Graveyard Samba (Devil Barnett Detective Series Book 4) Page 8
“Listen, I need to find out what he wanted to know about this dead gringo.”
“He wanted to know who I D’d the body from your department.”
“What did you tell him?”
“I told him I didn’t know, but that I could get it from the manager’s files.”
“Where is the file kept?”
“In the record room in the manager’s office in a special filing cabinet.”
“But you can get in if the price is right?” Sangalo said raising his eyebrows. Carlinhos brightened at the thought that Sangalo was offering an opportunity to do business.
“How much was he paying?” asked the police detective.
“Fifty U.S.”
“How will you do it?”
“I got my own keys made,” smiled Carlinhos.
“Very clever. I like your style,” Sangalo grinned devilishly.
Carlinhos relaxed a little. At first he thought the cop had come to try and sweat him about Vianna’s murder or worse yet bust him for tampering with or selling unauthorized information from his job. But this was better than he had hoped for.
“Okay, let’s say I agree to pay you one hundred U.S. for what I want.”
Carlinhos’ face lit up with anticipation and greed. “Yeah, that’s good.”
Sangalo pulled out a thick roll of cash in U.S. dollar bills. Carlinhos’ eyes grew wide as he glanced at the money and then back at Sangalo.
“Anybody else got a key?”
“Only the office manager. But she takes hers home at night.”
“When is the best time to get into the office?” Sangalo asked.
“Between 11:00 p. m. and 2:30 in the morning. It’s only me and the night manager and one porter.”
“What time do you go in tonight?”
“My shift is from 10:00pm until 6:00 am.”
“Okay, give me your key,” said Sangalo.
“But if I give it to you and something is missing then they will suspect me ‘cause I’m the only one allowed to go in there at night and . . .” Carlinhos was unsure of how to deal. He didn’t want to lose the money being offered but on the other hand he really needed his job.
“Listen, you stupid fucker. I don’t want excuses, I just want results,” said Sangalo as he pushed his face close to Carlinhos’. Sangalo’s menacing scowl and sour breath turned Carlinho’s stomach and made him back up so quickly that he hit his head against the wall. Carlinhos had to think fast. Sangalo had a reputation as a mean bastard who wasn’t afraid to take what he wanted, or to set you up and leave you hanging out to dry if you crossed him.
“Yeah, okay, but I need them back as soon as you’re finished,” was all he could think of to say, pulling the key from his pocket.
“You guys wear a uniform right? The green one with the insignia on the shirt?”
“Yeah.”
“You got one here?”
“Yeah.”
“Let me see.”
Carlinhos got up and went over to an old broken chest of drawers and pulled out a clean uniform from the top drawer.
Sangalo held the oversized green shirt and pajama-type pants up against his own thin body.
“Okay, I want you to miss work for a few days,” the detective said without looking at him.
“But . . .”
Before Carlinhos could get his other words out, Sangalo peeled off some bills from his roll of money and held it up to Carlinho’s face.
“Four hundred U.S. Just take the money and just do what the fuck I tell you to do, okay?”
“Okay,” Carlinho said, automatically taking the money.
He had reacted before he had had real a chance to think. But what was there to think about? Nothing really. Sangalo was offering him more than three month’s salary. Opportunities like these didn’t come knocking often.
“I’ll call you to tell you where I’ll leave your special key. I’ll leave ‘it in a place where only you will know.” Sangalo said. “And remember, if things go well, we can do some more business, lots of it.”
“Sure,” Carlinhos smiled, already thinking about the kind of happiness that money could buy.
“And I know I don’t have to tell you this, but I’m going to say it anyway. If I should hear anything about our arrangement, believe me, you will regret it. Understood?”
“Yeah, I understand,” agreed Carlinhos bobbing his head up and down.
“So did Vianna want to know anything else other than about the American’s body?”
