“Do me a favor,” he said. “For the moment, not a word about all this to Leandro or to anyone else.”

“I’m not mad,” Alicia cut in.

Vargas closed the window and went over to her. She was beginning to show signs of exhaustion.

“Isn’t it time you started getting into your coffin?” asked Vargas. “Come on.”

He took her hand and led her to the bedroom, then pulled back the blanket and signaled to her to get inside. Alicia let her dressing gown fall to the ground and got in between the sheets. He covered her up to her chin and looked at her with a smile.

“Aren’t you going to read me a bedtime story?”

“Get lost.” Vargas bent down to pick up the dressing gown and walked over to the door.

“Do you think they’re leading us into a trap?” asked Alicia.

He weighed her words. “Why do you say that?”

“I don’t know.”

“One sets one’s own traps. And all I know is that you need to rest.”

Vargas began to close the door.

“Will you be out there?”

He nodded. “Good morning, Alicia,” he said, closing the bedroom door.

32

Valls has lost all track of time. He doesn’t know whether he’s been in this cell for days or for weeks. He hasn’t seen the sunlight since one faraway afternoon when he was traveling up the road to Vallvidrera in the car, sitting beside Vicente. His hand hurts, and when he tries to scratch it, he can’t find it. He feels spasms in fingers that no longer exist and a stabbing pain in the knuckles, as if someone were nailing iron spikes into his bones. For some hours, or days, his side has been hurting. He can’t see the color of the urine that falls into the brass pail, but he thinks it’s darker than usual, tinged with blood. The woman hasn’t returned, and Martín still hasn’t appeared. He can’t understand. Isn’t this what Martín wanted? To see him rotting away in a cell?

The faceless and nameless jailer checks on him once a day, or so Valls believes. He has started to measure the days by the man’s visits. He brings Valls water and food. The food is always the same: bread, rancid milk, and sometimes a sort of dry meat like salted tuna that he finds hard to chew because most of his teeth are getting loose. Two have already fallen out. Sometimes he runs his tongue over his gums and tastes his own blood, feeling his teeth giving way to the pressure.

“I need a doctor,” he says when the jailer arrives with the food.

The jailer hardly ever speaks. He barely looks at him.

“How long have I been here?” Valls asks.

The jailer ignores his questions.

“Tell her I want to speak to her. To tell her the truth.”

On one occasion he wakes up and discovers there’s someone else in the cell. It’s the jailer. He is holding something shiny in his hand. Perhaps it’s a knife. Valls makes no attempt to protect himself. He feels the prick in his buttock and the cold. It’s just another injection.