A Game for the Living

  “Then who do you think did it?” Isabel said, leaning towards him. “You must have some suspicions, Teo. If you tell me, I promise you it won’t go any farther.”

  “I think I could trust you, Isabel,” Theodore said with a smile. “But, honestly, I have no suspicions. I’ve never had any. There’s not a person I’ve ever laid eyes on I would think capable of such a murder. I mean, no one I personally know—whom I could name.”

  Isabel nodded. “I know, I know.”

  “Eat while it’s hot. This is very good.”

  Isabel jumped at the sound of the doorbell. “Excuse me, Teo.” She pressed the release button. “He must have gone out without his keys.”

  Theodore pushed his chair back and stood up, braced already for Carlos’s effusive embraces.

  “Who is it?” Isabel called into the hall.

  “Capitán Sauzas of the Police, at your service,” Sauzas’s voice called, and then he appeared at the door. “Señora Hidalgo? Buenas tardes. I have an appointment with your husband at two o’clock. Well, Señor Schiebelhut! How are you?” Sauzas said, coming in, smiling at Theodore as if he were an old friend.

  “Very well, Señor Capitán. I didn’t know you had an appointment at this time.”

  “But yes! I rang up this morning. So sorry to disturb your meal. The police are always disturbing something, aren’t they. Is your husband here, Señora?”

  “No, he is out,” Isabel replied, fumbling with her napkin. “But I expect him at any moment. Is anything wrong?”

  “No, no. I just have some questions. I phoned him at ten o’clock this morning. Didn’t he tell you?”

  “No—I was out at ten myself. Well, if he made an appointment with you, I’m sure he’ll be back. Will you sit down?”

  Sauzas sat down on one of the studio couches in a far corner, declined Isabel’s offer of coffee, and asked them please to proceed with their meal.

  Isabel sat down, but did not pretend to eat. Theodore had lit a cigarette.

  “Perhaps I should be going, Isabel,” Theodore said. “If the Señor Capitán—”

  “But you have eaten nothing! You must have your coffee, Teo, at least.” She went off to the kitchen.

  Sauzas was quietly looking over some papers.

  Theodore did not want to ask him about news in the hearing of Isabel.

  “What time did Señor Hidalgo leave the house?” Sauzas asked her as she came back with the coffee-urn.

  “Around eleven,” she replied.

  Sauzas looked at his watch. “Nearly half-past two. Did he say where he was going?”

  “No, he didn’t. You are sure you would not like coffee, señor?”

  Sauzas accepted the coffee now. They chattered for a few moments about Carlos’s work at the Universidad. Sauzas seemed calm and as usual. Then he said:

  “Well, perhaps I can ask you one of my questions, Señora Hidalgo. Maybe a wife would know as well as a husband. Did Señor Hidalgo lose one of his mufflers recently?”

  “I don’t think so. Why?”

  “Why is very complicated to explain,” Sauzas said with a polite smile. “I can only say I have a reason for asking. Would you know from looking at his mufflers if he is missing any?”

  “I don’t know. I can look, if you wish,” Isabel said, standing up.

  Sauzas got up, too, and followed her into the bedroom, which was down the short passage, opposite the kitchen. Isabel pulled out the bottom drawer of a bureau. The drawer held mostly woollen socks, clean but in disorder, and at the right several folded mufflers of the gay stripes and plaids that Carlos preferred.

  “There are six here,” Isabel said, looking through them but not removing them from the drawer.

  “Quite a lot of mufflers. He is fond of mufflers?” asked Sauzas.

  “Ye-es. And students give them to him as presents,” Isabel said. “He has given one or two away himself.”

  “Lately?”

  “I think he gave one away at Tres Reyes. One at New Year’s too.”

  “You would not know if any is missing from his current stock?” asked Sauzas.

  Still stooping, Isabel looked up at him. “What is this about?”

  Sauzas took a breath. “A most serious matter, señora. I do not want to upset you. Please take your time and think. Perhaps you can recall a muffler your husband has not worn, say, in the last two months? Do you have a good memory?”

  She hesitated. “Is this in regard to the Ballesteros case?” she asked, wide-eyed.

