The Ways of Evil Men (25 page)

“Yes, it is.” Gonçalves admitted.

“So there you have it. I submit to you that the Indian said it, but she didn’t understand it, and the priest failed to translate it.”

“And why,
Doutor
Kassab, would he have, as you say,
failed
to do that?”

Most men would have taken offense at Gonçalves’s tone, but the seasoned lawyer, veteran of many a courtroom battle, did not. He merely shrugged.

Gonçalves persisted: “I really would like an answer to that question,
Doutor
Kassab.”

The lawyer thought about it for a moment, chose his words carefully. “Out of delicacy, perhaps? Or out of reluctance to spread an unsubstantiated rumor?”

“Are those your opinions? Or merely speculation?”

“Merely speculation.”

“So what’s your opinion?”

“Knowing Father Castori as I do, I think it’s far more likely to have had to do with his consumption of alcohol.”

“In other words, the priest is a drunk? And he simply forgot to translate that part of the conversation?”

“If you want to put it that baldly, yes.”

“And you don’t think there’s any chance that Father Castori might have altered his story after the fact.”

“Nah!” Borges said, rejecting the suggestion out of hand. “Why would he? He’s got nothing to gain. He’s got no motivation.”

“I agree with the Delegado,” the lawyer said.

Hector tried another tack: “Look, aside from Osvaldo Neto, you two are the only men in this town we’re sure had nothing to do with the lynching of the Indian. You”—he pointed at Kassab—“were in your office with Jade when it happened, and you”—he pointed at Borges—“made an attempt to stop it.”

“That’s true,” Borges said. “I did. And I wish that Chief Inspector of yours would give me more credit for it. He acts like I just stood back and let it happen.”

“Which is patently untrue,” the lawyer said. “The delegado and I both had a stake in preventing that lynching. We
have our livings to make, and people who take the law into their own hands don’t need policemen—or lawyers.”

“No,” Hector said, “they don’t. So how about giving us a helping hand? Think about it. Who might have had a motive to kill Omar Torres and pin the crime on the Indian to cover it up?”

Kassab shook his head, as if he was tired of trying to explain something to a child unwilling, or unable, to understand it. “You truly believe that’s what happened?”

“I think it’s a real possibility.”

“Well, I don’t.”

“Me neither,” Borges said.

S
ILVA AND
Arnaldo found the priest sitting on his front porch. A florid-faced man with a clerical collar, he was leaning back in a chair and staring blankly into the upper branches of a tree. Until Silva spoke, he seemed entirely unaware of their approach.

“Father Castori?”

The priest looked down, blinked, and brought his visitors into focus. “That’s me,” he said. “Who are you?”

“Chief Inspector Silva, Federal Police. This is Agent Nunes. Might we have a word?”

“By all means. Come on up.” He waved them forward with the hand he wasn’t using to hold his glass.

The two cops mounted the steps.

“How about a drink?” Castori said. He looked drunker than he sounded. There was hardly a slur in his speech.

Silva and Arnaldo exchanged a glance. “We wouldn’t mind,” Silva said.

“Good. Cachaça or beer?”

“Beer,” Silva said.

Castori stood up, went into the house and came back with
a tray. On it were two cans of beer, two glasses, and a bottle. He put the tray on the table, handed each of the cops a can and a glass and used the bottle to top off his drink.

“Fire away,” he said, when he’d resumed his seat.

Silva leaned forward, popped the can and concentrated on pouring a glassful of beer. Arnaldo took the lead.

“Amati told you Omar Torres murdered his entire tribe, correct?”

“Correct,” the priest said.

“How did he reach that conclusion?”

“I have no idea.”

“How come you never translated that part of the conversation to Jade?”

The priest’s mouth rounded in an O of surprise. “Didn’t I? My goodness, I thought I did.”

“Not according to her.”

Castori avoided their eyes by looking at the little church next door. A low mudbrick wall divided the two buildings.

“She … she caught me at a bad time. I wasn’t expecting visitors.”

“What does expecting visitors have to do with it?”

Castori took a deep breath and met Arnaldo’s eyes. “My burdens occasionally get me down.” A sigh and a shrug. “That was … one of those days. I’d had a bit too much of this.” He waved his glass at the bottle. “I’m afraid I don’t have total recall of the incident.”

