“Surely,” I said, “the foreign-born citizens have a stake here, too. They gave up their own lands voluntarily; they invested their efforts in Ciudad de Vados, and they don’t want to see their work wasted. Ruiz was stressing that when he insisted that this case now is concerned purely with the city — and after all, if it weren’t for the outsiders, the city wouldn’t be here.”
“Ruiz!” said Mendoza with violence, and twisted his mouth as though about to spit. “The hypocrite Ruiz! Listen, señor, and I will tell you what lies behind that smooth and aggressive face!”
“Felipe,” said Maria Posador in a warning tone. Mendoza brushed the word aside and thrust a forefinger through the air toward me.
“Think on this! Our President was married before. As a good Catholic — hah! — when his first wife became an encumbrance, he could not think of divorce. She fell ill. He had Dr. Ruiz to attend her. Within a week she was dead, and yet — -and yet — Vados has made Ruiz his director of health and hygiene.”
“I — you’re trying to tell me Ruiz killed her,” I said. “You should not speak recklessly, Felipe,” Señora Posador sighed, and I turned to her.
“You’re too right! I’ve read some of this guy’s articles in Tiempo which ought never to have seen print. You can’t go around tossing out accusations of bribery — or murder — with no evidence to support them.”
“There is evidence,” Señora Posador contradicted, and kept her violet eyes set on my face. “Enough evidence to ensure that if the regime falls, there will be a firing squad waiting to deal with the good doctor — if he does not flee first.”
“Well, what the hell has stopped you from using the evidence if it exists?”
“The fact,” she said coldly, “that he who would destroy Ruiz by using it will certainly destroy himself if Vados is still in power; he will then destroy Vados and perhaps the country. We are realists, Señor Hakluyt. What does it matter to us if one murderer goes free when to condemn him would be to tear Aguazul with civil war? There are men walking the streets here with worse crimes than murder to answer for. Come, Felipe — and hasta la vista, señor!”
She took Mendoza’s arm, and they walked toward the exit, leaving me with a peculiar taste of ashes in my mouth.
XV
There was a saturnine policeman waiting for me when I returned to the hotel — a man called Carlos Guzman, who spoke good but heavily accented English and presented himself as a sergeant of detectives.
“It is about a threat that was made to you,” he said, and left his words hanging.
I said, “Go on.”
“Allegedly, by a certain Jose Dalban,” he said. And waited again.
I took a deep breath. “Look,” I said. “Why not say what you have to say and get it over with?”
He glanced around; we were in the lounge of the hotel. Not many people were present, and none of them were in earshot of a low-toned voice. He sighed. “Very well, señor. I would have thought you might prefer to discuss it in more private conditions — but as you wish. We are unable to make proceedings on your unsupported word.”
“Well, that’s no more than I expected,” I snapped.
He looked unhappy. “It is not that we doubt you, señor. But you must realize that Señor Dalban is respected and well-known—”
I decided to take a long shot on the strength of a hint Angers had dropped to me. “Especially respected by the police, hey? Respected so much that you turn a blind eye on his affairs.”
Guzman colored a little. He said stiffly, “Your honor is unjustified in his remarks. Señor Dalban conducts a business of import-export, and—”
“And traffics on the side in unofficial goods, I’m told.” I more than half-suspected Dalban’s main business might turn out to be in marijuana or something like that; Guzman’s reply shook me rigid.
“Señor,” he said with a reproachful shake of his head, “is your honor a Catholic?”
Startled, I indicated no. Guzman sighed. “I am, strictly. And yet I would not condemn Señor Dalban for what he does — I come of a large family, and we were very hungry when I was a little boy.”
I began to see that I’d jumped to a stupid conclusion somewhere. “What exactly is this shady business of Dalban’s?” I said slowly.
Guzman glanced around. “Señor, in a Catholic country it is not a respectable matter. But—”
I began to laugh. Suddenly, for all my recollection of his bulk and manner, Dalban seemed far less menacirig. When I had mastered my amusement, I choked out, “Just — contraceptives? Nothing more illegal than contraceptives?”
Guzman waited woodenly till my face was straight again. Then he said, “Even they are not illegal, señor. They are — let us say unpopular in influential quarters. Yet we think, some of us, that he performs a good service for our people.”
“All right,” I said. “Granted. He still came to me and told me that if I didn’t get out of my own accord, he’d seeto it that I was got out forcibly.”
Guzman looked unhappy. “Señor, we are prepared to offer you a bodyguard if you wish — a man who would remain with you day and night. We have good men, well trained. You need only say the word and they are at your command.”
I hesitated. Before learning of Dalban’s real claim to notoriety, I would probably have accepted; now, thinking the question over, I was suddenly reminded of what I had seen on my first day in Ciudad de Vados — the policeman stealing my money from a beggar-boy’s pot.
“No,” I said. “No, I don’t want a bodyguard from your police. And I’ll tell you why.”
He heard me out with his face immobile. When I had finished he gave a nearly imperceptible nod.
“That is known, señor. That young man was dismissed the following day. He has gone back to Puerto Joaquín to work in the docks. He is the only support of his family, and his father was killed in Puerto Joaquín in the great fire. Perhaps the beggar from whom he stole was also the only support of his family.”
He rose to his feet. “I will inform el Jefe of what you have said. Good evening, Señor Hakluyt.”
I didn’t reply. I had a curious sensation, as though I had stepped on what seemed to be firm ground, and instead found myself floundering up to my neck in a river. A river that threatened at every moment to sweep me off my feet.
The Sigueiras case made practically no progress the following day. With incredible persistence Brown hammered at Dr. Ruiz; with corresponding doggedness Ruiz stuck to his guns. Brown got more and more bad-tempered, though the directness and subtlety of his questioning endured; Ruiz got more and more vehement, and it was a considerable relief when the judge adjourned the case until Monday.
Most of all, it was a relief to me. During the course of the week, the city had quieted down. I felt things were near enough back to normal for me to go out and assemble the supplementary data I needed to clarify my tentative conclusions. For one thing, Lucas was deputy chairman of the Citizens’ Party, and seeing how busy he was, I hoped the political front might remain quiet for a while — at least until this Sigueiras case was over.
Accordingly, I went down on Saturday to the market area. The first time I passed the little wall shrine where I had seen the candle burning in memory of Guerrero, I looked for it, but it had gone, and there was no sign of the notice attached to it. I felt a curious sense of relief — as though somehow the influence of symbol-Guerrero was to be measured by that candle.