bishop was-how shall I put this?-publicity conscious.' He seemed pleased with his phrasing and repeated it. 'Yes, publicity conscious. He was making a grand entrance into Cascatas. My presence on the helicopter would have been… a distraction.'
'A prima donna was he? A publicity hound?'
'I didn't say that, Delegado.'
'No, Padre, of course you didn't. Let me ask you this: Did his arrival achieve the intended effect?'
'Oh my, yes. It was a great success. He must have been very pleased.'
'His idea? The helicopter?'
'Mine. More coffee?'
Hector accepted the coffee. His interview with Father Francisco went on for almost another hour, but nothing of any further significance came to light.
Silva was in a taxi when his nephew's call came through.
'Where are you?' Hector asked.
'On my way to see Anton Brouwer, that priest Diana Poli mentioned. You?'
'Just leaving Presidente Vargas.'
Hector gave his uncle a quick summary of his conversation with the bishop's secretary. Toward the end of his account, the signal started breaking up. '… bring… Sao… leg…'
'What?'
'I said… bring Arnaldo… Sao Paulo… legwork.'
'You want to bring Arnaldo from Sao Paulo to do some legwork?'
'Yes. I… you fine.'
'Well, I can't hear you. Okay, call Arnaldo. Tell him to drive. We could use another car.'
Silva could see the cabdriver's face in the rearview mirror. The man's mouth tightened when he heard the part about another car. More cars meant fewer customers for taxis.
'Did you start a trace on the bishop's incoming calls?' Silva said.
'… already underway. If… home phone, we'll get him.'
'Don't count on it. Anything else?'
But Hector was gone.
The cabdriver pulled onto the unpaved shoulder of the road, put one arm over the back of the seat, and pointed with the other.
'Father Brouwer's place is over there. You go down that alley between the banana trees,' he said. 'You want me to wait?'
Chapter Sixteen
A friendly mongrel with a gray muzzle came padding up to Silva as he started down the path. He paused to scratch the dog behind the ear. When he resumed walking the animal, panting in the heat, fell into step behind him. The path ended at a little house with a tile roof and stucco walls badly in need of paint. Wooden steps led up to a small porch. The dog brushed by, sought a place in the shade, and lay down with its head between its paws.
As Silva mounted the last step the front door opened and a priest in a black cassock appeared. He smiled at his visitor and then bent his head to light the unlit cigarette dangling from his lips.
The priest was frail and very old. Silva had expected a younger man. 'Father Brouwer?'
'Oh, my goodness, no. You flatter me. I have thirty-seven years on Anton,' he said. 'I'm Father Angelo.' The priest stuck out a hand. There were amber tobacco stains on his index and middle fingers.
Silva shook hands and introduced himself. If the priest was impressed to be speaking to a chief inspector of the Federal Police, he didn't show it.
'What can I do for you, my son?' Father Angelo was a small man. The top of his head didn't quite reach Silva's chin, and he had a sparse rim of hair that encircled it like a white laurel wreath.
'Actually, Father, I'm here to talk to Father Brouwer.'
'Nothing I can help you with? You sure?'
'I wanted to talk to him about liberation theology.'
'You've come to the right place. Have a seat.'
He pointed to one of four chairs that surrounded a wicker table. Silva sank into it, and Father Angelo sat down in another. 'He doesn't like me to smoke inside the house,' he said.
'He?'
The priest ground out his cigarette in the ashtray, fished a half-empty pack of unfiltered Caballeros from somewhere within his cassock, and immediately lit another one. 'Anton. Father Brouwer.'
The old man coughed, took out a handkerchief, put it over his mouth, and coughed again. Before he put it away he studied the surface of the cloth and nodded to himself, as if pleased. 'I'd offer you coffee,' he said, his voice like a rasp on hardwood, 'but he doesn't like me mucking about in his kitchen.'
'I'm fine, Father. Thanks.'
'Smoke?'
Silva shook his head. 'I gave it up.'
'Very wise of you. Sorry about the ashtray. Anton doesn't smoke either. This is his week to do the household chores, but he refuses to clean it. And if I leave my cigarettes lying around, they have a mysterious way of disappearing. It's a little game we play. Now, tell me, what sparks your interest in liberation theology?'
'I'm investigating two crimes: the shooting of Bishop Antunes and the abduction, perhaps murder, of a landowner by the name of Orlando Muniz Junior.'
'Ah, yes. Muniz.'
'You know him?'
The priest took his time in answering, first studying the ash on his cigarette, then tapping some of it off into an overflowing ashtray. Most of the ash fell onto the surface of the table. He didn't attempt to clean it up.
'Oh, yes,' he said at last. 'Everyone around here is familiar with young Muniz. Slavery was abolished in this country in 1889, but that fact seems lost on people like him.'
Silva said nothing, suspecting that Father Angelo would have more to say, which he soon did.
'Muniz is a bloodsucker, a modern day slaveholder. You must know how it works.'
'Why don't you tell me?'
'It's the old story: His agents recruit people, promising to pay them a fair wage. When they arrive they find they're in debt for the cost of their transport and the food they ate along the way. Then he forces them to buy everything they need from his own store.'
'So they never get out of debt?'
'Never.'
Silva was all-too-familiar with the practice. The Brazilian government had been trying to stamp it out for more than a century, but it persisted.
'And if they run,' the priest went on, 'Muniz's capangas go after them, beat them into submission, and bring them back. In your work you must have met others like him.'
'Never in the state of Sao Paulo. The practice is more prevalent up north, in places like Acre.'
'It happens here, too. And it's not just Muniz.'
'We can stop him, you know. All we need are-'
'Witnesses brave enough to come forward?'
'Yes.'
The priest shook his head sadly. He lit another cigarette with the glowing butt of the one he'd been smoking and then stubbed out the butt, causing more detritus from the ashtray to fall onto the table.
'You won't find them. Not after what happened to a man named Aurelio Azevedo.'
Silva nodded. 'I've heard about him.'
'God forgive me. I try to love my fellow man, but I can't help myself from despising some of them. Cascatas is going to be a better place without Orlando Muniz Junior.' The priest seemed to realize what he'd just said and
