“How did you find out?”
“She got pregnant, that’s how. You’d think she would have learned, right? I mean after what happened to her sister and all? But no, she went out and got herself pregnant. Stupid, I thought at the time. But Juraci never did stupid stuff, even when she was a teenager, so when I looked back on it later, I got to thinking she did it on purpose.”
“Because she loved him? Because she wanted him to marry her?”
“That’s what I figure. It was good for me in a way, though, because the baby could just as well have been mine.”
“One minute you say she was stupid, and the next you say the kid could have been yours. What’s with that?”
“What’s with that is I broke a condom. I learned my lesson with Graca, and always used them with Juraci, but I never broke one. Only that one time. Never before and never since. The way I figure it, my ex-wife found it in my wallet. And she sure as hell knew I wasn’t using condoms on her. So the bitch stuck a pin through it, or something. She wouldn’t have done it if she’d known it was gonna wind up in her sister. And the fact she never knew was really lucky for me. If she, or her parents, had ever found out who I’d planned to use that condom on, they would have killed me.”
“What happened to the baby?” Hector asked. “Did Juraci have it?”
Lyra was about to take another sip of his cachaca. He took the glass away from his lips and smiled. “You mean you still don’t get it?” he said.
Comprehension dawned for both cops at the same moment. “Are you telling us the baby was Tico?” Hector said.
Lyra nodded. “You think he looks like me?”
“Frankly?” Hector said. “No.”
Lyra sighed. “No,” he said. “Me neither. Caralho, that boy’s even uglier than I am. But now it’s all these years later, and here’s Juraci giving out that the kid’s father died in an accident, and here’s Rafael-”
“Who’s Rafael?”
“Rafael Souza, the boyfriend she had at school. And here’s Rafael, not stepping up to claim he’s the kid’s old man. And nobody else either. So I figured-”
“Why do you think Rafael didn’t put in a claim to be the father?”
“Probably because he doesn’t think he is. Rafael’s father had a good business, an oficina mechanica. He was well-off, and he didn’t want his son marrying some slut. When Juraci got pregnant, he checked around and discovered a few things.”
“Like what?”
“Juraci was screwing a whole bunch of other guys. At least three, probably more. If any of them knew then what they know now, it would have been different. I mean, who wouldn’t want to be the father of the best striker in the world, right? But back then, nobody wanted to be the husband of a slut, and nobody wanted to assume responsibility for somebody else’s baby. All of them bowed out.”
“And you?”
“Nobody ever found out about me, thank God. Like I said, her parents would have killed me. Well, as to the rest of it-hey, you want another drink?”
“No, thanks,” Hector said.
Lyra turned to Goncalves. “You?”
Goncalves shook his head. “I’m driving,” he said.
“Yeah, okay, where were we?”
“How did it all end?” Hector asked. “What happened to your wife? Your in-laws?”
“My wife died last year. Cancer. She was only forty-one. We never had any more kids. She was scared to death of getting pregnant again. Her parents are dead too, killed in one of those bus crashes on the BR116 when they were going to Parana to visit her brother. I hadn’t seen Juraci in years. Graca wouldn’t have her in the house, said she couldn’t forgive her for what she did to their folks, getting pregnant and all.”
“But Graca got pregnant herself.”
“Right. But she snagged a husband out of it, and Juraci didn’t, so that made Graca the passionate wife who just couldn’t wait for the wedding, and her sister was the slut. You want to hear the truth?”
“Tell us.”
“Graca and Juraci never really got along. I figure it was just an excuse to keep her out of the house.”
“I think I see where this is going,” Hector said.
“Where what’s going?”
“What the argument was about.”
“Well,” Lyra said, defensively. “Wouldn’t you do the same thing? I mean, here’s the kid sitting on a pile of money. And it could be my kid. I couldn’t approach him directly. Why should he believe me? But if Juraci admitted she was fucking me, and the kid would agree to take a blood test, hell, to me it was like playing the lottery. You know your chances of winning are pretty slim, but you play anyway, right?”
“Uh huh.”
“It wasn’t hard to find out where she lived, but it was hell to get there. I took a bus to Cotia, got off on the way, and walked to her place. Musta been a good ten kilometers.”
“You didn’t try to call her first?”
“She’s unlisted.”
“So you just showed up on her doorstep and asked to see her?”
“And was she surprised! She was nice enough at first, thought I’d just dropped by for old time’s sake, but when I told her what I wanted, she started treating me like shit. Where were you when I needed you? Stuff like that.”
“She refused to even consider the blood test thing?”
“She did.”
“And it made you angry?”
“Sure it did. Hey, you’re not suggesting that I had anything to do with this kidnapping, are you? Just because of a thing like that?”
“Did you, Jose? Did you have anything to do with it?”
“Hell, no. I wasn’t happy about her attitude, but I gotta admit she was right. I didn’t step up when she was accused of being the family whore. I didn’t go out of my way to stay in touch. I haven’t even seen her in what? Twenty years? And, besides, she’s getting long in the tooth. Maybe she’ll be looking for some company in a few years. I could always try again, right? Hey, you sure you don’t want some more cachaca?”
Chapter Twenty-Two
At nine in the evening, Silva was sitting at Hector’s desk, re-reading Mara’s most recent summary of the team’s activities, when the author put in an appearance.
“That guy, Miranda?” she said. “The bicheiro?”
Silva put down the folder and looked up expectantly.
“What about him, Mara?”
“He’s on the phone. He wants to talk to you.”
Silva looked at his watch.
“What are you doing here at this hour?”
“Waiting for you to take me to dinner.” She smiled, but Silva didn’t think she meant it as a joke. “Line five.”
Silva picked up the receiver and pushed the appropriate button.
“Silva.”
Miranda began without preamble. “Just one question,” he said. “Did the kidnappers tell you they wanted to be paid in diamonds?”
Silva stiffened.
“Where did you get that information?” he said.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” Miranda said. “Get this: Somebody’s checking out the market in illegal gemstones. They want to know how they can best convert diamonds into cash. And they want to know details about the most marketable stones, their size and quality.”
“Names, Miranda. I need names.”
“I don’t have any. Not yet.”
“But you will?”
“By tomorrow morning.”
“And when you get this information, are you going to share it?”
“It depends. I do something for you, maybe you can do something for me. Tit for tat. Let’s talk about it.”
“When and where?”
“Noon. My office.”
Silva thought about it, concluded he had nothing to lose. “There will be two of us, myself and Arnaldo Nunes.”
“Nunes, huh? That the gorilla who was with you last time?”
“I’ll be sure to tell him you said that.”
Miranda laughed. “And I’ll tell my boys you’re coming. Gaspar, particularly. He’s got a thing for your buddy Nunes.”
Miranda hung up. Silva took out his notebook and looked up the Artist’s unlisted number. When he called, Cintia Tadesco picked up the phone.
“Tico’s sleeping,” she said. “I have no intention of waking him up.”