The Case of Lisandra P. (19 page)

“Estéban! Estéban!”

Eva Maria goes into the living room. Estéban is sprawled on the sofa. His bandoneon between his feet. Eva Maria stands in front of him.

“I forbade you from going through the things in my room: where are they?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Stop this right now—where are my bottles? Answer me. I can't stand it when you lie.”

Estéban runs his fingers through his hair.

“Oh, okay . . . you mean, ‘Where are
my
bottles?' Since I'm the one who always finds you dead drunk . . . they're sort of my bottles, too . . . well, as it happens . . . I drank them . . . to see, Mama . . . to see what it is that gives you greater comfort than I do . . .”

Estéban gets to his feet and staggers. Eva Maria slaps him. Estéban lifts his hand to his cheek.

“My mother has just touched me . . . for the first time in all these years . . . this slap is like a caress on my cheek . . . Here . . .”

Estéban takes a banknote out of his pocket. He flings it in Eva Maria's face.

“Go get yourself something to drink . . . it's true, it helps . . .
you can celebrate good riddance to me . . . I'm leaving . . . you happy now? . . . For five years you've made it clear I have no more mother . . . so tonight, lemme tell you, you have no more son . . . I won't come back . . . I tell you . . . solemnly . . .”

Estéban stands up straight.

“'Cause if I don't tell you . . . you won't even notice . . . I come back later and later every night but what good does it do . . . Not once did I find you worrying yourself sick on the sofa . . . the way any mother on the planet would do . . . you hear me, Mama? I know you don't see me anymore but you spend all your time listening to my tape recorder . . . that means you can hear, right? . . . You think they're inhuman, those people who killed Stella, but look at yourself . . . you managed to kill us, as surely as whoever killed Stella.”

Eva Maria slaps Estéban again. With full force. On both cheeks. Estéban lifts his chin.

“I talk about my sister if I want to talk about my sister . . . You're sorry it wasn't me who died . . . instead of Stella . . . you would rather I had died in Stella's place . . . isn't that what you told your shrink? Well, sorry, Mama . . . forgive me for being alive . . . but I'm out of here . . . there . . . Mama, I'm gonna do like you . . . I'm gonna go and mourn my sister and try and forget I even have a mother . . .”

Estéban picks up his bandoneon. He walks unsteadily out of the room. A few false notes escape from the instrument. Eva Maria doesn't move. She hears the door slam. She looks at the banknote in her hands. Eva Maria doesn't move.

Eva Maria leans over her handbag. Her hands are trembling. She takes out the photo. The early morning has made her lose her composure from the night before. And finding herself across from Vittorio again, too. Eva Maria puts the photograph on the table between them. She murmurs, “Who is this woman?” And yet Eva Maria had prepared something very different. Mentally.

 • • • 

I know this woman is your mistress, Vittorio. And that is why you argued with your wife that night. Because you had a mistress. Your wife had asked you, for the umpteenth time, to stay with her, and not to go out that evening; she had put on a new dress to try to boost her chances, but you didn't notice, because you had her there all day long before you, your wife, and because you already possessed her you didn't see her anymore, you were too full of thoughts of another woman, you didn't give in, you were annoyed and eager to leave, like any husband who thinks that nothing sublime can ever occur anymore between those four walls of home. That is why neither the usher nor the box office attendant remembers seeing you that night, for the simple reason that you weren't at the movies. Because you were with another woman, somewhere, at her house or at the hotel. And when you'd finished, because any mistress worthy of the name is someone you leave during the night, you went
home; and you say that the door to the apartment was unlocked, and you immediately noticed a terrible draft, there was loud music coming from the living room, and everything was in a mess as if there had been a struggle; you instantly knew something had happened, you closed the window and looked for Lisandra everywhere, you ran into the kitchen, the bedroom, the bathroom, and it was only then that the fear of understanding came over you. You stepped over the broken vase on the floor, with the puddle of water all around it, you heard a shrill cry in the street, and you opened the window in the living room again, and Lisandra's body was lying downstairs. I believe all that, Vittorio—I want to believe you—but admit that this woman is your mistress, tell me the truth; I have to be able to trust you if I'm to go on helping you; rest assured, I won't jump to any hasty conclusions, I won't judge you.

