Dying Gasp Read online

  “And we import more of it than their cheese and their chocolate. You pick up any promising leads?”

  “Not as far as drugs are concerned, but there’s something else. I have to see you.”

  “Personally?”

  “Personally. My flight from Amsterdam arrives in São Paulo tomorrow morning at seven. I’ll catch a connecting flight and come right to Brasilia.”

  “It’s that serious?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’d better bring Arnaldo.”

  Agente Arnaldo Nunes was about Silva’s age and had been a cop for almost as long. The fact that he hadn’t achieved a lofty position in the hierarchy had nothing to do with being irreverent and sarcastic, which he was, nor to do with his abilities and competence, both of which were considerable. But he’d come from a poor family, married young, and had never been able to raise the money to go to law school. Without a law degree, the statutes governing the federal police blocked him from becoming a delegado, which was the first step to every other position of major responsibility. So on paper, Arnaldo remained a lowly agente. In practice, he wielded far more power and influence.

  “What do you mean, bring Arnaldo?” Hector asked. “Isn’t he there with you?”

  “He’s in São Paulo at the moment. I’ll call him and tell him to meet your flight.”

  “It’s Air France.”

  “Not KLM?”

  “No. I connect in Paris.”

  “Number?”

  “AF 0454.”

  “Consider it done. Now, tell me.”

  Hector gave his uncle a rough overview of the situation, and then described his conversation with Montsma and Kuipers. He finished by saying, “There are tapes from Russia and Thailand, too, but the Brazilian ones are the most disturbing. They made me sick, Tio, physically sick. They all have titles in English. One is called Killing the Vampire. The killer uses a sledgehammer to drive a sharp stake through the woman’s chest.”

  “Ouch,” Silva said.

  “All of them cover the murder in one shot. And they all end with either dismemberment or severe mutilation of the victim. Kuipers thinks that’s to prove to the buyers that what they’re seeing is real, not faked. That it’s proof of death. Another one was entitled The Lumberjack’s Revenge. The killer takes a chain saw and—”

  “That’s enough. I get the picture. How can they tell which ones came from here?”

  “They’ve all got live sound. It appears that the . . . clients like hearing what’s going on.”

  “Sick bastards. Any luck following the money?”

  “None. They were using a bank in Riga.”

  “Riga?”

  “Capital of Latvia. Apparently, Latvian banks are much tougher to deal with than the Swiss. Montsma says they won’t violate their security for anyone.”

  “How about the master tapes? Any fingerprints?”

  “Only Schubski’s and Oosterbaan’s. But I got a list of their clients. It was password protected and encrypted, but Oosterbaan gave it up.”

  “Any Brazilians?”

  “A few.”

  “Addresses?”

  “Mostly post office boxes and E-mail addresses so they can be advised about new releases.”

  “Send them to me. I’ll have Arnaldo lean on the Internet service providers, get us names and addresses for the account holders.”

  “The Dutch don’t have a law that makes it illegal to buy the stuff, only to sell it. They can’t prosecute the customers in their own country. It’s got them hopping mad.”

  “I’m not sure we can prosecute either. I’ll have to check. How about the killers? More than one?”

  “Different in every DVD.”

  “You get frame blowups?”

  “Being made as we speak. But there’s something more. There’s a Brazilian woman whose phone call was taped. She seems to have been a supplier.”

  “The woman. Is her voice in the background on any of the DVDs?”

  “The last one. She spoke English with Smit, and Portuguese on the DVD, but they did a voiceprint analysis. Same person.”

  “What did she say?”

  “It sounded to me like she was operating the camera and directing the action at the same time. She tells the murderer to hold the victim still, because there’s too much movement to zoom in and get a tight close-up of her eyes. Later, she tells him to get out the ax and do what she told him to do.”

  “And he did it? Just like that?”

  “No. Not just like that. He looks at the camera and shakes his head. He tells her it isn’t worth the trouble, that the woman is already dead.”

