thing had passed. The timing was poor, he had work to do. But the timing was necessary. He had remembered the scene, placed the face in the course of vomiting across his bathroom floor. His illness had bred the realization.

He tried to circle around the thoughts rather than confront them. The connections: the corporation, the killer, Carlos. It should have been enough that he had felt it, known it. The killer would have information. There were the records, the archives: holdings in the interior, illegal practices and missing communities. The killer, insane, destroying an indigenous person. But what did it have to do with Carlos? What was he pushing for?

He speculated again on what had happened to Carlos. ­Isabella had not contradicted him when he asked if the source of the illness could be psychological, prompted by something Carlos had seen, something he had learned. This ‘information', then, this source, whatever it was, causing the illness – could it be related to something within the corporation? Something in its history? Could it be related to the killer?

He didn't know what Carlos had found out. What kind of pressure he had been under. But if he could interview the killer, learn about his employment, the nature of his role in the corpor­ation, then perhaps he could get a little closer.

He made the necessary enquires. Public information was minimal, the case having been omitted from the media by request. He was referred to several different departments, each clerk assuring him the following number would give him all the information he required. He remained at his desk, on hold, doing his best to resist the eruption of his rage. He spoke to someone else. He was transferred again. He was put on hold.

Eventually he got somewhere – a holding cell in the south. Montero sounded a little young for a sergeant. He seemed to be eating and to be addressing at least one other person in the room, the line coming in and going out, as if obstructed by an object. He did not have long, Montero explained – it was another very busy evening – but he would give the inspector what he could.

He remembered the case, of course. How could he not? The inspector had worked with him only briefly. It wasn't unusual that he couldn't place the name, the voice. People often told the story. Montero congratulated the inspector on his work. Who knew, he said, how many others that monster would have taken?

The inspector cut in. ‘I'd simply like to know where he is. Which facility he's held in.'

‘Yes, yes,' Montero said, apparently in full agreement. ‘Why?'

The inspector asked him to repeat himself.

‘Why do you want to see him?' he said. ‘Are you sure it's for the best? Isn't it true the events had quite an effect on you, at the time?'

‘Listen, just give me the name of the relevant facility and I'll be getting on.'

Montero made a noise, perhaps striking a match. He paused. ‘I'm afraid we're going to have a problem.'

At any moment, he thought, the scene would correct itself. Everything would be clarified and the manner of the officer – his colleague – would soften.

Montero explained the situation as best he understood it. It appeared, he said, to all intents and purposes, that the killer had been lost.

He clarified: obviously he remained in a secure facility – he would never be released, that went without saying. It's just that we are having some temporary difficulty, he explained, establishing precisely where he is.

The beginning of the problem, he told the inspector, was the killer's insanity.

‘He struck me as lucid.'

‘Quite,' Montero agreed. ‘But did you ask him his name? He had no identification. Nothing especially unusual in that. But that's not what we're talking about. He claimed he didn't
have
a name. Kept up the claim for quite some time. The problem was there was nothing to identify him in the apartment. No passport, credit cards. No mail. Neighbours on nodding terms only – he hadn't been there long. The apartment was sublet or sub-sublet, paid weekly in cash, no contract. He worked independently, freelance, he said. Naturally, he would give us no more details.

‘You would not believe,' he said, ‘the trouble we have had administering this man.

‘We assigned him the temporary moniker Juan Pérez. It would have been better, we agreed, if he had, in fact, been a real Juan Pérez, dead like the others. As this man had no bank account, you can imagine our surprise when his full legal team arrived.

‘The defence was rhetorical. They said – I remember the words – that we had “no one we could legitimately charge”. The onus was on us to identify him, they claimed. Until that point we could proceed no further.'

The inspector waited. Several seconds of silence.

‘Well, that's it, effectively. We were at an impasse. He remained held indefinitely, awaiting trial. He was imprisoned, that wasn't going to change. There were other, more pressing matters. I won't deny it was frustrating. But we had our man, that was the main thing. Besides, what could we do? You should have heard the defence. The young lawyer said that given the limited information gathered, we'd no way to prove this was a living man. There was no laughter, Inspector. They said he didn't pay tax and he didn't procreate. He was nameless, had no known relatives. He didn't seem to have come from anywhere. What exactly were we dealing with? They used the word “suspect”, as if none of it had really happened, as if you hadn't really seen it for yourself.

