Water-Blue Eyes (5 page)

A jazz saxophonist, Luis Reigosa was single and lived alone. His mother lived in a small house on the seashore by the Pontevedera inlet, in the fishing village of Bueu, which was also his place of birth. He didn’t have any known siblings or a known father. According to the security guards at the entrance to Toralla Island, he was a quiet man, even if he lived mostly by night. He played the sax with his band four days a week at the Grial, a bar on the edge of the city’s old quarter. There were three members in the band, including Reigosa himself. The other two were the Irish bass player Arthur O’Neal and the pianist Iria Ledo. Reigosa had also taught as a supply teacher at the municipal conservatory of Vigo.

It was a beautiful day, bright and clear, without a cloud in the sky, and Rafael Estévez drove in silence. Leo Caldas spent the drive examining a report drawn up by Officer Ferro from forensics. Its many stapled sheets recorded some preliminary considerations, impressions put forward by a few neighbours, the caretaker of the building, María de Castro, and the security guard who was on duty on the night of the crime. The guard remembered seeing Reigosa’s car driving on to the island, but he didn’t recall anyone else being there with him. In any case, he made it a rule not to pry into the identity of guests. He’d seen the vehicle leave a few hours later, in the small hours, and had assumed it was Reigosa who was driving. He blamed this on the darkness and the rain that night.

The car had not reappeared.

The report also contained the lophoscopic analysis and the results of the first inspection of the flat. Forensics ruled out
the possibility that Reigosa might have been tied up and gagged after being killed, and marked the time of death at around eleven p.m. on 11 May. On the whole, it wasn’t the most exhaustive report Caldas had read, and it barely
contributed
anything new, but it was still better than nothing. Clara Barcia’s conclusions were still pending; she would take another couple of days. Caldas was confident that her metic ulousness at combing the scene would open new avenues of investigation, but for the moment he couldn’t find a clear way forward. In his mind, he went over what he had: the small part of a fingerprint that was impossible to match with any prints stored in the police files; a commonly used
chemical
product as a weapon; and the certainty that the
murderer
must have had quite an advanced degree of medical knowledge. It was also quite likely that the murderer was a man. A homosexual man.

Caldas took the portrait he’d commandeered at Reigosa’s flat out of the pocket of his jacket. Once again he had the impression he was missing something. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but a little voice inside him told him a piece didn’t quite fit in that puzzle. He knew that feeling, and trusted his instinct. He was sure that, no matter how small it was, whatever was hiding at the back of his mind now would suddenly come to light at a later stage.

He tilted his head back, returned the picture to his pocket and closed his eyes.

The small village of Porriño was in the valley of the Louro river, where it flowed towards the Miño. It was some ten kilometres away from Vigo. The southbound motorway, to Portugal, and the eastbound, to Madrid, went past near the village, which was growing at the same speed as the granite mountains around it were being quarried.

A few years back, as a consequence of the quarrying boom, a large industrial park had been built in the region. Reasonable land prices, good road links and tax exemptions had attracted many companies to Vigo.

The policemen left a few ships behind and got off the
motorway
. They went on along the main road until they reached a high fence that protected several hectares of land. A name was written in sober lettering over the gate at the entrance: ‘Riofarma’.

The building housing the laboratory had retained the
flavour
of old companies: a certain air of mystery. The stone it was made of gave it a look of nobility and strength which was lacking in the new structures of the industrial area. After several decades, the company was still owned by the family of the founder, Lisardo Ríos.

‘Good morning,’ said a security guard as he approached the car.

Estévez sought help in the seat next to him.

‘Ramón Ríos is expecting us. I’m Inspector Leo Caldas from the Vigo police station.’

‘Inspector Leo Caldas?’

‘Yes,’ he confirmed.

‘Are you really Leo Caldas, from
Patrol
on
the
Air
?’

‘The very same one,’ confirmed Estévez, nodding appreciatively.

‘Leo Caldas… I can’t believe it, I never miss your show. Here in my box I always tune in to Radio Vigo.’ The man stuck half his body out of the window and offered his hand. ‘It’s a misleading medium, radio, isn’t it? I would have thought you were an older man.’

‘I’m sorry to disappoint,’ replied Caldas as he shook his hand. He still couldn’t figure out how anyone could like the programme.

‘I’m not disappointed at all,’ said the security guard
without
letting go of his hand. ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you, inspector.’

‘Can we come in now?’ asked Caldas, when he considered his lower arm had been sufficiently shaken.