  Hector paused. His uncle could hear him swallow as he remembered.

  “And?” he prompted.

  “She told him he was a cretin and to do it anyway.”

  Chapter Nine

  MANAUS

  WITH CONSCIOUSNESS CAME FEAR.

  Marta turned her head and looked at the door.

  Ajar.

  She toyed with the idea of not playing Rosélia’s game, but the alternative, another day of being alone, caused her throat to constrict and made it hard for her to breathe.

  She inhaled deeply, kept on inhaling until her heartbeat settled down. Then she stuck her head into the corridor.

  Empty.

  She crossed the threshold and turned left. The sound of high-pitched voices got louder, the smell of frying onions and garlic stronger, as she approached the green door at the end of the corridor.

  She turned the knob and pushed.

  A head turned in her direction, then another. Conversation stopped dead. Marta found herself in a bar filled with girls. Several wore T-shirts, others nightgowns. The youngest, a brunette with big eyes, looked to be no more than twelve. A mulata, taller than the others by half a head, and with dirty blond hair the texture of steel wool, opened her mouth to say something.

  But then she froze like a nocturnal animal caught in a searchlight.

  Marta spun around. The Goat, a menacing figure almost six-foot-two in height and an obese two hundred and sixty pounds, was less than a foot behind her. She flinched.

  He smiled at her reaction, brushed her aside and headed for a raised platform in the center of the room. Like dogs with their master, the girls’ eyes followed him every step of the way.

  Light on his feet for such a big man, he mounted the platform. Muscular biceps stretched the sleeves of his T-shirt. His blue eyes were set close together and seemed out of place in a face as dark as any Indian’s.

  “Good morning, my children,” he said.

  One and all, except for Marta, they murmured a response. “You girls over by the bar,” he said, “come closer. This is important.”

  He waited until they’d rearranged themselves, until he could see the entire group. Then he pointed a stubby finger. “This,” he said, “is Marta. She’s eating my food, she’s sleeping in one of my beds and she hasn’t done a damned thing to work off her debt. What do you think about that? You, Topaz?”

  Topaz, the girl with the steel wool hair flinched. “Senhor? ” “You think that’s fair, Topaz? You think it’s fair she’s eating my food and sleeping under my roof, and she isn’t doing a damned thing to earn her keep?”

  The mulata looked down at her bare feet.

  The Goat cupped a hand behind an ear. “I can’t hear you.” “No, Senhor,” the mulata said, almost inaudibly.

  “You’re goddamned right it’s not.” The Goat’s voice was a whip, but when he spoke again his tone was almost gentle. “I’m a reasonable man. You know that, don’t you girls? You know I’m a reasonable man?”

  No one said a word.

  “I’ll take silence as agreement,” he said. “So, as a reasonable man, here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to leave her here all afternoon. You girls are going to reason with her and get her to change her attitude.”

  Marta shook her head. “I’m not—”

  “Shut up,” The Goat snapped. “I’m not talking to yo
u; I’m talking to them.”

  Marta glared at him.

  He ignored her and let his gaze sweep over the other girls. “If you’re not successful,” he said, “I’m gonna be unhappy, and all of you know what happens when I’m unhappy.”

  He walked back through the green door and slammed it behind him.

  Topaz was still shaken. She’d risen to her feet when addressed, but now she sank back into her chair and put her head in her hands. The other girls turned, as one, to stare at Marta.

  Marta braved it out. She swallowed and said, “I came here with another girl. Her name is Andrea. Has anyone seen her? Anyone heard anything about a girl named Andrea?”

  No one had.

  They had lunch right there in the boate: rice, beans, and fried fish, cooked and served by an old woman the girls called Dona Ana. No one invited Marta to share a table, so she ate standing at the bar, keeping to herself, knowing they’d be at her before long. Under the circumstances, it was no use to try to make friends. She wasn’t about to give in, and they’d hate her for that. Not only because they feared The Goat, but also because they were all putas and she wasn’t about to become one. They’d take that to mean she thought she was better than they were. And they’d be right.