 • • • 

But the early morning has made her lose her composure from the night before. Eva Maria murmurs.

“Who is this woman, Vittorio?”

“I don't know her.”

“You don't know her?”

“No, what is this photograph about?”

Eva Maria leans over her handbag. Her hands are trembling. She puts the photograph away. And her hopes. Of frankness. Sincerity. Eva Maria knows that Vittorio is lying. If Pepe had been there, he would have confirmed it; the old man who reads body language would have proved it to her, and the proof would have been implacable: a raised eyebrow, a movement of his head, tension in the jaw, Vittorio would have betrayed himself. Eva Maria puts the photograph in her handbag. She thinks of Estéban; he didn't come home all night, he didn't come back. Eva Maria has lost heart. She is ready to give in; her body is suddenly too heavy to carry. Just shifting it to sit down across from Vittorio is overwhelming. Eva Maria begins to cry. Vittorio draws closer.

“What is going on? Where did you find that photograph?”

“I took it at Lisandra's funeral.”

“Why are you crying? Calm down.”

Eva Maria does not calm down. She looks at Vittorio, and behind him, at the dirty beige walls of the visitors' room. She articulates.

“That huge peacock in your study, that huge painting, it was a present from Lisandra, wasn't it?”

“How did you know?”

So she was right. At least partially. Eva Maria composes herself. She will start over again from there.

“You don't know the legend?”

“What legend?”

“The legend of Argos?”

“No.”

Eva Maria feels her resolve grow stronger.

“Hera, the wife of Zeus, had him watched by Argos, the spy with a hundred eyes. That was the best she could do, given his rich love life. Argos had a hundred eyes spread all over his head: fifty that were asleep and fifty that were constantly on the lookout, so there was no way to get around his vigilance. Zeus was in love with the priestess Io, and this aroused Hera's jealousy. To reassure his wife, Zeus turned Io into a white heifer, but their affair continued in secret. So Hera decided to hand Io over to Argos to get her away from Zeus, but Zeus sent Hermes to kill Argos and free Io. Despite the failure of her plan, Hera rewarded the dead giant's loyalty by transferring his eyes to the feathers of a peacock, her favorite animal. So you see, that painting in your office is the ultimate symbol for Lisandra. And I am sure that was the point, in a way: the peacock was keeping an eye on you. Did you know how jealous your wife was?”

Vittorio would never have come up with such an interpretation. He takes his time to reply.

“Lisandra was jealous, that's true . . . but the way women often are.”

“No, that's just it; not ‘the way women often are'—she was pathologically jealous, or didn't you know that? But I understand, when you stop seeing someone, you hardly pay much attention to how they are feeling.”

Eva Maria no longer displays any tact or discretion. She has decided to lay her cards on the table. Eva Maria tells Vittorio that Lisandra was cheating on him. Vittorio doesn't believe a word: he would have known. Eva Maria quotes him: “The very principle of a lover is that the husband doesn't know he exists.” Vittorio is adamant: Lisandra was not that type of woman. Eva Maria replies that his classification doesn't mean much. Vittorio asserts that Lisandra loved him. Eva Maria retorts, “Are the two so incompatible? It is precisely because she loved you that she was unfaithful to you.” And Eva Maria now describes the scenes of love, the unequivocal words that Francisco had used to describe the affair.

“Doesn't that resonate with you? Or do you recognize your wife? Lisandra was in such pain that she had only one thing in mind. To find in another man's arms the best of what you had given her. But which you no longer gave her. The very things you no longer noticed—that was what she was prepared to give someone else. And she died because of it. I have two theories regarding what might have happened on the evening of the murder.”

Vittorio sits up straight. Eva Maria continues.

