Free The Good Suicides by Antonio Hill Page A

out if Fort would have heard his unfortunate comment; he cursed himself for having said it and yet he couldn’t help thinking that that boy had the gift of bad timing. So when he suddenly saw in his face that Fort had just asked a question he hadn’t heard, he didn’t know how to answer and looked at the photo the agent had placed on his desk with unusual intensity.
    “So, Fort,” he finally said, in an attempt to summarize, “you found this photo in Sara Mahler’s apartment and spoke to her roommate. Don’t rush, describe the interview slowly.”
    His subordinate looked at him, flushing.
    “I’m sorry,” he said, and Héctor felt even worse than before. “I suppose I’m in a hurry to get to the end.”
    For the next few minutes Roger Fort obediently told him of the impressions gathered in his brief encounter with Kristin Herschdorfer. He explained that, while not definitive, they suggested Sara Mahler was not easy to live with, she led a solitary life and generally didn’t seem happy. All ready for happy Christmas to be the final blow, thought Héctor. Her flatmate was away, the house empty. If Sara had felt depressed in those final days, perhaps she had opted to end it all forever. Suddenly something occurred to him that it seemed no one had acknowledged up to now.
    “And why was she in the metro station at that time? Any idea?”
    Agent Fort looked uncertain.
    “I mean, according to this Kristin, Sara hardly went out … And if she was in the habit of staying out all night, she would have told you so. But in the early hours of Thursday Sara was in the metro. She had to be going or coming from somewhere, right?” He answered himself: “Even if she had decided to throw herself onto the tracks, she didn’t have to go to a station so far away. And I doubt if she left home with that idea.”
    It was a more than reasonable doubt. Although statistics were an inexact science, few women chose this method to end their lives. Héctor still believed those who did were succumbing to a momentary temptation, that moment of desperation in which the fatal jump felt like the only option.
    Roger shook his head, distressed.
    “I don’t know, sir. I’m sorry, it hadn’t occurred to me until now.”
    “Well, don’t worry. What else did you want to tell me?”
    Slowly, Fort continued with his story: the description of the apartment, of the bedroom; the photos of the footballers on the corkboard … and finally came to the photograph Inspector Salgado had before him.
    It showed Sara with seven people: two women and five men ofvarious ages, between thirty and fiftysomething. Sara was at one side of the photo and, although she was smiling, there was a barely perceptible but real distance between her and the rest of the group.
    “Are they all work colleagues?”
    “Yes, sir. As soon as I saw it, I had the impression that one of the faces was familiar. The guy on the opposite side of the photo. The one wearing glasses.”
    “And?”
    “If I’m not mistaken, and I don’t think I am, that’s Gaspar Ródenas.”
    Héctor frowned slightly. An excited Roger Fort finally repeated the phrase he’d said at the start of the conversation that the inspector hadn’t heard.
    “Last September, Gaspar Ródenas killed his wife and his fourteen-month-old daughter. Then he committed suicide.”
    Salgado looked at the photo. He didn’t take on domestic violence cases, but the age of the little girl had stayed with him.
    “You mean Sara and Gaspar Ródenas worked at the same company? And both have committed suicide?”
    “Yes, sir. Bit strange, isn’t it?”
    Yes, thought Héctor. Very strange. He looked back at the photo: of those eight people, all relatively young, two had died in a violent manner. In the case of one, the suicide took place alongside his family; in the other, all alone. Although everything could have another explanation, if you listened to the experts.
    “Remember the knock-on effect?” he asked Fort. “If