Free Sweet Money by Ernesto Mallo

it? He knows he’s desperately clutching at straws, out of necessity, because he can’t come up with another idea. Someone he used to know, a guy named Fermín, worked at that bank. He decides to go there, only a few blocks away. When he gets there, he sees that there is, indeed, a bank. His memory of it, though, is quite different: the one he remembers had a kind of Soviet-style austerity and a different name. He goes in anyway. The safe deposit boxes used to be in the rear, almost within reach, the offices have made way for desks separated by carpeted partitions, and the tellers are all very young women dressed in uniforms of skirts and jackets, which look just like men’s business suits with a touch of sexy “lite”. Banks used to look like prisons; now they look more like a cross between a boutique and a brothel. The walls are covered with posters showing young men and women, smiling and prosperous, offering “package deals” with bombastic names, that include bank accounts, credit cards, loans for the life you deserve . Everything carefully designed to neatly package and tie up the customer. The deviousness here is so obvious that even the guy who designed the poster should be put in jail. On one side is the only office with glass walls. A small sign says “F. Martínez – Manager”. Lascano lowers
his eyes and meets those of Fermín, who looks at him as if he were seeing a ghost.
     
    Lascano? How ’re you doing, Fermín? I see you got a promotion. Please, please, come in. I can’t believe it. I saw you, dead, right here in front of the door. Well, I guess I wasn’t that dead. I can’t believe it. Start believing it.
     
    It takes Fermín a good while to get over his shock. Lascano invents a story that will suit his temperament. Fermín is sincerely happy that Lascano has survived, this despite the fact that Lascano was the one who arrested him for robbery when he was a young man. Perro had rescued him, half dead from fear, right at the moment they were about to work him over, hard.
     
    Look, Fermín, I’m here because I got this crazy idea. I don’t know if you remember that I opened a safe deposit box. I remember very well. What happened to it, does it still exist? Nope. The bank changed ownership, I mean, just between us, the only thing that changed was the name and the decor. Then, when they started the construction that turned this into what you now see, they notified the owners of the inactive boxes and gave them a certain amount of time to come by the bank and close out their accounts. Those who didn’t show up, their boxes were opened in front of a notary. I handled it personally. There were three or four, and one of them was yours. They were all empty. I see.
     
    Perro looks down, the little wisp of hope vanishes without a trace, just as he suspected it would. Fermín notices.
     
    Are you in trouble?

     
    Sticking in bits and pieces of the true story, and seasoning it just right to prevent him from getting the idea that it would be dangerous to help him, Lascano spins a yarn about political rivalry within the department that, along with his gunshot wounds, left him on the street. He tells him he’s hoping to recover the money that was in the safe deposit box, which no longer exists, and which, it appears, a treacherous female associate has stolen from him. When Lascano says “female associate” Fermín understands “lover”, and he doesn’t ask the amount or the source of the money. Nobody would ever think that a police superintendent would have a safe deposit box to stash his salary, and these days no banker is going to worry about where money comes from.
     
    What are you planning to do? I’ve got a few job interviews. But it’s not easy. These days, if you’re over thirty-five you’re all washed up.
     
    They keep conversing until Fermín has to attend to an important client. They agree to meet another day after work, and Fermín tells him he’ll see what he can do for