The Flanders Panel

“You want proof, do you?” she said suddenly, for she’d just realised what the card was. “Here’s a direct link between Alvaro’s death and the mystery player. I know these cards all too well. They’re the ones Alvaro used in his work.” She paused to take in the significance of her own words. “Whoever killed him could have taken a handful of his cards.” The irrational sense of panic she’d felt only minutes before was already ebbing away, to be replaced by a more precise, more clearly defined feeling of apprehension. She said to herself, by way of explanation, that the fear of fear, of something dark and undefined, was not the same as the concrete fear of dying at the hands of a real human being. Perhaps the memory of Alvaro, of his death in broad daylight with the taps turned on, helped to clarify her mind and free her of superfluous fears. She had quite enough on her plate as it was.

She put a cigarette to her lips and lit it, hoping the men would interpret this as a display of self-control. She exhaled the first mouthful of smoke and swallowed. Her throat felt unpleasantly dry. She urgently needed a vodka. Or half a dozen vodkas. Or a strong, silent, good-looking man, with whom she could find oblivion in sex.

“Now what do we do?” she asked, mustering all the calm she could.

Cesar was looking at Munoz and Munoz at Julia. She saw that Munoz’s eyes had become opaque again, devoid of life, as if he’d lost all interest until the next move claimed his attention.

“We wait,” said Munoz, indicating the board. “It’s Black’s turn to move.”

* * *

Menchu was very excited, but not about the mystery chess player. As Julia told her what had happened, Menchu’s eyes grew round, and if you listened carefully, you could have heard the clatter of a cash register ringing up totals. The fact is that, when it came to money, Menchu was always greedy. And at that moment, happily calculating future profits, she most definitely was greedy. And foolish, added Julia to herself, for Menchu had seemed almost unconcerned by the possible existence of a rnurderer with a taste for chess. True to her nature, her favourite method of dealing with problems was to act as if they didn’t exist. Disinclined to give her attention to anything concrete for any length of time, perhaps bored with having Max in her home in his role as bodyguard – thus making other sexual encounters difficult – Menchu had decided to look, at the whole business from a different angle. For her, it was now just an odd series of coincidences, or a strange, possibly harmless joke, thought up by someone with a peculiar sense of humour, whose motives were too ingenious for her to grasp. It was the most reassuring version of events, especially when there was so much to be gained along the way. As for Alvaro’s death, hadn’t Julia ever heard of judicial errors? Like the murder of Zola by that chap Dreyfus, or was it the other way round? And Lee Harvey Oswald and other such blunders. Besides, slipping in the bath could happen to anyone. Or almost anyone.

“As for the Van Huys, you’ll see: we’re going to make a pile of money out of it.”

“And what do we do about Montegrifo?”

There were only a few customers in the gallery: a couple of elderly ladies chatting in front of a large classical seascape in oils, and a gentleman in dark clothes who was flipping through the portfolio of engravings. Menchu placed one hand on her hip as if it were the butt of a revolver and said in a low voice, theatrically fluttering her eyelashes:

“He’ll fall into line, sweetie.”

“You think so?”

“Take my word for it. Either he accepts or we go over to the enemy.” She smiled, sure of herself. “With your track record and this whole fabulous story about the Duke of Ostenburg and his harpy of a wife, Sotheby’s or Christie’s would welcome us with open arms. And Paco Montegrifo is no fool.” She seemed suddenly to remember something.

“By the way, we’re meeting him for coffee this afternoon. Make yourself pretty.”

“We’re meeting him?”

“Yes, you and me. He phoned this morning, all sweetness and light That bastard’s got an amazing sixth sense when it comes to business.”

“Look, don’t drag me into this.”

“I’m not. He insisted that you come too. I can’t think what he sees in you, darling. You’re nothing but skin and bones.”