Crimes of August: A Novel: 5 (Brazilian Literature in Translation Series) (25 page)

LEARNING FROM MATTOS
that Lomagno wanted to call her, Alice stopped answering the phone that day. The doorbell rang futilely countless times. Alice left the phone on the hook. Thus it was Mattos once again who answered Lomagno’s telephone call.

“I wanted to speak with Alice.”

“She’s here beside me and said she doesn’t want to speak with you.”

Silence.

“Mr. Mattos, I’m convinced that you’re keeping me from speaking to my wife. I want to warn you that I’ve consulted an attorney, who after hearing the facts that I told him stated that I can report you for the crime of kidnapping and unlawful imprisonment. According to the lawyer, your crime has an aggravating factor, namely, given her state of health it has probably caused Alice serious physical and psychological suffering.”

“Do whatever you like. But I advise you to look for a different lawyer. The one you consulted is an idiot. Good night.”

twenty

SHORTLY BEFORE NOON
, Mattos arrived at the precinct to relieve Pádua. Normally he would get there earlier, to inform himself in detail about the incidents of the evening before with the inspector of the previous shift. But that day he was inclined to have the least possible contact with Pádua.

Pádua was waiting for him. “I want to talk to you.”

“It’s enough to give me the blotter.”

Pádua picked up the book from the desk and placed it under his arm.

“Five minutes. I’ve got a question to ask you. Not the policeman, the top student in law school.”

“I wasn’t the top student.”

“But you were one of the top students. Everybody knows that. Your nickname was Brain.”

“What is it you want to know?”

“Morally, we’re obligated to sacrifice our lives, if necessary, to carry out our duty, which is to prevent the commission of crimes. Isn’t that right? Why can’t we, also to carry out our duty, kill an outlaw to prevent him from committing a crime?”

“I’m going to answer in a simple manner your simplistic question. Because the law doesn’t give us that right. And the law applies to everyone, especially those who have some form of power, like us. A policeman can die in the exercise of his duty, but he can’t disobey the law.”

“You say my question is simplistic. Your answer is sanctimonious. You chose the wrong profession.”

“I think it’s you who chose the wrong profession.”

Pádua tossed the book on the table, flexed his arm muscles, and left the inspector’s office.

Ipojucan Salustiano, Ilídio’s peg-leg lawyer, appeared at the precinct with a medical statement attesting to his client’s inability to honor the summons he had received. The statement was handed to the recording clerk in the presence of Inspector Mattos.

Ipojucan liked to talk about his mechanical leg. It was a way of not feeling awkward about his stiff and unsure manner of walking. Now that he was the lawyer of a numbers game banker and made more money, he planned to order a mechanical leg from the United States.

“I have a mechanical leg,” Salustiano told Inspector Mattos.

“It doesn’t seem like it,” said Mattos politely.

“If I may ask, what is the reason for this summons? Has my client committed some crime?”

“For now, I only want to question him, in keeping with the law. You’re aware, counselor, that it’s a punishable offense to refuse law enforcement demands, solicited with proper legal authority, for data or information concerning identity, marital status, profession, domicile, and place of residence.”

“Of course, sir. I know the law.”

“Tell your client that he can’t stay hidden for long in the clinic, and if he doesn’t get well by Tuesday, I’m going to prove that that medical certificate is phony, which is a crime punishable by law. You don’t want to make things worse for your client, do you?”

Salustiano consulted a small calendar taken from his pocket. “Tuesday, the twenty-fourth. That’s just four days from now. I don’t know if he’ll get well in such a short time.”

“If he doesn’t, a police doctor will go to the clinic to examine him.”

IN THE CHAMBER OF DEPUTIES
, the deputy and jurist Bilac Pinto spoke affirming that Vargas would have to sit in the defendant’s chair beside his gunmen. Citing Article 25 of the Penal Code—whoever in any way colludes in the commission of a crime is subject to the penalties imposed thereto—Bilac Pinto said that Vargas, by organizing a band of criminals, killers, thieves, and perjurers as his personal guard, had assumed the risks stemming from his action and choice. His preventive custody must be decreed, and Vargas must be taken into custody and subsequently tried by the Federal Supreme Court. There was no need for the Chamber to agree to a leave of absence, for it was a matter of common, rather than political, crime.