“We’d be grateful,” Silva said, “if you could tell us what you remember.”

The priest scratched the crown of his head, drawing attention to how bald he was at the top, and took another sip of cachaça.

“I recall the Indian telling me how he and his son came back to their village to find the entire tribe dead. I recall him
saying they were poisoned, and that Torres was responsible. I remember him telling me about Jade’s arrival, and how he agreed to come back here to get justice for his tribe.”

“Those were his words?
Justice for his tribe
.”

Castori rubbed his chin. “No. I think they were Jade’s. I’ve got it all mixed up you see. I don’t even remember them leaving. I woke up in bed, the next morning, with a god-awful headache.”

“Did you, personally, ever hear Omar Torres make any remarks about doing away with the Indians?”

“Several times. But I never expected him to do it. I thought he was letting off steam. Now, of course, after everything that’s happened, I think otherwise.”

“In other words, you agree with the Indian. You think Torres murdered his tribe?”

“Yes.” The priest lifted his glass. This time it was more than a sip that he took. It was closer to a gulp.

“And, after what the Indian told you, don’t you think it would have been a good idea to warn Torres? Tell him his life might be in danger?”

Castori waved his glass in denial. “The Indian never actually made any threats. I thought the intention was to attempt to prosecute Torres in a court of law. I never, ever, expected the Indian to do what he did. I know … knew … the Awana. They were, in the main, a peaceful people. This particular savage turned out to be an exception.”

“We’ve been told,” Arnaldo said, “that you were present at the lynching.”

“I was. It was a terrible thing. I’ll never forget it. It haunts me even now.”

“You tried to stop it?”

“I did. But the crowd was out for blood. There was nothing I could do. Nothing. Once they’d overpowered the delegado,
and the Indian was in the hands of the mob, his death was inevitable.”

“Inevitable?”

“Inevitable. At that point, all I could do for him was to make his passing easier. And it would have been, if he’d embraced Jesus. But he spit in my face and went to his death an unbeliever. The fact that he’s going to be damned for all eternity is his fault, not mine. I gave him his chance. He chose not to take it.”

Arnaldo flushed. Silva intervened before the exchange could turn acrimonious. “We know now,” he said, “that the tribe was poisoned by a piece of meat dropped by parachute from a small plane.”

The priest sat back in his chair. “Well, that explains it then,” he said. “Omar was a pilot. He owned his own aircraft. He must have flown low over the village, low enough for the Indian to have recognized him when he dropped it. Perhaps he told me that. But, as I said, there are whole parts of our conversation of which I have no memory. No memory at all. How’s it going with that beer? Can I offer either of you gentlemen another?”

R
ANCHES AND FARMS IN
Brazil tend to be larger than those of almost any other country in the world—and in the country’s north and northeast, they’re the largest of all.

“Three hours, more or less,” Osvaldo said when Hector asked him, after dinner that evening, how long the drive to Nelson Lisboa’s place was likely to take.

“
Three hours
?” Gonçalves exclaimed. “Hell, you can get from São Paulo to Rio in four and a half, and that’s almost four hundred and fifty kilometers.”

“It’s a big spread,” Osvaldo said, “and the house is a number of kilometers from the border of the property, but it’s also the road. You’re going from São Paulo to Rio, you’re driving on asphalt. From here to Lisboa’s place, you’ll be driving on mud. You’d better get an early start.”

T
HEY GOT
up at seven. By nine, they’d learned, first hand, why the hotelkeeper had suggested they get an early start. In the low-lying areas, where water had collected from the recent rains, there were vast pools of mud. On the higher ground, where it was drier, the surface of the road was rutted and uneven. Vegetation hemmed them in on both sides for much of the distance, and the shoulders looked dangerously soft. There was no signage to prevent them from making false turns. Twice, they had to be set right by
vaqueiros
caring for Senhor Lisboa’s cattle, and that cost them at least another hour.

It was past noon when they topped a rise and came in sight of an elegant mansion. The land around it had been
deep rainforest not twenty years before, but not a single tree remained. Between the cops and the
casa grande
, there was nothing but pasture.

