to consider our case.'
'Petitioned the-'
Muniz cut Ferraz off. 'What court?' he said.
'A federal court and a federal judge,' Father Angelo Monteiro said, stepping out of the crowd around Pillar. He held a smoking cigarette in his right hand and a document in the left.
Muniz lowered the shotgun, snatched the paper from the old priest, and stared at it. 'Son of a bitch,' he said, his eyes bulging as he absorbed the significance of what he was reading.
'No,' Father Angelo said, 'he isn't. That particular judge happens to be an honest man, unlike a certain local magistrate you have on your payroll.'
Muniz ignored the priest and turned to Ferraz. 'Can they do this?'
Ferraz opened his mouth, thought better of whatever he had planned to say and shut it again.
'May I see that?' Vicenza Pelosi took the paper from Muniz's unresisting hand and held it toward the camera. The cameraman adjusted his focus.
Muniz realized what was happening, snatched the paper back, and tore it to shreds.
'I got it,' the cameraman said to Vicenza. 'Sharp, but short. We'll have to freeze it.'
Muniz started advancing toward him.
The cameraman stepped backward, zoomed out, refocused.
'Keep rolling, Beto,' Vicenza said.
'Rolling,' the cameraman confirmed, stopping when Muniz did.
Muniz, trembling with rage, spun around. He raised his shotgun and aimed it at the ground in front of Pillar. He shouted an epithet, but no one heard it. The blast of the weapon overpowered his voice. The hail of buckshot threw up a cloud of dust. Before it had settled, and while the report was still ringing in everyone's ears, he turned on his heel and walked back to his car.
Chapter Thirty
'She said she's going to do what?' the director said, his voice loud and shrill.
Silva held the telephone away from his ear. '`Stick around for a few days while we catch the bad guys,' was the way she put it.'
'Ave Maria,' the director said. 'That's all we need. That woman is
…' His voice trailed off. He apparently couldn't think of an adequate definition for Vicenza Pelosi. 'She'll make us look like the Curbstone Cops,' he finished lamely.
'Keystone Cops.'
'Whatever.'
'She didn't seem to like Muniz or Ferraz all that much,' Silva said.
'Well, she wouldn't, would she? Her father was a union organizer or some such, and they killed him for it.'
'She said her first report would be on the Jornal de Noticias at eight.'
'Merda! I'm going to have to brief the minister. You got any good news?'
'Not yet.'
Silva's boss grunted and did what he usually did when he was displeased. He hung up.
'You heard?' Silva asked his nephew.
Hector nodded. 'He wasn't exactly whispering.'
Arnaldo walked into the suite and caught Hector's last remark. 'Who wasn't whispering?' he said.
'The director,' Silva said glumly. 'He just found out that Vicenza Pelosi is in town.'
'No kidding? She's hot stuff.' Arnaldo saw the expression on Silva's face and wiped the grin off his own.
Hector walked over to the little refrigerator and opened the door. 'Who wants a beer?'
Silva shook his head. Arnaldo raised a hand.
'Glass?'
'Hell, no,' he said to Hector. Then, turning to Silva: 'I found Edson Souza's mother.'
Silva had been studying the dust on his shoes. He looked up sharply. 'And?' he said.
'And I could be wrong, but I think she knows where he is.
'Hector, give me one of those beers,' Silva said.
'But she's not going to tell us. Thanks.'
The last word was for Hector. Arnaldo popped the tab on the can.
'Why the hell not?' Silva said.
'Because she's got other kids, younger ones, and she's scared of Ferraz.'
'She said that?'
Arnaldo took a swig of his beer and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. 'No,' he said. 'She didn't say it, but she is. The woman she worked for was a real bitch. She fired her for bringing a cop to the house.'
'Fired her?'
Arnaldo nodded. 'Right in front of me. I had a taxi waiting. I gave Marly-that's her name-a lift home. We talked. She told me Edson was earning money, but he wouldn't tell her how. Sometimes he'd sleep at her place. Mostly he didn't. She didn't say it, but I got the impression that he didn't like to see his mother being fucked by different people. She and the kids-there are three of them, two girls and a boyall live in one room and sleep in the same bed, if you can call it a bed. Every now and then, she said, Edson would bring her a bag of groceries, sometimes presents for the little ones. One time, he even brought a television set.'
'Stolen, probably.'
'Marly says no. Says it was in a box with a guarantee and all. Says the kid swore he wasn't a thief.'
'And she believes him?'
'Yeah. She does. Says he never lies to her.'
Arnaldo gulped down the remainder of his beer, bent the can, and tossed it into a wastebasket. It landed with a clatter. 'I've been giving it some thought,' he said. 'I've got a sister in Riberao. She works in one of those homes for battered women.'
'So?'
'So, maybe she could take Marly and the kids. Ferraz'd never find them there. Once she's safe, maybe she'll open up.
'Worth a try,' Silva said.
Arnaldo pulled out his address book and picked up the phone.
Vicenza Pelosi appeared, as promised, on the eight o'clock news and she spared no one.
She used the shot of Ferraz waving his arms and excoriated him for trying to deny to the public their 'constitutionally guaranteed' right to the truth. She berated Orlando Muniz Senior for raising a private army of thugs and for threatening 'physical violence to defend his property' instead of 'availing himself of the recourse provided by law.' She accused Luiz Pillar and Roberto Pereira of 'demagoguery' and a 'lack of respect for private property.' She denounced Wilson Cunha, the local judge, for not implementing the appropriation of uncultivated land as 'clearly prescribed in the Constitution of this country.' She castigated the police'both State and Federal'-for their lack of progress in soly- ing the 'brutal assassinations' of Dom Felipe Antunes, the journalist Diana Poli, and the landowner Orlando Muniz Junior. She took the President of the Republic and the Minister of justice to task for not having taken preventive measures to defuse the 'land wars that lie at the heart of all of the problems.'
And she did it all in only three minutes and twenty seconds.
About a quarter of an hour after the broadcast ended there was a knock on the door of Silva's suite. Arnaldo opened it, and his jaw dropped.
It was Vicenza Pelosi.
She was fresh from the shower. Her long hair was tied up in a bun and held in place by oriental chopsticks. She came in smelling of freshly applied perfume, sat down without being asked, flashed her radiant smile, and ignored the fact that her host wasn't smiling back.
'I guess you didn't do that broadcast live,' Silva said.