THE PROCURESS LAURA
had told Mattos that Lomagno had a boxing instructor who was black. There were lots of black boxers, and that was the problem. Mattos was looking for one whose name started with
F
. Many fighters were known only by their nicknames; most were constantly on the move, fighting in arenas in the country’s hinterlands.

Mattos had asked for the help of the Surveillance division to search the city’s boxing schools for black men who taught boxing. For days no useful information came to his attention. But soon after the lawyer Salustiano left the precinct, an investigator from Surveillance came to tell him that at the Boqueirão do Passeio club there was a black boxing instructor called Chicão.

Mattos looked up the Boqueirão do Passeio number in the phone book. The guy who answered said they didn’t have any teacher called Chicão, and that their boxing instructor was Kid Earthquake. Earthquake could be found at the club that Friday at the eight p.m. class.

The Boqueirão do Passeio was on Rua Santa Luzia, near Rua México. It was a boating club; boxing, as well as basketball and yoga, were secondary activities of the Boqueirão.

When Mattos arrived, there were half a dozen athletes in the gym. One was hitting a speed bag; two others were pounding the heavy bag. Others were skipping rope. In the ring, a pair, in protective headgear, were fighting, oriented by a potbellied old man with a broken nose. Mattos concluded, accurately, that he must be Kid Earthquake.

Mattos waited patiently for the activities to end, which took over two hours. Then he addressed Kid Earthquake.

“I’d like five minutes of your time. We could have a beer while we talk.”

“About what?”

“I’m from the police.”

“Having beer with a cop isn’t good for your health.”

“Sorry, Kid, but you’re going to have to talk to me one way or another. All I want is some information. It’s nothing to do with you.”

Kid Earthquake appeared to meditate about what Mattos had said.

“I’m going to change clothes.”

He returned soon, carrying an enormous bag. “I don’t leave my stuff here. They stole a new pair of gloves last week. There’s thieves everywhere these days. But you know that better than I do.”

They went to a bar in Lapa that stayed open late. On the round marble tabletop someone had written in pencil: “Marietta, I’m going to drink ant poison because of you.”

“Ant poison with guaraná is a sure thing,” said Kid Earthquake, who had read the words written on the marble. “I had a cousin killed himself that way, also a woman thing. She put horns on him.”

Mattos ordered a beer and a glass of milk.

“All we have is warm milk,” said the waiter.

“It’ll do.”

“You don’t drink beer?” asked Kid Earthquake.

“I have an ulcer in the duodenum.”

“That’s in the stomach, isn’t it? I’ve got a cousin with that problem.”

When Kid Earthquake finished his second bottle, Mattos asked him about Chicão.

“He doesn’t work with me anymore. He was a black man, strong as hell, but he didn’t have good technique. Just brute force. He served in the
FEB
. He learned to fight from the Americans in the war. Has he fucked up?”

“No, he hasn’t done anything. I’m looking for him so he can give me information about a guy who was a student of his at the Boqueirão. One Pedro Lomagno.”

“Then it was that guy who fucked up.”

“Nobody fucked up.”

“Then why’s the police interested?”

“Well, you I can tell. This Lomagno seduced a girl.” Whenever Mattos needed a pretext for an investigation he always used seduction. It had been that way at the Catete when he visited the quarters of the former personal guard of the president.

“Seduction. I never much understood that crime,” said Kid Earthquake.

The crime of seduction—unlike rape—didn’t evoke strong reactions from anyone who wasn’t directly involved, like the victim’s father and mother. Or the accused.

“The crime of seduction occurs when a man, taking advantage of the inexperience or the justifiable trust of a female older than fourteen and younger than eighteen, has carnal relations with her.”

“Carnal relations is the guy sticking his knob in the girl, right?”

“It’s necessary that she trusts him or is inexperienced.”

“How?”

“The guy’s engaged, and says they’re going to get married. The girl consents, believing the promise. Or else the girl doesn’t know what she’s doing, because she’s so naïve—”

“Sir, do you believe that? Women know what they’re doing from the day they’re born. It’s men who don’t know.”

Mattos ordered another beer.

“You’re a decent cop,” said Kid Earthquake, “I saw that right away in your face. I’m going to come across for you, because that Pedro Lomagno is a rich guy with a swelled head. I’m surprised at you telling me he did a girl wrong, ’cause I always took him to be a fag. I got my suspicions that he used to get it on with Chicão. He set up a boxing school for Chicão, but Chicão screwed up and from what I hear had to close down the school.”

“Do you know where that school is located?”

