The Good Suicides (5 page)
Authors: Antonio Hill
Ruth Valldaura Martorell. 39. Designer/illustrator of considerable success due to a line of home accessories very popular recently. Separated and mother of one son, Guillermo, who lived with her. Disappeared from her home, a loft-type apartment she also used as her studio, located on Llull, on July 7, 2010, although it wasn’t reported until two days later. There were no signs of violence in her home and the door hadn’t been forced. According to her partner,
Carolina Mestre, a suitcase and four garments were missing, which tallied with the last she knew of Ruth, who had declared her intention of going away to spend the weekend at the apartment owned by her parents, which they still own, in the coastal area of Sitges. Her car was found parked close to her home, which led us to believe that probably its owner had never come to take it on the morning of July 7, when she told her parents, her ex-husband and her new partner that she wouldn’t be back until Sunday night. Her messages had been succinct. Seemingly, Ruth wanted to spend a couple of days alone near the beach.
On Sunday night, her son Guillermo, whom she was meant to collect from a friend’s house where he was spending a few days’ vacation, called his father, Inspector Héctor Salgado, asking about Ruth. This raised the alarm.
The primary investigations focused on the threats uttered against Inspector Salgado’s family by Dr. Omar, a witch doctor of African origin linked to a woman-trafficking network which had been dismantled around the middle of the previous year. The pimps were detained and although it was suspected that Omar used voodoo to terrify the young Nigerian prostitutes, only one agreed to testify against him. This girl’s violent death led Inspector Salgado to turn up at Omar’s clinic in an alley near the Post Office and give him a beating, which was the source of the threats to Salgado and those around him. Later, the doctor was murdered by his accomplices.
However, according to what Damián Fernández, Omar’s lawyer and killer, confessed, before dying Omar carried out a ritual curse against Ruth Valldaura. The aim was, obviously, to revenge himself on Inspector Salgado. This witness affirmed that Omar was certain that Ruth would disappear without leaving the least trace. As it happened in the end.
Leire paused. The objective facts were as simple as that. It made no difference that she didn’t believe the quack’s claims; the astonishing reality
was that due to the curse or not, Ruth’s destiny had been as the bastard Omar had predicted. And although for a time it was thought that the doctor himself had contracted someone to carry out his threat, Leire had never been convinced by this hypothesis. If anything became clear from studying a character as dark as the quack’s, it was the faith he had in his own power: despite it appearing like a cock-and-bull story, Omar was sure the ritual curse would work.
For the first time in months, Leire missed having a cigarette, but she resisted. She’d given up smoking at the end of the summer and had no intention of starting again. To calm herself, she went to the kitchen, grabbed a couple of biscuits, also forbidden by the doctor, and returned to the table. It was late, but she could sleep as long as she liked. She took up her pen once again and returned to her task.
Ruth Valldaura was a reserved person, with few friends and no known enemies. The general opinion held that she was a balanced, attractive and friendly woman, with a pronounced tendency to be introspective. She maintained a cordial relationship with her ex-husband, and in her subsequent involvement with Carol Mestre didn’t seem to have any problems more serious than the usual tensions of any couple. Ruth had accepted her lesbianism, or bisexuality, openly. She hadn’t attempted to hide it from her parents or her son. Her work, although well paid, didn’t make her rich, or well known outside her professional circle. She worked alone, although she collaborated with her partner and associate in marketing her designs. In fact, it was in the professional sphere that they fell in love.
The investigations into her disappearance immediately came to a dead end. The street where she lived, located in the old industrial area of Poblenou, not very far from where her ex-husband still lives, was fairly deserted during the summer weekends, and the few neighbors interviewed didn’t contribute any significant information.
There are, a priori, two alternatives that, despite being mere supposition, must be taken into account:
1. Dr. Omar and his people, including the curse, whatever it means.
2. Someone close to Ruth, however improbable it may seem. Her ex-husband, her girlfriend, a friend.
Leire inhaled. Something in the last sentence made her feel like a traitor. She was very fond of Héctor Salgado. She respected him as a boss, and got on well with him as a person. And she found him handsome, she thought with a smile. Abel seemed to protest from her womb, or perhaps to warn her that it was late and she should just go to bed. “I’m going, kid. But you should know if he hadn’t been my boss, if you weren’t here, and if everything were different, mama would have hooked up with that Argentine.” The baby kicked again and Leire caressed her belly. Although initially it had seemed strange, now she loved feeling how he moved. It was irrefutable proof that he was alive.
Rapidly she wrote one more paragraph.
As always, there is a third option. Persons unknown. Someone we don’t know anything about, someone who had something against Ruth Valldaura and turned up at her house that Friday before she left. Someone Ruth knew and whom she allowed into her house not suspecting anything strange.
This killer or kidnapper X would have benefited from the clues pointing to Dr. Omar and would have had time to hide their trail.
To the point, Leire thought before going to bed, that six months later no one had managed to find them.
Sara Mahler. The name came back into Salgado’s head during the interminable meeting in one of the rooms at the station. Not the whole time, since the meeting was intense and required concentration, but in flashes, unable to avoid it, his mind went back to that woman who had jumped onto the tracks early on Thursday morning. By her passport photo, which he’d seen again a few hours before, Sara Mahler wasn’t pretty. She had a pale complexion, wide nose and very small blue eyes. Central European features betrayed by obviously artificial jet-black hair, which made the pallor of her skin stand out even more.
When the meeting finished it was almost seven in the evening. The inspector hurried toward Fort’s desk; he hadn’t seen him since the day of the incident. The agent was there with Martina Andreu.
“Do we know any more about Sara Mahler? Have you tracked down the family?”
Fort almost stood to attention before answering.
