The Ignorance of Blood. Robert Thomas Wilson

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СКАЧАТЬ when I see it,’ said Zorrita, who was a man incapable of complications in his love life, because there'd only ever been one woman in it.

      ‘The prison governor just called me to say that he's volunteered to see a shrink.’

      ‘No amount of talking, no amount of disentangling the shit that went on between him and his parents, no amount of “light” shed on “feelings”, will take away the fact that he beat that poor woman and then killed her and, if he's given half a chance, like all those other weak brutes, he'll do it again.’

      ‘This isn't what I've come to talk to you about today,’ said Falcón, seeing that this was something that stoked Zorrita up. ‘Would you mind if I laid out the basic problem I've got? Some of it you'll know, but other parts of it will be news to you.’

      ‘Go ahead,’ said Zorrita, still simmering.

      ‘As you know, the destruction of the pre-school and apartment block by the Seville bomb of 6th June, three months ago, came about as a result of the detonation, by a smaller device, of approximately one hundred kilos of hexogen. This high explosive was being stored by a logistics cell of the Moroccan terrorist group, the GICM, in the basement mosque of the building. The smaller device was comprised of Goma 2 Eco, the same explosive used in the 11th March bombings here in Madrid back in 2004. Prior to the explosion, the mosque was cased by two men masquerading as council inspectors, who, we believe, inserted some device in the fuse box, which blew and caused a power failure. These men have not been found, nor have the electricians who were brought in to repair the fuse box, restore power and do some other work, during which we believe they planted the Goma 2 Eco device in the false ceiling of the mosque.

      ‘The idea of the so-called Catholic conspiracy was to use this outrage to blame Islamic extremists, to make it look as if they had a plan to return Andalucía to the Muslim fold. The conspirators wanted to turn public opinion in favour of a small right-wing party called Fuerza Andalucía, who, in becoming the new partner of the ruling Partido Popular, would put the conspirators in control of the Andalucían state parliament. It didn't work and the alleged masterminds of the plot – César Benito, a board director of Horizonte, and Lucrecio Arenas, the ex-CEO of Banco Omni, who were Horizonte's bankers – were executed a few days after the bombing.’

      ‘What about the Islamic calling cards left near their bodies?’ asked Zorrita.

      ‘Nobody thinks that those killings were carried out by any radical Islamist group,’ said Falcón. ‘It's believed they were terminated by their co-conspirators.’

      ‘Who are, as yet, unknown.’

      ‘We're coming to that.’

      ‘What about the company that owned Horizonte?’ said Zorrita, squinting at the evening sunlight coming in through the window. ‘The media tried to make something of them – a couple of American Christian fundamentalists.’

      ‘I4IT own Horizonte. It's an American investment group run by two born-again Christians, called Cortland Fallenbach and Morgan Havilland. They are so far removed from this situation as to be completely untouchable and, for legal reasons, we have as yet been unable to gain access to I4IT's European offices here in Madrid.’

      ‘And presumably the lives of the Catholic Kings, as the media now calls César Benito and Lucrecio Arenas, have been taken apart.’

      ‘That has been, and still is, a time-consuming business. The CNI's banking and accounting department are working their way into the offshore world. Benito and Arenas were what are known in that world as Hen-Wees – High Net Worth Individuals. Their assets are hidden behind nominee directors and shareholders and unregistered offshore trusts. It will be pure luck if somebody manages to find something in the next six months that we can act upon.’

      ‘So you're blocked,’ said Zorrita. ‘And the whole of Spain knows what Javier Falcón is after.’

      ‘I think I only want what any police officer in my position would want,’ said Falcón, leaning forward in his chair. ‘To catch the people responsible for casing that mosque and planting the Goma 2 Eco device, along with the bosses who ordered them to do it.’

      Zorrita held up his hand to calm Falcón down, nodded his agreement.

      ‘You're not getting anything from the suspects in your custody and the two ringleaders have been “executed”,’ said Zorrita. ‘So where else have you got to go?’

      ‘I've decided to take a long look at the violence,’ said Falcón. ‘Where do a bunch of conspirators, sophisticated men like Lucrecio Arenas and César Benito, access that sort of violence?’

      ‘As you say, every news channel and paper, apart from the ABC, are calling this the Catholic Conspiracy. What with the national obsession with Opus Dei, the PR campaign by the Church to counteract all this has been unprecedented,’ said Zorrita. ‘Do Opus Dei have an Improvised Explosive Device division?’

      The two men smiled at each other.

      ‘What we do know from our suspects in custody and other inquiries is that Arenas's motivation was not his Catholic beliefs,’ said Falcón. ‘The Hen-Wee spoke from his heart.’

      ‘And César Benito was in construction,’ said Zorrita.

      ‘Where there's always large amounts of black money, which can be hidden away in the offshore world.’

      ‘But you're not getting anywhere by following the money,’ said Zorrita.

      ‘Only that there's undoubtedly money-laundering involved and that both men were well set up in property in the Costa del Sol.’

      ‘The Russian mafia,’ said Zorrita. ‘I know it's a knee-jerk reaction when you hear the words “money-laundering” and “Costa del Sol” in the same sentence, but after the recent Marbella town council scandal…’

      Falcón nodded.

      ‘And you think they're going to be easier to penetrate than the offshore world?’ said Zorrita.

      ‘Let's just take a look at the violence,’ said Falcón, holding up a finger. ‘In that period around the 6th June bombing there were five expressions of violence. The first was the murder of Tateb Hassani, who was vital to the conspiracy for his drafting in Arabic script of the extremists' plans for taking over Andalucía. He was found on the Seville dump, poisoned and mutilated, on the morning of the explosion. Murdered because a) he knew too much, b) he would always be a vulnerable point to the conspiracy and c) it got everybody's hands dirty. The second expression of violence was the bomb itself which, as I said, was designed to point the finger at Muslim extremism whilst increasing the prestige of Fuerza Andalucía, making them the preferred partners of the ruling Partido Popular.’

      ‘The third, presumably, was Esteban Calderón's murder of his wife,’ said Zorrita, ‘which derailed the investigation into the Seville bombing.’

      ‘And four and five were the executions of Lucrecio Arenas and César Benito,’ said Falcón. ‘They had to be killed once we'd caught the other half of the conspiracy, because there were direct links between them. It would only be a matter of time before Arenas and Benito gave up the bombers they had employed.’

      ‘So there's a clear motive in every case.’

      ‘Except Calderón,’ said Falcón.

      ‘He СКАЧАТЬ