The Ways of Evil Men (28 page)

“Enough is what I’ve had of him.” Cunha pointed at Frade. He got to his feet and, somewhat unsteadily, walked out.

Osvaldo appeared at their table. Castori ordered fresh drinks for himself and Borges. The doctor tossed a banknote on the table and stood up.

“That will cover my share,” he said.

Frade stood with him. “I gotta get some air,” he said and followed the doctor out the door.

The doctor turned right toward his home. Frade turned left and, like Omar Torres before him, stumbled into the alleyway.

N
O LIGHTS WERE SHOWING
at Raul Nonato’s place, but from afar they could hear a voice:
Zezinho to the Artist, the Artist shoots … Goooall!

A crowd erupted into raucous cheers. Silva pounded on the door. The audio went mute. A few seconds went by and then, “Who’s that?”

“Federal Police, Nonato. Open up!”

They heard him slip the bolt. The IBAMA agent was in pajamas, blue ones with black trim. He’d been drinking. They could smell the scotch. “What do you people want at this time of night? What’s so important it can’t wait until morning?”

This was a different Raul Nonato from the one Hector and Gonçalves had met on their first visit. The alcohol had turned him belligerent.

“We need to talk,” Silva said.

“I’m busy. Come back tomorrow.”

“Now. Step out of the doorway.”

He put up an arm to block their access. “You got a search warrant?”

“No. Now, step out of the doorway.”

Nonato, filled to the brim with liquid courage, stood his ground. “We can talk right here,” he said. “State your business.”

“We’re looking for the journalist, Maura Mandel. We have reason to believe she’s been kidnapped.”

“Really? What’s that got to do with me?”

“We believe that the people who kidnapped her are extracting gold illegally.”

“And?”

“And we think you know who they are.”

“I got no idea what you’re talking about. Fuck off and let me get back to my game.”

“May I?” Gonçalves said. “You may,” Silva said. He and Arnaldo stepped aside. “Senhor Nonato, I’m Agent Haraldo Gonçalves—”

“I don’t give a fuck who you are.”

Gonçalves drew his Glock and put the muzzle against the IBAMA agent’s left temple.

“—and if you tell us one more lie, I’m going to kill you.”

Nonato ducked his head, weaved, and tried to move away. Gonçalves grabbed him by the collar and pushed the muzzle more firmly into his head. Nonato lost control of his bladder. A stench of urine overpowered the odor of the scotch.

“Stop struggling,” Gonçalves said. “I don’t want this thing to go off by mistake.”

Nonato froze.

“Now, let’s start again. Where’s Maura Mandel?”

“Maybe … maybe at the Bonetti’s place. I don’t know for sure, but she could be there.”

“Thank you,” Gonçalves said, and pulled the trigger.

C
ESAR
’
S TRUCK
needed a new muffler. Maria had heard him coming and was standing on the veranda to greet him

“What took you so long?”

“I wanted to be thorough, didn’t I?” he said. “And don’t think it was easy getting back here in the dark.”

“You could have called.”

“I tried. Fucking tower must be down again.”

“Everything taken care of?”

“The dredge is at the bottom of the river. The rest, I burned.”

“So that’s it then. There’s nothing to tie us to the place?”

“Nothing. And I even brought a present.” He went around to the back of the truck and retrieved a jute sack, the mouth of it tied together with a piece of rope. When he shook it, an angry rattle emanated from the inside.

“A
cascavel
?” she said.

“You know anything else that makes a sound like that? He’s a huge bastard. And mean. Have we got her?”

“We’ve got her.”

“How did she get here?”

“Driving her friend’s jeep. I suggested it.”

“Good thinking. That way, she didn’t have to tell anybody where she was going, right?”

“Right. And I didn’t have to pick her up, so no one saw us together.”

He looked around. “So where is it?”

“Where’s what?”

“The jeep.”

“I hid it in the barn. We’ll take it halfway to town and leave it near her corpse. That way, it’ll look like she was far, far away from here when the accident happened. Bring the sack. I’m itching to introduce the nosy little bitch to her new friend.”

T
HE SLAMMING
of the door had left Maura in total blackness. She’d spun around, grabbed for the doorknob and found it locked. She’d switched her attention to the door itself and pounded on the hardwood. The only result had been to hurt her hand. Next, she’d tried screaming at the top of her lungs.

