“Ketamine. Ever heard of it?”
“No. Where are you going with all of this?”
“We found a syringe in Senhora Santos’s bedroom. It contained traces of Ketamine, a drug used in veterinary medicine.”
“Used for what?”
“To anesthetize animals.”
“Animals?” Tico said, shocked. “And the bastards used it on my mom?”
“We think they did,” Silva said.
“Could it… could it have hurt her?”
“We don’t think so. It was originally developed for human use.”
“Well, thank God for that,” Tico said.
“I can’t see that wimp Tarso getting involved in something like this,” Cintia said. “He wouldn’t have the balls. You done?”
Silva got to his feet. He’d had quite enough of Cintia Tadesco for one day.
“We’re done,” he said.
“Good,” she said, and picked up her magazine.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Silva had switched off his mobile phone while they were in the Artist’s apartment. After they were back in the car, he remembered to turn it on again. There were three missed calls and a voicemail, all from the Director. He listened to the voicemail and spat out an expletive.
“What?” Arnaldo said, starting the engine.
Before Silva could respond, the phone started to vibrate. Still annoyed at what he’d just heard, and without glancing at the caller ID, he pushed the button and took the call.
“Director?”
“I thought my promotion was supposed to be a secret.”
It was Hector, not Sampaio.
“Not funny,” Silva said.
“I thought it was.”
“Really? Well how’s this to take the smile off your face? The reason I addressed you as Director was because Sampaio is anxious to get in touch with me. When you called, I thought it was him, making another attempt.”
“I’m still smiling.”
“You won’t be when I finish. He left a voicemail. The reason he called was to tell me he’s coming to Sao Paulo.”
“You’re right. I’ve stopped smiling. He’s coming to stick his nose into the investigation?”
“He’s coming to attend a cocktail party at the governor’s mansion.”
“That’s a relief.”
“Not entirely. He has to be prepared to hold forth on the great job he’s doing.”
“Meaning we’ll have to give him a briefing.”
“Meaning exactly that. Second floor meeting room. Four PM the day after tomorrow. Tell Mara.”
“I’m sure she’ll be as pleased as I am. Where are you?”
“We just left the Artist. We’re on our way to you.”
“So is that fire inspector, Elisabeth Correia.”
“She’s an examiner, not an inspector. What does she want?”
“Says she found something important.”
“What?”
“She wouldn’t tell me, says she has to show us.”
“Give her some coffee. Arnaldo and I will be there in twenty minutes.”
They weren’t. But neither was Elisabeth Correia.
“Tractor-trailer jackknifed on the Limao bridge,” she said when she bustled in a quarter of an hour later. “I had to make one hell of a detour.”
She wore jeans, a denim shirt and rubber boots. She smelled of citrus perfume, smoke and ashes. She was carrying a paper bag.
She put the bag on the conference room’s big table and helped herself to coffee from the thermos flask on the sideboard. “Most people have no idea what we can find by sifting through the detritus of a fire. We can usually determine where it started, and how it started. The how can occasionally lead us to the what, the object that actually set it off. Knowing the what can sometimes lead us to the who.” She added a packet of sugar, and dissolved it with one of the stirring-sticks. “It seldom works like that, but sometimes we get lucky.”
“Thanks for the lecture,” Arnaldo said, “but what’s the point?”
“The point,” she said, taking a sip, “is this.” She thrust her free hand into the bag and took out a fistful of plastic envelopes. “These are all components of the device used to detonate the bomb. The timer was purely mechanical. There were no electronics involved.”
“So it was like a clock?” Silva said.
“It was exactly like a clock, not a digital clock, but an oldfashioned clock driven by a spring. And it wasn’t an off-theshelf item. It was built from scratch.”
Silva turned to Arnaldo. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
“Talafero.”
Elisabeth looked from one to the other. “How about you guys share? What’s with the knowing looks?”
“In confidence?” Silva asked.
“Absolutely,” she said. “Dish.”
“Have you ever heard the name Jordan Talafero?”
“Who hasn’t? He owns the Spartans. And the bastard just sold the Artist to Real Madrid for a gazillion dollars.”
“A woman who likes football,” Arnaldo said. “Marry me.”
She looked him up and down.
“I don’t think so,” she said. “I’m a single mother, but I’m not that desperate.”
“Talafero is an expert on clocks,” Silva said. “His office is full of them. They’re his hobby. He collects them, he repairs them, and he undoubtedly knows how to build one.”
“This might be easier than I thought,” she said. “I’ve got a present for you.”
“What kind of present?”
She selected an envelope from the pile. “I was saving this one for last,” she said, handing it to Silva. “Look close. No, not on that side, on the other.”
Silva put on his reading glasses and squinted. The object in the bag was a blackened strip of something that looked like plastic. On one side, clearly delineated, was a fingerprint.
“I already made a photograph of that,” she said. “Unfortunately, it’s not a thumbprint.”
Thumbprints, like photos, were an integral part of all national identity cards. The Federal Police had thumbprints on file for the vast majority of the adults in the country. But only thumbprints, not prints of any of the other fingers.
“Visualize a clock,” Elisabeth said, “that, instead of an hour hand and a minute hand, had two contact points. The points, in turn, were wired up to a battery and a blasting cap. When the two points came together they closed the circuit. That sent an electrical impulse to the blasting cap and boom!”
“I understand. Go on.”
“The wires from the detonator were fastened to the power source, in this case a battery, with electrical tape.”
“And this,” Silva said, holding up the bag, “is a piece of that tape?”
“Uh huh. The part wound around the battery was protected from the explosion by what remained of the battery wall. It was blown into the toilet, where the water prevented it from burning up. When I unwound it-voila-I found the print.”
“Great work,” Silva said. “It’s as good as a signature.”
“It is, isn’t it?” she preened. “If it’s Talafero’s print, I’d say he’s gonna have a pretty hard time explaining how it got there.”
“I’d say you’re right,” Silva said. “Now, when first we spoke, you suggested the bomb might have been set off in the apartment below Miranda’s.”
“No might about it. It was set off in the apartment below Miranda’s.”
“That apartment,” Silva said, “was owned by a man named Atilio Nabuco. He had a wife and two kids.”
“ Had is the correct tense. All four of them died in the explosion. It was murder.”
“How can you be sure?”
“Because we found all four of them together. They were handcuffed and shackled to the plumbing.”
“What a bastard that Talafero is,” Arnaldo said when the fire examiner had gone. “I didn’t like the prick from the moment I set eyes on him.”
“Ask Mara to see if there’s a complete set of his prints on file,” Silva said to Hector. “Maybe they were archived for some reason, a weapons permit perhaps.”
The Federal Police had, long since, digitalized and centralized fingerprints from every law enforcement organization in the country. In the early days of his career, Silva had spent a great deal of time lobbying for the establishment of such a database. Now, some thirty years on, the system was almost as good as the American FBI’s IAFIS.