de Soria, collapsed and had to be taken away by medical personnel. Doctor Soria looked on as, just yards away, the body thought to belong to his daughter was zipped into a grey, plastic bag and taken away to the morgue. The grim task of identifying his daughter’s body still lies ahead. Meanwhile it was reported that his wife was wearing a medallion on her chest bearing the initials “A.S.” and Alicia Soria’s date of birth.
By this time, five hours had passed since the three boats and three dinghies set out, one of them carrying beside the wheel the ecographic probe belonging to Luis Mateua, personal friend of Doctor Soria and a keen angler. Firemen and divers, both from the Coast Guard and civilian organizations, took part in the operation. As soon as the probe identified the correct area, a diver was sent down and touched the head of the unfortunate woman. Immediately the other boats moved to the area and three more divers went down. After cutting and dragging the weeds away, they were able to retrieve the body. On three previous occasions the probe had given erroneous signals. These errors came about because the probe is designed to detect fish, transmitting images of them to a four-inch liquid crystal screen. The equipment classifies the fish as medium, large and small. When the apparatus detected the body of Alicia Soria, it reported the existence of four large fish and a small one, all together.
26
Ernesto returned home. Thus abrogating question number 3 of Possibility Number 3 on my diagram. That Monday, at five o’clock in the evening, he opened the door with his own keys and said, “Hello, Inés.” He came over to the armchair where I was sitting and gave me a peck on the cheek. He left the suitcase to one side.
“I’ve got a pile of stuff to wash in there.”
“Just as long as you don’t expect me to wash her bra,” I thought.
He apologized for not having stopped to buy me something in the duty-free shop. “I’d promised to get Lali some perfume, but I’m whacked, I wanted to get straight home.”
“Was it a very busy weekend?”
“Like you wouldn’t believe…”
Several times I nearly interrupted him to tell him about the body that had been found, but each time I steeled myself to tell him he took off on a new tangent. He asked after Lali, as he always does.
“I don’t know; she spent the whole weekend at a friend’s country house and didn’t even call home, so she must be OK. If she had needed something she would have called, wouldn’t she?”
No news is good news – my mother hates that expression. Of course, in the case of my father it was almost a bad joke. Then Ernesto said some other stuff, the kind of things that any man would say on his return from a trip: did anyone call, how was the weather here, etc, etc, etc. If he didn’t ask about the dog it was only because we don’t have one. All these platitudes began to disorientate me. I had spent the weekend preparing for anything to happen when Ernesto returned. That “anything” included Ernesto not speaking to me, or coming to collect his things and leaving for ever, or simply saying “I’ve fallen in love with someone else.” Even that he might not come home at all. The one thing I had not prepared for was so much normality. Ernesto was behaving the same as usual – and that made me think that there must have been other weekends of illicit passion. With Charo or maybe another woman. And that was when something clicked and I began to see things more clearly. If there had been other trips, that was very good, it meant that our marriage must be stronger than his hygienic escapades – for isn’t that the best way to describe them? Some people go to a spa for three days for massages, others to do detox, others to bathe in mud, or wrap themselves in turtle placentas. There’s no accounting for tastes. And it seemed that Ernesto just needed a different sort of release. Who is so free of sin that he can condemn
By this time, five hours had passed since the three boats and three dinghies set out, one of them carrying beside the wheel the ecographic probe belonging to Luis Mateua, personal friend of Doctor Soria and a keen angler. Firemen and divers, both from the Coast Guard and civilian organizations, took part in the operation. As soon as the probe identified the correct area, a diver was sent down and touched the head of the unfortunate woman. Immediately the other boats moved to the area and three more divers went down. After cutting and dragging the weeds away, they were able to retrieve the body. On three previous occasions the probe had given erroneous signals. These errors came about because the probe is designed to detect fish, transmitting images of them to a four-inch liquid crystal screen. The equipment classifies the fish as medium, large and small. When the apparatus detected the body of Alicia Soria, it reported the existence of four large fish and a small one, all together.
26
Ernesto returned home. Thus abrogating question number 3 of Possibility Number 3 on my diagram. That Monday, at five o’clock in the evening, he opened the door with his own keys and said, “Hello, Inés.” He came over to the armchair where I was sitting and gave me a peck on the cheek. He left the suitcase to one side.
“I’ve got a pile of stuff to wash in there.”
“Just as long as you don’t expect me to wash her bra,” I thought.
He apologized for not having stopped to buy me something in the duty-free shop. “I’d promised to get Lali some perfume, but I’m whacked, I wanted to get straight home.”
“Was it a very busy weekend?”
“Like you wouldn’t believe…”
Several times I nearly interrupted him to tell him about the body that had been found, but each time I steeled myself to tell him he took off on a new tangent. He asked after Lali, as he always does.
“I don’t know; she spent the whole weekend at a friend’s country house and didn’t even call home, so she must be OK. If she had needed something she would have called, wouldn’t she?”
No news is good news – my mother hates that expression. Of course, in the case of my father it was almost a bad joke. Then Ernesto said some other stuff, the kind of things that any man would say on his return from a trip: did anyone call, how was the weather here, etc, etc, etc. If he didn’t ask about the dog it was only because we don’t have one. All these platitudes began to disorientate me. I had spent the weekend preparing for anything to happen when Ernesto returned. That “anything” included Ernesto not speaking to me, or coming to collect his things and leaving for ever, or simply saying “I’ve fallen in love with someone else.” Even that he might not come home at all. The one thing I had not prepared for was so much normality. Ernesto was behaving the same as usual – and that made me think that there must have been other weekends of illicit passion. With Charo or maybe another woman. And that was when something clicked and I began to see things more clearly. If there had been other trips, that was very good, it meant that our marriage must be stronger than his hygienic escapades – for isn’t that the best way to describe them? Some people go to a spa for three days for massages, others to do detox, others to bathe in mud, or wrap themselves in turtle placentas. There’s no accounting for tastes. And it seemed that Ernesto just needed a different sort of release. Who is so free of sin that he can condemn
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