I saw the blade of the scalpel coming down in the liquid darkness and felt the metal making a cut across my forehead. There was no pain. I could feel something issuing out of the cut and saw a black cloud bleeding slowly from the wound and spreading into the water. The blood rose toward the lights in spirals, like smoke, twisting into ever-changing shapes. I looked at the boy, who was smiling at me and holding my hand tightly. Then I noticed it. Something was moving inside me. Something that, until just a minute ago, had been gripping my mind like pincers. I felt it being dislodged, like a thorn stuck right into the marrow that was being pulled out with pliers. I panicked and wanted to get up, but I was immobilized. The boy kept his eyes on mine and nodded. I thought I was going to faint or wake up, when I saw something reflected in the lights of the operating theater. Two black filaments were emerging from the wound, creeping over my skin. It was a black spider the size of a fist. It ran across my face and before it could jump onto the table, one of the surgeons skewered it with a scalpel. He lifted it up so that I could see it. The spider kicked its legs and bled, silhouetted against the light. A white stain covered its carapace suggesting the shape of wings spread open. An angel. After a while the spider’s legs went limp and its body withered. It was still held aloft and when the boy reached out to touch it, it crumbled into dust. The doctors undid my ties and loosened the contraption that had gripped my skull. With their help I sat up on the table and put my hand on my forehead. The wound was closing. When I looked around me once more, I realized I was alone.
The lights of the operating theater went out and the room was dark. I went back to the staircase and ascended the steps that led back to the sitting room. The light of dawn was filtering through the water, trapping a thousand floating particles. I was tired. More than I’d ever been in my whole life. I dragged myself to the armchair and let myself fall into it. My body collapsed and when I was finally resting on the chair I could see a trail of tiny bubbles beginning to move around the ceiling. A small air chamber was being formed at the top and I realized that the water level was starting to come down. The water, thick and shiny like jelly, gushed out through the cracks in the windows as if the house were a submarine emerging from the deep. I curled up in the armchair, succumbing to a sense of weightlessness and peace that I hoped would never end. I closed my eyes and listened to the murmur of the water around me. I opened them again and saw drops raining down from on high, slowly, like tears caught in midflight. I was tired, very tired, and all that I wanted to do was fall into a deep sleep.
…
I opened my eyes to the intense brightness of a warm noon. Light fell like dust through the French windows. The first thing I noticed was that the hundred thousand francs were still on the table. I stood up and went over to the window. I drew aside the curtain and an arm of blinding light inundated the room. Barcelona was still there, shimmering like a mirage. I realized that the humming in my ears, which only the sounds of the day used to disguise, had disappeared completely. I heard an intense silence, as pure as crystal water, which I didn’t remember ever having experienced before. Then I heard myself laughing. I brought my hands to my head and touched my skin: I felt no pressure whatsoever. I could see clearly and felt as if my five senses had only just awoken. I could even smell the old wood of the coffered ceiling and columns. I looked for a mirror but there wasn’t one in the sitting room. I went out in search of a bathroom or another room where I might find a mirror and be able to see that I hadn’t woken up in a stranger’s body, that the skin I could feel and the bones were my own. All the rooms in the house were locked. I went through the whole floor without being able to open a single door. When I returned to the sitting room I noticed that where I had dreamed there was a door leading to the basement there was only a painting of an angel crouching on a rock that looked out over an endless lake. I went to the stairs that led to the upper floors, but as soon as I’d gone up one flight I stopped. A heavy, impenetrable darkness seemed to reside beyond.
“Señor Corelli?” I called out.
My voice was lost as if it had hit something hard, without leaving an echo or a trace. I went back to the sitting room and gazed at the money on the table. One hundred thousand francs. I took the money and felt its weight. The paper begged to be stroked. I put it in my pocket and set off again down the passage that led to the exit. The dozens of faces in the portraits were still staring at me with the intensity of a promise. I preferred not to confront their looks and continued walking toward the door, but just as I was nearing the end of the passage I noticed that among the frames there was an empty one, with no inscription or photograph. I became aware of a sweet scent, a scent of parchment, and realized it was coming from my fingers. It was the perfume of money. I opened the main door and stepped out into the daylight. The door closed heavily behind me. I turned round to look at the house, dark and silent, oblivious to the radiant clarity of the day, the blue skies and brilliant sun. I checked my watch. It was after one o’clock. I had slept more than twelve hours straight on an old armchair and yet I had never felt better in all my life. I walked down the hill toward the city with a smile on my face, certain that, for the first time in a long while, perhaps for the first time in my whole life, the world was smiling at me.
