‘You don’t have the guts,’ he whispered.
He placed his hand on the barrel and smiled at me. I pulled the trigger. The bullet blew off his hand, flinging his arm back. Marcos fell to the floor, holding his mutilated, smoking wrist, while his face, splattered with gunpowder burns, dissolved into a grimace of pain, a silent howl. I got up and left him there, bleeding to death in a pool of his own urine.
21
Somehow I managed to crawl through the narrow streets of the Raval as far as the Paralelo, where a row of taxis had formed outside the Apolo theatre. I slipped into the first one I could find. When he heard the door, the driver turned round; he took one look at me and pulled a face. I fell onto the back seat, ignoring his protests.
‘Listen, you’re not going to die on me back there, are you?’
‘The sooner you take me where I want to go, the sooner you’ll get shot of me.’
The driver cursed under his breath and started the engine.
‘Where do you want to go?’
I don’t know, I thought.
‘Just drive and I’ll let you know.’
‘Drive where?’
‘Pedralbes.’
Twenty minutes later I glimpsed the lights of Villa Helius. I pointed them out to the driver, who couldn’t get rid of me fast enough. He left me at the entrance to the mansion and almost forgot to charge me the fare. I staggered up to the large front door and rang the bell, then collapsed on the steps and leaned my head against the wall. I heard footsteps approaching and at some point thought I saw the door open and heard someone saying my name. I felt a hand on my forehead and I seemed to recognise Vidal’s eyes.
‘I’m sorry, Don Pedro,’ I begged. ‘I had nowhere else to go…’
I heard him call out and after a while I felt various hands taking my legs and arms and lifting me. When I opened my eyes again I was in Don Pedro’s bedroom, lying on the same bed he had shared with Cristina during the two short months of their marriage. I sighed. Vidal was watching me from the end of the bed.
‘Don’t speak now,’ he said. ‘The doctor is on his way.’
‘Don’t believe them, Don Pedro,’ I moaned. ‘Don’t believe them.’
‘Of course not.’
Vidal picked up a blanket and covered me with it.
‘I’ll go downstairs to wait for the doctor,’ he said. ‘Get some rest.’
After a while I heard footsteps and voices coming into the bedroom. I could feel my clothes being removed and glimpsed the dozens of cuts covering my body like bloodstained ivy. I felt tweezers poking into my wounds, pulling out needles of glass that brought with them bits of skin and flesh. I felt the heat of antiseptic and the pricks of the needle as the doctor sewed up my wounds. There was no longer any pain, only tiredness. Once I had been bandaged, sewn up and mended like a broken puppet, the doctor and Vidal covered me with a sheet and placed my head on the sweetest, softest pillow I had ever come across. I opened my eyes to see the doctor’s face, an aristocratic-looking gentleman with a reassuring smile. He was holding a hypodermic syringe.
‘You’ve been lucky, young man,’ he said as he plunged the needle into my arm.
‘What’s that?’ I mumbled.
Vidal’s face appeared next to the doctor’s.
‘It will help you rest.’
A cold mist spread up my arm and across my chest. I felt myself falling into a chasm of black velvet while Vidal and the doctor watched me from on high. Gradually, the world closed until it was reduced to a single drop of light that evaporated in my hands. I sank into that warm, chemical peace from which I would have preferred never to escape.
I remember a world of black water under the ice. Moonlight touched the frozen vault, breaking into thousands of dusty beams that swayed in the current as it pulled me away. The white mantle draped around her body undulated, the silhouette of her body just visible in the translucent waters. Cristina stretched out a hand towards me and I fought against that cold, heavy current. When our fingers were only a hair’s breadth apart, a sombre mass unfolded its wings behind her, enveloping her like an explosion of ink. Tentacles of black light surrounded her arms, her throat and her face, dragging her inexorably towards a dark void.
22
I awoke to hear Víctor Grandes saying my name. I sat bolt upright, not recognising where I was – if anything, the place looked like a suite in a luxury hotel. The shooting pain from the dozens of cuts that streaked my torso brought me back to reality. I was in Vidal’s bedroom in Villa Helius. Through the closed shutters, a hint of mid-afternoon light. A fire was blazing in the grate and the room was warm. The voices came from the floor below. Pedro Vidal and Víctor Grandes.
Ignoring the stinging of my skin, I got out of bed. My dirty, bloodstained clothes had been thrown onto an armchair. I looked for the coat. The gun was still in the pocket. I drew back the hammer and left the room, following the trail of voices as far as the stairs. I went down a few steps, keeping close to the wall.
‘I’m very sorry about your men, inspector,’ I heard Vidal saying. ‘Rest assured that if David gets in touch with me, or if I hear of his whereabouts, I’ll let you know immediately.’
‘I’m grateful for your help, Señor Vidal. I’m sorry to bother you in the circumstances, but the situation is extremely serious.’
‘I understand. Thank you for your visit.’
The sound of the front door closing. Vidal’s laboured breathing at the foot of the staircase. I went down a few more steps and found him leaning his forehead against the door. When he heard me he opened his eyes and turned round.
He didn’t say anything, just looked at the gun I held in my hands. I put it down on the small table at the bottom of the stairs.
‘Come on, let’s see if we can find you some clean clothes,’ he said.
I followed him to a huge dressing room that looked more like a costume museum. All the exquisite suits I remembered from Vidal’s years of glory were there. Dozens of ties, shoes, and cufflinks in red velvet boxes.
‘This is all from when I was young. It should fit you.’
Vidal chose for me. He handed me a shirt that was probably worth as much as a small plot of land, a three-piece suit made to measure in London and a pair of Italian shoes that would not have disgraced the boss’s wardrobe. I dressed in silence while Vidal observed me with a pensive look.
‘A bit wide on the shoulders, but you’ll have to make do,’ he said, handing me a pair of sapphire cufflinks.
‘What did the inspector tell you?’
‘Everything.’
‘And you believed him?’
‘What does it matter?’
‘It matters to me.’
Vidal sat on a stool by a wall that was covered in mirrors from ceiling to floor.
‘He says you know where Cristina is,’ he said.
I did not deny it.
‘Is she alive?’
I looked him in the eye and, very slowly, nodded my head. Vidal gave a weak smile, eluding my eyes. Then he burst into tears, emitting a deep groan that came from his very soul. I sat down next to him and hugged him.
‘Forgive me, Don Pedro, forgive me…’
Later, as the sun began to drop over the horizon, Vidal gathered my old clothes and threw them into the fire. Before he abandoned my coat to the flames he pulled out the copy of The Steps of Heaven and handed it to me.