“Nothing, that’s it. But I’ll tell you something, that was some strange shit. One minute I swear the body was lying under a sheet in the corridor, but the next time I looked, about fifteen minutes later, it was gone. I looked all over, and I asked if anyone moved it but I couldn’t find it. If you want I can keep checking to see what happened to it maybe . . .”
Sangalo cut him off, “Fuck him, just another dead gringo, it’s not that important.” Sangalo moved to the window and looked out through a crack in the curtains.
“Now, go outside, look down to the corner and see if there is a blue Honda sitting there. Make sure you do it so that you aren’t seen by the guy inside the car,” Sangalo said.
When Carlinos went out, Sangalo folded Carlinhos’ green work uniform into a neat flat package and placed it down inside the waistband at the back of his trousers and pulled his shirt and jacket over it so that it was undetectable. Sangalo went into the bathroom and looked around, then moved to the bedroom. His eyes rested on the three pair of women’s shoes on one side of the bed and a cheap lace nightgown hanging on the bedpost. He opened to closet to find more women’s clothes along with some of Carlinhos. He smiled to himself. So Carlinhos had a woman. The more information he had about Carlinhos the easier it would be to control him. Sangalo didn’t believe in leaving much to chance. In his business, he couldn’t afford to.
Carlinhos came back after a few minutes.
“That blue car, yeah, it’s there.”
“Okay, remember what I said,” the cop said as he walked out of the apartment.
“Yeah, don’t worry, everything’s cool,” said Carlinhos.
Sangalo walked out into the street, and turned in the direction of the blue Honda parked at the corner. As he approached it, he could see his partner Luis Vargas behind the wheel.
“So what did he say?” Vargas asked Sangalo.
“Nothing really. He just said Vianna wanted to know when he could get a copy of the autopsy report.”
“Anything about the missing body?”
“No nothing, hey man I’m fucking hungry, let’s go eat,” said Sangalo changing the subject. “Later we can hook up a couple women, I know a hooker who’s hot for me, and she’s got a friend.”
“No, no thanks, I got something to do tonight,” said Vargas.
“Going home to a cold sandwich and to jack off again huh? Don’t worry, I’ll fuck both women ha, ha, and if you want I’ll make one of the girls call out your name when I make her come,” laughed Sangalo.
Whatever did I do to deserve such an asshole for a partner? thought Vargas as he pulled the Honda out into traffic.
As the two detectives pulled away from the curb, they were being watched by a man who hated cops. He felt they had been responsible for most of the bad events in his life. Foremost his brother’s death, which had been caused by the police. And even more ironically, his brother had been a cop. The memories and hurts caused by law enforcement built up first in pieces then in piles until the pile became so huge and heavy that it began to spill over from his past into his present.
Now, the laws of man no longer applied to him. He felt as if he were a holy prophet living in the midst of Sodom and Gomorrah. The idea that God and Satan were one and the same would have come as a shock to most people, but not to him. To him, God and the Devil were just different sides of the same coin. His understanding of this reality didn’t come about randomly or through some lunatic reasoning. Wasn’t God the one who often brought disaster to mankind through famine and catastrophe? Wasn’t God responsible for all forms of pestilence and plague? Wasn’t God in control of it all, the good and the bad?
All of this had been documented in the Bible which he had studied for many years. And he had only come to a full understanding after much soul searching and sacrifice. Through his investigation of scripture, he had also discovered that throughout history God gave special men and women the gift, honour and opportunity of exorcising demons. The man felt elated that he was one of these chosen few. He believed that his acts of violence against the cops or other members of the law enforcement community who lived lives of hypocrisy were holy. Death at his hands was their punishment for defaming and defiling the purest of the pure—the concept of love. God’s love. As The Man of Heavenly Love, his mission was to bring back into balance that which had been put askew by all the lies and ugliness when they turned their backs on love. Yes, and then there was the money. Ironically, he had been able to finally gain financial freedom through the prison of his hatred. Yes, God worked in mysterious ways—no question about it. And God had rewarded him by filling his pockets with dollars for cutting out the cancer of the world.
