Crimes Of August Part 7

Adelino nodded.

"The land of Camilo Castelo Branco."

Adelino didn't react to the writer's name.

"Your son is going to be in prison for twenty years."

Again, Adelino wiped his eyes.

"I know why you're crying."

Adelino's body shook.

"Because you're ashamed of accusing your own son of a crime you yourself committed."

Adelino nodded, his head hanging forward, as if he were about to say something. His body shook again.

"Tell me how it was. The truth." Mattos placed his hand lightly on Adelino's shoulder.

"No, it wasn't me. I should have defended my son, but it wasn't me."

"Tell the truth. We know it was you. You'll serve a shorter term than your son . . . You're an old man . . ."

Adelino wiped his eyes. Pensive, he took some time before he spoke.

"It was me, yes," he finally confessed. "I lost my head when I saw the boy being beaten by that animal. Then I grabbed the lug wrench . . ."

The Portuguese went on to say he had struck the man in the head, the man fell and lay still, his eyes open. Horrified, Adelino and his son saw that the man was dead. The family, called together, had decided that Cosme should take the blame, as the old man, who had a heart condition, would never survive being in prison.

"Are you willing to repeat that to the clerk and sign a paper with your confession?"

"I don't know how to read or write," said Adelino, who appeared relieved.

"No matter. We'll call two witnesses."

Mattos went with Adelino to the clerk's room. On the way he b.u.mped into Biriba, the trusty, and asked him to buy a box of antacids at the pharmacy.

Adelino's confession was signed by the two witnesses who had been rounded up in the neighborhood, an attendant at a school and the counterman at a hardware store.

"You can return to your orange grove. For now."

"I can leave?"

"Yes. You weren't arrested within twenty-four hours of the offense. We're not even going to ask for preventive custody. You're going to await trial in freedom. A good lawyer can get you acquitted."

"What about my son?"

"He'll be released after a few formalities."

"Jesus heard my prayers!"

The inspector went to the lockup. Cosme was eating a codfish ball from the lunch pail.

"Want one, inspector?"

Mattos took the codfish ball. "Come with me," he told Cosme.

The youth followed the inspector, pallid, as if knowing what he was about to hear. They went to the area where Cosme usually saw his wife.

"Your father confessed that he killed that guy in your workshop."

"It was me, it was me! Papa doesn't know what he's saying!"

"He confessed in the presence of two witnesses."

"You can't do this to my father. He's a sick man. Don't you see he's sacrificing himself for me?"

"I'm very sorry."

"My father doesn't know what he's saying. He's a sick man. It was me who killed that guy."

"Your father killed him."

"I swear it was me! He's a sick man."

"Get him a good lawyer."

There was a knock on the door. "Can the boy's father come in?" asked the guard.

Mattos left as soon as the old man entered the room. He walked down the corridor. His stomach ached. He saw that he still had the codfish ball in his hand. He crushed it against the wall until it crumbled into small pieces that fell to the floor. He wiped his hand on his pants. Then he banged his head twice against the wall, cursing.

Still on Wednesday afternoon, Padua returned to the precinct to see Mattos. Rosalvo was there, with the inspector.

"What happened to your head?" asked Padua.

"I banged it against a wall. I'm thinking of taking Rosalvo with us."

"Better not to," said Padua.

In the taxi, heading downtown.

"That Rosalvo, besides being a Lacerdist and a Jesus freak, is a thief. He's gonna want to put the squeeze on the madam who runs the Senate Annex. He wouldn't get anywhere, but it'd stir up a real s.h.i.+tstorm."

"He's not a thief. Maybe he doesn't even take numbers money," answered Mattos.

"Thieves start with game money, then go on to take from everybody. When it comes to honesty, once the guy pops his cherry, he never stops. Careful, one of these days that sc.u.mbag will end up taking payoffs in your name."

"He doesn't have the courage to do that," said Mattos, putting an antacid tablet in his mouth.

"Did you let those dirtbags I arrested go?"

"Yes. They didn't have a record."

"Did you already get the records?"

"Not yet. But I cut the red tape and called headquarters, and they gave me the information on the phone."

"Holy s.h.i.+t! That's illegal, don't you know that? You put yourself at risk for a bunch of sc.u.mbags. You expecting some kind of medal for that? One of these days you're gonna get f.u.c.ked-they'll open up an internal investigation and kick your a.s.s out. Fired for the public good. HQ has had its eye on you ever since that crazy strike you tried to organize."

They got out on Avenida Rio Branco, at the door of the So Borja Building. The building, eighteen stories, was relatively new, having been built during the war. Across from it, the Senate palace.

"After all, exactly what is it you're after? Let's not rattle Laura's cage unnecessarily."

"I want information about Senator Vitor Freitas. You think she'll come across?"

"She does for me." Pause. "Look, I've never had anything with her." Pause. "Or with any wh.o.r.e."

"But she's a friend of yours."

"Friend, my a.s.s. She's my informant."

