“Did you take it from Abel’s apartment?” Montserrat asked.
“You ask many questions but have not even introduced yourselves. It is a bit rude.”
“We’re Abel’s little friends,” Tristán said.
The woman smiled, although Montserrat wasn’t sure she appreciated the jest. “You brought with you a letter.”
“Yes, and we’ll hand you the other half of it if you’ll tell us the truth,” Montserrat said.
“You are rude,” she replied, but her smile only grew wider as if now she was becoming truly amused. “You already have the answers, but I’ll play. What do you want to know?”
“Abel is dead,” Montserrat said bluntly.
“A pity, that.”
“You were not aware of it?”
“I suspected. It’s why I have the film. He gave it to me.”
“Why would he do that?”
“He sold it. For protection.”
“From whom?”
“Can’t you guess?”
“Alma.”
Clarimonde Bauer looked directly at her. She did not nod, but Montserrat knew she’d gotten it right.
“How were you going to protect him?” Montserrat asked.
“Guess.”
“Magic.”
“See? You already have the answers.”
“Not all of them. You are a sorceress and you’ve tried to maintain Ewers’s cult. It didn’t quite work like you planned it, right? That building downtown, it’s abandoned.”
For the first time Clarimonde Bauer raised her eyebrows at them, a trace of irritation coloring her eyes. She had been a pretty girl when she was young, but the years had corroded her easy beauty. What was left was a hard shell. It reminded Montserrat a little of Ewers’s look. He’d had that trace of resentment in his mouth as if something had been denied to him. A hunger, in the pit of their bellies.
“The building is to be sold. It belonged to my husband. But tides do turn; 1987 was a bad year for us. The stock market tumbled. Our building sustained damage during the earthquake of ’85 and needed repairs I could not fund. I’ve had to economize. Now, the letter, please.”
Montserrat wondered what “economize” meant to this woman. She still had a grand home in Las Lomas and servants. Maybe it had not been the performance of the stock market that had pushed her to shutter her book business. Had she grown tired of idolizing a dead man?
Montserrat reached into her purse and took out the piece of rice paper. Inside the purse she carried her charm. She noticed that Tristán kept a hand in one pocket, no doubt clutching his own talisman.
Montserrat held the letter up. “We do have a few more questions.”
“What more will you ask? You know what you did.”
“No, no, we don’t,” Tristán said, shaking his head. “We’re trying to understand.”
“You and Abel cast a spell, and in doing so you’ve reset the clock, you put things in motion again. Now, hand me the letter and perhaps we can chat more.”
Clarimonde’s voice was smooth and rich. The voice of someone used to making demands and writing down orders. For a moment Montserrat thought to refuse her request, but she didn’t think it mattered. The letter, by itself, held no special magic. Neither did Ewers’s book. She knew this instinctively.
Montserrat slid the letter across the table. Clarimonde picked it up carefully, smoothing its creases with her ringed fingers. “Where did you find this?”
“He hid it in a book.”
“Clever boy. He was ever so clever.”
Tristán wet his lips and leaned forward. “Listen, you’re telling us we put things in motion. How do we end that motion? How do we go back to the way it was? Because Abel is dead and things are getting weird around us.”
“I would not have killed Abel. I made a deal with him. That is Alma’s doing.”
“Why would she kill the guy?”
“Wilhelm was murdered thirty-two years ago, but Alma still fears him. Now, as to the ‘weirdness’ you’ve experienced, I cannot say exactly what you’ve seen, but Wilhelm loved setting snares and curses. When he didn’t get his way, things could become complicated.”
“When his film wasn’t finished everyone had a bout of bad luck,” Montserrat said. “And now that we dubbed that reel he’s not satisfied with that.”
“Of course not. The spell needs to be finished. See? I told you that you had all the answers already.”
“Except how we set things back the way they were,” Tristán said. “How do we undo this snare?”
“There’s only one solution: by finishing what Wilhelm started. Finishing the spell. You must have the silver nitrate print.”
“Alma says we should burn anything that belonged to Wilhelm.”
“Of course she would say that. The murderous bitch,” Clarimonde said in a slow voice. Each word was the stab of a knife.
“You think Alma killed Abel,” Montserrat said.
“It’s nothing I could prove, and yet it is the obvious answer.”
“You didn’t think to kill her yourself in all these years?”
Clarimonde smirked. “Let’s say she’s been off limits.”
“What happens if we finish what Ewers started, if we finish the spell?” Tristán asked.
But, oh, even before he asked the question Montserrat already knew. It was like Clarimonde had told them: she had the answers. It was in the pages of that book she read, in Ewers’s letter, which now rested on Clarimonde’s lap. She’d been circling around the inevitable answer.
“He comes back,” Montserrat said, her words low.
Clarimonde looked pleased, like a teacher who is about to award a prized pupil a gold star. She grabbed her sketchbook and her charcoal, turned the page, and began delicately tracing the outline of an apple.
“Despite the problems in ’87, I still have certain resources, even if that building is no longer in use. It’s quite a lovely space; we used to meet there, once upon a time. The others remain around the city, at least a fair number of them, and there have been a few new converts. We still meet to share in Wilhelm’s wisdom. The congregation is eager to greet him.”
Montserrat saw the look Tristán shot her. He wanted to get up and run to the door. Fear is not the answer, fear gives a sorcerer power over you. She wanted to tell him that but since she couldn’t, she pressed her palm firmly against his knee. Tristán froze in place.
“You do not need to be one of us. I wouldn’t ask that,” Clarimonde said.
Clarimonde’s voice was soft, but her face was ice. Something about them offended her sensibilities. Their appearance or their dress or the combination of them. She supposed they looked like a couple of people who’d grown up playing near the train tracks in Pantaco. Kids from slightly squalid apartment buildings. Their hues, their mannerisms, were flawed. Wilhelm would have disapproved. Clarimonde Bauer, Abel Urueta, Alma Montero. He’d recruited his disciples from the upper echelons of Mexican society, which were also the whitest. The purest. The most suitable to his purposes.
“I know. It was an exclusive country club,” Montserrat said.