“Senhora Bonetti! Maria! What the
hell
are you doing? Let me out of here!”

There’d been no response. None at all.

She began to explore the space.

Setting off to the left of the door, she felt her way along the walls in hope of finding a switch.

And did. She tried it, but the room remained as black as ever. They’d either removed the bulb or the fuse, or there hadn’t been one or the other in the first place.

She kept going: a corner, another, a third, a fourth—and she was back at the door. Nothing along the way had impeded her progress. There were no fixtures, there was no plumbing, there were no shelves. Whatever the space was, it wasn’t—and never had been—a bathroom.

She took a step away from one of the corners and crossed to the opposite wall. And again. And again, until she’d cross-hatched the room in its entirety. Five paces, and a little more in each direction. The same on the other axis.

Square. Completely empty. And no way out except for the door. There was nothing else she could do. She leaned against one wall, sank down upon her haunches, and waited.

A
N HOUR
passed. Or maybe it was two. Without her cell phone, and unable to see her watch, Maura had no way of telling.

Suddenly, she heard a key turning in the lock. She started scrambling to her feet, but the adrenaline in her system had dissipated and she wasn’t fully erect when the door was flung open.

A silhouette appeared, deeper black against the blackness of corridor. An arm was raised. Something was flung at her head. When Maura attempted to fend it off, her fingers touched rough fabric. She clenched her fists, caught the
object and had just enough time to see what she was holding—some kind of bag, or sack—before the door slammed shut. Still dazed, and with the image of what she’d seen persisting on her retina, she stood there for a moment, clutching the cloth.

And then it moved. There was something inside, something alive. She released her grip. The bag hit the floor with a soft
plop
, followed by an angry rattle. A second later, something slithered over her foot.

N
ONATO WASN
’
T DEAD
. T
HERE
’
D
been no bullet in the chamber.

Gonçalves holstered his pistol, took out his handcuffs, and none too gently shackled the man’s hands behind his back.

“Tell us the rest of it and be quick about it,” Silva said.

Nonato was still trembling. He was opening and closing his mouth like a fish starved for oxygen.

Gonçalves grabbed him by the collar of his pajamas and shook him. “Talk, you
filho da puta
.”

It all came out in a rush: “She came here, told me she took water samples from the Sapoqui, told me she found traces of mercury. She wanted my help to discover who was behind it, go out there to make photos of the site, shut them down.”

“So she didn’t know it was Bonetti?” Silva said.

“No.”

“And you didn’t tell her?”

“No.”

“Did you call him after she was gone? Warn him?”

“That’s all. That’s all I did.”

“And what did you expect him to do?”

“Talk to her. Offer her money.”

“That? Or kill her?”

Nonato looked at his feet. If he’d said even a single word, handcuffed or not, Gonçalves would have hit him.

C
ESAR AND
Maria were unwinding with a drink when they heard a knock.

“Cesar, it’s me, Raul. Let me in.”

Bonetti looked at his watch. “Fucking Nonato,” he whispered. “What does he want at this time of night?”

“Reassurance,” she whispered back. “He’s a nervous little bastard.”

“I’m getting nervous myself.”

“Calm down, Cesar. It’s all over now.”

“I don’t like having her body back there. The hell with waiting until tomorrow morning. As soon as he’s gone, we’ll take her out and dump her.”

“Get Nonato to help. It’ll remind him that he’s in as deep as we are.”

The knock came again, more urgently this time.

“Cesar? Maria? You guys in there?”

Bonetti held a finger to his lips to cut their conversation short. He went to the door, slid back the bolt and opened it. “Cops!” he shouted when he saw Nonato wasn’t alone.

Maria scuttled toward the back of the house, fumbled with the lock, and flung open the door only to find Hector waiting on the other side. He handcuffed her and brought her back to the living room where her husband, wearing cuffs of his own, was spewing abuse at Nonato.

“You weak, stupid little bastard! I’ll kill you for this!”

“Shut up,” Silva said. “Your killing days are over. Where’s Maura Mandel?”

“I got no idea.”