  “Yes, señora. We are asking the same questions of everybody. Everybody who knew her at all. There’s nothing to be alarmed about.”

  Isabel suddenly burst into sobs, and Theodore lifted her by her arms. Sauzas looked at Theodore with wondering eyes.

  “Her husband has been drinking a lot lately,” Theodore said quietly, thinking it was better to say this than not to try to explain her state at all. “That’s perhaps why he didn’t keep the appointment with you.”

  Sauzas lighted a cigarette. “Señora Hidalgo, pardon me,” he said with a small bow that she did not see. “Did your husband receive any other telephone calls this morning? Or last night?”

  Isabel daubed her eyes with Theodore’s handkerchief. “I don’t know, señor.”

  “Was he also upset last night?”

  “He has been quite upset for many weeks—months.”

  “What is he worried about? Money? His job?”

  “His job is too much for him, and he takes on too much,” Isabel replied.

  Sauzas looked at his wrist-watch, then said gloomily to Theodore: “I’m to see Sanchez-Schmidt at three-thirty.”

  “You have seen Eduardo Parral?” Theodore asked.

  Sauzas nodded, and smiled a little at Theodore. “Señora Hidalgo, your husband has not said anything about a muffler in the last day? Or weeks?”

  “No,” Isabel said, shaking her head.

  And she seemed to be speaking the truth, but Sauzas questioned her closely and begged her to try to remember if there had been any strange telephone calls whatsoever, or if she thought there had been any that her husband might not have told her about, and Isabel said none that she knew of. Sauzas asked why Carlos was not at the Universidad today, a Thursday.

  “Because—he did not feel well today,” Isabel said, looking wretchedly down at the floor.

  “Did he say last night he was not going to work today?”

  “Yes,” Isabel replied readily.

  “He was drinking last night?”

  “Drinking and playing the gramophone,” said Isabel.

  “I see. Well, Señora Hidalgo,” he said, “it’s getting on to three and I must leave. Can I give you a number to call when your husband comes in? Just ask for this exchange and leave the message with anyone.” He handed her a card.

  Theodore, though he thought Isabel might have liked him to stay on, was very eager to talk with Sauzas. “I shall telephone you this evening, if I may, Isabel,” he said, touching her shoulder. “I’m sorry this was so upsetting to you. It was a bad time for me to come.”

  “Oh, no,” she protested, getting up and managing a smile as she walked with them to the door. “I had rather have seen you than anyone, Teo.”

  “What do you make of that?” asked Sauzas when they were on the sidewalk.

  “I don’t know. I really don’t think she knows anything about the muffler. Do you?”

  “Um-m. What’s Carlos drinking for? He is young, successful—a reasonably pretty wife—”

  “Carlos has always drunk too much. As long as I’ve known him, which is two years now.”

  They were walking to the corner of Insurgentes, towards the spot where Theodore had caught a taxi to Lelia’s on the night of her death.

  Sauzas s
uddenly patted Theodore’s shoulder. “Can I trust you to call me later this afternoon or tonight, if Hidalgo comes home? I have the feeling his wife will not call me. She’s the protective type.”

  Theodore felt a tingle of alarm. “Yes. You’ll be in your office?”

  “I think so. After Sanchez-Schmidt. But leave the message with anyone. Here’s a libre. Can I drop you? I’m going to Meichor Ocampo, way up.”

  “No, no, thanks, Señor Capitán.”

  “Cheer up! I expect to hear any minute that we’ve found Infante. I’m going to call my office from Sanchez-Schmidt’s.”

  Theodore only nodded and waved an adieu.

  When Theodore phoned Isabel Hidalgo at seven, Carlos had still not come home. He phoned again at nine-thirty. Isabel had telephoned several of their friends, and she was quite worried.

  “Do you think I should call the hospitals, Teo?”

  It was a moment before the question registered on him, and then it did not seem to make sense. Carlos was more likely in a little bar with piano music, somewhere. “Have you spoken to Capitán Sauzas?” Theodore asked. “Have you told him?”

  “He called an hour ago. I told him Carlos had not come home.”