“You can work wonders with matches,” Hector said.

Slash and burn, the ecologist’s nightmare, was the method used to clear land in Pará. The few trees left standing after such an exercise tended to be sturdy hardwoods, the kind most resistant to fire. They were promptly harvested. Lisboa met them on his spacious veranda. He was accompanied by a man he introduced as his foreman, Toni Pandolfo.

Pandolfo had tattoos on his arms, the grip of a pistol protruding from his waistband, and the eyes of guard dog. And, like a guard dog, he followed them into the house. The cops were waved into two chairs. A maid brought coffee, served it, and left them alone.

Lisboa’s earlobes were pierced and adorned with gold studs. A massive bracelet of the yellow metal encircled one wrist. A golden cross dangling from a necklace of nuggets glittered on his chest.

Gonçalves, mindful of what Maura had told him, let his eyes flick from Lisboa’s chest, to his wrist, to his earlobes and back again, before directing his attention to the other man on the couch. He was more than a little surprised to find Pandolfo staring at him with jealous hatred. He must have misunderstood the scrutiny, taken it for sexual appraisal.

One of the many things women found endearing about Gonçalves was that he blushed easily. He did it now, which made the situation worse.

Hector missed the silent exchange. He was already asking the usual questions.

“I can’t recall his exact words,” Lisboa said.

“Try,” Hector said.

“The boss already told you,” Pandolfo growled, making
it clear that he hadn’t been entirely distracted. “He don’t remember.”

“How about you then,” Hector said. “You ever hear Omar Torres talk about killing Indians?”

“All the time,” Pandolfo said.

“And what, exactly, did you hear him say?”

“I’m like the boss. I don’t do exact.”

Hector looked from one to the other. “So, in summary, neither of you has any reason to doubt it was Torres who poisoned the Awana?”

Pandolfo shook his head.

“No,” Lisboa said.

“Do you own an airplane, Senhor Lisboa?”

“If you run cattle around here, they’re a necessity. The herds graze freely, you see. With a large spread, and little fencing, you have to—”

“I don’t need a justification. I merely asked if you had one.”

“I do. A Cessna One Seventy-Two.”

“Where is it?”

“In the barn next to the landing strip.”

“Where do you keep your logbook?”

“In the aircraft.”

“May I see it?”

“Why would you want to—”

“I’d just like to see it. Please.”

Lisboa shrugged and turned to his foreman. “Toni,” he said, “go get the logbook out of the plane. It’s in a pocket, in the door.”

Pandolfo didn’t move.

“Toni,” Lisboa repeated.

“I’m going,” Pandolfo said. But he waited another beat before he got up.

When the door closed behind him, Hector said, “Other than the Indian, who else might have had a reason to kill Torres?”

Lisboa waved a dismissive hand. “The Indian was found lying in the alley next to Omar’s corpse. The murder weapon was in his hand. He was covered in blood. Why would you look any further? Isn’t that proof enough for you?”

“If it was, Senhor Lisboa, I wouldn’t have asked you the question. And I’m still waiting for an answer.”

“Anybody else? No, nobody else.”

“Isn’t it true that you owed Torres money?”

Lisboa leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest. “I owed him some money, yes. Who told you?”

It had been Osvaldo, but Hector wasn’t about to tell him that.

“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “The way I heard it,
some
is an understatement. The way I heard it, you owed him a lot.”

“Okay, so it was a lot. And before you ask, yes, it’s convenient for me that he’s dead, but I wasn’t anywhere near that alley on the night he was murdered.”

“No? Where were you?”

“On my way back here. We’d all been playing cards. I got up about five minutes after he did. One of my
vaqueiros
is getting married the day after tomorrow. We had the party to organize.”

“So you’re Pandolfo’s alibi, and he’s yours?”

“That’s correct. We were together all the time, all night at the card table, all the way back home.”

And maybe even all night in bed
, Hector thought.

“Any questions, Haraldo?” he asked.

Gonçalves was still impressed by the quantity of gold Lisboa was wearing. He would have liked to ask him if he knew the prospector, Welinton Mendes. But he couldn’t think of
how to broach the subject without breaking his agreement with Maura.

He shook his head.