1
I celebrated my return to the world of the living by paying homage to one of the most influential temples in town: the main offices of the Banco Hispano Colonial on Calle Fontanella. The sight of a hundred thousand francs sent the manager, the auditors, and the army of cashiers and accountants into ecstasy and elevated me to the ranks of clients who inspired a devotion and warmth that was almost saintly. Having sorted out formalities with the bank, I decided to deal with another Horseman of the Apocalypse by walking to a newspaper stand in Plaza Urquinaona. There I opened a copy of The Voice of Industry and looked for the local news section, which had once been mine. Don Basilio’s expert touch was still apparent in the headlines and I recognized almost all of the bylines, as if not a day had gone by. Six years of General Primo de Rivera’s lukewarm dictatorship had brought to the city a poisonous, murky calm unconducive to the reporting of crime and sensational stories. I was about to close the newspaper and collect my change when I saw it. Just a brief news item on the last page of the section in a column highlighting four different incidents:
MIDNIGHT FIRE IN THE RAVAL QUARTER.
ONE DEAD AND TWO BADLY INJURED
Joan Marc Huguet/Barcelona
A serious fire started in the early hours of Friday morning at 6 Plaza dels Àngels, main office of the publishing firm of Barrido & Escobillas. The firm’s director, Don José Barrido, died in the blaze, and his partner, Don José Luis López Escobillas, was seriously injured. An employee, Don Ramón Guzmán, was also badly injured, trapped by the flames as he attempted to rescue the other two men. Firefighters are speculating that the blaze may have been started by a chemical product that was being used for renovation work in the offices. Other causes are not being ruled out, however, as eyewitnesses claim to have seen a man leaving the building moments before the fire began. The victims were taken to the Clínico hospital, where one was pronounced dead on arrival. The other two remain in critical condition.
I got there as quickly as I could. The smell of burning reached as far as the Ramblas. A group of neighbors and onlookers had congregated in the square opposite the building, and plumes of white smoke rose from the rubble by the entrance. I saw some of the firm’s employees trying to salvage what little remained from the ruins. Boxes of scorched books and furniture bitten by flames were piled up in the street. The façade of the building was blackened and the windows had been blasted out by the fire. I broke through the circle of bystanders and went in. A powerful stench stuck in my throat. Some of the staff from the publishing house who were busy rescuing their belongings recognized me and mumbled a greeting, their heads bowed.
“Señor Martín … what a tragedy.”
I crossed what had once been the reception area and went int
o Barrido’s office. The flames had devoured the carpets and reduced the furniture to glowing skeletons. In one corner, the coffered ceiling had collapsed, opening a pathway of light toward the rear patio along which floated a bright beam of ashes. One chair had miraculously survived the fire. It was in the middle of the room and sitting on it was Lady Venom, crying, her eyes downcast. I knelt in front of her. She recognized me and smiled through her tears.
“Are you all right?” I asked.
She nodded.
“He told me to go home, you know? He said it was late and I should get some rest because today was going to be a very long day. We were finishing the monthly accounts. If I’d stayed another minute …”
“What happened, Herminia?”
“We were working late. It was almost midnight when Señor Barrido told me to go home. The publishers were expecting a gentleman—”
“At midnight? What gentleman?”
“A foreigner, I think. It had something to do with a proposal. I’m not sure. I would happily have stayed on, but Señor Barrido told me—”
“Herminia, that gentleman, do you remember his name?”
She gave me a puzzled look.
“I’ve already told the inspector who came here this morning everything I can remember. He asked for you.”
“An inspector? For me?”
“They’re talking to everyone.”
“Of course.”
Lady Venom looked straight at me, eyeing me with distrust.
“They don’t know whether he’ll come out of this alive,” she murmured, referring to Escobillas. “We’ve lost everything—the archives, the contracts, everything. The publishing house is finished.”
“I’m sorry, Herminia.”
A crooked, malicious smile appeared.
“You’re sorry? Isn’t this what you wanted?”
“How can you think that?”
She looked at me suspiciously.
“Now you’re free.”
I was about to touch her arm but Herminia stood up and took a step back, as if my presence scared her.
“Herminia—”
“Go away,” she said.
I left Herminia among the smoking ruins. When I went back outside I bumped into a group of children who were rummaging through the rubble. One of them had disinterred a book from the ashes and was examining it with a mixture of curiosity and disdain. The cover had been disfigured by the fire and the edges of the pages were charred, but otherwise the book was unspoiled. From the lettering on the spine, I knew that it was one of the installments of City of the Damned.
“Señor Martín?”
I turned to find three men wearing cheap suits that were a bad choice for a humid, sticky day. One of them, who seemed to be in charge, stepped forward and proffered me the friendly smile of an expert salesman. The other two, who stood as rigid and unyielding as a hydraulic press, glued their openly hostile eyes on mine.
