Police’s field office. Lunch, he’d told them when he called from the airport, hadn’t been in the cards, so Mara Carta, Hector’s Chief of Intelligence, took the initiative and had a sandwich and a soft drink waiting for him when he arrived. They updated him while he ate.
Arnaldo began by reporting on his visit to the Argentinean Club.
“You think it’s enough to satisfy Sampaio,” he asked when he was done, “or are we going to have to waste more time on his stupid theory?”
“It’ll be enough,” Silva said between bites, “provided Mara composes a report making it sound like an intensive investigation of the entire Argentinean community.”
“But unfortunately unproductive,” Mara said. “Leave it to me. I always wanted to write a novel.”
“Hold back a day or two,” Silva said, after swallowing a mouthful, “otherwise he’s unlikely to believe we’ve done everything you’re going to invent and put in there.” He turned to Hector. “What did you learn at the crime scene?”
Hector shared Lefkowitz’s theories.
“That Lefkowitz,” Arnaldo said, “may well be the only good thing ever to come out of Manaus.”
Arnaldo wasn’t fond of the Amazonian city of Manaus. He hated to go there, even on the shortest of assignments, considered it a filthy and degenerate hell hole. And everyone around the table, as it happened, agreed with him. Even Mara, who usually didn’t agree with Arnaldo about anything.
“He only worked there for two years,” Hector said. “Long enough to inflict great suffering upon him, but not long enough to ruin him.”
Silva blotted his lips and wiped his hands on a paper napkin. “And you, Mara? What have you got for us?”
“Nothing substantial,” she said, “just alleged sightings. Juraci’s in Porto Alegre. She’s in Rio. She’s in Belo Horizonte. She’s all over the map. We’ve got twelve people working the national tip line, and they’re overloaded. The average waittime is bordering on fifteen minutes, which is an all-time record. It seems like everybody in the country wants to help. They all love the Artist.”
“Joaozinho Preto doesn’t,” Arnaldo said.
Mara leaned forward, her shoulder brushing Silva’s. “Who’s Joaozinho Preto?”
All the men looked at her.
“You’re being serious?” Goncalves said. “You never heard of Joaozinho Preto?”
“If I had,” she said, “I wouldn’t have wasted everybody’s time by asking.”
“Until the Artist kicked him in the shin,” Silva said, “Joaozinho was the best striker Palmeiras ever had.”
“Heart and soul of the team,” Goncalves said. “A photographer from the Jornal da Tarde captured the moment it happened. Most horrible football photo I ever saw. Tico’s shoe is against Joaozinho’s shin, right at the height of his kick. From the point of impact on down, Joaozinho’s leg is off at a right angle to the rest of it. His career was over just like that.” He snapped his fingers. “It was an accident, but still…”
“The team’s chance to win last year’s national championship, the only one they’ve had in the last ten years, went right out the window when that happened,” Arnaldo said. “Every single Palmeirense wanted to kill the Artist, and they are neither few nor noted for their passivity.”
“The break never healed properly,” Goncalves said. “It was the end of Joaozinho’s career, and he was only what? Twenty-seven?”
“Twenty-eight,” Hector said. “But I never heard him say a word against the Artist. Not then and not since.”
“Let’s talk to him anyway,” Silva said. “It can’t hurt. Any more from the kidnappers?”
“Maybe,” Mara said.
“Why maybe?”
“They’re communicating through the Artist’s website.”
“I know. So?”
“So, before the news broke, the Artist was getting about a hundred emails a day. At the moment it’s more than five thousand an hour, mostly expressions of sympathy. The kid who administrates the site is overwhelmed. I assigned a couple of people to help him. They’re overwhelmed too.”
“Put more people on it.”
“I don’t have more people.”
“Can’t you sort electronically?”
“We have no parameters. They didn’t use the subject line when they first made contact. They wouldn’t be stupid enough to use the same email address twice. And, if they run true to form, they’ll log on through a wireless connection.”
“And it’s unlikely to be the same one they used last time.”
“Correct.”
“So you have to read every incoming email?”
“We do. It’s a nightmare.”
“Damn. How about the media? Who broadcast the story first?”
“Radio Mundo.”
“Where did they get it? Sampaio wants to know.”
“They won’t tell us.”
“Why not? What difference does it make?”
“According to them, their source insists on confidentiality.”
“Probably just means she’s some blabbermouth who feeds them information all the time,” Arnaldo said, “and they want to make sure she keeps on doing it.”
“She?” Mara bristled. “Why do you assume it’s a she?”
“Uh oh,” Goncalves said. “Here we go again.”
“You know any male blabbermouths?” Arnaldo said.
“I know one. He’s a Neanderthal by the name of Arnaldo Nunes.”
The sniping between Mara and Arnaldo was a regular feature of their meetings. Silva didn’t think either one of them took it seriously. He generally ignored it.
“What’s the Artist’s reaction to all of this?” he said.
“He wants to pay,” Mara said.
“Five million in diamonds? Just like that?”
“Five million dollars in diamonds. Not Reais, dollars. He doesn’t even want to negotiate the amount. He’s terrified, Mario. Terrified they might hurt her.”
“For him,” Goncalves said, “five million dollars is peanuts. The Artist is loaded.”
“I think even the Artist would miss five million dollars,” Silva said. “Are his telephones being monitored?”
“His apartment,” Mara said, “plus his mobile phone, his girlfriend’s apartment, his house in Guaruja, his house in Campos do Jordao, his condo in Rio and his agent’s office, home and mobile.”
“How about the civil police? Have they brought anything to the party?”
Mara shuffled through the pile in front of her and handed him a folder. Silva perused it, and after a moment, looked up.
“Says here,” he said, “that Juraci had an appointment scheduled with her hairdresser for 10:00 this morning.”
“Jacques Jardin, no less,” Mara said.
“Why ‘no less’? Is this Jardin some kind of a big deal?”
“Yes, Mario, he’s a really big deal. I wouldn’t be able to get an appointment with him even if I could afford it.”
“I fail to see,” Goncalves said, “how an appointment with a hairdresser could be of any significance.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to. You’re a male.”
“So?”
“You guys know about football players. We girls know about hairdressers. The person who wrote that report is a woman. If she was sexist pig like Nunes here-”
“Hey,” Arnaldo said.