The So Borja had an ample entrance, a long corridor with several businesses, a tobacco shop, a cafe, a barbershop, and a record store-the Casa Carlos Wehrs. Mattos remembered then that in that store, some months earlier, he had bought the scores for La Traviata and La Boheme. If he were alone, he would use the opportunity to ask what the long-play of La Traviata cost.

The cops walked down the corridor where the elevators were, three on each side. The So Borja was a mixed-occupancy building, residential and commercial. In a large gla.s.sed-in panel Mattos noted some names, followed by room numbers: Brazilian Workers Party, Radiobras, Odeon Records, Radio Copacabana. A Workers Party poster read: "Vote for the candidates of the Workers Party and partic.i.p.ate in the gigantic struggle for the transformation of Brazil into a great nation. Social Justice. Economic Emanc.i.p.ation. Nationalistic Policy. Defense of Petroleum. Respect for the Minimum Wage. Democratic Enfranchis.e.m.e.nt. Union Freedom. Agrarian Reform. A Workers Party government is a government of the people."

"Those guys are a pack of demagogues," said Padua.

There was another entrance, in the rear, near the elevators. It faced a courtyard where several automobiles were parked, opening onto Rua Mexico.

"That's where the senators come in, so as not to be seen," said Padua.

They returned to the lobby and waited for the elevator. On the tenth floor a single room had its door open. They heard the sound of a typewriter. A woman, sitting in front of an Underwood, didn't notice the two cops as they pa.s.sed by silently. LOTTUFO REPRESENTATION read a small plaque. Padua turned to the right, in the hallway. The sound of the typewriter keys was no longer heard. All the doors were closed.

"Here it is," said Padua, ringing a doorbell.

A middle-aged woman in a maid's uniform opened the door.

"I'm here to speak with Dona Laura. I'm Inspector Padua."

The woman made a gesture for them to come inside. Padua paced from side to side in the small vestibule. From the movement of his arms, Mattos concluded that his colleague's biceps and triceps must be flexing furiously.

A thin man with a small mustache and slicked-down hair appeared.

"Ah, Inspector Padua . . . What a pleasure! How nice!"

"I'm not here for small talk, Almeida. I want to speak to Dona Laura."

"She's very busy at the moment. Can't it be with me?"

"No, it can't be with you. Get in there and call Laura right now."

"I'm going to have them get you some nice whiskey."

"We don't want any nice whiskey. Call the woman."

"She's in the other apartment, on the sixteenth floor. We'll go up by the stairs. Please follow me."

Laura was waiting for them in a large room full of overstuffed red velvet furniture. The curtains were also red. The room was illuminated by soft light coming from two lamps whose shades were mosaics of colored gla.s.s.

Laura was dressed discreetly. Her hair, dyed red, gave her face a look of insolence. A gold pince-nez, held by a black silk ribbon, swayed on her chest.

"You may go, Almeida dear," she said. Her voice is as dark as the room, thought Mattos.

"This is my colleague, Inspector Mattos."

"Would you like something to drink? Whiskey? Champagne?"

"He has a stomach ulcer. Can't drink."

"But you can."

"Not today."

Laura put on her pince-nez and looked at Mattos. "Are you a nervous man?"

"More or less."

"What happened to your head?"

"Banged it against a wall."

"Inspector Mattos wants information about a client of yours."

"We don't give out information about our clients. You know that."

"Confidential. Anything you say will be strictly between us."

"The police can shut down your house," said Mattos.

"Can. But don't want to." Pause. "Have a little whiskey, Padua."

"Mattos, can you give us a moment? I want to say a few words to Laura in private, inside there."

The two left the room.

I can shut down this wh.o.r.ehouse, thought Mattos. It was a crime to maintain, for personal gain, a house of prost.i.tution or place designated for libidinous encounters, whether or not with the intent of monetary gain or direct mediation on the part of the owner or manager. But was there any harm in a bordello? Even for corrupt, crooked senators and important government officials? In Solon's Athens prost.i.tution was free, and prost.i.tutes were considered a public utility, subject to taxation by the state, a source of revenue for the exchequer, while procuring for pay or acting as go-between by pimps was rigorously punished. Padua, who enjoyed citing the thinkers of the church, was probably familiar with St. Augustine's phrase: "Aufer meretrices de rebus humanis, turbaveris omnia libidinus."

Alberto Mattos remembered the debates in his criminal law cla.s.ses about the idiotic phrases dealing with prost.i.tution, which had inflamed discussions among the students. Since childhood he had felt an attraction to prost.i.tutes, although he had never frequented a bordello. There came to his mind phrases: from Weininger, "the prost.i.tute is the safeguard of my mother"; from Lecky, "the prost.i.tute is the custodian of virtue, the eternal priestess of humanity"; from Jeannel, "the prost.i.tutes in a city are as necessary as sewers and trash bins." An inextirpable but necessary evil-who was it said that? In an a.s.sociation of ideas he recalled the melody of the aria "Ah, fors e lui," but his claqueur's reverie was interrupted by the return of Padua and Laura to the room.