  She was still eating when the door opened again, and a man with a broken nose stuck his head into the room. He beckoned to the little brunette with the big eyes. She went to him, still chewing a mouthful of rice and beans. There was a rustle of relief from the other girls as soon as the door had closed behind them.

  Lunch over, the girls turned their backs on Marta, drew their chairs into a circle and started talking in hushed tones. Every now and then one would turn her head to make sure Marta was keeping her distance. While they were at it, Marta took one of the vacated chairs on the far side of the room.

  The talking was still going on when the big-eyed girl came back, a cigarette dangling from her lower lip. She looked longingly at the group. A few girls saw her, but no one invited her to join. She took another puff on her cigarette and sat down across from Marta.

  “This girl you mentioned,” she said.

  “Andrea?”

  “Yes, Andrea. How old is she?”

  “How old are you?”

  The little girl took another drag on her cigarette.

  “Ten,” she said, exhaling smoke.

  Marta didn’t know how to respond. After a moment, she said, “Andrea is eighteen.”

  “Oh,” the little girl said. “Well, then, it’s plain.”

  “What do you mean by ‘plain’?”

  “The Goat doesn’t keep anybody as old as that unless they look younger, or they have lots of regular customers. Your friend, Andrea, does she look younger?”

  Marta thought before answering. “No,” she said.

  “See? That’s why we never met her. When they’re old like that, and haven’t been brought up in his house, The Goat gets rid of them. Sometimes he lets them work the street, but then they have to give him money until they pay back what they owe.”

  “Owe? What do you mean, owe?”

  “Well, he brought you here, didn’t he?”

  “He didn’t. Rosélia did.”

  The little girl sighed at the need to explain something so obvious.

  “Rosélia works for him, but The Goat has all the money. So it’s him you owe, not her.”

  “Rosélia told us she had modeling jobs for us.”

  When she’d finished laughing, the little girl said, “You fell for that? I’m only ten, and I wouldn’t have fallen for that. Where did you come from?”

  “Recife.”

  The girl looked surprised.

  “All the way from Recife? How long did that take?”

  “Not long. We flew.”

  “In an airplane?”

  “In an airplane. Of course.”

  “I always wanted to fly in an airplane. Tell me what it’s like to fly in an airplane.”

  “Later. Does the Goat think I owe him money?”

  “Of course, you do,” the little girl said impatiently. “You owe him for the airplane, and for the food you ate, and for anything he gives you, like perfume. Did he give you any perfume?”

  “No. He didn’t give me any perfume. The only thing he gave me was a beating. I’d love to pay that back.”

  The girl put one of her little fingers on Marta’s lips.

  “Don’t say things like that,” she said. “If you say things like that, and he hears you, he’ll do it again.”

  “Why does he get rid of the older girls?”

  The little girl shrugged. “They aren’t chosen. If you don’t get chosen, you don’t earn him any money. The Goat doesn’t keep you unless you earn him money.”

  The girl had smoked her cigarette almost down to the filter. She contemplated the ash for a moment and then ground it out in the empty margarine can she’d been using as an ashtray.

  “How did you get here?” Marta asked.

  “I tried living on the street, but it’s hard, you know. When you’re little, like me, they fuck you, but they don’t pay you. They say they’re going to, but when they’re finished they don’t care. I started asking for the money first, but then they’d pay me and take it back afterwards.”

  “Why didn’t you go to the police?”

  “Why? So they could fuck me too?”

  “Why do you have to . . . fuck anybody? Are you an orphan?”

  A cloud passed over the little girl’s face. “No, but we never had any money. When you’re really hungry, and you only have one thing to sell, you sell it. And it wasn’t like I was a virgin any more. My stepfather took care of that.”