  “And what did he say?”

  “I don’t know. I’m supposed to let him know,” she said with a tremor in her voice. “What is all this about the muffler? What muffler? Have they found a muffler?”

  “I don’t know exactly myself. It’s what the police call a lead—to something. I was also asked if I had lost a muffler.”

  “Well—is there something dangerous connected with it?”

  “I don’t even know that, Isabel. Now sooner or later you must go to sleep tonight, you know. Don’t try to wait up for him. Shall I call you again before midnight to see if he’s home?”

  “Yes, please do, Teo.”

  Ramón was standing in the hall. “What’s the matter?” he asked with a suspicious frown when Theodore had hung up.

  “Carlos Hidalgo. He’s drinking and he hasn’t been home all day.”

  Ramón had been out when Theodore returned from Isabel’s, and he had not yet told him of Carlos’s absence or of Sauzas’s visit to his house. Ramón listened to it with unconcern, and remarked that Carlos was a fool and that he had always drunk like an American. “It is too bad for Isabel,” Ramón added. He had always liked Isabel better than Carlos. “There is no news yet about Infante?”

  “I was just going to call Sauzas.” Theodore picked up the telephone again.

  Ramón stood waiting with a calm, determined expression. He lighted a Carmencita and watched Theodore as he spoke.

  “No. . . . No,” Theodore said in answer to Sauzas’s questions about Carlos Hidalgo. “I have just spoken to his wife.”

  Sauzas grunted an “Umph. . . . Well, there is an unconfirmed and unconfirmable report that Infante was seen this evening in Acapulco.”

  “Acapulco! Seen by whom?”

  “One of the boys of the town, who told the police in hopes of a reward. They said the boy who told them looked reasonably honest, but they are not sure that he is correct. A bad place for Infante to be—for us. He must still have some money and for money a thief will hide a thief, and there are plenty of those in Acapulco.”

  “Do you think he could be there?”

  “I think it is quite possible. Acapulco is a flashy place and Infante likes that. Maybe he got some money for his muffler, eh?” Sauzas said with a chuckle. “Well, we have flown a batch of photographs to Acapulco. He will certainly not leave the town on any boat or from the airport. Señor Schiebelhut, does your friend Hidalgo often go on binges and not come home for days?”

  “I don’t think so—but I don’t know, Señor Capitán. I’m to call his wife again before midnight, and I can call you, if you like.”

  “I am going home. But leave the message. Adiós, señor.”

  Theodore hung up, and told Ramón that Infante had been reported seen in Acapulco that evening.

  Ramón nodded. “But they are not sure?”

  “No. And I don’t think Sauzas is going there.”

  Ramón asked who had seen the boy, and Theodore told him the little he knew. Restlessly, Ramón walked into the hall, and came back. “I think I shall go there, Teo—if there is a chance.”

  “But it’s only a rumor!”

  “I have a hunch. What can I do here in his enormous city? If he’s in Acapulco, I can find him in a matter of hours.”

  “Quicker than the police?”

  “If they find him first, I’ll at least be there. You understand, don’t you, Teo?” he said, looking at him.

  Theodore understood. Ramón saw himself intervening between Infante and the police, somehow convincing the police the fellow was innocent of Lelia’s murder—whereas it was not even certain yet that Infante was going to be accused of it—and protesting again his own guilt.

  Ramón walked to a black window and stood looking out. “There’re no planes until tomorrow morning.” He turned round. “I have about a hundred pesos, Teo, and the fare is a hundred and seventeen one way, I remember.”

  “There’s plenty of money in the house, Ramón.”

  “I’ll pay you back, Teo, I promise.” Then he walked out of the room as if to escape the embarrassing subject of money.

  Theodore closed his fountain-pen and then his diary. Perhaps before tomorrow morning they would hear that Infante had been apprehended in Mexico, D.F., or in Acapulco and that he was being brought to Mexico, D.F., and Ramón would not go. But as he closed his door, he heard Ramón on the telephone in the living-room, making a reservation on the 8 a.m. plane.