His eyes followed the cops as they drove away, but he didn’t bother to follow. Not tonight, because he had other plans. The Man of Heavenly Love turned his attention towards the late September sky and became awestruck with its beauty. Brilliant fluffy white clouds rushed across the pale blue sky to take on a greyish hue as they mixed with thick pinkish and magenta ribbons of fading light the sun had abandoned in its reluctant retreat. It reminded him of Michelangelo’s majestic paintings that adorned the walls and ceilings of the Sistine chapel he had seen when he had visited Rome during the days when he was a young priest. His eyes rested on two thick rib
bons of pinkish light that formed a perfect cross. It was as if God was signalling to him personally through this celestial crucifix.
He inhaled and felt the depth of his calling. As he started to cry, a feeling of love burned through the tears down into his soul—warming and comforting him and nourishing his heart with a sense of increased validation and purpose. This had to be an epiphany of sorts. He felt that it must have been similar if not exactly the same as Paul must have experienced on the road to Damascus.
As The Man of Heavenly Love moved off into the night with his mind on murder and other godly things, a shadowy bluish haze moved high above. The haze contained the boy ghost named Jesús. The boy ghost was aware of the glowing red spirit demons inside The Man of Heavenly Love. Spirits that beckoned him and moved him closer and closer towards an act of death and destruction.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I didn’t know the city of Rio at all but I could tell when we left the city for the countryside from the way the roads and the landscape changed. We had driven for almost an hour with not much conversation between us. Then Ilva turned the Ford Escort off the main road and down a dirt road and stopped at a small wooden framed house that was such a bright yellow it looked freshly painted. Dusk had almost settled and still the house was gleaming in the sun’s dying rays. Ilva used her key to open the front door and I followed her inside carrying my bags. It wasn’t a large house but it was roomy and pleasant. From the residue of the smell of bacon faintly hung in the air. Somebody in the house knew how to get busy with the pots and pans.
“Mr. Barnett , this is my sister and brother-in-law’s house,” she said.
My guess was this was the safe place she had in mind.
“I want you to make yourself comfortable,” Ilva said as she led the way into another room. “You’ll sleep in here.”
The room was big enough for the double bed covered with two thick pillows and a thin blanket, and a wardrobe with an old faded mirror hung on the door.
Ilva poured us each a cup of coffee and then we went out onto the small porch. Sitting there made me think of the time I had gone down south to see my mother’s Aunt Clara in Hartwell, Georgia. It was the same summer I lost my cherry to a girl named Darnetta Jordan. I was only fifteen. She had been impressed with me because she said I had nice manners and I didn’t act scared when I spoke to white people.
As I sat in a hard-backed chair drinking in the peace and quiet of the deepening shadows along with my coffee, Ilva sat down on the top porch step and opened a small brown notebook.
“Mr. Barnett, does it sound too crazy to believe, what Rosa and Silvio said about the Candomble?”
Her statement made me think about Albalita again. Albalita was a blind woman who had helped me on a case the previous year in New York. She had convinced me she had real supernatural powers, spooky powers that went beyond reason or instinct.
Ilva was staring at me as if she needed an answer.
“I look at it like this. Four hundred years ago, people didn’t know that viruses caused disease, right? So doctors used leeches and maggots to try and cure people. Then some scientists discovered bacteria and viruses and then went on to make medicines which would control and stop diseases altogether. So it wouldn’t surprise me if maybe two or three hundred years from now, what we call supernatural will be recognized as being something real and even scientifically understandable. So in a word I guess what I’m saying, is no, it doesn’t sound so crazy.”
She was looking hard into my eyes as if she were trying to gauge if I really believed my own words or just making patronizing sounds.
She finished her drink without speaking.
“So where and how do we begin?” I asked.
