The Flanders Panel

They set off towards the car, using stalls as cover. Julia’s heart was beating hard when she at last got a glimpse of the numberplate. There was no doubt about it: a blue Ford, smoked-glass windows and the letters TH. Her mouth was dry, and she had an uncomfortable feeling in her stomach as if it had contracted in upon itself. That, she said to herself quickly, was what Captain Peter Blood used to feel before boarding an enemy ship.

They reached the corner, and everything happened fast. Someone inside the car lowered the driver’s window to toss out a cigarette. Cesar dropped his umbrella and his hat, raised the poker and walked round to the left side of the car, prepared, if necessary, to kill the pirates or whoever was inside. Julia, her teeth gritted and the blood pounding in her temples, started to run. She took the pistol out and stuck it through the window before the driver had time to wind it up again. In front of her pistol appeared an unknown face: a young man with a beard, who was staring at the gun with terrified eyes. The man in the passenger seat jumped when Cesar wrenched opened the door, the iron poker raised threateningly above his head.

“Get out! Out!” shouted Julia, almost beside herself.

His face deathly pale, the man with the beard raised his hands with his fingers wide, in a gesture of supplication.

“Calm down, Senorita!” he stammered. “For God’s sake, calm down! We’re the police.”

“I recognise,” said Inspector Feijoo, clasping his hands together on his office desk, “that so far we haven’t been terribly efficient in this matter…”

He smiled placidly at Cesar, as if the police’s lack of efficiency was justified. Since we’re in sophisticated company, his look seemed to say, we can allow ourselves a certain amount of constructive self-criticism.

But Cesar seemed ill-disposed to accept this.

“That,” he said disdainfully, “is one way of describing what others would call sheer incompetence.”

It was clear from Feijoo’s crumbling smile that Cesar’s remark was the last straw. His teeth appeared beneath the thick moustache, biting his lower lip and he began an impatient drumming on the desk with the end of his cheap ballpoint. Cesar’s presence meant that he had no option but to tread carefully, and all three of them knew why.

“The police have their methods.”

These were empty words, and Cesar grew impatient, cruel. The fact that he had dealings with Feijoo didn’t mean that he had to be nice to him, still less when he’d caught him in some funny business.

“If those methods consist of having Julia followed while some madman out there is on the loose, sending anonymous messages, I would rather not say what I think of such methods.” He turned towards Julia, then back to the policeman. “I can’t believe that you consider her to be a suspect in the death of Professor Ortega. Why haven’t you investigated me?”

“We have.” Feijoo was piqued by Cesar’s impertinence, and had to bite back his anger. “The fact is, we investigated everyone.” He turned up his palms, accepting responsibility for what he was prepared to acknowledge had been a monumental blunder. “Unfortunately, these things do happen in this job.”

“And have you found out anything?”

“I’m afraid not.” Feijoo reached inside his jacket to scratch an armpit and shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “To be perfectly honest, we’re back at square one. The pathologists can’t agree on the cause of Alvaro Ortega’s death. If there really is a murderer at large, our only hope is that at some point he makes a mistake.”

“Is that why you’ve been following me?” asked Julia, still furious. She was clutching her bag in her lap. “To see if I make a mistake?”

The Inspector looked at her grimly.

“You shouldn’t take it so personally. It’s purely routine. Just police tactics.”

Cesar arched an eyebrow.

“As a tactic it doesn’t strike me as being either particularly promising or particularly efficient.”

Feijoo gulped down the sarcasm. At that moment, thought Julia with wicked delight, he must be deeply regretting any illicit dealings he’d had with Cesar. All it needed was for Cesar to open his mouth in a few opportune places and, with no direct accusations being made and with no official paperwork involved, in the discreet way that things tend to be done at a certain level, the Inspector would find himself ending his career in a gloomy office in some far-flung police department, as a pen-pusher with no prospect of extra income.

“I can only assure you,” he said at last, when he’d managed to digest some of the rancour which, as his face plainly revealed, was still stuck in his gullet, “that we will continue our investigations.” He seemed to remember something, reluctantly. “And of course the young lady will be put under special protection.”

“Don’t bother,” said Julia. Feijoo’s humiliation was not enough to make her forget her own. “No more blue cars, please. Enough is enough.”

“It’s for your own safety, Senorita.”

“As you see, I can look after myself.”