“Yeah. Chicão gave me the address and asked me to send him students. But you think I was going to send him students when I barely got enough to cover my expenses?”

“Does this Chicão wear a heavy gold ring?”

“Uh-huh. He liked to show off the ring. Never took it off his finger. Only when he put on the gloves or took a bath. He said soap was bad for the ring. He used to say a lot of dumb things.”

It was late at night, but even so Mattos got a cab and went to Rua Barão de Itapagibe, the address Kid Earthquake had given him. He got out of the cab and found himself in front of a large shed with whitewashed masonry and aluminum roof shingles. The door, of green-painted metal, was shut. There were no lights inside the building.

Mattos banged on the door. No one answered. He was about to leave when he heard the sound of the door opening.

A mulatto with missing teeth, wearing striped pajamas, asked, “What is it? What is it?”

“I’m looking for Chicão.”

“There’s no Chicão here.” The man tried to shut the door, but Mattos stopped him.

“I want to speak to the owner.”

“The owner is Francisco Albergaria.”

“Isn’t his nickname Chicão?”

“Maybe.”

“He’s the one I want to talk to.”

“He hasn’t been around. I’m the watchman.”

“What’s your name, please?”

“José.”

“Do you know how to read, José?”

“More or less. If you write with little letters on the paper, I don’t know. I can only read big letters.”

“Would you be able to give Mr. Francisco a message?”

“If it’s not very long.”

“Tell him Inspector Mattos, who’s investigating the crime at the Deauville Building, wants to talk to him.”

“That’s real long.”

“I think I’m going to write a note for you to give him. Can you get me a piece of paper?”

“I’ll check.”

José returned with a piece of brown cardboard.

Mattos wrote in large block letters: “Francisco Albergaria. I’d like to meet with you. All I need is some information from you. Nothing important. Please call me.”

twenty-one

AMONG THE PAPERS
Colonel Adyl de Oliveira had found upon breaking into Gregório Fortunato’s drawers and files when he invaded the Catete Palace were documents relating to the crooked deals in the Cexim, brokered by Gregório along with Arquimedes Manhães and Luiz Magalhães, the lover of Salete Rodrigues, Inspector Mattos’s girlfriend. According to the documents, as intermediaries in those deals, Manhães and his associates earned more than fifty-two million cruzeiros.

Luiz Magalhães was not located by those in charge of the inquiry. Manhães, however, was arrested and taken to the Galeão air base when he made his statement.

Manhães declared that he had been a guest at the Catete at the beginning of the Vargas administration but had distanced himself from the palace following a deal for buying and selling cotton, made with financing from the Bank of Brazil, in partnership with Roberto Alves, ex-secretary of the president. Asked how much he had realized in that transaction, he answered that he couldn’t say exactly, since quite some time had gone by since the operation had occurred.

To the good fortune of the investigators, the man with whom Manhães worked in Marília, São Paulo, went to Galeão, accompanied by a lawyer, to try to effect the prisoner’s release. Manhães’s patron, the Japanese Iassuro Matsubara, was immediately arrested by the military men.

Manhães stated that Matsubara had financed the campaigns of candidates to the Chamber and Senate. Matsubara had contributed half a million cruzeiros to the campaign of Roberto Alves for federal senator from São Paulo. That money had been diverted by Gregório to deliver to Climerio for his escape. In exchange for his contributions, Matsubara received financing and special privileges from the Bank of Brazil and other public entities, as well as favorable treatment from state government for the purchase of land in São Paulo and Mato Grosso.

ALL DAY LONG
, wherever he went Lomagno heard the rumors that were flying around the city. There was talk of a military coup deposing the president; of the scabrous scandals discovered in Gregório’s secret files—Vargas’s cellar was said to be like the Borgias’; all the military garrisons were supposedly at the ready, the tanks at the military compound were prepared to go into action; it was claimed that Café Filho had been called to the Catete Palace to take the oath of office. To Lomagno the comments he heard from rumormongers seemed little different, in mood and confusion, from those generated months earlier by the lubricious details of the murder, out of jealousy, of the bank teller Arsênio by Air Force Lieutenant Bandeira. To him, the prestige of President Vargas and his government had for months been suffering a continuous process of attrition and had, in that month of August, hit its lowest level of popular approval. And Getúlio Vargas being deposed by the armed forces was not exactly anything new.