‘The young lawyer said the suspect did not live anywhere. Nothing definitive placed him in that apartment for any length of time. By this stage the neighbours were refusing point-blank to cooperate with enquiries. The lawyer, with some relish – I wish I could remember the name – said the suspect, prior to arrest, had been continuously moving, never ultimately settling down in any one place. These were games, obviously. They were playing for time. They said he didn't live anywhere, said he wasn't, effectively, alive.'

The inspector was incredulous. He waited for the reveal, the truth explaining that this was a joke, it wasn't real. Nothing. It couldn't go on like this. ‘In the trial, in interviews, was there anything to suggest Pérez worked for a financial institution?'

‘We told you, we learned nothing about his job. He claimed he worked independently, that was all. Why?

‘But he's there, Inspector – we have him, don't worry about that. For the moment, however, we're unable to pinpoint the particular facility he's held in. Inmates are transferred regularly and Pérez's location has become confused. And… well, he seems to have coerced some of the other prisoners. Whenever we look for Pérez, more than one of them claims the name. Groups of them, they copy each other in the way they carry themselves, the way they walk. You could say Pérez, in a manner, flows through the cells. If we thought there was any chance of a positive identification, then, really, we'd bring you in, Inspector. But it's been many years. And it would take some time – we're talking a minimum of six facilities. If you think it's worth it, then by all means, fill out an application and we'll have it processed just as soon as we can.'

A chair makes an average man half as tall. The office employee spends around two-thirds of his life at this height or lower (asleep, childhood). Sitting in the one position for extended periods may have a quite different effect from that intended. After a period of 2–3 hours in a single seated position, the redundant legs become insensate. Obscured from view beneath the desk, he loses awareness of them.

The feeling, once he stands, is novel. He slaps the trouser legs to spark sensation and feels transparent charge in the momentum of his blood. The legs, having effectively been in storage, are returned to him in the manner of a prosthesis, an addition with which he has to familiarize himself again in order to activate. The loss of muscle strength in calves, quads, forelegs and thighs increases the likelihood of significant injury later in life, the decades-long disuse perhaps being returned to in the provision of a wheelchair.

TRIBES OF THE SOUTHERN INTERIOR, p. 43

He woke to the insistent, shrill sound, sat up from the sofa in his front room, smoothed his shirt. It had been going on for some time. The sound had entered his sleep, into whatever he had been dreaming. He felt uncertain, not quite in his place, a little reluctant to pick up.

‘Hello?'

‘We have him.'

Carlos?

It took him several moments to realize the voice on the other end was referring to Pérez.

They had located him in the prison system. He was willing to talk, so the inspector acted quickly, arranging delivery of his service vehicle and washing and readying himself while he waited. The hotel – which had a reputation for being unfeasibly lavish – was a distance away, past the city in the east.

His headlamps lit up demolition sites, fenced off, abandoned land and two last remaining tower blocks. It wasn't clear if anyone still lived there. He passed on, through rows of black-window bars, pawn shops and anonymous takeaways. He drove more purposefully through the night streets unimpeded. Why hadn't he thought of this before, the relief of night driving? The ease of getting somewhere, the reassurance of autonomy.

It was quite a peculiar arrangement, but he was in no position to turn it down. Several lawyers would be present and the terms insisted on a neutral location, taking the man out of prison grounds. Pérez had a story to tell, and he wanted to speak to the inspector and no one else.

He joined the Rio Paraná again, wide, enormous looking, extending into the clouded sky. For a while he drove in parallel. He could hear its rush through the open windows. The road was thin, with no edge-lights, no barriers in place on the riverside. He was out in dark farmland, in sheets of soft green, with the silhouettes of sleeping animals cut out of the land.

He had the feeling he had to get there quickly, that it was important. Potentially crucial. If he had been correct in identifying a link between Pérez and the corporation, then what he was driving towards could well be a revelation. The lawyers would push for leniency, finally giving up the identity of their client, along with the information he had to give, on condition of favourable treatment. Transfer to a low-security prison, perhaps. A comfortable place; somewhere he could live out the rest of his life quietly. The thought disgusted the inspector, but he should wait and see what the man had to give them before ruling anything out.

The ground-floor lobby was deserted. His shoes made a tapping sound on the bright, hard floor. Outside was sheer dark, the interior baldly reflected on the glass.