The guard opened the gate, revealing the beautiful gardens that surrounded the building of the laboratory.

‘It’s been a pleasure,’ he shouted enthusiastically as they went through.

‘All the best,’ replied the inspector with a forced smile.

‘Funny what fame achieves, right, chief?’ Estévez
commented
once they’d cleared the gate.

‘What do you mean, fame?’

‘Oh, no need to be humble in front of me, chief. You saw it – once he recognised you, he let us through straight away.’

‘I’m not that well known. Besides, it’s pretty normal not to stand in the way when the police want to come through.’

‘Come on, inspector, you won’t deny that people treat you completely differently because you’re on the radio. When we’re undercover, or when I go somewhere on my own, everyone looks annoyed. But if you identify yourself as the officer from
Patrol
on
the
Air,
we instantly receive special treatment, as happened just now.’

‘Firstly, I didn’t identify myself as anything. Secondly, you won’t receive any special treatment from people if you beat them up at the slightest provocation.’

‘Don’t lecture me on work ethics,’ Estévez defended
himself
. ‘We all have our methods. If you’re not aware that your popularity is a plus, there’s no reason to turn it against me. Your success is your own business.’

‘Leave me alone, will you?’ said Caldas, sensing that his assistant might be right. Despite his many years of service as a police officer, if anyone knew him it was because of that ridiculous radio programme, no matter how much he
disliked
being a part of it.

They got out of the car and made for the building. Ramón Ríos was waiting for them at the entrance.

Ramón Ríos had been Leo Caldas’s schoolmate. Together they had learned many disparate things: that there was one sin graver than the others; that a goal scored from a penalty
kick was a valid goal; that the derivative at a point equalled the slope of the line tangent to the graph of the function at that point … They had also heard Don José instructing them on extreme situations from the pulpit: for instance, if a
terrorist
is threatening a child’s family with a machine gun and asks the child to trample on a consecrated wafer, the child need not trample on it, for if the terrorist were to follow through and shoot, the family would ascend into heaven, happy and whole, as martyrs. On some occasions, provided that Alba was part of the deal, Leo would have agreed with Don José’s unorthodox theory. On most he wouldn’t.

‘Leo, you must be the only madman who comes to the lab when he wants to see me,’ said Ríos, by way of greeting.

‘Each to their own, you know.’

They greeted with a hug. Although they no longer saw each other on a regular basis, they still acknowledged a
pleasant
well of friendship left over from childhood, when, for different reasons, both had found it quite difficult to interact with other children.

‘This time it’s not a personal visit, but a matter related to your line of work,’ said Leo Caldas, hinting at why he was there.

‘My what? Are you sure you’re OK?’

‘Don’t they pay you for coming here?’ asked Leo.

‘Only not to have me moping around the house,’ replied Ríos, and looked at the expensive watch he sported on his left wrist. ‘On a day like this, I’ll be on the boat in half an hour at the latest.’

‘Lucky for some,’ said the inspector.

Ramón Ríos gestured in the direction of Estévez, who had lagged behind and was engrossed watching four young people in white coats manipulating a smoking green liquid.

‘You’ve got yourself a gorilla?’ he asked in a low voice.

‘Rafael Estévez, my new assistant. He’s only been in the city a few months. Rafael!’ he called out.

‘Quite a beast! I’m sure you’re well protected,’ muttered Ríos, winking at him in the same naughty manner he had as a child. ‘I’d heard radio celebrities need bodyguards.’

‘It must be that,’ Caldas said tersely.

Estévez came over and said hello to Ríos.

‘How’s it going?’

‘Well, losing quite a bit of hair. Otherwise I can’t complain.’

‘Rafael, this is Ramón Ríos,’ said Caldas.

‘A pleasure,’ said Estévez, and pointed in the direction of the men in white coats. ‘What are they doing?’

‘The ones with the green smoke?’

Rafael Estévez nodded.

‘I have no idea,’ replied Ríos, as if there were no other possible answer to the officer’s question. ‘I only know about stuff in my area, and not even much about that, to be honest. In my family the clever one was Grandpa Lisardo, who set up this joint. Nowadays, the really clever ones are my
brother
, my cousin and the cat. And, round here, no one’s terribly clever either. In fact they’re all pretty dumb,’ he said, looking at a couple of employees coming down the corridor. ‘The best brains go over to the competition. The thing is, since Zetiza was floated, it pays better than us.’