The Ignorance of Blood

‘Encantada,’ said Marisa, and turned her back on them.

She put the hammer and chisel down on the work bench, tied up her dressing gown, sat on a high stool and lit the cigar stub. Resistant was a mild description of her attitude.

‘Now?’ she asked. ‘Why can you understand it now, Inspector Jefe?’

‘Because we've just found your sister,’ said Falcón.

The line was intended to shock and it did. In the intense silence after its delivery Falcón saw pain, fear and horror flash across Marisa's beautiful features.

‘I distinctly remember telling you that my sister was not lost,’ said Marisa, summoning all the self-control she could muster.

Ferrera stepped forward and gave her the printout of the still image taken from Vasili Lukyanov's disks. Marisa looked down at it, pursed her lips. Her face was impassive as she reconnected with Falcón.

‘What is this?’

‘This was in the possession of a known Russian gangster who died in a motorway accident yesterday morning,’ said Falcón. ‘Maybe you knew him, too: Vasili Lukyanov.’

‘How is this relevant to me?’ asked Marisa, that name thudding into her with the force of a slaughterer's bolt. ‘If my sister, who I haven't seen for six or seven years, has chosen to take up prostitution…’

‘Chosen to take up prostitution?’ said Ferrera, unable to contain herself. ‘Of the four hundred thousand prostitutes operating in Spain, barely five per cent have chosen their profession. And I don't think any of them are working for the Russian mafia.’

‘Look, Marisa, we're not here to take you down,’ said Falcón. ‘We know you've been coerced. And we know who's been doing the coercing. We're here to relieve your situation. To get you out of it, and your sister.’

‘I'm not sure what this situation is that you're talking about,’ said Marisa, not ready yet, needing to keep it going while she weighed things up in her mind.

‘What was the deal? Did they say they'd let Margarita go if you started up an affair with Esteban?’ asked Falcón. ‘If you fed them information, told them he was beating his wife, got them a key to his apartment…’

‘I don't know what you're talking about,’ said Marisa. ‘Esteban and I are lovers. I go to see him every week in prison – or at least I did, until you stopped my visits.’

‘So they haven't let Margarita go yet,’ said Ferrera. ‘Is that right?’

‘Is what right?’ said Marisa, turning on Ferrera, feeling that she could loose off some of her fierceness at her. ‘What …?’

‘That you've got to keep up the after-sales service,’ said Falcón. ‘But how long for, Marisa? How long do you think they'll keep you dangling? A month? A year? Maybe for ever?’

As he said this he wondered whether he was the right man for this job. Maybe he was too personally involved. This woman's responsibility for Inés's death was perhaps making him too brutal, giving her nowhere to turn. But he had to show the full weight of his knowledge, make her face the gravity of her circumstances, before showing her that he was the softer option. This, he thought, might not be achievable in a single visit.

‘Esteban and I are very close,’ said Marisa, setting off on another round of fabrication. ‘It might not look it from the outside. You might think I've been using him in some way. That he was somehow my ticket to a better life. But I'm not …’

‘I've heard all this before, Marisa,’ said Falcón. ‘Maybe I should let you see Esteban again.’

‘Now that you've poisoned his mind against me, Inspector Jefe?’ she said, getting to her feet, going on the attack with that cigar stub. ‘Now that you've told him that he might not have to face twenty years in jail because you reckon you can shift the blame on to some black trash he was fucking. Is that it, Inspector Jefe?’

‘I'm not the one who's put you in your situation.’

‘What fucking situation?’ she screeched. ‘You keep talking about it, but I don't know what it is.’

‘Your position between the gangsters holding your sister and the police investigating the Seville bombing,’ said Falcón calmly.

‘We're already close to finding where Margarita is being held,’ said Ferrera, which snapped Marisa's head round in her direction.

‘The man in the photo,’ said Falcón. ‘He'll talk. And if you talk to us, Marisa, nothing will happen until Margarita is safe.’

Marisa looked at the printout. Still not ready. Needing more time to make up her mind, not sure who or what was going to be more dangerous for her sister. Ferrera and Falcón exchanged a look. Ferrera gave her a card with her fixed line and mobile numbers. They made for the door.

‘Talk to us, Marisa,’ said Ferrera. ‘I would, if I was you.’

‘Why? Why would you?’ said Marisa.

‘Because we are not in the business of killing defenceless women in their homes, planting bombs, bribing local government officials and forcing girls into prostitution,’ said Falcón.

They went down the steps from her atelier and into the broiling heat of the courtyard. They stood for a moment in the cool of the tunnel leading to Calle Bustos Tavera.

‘We were that close,’ said Ferrera, holding up her thumb and forefinger pressed together.

‘I don't know,’ said Falcón. ‘Fear does strange things to people. It can bring them to the brink of the only possible next logical step, and then they veer off into the night because some perceived threat appears to be nearer and uglier.’

‘She just needs time,’ said Ferrera.

‘Time is the problem, because she's alone,’ said Falcón. ‘Under those circumstances, the person who's going to kill you seems more powerful than the one who's holding out a helping hand. That's why I want you involved with her. I want you to make her feel as if she's not facing this on her own.’

‘Let's find Margarita then,’ said Ferrera. ‘If we can get her safe, Marisa will follow.’