“Like I said before, there are lots of very dangerous people making lots of money in this business of child pornography and drugs. The corruption goes right to the top.”
“That’s what Ramón said.”
“How did you meet Ramón?” she asked.
“He contacted me when I left the IML.”
“Did this Ramón say he was a friend of Duncan’s?”
“That’s exactly what he said, and that he wanted to help me find Duncan’s body.”
I could tell she wanted me to say more but I decided I would only say what I was asked.
Her cell phone rang and she answered it.
“What? When? What time did they find him? Really? . . . Shit. Who’s doing the story? Fuck . . . I mean did you get any follow up yet from his . . . ? No, absolutely not. I want to go. Yes, I’m on my way, see ya.” She clicked off her cell phone, stood up and looked at me.
“Let’s go, the police just found the body of a judge named Paolo Tavares who was working on a major child prostitution case. He was shot and stuffed into the trunk of his car.”
“Really,” I said as she stood up, closed her book and rushed into the house.
It seemed I had only blinked twice blinked and she had returned.
“We’re going to the crime scene, I can smell a connection between this killing and Duncan’s death. Somebody has been shaking the tree and now a few of the apples are falling off.”
“Sorry I don’t follow you,” I admitted.
“Let’s go, I’ll tell you about it as we drive.”
The thought of Ramón’s body parts, and the phone call Ilva had just received gave me a queasy feeling—like I had just climbed into the ring with a big vicious invisible Grizzly bear.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
As we drove through the darkness of the countryside, I thought about how everyone had kept telling me that top government people were involved in these crimes involving kids.
“So what do you know about Vargas, the cop?” I asked Ilva.
“Luis?” she smiled a little, but kept her eyed glued to the dark road. “He’s one of the good guys.”
“Good guy as in person or good guy as in honest cop?”
“Both, I’ve known him a long time. Why do you ask?”
“I just thought it might have been him who told you about my being at the station.”
“No, not at all—it was one of our inside people at the police station. In fact, I was surprised that Luis was on the case. Happily surprised, but surprised nevertheless. He’s one of the few honest cops around and I’m pretty sure that Passador is honest, too. He was raked over the coals with another corruption case awhile back and he came out okay. Passador and Luis I trust, but that’s about it.”
“What about Sangalo?”
“That scumbag. I wouldn’t put anything past him. Word on the street is that Sangalo suddenly came into a large sum of money about a year ago. He supposedly had a rich uncle in Miami Florida who left him a lot of money and property. That’s how he can afford to live like a prince on his policeman’s salary, but my guess is that he came up with that as a cover story in order to account for the money that he had been taking from the drug dealers.”
“Vargas is his partner, why not him, too?” I wanted to know.
“If Luis were involved in something like that I’d be very surprised. Like I said I know him, he’s a good man.”
“So you think he just turns a blind eye to what Sangalo does as a matter of course?”
“He has to survive within a department that will kill a cop who informs on another cop. What choice does he have? Besides Sangalo has connections on a high level. From what I hear that’s how he made detective in the first place.“
“I think Sangalo would like to set me up and leave me hanging out to dry,” I told her.
“That wouldn’t surprise me.”
“So you think that Sangalo is being protected by some people higher up in the police department who cover for him because they are receiving part of his take?” I added.
“That’s the way I read it,” Ilva said confidently.
Here I was driving down a strange road in a foreign country with a woman I didn’t know talking about intrigue and murder. For the first time since I had left the agency three years ago, I really felt like I had really been thrown back into the game. A game where the only one you can trust is your partner or the demons inside your head to keep you from harm.
Before we turned into the street of the crime scene, I got out of the car and blended into the shadows. I set myself up in a place where I could see without being seen while Ilva on the other hand was as conspicuous as a cockroach swimming around in a glass of milk. The first two people I recognized were Vargas and Sangalo. They were standing outside the underground garage entrance by the IML ambulance as two attendants loaded the dead body into the vehicle.