  “Don’t you just hate it? Being here?”

  The girl shook her head. “It’s not so bad. There’s always food, and the men who come here, they like me.”

  “Like you?”

  The little girl looked hurt. “It’s true,” she said, defensively. “You saw Osvaldo just now.”

  “Osvaldo?”

  “Osvaldo.” She pointed to her face. “The one with the broken nose. He chose me. He could have had any of the other girls, but he chose me.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean I didn’t believe you, I just meant—”

  “What?”

  “Well, that you’re so . . . young.”

  “That’s what the other girls say, that I’m too young, too young to be their friend. You don’t want to be my friend either, do you?”

  “I do want to be your friend. I didn’t mean too young for me. I meant for the men.”

  The little girl shook her head.

  “But that’s just it,” she said. “I’ve got something the other girls don’t have. Guess what it is.”

  Marta looked at her. She wore a T-shirt that was so big on her, it served as a dress. She wasn’t particularly pretty, not even particularly clean. The stench of the man she’d been with still clung to her.

  “I have no idea,” Marta said. “What?”

  “This,” the girl said, lifting her T-shirt to expose her bare chest.

  For a moment, Marta didn’t understand. Then she did.

  The little girl’s breasts hadn’t yet begun to bud.

  Chapter Ten

  BRASILIA

  HECTOR COSTA LOOKED LIKE hell.

  There were dark circles under his bloodshot eyes, and the long hours he’d spent inside windowless Dutch conference rooms had bleached his customary tan.

  “You sure you want to do this now?” Silva said. “You could go over to my place and take a nap first, you know.”

  “I told him the same thing,” Arnaldo said. “But he’s stubborn, like someone else I know.”

  Silva raised an eyebrow. “And just who might that someone be, Agente Nunes?”

  “My uncle Eustacio,” Arnaldo said, without missing a beat. “You haven’t got an uncle Eustacio.”

  Arnaldo opened his mouth to refute that, but Hector interceded. “If I was going to sleep,” he said, “I would
have done it in São Paulo and in the loving arms of my squeeze.”

  “Squeeze, is it?” Arnaldo said. “Does Gilda know you call her that? And where did you pick up a word like ‘squeeze’?”

  “She doesn’t know it, not yet, because I have yet to see her since I got back,” Hector said. “As to the word, it’s a bit of European sophistication that I learned from my new friend, Chief Inspector Lane of Scotland Yard.”

  “That does it,” Arnaldo said to Silva. “You got to stop sending the kid off on conferences. Every time he gets back, I have to scrape the sophistication off. It smells bad, and it gets under my fingernails.”

  “Is that what it is?” Silva said. “I always thought the stuff under your fingernails was a consequence of poor personal hygiene.”

  There was a knock on the door of Silva’s office.

  “Come,” Silva said.

  A guy in a white lab coat appeared in the doorway.

  “Where do you want it, Chief Inspector?”

  “Over there, Soares,” Silva said. “Turn the screen toward us.”

  Soares went out into the hallway and returned, wheeling a metal cart almost as tall as himself.

  The top shelf of the cart was entirely occupied by a large TV monitor. The two shelves below it contained three tape players, VHS, Beta SP, and digital Beta. There was also a DVD player and a computer with a couple of disk drives.

  “DVD, right?” Soares asked.

  Silva looked at his nephew.

  “DVD,” Hector confirmed.

  The technician unplugged a cable, plugged in another one, toggled a switch, pressed a button and held out his hand for the DVD.

  Hector didn’t surrender it.

  “Confidential,” he said.

  Soares shrugged, pushed another button. With a click and a whirr, the DVD player stuck its tongue out at the cops.

  “Enjoy the movie,” Soares said. And left.

  Hector put the DVD onto the extended tray, gave it a gentle push, and hit the PLAY button.

  Fourteen minutes later, the girl’s severed head hit the floor with an audible clunk.