Lomagno had reasons to worry. In the secret files taken from the Catete, on the list of import firms that bribed Gregório with twenty percent of the value of the import licenses obtained from the Cexim without providing the hard currency reserves required by law, was the name of Lomagno & Co., along with that of other firms, like Brasfesa, Cemtex, and Corpax. The news was in all the papers. Only the
Diário Carioca
mentioned the circumstance of the president of Cemtex, Paulo Gomes Aguiar, having been murdered at the start of the month, saying that the police seemed to have given up finding the killer. Lomagno had reasons to worry about revelations that involved his firm, but he didn’t. Lomagno had reasons to worry in case a military coup deposed the president. But he didn’t. His father, in a hospital bed days before his death, probably recalling the failures he had suffered thinking he could change the country by working as a militant in the fascist Integralist Party, had told him: “Son, don’t think you can change Brazil. The French, an intelligent people, invented the perfect maxim, which becomes more true the older it gets:
plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose
.”

But his lack of concern with developments resulted mainly from the fact that a greater anxiety occupied his mind. It included a plan for which he would need the aid of Chicão.

“Zuleika gave me your message. I also needed to talk to you. The inspector was with Kid Earthquake, at the Boqueirão, looking for me. I don’t know how he managed to find me. Fingerprints, maybe. But I wore a glove. The ring I forgot there—”

“You left your ring in Paulo’s apartment?”

“I forgot it somewhere, when I took a bath. The fucker bit me in the chest, got his filth all over me, even my hands were dirty, I had to take a bath. But it was a ring like any other, without any identification . . . It has an F engraved on the inside. I made a lot of sacrifices to buy it, as soon as I got back from the
FEB
. I was really pissed when I lost the ring.”

“That cop already knew it was a black man who killed Paulo. He was here and told me that.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I was going to. But he was following a red herring thinking that the Negro was Gregório, Getúlio’s bodyguard.”

“But now he knows it was me, Francisco Albergaria.”

Lomagno heard with satisfaction what Chicão told him, despite the grave personal risks that Mattos’s investigations could cause him. Chicão was being cornered. It would be easier to convince him to defend himself.

“What did you want with me?”

“I want you to kill that son of a bitch.”

“Not me, sir. I’m going to leave for Bahia. I’ve always wanted to get to know that good land.”

“I know that cop. He’ll go after you even in hell. He’s obsessive, crazy.”

“Bahia’s a big place and full of black people like me. It’ll be hard for him to find me.”

“I’m telling you: he’ll end up finding you. You’re going to live terrified, hounded, afraid to let anyone know you’re from Rio, afraid to say you were a soldier, those things he already knows about you. One day you drop your guard, and he catches you. Do you want to live in a hole, hiding like a rat?”

“Is that inspector a queer like Mr. Paulo?”

“No.” Pause. “It’s going to be a more difficult job.” Pause. “Alice—”

Lomagno was about to say that Alice had abandoned him to live with the cop but stopped. He didn’t want to humiliate himself before Chicão.

“If you kill that dog, which will be even more useful to you than to me, I’ll give you whatever you want. Money to buy a beachfront house in Bahia. A stipend every month, for expenses, for the rest of your life.”

“You’ve already given me a lot. I’ll do this for you for free.”

“By killing that bastard you’ll give me such great pleasure that I insist on those gifts.”

“Can I ask a question?”

“Sure.”

“Does Dona Luciana know about this?”

“No. I don’t have anything more to do with Dona Luciana. We fought.”

SALETE CALLED MATTOS
. Alice, irritated, stopped writing in her diary to answer the phone.

“Alberto isn’t in.”

“Do you know where he went?”

“He’s working.”

“Didn’t his shift end at noon today? I called the station, and he wasn’t there.”

“What do you want, Salete? I’m very busy.”

“I wanted to know if Alberto wanted to go to São Paulo with me. I’ve already bought two plane tickets. There’s going to be in São Paulo, in Ibirapuera Park, it’s here in the paper, a glorious fireworks festival to inaugurate the exposition of the city’s four hundredth anniversary.”

“The celebration’s going to be postponed. Everything’s being postponed.”

“It’s here in the paper that Governor Garcez of São Paulo said that only an earthquake will stop the festival.”

“Alberto telephoned to say he’d be arriving late. It’s better for you to go by yourself.”

“Oh . . . What a shame . . . Wouldn’t you like to go with me?”

“Me?!”

“You.”

“No, thank you very much. I’m very busy. Excuse me, I’m going to hang up. I’m very busy.”