“Say your wife received her lover at home: was that the first time or was it something she did regularly? I haven't a clue. She had put on a new dress, high heels, to try and exert her power over you; she knows she won't be able to hold you back, she knows where you
stand, she's no fool, she knows you've fallen out of love, you're having an affair with someone else, and she knows that even the newest dress cannot compete with a new woman, no matter what she's wearing, but she hopes at least your gaze might linger on her, and even if she is prepared to go with another man, she cannot help but reproach you for not noticing her new dress, because that Other Man is nothing more than an accessible You—available, different, but he is you, all the same. Whence the argument. Your quarrel. The neighbor's deposition. None of which stops you from going out. So she goes and gets two glasses and a bottle of white wine, thinking how vulgar it is, a woman who has to pour the wine for herself. And then she switches on the radio and she waits. The doorbell rings. She asks twice over,
Who's there?
because she's fearful; she hears the right answer and she opens the door. And the lover waits for the few seconds required by the script while she goes back into the living room and pulls up her dress to give him that first image she always gives him. Her ritual. But to undo his trousers, the lover has to put his flower bouquet on the table . . . what kind . . . let's say a bouquet of red roses . . . and Lisandra sees them out of the corner of her eye. She stands back up, very straight, and smoothes down her dress; she tries to control herself, she tries to deflect her anger through movement, so she picks up the vase, goes to fill it with water, then comes back into the living room; but it wasn't enough, the sight of the bouquet of red roses is still unbearable to her, so she opens the window, she tries to deflect her anger with some fresh air, and she leans out to breathe deeply; but that's not enough, so she turns around, takes the bouquet of red roses, and throws them in her lover's face.
Get out. Who do you think you are? I hate roses.
The truth is not that she hates roses, the truth is that you, Vittorio, you would have given her lilies, her favorite flowers, isn't that what you told me? The hapless lover then picks up the bouquet and goes off with his flowers under his arm, leaving behind
the water that was waiting for them in the vase, orphaned—yes, orphaned, because it's not enough merely to note that the water from the vase was spreading across the floor, without wondering where the flowers went. How to explain the fact that nowhere in the crime scene did anyone find a trace of these flowers? And unless your wife had the strange mania of filling up all the vases in the house with water, with or without flowers, the only explanation would be that her lover went away again with his bouquet under his arm. But not before taking the time to shove Lisandra out the window next to which she might still have been standing, maybe to banish the effluvia from the roses. If Lisandra hadn't leaned out a few seconds earlier to take a breath of air, maybe he would never have thought of doing such a thing, but therein lies the mystery of how another person's gesture can drive someone to commit a murder. But naturally Lisandra would have resisted, so the chairs got knocked over, and the lamp, too, the little porcelain cat got broken, and the vase, naturally, but the hapless lover won in the end. Out the window for the woman who didn't like roses. The woman who liked only lilies. Who loved only you. Who had just driven her lover mad. The murderer-lover hurried to leave the premises. And then you arrived. That's it.”

Eva Maria stops talking. She thinks it's easier to admit to having a mistress when you know your wife has a lover. So she tries again.

“Who is that woman in the photograph, Vittorio?”

“I told you, I don't know her. What are you trying to make me say, in the end? That she's my mistress? You're completely off your rocker.”

“Right. I'm completely off my rocker, forgive me. So then my second theory must be the right one.”

“Which is?”

“Can't you guess?”

“No.”

“When you got back from the movies, you found your wife with
her lover. And you're the one who threw out the flowers. And you're the one who pushed your wife out the window.”

Vittorio shakes his head.

“I think you'd better leave now.”

“I think so, too.”

Eva Maria stands up. She wishes Vittorio would say, “Stay. Yes, that woman is my mistress, it's true, but I didn't kill Lisandra and I still need you; you have to go on helping me to find the true murderer.” But Vittorio says nothing. Vittorio doesn't try to hold her back. Vittorio lets Eva Maria go. But not quite yet. One last question.

“This lover. Who was it?”

Eva Maria turns back toward Vittorio.

“Who was with her on the night of the murder? I don't know. It would seem she had several lovers.”

“No, the one who told you everything they did together.”

“You don't know him.”

Vittorio shook his head.

“You have forgotten my profession. To say that I ‘don't know' this man proves, on the contrary, that I
do
know him. If I didn't know him, you would simply have given me his name. So tell me. Who is it?”

Eva Maria thinks. Since Francisco had decided to tell the police, then she could tell Vittorio.

“Francisco.”

“Francisco . . . from the Pichuco?”

“Yes.”

Vittorio doesn't move. Eva Maria takes a few steps toward the door. She turns around. Her hand on the handle.

“On second thought. What about you? When you say you ‘don't know' that woman in the photograph, what am I supposed to conclude? That you
do
know her?”

Eva Maria does not wait for his answer. Eva Maria leaves the room.