“Why would anyone want to follow us?”

“Maybe he’s not following us. Maybe he’s following her.”

“This is making less sense by the minute, Fermín.”

“On the contrary. It’s becoming increasingly clear that something ominous is going on here . . .”

They followed Alicia’s trail along Calle Baños Nuevos, a narrow chasm through ancient buildings that seemed to join in a shadowy embrace over the winding route.

“I wonder where she’s going?” murmured Daniel.

The answer came soon. Alicia stopped by a front door on Calle Aviñón, opposite the Gran Café. They saw her enter the building. They walked past and took shelter a couple of doors farther down.

“And now what?”

Fermín’s answer was to point toward the facade of La Manual Alpargatera, a shop a few doors up the street. Daniel realized that his friend was right. They were being followed, or Alicia was. Hiding under the arches of the espadrille-shop entrance, barely visible, was a small figure wearing a cheap bowler hat.

“At least he seems to be on the small side,” Fermín reckoned.

“And what’s that got to do with anything?”

“It’ll prove a tactical advantage for you, once you get into fisticuffs with him.”

“Great. And why does it have to be me?”

“Because you’re the younger of us two, and when it comes to dishing out a thrashing, what matters is brute force. I provide the strategic vision.”

“I have no intention of dishing out a thrashing to anyone.”

“Don’t get all squeamish on me now, Daniel. As the Lord is my witness, you already proved your warrior’s zeal when you smashed that jerk Cascos Buendía’s face in at the Ritz. Don’t think I’ve forgotten.”

“It was not my best hour,” Daniel admitted.

“No need to make excuses. May I remind you that the swine was sending lovey-dovey letters to your wife to soften her up, following orders from that worm Valls. Yes, yes, the same worm whose slimy path you’ve been tracking in the Ateneo newspaper library since spring last year. Don’t think for a second I hadn’t noticed.”

Daniel hung his head in defeat. “Any other secret you don’t know about me?”

“Haven’t you wondered why the hell it is there’s been no sign of Valls for so long?”

“Every single day,” Daniel admitted.

“Or where Salgado’s booty ended up, the one he’d hidden in the baggage locker?”

Daniel nodded.

“Who says this fox isn’t another one of Valls’s minions? Possibly the worst one . . .”

Daniel closed his eyes. “You win, Fermín. What do we do?”

* * *

When she reached her apartment, Alicia noticed the strip of light under the door and recognized the smell of Vargas’s cigarettes in the air. She went in without saying a word, leaving her bag and coat on the dining-room table. Facing the window, with his back to the door, Vargas was smoking. He too was silent. She poured herself a glass of white wine and collapsed on the sofa. In her absence, Vargas had pulled out the box with the documents stolen from Brians’s warehouse from under the sofa. Isabella’s notebook lay on the table.