An indistinguishable shape sat behind the wheel. On the screen it was no more than a featureless blob.
“Have you ever seen Senhor Nabuco driving this van?” Silva said.
All three men shook their heads.
“People here don’t drive vans,” the older man said. “They drive BMWs and Mercs, stuff like that. I remember thinking a van was funny.”
“Funny, but you were too lazy to get off your fat ass and have a closer look, weren’t you?” Antonio said.
“Don’t try spreading the blame for your incompetence to me, you fuck.”
Silva’s phone rang. He left them sniping at each other and stepped into the lobby to answer it.
“Chief Inspector Silva?”
He didn’t recognize the voice.
“I’m Silva.”
“Chief Inspector, this is Warden Fuentes.”
Fuentes ran the penitentiary where Fiorello Rosa, the ace kidnapper, had been incarcerated for six of the last seven years.
“Rosa wants to talk to you, wants to know if it could be this afternoon.”
“Even sooner,” Silva said.
“No hurry,” Fuentes said, “He isn’t going anywhere.”
They were heading toward their car when Arnaldo came to a sudden stop.
“Look,” he said.
Gaspar, the black man who’d been Miranda’s bodyguard, was standing next to one of the trucks, talking to a firefighter.
Money changed hands.
The federal cops changed direction.
“Gaspar, isn’t it?” Silva said when they came within earshot.
“Yeah,” the black man said, “that’s right. Gaspar.”
No broad grin this time. He looked angry as hell.
“I gotta get back to it,” the fireman said and hurried off.
“I suppose you told him you were a reporter,” Silva said.
“None of your damned business.”
“What did he tell you?”
“That some filho da puta put a bomb under the boss’s apartment and blew him, and his wife, and his two kids, and some friends of mine all to hell.”
“How come you weren’t in there with them?” Arnaldo said.
“Not that it’s any of your fucking business,” Gaspar said, “but it was my night off. You know how old those kids were?”
“We know,” Silva said.
“Come on,” Arnaldo said, “give us some help here. Who did it?”
Gaspar exploded. “You think I know? You think I don’t want to know? What kind of a sick fuck does something like this? What kind of a callous bastard kills kids so they can get at their old man? You and me, cop, we’re asking ourselves the same questions.”
“You sound as pissed off as I am,” Arnaldo said. “You got any kids?”
“I got two. Girls. Just like the boss had.”
“Did you know,” Silva said, “that your boss called us and scheduled a meeting?”
“I knew,” Gaspar said. “There’s a roster. Your names were on it.”
“Any idea what he wanted to talk to us about?”
“No,” Gaspar said. “It was none of my business. My business was to keep him safe, that’s all.” He turned to Arnaldo. “And spare me any wise-ass remarks. I already told you. It was my night off.”
“It’s gonna surprise you to learn that I wasn’t gonna make any wise-ass remarks,” Arnaldo said. “Who might know what he wanted to talk to us about?”
“Nobody. The boss didn’t blab his business to anybody.”
“Speaking of business,” Silva said, “what’s likely to happen to Miranda’s operation now that he’s dead?”
“Even if I knew, you think I’d tell a federal cop? I will tell you one thing, though.”
“What’s that?”
“The guy who did this is dead meat. And it won’t matter a damn if you’re the first ones to catch up with him. People can always be got to-wherever they are, jail or anywhere else.”
“A comforting thought,” Arnaldo said.
“Maybe not for you,” Gaspar said, “but it sure as hell is for me.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
“Killing Miranda is one thing,” Fiorello Rosa said. “He was a cold-blooded murderer. But his two little girls? That, Chief Inspector, is way out of line. Whoever did it should rot in hell.”
“I agree,” Silva said.
“His wife, now, that’s another matter. She was an adult. She had a choice. She must have known what kind of a man her husband was.”
“Did your wife know about you?”
“Ex-wife. Yes, she did. She told everyone she didn’t, but she did. Before I took my first customer, I told her what I was planning to do. Share the benefit, I said, but be aware there’s a risk-and you’ll be sharing that as well.”
“And she accepted that?”
“She said she did. But the truth is Carolina is a person incapable of sharing. I clung to some illusions to the contrary before I was arrested, but she disabused me of them in short order. I wasn’t in jail for twenty-four hours before she’d emptied our joint bank accounts. Less than a week after that, she filed for divorce. Fortunately, I’d lived with her long enough to… well, never mind. Enough about her. Have you given any thought to my proposition?”
“I have.”
“And?”
“And we’ll discuss it if you’re granted a parole.”
“ When I’m granted a parole.”
“You’re that confident?”
“Oh, yes, Chief Inspector, I am. I’m extremely confident.”
“Because?”
“Because, with a few exceptions, like yourself, this country has the best justice system money can buy.”
“I’m all too aware of that. But haven’t you been telling everyone you’re broke?”
“I have, haven’t I?” Rosa sighed. “Well, I suppose I’ll just have to find the money somewhere.”
“I think,” Silva said, “you’re likely to have more luck than we did when looking for the same money.”
Rosa responded with a smile.
“Why did you want to talk to me?” Silva said.
“To share my knowledge of Ketamine.”
“Ketawhat?”
“Ketamine. The substance found in the syringe. Didn’t you read the lab report?”
“I’ve been busy. What’s Ketamine? I’ve never heard of it.”
“There’s no reason why you should have. But I, before being totally reformed by this excellent penal system of ours, made it my business to familiarize myself with drugs that might have been of use to me in my former profession. Ketamine was one of them.”
“You have my full attention, Professor.”
“Ketamine was developed by Parke-Davis back in the early sixties. Initially, it was employed as an anesthetic by American medics during the Vietnam War. Small doses of it will make you high, medium doses will knock you out, large doses will kill you.”
“Did you ever use it?” Silva asked.
“No. I wrote it off as too dangerous. Psychotomimetic effects have been observed in its use.”
“ What kind of effects?” Arnaldo said.
“Psychotomimetic. Delusions, hallucinations, the reactions we’ve come to expect from opiates.”
“How easy is it to get, this Ketamine?”
“Very. In the days before my total transformation into an honest citizen, I could have acquired the drug with no difficulty whatsoever. Ketamine is still widely used in veterinary medicine. A single visit to my local unethical veterinarian would have provided me with enough to treat a dozen unwilling patients. I think it’s unlikely that the situation has changed very much over the course of the last seven years.”
“Interesting,” Silva said, “but I don’t see how knowing any of this is going to be of help. As you say, any veterinarian who’d provided the stuff to Juraci’s kidnappers would, by definition, be unethical-and unlikely to come forward. Where else would one get Ketamine, if not from a veterinarian?”
“From narcotics dealers. The street name is Special K.”
“We can hardly expect any of those people to come forward either. Other sources?”
“Pharmacies. I imagine a number of them would stock it to serve veterinarians in their area.”
“Maybe. Other thoughts?”
“On Ketamine? No.”
“Something else then?”
“It’s occurred to me that the gang you’re after is probably quite small.”