His instructions were to wait in the foyer until he was collected by officials, who would then escort him to the room where Pérez was held. Now he had stopped, had a moment to think, it seemed outrageous. That Pérez could be there, locked in a room. Presumably he would be shackled. There would be guards as well as lawyers, armed men. Pérez should pose no threat. Still… He would have preferred a meeting on prison grounds, with separating bars. He pictured the face from the photograph, blank, unremarkable. The man he had met at the doorway and apprehended in the apartment. The glazed, distant, vacant expression. The cool, unaffected way he had stood around an obliterated individual.

Pérez had frightened him more than anyone he had ever met.

He pictured a box in the room upstairs. A cage, the man kept in metal. It all reminded him of a film he'd seen once, the name long forgotten. And something there: an identity switch?

He waited a moment more, then introduced himself at reception.

‘They'll be expecting me,' he said.

He sat at the long bar, ordered a whisky to settle his nerves. His ears were ringing. His hands shook. He again reminded himself that there was no forensic evidence of a contagion in Carlos's office. He was simply tired, getting over the food poisoning. Too old to be taking cases like this.

He heard deep, thick laughter from further down the bar, followed by detailed descriptions of anatomy and intercourse. The barmaid kept her head down, mouth closed, alternating purposefully between wiping the glasses and the bar counter. To his left two handsome, well-dressed young men raised their shot glasses and smiled. He found himself nodding back. He ordered another whisky.

One thing that irritated him was the mysterious ability, as it seemed, of everyone else to remain composed. The interview subjects at the corporation, Vasquez, Dias and Kandinski, for instance, especially Dias – they never seemed to register the heat, whereas he always appeared flustered wherever he arrived. This sometimes aided him, lending an impression of a lack of care. He often seemed to be struggling to catch up with something, and this could give an opponent an unmerited sense of control.

But still, he would have liked it if at least one of the employees had shown the faintest sign of physical unease.

He downed his drink.

‘Mengano,' the younger man said, offering his hand.

‘Beltrano,' went the other, appearing irritated.

‘Caballero,' the inspector offered, playing along.

‘We thought you weren't coming,' Mengano said.

The inspector took his coat from his stool.

‘He's here, don't worry. There's no rush, is there? We can sit. It's better we wait a moment. Have you prepared yourself, inspector? Perhaps you should order another drink?'

‘Who exactly—?' the inspector began, before Beltrano, still refusing to make eye contact, raised his hand to silence him.

A young woman, dressed in a black gown, walked past the bar and disappeared into the adjoining room.

‘Isabella?' the inspector called, stunned. ‘Isabella!'

‘Let's go, we need to hurry,' the other one said, contradicting Mengano.

‘But—'

‘Come on. Finish your drink. We don't have much time.'

Mengano led them on, past the elevator to the stairs. ‘He's up there.'

‘Did you know, Inspector,' Beltrano said, as they began briskly ascending the first steps, ‘that every single person has an appointed killer, someone who, upon seeing them, suddenly recognizing who they are, has no option other than to do it, usually with their bare hands?'

‘What joke is this?' the inspector asked, struggling to match the pace of the two younger men. ‘
No option?
Are you Pérez's lawyers? I was under the impression…'

‘You've got us wrong! We're on your side, Inspector. But humour us, won't you? Can't you think of examples from your experience in the force? Motiveless murders. Haven't you ever wondered?'

‘I should explain,' Beltrano continued, ‘the meeting, the recognition – whatever you want to call it – it hardly every happens. World's a big place. People die other ways.'

‘I like to dress darkly, discreetly, just in case.'

They suddenly branched off the staircase, turning sharply down a corridor of identical doors, then another, and another. They were moving so fast now that the inspector almost had to run to keep up.

‘When it does happen,' Beltrano pressed on, without breaking his stride, ‘when the killer meets the appointed target – remember he or she knows nothing about it. They're not bad people, necessarily. They don't – that is to say –
choose
to kill this person. It's just the way things are—'

‘Where is this room?' the inspector cut in. ‘Haven't we made a full circuit of the third floor?'

‘Third floor? What are we doing on the third floor?'

‘Isn't it on the fourth floor? Isn't that where he's held?'

‘That's where we're supposed to be.'

‘Mengano? Okay. But first I should come clean. The reason I know about this is… I've actually seen it happen. I've witnessed a real case. And it was quite something.'

They stopped by the staircase. The inspector wiped his head, relieved at the break.

‘Some water?' Beltrano said, smiling and taking a bottle from his briefcase. ‘Apologies, I was sure there was something in it.'

