I think it was two or three weeks to the end of classes, then came the exams and after that the second year of high school would start, which is almost like the third, and almost like already being at university, and nobody could bug us about the length of our sideburns or our moustaches or about the virtues of short hair and all that stuff that makes you want to get out of school, however much you like going round with your schoolmates, having a girlfriend from there and so on. That was the worst of alclass="underline" wanting time to pass quickly. Why should we? And we were lined up in the playground, it was June, the sun was burning our backs, and the headmaster spoke: we would win all the honours in all the competitions, we would be the most outstanding high school in the whole of Havana, in the country, practically in the universe, because we’d been best at working in the countryside, had won the Intercollegiate Games, two prizes in the National Amateurs Festival and ninety percent of us would get to university and nobody would shift us from first place, and we clapped, hurray, hurray, we shouted and thought how wonderful we were, how unbeatable. And the headmaster said there was more good news to come: two comrades had won medals in the National Mathematics Competition, hurray, hurray, more clapping, Comrade Fausto Fleites, hurray, hurray, a gold medal in the category of eleventh grade, and, hurray, hurray, Comrade Rafael Morín, a silver medal in the thirteenth grade category, and Fausto and Rafael climbed onto the platform where all the speeches were being made, real champions, arms aloft in salute, smiling, naturally, they’d showed they were tremendous wavers of the flag, and Tamara kept on applauding after almost everyone else had stopped, even jumped for joy and Skinny asked, hey, pal, is this for show or did our girlfriend there really not know? And right, she just must have known, but she was too, too happy, as if she had just found out, jumping for joy, swinging her butt, in a way that even showed through the voluminous spoilsport tunic she was wearing, and Rafael walked over to the microphone, and I told Skinny, be prepared, you animal, under this scorching sun and the way he likes to gab, but I got it wrong, I almost always get it wrong: he said he and Fausto were going to dedicate their prizes to the teachers in the maths department and to the school management team, but anyway he exhorted students to give it their all in the final examinations and stay in the forefront of the results table etcetera, etcetera, and while he was talking I looked at him and thought he was a fantastic guy after all, bright and dapper, silver-tongued and blue-eyed, with a girlfriend like Tamara who was always so well turned out and I muttered, fuck, I reckon I do really envy the bastard.
“What do you think, my friend?” asked Manolo as he switched on the engine and the Count smoked the final remnants of the cigarette he’d not dared light at María Antonia’s.
“Drive to headquarters, we’ve got to talk to the Boss and see whether we can’t interview today the deputy minister responsible for the enterprise,” said the Count as he took one last look down the almost lugubrious passageway to the home which was Rafael Morín’s birthplace. “Why didn’t he find a way to get his mother a house?”
The car proceeded along the Avenue of October Tenth towards Agua Dulce, and Manolo accelerated down the hill.
“Just what I was thinking. Rafael Morín’s lifestyle and that homestead don’t fit.”
“Or are too good a fit, right? Now what we need to know is where he got to on the afternoon of the thirty-first, or find out if he really was at the enterprise and why he told Tamara he’d be here with his mother.”
“You’ll have to catch up with Morín or find a babalao to read the bones and clear the way, right?” the sergeant replied as he stopped the car at the traffic lights on the corner of Toyo. On the pavement opposite, the queue to get the vital Sunday bread ration was a block long. “Hey, Conde, Vilma lives just round that corner.”
“And how did you get on last night?”
“Just great, that girl’s a scorcher. You know, I’ll probably get married, the whole bit.”
“Uh-huh. You know, Manolo I’ve heard that one before, but I wasn’t asking you about Vilma and your sex life but about work, but just watch it. If you and your carryings on get you AIDS, I’ll visit you in hospital once a month and bring you some good novels.”
“What’s got in to you today, Maestro? You woke up as sharp as a razor.”
“Take it easy. Yes, I woke up really going for it. I’m up to here with Rafael Morín and when I heard his mother talking I felt sick, as if I’d done something wrong…”
“All right, but don’t take it out on me,” the sergeant protested, as if he felt hard done by. “Look, El Greco and Crespo have been looking for Zoilita all night, and we agreed they’d report to me at ten am, so they’ll be expecting me. I asked for a report on all missing persons over the last two years, and I’ll get that at eleven, and we can see if there’s another case like this or whatever, Conde, but all this is quite crazy.”
“When we get to headquarters, also phone the guy responsible for security at the enterprise and see if Rafael went there on the afternoon of the thirty-first. If it turns out he did, get him to arrange for us to see the person on duty.”
“All right. Can I tune into some music?”
“Where did you get that aerial from?”
“If you’ve got friends…” He shrugged his shoulders and smiled. Switched on the car-radio and looked for a music programme. He tried two or three and finally plumped for “Oh, vida” sung by the pure voice of Benny Moré in a programme entirely devoted to his music.
“I think you’re exaggerating, Conde,” Manolo commented as they listened to “Hoy como ayer” and drove through the Plaza de la Revolución. “You may not like it but this is just another case, and you can’t spend your day going from one bad mood to another.”
“Manolo, my grandfather used to say ‘Born a donkey die a horse…’ That’s progress enough for me.”
“Lieutenant, the major says you should go to see him as soon as you get here. He’s up in his office,” said the duty officer, and the Count returned his salute.
On Sunday morning the peace and quiet in the street also permeated headquarters. All the routine cases, those which had gone on too long and didn’t look as if they’d ever be solved, those which followed normal procedures and were of no great import, were adjourned for the day, and the detectives disappeared and left headquarters eerily calm. Secretaries, office workers and researchers, identikit and forensic workers took the day off, and for twenty-four hours headquarters lost the stormy frenetic pace it had the rest of the week. Only those on permanent duty or engaged in urgent investigations were working in that building, which seemed bigger, darker and less human on Sunday mornings, when it was possible to hear the click of the dominoes with which the policemen condemned to guard duty attempted to relieve their boredom. Only the Boss had worked every Sunday for the last fifteen years: Major Rangel demanded that every thread in the fabrics being woven by his subordinates pass through his hands, and he followed the movement traced by each investigation with the passion of a man possessed, from Monday to Sunday. The Count knew that the warning from the duty officer was more than an order, it was a diktat from his chief, and he asked Manolo to look out the reports and expect him in the incubator in half an hour.
The peace in the building persuaded him he should wait for the lift. The lights indicated it was on its way down, fourth, third, second, and the door to the cage opened like the theatre curtain the Count always imagined, and he now practically collided with the man getting out.
“Maestro, weren’t you going to make Sunday a day of rest?”