The Black Minutes by Martín Solares Read Free Book Online

notice my hesitation. Then I took up the next book over:
Black Past
, by Rubem Fonseca. The devil you say—I thought, do all books lead to the dead man? In a state of nerves, I pulled out the three books beside them:
In Cold Blood
, by Truman Capote;
The Judge and His Hangman
, by Friedrich Dürrenmatt; and
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
. . . . When I experience coincidences like these, in which the harmony of all things is revealed, I fall to trembling before the divine plan, and Ramón noticed.

    “Father? Are you feeling all right?”
    Nothing irritates me more than pity, especially when it’s directed at me. So I responded thoughtlessly. “It’s nothing, nothing. Here you go.”
    Macetón lowered his gaze, and I began wondering how this man could possibly be in charge of investigating Bernardo Blanco’s death. Young Bernardo had had a brilliant mind, astute and inquisitive; his reporting work was a wonder, particularly his crime pieces, and Macetón. . . . You could expect nothing from Macetón, I thought; he was a vulgar imitation. But I was wrong.
    “Is this all?”
    “What do you mean?”
    We’d gone back to square one. He was once again the hound and I the fox.
    “My impression a while ago was that you were going to give me something else.”
    “Like what?”
    “I don’t know,” he replied. “Something very important.”
    “These books are important; they were very important to Bernardo,” I insisted. How I needed a shot of vodka!
    “But you gave me to understand it was urgent.”
    “Well, of course.” I gestured at the bookshelves. “I never have enough room in this place! Every student who comes in forgets a book in this office! I am not a public library!”
    He frowned and I understood that since I’d seen him last he had sharpened his intuitive capacity (quite dilute, but there it was). Cabrera looked at me the way Bernardo used to look when he knew people were lying to him. For a moment, I thought he was about to come straight out and interrogate me probingly, just as the dead boy once had, but his reaction was crueler. He prolonged the torture, speaking of trivia, until he was set to attack.

    “It was a pleasure to come to the school. I see they built more classrooms.”
    “Yes,” I answered. “Every day more illiterate people are being born. How long has it been since you were here last?”
    “Oof . . . like twenty years.”
    “Ah, I see.” And before Ramón could barrage me with further questions, I tried cornering him. “When did they give you the case?”
    “This morning.”
    “They bumped El Chaneque?”
    “Yep,” he said. “By the way, Father, last week I saw you talking with the very man. What did you want with him?”
    “It’s part of my job, as you know.”
    “You don’t work with the prisoners anymore?”
    “I do both. The Lord Bishop ordered me to close the loop and mediate between the two camps. It’s the only way to stop the violence.”
    His questions put me on guard. At this moment, my main concern was finding out how much he knew. The way he frowned, it seemed he had some idea of what Bernardo Blanco had been working on. We both passed an awkward moment and fell silent. What must have been going on in Ramón’s mind? If he was expecting me to confess, he was very mistaken. But he stayed on, and meanwhile the bottle of vodka, like a seductive woman, enticed me from the bookshelf. You deserve it,
Saüfer
, I told myself, nobody’s more to blame than yourself. I put on an angry face, but Ramón made it clear he was just getting comfortable. I wanted him out of my office this minute! Since he had arrived too early, I’d had no time to clean up. My office was full of telling evidence, right there for him to find. To begin with, he noticed the chess-board to one side of my desk, an unfinished game on it.

    “Was Bernardo a worthy opponent?” he asked.
    “He was incredible,” I said, “but he always lost on account of the queen.” I immediately regretted