“We’re going to search the place,” Silva said. “If you’re lying, this gentleman here”—he hooked a thumb at Gonçalves—“will give you a severe beating.”

“That’s crap! You can’t do that. You’re cops.”

Gonçalves hit him in the stomach—hard.

“Think again,” he said as Bonetti fought for breath.

“Leave him alone,” Maria said. “You’re too late. She’s dead.”

When he heard that, Gonçalves turned to Maria. She saw the look on his face and recoiled in fear.

“If you’re not wrong,” he said, “you’re dead.”

Silva put a hand on his arm. “Take us,” he said to Maria.

She led them to a door in an unlit hallway. By the time they got there, her hands were trembling too much to insert the key. Gonçalves, cursing, grabbed her wrist and took over the task.

Inside in a pool of light cast by Silva’s flashlight, they found Maura facedown on the floor. And from somewhere in the dark they heard an ominous rattle.

I
T WAS FOUR IN
the morning. Maura, now out of danger, was resting comfortably, Gonçalves at her side. The other three cops, Gilda, and Doctor Pinto had adjourned to Jade’s living room.

“That snake was a mess,” Gilda was saying. “You shot it, right?”

“Babyface shot it,” Arnaldo said. “Six times. I was standing right next to him when he did it. The room was tiny. I don’t think my ears are ever going to be the same.”

“Whose idea was it to bring us the remains?” Doctor Pinto asked.

Arnaldo pointed at Silva.

The doctor turned to face him. “Quick thinking, Chief Inspector. Without that, she’d be dead.”

“It was a close call,” Gilda explained. “There wouldn’t have been time to run tests for the proper antivenin.”

“And speaking of dead,” Doctor Pinto said, “I’m sure it will interest you to hear that we’ve had another murder.”

“Another one?” Silva said.

Pinto nodded. “Just a few hours ago. I don’t recall ever having—”

“Who was the victim?”

“José Frade,” the doctor said shortly. His expression showed he didn’t take kindly to being interrupted.

“Where?”

“In the same alleyway where the Indian murdered Omar
Torres. And with a machete to the neck, while urinating. The two killings were similar in every way.”

“But not,” Silva said, “committed by the same person.”

“Of course not,” Pinto said. “How could they have been? The Indian’s dead, isn’t he?”

Gilda shook her head from side-to-side. “The Indian wasn’t the murderer of Omar Torres.”

“He was. And that’s what my report is going to reflect.”

“You’re wrong.”

Silva intervened. “So you’re in agreement about one thing, at least: Torres and Frade were killed by two different people?”

“On that,” Gilda said, “we agree.”

“Yes,” Doctor Pinto said.

Silva addressed Gilda. “You saw Frade’s corpse
in situ
?”

She nodded. “It happened just below my window. A crowd gathered when they found him. The noise woke me up. I was just getting out of bed when Amanda knocked on my door.”

“Interfering woman,” Doctor Pinto grumbled. “It was none of her damned business.”

“Doctor Pinto feels,” Gilda said, “that I invaded his territory—”

“
And
interfered with my work. I’m the medical examiner in this town, not you.”

Gilda ignored him. “But I really don’t give a damn what Doctor Pinto thinks, because I totally disrespect him as a professional—”

“Why you little—”

“That’s enough, Doctor,” Silva said, “Get a handle on your temper, or I’ll expel you from the room. Go on, Gilda.”

“—so I borrowed a flashlight, went down to the alley, made a cursory examination, and found significant differences between the two murders.”

“Tell me.”

“The killer took the murder weapon.”

“But you have reason to believe it was the same kind of knife?”

“Very similar, I’d say.”

“Okay, go on.”

“The first blow to Frade’s neck, as with Torres, was administered from behind, but delivered by a shorter, and weaker, individual. The wound was slanted upwards and nowhere near as deep. I think, but this is just a guess, that it might have been delivered with some hesitation.”

“Why do you say that?”

“The full force of the killer’s arm wasn’t behind it.”

“And then?”

“Frade turned around, exposing the other side of his neck.”

“So he looked into the face of his killer?”

“He did.”

“How can you be sure which blow was delivered first?”

“He was facing the wall, urinating. The murderer wouldn’t have been able to sneak up on him otherwise.”