Sitting in the office of the chief inspector, a slim type with a sallow complexion and an embittered appearance, she confessed everything: how she dissolved the rat poison in her husband’s meal, how she found him dead after returning home. When she was going to tell him about the way she had chopped up her husband’s body, the policeman asked her to wait there a moment and left the office. From her chair, with her bag placed on her lap, she heard him shouting for “the damned voice recorder.” Five minutes later, he returned to the office with it in his hand. He closed the frosted-glass door and warned her that from then on, if she had no objections, everything she said would be recorded.
“It seemed fine to me, so I went on talking.”
Staring at the red light on one side of the voice recorder, Irene explained to the astonished chief inspector how she had chopped up her husband’s body, boiled the remains, and distributed the flesh in the park for the cats to eat, a little every day and always in places some distance apart so as not to raise suspicion.
“When I explained to him how I had ground the bones, I realised that total silence had fallen over the police station. I looked towards the door and saw that all the officers were listening on the other side of the glass,” said Irene, throwing her head back, laughing softly.
“And did it work?” I asked her. “Did you stop hearing the voice?”
“Oh yes! At first he protested quite a lot, and of course he didn’t stop shouting for a minute. But when I finished and the chief inspector asked me to record a statement to confirm that I had confessed of my own accord, without having been subjected to police brutality of any sort, and I agreed, the voice fell silent.”
“Then?”
“I never heard it again. That psychologist was right,” she concluded with a charming smile. “They tried me, found me guilty, and I served my sentence in Soto del Real. My lawyer insisted I shouldn’t mention the voice because, according to him, it would seem that I was making it up to plead temporary insanity and thus would appear guiltier in the judge’s eyes. They reduced my sentence because of work and good behaviour and, as I had finished my teaching degree in prison, they put me on a rehabilitation program. That’s how I ended up giving night classes. And that’s it, I suppose.”
I stared at her without knowing what to say. Irene was looking at me too. After a while, she went on, “Do you still love me?”
Did I love her? I searched deep down for a response and got it almost straightaway: Yes, I loved her. I suppose it had all happened so quickly, so abruptly, that I didn’t have time to reconsider my feelings towards her. Suddenly I remembered the reason why I had invited her to dinner that night. I put my hand in my pocket and took out the little box. I offered it to her, opening it slowly.
Irene opened her eyes wide; I would swear she was on the verge of tears.
“My God! Is it for me?”
I nodded, taking out the ring and placing it on her ring finger. My heart was beating in my chest like a little bird’s wings. Irene raised her hand in front of her face to admire the stone’s glow under a streetlight.
“It’s lovely!” she exclaimed. Huge tears ran down her cheeks. “It’s lovely.”
We had a long hug next to Puerto Chico. The halyards struck the masts like the erratic ticking of a clock. A road-sweeper’s van with its flashing light, very like that of an ambulance, brushed the whole of Castelar.
We went back with our arms around each other’s waists, in silence. The tide had begun to go out and you could hardly hear the sound of the water from the pier. In the Jardines de Pereda there were just a couple of prostitutes, looking for a treble. For them, the night had only just started.
We got in my car and went to her house. Irene shone, pure and clean, like a religious icon. We made love. When we finished, I heard sobbing on her side of the bed. I kissed her tears and asked her why she was crying.
“They’re tears of joy,” she responded. And we made love again.
There’s still one chapter left. One last chapter.
That same night, a few hours after we made love for the second time, I was awoken by a light whisper of sheets behind me. I thought Irene had changed her position, so, after seeing on the clock on the bedside table that it wasn’t yet five in the morning, I got ready to go back to sleep. But I couldn’t. I began to go over and over the maddening story that Irene had told me, recalling every one of her words, the taste of that kiss on the bench in front of Puerto Chico, the twinkle in her eyes when she saw the ring, the joy, and so on. The more I thought about it, the more convinced I became that Irene was the love of my life. In my head it seemed as if I could hear bells, wedding bells. We would have children. We would grow old together. I realised my life was really just beginning that night, and I felt like crying as Irene had done hours earlier: crying out of pure happiness.
The room was dark and silent. The only light was the luminous digits on the clock bathing the chair with my clothes in a faint crimson glow, the chest of drawers at the back, the window with the blinds down. I stayed very still in that calm scene, lying on my side, smiling in the darkness while the smell of our sex pervaded the air I was inhaling. I may have gone back to sleep.
After a while, however, I heard another noise and this time I was wide awake. It was a sharp sound, the scraping of metal on Irene’s side of the bed. Metal scraping against metal in the darkness, slowly, very slowly. All my hair stood on end instantly, and I felt as if my testicles had turned into tiny ball bearings. Somehow, I managed to stay still.
I heard a whisper near my ear, the stifled voice of a woman.
“I don’t want to do it,” whimpered the voice. I shuddered. It was Irene.
The sound was extinguished, but the silence terrified me even more. If the sound had been produced by something being removed — something metallic — hidden between the mattress and the bedsprings, that silence meant it was already right out, in her hand. Suddenly, fleeting images of the pig slaughter filled my head. Knives. Enormous butcher’s knives.
“He’s sleeping. It’s time,” muttered a man’s voice behind me in the darkness. I recalled the way Irene had imitated Paco’s voice, and I felt my heart beat faster in my chest.
“I don’t want to.”
“Do it.”
“No.”
I heard that metallic screeching sound again. I thought about old swords being replaced in their scabbards.
“You’re right,” replied the man’s voice. “Perhaps it’s a little too soon...”
“It is.”
“Too soon,” insisted the voice.
The metallic sound was extinguished again, and only the darkness remained, the red chest of drawers, the clothes upon the chair, the silence. Whatever was there under the mattress had been put back. I stayed still. I heard the whisper of the sheets behind me, and I felt Irene’s breath, her hot breath, next to my ear. And afterwards she slipped her arm round me from behind, her head leaning on the pillow beside me, and her legs tucked into the gap next to mine. Sleeping by my side. Sleeping peacefully by my side.
Now I couldn’t get back to sleep. The clock on the bedside table had just gone seven-thirty. I got up and dressed without taking my eyes off the love of my life, who was still in bed. When she asked in a sleepy voice where I was going, I told her I was on my way out to buy something for breakfast. I quickly closed the door of the flat behind me. I flew down the stairs and went out into the cool street. I began running towards the car, parked a couple of streets away. But before reaching it, I slowed down. On the other side of the street, the smell of freshly baked bread was wafting out of a bakery.
I stopped for some five minutes. I don’t know what went through my head during that time, but what’s certain is that eventually I began walking, crossed the street, and went into the bakery.