“Well, one of the large ones seemed to find it very amusing.” Isabella took another biscuit and devoured it in two bites. She noticed me looking at her and immediately stopped chewing.
“What did I say?” she asked, projecting a shower of biscuit crumbs.
32
A sliver of light fell through the blanket of clouds, illuminating the red paintwork of the shop front in Calle Princesa. The establishment selling conjuring tricks stood behind a carved wooden canopy. Its glass doors revealed only the bare outlines of the gloomy interior. Black velvet curtains were draped across showcases displaying masks and Victorian-style apparatus: marked packs of cards, weighted daggers, books on magic, and bottles of polished glass containing a rainbow of liquids labeled in Latin and probably bottled in Albacete. The bell tinkled as I came through the door. An empty counter stood at the far end of the shop. I waited a few seconds, examining the collection of curiosities. I was searching for my face in a mirror that reflected everything in the shop except me, when I glimpsed, out of the corner of my eye, a small figure peeping round the curtain of the back room.
“An interesting trick, don’t you think?” said the little man.
I nodded.
“How does it work?”
“I don’t yet know. It arrived a few days ago from a manufacturer of trick mirrors in Constantinople. The creator calls it refractory inversion.”
“It reminds one that nothing is as it seems,” I said.
“Except for magic. How can I help you, sir?”
“Am I speaking to Señor Damián Roures?”
The little man nodded slowly. I noticed that his lips were set in a bright smile that, like the mirror, was not what it seemed. Beneath it, his expression was cold and cautious.
“Your shop was recommended to me.”
“May I ask by whom?”
“Ricardo Salvador.”
Any pretense of a smile disappeared from his face.
“I didn’t know he was still alive. I haven’t seen him for twenty-five years.”
“What about Irene Sabino?”
Roures sighed. He came round the counter and went over to the door. After hanging up the Closed sign he turned the key.
“Who are you?”
“My name is Martín. I’m trying to clarify the circumstances surrounding the death of Señor Diego Marlasca, whom I understand you knew.”
“As far as I know, they were clarified many years ago. Señor Marlasca committed suicide.”
“That was not my understanding.”
“I don’t know what that policeman has told you. Resentment affects one’s memory, Señor … Martín. At the time, Salvador tried to peddle a conspiracy for which he had no proof. Everyone knew he was warming the widow Marlasca’s bed and trying to set himself up as the hero of the hour. As expected, his superiors made him toe the line, and when he didn’t they threw him out of the police force.”
“He thinks there was an attempt to hide the truth.”
Roures scoffed.
“The truth … don’t make me laugh. What they tried to hide was a scandal. Valera and Marlasca’s law firm had its fingers stuck in almost every pie that was being baked in this town. Nobody wanted a story like that to be uncovered. Marlasca had abandoned his position, his work, and his marriage to lock himself up in th
at rambling old house doing God knows what. Anyone with a half a brain could see that it wouldn’t end well.”
“That didn’t stop you and your partner, Jaco, from profiting from his madness by promising him he’d be able to make contact with the hereafter during your séances …”
“I never promised him a thing. Those sessions were a simple amusement. Everyone knew. Don’t try to saddle me with the man’s death—because all I was doing was earning an honest living.”