  When Theodore called Isabel again at twelve-fifteen, Carlos had not come home.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  The gentle buzz of his alarm clock awakened Theodore at six. The house was ominously silent. For a minute he lay motionless, listening for a sound from Ramón’s room. Then he threw off the bedclothes and in pajamas and bare feet went to Ramón’s door and gently turned the knob, saw the undisturbed bed and the glow of a lamp.

  Ramón was sitting at the writing-table with a pen in his hand.

  “Excuse me, Ramón.”

  “No matter.” He continued to write.

  His shirt was the same blue one of last night. Theodore wondered if he had slept at all. “Have you called the police this morning?” Theodore asked.

  “No.”

  “I’ll call them. They may have found Infante.”

  But they had not found Infante. Theodore stood at the telephone in his room, in his dressing-gown and slippers now, smoking a Delicado and listening to the dull words of the police officer.

  “Nothing from Acapulco?”

  “Nothing, señor.”

  Theodore went down to make coffee. Inocenza did not get up until seven, and he saw no reason to awaken her. He put coffee on, gave Leo his breakfast of an American gravel-like cat cereal with milk on it, and squeezed some orange juice for Ramón and himself. Without waiting for the coffee, he carried the orange juice to Ramón’s room.

  “I’ll call the police again before seven,” Theodore said. “If you go, I’ll go with you.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I want to. I promise you I’ll not be in your way.”

  Ramón lifted his brows as if it did not matter at all, and sealed his letter. From his old bent note-case he produced some stamps. “We must leave here at seven, then.”

  Inocenza was dressed and downstairs at six-thirty, making them a hasty breakfast of scrambled eggs, asking questions.

  “I can’t say when we’ll be back,” Theodore said, “but I’ll telephone, Inocenza.” He was then phoning for a reservation on the Acapulco plane.

  “This evening, señor?”

  But
he could not promise that. No, he was not taking anything with him, not even a toothbrush. He did not want to be burdened. His call to police headquarters just before seven produced no more news, and he was thinking of calling Isabel Hidalgo, when Ramón appeared in the doorway of his bedroom and said:

  “Well, Teo, if you are going—”

  Ramón gave Inocenza an affectionate farewell, and thanked her for caring for his bird. Theodore noticed tears in Inocenza’s eyes. She understood why Ramón was leaving, because Theodore had told her that Infante had been seen in Acapulco. She looked at Theodore as Ramón spoke, as if she would have liked to beg Theodore not to let him go.

  “If I had thought of it earlier this morning, I would have taken my bird to Chapultepec Park and released him,” Ramón said to Inocenza.

  “What? He would die, señor! He wouldn’t know how to find his food!”

  “With the whole woods to eat from?” Ramón replied.

  “Pepe would not even like the park!” Inocenza said.

  “Release him today, anyway,” Ramón said quietly but like a command. “Release him in the patio.”

  “But—the cat, señor—”

  “He may be killed, but I don’t want him caged any more. Adiós, Inocenza.” He went out of the door.

  Theodore also turned to go, but Inocenza snatched up from the sofa the newspapers she had bought that morning and thrust them into his hands. He started to tell her not to obey Ramón’s order about the bird, then with a wave of his hand he went out. Ramón’s determination to go to Acapulco was part of his destiny, whatever happened, and the senseless sacrifice of the bird, if it improved Ramón’s mental state, perhaps would play its part.

  Ramón had already found a taxi. During the ride to the airport they said nothing and looked at the newspapers. Infante’s being seen in Acapulco provided the headline of the story, and the incidents concerning the muffler were all there—that Ramón Otero and himself and Eduardo Parral had been approached by Infante either in person or by telephone and asked if they had lost a muffler. But there was no speculation as to the significance of this. Ramón glanced through the papers and refolded them. He stopped the taxi near a mail-box, and got out to post his letter. Theodore had noticed that it was addressed to Arturo Baldin, and it crossed his mind that Ramón might have written something like a farewell letter to Arturo, that Ramón foresaw a fight to the death with the police. It also occurred to Theodore that if he stayed with Ramón he might also become a target for the pistols of the police, though he did not know now what he could possibly do about it.