The men were smiling, watching him. He wanted to say to them, ‘Listen, can't we just stop this? I don't want to hear this shit,' but he hadn't caught his breath.

Beltrano corrected his waxed side-parting in the mirror-wall.

‘Let's go.'

They let the inspector start back up the staircase before them, as if he knew where to go, and they followed. He went along with it. He just wanted it over with, wanted to get there. They climbed another flight, two steps at a time, and started a loop of the fourth floor. It was a straightforward enough task, simply walking past every door. They didn't see a single person. Mengano continued. The inspector heard him from behind like an insistent voice in his head.

‘Last year, September, late at night. Amazing. Raining hard. I couldn't believe he was able to make an identification. Wouldn't have thought he'd even be able to see clearly. I heard this voice: “Where are you going?” Not too loudly. Again. Then he reached out and grabbed the neck and wrenched – and it was amazing, because up until that point he had just been a pedestrian. He hadn't been the kind of person who could do something like that. Thing is the guy under his hand somehow got away. Ran. Like I say, amazing!

‘He ran all through the city. People were afraid of him.'

‘How did you—?'

‘They thought that he was dangerous, because of the way he was running; he was desperate, he wasn't going to move out of the way to avoid hitting someone. They couldn't see that he was running
from
someone. He must have been going twenty, thirty minutes…'

‘Inspector, I don't mean to be rude, only you're going to have to walk faster. Otherwise, well, we're just going to walk right through you. You do want to get there, don't you?'

‘If they were running,' he managed, ‘then you were too – you chased this poor man.'

‘I had to find out what happened, didn't I?'

He heard Beltrano quietly behind him. ‘Just this door here, any one, very soon now. It's around the corner, I'm sure of it.'

He was beginning to feel nauseous. He had drunk too much at the bar. His stomach curdled. When had he been sick in his apartment? One day ago? Two? A week? He had lost track, and now he was charging along a corridor with two strangers. He realized he hadn't yet established who exactly these men were, which body they represented. The official on the phone had led him to believe he would be met by police. But were they the lawyers, part of a team acting on Pérez's behalf? Were they more directly involved with the corporation?

Additionally, he wanted to ask for clarification on the illogical details in their story – was he supposed to believe Mengano had been present for the whole duration of the chase, running through the city at night in the rain? The way it was told it seemed Mengano had overtaken the pursuer, that he had, in fact, become him. If he was running, which must have been the case if the story were to have any credence, then the victim, the man being chased for no reason, would have seen him, leading to a confrontation when they both stopped, surely? And it became Mengano he feared.

‘Can you imagine what he's thinking, waiting at the bus stop?'

‘Almost there, Inspector.'

It was unpleasant hearing the words coming from behind, their footsteps, the quickness increasing, threatening to meet him, go through him. His instinct was to turn around now, but if he did, he knew he would vomit – that's all it would take. In any case, they wouldn't stop for him. He was positive that if he turned around there would be a collision, head-on. By this stage he had lost all hope of seeing Pérez. He doubted Pérez had ever been there.

‘There were a few people at the scene – someone in uniform having just finished a late shift; a young couple who'd been drinking for hours – and they didn't like the look of the guy who'd just shown up. There was something not right about him. His pupils, nostrils – the whole face wild. He was leaning against the shelter, doubled over, retching, wheezing. Just like you, in fact, Inspector. He was wild and exhilarated. Terrified, but exhilar­ated – that's the thing, that's what I remember. He'd got away. He knew how lucky he was. He was living at his greatest capacity. And then he closed his eyes.

‘So now he's on the bus, single deck, half-full, sitting at the back. He's still terrified, paranoid, thinking stupid things. He's even looking out the window at the back of the bus – that must've been why he chose the seat. But the bus pulls away. I'm thinking the guy must be imagining another scenario, say the bus suddenly stopping, a rapping on the door, a new passenger coming on – the same man, the hunter, walking the aisle towards the back of the bus. I mean, what would the guy do?'

His head spun. He didn't have control of himself. He was acting absurdly, moving up and down the corridor at the behest of these strangers, these sinister young men with false names. He knew how stupid he looked. He hated them. He heard himself snorting, panting. He felt sweat on his back and forehead, sensed the red spreading across his face. He heard them right behind him – not just the sound of their expensive shoes, but the swish of their shirts and jackets, the metronomic rhythm of their breath, the assurance of their ease and absolute control. How long would they keep going like this, chasing him, he wondered?