Free Mapuche by Caryl Férey, Steven Randall

in November, before the summer festivals.
    Gurruchaga 3180, Palermo Hollywood. The paved streets were shaded by sycamores with trunks covered with romantic slogans. Jo lived two blocks from the Plaza Cortázar, famous for its beer taverns, its giant screens, and its high-priced, fashionable stores, in a white three-story building shaded by the foliage of a rubber tree.
    An acrobatic painter harnessed to his pulleys was repainting the shutters of the little apartment building next door, accompanied by a mutt’s shrill barking: Rubén looked at the worker’s overwhelmed face, kicked the dog to make it go away, threw his cigarette in the gutter, and went into the lobby. A polished marble stairway led to the upper floor. Informed of Rubén’s visit, the singer immediately opened the door.
    The last Grinderman album was playing in the living room of the apartment decorated with a refined taste that clashed with the lugubrious look of its owner: pasty-faced, made-up eyes, dressed in black leather pants despite the humid heat, Jo Prat received him rather coolly.
    â€œYou don’t look like a private eye,” he said when Rubén came into his lair.
    â€œWere you expecting some guy with a fedora and a flask in his pocket?”
    â€œI no longer drink anything but green tea,” declared the former rocker. “Do you want some?”
    â€œ
Vamos
.”
    A Fender guitar hung on the wall, and there were engravings and a finely-worked teapot steaming on the table of the Japanese-style living room. A white angora cat straight out of an old Disney film jumped off the armchair from which he dominated the scene and, intrigued by the stranger’s Italian shoes, sniffed them with the assiduity of a professional feline.
    â€œLedzep,” Jo Prat said in lieu of an introduction.
    The animal rubbed against the leather as if he wanted to make a genie come out of it, then relaxed a bit. Rubén folded his legs underneath the Japanese bench while the master of the household did the honors. An inhaler lay on the table. Ventolin.
    â€œWell?” inquired the singer.
    Rubén explained the situation, María Victoria’s phone call to
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, the silence that had since surrounded her. As Rubén talked, Jo Prat’s face contracted, which only made his double chin more noticeable.
    The cat was doing his best to settle down on his knees, and Rubén was struggling to stay perched on the bench.
    â€œHave you seen her or talked to her on the phone recently?” he asked, his face full of cat hair.
    â€œNo,” Jo replied. “Why, do you think something happened to her?”
    â€œThat’s what I’m trying to find out. Do you mind if I smoke?”
    â€œSo long as you don’t blow your poison in my face.”
    Ledzep didn’t much like the cigarette, but he remained concentrated on his objective.
    â€œDid María talk to you about herself or about her problems?” Ruben went on.
    â€œNot really. On tour, people say stupid things to each other. It’s either that or stress,” added the musician, pragmatically.
    â€œI found antianxiety medicine in her apartment. Does María have a tendency to get depressed?”
    â€œHuh?”
    â€œIs she in therapy?”
    â€œLike everyone else here, no?”
    Buenos Aires has more psychoanalysts per capita than any other city in the world.
    â€œHm. What kind of relationship does María have with her parents?”
    Jo shrugged. “Normal.”
    â€œAnd that means . . . ?”
    â€œI had the impression she doesn’t see them much.”
    â€œDo you know why?”
    â€œGoodness no.”
    â€œHer father is one of the wealthiest men in the country,” Rubén insinuated.
    â€œRight. That’s nothing to boast about,” the rebel grumbled, pouring another round of green tea.
    â€œDoes María have a reason for being angry with him?”
    â€œWith her father? I know that