A Not So Perfect Crime (18 page)

My brother must have been imagining how worried Montse was and so he gave me a helping hand. The truth was that after all that had happened, regardless of when I turned up, I'd be in for a hell of a blasting.

“Of course, of course! You go,” agreed the MP. “The two of you don't need to stay. And my sincere thanks to you,” he turned to the policemen. “It's so gratifying to see how well our security forces work!” Now it was the politician speaking. “Naturally if we were in government,” he smiled, “the home affairs budget would get a real boost ...”

“Great, you'll get our vote, and then fingers crossed for a rise ...” said the squinting policeman unenthusiastically. “Because we're always last on the list, right?”

“Come on, Ruiz,” said the other policeman rather nervously. “These gentlemen have been very patient with us. Sorry to have bothered you,” he apologized a second time. “But you know what neighbours are like sometimes ...”

“Not at all. You have a job to do. It was most kind of you to bring these gentlemen to my house.”

“The least we could do. Good night. And we are very sorry about your wife. If we can help in any way ...”

“Thank you very much,” the MP repeated, “have a good night.”

I left Borja alone with our client and went off with the policemen. The patrol drove me home while I wondered what tale I could spin Montse, who was certain to be waiting up for me. I was feeling tired but slightly calmer now the night seemed to have ended satisfactorily. From the main door, I saw the curtains of Flat 2 on the fourth floor twitch again (and the ones in our dining room too), and went up prepared for the worst. To my surprise, the moment I opened the door Montse threw herself around my neck,
kissed me and asked with tears in her eyes if I was all right. She'd thought I was in jail.

“What nonsense! Of course they didn't arrest me!”

I told her about the paperwork we'd fetched and the business of the woman falling through the ceiling.

“And this?” Montse had unwrapped the package. “It's not a present for the girls, is it? The painting my mother gave us has gone missing by the way.”

I had to think on my feet and say there was a problem with the invoice for the painting, which was very valuable, and we'd had to swap it for her mother's oil painting until it was sorted. It was very likely, given the circumstances, that the police would search the MP's house and he'd asked us to keep hold of the painting for a few days. As he was a well-known politician, there was a risk his enemies would accuse him of buying it and the newspapers might stick the knife in.

“So he's trafficking in stolen art works! ...” summed up Montse, scandalized.

“It's just a favour we're doing him, dear. We're also giving him advice on his investments ... His wife's death is pure coincidence.”

“I want this picture out of the house in the morning,” she said definitively. “Let Borja look after it, or whoever, I don't want it here. It will cause us problems.”

I assured her I would remove it early on and persuaded her to come to bed without more ado. Arnau was asleep in his bed, the twins were at their friends' and I was exhausted. Once we were in bed, my wife and I still took a while to get to sleep. When I felt the touch of her skin I realized I wasn't as tired as I thought I was. Despite all the shocks and surprises, the night was still young.

13

Next morning, before Montse woke up, I wrapped the picture up again. My wife had apparently not noticed it was a portrait of the murdered woman, and so much the better. I went down to buy chocolate croissants to mollify her and got the coffee ready. After last night's hullabaloo Arnau was sleeping like a log, and while Montse was in the shower I phoned Borja. He was still asleep in bed.

“Hey, there's no way I can keep the picture here. I'm sorry, but Montse won't hear of it.”

“All right,” he said drowsily. “Bring it to my place.”

Before hanging up, he told me he'd got to bed in the early hours because he'd had a very long and insightful conversation with the MP. I was intrigued and told him I'd be there within the hour.

Montse didn't have to be at the Centre till the middle of the morning so the girls would be back in time to look after Arnau. As I was still trying to get back into her good books, I told her I'd be back earlier and would get lunch ready for everybody. She'd not be home till three o'clock, would have a quick bite and then rush back to work. As it was party time, women wanted to be beautiful and Montse was run off her feet.

When I got to his flat, my brother was already showered, dressed and shaved, though his face looked sleepy. We put the picture under his bed and hoped Merche wouldn't start sniffing around – not that she was likely to. And if she did
find it, it was so well packaged Borja could tell her it had to do with one of his lines of business.

“I think this guy has put us right in it,” Borja started off.

“Why do you say that.”

“The whole matter is much more complicated than I thought.”

“Fine, we've still time. Look, we just take the damned picture, return it to him and tell him our job's over,” I suggested. “His wife is dead, isn't she? She can't have any lovers now.”

“It's not so simple. Want a coffee?”

While he prepared coffee in the kitchen, he began to tell me in detail about his conversation with our client. First things first, the autopsy confirmed she'd been poisoned, although it would be a few days before the forensics identified the kind of substance that had caused death. But that wasn't all.

“It turns out this Sílvia and the MP have been lovers for almost a year,” he let drop.

“Fucking hell!”

“He went stiff as a board when I told him there was a naked Cuban in the upstairs flat as well, twenty years younger than his sister-in-law, who disappeared in a flash when the ceiling collapsed,” he went on as he gulped down his coffee.

“Well, well ... And the guy was upset in case his wife was carrying on with a painter!” I said scandalized. “And all the time his lover was having it off with someone else!”

“Just so. And we were happily investigating his wife while he was carrying on with his sister-in-law. Of course I already suspected something ...” he said, playing the wise guy.

Apparently, when they were by themselves, Borja decided to make a few stabs in the dark and the MP had finally confessed the usual old story: his marriage had been on the rocks for years and he'd fallen in love with another woman; unfortunately the woman in question was his sister-in-law. Given his position, divorce was unthinkable, apart from not being a very practical solution. As Mariona had told us, Sílvia was Lídia's step-sister, daughter of her father's first marriage to a woman who broke her neck skiing in Cortina, and, unlike Lídia, she was a good listener, an affectionate, understanding woman he could relax with (with the occasional bit of rumpy pumpy, no doubt, I thought to myself). On the other hand, Sílvia Vilalta was quite an attractive woman, although not to be compared to her sister. She was divorced and childless. In Borja's view, Lluís Font spoke about her as if he sincerely loved her and found it difficult to accept she was having it off with a mellifluous gigolo.

