“Calm down. Señora de Vidal is all right. Just a fright. It seems that she overdid it with the laudanum. Will you sit down, Martín? Please.”
I sat down.
“When was this?”
“Two or three days ago.”
My mind filled with the image of Cristina in the window of Villa Helius a few days earlier, waving at me while I avoided her eyes and turned my back on her.
“Martín?” the inspector asked, waving a hand in front of my face as if he feared I’d lost my mind.
“What?”
The inspector seemed to be genuinely worried.
“Have you anything to tell me? I know you won’t believe me, but I’d like to help you.”
“Do you still think it was me who killed Barrido and his partner?”
Grandes shook his head.
“I’ve never believed it was
you, but there are others who would like to.”
“Then why are you still investigating me?”
“Calm down. I’m not investigating you, Martín. I never have. The day I do investigate you, you’ll know. For the time being I’m only observing you. Because I like you and I’m concerned that you’re going to get yourself into a mess. Why won’t you trust me and tell me what’s going on?”
Our eyes met and for an instant I was tempted to tell him everything. I would have done so, had I known where to begin.
“Nothing is going on, Inspector.”
Grandes nodded and looked at me with pity, or perhaps it was only disappointment. He finished his beer and left a few coins on the table. He gave me a pat on the back and got up.
“Look after yourself, Martín. And watch how you go. Not everyone holds you in the same esteem as I do.” “I’ll keep that in mind.”
…
It was almost midday when I got home, unable to stop thinking about what the inspector had told me. When I reached the tower house I climbed the steps slowly, as if my very soul were weighing me down. I opened the door of the apartment, fearing I’d find Isabella in the mood for conversation. The house was silent. I walked up the corridor until I reached the gallery and there I found her, asleep on the sofa, an open book on her chest—one of my old novels. I couldn’t help but smile. The temperature inside the house had dropped considerably during those autumn days and I was afraid Isabella might catch a chill. Sometimes I’d see her wandering about the apartment wrapped in a wool shawl she wore over her shoulders. I went to her room to find the shawl, so that I could quietly cover her with it. Her door was ajar. Although I was in my own home, I’d rarely entered that room since Isabella had installed herself there and now I felt uneasy going in. I saw the shawl folded over a chair and went to fetch it. The room had Isabella’s sweet, lemony scent. The bed was still unmade and I leaned over to smooth out the sheets and blankets. I knew that when I applied myself to these domestic chores my moral standing rose in the eyes of my assistant.
As I straightened up I noticed there was something wedged between the mattress and the base of the bed. The corner of a piece of paper stuck out from under the folded sheet. When I tugged at it I realized it was a bundle of papers. I pulled it out completely and found that I was holding what looked like about twenty blue envelopes tied together with a ribbon. My whole body felt cold. I untied the knot in the ribbon and took one of the envelopes. It had my name and address on it. Where the return address should have been, it simply said: Cristina.
I sat on the bed with my back to the door and examined the envelopes, one by one. The first letter was a few weeks old, the last had been posted three days ago. All of the envelopes were open. I closed my eyes and felt the letters falling from my hands. I heard her breathing behind me, and when I opened my eyes she was standing motionless in the doorway.
“Forgive me,” whispered Isabella.
She walked over slowly and knelt down to pick up the letters. When she’d gathered them together she handed them to me with a wounded look.
“I did it to protect you,” she said.
Her eyes filled with tears and she placed a hand on my shoulder.
“Leave,” I said.
I pushed her away and stood up. Isabella collapsed onto the floor, moaning as if something were burning inside her.
“Leave this house.”