'My agent's not back from lunch yet,' he said. 'They'll call me as soon as he gets in.'
'It's just gone 4.30 p.m.,' said Falcon, giving him his mobile number. 'He's running a bit late, isn't he?'
Barros shook his head, shrugged. Things were not going well for him.
'What's your agent's name?'
'Ricardo Gamero,' said Barros.
Falcon called Esperanza and they arranged to meet in some nearby gardens. He asked to bring a female police officer with him.
Cristina Ferrera was waiting for him outside the preschool. He briefed her on the way. Esperanza recognized Falcon as he got out of the car. Introductions were made. They piled back in. Esperanza sat next to Falcon, Ferrera was behind, staring at Esperanza as if she recognized her.
'How are the women holding up?' asked Falcon. 'I imagine the circumstances are very difficult for them.'
'They oscillate between despair and fear,' she said. 'They're devastated by the loss of their loved ones and then they see the news-the assaults and damage to property. They feel a little more secure since your Comisario came on television and announced that violence against Muslims and vandalizing of their property would be dealt with severely.'
'You're their representative,' said Ferrera.
'They trust me. I'm not one of them, but they trust me.'
'You're not one of them?'
'I'm not a Muslim,' said Esperanza. 'My partner is a convert to Islam. I know them through him.'
'Your partner is Miguel Botin,' said Falcon.
'Yes,' she said. 'He wants me to convert to Islam so that we can get married. I'm a practising Catholic and I have some difficulties, as a European, with the treatment of women in Islam. Miguel introduced me to all the women in the mosque to help me understand, to help me get rid of some of my prejudices. But it's a big leap from Catholicism to Islam.'
'How did you meet Miguel?' asked Ferrera.
'Through an old school friend of mine,' said Esperanza. 'I ran into the two of them just over a year ago, and after that Miguel and I started seeing each other.'
'What's your friend's name?' asked Falcon.
'Ricardo Gamero,' she said. 'He does something in the police force-I don't know what. He says it's administrative.'
Seville was a village, thought Falcon. He told Esperanza what they needed from the women and said that Ferrera would accompany her to collect and mark up the DNA samples.
'We'll need a sample from Miguel Botin as well,' said Falcon. 'I'm sorry.'
Esperanza nodded, staring into space. She had a clear, unadorned face. Her only jewellery was a gold cross at her neck and two gold studs in her ear lobes, which were visible as her slightly crinkly black hair was scraped back. She had very straight eyebrows and it was these that first gave away her own emotional turmoil, and then the moisture flooding her dark brown eyes. She shook hands and got out of the car. Falcon quickly told Ferrera how Ricardo Gamero fitted in and asked her to find out if Esperanza knew what her partner had been doing.
'Don't worry, Inspector Jefe,' said the ex-nun. 'Esperanza and I recognize each other. We've been on the same path.'
The two women moved off. Falcon sat in the airconditioned cool of the car and breathed the stress back down into its hole. He made himself believe that he had time on his side. The terrorist angle of the attack was not, at the moment, in his hands, nor was the Imam's history, but progress had been made. He had to concentrate his powers on finding a link to the fake council inspectors and the electricians. There had to be another witness, someone more reliable than Majid Merizak, who'd seen the inspectors and the electricians. Falcon called Ferrera and asked her to find out from the women if there was anybody else who might have been in the mosque on the mornings of Friday 2nd June and Monday 5th June.
He went back to his notebook, too much occurring to him for his brain to have any chance of remembering detail. The first bugging request the CGI made to the Juez Decano was submitted and refused on April 27th. When did Informaticalidad buy the apartment? Three months ago. No date. He called the estate agency. The sale went through on the 22nd of February. What was he expecting? What was he looking for? He wanted to apply pressure on Informaticalidad. He was still suspicious of them, despite the performance by the sales reps in the police interviews. But he didn't want to apply pressure directly. It had to come from another source, other than the homicide squad. He wanted to see if they would react.
Maybe if he could find someone who'd been recently fired, or had 'moved on'', from Informaticalidad they would still know people at the company, perhaps even some of the guys who'd used the apartment on Calle Los Romeros. He found the lists given to him by Diego Torres, the Human Resources Director. Names, addresses, home telephone numbers and the dates they left the company. How was he going to find these people at this time of day? He started with the employees who'd left the company most recently, reasoning that they might still be out of work until after the summer. He hit answer machine after answer machine, number no longer in use, and then, finally, a ringing tone that went on for some time. A female voice answered sleepily. Falcon asked for David Curado. She shouted and threw down the phone, which took a soft landing. Curado picked it up. He sounded just about alive. Falcon explained his predicament.
'Sure,' said Curado, waking up instantly. 'I'll talk to anybody about those wankers.' Curado lived in a modern apartment block in Tabladilla. Falcon knew it. He'd been there years ago to observe a hostage situation across the street. Curado came to the door stripped to the waist, wearing a pair of white short trousers as seen on the tennis player Rafael Nadal. Like Nadal, he looked as if he went to the gym. Beads of sweat stood out on his forehead.
The apartment was hot. The girl who'd answered the phone was lying splayed across the bed in a pair of knickers and a tiny vest. Curado offered a drink. Falcon took some water. The girl groaned and rolled over. Her arms slapped against the mattress.
'She gets annoyed,' said Curado. 'When I'm not earning I don't turn on the air conditioning during the day.'
'Dav-i-i-id,' said the girl in a long whine.
'Now that you're here,' he said, rolling his eyes.
He got up and flipped the switch on the fuse box. A light mist appeared at the vents. The girl let out an orgasmic cry.
'How long did you work for Informaticalidad?' asked Falcon.
'Just over a year. Fifteen months, something like that.'
'How did you get the job?'
'I was head-hunted, but I did the research to make sure that I was head-hunted.'
'What was the research?'
'I went to church,' said Curado. 'The sales guys at Informaticalidad were the best paid in the business, and it wasn't all commission-based money. They paid a good basic salary of close to €1,400 a month and you could triple that if you worked hard. At the time I was working like a slave for €1,300 a month, all commission. So I started asking around and it was weird; nobody knew anything about how this company recruited. I called all the agencies, looked through the press and trade magazines, the internet. I even called Informaticalidad themselves and they wouldn't tell me how they recruited. I tried to get friendly with the Informaticalidad sales crew, but they brushed me off. I started looking at who they sold to, and it didn't matter what prices I offered, I could never make a sale. Once a company started buying from Informaticalidad, they bought exclusively. That's why they can offer the high basic salary. They don't have to compete. So, I began looking at the individuals in the companies they sold to and tried to get friendly with them. Nothing.
'I couldn't get anywhere until a buyer from one of these companies got fired. It was she who told me how it worked: you've got to go to church, and you mustn't be a woman. So I qualified on one score, but I hadn't been to church for fifteen years. There were three churches they used: Iglesia de la Magdalena, de Santa Maria La Blanca and San Marcos. I bought myself a black suit and went to church. Within a couple of months I'd been approached.'
'So you got the job, the money, the nice apartment,' said Falcon. 'What went wrong?'
'Almost immediately they started to cut in on my free time. We were sent on courses-sales training and product information. Normal stuff. Except that it was almost every weekend and there was a lot of repetitive company ethos shit and religion, and it wasn't always easy to differentiate between the two. They also did this
