Buried Strangers

“Let me ask you something else,” he said.

“Ask away, but be quick about it. I told Paulo we’d be lunching together. He says I’m allowed to answer all your questions.”

“Including what you were starting to say when he cut you off?”

“Uh-huh.”

“What was it?”

Gilda raised a hand, caught the waiter’s attention, and made a gesture as if she were writing on a pad. He hurried over to their table.

“Coffee?” he said. “Dessert? I’ve got a nice sweet made from beans.”

Both shook their heads.

“Just the check,” Hector said.

The waiter smiled in satisfaction, gave a little bow, and hurried off. Gilda watched his retreating back for a moment, and then fixed her gray-green eyes on Hector.

“Every corpse had a split sternum,” she said.

“A split what?”

“Sternum. Breastbone. Cut through from top to bottom. Like this.”

She reached across the tiny table and traced a vertical line on his chest, dividing his ribs. It was a strangely intimate ges-ture. He had a sudden attack of gooseflesh and couldn’t be sure what was causing it, her words or her touch.

“Paulo cut me off because we weren’t sure, then, that the sternum-cutting applied to all of the corpses. It would have been premature to suggest that it did.”

“What reason could anyone have for doing something like that?”

“Only one I can think of: to obtain access to something behind the ribs.”

“The heart, maybe?”

“Maybe.”

Hector recalled a woodcut he’d once seen of a victim bent backward over an altar while an Aztec priest ripped the heart out of his chest.

“Seems to reinforce the idea of ritual killing,” he said.

She hesitated for a moment. “Possibly,” she said. “But, if you really want me to make a wild and unsubstantiated guess. .”

“Live dangerously.”

“A doctor did it.”

“A doctor?”

“I’ll rephrase that. Not just a doctor. A surgeon. He or she did a clean job of it, and he or she used a saw.”

“A saw?”

“A sternal saw. It’s a device with an electric motor and a blade that moves like this,”-she waved a finger up and down in the air-“a medical instrument that has only one purpose, to open the chest cavity.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Sternal saws have a unique signature. Under a micro-scope, the serrations stick out like a Caucasian in this neigh-borhood. They’re unmistakable.”

The waiter appeared with the check. Hector took out a credit card and slipped it into the leather cover embossed with the name of the restaurant. “So, if it’s not a cult thing,” he said when the waiter was gone, “if it’s not some kind of ritual murder, what else could it be?”

“We don’t-”

“Speculate. Yeah, I know.”

“How did you know what I was going to say?”

“You started with a we. That’s the medical examiner’s office talking.”

She sighed.

“Look,” she said, “you may not like it, but I think Paulo’s right. We’re supposed to deal in facts. If we start speculating, there’d be no end to it. Experience has taught us it’s better if we just tell you guys what we know, and you come up with a hypothesis to explain it.”

The waiter came back. Hector scrutinized the bill and the accompanying credit card slip.

“Service included?”

“Sim, Senhor.”

Hector scrawled his signature. The waiter thanked him, detached the customer’s copy of the slip, and wished them both a pleasant afternoon.

“Mind you,” she said, when they were alone again, “I don’t think you can rule out ritual murder just because the killers used a saw. The cult thing remains a distinct possibil-ity; I’m not saying it isn’t, but. .”

“But you have another theory?”

“Yes.”

“How about sharing? Not the cop and the medical exam-iner, just a young couple having a romantic lunch?”

“Romantic lunch, huh? What would your namorada have to say about that?”

“Was there a question behind that question?”

“Absolutely.”

“If it was what I think it was, the answer is no. I haven’t got a namorada.”

“It was what you think it was. You’re not gay?”

“No.”

“So?” She made that writing gesture again.

He reached into his pocket, pulled out his notebook, and handed her a pen. She jotted down her address and tele-phone number.

“It’s the building on the corner with Rua Aracaju,” she said. “Fourth floor.”

“Thursday night?”

“Friday’s better.”

“Eight o’clock?”

“Fine.”

She’d released her purse, left it on her lap. Now, she picked it up again and stood.

He remained glued to his chair.

“You’re not going to tell me, are you?” he said.

“Maybe on Friday. It will give you something to look for-ward to.”

“I already have something to look forward to.”

“Which is?”

“Seeing you.”

“There. That wasn’t so hard, was it? You do know how to flatter a girl. You were just holding it in.”

“I wasn’t holding it in.”

“And you can wipe the hurt puppy expression off your face. It’s not going to help. I’m not telling you what my the-ory is, not today at any rate.”

“Why not?”

“I need a second opinion. I have a girlfriend, a specialist. She’s in a position to give me one.”

“What do you need a second opinion for?”

“Someone has to tell me I’m not crazy.”

And before he could ask her what she meant by that, Gilda had turned her back on him and was heading for the door.

Chapter Eighteen