“Yes, Inspector. It took me all day Friday and part of Saturday to find them, but I got there in the end. Her father arrived this morning from Salzburg.” It took him a few seconds to add, in an almost mysterious tone, “Honestly, he’s a strange one. I haven’t been able to communicate with him much because he only speaks German, but all the same it was clear that he wasn’t too upset. According to the little I know, they haven’t seen each other in years. Sara came to Barcelona in
2004 and, from what I understand, she only went back to her country on one occasion, the following year. And her father has never been to Spain, so he said.”
The agent kept the additional words the interpreter had translated for him to himself. Joseph Mahler, taking advantage of the journey, planned to spend a few days in Mallorca, where he had friends. The fact that someone might consider such a journey as the excuse to take a holiday had left poor Agent Fort speechless. And saddened.
“Okay,” said Salgado. “And Sara? What else do we know?”
Fort consulted his notes, as if he feared forgetting something.
“Sara Mahler, thirty-four. As I said, she arrived in Barcelona seven years ago, around the middle of the year. She lived on Passatge Xile, near Collblanc market, and shared an apartment with another girl. Kristin something … I didn’t catch the surname. She’d also been away over the
Reyes
bank holiday, so I only spoke to her today.”
Héctor nodded, encouraging Fort to continue.
“According to Kristin, Sara was personal assistant to the managing director of Alemany Cosmetics, a company that develops and markets cosmetic products.”
“Did she give you any motive that might explain Sara’s suicide? An unhappy love affair, problems at work?”
Fort shook his head.
“No, sir, but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t any.” Seeing his boss’s perplexed face, he hastened to add, “I mean that Kristin had been sharing an apartment with Sara for barely two months. They weren’t friends or anything like it. I asked her if she’d found a note in Sara’s bedroom. You know …”
“Yes, I know. And?”
“She found it hard to go and look. It seems Sara didn’t like anyone going into her room. I told her she wasn’t going to know now and then she went. But nothing. No note, or anything resembling one.”
For the first time, Martina Andreu, who had been listening silently, turned to Salgado.
“Is there anything, apart from that macabre message, that might indicate it wasn’t a suicide?”
“Quite honestly, no. The most likely thing is that this woman, in a state for whatever reason, threw herself onto the metro tracks of her own will. But I don’t like the message and photo. Do we know who sent them, Fort?”
“It’ll be tricky, Inspector. It was sent from a free texts website. We’re waiting for the IP, but it doesn’t usually help much.”
“Then focus on more concrete things,” Héctor advised him. “Andreu, I know all this will go nowhere, but it can’t hurt for Fort to go to see this Kristin something. And Sara’s work—you called them too, right? Strange no one has turned up. No boyfriend, no friend …” And he added, with his usual half-smile, “Or girlfriend or friend.”
“Maybe that’s why she threw herself onto the tracks,” said the sergeant. “Because she knew no one was going to miss her much.”
“Not her father, anyway,” Fort said. That man’s lack of emotion had unsettled him.
At that moment the telephone on the desk rang and the agent answered. It was a brief conversation.
“Well, speak of the devil.”
“The boyfriend?”
“No, Inspector. Her boss. Sara’s boss, I mean.”
“Yeah, I got that.”
“He’s at the door and wants to see the inspector in charge of the case.”
Héctor glanced at his watch. He was dying to go out for a cigarette, but his curiosity stayed him.
“Bring him in. What did you say his name was?”
“Sorry, I didn’t say.” Fort seemed not to notice the irritated expression that came over his boss’s face. “His name is Víctor Alemany, managing director of Alemany Cosmetics.”
Before Fort could conclude that, given the coincidence of the names, it was a family business, and even worse, say so aloud, Héctor turned
and went to his office. At the door, he turned to add, “Martina, tomorrow we need to talk. About the meeting with Savall. First thing, okay? It’s important. Fort, you get to go alone to speak to Sara’s roommate. Have a look at the poor girl’s bedroom.”
Víctor Alemany was definitely upset, Héctor said to himself. Or uncomfortable, at least. He had sat down at Héctor’s desk just a few minutes before and his face expressed something that could only be defined as bewilderment.
“Inspector Salazar—”
“Salgado.”
“Oh yes, I beg your pardon. All this seems terrible …” He gave the impression that he was seeking another adjective, but immediately gave up and said again: “Terrible.”
Héctor observed him. In his line of work he tended to evaluate people quickly, and after those few minutes he could say that Víctor Alemany was a decent sort. In his forties, not much older than Salgado, Alemany had an almost Nordic appearance. Blond, with some gray; he wore a good suit and glasses that looked expensive, hiding a pair of sky-blue eyes. Despite the attire, there wasn’t much of the aggressive executive head honcho in him. In fact, as soon as he walked through the door he’d reminded Héctor of Michael York’s student character in
Cabaret
. A few years older, of course.
“When did it happen? We didn’t hear until this morning, when we realized Sara hadn’t come to work …”
“Was that unusual? That she didn’t come to the office, I mean.”
“I don’t think it’s ever happened. Actually, I’m sure of it. Sara was never absent. Or even late. On the contrary, she was usually one of the first to arrive.”
“Your company produces …?”
“We’re a cosmetics company.” Víctor Alemany smiled. “All sorts of
face and body creams, makeup … My grandfather founded it, in the forties, and we’re still here.”
“Tough times?”
Alemany shrugged.
“We can’t complain. Although I fear the worst is yet to come.”
“What exactly did Sara do?” asked Héctor, directing him back to the subject at hand.
“She was my secretary for five years.”
“And were you satisfied with her?”
“Of course,” the other man answered with what seemed complete honesty. “There were no complaints with her work. She never made an error.”