As for the flat the neighbours thought was empty, as the MP had told the police the previous night, he was its owner. He'd found it an unobtrusive way of being able to meet his lover without his movements giving rise to suspicion. Behind his wife's back and through that company called Diagonal Consulting, he'd bought the flat so everything stayed in the family. The only precaution the MP and his lover had to take was to ensure the neighbours didn't catch them going up or down the flight of stairs that separated his office from the bachelor pad, but luckily it was an attic and opposite was one of those phantom companies that act as a tax address. The ruse had worked reasonably well up to then.

“Christ, what a mess!” I said, rather confused. “Naturally if these two are lovers, they had a good reason to get rid of the deceased. Either together or separately.”

“I expect that's what the police will think if they ever find out. He swears it wasn't the case and I believe him.”

“At this point I really don't know what to think!” I responded, shrugging my shoulders. “Perhaps he thought if he killed her in this recondite way, using sweets or poisoned cognac sent by a stranger, he wouldn't be caught ...”

“It hardly makes sense,” he shook his head, “why should he implicate us with the picture business? And what if his daughter had eaten the
marrons glacés
? Or if the maid or someone else had poured a shot of cognac?”

“In any case, we still don't know what killed her. You ate one of those things and you're all right ... So it must be the cognac.”

“I suppose so. But I think if our MP had wanted to see off his wife he'd have found a simpler way than putting poison into a bottle of Courvoisier. An accident in the house, for example,” Borja speculated.

“Yes, he'd have avoided the publicity,” I conceded.

“The newspapers have talked about nothing else for a couple of days, and I don't think a murder in murky circs will help his political ambitions. Conversely, the poison implies premeditation, that the person who put her away thought carefully before acting.” He paused and sighed, joined his hands together and half-closed his eyes. “Eduard, this is no crime of passion.”

“Elementary, my dear Sherlock,” I laughed, because it was the first time I'd seen him play that role. “And do you have any idea what might have happened?”

“This Sílvia woman came to their Christmas lunch. She was probably connected to the poisoning,” he suggested. “She was probably unhappy with her role as second lady and thought the most expeditious way forward was to make her brother-in-law a widower.”

But that wasn't all. Borja extracted from the drawer of his night-table an envelope full of 100 and 500 notes. He reckoned 12,000 euros all told.

“The MP wants us to continue with our investigation. Discreetly, of course. He says he's got a contact in the police who'll tell us how
their
investigation is faring and will get us copies of their reports. Apparently it's the nephew of a friend.”

“So he wants us to spy on what the police find out!” I said, shocked. “So he can cover his own back, I expect!”

“I suppose so. Well,” my brother turned serious, “if he's guilty, we'll also find out.”

“And will we also cover it up?” I wondered, though not daring to voice the question out aloud. “At what price? How stuffed does an envelope have to be in such cases?”

“Pep, it's one thing to be a prying eye for the rich and quite another to cover up a murder. Besides, I should remind you we're not detectives.”

“He knows. Listen, I give you my word that if we discover he murdered his wife we'll go straight to the police. But I think he's innocent. People who can afford lawyers don't usually opt for violence.”

“Only if divorce is too expensive,” I retorted, “and I'm not just referring to money.”

12,000 euros were tempting enough, not to mention the 20,000 he'd already shelled out in less than three weeks. On the other hand, what Lluís Font asked of us bordered on the illegal, although so far, when all's said and done, we'd done nothing to keep me awake at nights. Even so, keeping hold of his wife's portrait in oils to avoid her adultery hitting the
headlines, or having furtive conversations with a policeman so he could tell us how their investigation was going, wasn't the same as turning a blind eye to cold-blooded murder.

I was convinced Borja and I would never cross that frontier however much cash the MP might offer us. Besides, I had my brother's word, and he didn't usually go back on his promises. I agreed to carry on with the case, although I didn't have the slightest idea where we should start.

“We'll go to Paris and see Pau Ferrer,” Borja decided. “If he and Lídia were lovers, he may be implicated or perhaps can give us the name of somebody who had it in for her. Perhaps she suspected someone wanted her out of circulation, her husband even.”

“Yes, that makes sense,” I agreed.

Given the circumstances, we decided we would bluntly ask the painter how he got to know Lídia Font and what kind of relationship he'd had with her. We were quite sure a conversation with the painter of the picture that had caused such a stir would clear up many of our doubts.

I'd promised Montse I would get lunch ready, so I told Borja I'd see him in the afternoon. We'd have to pass by a travel agency to order the plane tickets and book a hotel. I'm not over fond of flying, but knew that Borja wouldn't agree to take the train.

When I told Montse my business partner and I were off to Paris she got all furious again. She harped on about the murder, the picture and the police, and it began to look as if I had a full-scale matrimonial crisis on my hands.

“You know,” I said, trying to change the subject, “I think Borja really likes your sister.”

It was as if I'd uttered words of magic. The long face and reproaches went and suddenly the conversation centred on the relationship between my twin brother and much adored sister-in-law. Women always go for the romantic, some at least, and Montse took the bait immediately. Of course my timely comment would generate futile expectations for Lola and a future problem for Borja, but I thought it better they focussed for a couple of days on the Borja
affaire
rather than on the business of the painting.

“Well, I had thought Borja was rather taken by Lola ...” said Montse excitedly. “Do you think he'll bring her a present from Paris? And what about you? Will you bring me something?” she asked sweetly.