“Señor Martín, I’m Inspector Víctor Grandes and these are my colleagues Officers Marcos and Castelo from the investigation and security squad. I wonder if you would be kind enough to spare us a few minutes.”
“Of course,” I replied.
The name Víctor Grandes rang a bell from my days as a reporter. Vidal had devoted some of his columns to him, and I particularly recalled one in which he described Grandes as a harbinger, a solid figure whose presence in the squad confirmed the arrival of a new generation of elite professionals, better prepared than their predecessors, incorruptible and tough as steel. The adjectives and the hyperbole were Vidal’s, not mine. I imagined that Inspector Grandes would have moved up the ranks since then, and his presence was proof that the police were taking the fire at Barrido & Escobillas seriously.
“If you don’t mind, we can go to a nearby café so that we can talk undisturbed,” said Grandes, his obliging smile not diminishing one inch.
“As you wish.”
Grandes took me to a small bar on the corner of Calle Doctor Dou and Calle Pintor Fortuny. Marcos and Castelo walked behind us, never taking their eyes off me. Grandes offered me a cigarette, which I refused. He put the pack back in his pocket and didn’t open his mouth again until we reached the café and I was escorted to a table at the back, where the three men positioned themselves around me. Had they taken me to a dark, damp dungeon the meeting would have seemed more friendly.
“Señor Martín, you must already know what happened early this morning.”
“Only what I’ve read in the paper. And what Lady Venom told me—”
“Lady Venom?”
“I’m sorry. Miss Herminia Duaso, the directors’ assistant.”
Marcos and Castelo exchanged glances that were priceless. Grandes smiled.
“Interesting nickname. Tell me, Señor Martín, where were you last night?”
How naïve of me; the question caught me by surprise.
“It’s a routine question,” Grandes explained. “We’re trying to establish the whereabouts of anyone who might have been in touch with the victims during the last few days. Employees, suppliers, family …”
“I was with a friend.”
As soon as I opened my mouth I regretted my choice of words. Grandes noticed it.
“A friend?”
“Well, he’s actually someone connected with my work. A publisher. Last night I’d arranged a meeting with him.”
“Can you tell me until what time you were with this person?”
“Until late. In fact, I ended up sleeping at his house.”
“I see. And this person you describe as being connected with your work, what is his name?”
“Corelli. Andreas Corelli. A French publisher.”
Grandes wrote the name down in a little notebook.
“The name sounds Italian,” he remarked.
“As a matter of fact, I don’t really know what his nationality is.”
“That’s understandable. And this Señor Corelli, whatever his nationality may be, would he be able to corroborate the fact that last night you were with him?”
“I suppose so.”
“You suppose so?”
“I’m sure he would. Why wouldn’t he?”
“I don’t know, Señor Martín. Is there any reason you would think he might not?”
“No.”
“That’s settled then.”
Marcos and Castelo were looking at me as if I’d done nothing but tell lies since we sat down.
“One last thing. Could you explain the nature of the meeting you had last night with this publisher of indeterminate nationality?”
“Señor Corelli had arranged to meet me because he wanted to make me an offer.”
“What type of offer?”
“A professional one.”
“I see. To write a book, perhaps?”
“Exactly.”
“Tell me, is it usual after a business meeting to spend the night in the house of, how shall I put it, the contracting party?”
“No.”
“But you say you spent the night in this publisher’s house.”
“I stayed because I wasn’t feeling well and I didn’t think I’d be able to get back to my house.”
“The dinner upset you, perhaps?”
“I’ve had some health problems recently.”
Grandes nodded, looking duly concerned.
“Dizzy spells, headaches …” I added.
“But it’s reasonable to assume that now you’re feeling better?”
“Yes. Much better.”
“I’m glad to hear it. In fact, you’re looking enviably well. Don’t you agree?”
Castelo and Marcos nodded.
“Anyone would think you’ve had a great weight taken off your shoulders,” the inspector pointed out.
“I don’t understand.”
“I’m talking about the dizzy spells and the aches and pains.”
Grandes was handling this farce with an exasperating sense of timing.
“Forgive my ignorance
regarding your professional life, Señor Martín, but isn’t it true that you signed an agreement with the two publishers that didn’t expire for another six years?”
“Five.”
“And didn’t this agreement tie you, so to speak, exclusively to Barrido & Escobillas?”
“Those were the terms.”
“Then why would you need to discuss an offer with a competitor if your agreement didn’t allow you to accept it?”
“It was just a conversation. Nothing more.”
“Which nevertheless turned into a soirée at this gentleman’s house.”
“My agreement doesn’t forbid me to speak to third parties. Or spend the night away from home. I’m free to sleep wherever I wish and to speak to whomever I want.”
“Of course. I wasn’t trying to imply that you weren’t, but thank you for clarifying that point.”